Author Archive
Global Stocks Saddled as Nafta Rewrite Drags On
Posted by: | CommentsTrump’s latest comments on trade weigh on markets
After $40 Billion Exit, Morgan Stanley Says Give Europe a Chance
Posted by: | Comments-
‘Unloved’ European stocks looking ‘increasingly attractive’
- Underperformance, undervaluation of banks becoming ‘extreme’
No other region has suffered Europe’s massive outflows this year, and that’s exactly why Morgan Stanley says it’s time for investors to take a fresh look at these stocks.
“From a relative perspective, Europe (and European exposure) looks increasingly attractive,” Morgan Stanley strategists, led by Graham Secker, wrote in a report. “Having seen the largest outflows of any region over the last six months, Europe appears unloved and undervalued just as the growth newsflow starts to pick up.”…
Wealth Managers Are Getting 30% Pay Hikes to Defect in Asia
Posted by: | CommentsWith great wealth comes great remuneration.
Competition to manage the money of Asia’s burgeoning army of millionaires has pushed pay hikes for wealth managers to the highest in more than a decade. Those willing to jump to a rival are getting increases of 30 percent or more in Hong Kong and Singapore, according to private bankers and recruiters…
Wealth Managers Are Getting 30% Pay Hikes to Defect in Asia
Why It’s So Hard to Be an ‘Ethical’ Investor
Posted by: | CommentsBuzzy phrases are used to put a halo over some mutual funds, but the devil’s in the definition
In life, ethics are in the eye of the beholder. In investing, ethics are up to the whims of your fund manager.
With little regulation governing what a fund manager can call a “socially responsible” or “ethical” investment, a myriad of bespoke standards have popped up. Increasingly, these fund strategies are designed to beat the market rather…
Why It’s So Hard to Be an ‘Ethical’ Investor
Australia House Prices Fall for 11th Month as Downturn Deepens
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National dwelling values drop 0.3%, led by Sydney, Melbourne
- Westpac rate rise, household debt set challenges for spring
Australian housing prices fell for an 11th straight month in August, and further declines are likely as the peak selling season starts.
National dwelling values dropped 0.3 percent last month, led by declines in Sydney and Melbourne, according to CoreLogic Inc. data released Monday. Prices in Sydney, the epicenter of the recent property boom, have now fallen 5.6 percent from a year earlier…
Australia House Prices Fall for 11th Month as Downturn Deepens
HNA Is Starting to Trim Down One of China’s Biggest Debt Piles
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Total debt fell for first time after company sold off assets
- More HNA disposals on the way, such as buildings in Manhattan
China’s embattled HNA Group Co., which has managed to reduce one of the country’s biggest debt piles by selling off dozens of assets, will probably need to slim down even further before regaining the trust of investors.
The conglomerate’s total debt fell 9.5 percent to 541.6 billion yuan ($79 billion) at the end of June, down about $8.3 billion from a record set at the end of last year, according to figures derived from a half-year report dated Friday. It’s the first time the number has fallen, based on public data compiled by Bloomberg stretching back to 2005…
Smart Money Sees China Bear Market Lasting: JPMorgan Survey
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Majority in JPM survey predict gains won’t exceed 15 percent
- Chinese investors less optimistic on returns in rest of world
China’s institutional investors aren’t counting on recouping this year’s equity losses any time soon, according to a JPMorgan Asset Management survey last month.
China Selloff Casts Foreigners in Unusual Role as Market Bulls
Posted by: | CommentsU.S. hedge funds look to buy in China, showing more interest in market than Chinese investors
MTN Nigeria Listing in Doubt Over $8 Billion Claim
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African wireless carrier seeking to complete IPO this year
- Nigerian central bank says MTN illegally repatriated funds
MTN Group Ltd.’s plan to sell shares in its Nigerian unit this year is in jeopardy following allegations by the central bank that the South African company illegally moved almost $8.1 billion out of the country, according to people familiar with the matter.
While the listing process is far advanced there needs to be regulatory certainty for it to go ahead, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is private. That evaporated when Africa’s largest wireless carrier’s four banks were ordered late Wednesday to return the funds, causing MTN’s share price to plunge to nine-year lows…
China’s Consumers Are On Point to Defend Economy From Trump
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Trade war adds to worsening economic mood amid soaring rents
- Economists see smaller cities as brighter; broad trend intact
Determining the true mood of the Chinese consumer has rarely been so important.
Life for many in megacities like Beijing is getting harder this year, with soaring rents gnawing at disposable incomes. As Donald Trump’s trade war with China begins to threaten the economy in earnest, with tariffs on another $200 billion of goods potentially arriving this week, the resilience of the economy will depend to a large extent on the confidence, or otherwise, of shoppers…
At Wells Fargo, Discontent Simmers Among Female Executives
Posted by: | CommentsWomen at bank convene, allege gender bias in wealth division
About a dozen female executives in Wells Fargo & Co.’s wealth-management division gathered in Scottsdale, Ariz., in June after an internal conference. They’d had enough.
Women should be at home taking care of their children, some of the executives said they had been told over the years by Jay Welker, president of Wells Fargo’s private bank and head of the wealth-management division since 2003. Qualified women had recently been turned down for several top roles that went to male applicants. When the women raised concerns,…
Uber Defeats Suit by Investors Who Blamed Scandals for Losses
Posted by: | Comments-
Texas pension fund said startup’s value plunged 15% last year
- Former CEO Travis Kalanick was also named as defendant
Uber Technologies Inc. and its former Chief Executive Officer Travis Kalanick defeated a lawsuit claiming the company swept illicit business practices under the rug that cost investors billions of dollars.
U.S. District Judge Haywood S. Gilliam Jr. in Oakland, California, on Friday agreed with Uber’s and Kalanick’s bid to toss the class-action claims by a Texas city’s firefighter pension fund while allowing the fund to revise and refile the complaint…
Uber Defeats Suit by Investors Who Blamed Scandals for Losses
Rupiah Declines to Asian Crisis Low as EM Rout Worsens
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‘Weak external payments position’ spurs rupiah weakness: ING
- Bank Indonesia has raised rates four times since mid May
Indonesia’s rupiah slid to a two-decade low, spurring intervention from the central bank as the meltdown in Argentina and Turkey raises scrutiny on emerging markets with current account deficits.
The rupiah fell to 14,750 per dollar, the weakest level since the 1998 Asian financial crisis, while the benchmark bond yields advanced 10 basis points to the highest level since 2016. The Jakarta Composite Index slipped as much as 1.3 percent…
Rupiah Declines to Asian Crisis Low as EM Rout Worsens
Ad Man Inspired by Goldman Becomes a Billionaire
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Revenue surged 52% last year at Jeff Green’s advertising firm
- He sold his previous company to Microsoft for undisclosed sum
Making the ad world work more like financial markets has made Jeff Green a billionaire.
Green, 41, co-founded Trade Desk Inc. in 2009, seeing it as the Goldman Sachs of online advertising. The platform offers a marketplace that lets buyers place specific ads in front of a precisely targeted audience…
Ad Man Inspired by Goldman Becomes a Billionaire
Meituan Said to Set Terms for Up To $4.5 Billion Hong Kong IPO
Posted by: | CommentsMeituan Dianping, a Chinese food delivery giant, plans to raise as much as $4.5 billion in an initial public offering in Hong Kong, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
The company plans to sell shares between HK$60 ($7.64) and HK$72 apiece, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. The offering has attracted five cornerstone investors, including Tencent Holdings Ltd., to invest a combined $1.5 billion, according to the people…
Meituan Said to Set Terms for Up To $4.5 Billion Hong Kong IPO
HNA’s Debt Declines for First Time, Shrinking by $8.3 Billion
Posted by: | Comments-
Total debt falls for first time after group sells assets
- More HNA disposals on the way, such as buildings in Manhattan
Though HNA Group Co. managed to reduce one of China’s biggest debt piles by selling off dozens of assets, the embattled Chinese conglomerate will probably need to get much slimmer before regaining the trust of investors.
Total debt fell 9.5 percent to 541.6 billion yuan ($79 billion) at the end of June, down about $8.3 billion from a record set at the end of last year, according to figures derived from a half-year report dated Friday. It’s the first time the number has fallen, based on public data compiled by Bloomberg stretching back to 2005…
‘$1 Million Price Drop!’ The Eager New Language of Manhattan Home Listings
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Listing texts emphasize sellers’ willingness to make a deal
- Urgency increasing as property sales slow and inventory mounts
When a three-bedroom condo in Tribeca got its fourth price cut in a year, the sales broker, Steve Snider, didn’t leave it at that. He also spiced up the listing to make sure potential buyers didn’t miss the news.
“New price. Motivated seller. Bring offers!” reads the pitch for the 2,287-square-foot (212-square-meter) apartment at 71 Laight St., revised last month. The current asking price, $5.795 million, is less than what the seller paid three years ago…
Fed Adviser Adds to Argument That May Back Higher Interest Rates
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New Fed staff research builds on Powell’s Jackson Hole speech
- Price gauge back at 2% puts greater focus on unemployment
Low inflation has long confounded the Federal Reserve’s models, leading central bankers to keep interest rates lower than they otherwise would. Now, with a key measure of inflation at their 2 percent target, some of the Fed’s top economists are urging policy makers to put more focus on the risk that it could accelerate.
Michael Cohen Sells New York City Apartment Stakes Worth Millions
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Under financial strain, lawyer is said to collect $7 million
- Cohen pleaded guilty last week to campaign finance violations
Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former personal attorney who recently pleaded guilty to campaign-finance and tax crimes, has sold his interest in two Manhattan apartment buildings, public records show.
Cohen sold his stakes in 330 East 63rd St. and 133 Ave. D earlier this month, according to documents filed with New York City. The records show a combined sale price of almost $13 million, but that also accounts for Cohen’s share of the debt, a person familiar with the sales said. Cohen cleared about $7 million, according to the person. Cohen purchased his stakes in the properties in 2015…
Wells Fargo Fires Bankers Amid Probe of Dinner Receipts That Were Allegedly Doctored
Posted by: | CommentsMore than a dozen employees have left Wells Fargo during expenses investigation
China’s Central Bank Faces a Tough Task in Guarding Nervous Yuan
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Liquidity needs could hit around $143 billion at quarter-end
- Officials seen preferring open-market route to funding supply
September is set to be a hard month for China’s money markets, handing the nation’s central bank the tricky task of adding just enough liquidity without prompting renewed weakness in the yuan.
Funding costs usually spike at this point, as banks hoard cash for quarter-end regulatory checks. Adding to the pressure now is a requirement to buy a flood of local government bond issuance, mandated to shore up infrastructure spending as the economy slows. A large amount of the People’s Bank of China’s existing funding is also maturing, and all told, liquidity needs could hit around 980 billion yuan ($143 billion) according to Bloomberg calculations…
JPMorgan Is Liquidating $1 Billion Credit Hedge Fund Led by Fahad Roumani
Posted by: | CommentsJPMorgan Asset Management is liquidating a $1 billion credit hedge fund led by Fahad Roumani after abandoning a plan to spin it off, according to a letter to investors seen by Bloomberg News.
The Palm Lane Credit Opportunities Fund, which started with initial capital from JPMorgan Chase & Co., earlier this year reversed a decision to transfer the management contract to a separate company, according to the letter dated June 13. JPMorgan didn’t give a reason for the decision and a spokeswoman for the fund declined to comment…
JPMorgan Is Liquidating $1 Billion Credit Hedge Fund Led by Fahad Roumani
U.S. Stocks Fall on Tariff Plans
Posted by: | CommentsReport suggesting President Trump wants to move ahead soon with tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese imports pulled down the stock market
U.S. Stocks Fall on Tariff Plans
Transurban Group Buys Sydney Tollroad Stake for $6.7 Billion
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Transurban to raise A$4.8 billion to help fund acquisition
- New motorway connects fast-growing Sydney suburbs to CBD
A Transurban Group-led consortium agreed to buy 51 percent of Sydney’s WestConnex toll road for A$9.26 billion ($6.7 billion), doubling its network in Australia’s largest city.
Transurban will raise A$4.2 billion in a rights issue to help fund the acquisition, and a further A$600 million from other members of the bidding group, the Melbourne-based company said in a statement. The shares will be sold at A$10.80 each, a 10 percent discount to the latest closing price…
Transurban Group Buys Sydney Tollroad Stake for $6.7 Billion
Argentina Lifts Rates to World-High, Seeks IMF Aid to Save Peso
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Currency extends losses to 12% after central bank increase
- Move comes a day after Macri asked IMF for faster payouts
Argentina’s currency crisis deepened on Thursday as an emergency interest-rate increase to 60 percent failed to stop jittery investors from pulling their money out of the country.
The peso extended losses after the bank raised its benchmark measure by 15 percentage points to a global high. The hike, the second this month, was the latest attempt by policy makers to defend a currency that’s lost more than half its value this year. A day earlier, President Mauricio Macri shocked the nation with an appeal for quicker payouts from the International Monetary Fund, which said it’s considering the request…
SEC Chairman Wants to Let More Main Street Investors In on Private Deals
Posted by: | CommentsJay Clayton outlines overhaul plans in interview, says changes could happen ‘pretty quickly’
NASHVILLE, Tenn.—The Securities and Exchange Commission wants to make it easier for individuals to invest in private companies, including some of the world’s hottest startups, the agency’s chairman said in an interview.
SEC Chairman Jay Clayton, a Trump appointee wrestling with how to boost flagging interest in public markets, said the commission also wants to take steps to give more individual investors a shot at companies that have been out of their reach because they haven’t gone public…
SEC Chairman Wants to Let More Main Street Investors In on Private Deals
Record London Rents Lure Overseas Landlords to Housing Market
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Brexit-driven pound weakness gives buyers more for their money
- 12 percent of London homes are now owned by foreign landlords
The U.K.’s struggle to secure a favorable Brexit deal may be giving Prime Minister Theresa May a headache, but it’s making London’s battered buy-to-let market attractive overseas again.
Foreign-based landlords owned 12 percent of the homes rented out in the capital at the end of the first half, up from 7 percent last year, according to Hamptons International, which measured a subset of the London’s housing market. A falling pound has made it cheaper for overseas investors to buy homes using their local currencies, and many have been lured by a red-hot rental market that’s still at record levels because of tenant demand…
Trump to Back $200 Billion China Tariffs as Early as Next Week, Sources Say
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China to respond with duties on $60 billion of U.S. imports
- Asia stocks follow U.S. lower, while dollar and yen hold gains
President Donald Trump wants to move ahead with a plan to impose tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese imports as soon as a public-comment period concludes next week, according to six people familiar with the matter.
Asked to confirm the plan in an interview with Bloomberg News in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump smiled and said it was “not totally wrong.” He also criticized management of the yuan, saying China has devalued its currency in response to a recent slowdown in economic growth…
Fund Manager With Over 300,000 Followers Turns Bullish on China
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Shennong focused on health-care, consumer, technology stocks
- U.S. trade war and deleveraging already long priced in: Chen
A Chinese fund manager with hundreds of thousands of social media followers has turned bullish on the country’s stocks, particularly the health-care sector.
Chen Yu, general manager of Beijing Shennong Capital Asset Management Co., said concerns over the U.S. trade dispute and China’s deleveraging campaign have long been priced in, and that market weakness isn’t down to fundamentals — it has stemmed from mood swings. He is getting ready to go all-in on equities, converting cash that’s accounting for 40 percent of his 2 billion yuan ($293 million) of assets under management…
WeWork Would Top JPMorgan in NYC Office Space With 1 World Trade Center Lease
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Co-working firm may take about 200,000 square feet of offices
- Deal would make WeWork the biggest office tenant in Manhattan
WeWork Cos. is in talks to lease space at 1 World Trade Center, according to a person with knowledge of the discussions, putting the co-working giant on a path to become Manhattan’s largest office tenant.
The company is negotiating to take about 200,000 square feet (18,600 square meters) in the lower Manhattan skyscraper, according to the person, who asked not to be identified because the matter is private…
WeWork Would Top JPMorgan in NYC Office Space With 1 World Trade Center Lease
New Puerto Rico Bond Group Starts Negotiations
Posted by: | CommentsFunds holding about $1.9 billion in general obligation bonds split from a rival group in a bid to further broader restructuring efforts
Investment funds owning about $1.9 billion of Puerto Rico’s general obligation bonds have formed a committee to negotiate a consensual restructuring with the commonwealth and the federal oversight board that manages its finances, people familiar with the matter said.
Members of the committee are seeking to differentiate themselves from a pre-existing group of general obligation bondholders that includes Aurelius Capital Management LP, which is fighting the board and the island’s government in ongoing litigation, the people…
Federer Match Brings Out Bankers to Support NYC Tennis Lessons
Posted by: | CommentsMaurice R. Greenberg, the 93-year-old insurance legend, braved the stifling heat to attend the U.S. Open for Roger Federer and a lesser-known player he’s helped bring along: Casey Brandes, who’s been taking free tennis lessons with support from Greenberg’s Starr Foundation.
Before Federer breezed past Yoshihito Nishioka Tuesday night in straight sets, Greenberg and Brandes, 17, appeared at a benefit for the City Parks Foundation, which runs free tennis instruction to more than 6,000 youth in more than 36 New York City parks…
Federer Match Brings Out Bankers to Support NYC Tennis Lessons
Biotech Boom Built Wall Street’s $3 Million Analyst
Posted by: | CommentsInvestment banks offer lucrative deals to attract and retain top-name biotechnology analysts
A biotech boom is fueling renewed interest in a group that has been out of favor: Wall Street analysts.
Investment banks Leerink Partners LLC, Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. and Jefferies Group LLC have lured top-name biotech analysts from large banks with guaranteed pay packages worth $3 million or more and contracts extending as long as three or four years, say people familiar with the matter…
Biotech Boom Built Wall Street’s $3 Million Analyst
Private Banks Are Starting to Breach the Wall Around China’s Wealthy
Posted by: | CommentsGlobal wealth managers have been seeking to tap into the second-biggest pool of ultrarich people for years, but regulations and tough domestic competition stood in their way.
It’s hard to put numbers on the vast private banking opportunity in China, but here are some: $29 trillion in household wealth and $15 trillion in the asset management industry. Perhaps the most crucial number right now is the more than $1 trillion packaged by local Chinese money managers into principal-guaranteed investment products, which are the focus of a government crackdown.
Mahathir Bans Foreigners From $100 Billion Property Project
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Malaysia won’t grant visas to project buyers to live there
- China’s capital control curbed sales at project near Singapore
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said foreigners won’t be allowed to buy property at Country Garden Holdings Co.’s $100 billion project, or be granted visas to live there.
The Forest City project near Singapore had targeted buyers from China for its mixed-residential development, as well as investors from Indonesia, Thailand and Dubai. Malaysia’s My Second Home program allows wealthy foreigners to live in the Southeast Asian nation on a long-stay visa, with Chinese nationals being the largest group of participants…
How a Quest for the Perfect Bowl of Rice Cooked Up a Billionaire
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Koo’s company dominates market even as rice consumption falls
- Cuckoo exports appliance to 25 countries, including China
Rice is a staple for Koreans, but as New York restaurateur Bobby Yoon explains it, the connection is deeper, almost spiritual.
“We need the perfect bowl of rice for each meal,” said Yoon, whose recently opened barbecue joint in Manhattan is an offshoot of Haeundae Somunnan Amso Galbijip, his grandfather’s venerable Busan institution. “It doesn’t have a flavor, but there is also a certain umami to it when cooked well.”…
How a Quest for the Perfect Bowl of Rice Cooked Up a Billionaire
Wall Street Expats Angle for Piece of China’s Biotech Drug Boom
Posted by: | CommentsBankers, ex-pharma officials buy rights to sell drugs in China as the government loosens regulations.
A growing herd of former Wall Street bankers and drug industry veterans from the West are rushing to cash in on China’s embrace of biotechnology.
For years, China has been seen as a backwater in the pharmaceutical business. Despite its vast potential market, cumbersome regulations kept brand-name treatments from reaching patients for years after they became available elsewhere. Facing a bureaucratic gauntlet, many drugmakers either waited or didn’t bother to seek approval for blockbuster therapies in China at all…
Drowning in Dirty Water, Permian Seeks $22 Billion Lifeline
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Wall Street largely unaware of growing challenge for producers
- Disposal costs could hike basin breakevens $6 a barrel by 2025
In the dry, dusty plains of West Texas, home to America’s most prolific oil play, the problem isn’t too little water, it’s too much of it.
Just ask Will Hickey, the 31-year-old chief executive officer of Colgate Energy…
Drowning in Dirty Water, Permian Seeks $22 Billion Lifeline
Crowne Is Considering $800 Million Windshield Wiper Unit Sale
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Auto parts maker has talked to advisers about selling Trico
- Crowne bought Trico from private equity firm Kohlberg in 2014
Auto parts manufacturer Crowne Group LLC is considering an $800 million sale of windshield-wiper blade maker Trico Group, people with knowledge of the matter said.
The closely held conglomerate has held talks with investment banks about a sale of its Trico unit, said the people, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. A final decision hasn’t been made and Crowne could elect to keep the business…
Crowne Is Considering $800 Million Windshield Wiper Unit Sale
Credit Suisse Is Seeking Withdrawal From Debt Deal With Owner of National Enquirer
Posted by: | CommentsCredit Suisse is having second thoughts about doing business with the owner of the National Enquirer, which is at the center of a scandal involving hush-money payments in 2016 to women who had affairs with Donald Trump.
The Swiss bank was planning to lead a deal to help American Media Inc.refinance about $425 million of debt, according to people with knowledge of the matter. But amid a flurry of negative headlines tied to the publisher, Credit Suisse is seeking to back out of arranging the debt for the company, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information isn’t public…
Short Bets on World’s Biggest Tech Stocks Surge to $37 Billion
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FAANG short bets have jumped 40 percent in the past year
- Alibaba, China’s Ping An Insurance, Tesla, Amazon top list
Short positions against the so-called FAANG group of the largest U.S. technology stocks have surged by more than 40 percent in the past year as investors bet against some of the biggest drivers of the global bull market.
Bearish investors have shorted about $37 billion worth of stocks in the group, which comprises Facebook Inc., Apple Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Netflix Inc. and Google parent Alphabet Inc., up 42 percent from a year ago. Amazon leads the way with almost $10 billion in short interest, according to data compiled by Bloomberg as of Aug. 28 from financial analytics firm S3 Partners LLC…
Elon Musk and Tesla Resolved One Issue. Now for the Rest.
Posted by: | CommentsAfter deciding not to try to remove its shares from the market, the electric carmaker must focus on some stubborn challenges while facing new ones.
So Tesla is no longer seeking to go private. Now what?
On Monday, the electric carmaker began to take stock of the residual damage from its August whirlwind — including the prospect of harsher scrutiny of its bottom line and of its chief executive, Elon Musk…
Elon Musk and Tesla Resolved One Issue. Now for the Rest.
Yacht-Owners Think More People Likely To Become Mobile Home-Owners
Posted by: | CommentsWhen my grandfather retired, he and my grandmother bought a mobile home. They took one trip to Las Vegas in it, realized the folly of their ways, and upon returning to their trailer park in upstate New York promptly removed the wheels and built a deck off the side of it, to ensure something like it could never happen again. That story, and the years spent visiting them in their no-longer-mobile-home, has cured me of the desire to hit the open road in a rolling one-bedroom apartment, even without doing the math and realizing just how little you save doing it when there are perfectly good three-star hotels strewn along every interstate in the country. Still, I recognize that I live in New York City and am therefore completely detached from the Real America, and in the Real America people eschew the Holiday Inn Express for an eight-foot-wide aluminum can on top of a septic tank containing their own waste…
Paul Singer Thinks Michael Dell Was Right Five Years Ago
Posted by: | CommentsIn 2013, much to Carl Icahn’s delightand then resigned chagrin, Dell the publicly-traded company engineered its sale to Michael Dell the person(and a private-equity fund). In retrospect, this taking the battered computer-maker private seems like an excellent idea to Paul Singer and Elliott Management, or at least an absolutely smashing and fantastic idea compared to Dell’s new plan to go publiconce more…
Paul Singer Thinks Michael Dell Was Right Five Years Ago
How a Banker’s Message to a Client Spelled Trouble for UBS
Posted by: | CommentsBreach of client confidentiality in Hong Kong sparked internal probe and a senior employee’s suspension
A UBS Group AG banker working on a large Hong Kong initial public offering last year disclosed the identity of an investor that sold shares shortly after the listing, a breach of client confidentiality that triggered an internal investigation and the suspension of a senior employee, according to people familiar with the matter.
An individual at the bank sent a message to ZhongAn Online P & C Insurance Co., a company whose backers include the founders of Chinese internet giants Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Tencent Holdings…
Uganda Social Fund Awards China Railway $110 Million Tower Deal
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NSSF plans $600 million housing and office-building projects
- Fund wants laws amended to allow investment outside region
Uganda’s state-controlled provident fund offered China Railway Group Ltd. a $110 million deal to construct a 32-story office tower in the capital, Kampala.
Construction will begin next month and will be finished in two to three years, the National Social Security Fund Chairman Patrick Byabakama Kaberenge said Tuesday in an interview. The project, which has been stalled for a decade, is part of NSSF’s plans to invest as much as $600 million in housing estates and office blocks, he said…
Stocks Get Small Boost From Trade Deal
Posted by: | CommentsThe S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite inch up to record closes
Stocks Get Small Boost From Trade Deal
End Entrepreneur Tax Break to Fund Health Service, U.K. Urged
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Resolution Foundation calls the tax break the U.K.’s worst
- Says 2.7 billion-pound cost could part-fund boost for NHS
Prime Minister Theresa May could help meet her 20 billion-pound ($26 billion) funding pledge for the National Health Service by scrapping what’s being branded as the worst tax break in Britain.
Entrepreneurs’ Relief, which cost an estimated 2.7 billion pounds in foregone revenue in the last fiscal year, is “expensive, ineffective and regressive,” the Resolution Foundation think tank said in an analysis published Wednesday…
End Entrepreneur Tax Break to Fund Health Service, U.K. Urged
Iran’s Oil Exports Dropping Faster Than Expected Before U.S. Sanctions
Posted by: | CommentsShipments are set to decline by a third as shippers pull back from the Islamic Republic months ahead of a Nov. 4 U.S. deadline
Iran oil shipments are declining at a faster-than-expected pace ahead of U.S. sanctions set to begin in November.
Iran expects crude exports to fall by a third in September, according to people familiar with purchasing plans, potentially posing an unforeseen supply risk to markets. Officials at the state-run National Iranian Oil Co. provisionally expect crude shipments to drop to about 1.5 million barrels a day next month, down from about 2.3 million barrels a day in June, say people familiar with the country’s ports loading…
Korea Post’s $112 Billion Fund Looks Overseas to Riskier Debt
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Aims to buy mezzanine, distressed debt in the U.S., Europe
- Met with Macquarie to increase foreign infrastructure assets
South Korea’s state postal service is planning to buy riskier debt in North America and Europe as well as seeking foreign infrastructure assets and properties as it looks abroad for better returns.
Korea Post plans to increase investment in mezzanine and distressed debt by selecting high-performing asset managers, president Kang Seong-ju said in an interview in Seoul. The $112 billion fund is also adding infrastructure and real estate assets abroad and putting more money in hedge funds while reducing investment in stocks, according to Kang…
Biggest Leveraged Loan of 2018 Hits Market for Reuters Buyout
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Banks to start marketing $8 billion of Loans for Reuters deal
- Blackstone agreed to acquire 55% Reuters stake in January
Investors led by Blackstone Group LP will start marketing $8 billion of risky corporate loans next week to fund their buyout of Thomson Reuters Corp.’s financial-and-risk operations, according to people with knowledge of the matter. It would be the biggest leveraged loan offering of the year.
Underwriters led by Bank of America Corp. are holding investor meetings on Sept. 4 in London and Sept. 5 in New York for a seven-year $5.5 billion term loan and a $2.5 billion loan denominated in euros, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because the deal is private…
U.S. Bank Regulator Moves to Modify Lending Rules for Poorer Communities
Posted by: | CommentsBanks applaud paper from OCC seeking to update 1977 Community Reinvestment Act; Fed and FDIC not involved
WASHINGTON—A national banking regulator took the first step Tuesday toward rewriting rules for lending in lower-income neighborhoods, an effort that could allow institutions to redirect billions of dollars spent on loans and investments.
In a release seeking feedback from the public, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency proposed new approaches to evaluating banks on their reinvestment activities. One controversial idea in the proposal would reduce the emphasis on loans and investments made locally, and instead create…
1MDB-Linked Banker Disappears From U.S. Website
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Ex-Goldman banker Ng was Asia managing director of Celsius
- Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing a key investor in drink firm
A former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. banker embroiled in the multibillion dollar 1MDB scandal has quietly vanished from the website of his last-known employer, a U.S.-based energy drinks company backed by Hong Kong’s richest man.
Roger Ng has been scrubbed off the website of Celsius Holdings Inc., where he was previously listed as managing director for Asia…
High Expectations Skew Global Investors’ View of U.S. Growth
Posted by: | CommentsBy some measures, U.S. falls short of high bar while other regions beat easier targets
The U.S. continues to grow at its quickest pace in years. Perversely, its very strength keeps raising the bar for investors flocking to the U.S.
By some measures, the U.S. is starting to fall short of heightened expectations, while other regions, with much lower and manageable targets, are beating theirs. The Citigroup Economic Surprise Index, a measure of whether economic reports are meeting projections, has fallen to its lowest level in nearly a year in the U.S. The gauge has dropped into negative territory, indicating economic…
Britons Are Dipping Into Pensions to Help Children Buy Houses
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Parents accept lower living standards to make offpring owners
- In over 50,000 cases, money for homes backed by pensions
Britain’s baby boomers are sacrificing their retirements to hoist their poorer offspring onto the property ladder.
Nearly one in five over 55-year-olds are accepting lower living standards to help family members to buy a home, according to a Legal & General report on Tuesday…
Britons Are Dipping Into Pensions to Help Children Buy Houses
$10 Billion of India Power Debt Near Resolution, State Bank Says
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Lenders work to resolve loans under central bank’s new rules
- RBI set 180-day timeline to recast stressed loans from March 1
Delinquent loans worth as much as 700 billion rupees ($10 billion) in India’s power sector are in the process of being resolved, according to the nation’s largest bank, helping lenders avoid dragging seven accounts to bankruptcy court under new norms laid out by the regulator.
What Does a Chinese Superpower Look Like? Nothing Like the U.S.
Posted by: | CommentsChina aims to expand its influence from one polar cap to the other. Debt, demographics and a middle income trap stand in the way.
What struck Wang Wen about Antarctica, beyond the brutality of the December cold, was the scale of U.S. operations in such an inhospitable environment and the American flag fluttering by the sign that marks the geographic South Pole. Observing the academic mission of hundreds of U.S. scientists in a region rich in resource potential, he was determined that China must catch up.
What Turkey Can Do if Market Troubles Return
Posted by: | CommentsA look at tools at Turkey’s disposal in case the market-shaking panic of earlier this month resurfaces
What Turkey Can Do if Market Troubles Return
China’s Wilting Consumer Lenders Need Some Relief
Posted by: | CommentsThe government’s clampdown may have gone too far.
China’s consumer finance industry is sagging under an intensifying campaign of regulation. That could be a problem for an economy that’s relying on domestic demand to sustain growth amid the trade war with the U.S.
The government has started a fresh round of checks on thousands of peer-to-peer lending sites, Bloomberg News reported last week. Meanwhile, shares of U.S.-listed cash-loan provider Qudian Inc. fell 12 percent on Friday after a separate Bloomberg report that it would lose access to customers through Ant Financial’s Alipay app. While a commercial matter rather than a regulatory action, Qudian’s slump underlines the travails of an industry that’s increasingly out of favor with authorities…
World’s Top Activist Fund Sets Eyes on One of Singapore’s Banks
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Judah Value says plans to build position, publish open letter
- Fund likes to work behind the scenes with ‘positive activism’
The world’s best-performing activist fund returned 103 percent in seven months by targeting mainly smaller Asian companies in industries from commodities to engineering and food.
Now, it’s getting ready to take on one of Singapore’s banks, according to Judah Value Activist Fund’s July newsletter obtained by Bloomberg…
World’s Top Activist Fund Sets Eyes on One of Singapore’s Banks