The onset of the Trump era forced economists to confront their doubts about their usefulness to the public. They shared this ordeal with political forecasters, Democrats, logicians and journalists. Maybe we all deserved the anguish. Those economists who remain in a funk should nonetheless snap themselves out of it. One reason is that the sappy self-loathing economist is now embarrassingly cliché. Take it from a sappy self-loathing […]
Should we try to time the market? And has the boom in passive investments brought any problems in its wake? The problems are linked and urgent. The move from traditional actively managed funds to passive indexed funds, which aim merely to track and index and reduce costs, continues to intensify. Meanwhile, if ever there was a point when it might seem right to time the market, and […]
So much for sticking “nuclear weapons” in carriers’ dumb pipes. Shine, last year’s enfant terrible of mobile ad blocking is pivoting (again!) — in both tone of voice and business model. It’s also rebranding to, er, Rainbow. So, to keep tabs, since 2011 this Disrupt startup battlefield alum has moved from trying to sell mobile antivirus (Shine Security), to threatening network-level mobile ad blocking (Shine Technologies), to — its latest pivot — […]
We may be about to witness the extinction of a very rare bird indeed: the $1m Monaco home. Savills agent Irene Luke hasn’t seen one on her books for several years. “We’re selling a parking space for €190,000,” she says, “so you’re not going to get very much for a million dollars.” Luke taps at a computer, trawling through all sorts of listings the public doesn’t have […]
Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif would soon know his political fate with the SupremeCourt on Thursday saying that it would come out with a detailed judgement in the high-profile Panama Papers case. File image of Nawaz Sharif. Reuters The apex court, which completed hearing the case on Thursday, reserved its verdict to a later date. The case pertains to investments allegedly made by Sharif and members of his family in Mossack […]
AirMap has raised $26 million in a Series B round led by Microsoft Ventures. The investment arms of Airbus, Qualcomm, Rakuten, Sony, and Yuneec also contributed to the round, as well as existing investors General Catalyst and Lux Capital. The latest round brings the total amount raised by the Santa Monica, California-based startup to $43.6 million. The Internet of Things 10 types of enterprise deployments As businesses […]
By Brian Love and Michel Rose | PARIS PARIS France’s presidential race took a new turn on Thursday as opinion polls began to show centrist Emmanuel Macron benefiting from an alliance with a veteran politician that could help him beat the far-right’s Marine Le Pen and win power at the age of 39. Macron, a fresh-faced ex-investment banker who has never held elected office, met his new […]
By Lucia Mutikani | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits rose slightly last week but the four-week average of such claims, considered a better gauge, fell to a 43-1/2-year low in a sign of a strengthening labor market. Other data on Thursday showed house prices increasing solidly in December amid strong demand for housing even as mortgage rates rose. The reports highlighted strength […]
“What’s up with the dollar?” has been the recurring question for investors lately as the reserve currency has slipped from a 14-year high set at the start of January. The answer may lie in the link between the dollar and real yields, a proxy for how investors in the bond market view prospects for stronger economic growth and the normalisation of interest rates. Whereas nominal yields give […]
For footloose international money, the safest place to hide in the European financial system may be two-year German debt. The government of Europe’s largest economy not meeting such obligations in euros is as close to inconceivable as things get. The debt is also easy and cheap to trade, which means it can be a market signal of investor angst. The price of such safety set a record […]
By Mehreen Zahra-Malik | LAHORE, Pakistan LAHORE, Pakistan Pakistani real estate giant Rafi Group made a ten-fold profit last year from its sale of hundreds of acres of land in the remote fishing town of Gwadar, acquired soon after the government announced plans for a deep-sea port there. The windfall came after 12 years of waiting patiently for the Gwadar port to emerge as the centrepiece of […]
Vodafone Australia has reported a net loss of AU$241.8 million for the first half of FY17 on total revenue of AU$3.35 billion, an 8.4 percent year-on-year decrease. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) were AU$912.2 million, a 12.2 percent increase from the AU$812.8 million reported for the first half of FY16. Net average revenue per user (ARPU) was AU$37.97, a loss of AU$7.71 from last […]
Axa chief executive Thomas Buberl has distanced himself from a bid for Generali’s German life insurance business. There has been speculation that the French group could play a part in any break-up process that would follow the possible acquisition of Generali by Italian bank Intesa Sanpaolo. However, speaking to the Financial Times on Thursday, Mr Buberl said that “buying a traditional life insurance business in Germany would […]
Good morning. Here’s our morning roundup of all the media news you need to know. Want to get this briefing in your inbox every morning? Subscribe here. A few months ago Vice founder Shane Smith fronted a superior Vice-HBO documentary, “A House Divided,” that detailed the issues, tactics and rancor that dominated Barack Obama’s relations with a Republican-dominated Congress. Now he sees “a perfect storm” that involves […]
Abu Dhabi-UAE: 22 February, 2017 At a press conference on day four of the 13th edition of the International Defence Exhibition and Conference (IDEX 2017), His Excellency Staff Brigadier-General Rashid Mohammed Al Shamsi, Official Spokesperson of IDEX 2017, announced 20 new deals worth AED 3,422,120,575. 13 of the deals are with national companies and the remaining 7 with international companies. The press conference, held at Abu Dhabi […]
By Nichola Saminather | SINGAPORE SINGAPORE Asian stocks pulled back from a 19-month high on Thursday, while the dollar tried to steady from losses suffered in the wake of the U.S. Federal Reserve minutes indicating a cautious approach to more interest rate increases. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was fractionally lower. Japan’s Nikkei slid 0.1 percent, while Australian shares retreated 0.3 percent. Overnight on […]
Telstra has sold its remaining 6.5 percent stake in Chinese online company Autohome to Chinese insurer Ping An Insurance Group for $29.30 per share, for a total of $217 million (AU$282 million). “The divestment reflects Ping An is now well established as a strategic partner for Autohome,” Telstra said in a statement to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) on Thursday morning. “As a result of the sale, […]
The shelves of Guillermo Lasso’s office are lined with books that inform his politics: Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations; The Denationalization of Money by Friedrich Hayek; a compendium of cases about free speech from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. “A government cannot regulate freedom of expression,” the Ecuadorean conservative opposition leader told the Financial Times before Sunday’s presidential election, in which he won more than […]
When Ford borrowed a €750m bond in euros at the start of the year, the US carmaker was following a path that has become familiar to corporate America. The deal was an example of so-called “reverse Yankee” issuance, where US companies sell bonds in euros, tapping demand from eurozone investors. Ford added to the more than €100bn of debt sold in the eurozone over the past two […]
By Simon Jessop and Pamela Barbaglia | LONDON LONDON Unilever (ULVR.L) sought to show shareholders it can go it alone on Wednesday after rejecting Kraft Heinz’s (KHC.O) $143 billion bid, with the promise of a swift, far-reaching review. This should be completed by early April and could lead to asset sales and cost cuts, a source close to the Anglo-Dutch company said only days after it roundly […]
Unilever has promised to boost profits and conduct a root-and-branch review of its business that could lead to asset sales just days after an aborted $143bn takeover approach from Kraft Heinz, the US food group backed by 3G Capital and Warren Buffett. Unilever is under pressure to speed up returns to shareholders following the bid from Kraft Heinz, which has raised questions about the consumer products group’s […]
French small-cap investors are showing little sign of nerves ahead of this spring’s presidential election, setting a strong pace since the start of the year. In a week when the possibility that Marine Le Pen, the anti-immigrant National Front leader, could win May’s presidential vote started to worry bond investors, the small-caps market, consisting of 187 members, maintained its sangfroid. The CAC small index stands 4.3 per […]
By Emmanuel Jarry and Gérard Bon | PARIS PARIS Francois Bayrou, a centrist candidate in three past French presidential elections, was set to announce on Wednesday if he will run in this year’s race for the Elysee, a move that could erode support for independent Emmanuel Macron. Opinion pollsters give Bayrou single figure percentages in the April 23 first round of voting, and therefore only a tiny […]
Wednesday 12:45 GMT Overview US equity futures suggest Wall Street will dip from record levels that were reached amid a positive outlook for economic growth. Political concerns leave the euro carrying the wooden spoon in the forex markets, while the rush for supposed havens pushes short term German bond yields to their lowest ever. Hot topic The FTSE All-World equity index is at another record, up 0.1 […]
