Johnson & Johnson is to acquire Swiss biotechnology company Actelion for $30bn in a complex deal that will see Actelion’s founder heading a standalone spin-off research company based and listed in Switzerland. The world’s largest healthcare company is offering Actelion shareholders $280 per share in an all-cash offer — as well as shares in the new research and development company headed by Jean-Paul Clozel, the Swiss group’s […]
EBay on Wednesday posted fourth quarter financial results that met market expectations, thanks to a solid holiday season and strong growth in StubHub revenues. The e-commerce company reported non-GAAP earnings of 54 cents a share on revenue of $2.4 billion, as Wall Street was expecting. Earnings were up 8 percent year-over-year, while revenue was up 3 percent. EBay generated $620 million of operating cash flow in Q4 […]
Via GEFIRA, US-centric media are reporting that Japan has become the biggest holder of the US treasuries, surpassing China last month. However, this is true only in regard to single countries. If we consider the European Union member states collectively, then they appear to be the biggest holder of the US treasuries. It has been so almost one year long. Unfortunately, the EU’s holdings are artificially overstated […]
Generali, Italy’s largest insurer, has bought voting rights amounting to 3.01 per cent in Intesa Sanpaolo in a defensive move designed to block a mooted takeover bid by the country’s largest bank. The move came after shares in the insurer rose nearly 4 per cent on Monday following a report in Turin-based newspaper La Stampa suggesting Intesa was considering a takeover bid in tandem with Germany’s Allianz. […]
German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung on Monday tweeted documents to ‘help’ Pakistanis form their own opinion on the role of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s daughter in Panamagate. “For those in Pakistan who doubt the role of the prime minister’s daughter Mariam Safdar in Panama Papers – some of the documents. Judge yourself,” Süddeutsche Zeitung tweeted, along with attachments purporting to show her involvement with Minerva Financial Services. Maryam […]
A billionaire Chinese hedge fund manager has been jailed for five-and-a-half years for market manipulation in one of the country’s highest-profile financial crimes prosecutions since a market rout in 2015. Xu Xiang, an investment guru who used to be compared with Carl Icahn, led a loose-knit group of hedge fund managers from the port city of Ningbo known as the “Limit-up Kamikaze Squad” because of their penchant for […]
The world’s largest pension fund, Japan’s GPIF, is under intensifying pressure to draw a “line in the sand” on corporate governance standards in the country as other investors rail against a controversial takeover deal. The imbroglio centres around Panasonic’s proposed purchase of PanaHome. Investors say it represents one of the sternest tests to date of Japan’s stewardship and governance codes, guidelines introduced in 2014 as part of the “Abenomics” drive to […]
When it comes to the future of bitcoin, the “holy grail” has emerged as becoming the first to have a bitcoin ETF approved by the SEC. Over three years ago, in 2013, the company of the Winklevoss twins, Cameron and Tyler, Winklevoss Capital Management LLC, launched the first proposed bitcoin ETF, the Winklevoss Investment Trust, looking to trade on the HFT-dominated BATS exchange. The SEC is expected […]
By Noel Randewich | SAN FRANCISCO SAN FRANCISCO U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration is only hours old, but already a small parade of S&P 500 companies’ chiefs have voiced optimism that his promised tax cuts, stimulus spending and deregulation will boost corporate profits. In the days ahead of Friday’s inauguration, senior executives from Morgan Stanley (MS.N), Delta Air Lines (DAL.N) and other major U.S. corporations said the […]
In 2015, Malian businessman and former interim prime minister Cheick Modibo Diarra told Arabian Business: “When it comes to investment…Africa really is the last frontier. Be it agriculture, energy production, extraction of gold and diamonds, or oil and gas, we have a lot of opportunities and a young workforce that understands how business works.” He was speaking at a time when interest in Africa among Middle East […]
Kabir Mulchandani is a hands-on developer. While he may not be laying bricks, the SKAI Holdings CEO forwent his air-conditioned office in Downtown Dubai for an often stinking hot construction site on the Palm Jumeirah for the two years that it took for his flagship $1.2 billion hotel to be built. It was only in November that he finally walked offsite when the Viceroy Dubai Palm Jumeirah […]
“Comeback is a good word, man,” noted the actor Mickey Rourke, after portraying a washed-up wrestler led to a career renaissance. Could 2017 be the year when stockpickers can say the same thing? The post-financial crisis environment has been unkind to active investing, especially in equities, with most portfolio managers unable to beat their benchmarks even before costs. That has accelerated the seismic investor shift towards cheap, […]
China cut its holdings of US Treasuries by $66bn in November, reducing its position in the safe-haven debt to the lowest level since 2010 as the country battles to stabilise its currency. The acceleration in sales — the largest monthly decline since December 2011 — threatens a rise in US interest rates if it continues and follows an unwinding in October that saw China cede its position […]
New stock trading allegations are set to cast a shadow over Tom Price’s confirmation hearing as health secretary on Wednesday, as Senate Democrats prepare to do battle over Donald Trump’s latest cabinet picks. On Wednesday Senate Democrats and Republicans will question Mr Price, a sitting Republican congressman, over his fitness for the health role and his plans for repealing and replacing Obamacare — a key policy agenda […]
As we observed in yesterday morning’s market wrap, while US market were taking the day off for the MLK holiday, China was busy defending an accelerating selloff across its stock markets. During Monday trading, having traded quietly lower for the past few days, Chinese stocks tumbled in early trading on the mainland and in Hong Kong’s offshore market amid weakness in Asian equities. The Shanghai Composite Index […]
Seldom have such small chips carried such a heavy load. China’s fledgling semiconductor industry, after a messy birth, now finds itself in the crosshairs of conflicting political goals in Beijing and Washington. Chips are a key plank of China’s industrial plans, attracting a massive $150bn government subsidy. This reflects national angst over reliance on overseas markets — it spends more on importing semiconductors than oil — and […]
There is no guarantee that all will go according to plan, of course. Israel struggled for years to develop regulations to manage its newfound wealth. The international energy firms that Israel is now courting have other options in an evolving global market. And the politics of a new era, as President-elect Donald J. Trump encourages assertive Israeli action in Jerusalem and the West Bank, could kindle fresh […]
|By Arabian Post Staff|The Shariah Standard for Gold, introduced with the support of the World Gold Council, will open up a vast new world for gold investments, according to the Council’s Gold Outlook Report for 2017. It quotes Mark Mobius of Franklin Templeton as saying the new Shariah Standard on Gold will be a “game changer.” “The Shariah Standard on Gold will enable the foundation of what […]
Qatar is regaining its appetite for deals. In the past two months alone, the world’s richest country per capita invested in Turkey’s biggest poultry producer, Russian oil giant Rosneft PJSC, and U.K. gas company National Grid Plc. The investments have been made through the Qatar Investment Authority, created in 2005 to handle the country’s windfall from liquefied natural gas sales, of which it is the world’s biggest exporter. […]
“We open a new hotel every 36 hours,” Sébastien Bazin remarks, after outlining the impressive portfolio of French hospitality chain AccorHotels, with 4,100 hotels spread across 95 countries and employing 240,000 people. The significant sum includes properties gained through the recent acquisition of FRHI, a hotel management company formerly owned by Qatar Investment Authority, billionaire Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal’s private investment arm Kingdom Holding and Oxford […]
By Jonathan Stempel | NEW HAVEN, Conn. NEW HAVEN, Conn. A former Jefferies Group Inc bond trader being tried a second time for defrauding clients about prices of mortgage bonds should be convicted because he lied repeatedly to his own customers to boost profits, a U.S. prosecutor argued on Friday. Jesse Litvak, 42, was “motivated by greed,” and it was no excuse that other traders might have […]
By Patrick Rucker and James Oliphant | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON U.S. Senate Democrats on Thursday pressed Ben Carson, Donald Trump’s nominee to lead housing policy, on potential conflicts of interest between the agency he is set to run and properties in which the president-elect may hold a financial stake. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) hands out billions of dollars each year to developers and landlords. […]
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. Donald Trump is nothing if not transparent, especially when it comes to views of the press and outright evasions about his business holdings. That was self-evident at his Wednesday spectacle (labeled “press conference”) in which he bashed media and also […]
HONG KONG Property developer China Vanke (000002.SZ) (2202.HK), embroiled in a high-profile corporate power tussle for over a year, said on Thursday its No. 2 shareholder China Resources Group is considering a major plan. The country’s second-largest developer said in a statement it had been informed on Wednesday that China Resources and a unit were ‘formulating a major plan involving its holdings in Vanke but are still […]
