Euromoney (August Issue)
“The value of mergers and acquisitions by Japanese companies of those in southeast Asia has reached $8.2 billion over this year to date, according to Dealogic, further demonstrating Japan’s relative strength on a regional and global basis. That makes Japan the highest single-country bidder for any southeast Asian companies.”
Tags: Global, Highest bidder, Japan, M&A, Southeast Asia, Strength
LA Times (August 10)
The “Arab Spring” may not have succeeded in bringing democracy to the Middle East. But it has provided powerful evidence of a different phenomenon: the illusion of U.S. influence over governments we once considered our clients.”
Tags: Arab spring, Clients, Democracy, Governments, Influence, Middle East, U.S.
Institutional Investor (August Issue)
“Facing an image problem,” many Chinese companies are retreating from U.S. exchanges. “Frustrated by low valuations and investor skepticism, Chinese companies are increasingly considering delisting from U.S. stock exchanges.” Since 2009, 24 Chinese companies have delisted, often going private, from the NYSE and Nasdaq. Much investor skepticism is directed at companies that utilized reverse mergers to attain their listing, thereby avoiding the scrutiny that would accompany a normal IPO, but the skepticism has tainted even Chinese companies with solid financials.
Tags: China, Companies, Delisting, Image, Investors, IPO, Listing, Nasdaq, NYSE, Private, Reverse mergers, Scrutiny, Skepticism, Stock exchanges, U.S., Valuations
The Economist (August 10)
China’s emissions are a worldwide concern. “Since 1990 the amount of CO2 pouring from Chinese smokestacks has risen from 2 billion tonnes a year to 9 billion—almost 30% of the global total. China produces nearly twice as much CO2 as America. It is no longer merely catching up with the West. The average Chinese person produces the same amount of CO2 as the average European.”
Washington Post (August 8)
“Knowing how much the Grahams loved the paper, we could only imagine how hard it must have been for Don and his niece, Post publisher Katharine Weymouth, to tell that stunned room of employees that the paper was being sold…. Many of us sense that Don and his family have done an unselfish and courageous thing, at some personal emotional cost. Knowing that the Grahams could not sustain The Post indefinitely as a great newspaper, they looked for someone who could.” Selling the Washington Post “was Grahams’ gift to journalism.”
Tags: Courageous, Don Graham, Emotional cost, Employees, Journalism, Katharine Weymouth, Newspaper, Publisher, Unselfish, Washington Post
Wall Street Journal (August 7)
“The most striking fact about the recently announced sale of the Boston Globe and Washington Post is their low prices…. The prices reflect the decline of newspapers as a business in the Internet age, which is the kind of creative destruction millions of Americans have experienced. Disruption is the price a capitalist economy pays for innovation, and the news business is merely the latest example.” The new owners should be welcomed as they provide “an opportunity for new ideas and perhaps a turnaround.”
Tags: Boston Globe, Capitalism, Creative destruction, Decline, Disruption, Ideas, Innovation, Internet, Newspapers, Opportunity, Owners, Prices, Turnaround, Washington Post
Financial Times (August 6)
Sony’s polite “rebuff of activist investor Loeb is hardly a surprise…. Daniel Loeb has joined the long line of activist investors rebuffed by Japanese companies.”
Tags: Activist investor, Daniel Loeb, Japan, Japanese companies, Rebuff, Sony
New York Times (August 5)
“The latest quarterly report on economic growth showed real G.D.P. up only 1.4 percent over the past year, a marked slowdown from year-over-year growth rates posted in 2012. Much of the weakening can be attributed to self-imposed wounds, including the fiscal-cliff showdown at the end of last year and this year’s payroll tax increase and automatic budget cuts, whose effects now appear likely to carry into the second half of the year.” The recovery could stall as the report suggests “Americans do not have the requisite economic security to absorb those imminent blows, let alone other inevitable setbacks, including another possible standoff over the nation’s debt limit.”“The latest quarterly report on economic growth showed real G.D.P. up only 1.4 percent over the past year, a marked slowdown from year-over-year growth rates posted in 2012. Much of the weakening can be attributed to self-imposed wounds, including the fiscal-cliff showdown at the end of last year and this year’s payroll tax increase and automatic budget cuts, whose effects now appear likely to carry into the second half of the year.” The recovery could stall as the report suggests “Americans do not have the requisite economic security to absorb those imminent blows, let alone other inevitable setbacks, including another possible standoff over the nation’s debt limit.”
Tags: Budget cuts, Debt limit, Fiscal cliff, G.D.P., Security, Setbacks, Slowdown, Standoff, Tax increase, U.S.
Institutional Investor (August Issue)
“In the wake of the financial crisis a few years ago, it seemed as if the world economic order had been turned upside down” The U.S, Europe and other established markets appeared risky and emerging markets “that once seemed risky began to look like a sure bet…. Today the supposed new world order already seems, well, old. Emerging markets have been among the worst-performing asset classes this year, and capital has been flowing out at a record pace in recent weeks.”
Tags: Asset classes, Economic order, Emerging markets, Established markets, Europe, Financial Crisis, Risk, U.S.
The Economist (August 3)
“The world’s thirst for oil could be nearing a peak. That is bad news for producers, excellent for everyone else.” Is oil becoming “yesterday’s fuel”? The Economist believes demand may be nearing long-term decline brought about by advances in fracking and automotive technology.
