Bloomberg (December 9)
Hong Kong is facing the “‘worst ever,” as layoffs and store closures multiply. “More than 5,600 retail jobs could be lost and thousands of stores shut down over the next six months, as pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong continue to disrupt sales during the crucial festive period.”
Tags: Disrupt, Hong Kong, Layoffs, Pro-democracy, Protests, Retail jobs, Sales, Store closures, Worst ever
Wall Street Journal (December 8)
“The S&P 500 is having its best run in six years, but individual investors are fleeing stock funds at the fastest pace in decades…. Investors have pulled $135.5 billion from U.S. stock-focused mutual funds and exchange-traded funds so far this year, the biggest withdrawals on record.” And, surprisingly, this may be a good sign for the stock market. The outflows show “investors aren’t chasing the stock market’s strong performance…. This suggests major indexes like the S&P 500 still have plenty of room to run after a decadelong rally.”
Tags: ETFs, Fleeing, Investors, Mutual funds, Outflows, Stock funds, U.S., Withdrawals
The Economist (December 7)
British voters are facing a “nightmare before Christmas.” They “keep being called to the polls—and each time the options before them are worse…. Next week voters face their starkest choice yet, between Boris Johnson, whose Tories promise a hard Brexit, and Jeremy Corbyn, whose Labour Party plans to “rewrite the rules of the economy” along radical socialist lines.” Both leaders are unpopular and on Friday, December 13th, “unlucky Britons will wake to find one of these horrors in charge.”
Tags: Brexit, Christmas, Corbyn, Johnson, Labour, Nightmare, Options, Polls, Radical, Starkest, Tories, UK, Unlucky, Unpopular, Voters, Worse
BBC (December 6)
Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil giant, “raised a record $25.6bn (£19.4bn) in its initial public offering in Riyadh. The share sale was the biggest ever, surpassing that of China’s Alibaba which raised $25bn in 2014 in New York.” When trading begins, it will become “the most valuable listed company in the world,” valued at $1.7tn based on the IPO.
Tags: Alibaba, China, IPO, Most valuable, New York, Oil, Record, Riyadh, Saudi Aramco, Share sale
Washington Post (December 5)
In the impeachment proceedings, “even the Republican witness helped the Democrats… If Turley is an example of the type of witnesses they think helpful, perhaps Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) should allow them to call many more.”
Tags: Democrats, Impeachment, Nadler, Republican, Trump, Turley, U.S., Witness
LA Times (December 4)
Trump’s impeachment should “be the simplest impeachment case in American history.” It’s an open and shut case, with clear echoes of a former president’s misdeeds. “Nixon’s and Trump’s misconduct wasn’t witnessed or suspected or gossiped about. It was recorded. Anyone can examine official and undisputed documentation of the fateful conversations.”
Tags: Fateful conversations
WARC (December 4)
Fully 45% of Malaysia’s population is made up of Millennials, “many of whom are digital natives.” As a result, “businesses looking to expand in Malaysia need to offer digital wallet payment options, as these cover a much greater proportion of the population than credit cards.” The diverse e-money options are dominated by outsiders, only 5 of the 46 e-money licenses “have gone to players in the traditional banking space.”
Tags: Banking, Credit cards, Digital natives, Digital wallet, E-money, Malaysia, Millennials, Population
Financial Times (December 2)
“Investors are becoming increasingly concerned about how climate risks will impact their portfolios.” TCI, one activist hedge fund, “has warned Airbus, Moody’s, Charter Communications and other companies to improve their pollution disclosure or it will vote against their directors and called for asset owners to fire fund managers that did not insist on climate transparency.”
Tags: Activist, Airbus, Asset owners, Charter, Climate risks, Directors, Disclosure, Fund managers, Hedge-fund, Impact, Investors, Moody's, Pollution, Portfolios, TCI, Vote
Washington Post (December 1)
“Experts have known for years what the United States must do: place a strong and steadily rising price on carbon dioxide emissions, invest heavily in clean-energy research and development, and make climate a top priority in international diplomacy. President Trump is instead denying the problem.”
Tags: Clean energy, Climate, CO2, Denying, Diplomacy, Emissions, Experts, Invest, Price, Priority, Trump, U.S.
The Economist (November 30)
World trade “works best when there is a referee, and for nearly 25 years a group of seven judges at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has done the job. But on December 11th this body will cease to function, because America is blocking new appointments.” Losing this final arbiter ”will make cross-border commerce unrulier and, in the long run, invite an anarchy that would make the world poorer.”
Tags: Anarchy, Appointments, Cross-border commerce, Judges, Poorer, Referee, U.S., Unrulier, World trade, WTO
