Major International Business Headlines Brief::: 26 February 2021

[Bulls n Bears]

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ü  ‘Sin Tax’ Hike in South Africa Will Backfire, Wine Exporter Says

ü  Airbnb Sales Beat Estimates, Showing Demand Amid Covid Surge

ü  EU Chief Wrongly Raised Apple Risk in Push for Vaccine Passports

ü  Cathie Wood’s Main ETF Slips Again After $4.9 Billion Asset Drop

ü  Brexit leaves London fighting for its future as Europe poaches business

ü  India imposes new rules on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube

ü  Twitter is considering letting users pay accounts they like

ü  Alibaba is back in Beijing's good books for helping to fix poverty 

ü  Airbnb and DoorDash went public at the same time but see very different paths post-pandemic

ü  Amanda Staveley loses High Court fight with Barclays over damages

ü  Kalifa review: UK 'needs a wake-up call' over fintech investment

ü  Nearly 30,000 Macs reportedly infected with mysterious malware

ü  Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase files to go public

ü  Hyundai's recall of 82,000 electric cars is one of the most expensive in history

ü  What happened when one company switched to a four-day workweek

ü  Netflix is doubling down on Asia with K-dramas and mobile-only deals. But China remains elusive

ü  Anglo aims at further 10 year life extension of SA iron ore assets; open to consolidation

ü  Anglo SA coal demerger plan given pause for thought as buyers “put up their hands”

 

	

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‘Sin Tax’ Hike in South Africa Will Backfire, Wine Exporter Says

 

South Africa has got its approach to taxing alcohol wrong and needs to hear more arguments to make it change tack, according to the country’s largest wine exporter.

 

Distell Group Holdings Ltd. expressed frustration after alcohol drinks makers, smarting from bans that crippled their sales during coronavirus lockdowns, were hit with an 8% increase on excise duties in Wednesday’s budget. The increased levy is likely to boost the market for illicit booze that exploded during South Africa’s lockdowns.

 

While the government contends that the higher taxes are aimed at reducing harmful drinking, “I’m not sure that’s necessarily the case,” Richard Rushton, Distell’s chief executive officer, said in an interview. “These hikes are sadly just going to essentially push an increasing amount of consumption to the gray market.”

 

Estimated to have grown to 15% of the South African alcohol industry, the illicit market may have cost tax collectors 6.4 billion rand ($432 million) under various bans or restrictions prompted by efforts to curb the spread of Covid-19. The government has said excessive drinking leads to injuries that crowd hospital emergency rooms, just as the virus strains the health system.

 

“We are going to have to engage government again,” Rushton said. “Perhaps we didn’t do a good enough job in providing enough education around it. We’ll own that responsibility.”

 

The curbs on their industry have also spurred alcohol companies to put expansion plans on hold and the new taxes could threaten other investments and place jobs at risk.

 

“It can’t be assumed the higher taxes naturally all get passed on to the consumers, so we’re going to have to see the extent to which excise is passed on by all of our competitors and what that must mean by way of jobs,” Rushton said.

 

The Stellenbosch, South Africa-based company reported after Wednesday’s market close that earnings rose 16% in its first half through December. An expanded international business boosted earnings, while units in the rest of Africa are growing.

 

“Our east African strategy is starting to play out very well for us,” Rushton said. In West Africa and other oil-rich economies, where Distell has taken a more cautious approach, it’s also “pretty confident” about the outlook.

 

Distell’s shares have rallied 20% in Johannesburg this year, rebounding from their 28% slump in 2020.

 

Alcohol Bans Force South African Wineries to Rethink Trade Plans-Bloomberg

 

 

 

Airbnb Sales Beat Estimates, Showing Demand Amid Covid Surge

 

Airbnb Inc. reported quarterly revenue that blitzed analysts’ estimates, benefiting as travelers chose vacation rentals during a holiday season marred by rising Covid-19 cases.

 

The company didn’t give a financial forecast and it was cautious about 2021, keeping a lid on share gains in extended trading.

 

Releasing its financial results for the first time as a public company on Thursday, Airbnb showed sales of $859 million in the final three months of 2020, a decline of only 22% from a year earlier. Analysts had been projecting $739.7 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Nights and experiences booked, a metric that represents the total number of guest stays and tourist activities booked on the platform, dropped 39% from a year earlier to 46.3 million, the San Francisco-based company said in a statement. Gross booking value fell 31% to $5.9 billion.

 

The coronavirus pandemic continues to hammer the travel industry after a surge in cases through winter led to new lockdowns and restrictions and the vaccine rollout has faced hurdles globally. Airbnb was among the hardest-hit companies of the pandemic and almost shelved its IPO plans as travel shut down nearly a year ago. By April, room bookings and experiences had plunged 72%. Airbnb rolled out a blanket refund policy and doled out more than $1 billion in cancellation fees.

 

But Airbnb, which helped pioneer the home-sharing vacation model, has fared better than its rivals as travelers have taken advantage of work-from-home opportunities, road-tripping to nearby mountain villages or beach towns, often booking longer stays than usual. Airbnb started to see business stabilize in the fall and the company ended 2020 with a record-setting IPO. It’s stock is up 165% since then, valuing the company at more than $100 billion, greater than either Expedia Group Inc. or Booking Holdings Inc.

 

The IPO and its associated stock compensation, as well as the effects of the pandemic, led to steep losses in the fourth quarter. Airbnb reported a net loss of $3.9 billion compared with a loss of $351.5 million a year earlier. Analysts had projected a loss of $3.2 billion. The loss per share was $11.24.

 

“We have been encouraged by our continued resilience and recovery, and are optimistic about the upcoming travel rebound,” the company said in its report. But, Airbnb said it has “limited visibility for growth” in 2021 “given the difficulty in determining the pace of vaccine roll-outs and the related impact on willingness to travel.”

 

Chief Executive Officer Brian Chesky has said he is hopeful vaccine distribution will lead to a post-pandemic travel boom that will continue to favor Airbnb over traditional hotels.

 

“We do believe the travel rebound is coming and we think it’s going to be a very big rebound,” Chesky said Thursday during an interview on Bloomberg Television. “We need to make sure we have enough hosts to prepare.”

 

The return in travel will likely be driven by longer stays as “now in a world of Zoom, people can work from home and they’re realizing they can work from any home,” he said.

 

In a conference call with analysts, Chesky said Airbnb will be investing in customer service. The company has plans to simplify users’ experiences by making it easier to book a stay and list your home on the platform. Airbnb has a goal to help users become a host in just 10 minutes. Guests will not just be “traveling on Airbnb, but living on Airbnb,” he said on the call.

 

Analysts are also optimistic. “Once a vaccine is widely distributed in the U.S. and Europe (we see by summer), revenue will come roaring back, with monthly bookings to exceed previous peak levels by year-end, reflecting the enormous amount of pent-up demand in the ecosystem,” CFRA analyst Angelo Zino wrote in a note before the results were released. He estimated Airbnb’s bookings would more than double in April. BTIG analyst Jake Fuller wrote that Airbnb is positioned to be the first online travel agent to return to room-night growth due to “the rising relevance of alternative accommodations.”

 

Airbnb shares rose about 3.5% in extended trading on Thursday. The stock closed at $182.06 in New York earlier.

 

Expedia and Booking reported steep revenue declines in the fourth quarter of 67% and 63%, respectively. However, both online travel agencies pointed to growth returning to their alternative accommodation businesses. Booking said it plans to increase its whole-home rental offerings in the U.S. in response to Airbnb’s success.

 

At the depth of the pandemic, Airbnb forecast revenue for 2020 would be less than half of what it was in 2019. On Thursday, it reported total revenue of $3.4 billion for 2020, down 30% compared to 2019.

 

“Airbnb operates almost a pure-play on alternative lodging so I think compared to other OTAs it will probably see less of a hit because that kind of lodging is more in demand,” Truist Securities analyst Naved Khan said in an interview before the results were released. People want to travel, but are opting to avoid hotels with communal lobbies, crowded elevators and shared dining spaces, according to a report released earlier this year by vacation rental data company AirDNA.

 

“Throughout 2020, alternative accommodations gained a significant leg up on traditional lodging,” the report said. Heading into last year, U.S. short-term rentals accounted for just 10% of total lodging revenue -- the pandemic boosted their share to over 25%, according to the report.

 

Airbnb is expecting to see a regional travel rebound this year. The company spent $630 million on sales and marketing in the fourth quarter, a 44% increase from the same period a year earlier. In January, the company released a report predicting travel trends for 2021, saying people will focus on rural destinations rather than crowded tourist hotspots. In the report, Airbnb said survey data showed 54% of respondents expect to travel this year. Research firm Morningstar also anticipates a travel rebound in the second half of 2021, and a full recovery by 2023.

 

 

 

EU Chief Wrongly Raised Apple Risk in Push for Vaccine Passports

 

The European Commission is backing away from claims that Apple Inc. is talking to the World Health Organization about developing vaccine passports, an argument that its president, Ursula von der Leyen, had used to encourage governments to take matters into their own hands.

 

After a five-hour video call with the European Union’s 27 leaders on Thursday, von der Leyen told reporters that it was “important to have a European solution” to establish certificates to enable countries to reopen to travel because “Google and Apple are already offering solutions to the World Health Organization.”

 

Within hours, a spokesperson from the WHO said “neither Google nor Apple” were involved in the process and a person familiar with Apple’s position suggested that von der Leyen had misunderstood.

 

On Friday, a person close to the commission president said that her understanding was now that experts from some technology companies are working with the WHO on a private basis, but Apple employees aren’t among them.

 

The debate on the summit call focused on how to haul EU nations back to a form of normalcy after a pandemic that’s claimed more than 500,000 lives and shut down large parts of their economies. While there was broad support for vaccine passports of some sort, leaders couldn’t agree on the privileges they would grant, raising questions over the summer tourist season in some of the bloc’s hardest hit countries.

 

“We have all agreed that we need vaccine certificates,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters after the talks on Thursday. “In the future, it will certainly be good to have such a certificate but that will not mean that only those who have such a passport will be able to travel; about that, no political decisions have been made yet.”

 

Europe’s leaders have been anxious to find a response after facing criticism for a vaccination program that lagged behind the U.S. and U.K. There’s also the prospect of a third wave of infections leading again to stricter lockdowns.

 

The growing support for a digital certificate with common criteria such as vaccination, negative testing or immunity was helped by Merkel seeming to soften her stance on the matter, backing work on such a document, according to two people familiar with her remarks.

 

The Greek government, one of those most urgently pushing to restart travel, also flagged up the risk that tech firms could step into the gap that EU governments have left.

 

“If we as European Union don’t provide a solution, somebody else will, whether it’s going to be the U.S. big tech companies or somebody else, the solution will be provided,” Alex Patelis, chief economic adviser to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, told Bloomberg. “Let’s get the infrastructure ready.”

 

relates to EU Chief Wrongly Raised Apple Risk in Push for Vaccine Passports

While Europe’s bloc’s tourism-dependent economies, which suffered the steepest contractions last year, are determined to open their doors to those who have been inoculated, others have resisted such moves, citing a lack of convincing evidence that vaccination halts transmission as well as concerns over granting certain citizens special privileges and legal considerations.-Bloomberg

 

 

 

Cathie Wood’s Main ETF Slips Again After $4.9 Billion Asset Drop

 

Ark Investment Management’s miserable week showed few signs of easing on Friday, as its flagship exchange-traded fund looked set for a fifth day of declines.

 

The ARK Innovation ETF (ticker ARKK) was down more than 3% in pre-market trading as of 6:28 a.m. in New York. The fund has lost 15% this week through Thursday, amid a tech selloff triggered by rising bond yields, which is putting pressure on pricier stocks.

 

The last time Ark founder Cathie Wood suffered a run this bad was almost a year ago, during the worst of the Covid-fueled mayhem. Her main fund is now 11 times larger than it was a year ago.

 

Assets in the ETF have slumped by $4.9 billion this week to $23.3 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That figure doesn’t include flows from Thursday, when ARKK dropped 6.4% for its worst day in six months.

 

After rapid build up in assets, ARKK is seeing a rapid decline

 

Bets on the ETF to decline continue to grow. Short interest now accounts for more than 4% of available shares, according to data from IHS Markit Ltd.

 

 

 

Brexit leaves London fighting for its future as Europe poaches business

 

London (CNN Business)London has been the unrivaled king of European finance for more than three decades. Brexit is starting to change that.

 

Billions of dollars worth of stock and derivatives trading has already vanished from the British capital after the United Kingdom completed its exit from the European Union on Jan. 1, shifting abroad to financial hubs in Amsterdam, Paris and Frankfurt.

 

And the threat of more lost business hangs above the city, home to dozens of the world's biggest banks, hedge funds and insurance companies. Financial services were not included in the UK-EU trade deal agreed by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Dec. 24, putting Brussels in a position to decide how much access UK-based companies will have to the vast EU market.

 

"I'm not predicting the end of London as a major financial center, but I think it's in the most precarious state it's been in for a long time and cannot be complacent," said Alasdair Haynes, the CEO of Aquis Exchange, an upstart rival to the London Stock Exchange and the CBOE.

 

[London] is in the most precarious state it's been in for a long time and cannot be complacent."

 

Trouble for London means trouble for the United Kingdom.

 

Financial services are the source of almost 11% of government tax revenue, according to PwC research. In 2019, the sector contributed £132 billion ($185 billion) to GDP, or nearly 7% of the economy's total output. Half of that was generated in London, where more than a third of the sector's 1.1 million jobs are located, according to the Office for National Statistics.

 

While more than half of Britain's finance sector revenues are domestic, any loss of tax receipts, jobs and business to rival financial markets deals a blow to the UK economy as it emerges from its worst recession in more than three centuries.

 

Early losses

 

In the absence of a deal with the European Union on financial services, there are already signs that London's undisputed position as Europe's top financial city is at risk.

 

Within days of the Brexit transition period ending at midnight on Dec. 31, London lost its ranking as Europe's largest share trading center to Amsterdam because EU financial institutions can no longer trade euro-denominated shares on UK exchanges.

 

An average €9.2 billion ($11.2 billion) of shares were traded daily in the Dutch capital in January — a more than fourfold increase from the previous month. The daily average across all shares in London fell by nearly €6 billion ($7.3 billion) to €8.6 billion ($10.5 billion) in January, according to data from CBOE Europe.

 

Huge volumes disappeared instantly. More than 99% of Aquis Exchange's European share trading moved from London to its Paris venue immediately following Brexit, according to Haynes. "Almost never do you see liquidity shift overnight," he told CNN Business.

 

London's share of trading in euro-denominated interest rate swaps, which are used to hedge against moves in interest rates, also collapsed from nearly 40% last July to about 10% in January. EU trading facilities accounted for about a quarter of the market in January, up from less than 10% in July, according to data provider IHS Markit. Trading on US venues doubled to 20%, in a sign that New York could also stand to gain from London's woes.

Analysts caution against reading too much into these early losses, but acknowledge they could be the start of a slow erosion of London's supremacy. Already, EU policymakers are taking steps to understand whether the clearing of euro-denominated derivatives such as swaps, the bulk of which still takes place in London, could move to European venues, Reuters reported this week. London's big clearing houses stand between buyers and sellers of financial instruments to ensure trades are settled.

 

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said on Wednesday that Britain would push back against any attempt by the European Union to force activity out of London. "That would be highly controversial and that would be something we would have to and want to resist very firmly," he said during a UK parliamentary hearing.

 

The loss of finance business in London looks more dramatic when compared with 2016, the year Britain voted to leave the European Union. International financial services firms have migrated £1.2 trillion ($1.6 trillion) worth of assets and relocated 7,500 jobs from Britain to the European Union since the referendum, according to data tracked by EY and published in October.

 

"We see this as a first wave," William Wright, managing director of London-based think tank New Financial wrote in January. It's plausible that about 35,000 jobs might move in the medium term, according to Wright. "The bigger threat for the UK in the medium term is that the EU tries to force more business to relocate," he added.

 

Trade details

 

The level of EU market access granted to UK companies will shape London's future. And in European capitals, there is a desire to reclaim some of the territory lost to London and deepen the continent's own financial markets.

 

Despite its huge importance to the economy, the UK government did not include financial services in Brexit trade negotiations as it raced to meet a self-imposed deadline for a deal to avoid jeopardizing trade in goods.

 

That's left London's banks, insurers and asset managers without the unfettered access to European markets they previously had, forcing companies such as JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Morgan Stanley (MS) to relocate jobs and assets to Europe in order to keep serving clients.

 

Boris Johnson's government is 'gaslighting' Britain about the realities of Brexit, critics say

 

The best that companies based in Britain can hope for now is the same market access rights that other non-EU countries have, which are determined by a patchwork of "equivalence" agreements. As things stand, the United States, Canada and Australia currently enjoy better access to EU financial markets than the United Kingdom.

 

London and Brussels have committed to agreeing a Memorandum of Understanding before the end of March, which will spell out how regulators cooperate going forward and form a basis from which equivalence agreements can be reached.

 

But the European Union is not in a rush. "It is not about restoring market access rights that the UK has lost. We will consider equivalence decisions where they are in the EU's interests," Mairead McGuinness, the commissioner for financial services, told the European Parliament last month.

Formidable strengths

 

While the loss of share trading is an "embarrassing own goal at such an early stage," it doesn't mean London has "lost the match or the tournament," said Haynes.

 

For starters, 70% of global secondary bond market trading happens in London and the city handles 43% of global foreign exchange trading, according to data from the London Stock Exchange and the Bank for International Settlements.

 

London also has established competitive strengths in highly lucrative areas of finance, such as insurance and asset management, as well as a leading position in digital payments and expertise in green finance, which is growing rapidly as companies commit billions to projects that tackle the climate crisis.

 

The London Stock Exchange is home to the first certified green bonds issued by companies in China, India and the Middle East and the first sovereign green bonds from Asia and the Americas.

 

The United Kingdom remains one of the world's largest asset management centers, second only to the United States, according to the Investment Association. And it is the world's biggest net exporter of financial services when insurance and pension services are taken into account, according to TheCityUK, a lobby group.

 

Its position and extensive infrastructure in these industries, rooted in London, has been built up over years and comes with a formidable ecosystem of specialist lawyers, accountants and regulators that can't be easily replicated. It is also underpinned by the global legal system of choice when it comes to commercial dispute resolution.

 

The fact that lost business has splintered between several different European capitals — with banks choosing Frankfurt and Paris, asset managers favoring Dublin and Luxembourg, and insurers leaning towards Brussels — makes it less likely that any one location will replace London as Europe's financial capital.

"London as a global financial center is extremely powerful," said David Durlacher, the UK and Ireland CEO of Swiss wealth manager Julius Bär. "There is a lot of established markets activity that is unlikely to shift materially. It may shift in the margins," he added.

 

Some European firms are even bolstering their presence in London. Around 1,500 EU financial services firms have applied for regulatory permission to operate in Britain, with more than two thirds planning to open their first UK offices after losing access because of Brexit, according to Financial Conduct Authority records obtained by consultancy Bovill.

 

"These numbers are a good indication that the UK financial services sector will continue to be in a strong position post-Brexit," Bovill managing consultant Mike Johnson said in a statement this week.

 

Some industry insiders say the United Kingdom should use Brexit as an opportunity to enhance investor-friendly policies, while developing financial services trade with the United States and Asia, which now has a bigger share of global finance activity than Europe.

 

"Forget about equivalence," said Haynes of Aquis Exchange. "Change the rules in such a way as to make yourself attractive," he added, pointing to the current UK listings review as an opportunity to reinvigorate London's moribund IPO market.

 

"While the EU is (not unreasonably) defining what business must be done in the EU, the UK should concentrate on being a financial center where people want to do business," added New Financial's Wright. "Brexit dents but does not fatally undermine the many factors that over decades have helped make London a dominant financial center."-CNN

 

 

 

India imposes new rules on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube

 

(CNN Business)India issued strict new rules on Thursday for Facebook (FB), Twitter (TWTR) and other social media platforms weeks after the country's government attempted to pressure Twitter to take down accounts it deemed incendiary.

 

The rules require any social media company to create three roles in India: a "compliance officer" who will ensure they follow local laws; a "grievance officer" who will address complaints from Indian users about their platforms; and a "contact person" available to Indian law enforcement 24/7. The companies will also have to publish a compliance report every month detailing how many complaints they received and what action they took.

 

Social media platforms will also be required to remove some types of content, including posts that feature "full or partial nudity," a "sexual act" or "impersonation including morphed images."

 

Large social networks, which India will define soon based on the number of users, will be given three months to comply with the policy changes, while smaller ones are expected to comply immediately, the government said.

 

The new rules come on the heels of a tense standoff between Twitter and the Indian government. Twitter reinstated several accounts that the government had ordered it to take down for using what it called "incendiary and baseless" hashtags related to farmers protesting against new agricultural reforms. The platform ultimately took down hundreds of accounts and partially restricted others, but drew a line by refusing to block accounts of journalists, activists and politicians.

 

At the same time, the rules signal greater willingness by countries around the world to rein in big tech firms such as Google, Facebook and Twitter that the governments fear have become too powerful with little accountability.

 

"Social media is welcome to do business in India — they have done exceedingly well, they have brought good business, they have brought good number of users, and they have also empowered ordinary Indians," Ravi Shankar Prasad, India's minister for electronics and information technology, told reporters on Thursday. But he said that while the government "welcomes criticism and the right to dissent," tech companies need to do more "against the abuse and misuse of social media."

 

Facebook said it would "carefully study" the new rules. "We have always been clear as a company that we welcome regulations that set guidelines for addressing today's toughest challenges on the internet," a company spokesperson told CNN Business. "Facebook is an ally for India and the agenda of user safety and security is a critical one for our platforms."

 

Twitter and Google, which owns YouTube, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

 

Some other provisions in India's rules could end up being a little more contentious, particularly a requirement to trace the "first originator" of problematic messages or posts that go viral. WhatsApp, the mobile messaging app owned by Facebook that is hugely popular in India, has pushed back against those requirements in the past, saying it would require breaking the app's end-to-end encryption.

 

Prasad also called out the difference between how social media platforms reacted to events in the United States and India, contrasting the Capitol Hill riots on January 6 with the violent clashes between Indian police and protesters at New Delhi's Red Fort a few weeks later. (The Indian government previously criticized Twitter for taking immediate action against several accounts following the Capitol Hill riot while doing so "unwillingly, grudgingly and with great delay" in India.)

 

"If there is an attack on Capitol Hill in Congress then social media supports the police action, but if there is an aggressive attack on Red Fort, the symbol of India's freedom ... there is a double standard," he said. "This is unacceptable."

 

The escalation in India creates a particular challenge for Silicon Valley as the South Asian country represents one of its biggest markets. India has more internet users than any other country except China, but its government has shown a growing tendency to regulate and restrict (or even outright ban) foreign tech companies in recent years.

 

In Thursday's press conference, Prasad cited industry estimates that highlight how important India is to these companies: WhatsApp has 530 million users in the country. Facebook's flagship platform has 410 million users and Facebook-owned Instagram has 210 million. YouTube and Twitter have around 450 million and 17.5 million users, respectively, he said.-cnn

 

 

 

Twitter is considering letting users pay accounts they like

 

(CNN Business)Twitter is exploring a way to allow users to become paid subscribers to Twitter accounts they really like.

 

The company teased the feature, which it's calling Super Follows, during its Analyst Day presentation on Thursday. If implemented, users would have the ability to pay creators for additional content within their Twitter feeds, including exclusive announcements and newsletters.

 

"We're rethinking incentives and exploring solutions to provide monetary incentive models for creators and publishers to be directly supported by their audience," Twitter said in its presentation. A company spokesperson told CNN Business that Super Follows are not available yet but Twitter will "have more to share in the coming months."

 

The social media company has been exploring subscription options in recent months, in an attempt to make money from its users and diversify beyond its core advertising business. Last month, it announced the acquisition of newsletter company Revue.

 

The concept of users paying for exclusive content from creators has become increasingly popular with the rise of platforms such as OnlyFans and Substack.

Twitter on Thursday also announced ambitious growth targets for the next few years, saying it aims to more than double its annual revenue to $7.5 billion by the end of 2023, by which time it also aims to hit or exceed 315 million monetizable daily active users — up from its current 192 million.

Twitter stock rose more than 10% on Thursday following the announcements, before giving up some of those gains later in the day.-cnn

 

 

 

Alibaba is back in Beijing's good books for helping to fix poverty 

 

Hong Kong (CNN Business)Jack Ma's tech empire may still be facing tough new regulations in China, but Alibaba seems to have won at least a little bit of favor this week from President Xi Jinping.

 

Alibaba was one of hundreds of companies that Xi commended on Thursday during a ceremony intended to bolster his years-long campaign to wipe out extreme poverty in the country.

 

Alibaba is a "model" of "national poverty alleviation," according to the certificate it received from the government. The company posted the certification on its Weibo account.

 

The company also received kudos for its efforts from Chinese state media, which this week called attention to Alibaba's efforts to help farmers sell some $155 billion worth of agricultural products through its e-commerce websites in support of Xi's campaign. State-run China Youth Daily published a report on Wednesday praising the company for its innovations, such as using AI algorithms to help farmers raise chicken, helping people sell agricultural products through live-streaming, providing education and training to poor women in the countryside, and extending loans to rural regions through its online banking services.

 

The government-backed praise is welcome news for Alibaba and Ma, which for months have been caught up in an intensifying crackdown by Beijing on the country's tech sector, including an anti-trust investigation.

 

The e-commerce giant's financial tech affiliate, Ant Group, is also expected to undergo major restructuring to satisfy regulators who are concerned about its vast reach in digital payments and finance. Ant's highly anticipated IPO was called off late last year after Ma criticized Chinese regulators.

 

The criticism of Ma in particular — who had not been seen in public for months before he briefly reemerged in January — even appeared to make its way into state media. Last month, he was left off a list of major Chinese business leaders compiled by the Shanghai Securities Journal.

 

And late last year, The People's Daily — the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party — published an opinion piece urging tech firms to take more responsibility and focus less on short-term results.

 

"Internet giants with massive amounts of data and advanced algorithms should have more responsibility, more aspirations, and more accomplishments in technological innovation," the piece read.

 

Alibaba "is privileged to have participated in [the anti-poverty campaign]," Alibaba wrote in a Weibo post Thursday.

Toeing the party line has a lot of benefits for Alibaba. Xi made clear last September that he expected private companies to support the work of the Communist Party.

 

Tech firms contributing to Xi's anti-poverty campaign are fulfilling their obligation of "serving the state," according to Alex Capri, a research fellow at Hinrich Foundation and a visiting senior fellow at National University of Singapore.

 

"This reflects well upon the party and wins support," he added. "As long as Big Tech is seen to be in proper alignment with the [Party's] nationalist message, they will be spared further public chastisement."

 

Even so, Capri cautioned that the praise for Alibaba this week "is not a contradiction of the Chinese Communist Party's hard line against Big Tech."

 

He still expects that the government will continue its crackdown, which is fueled by concerns that tech firms have too much influence over China's financial system. Several media outlets have reported that Ant, for example, has agreed with authorities to become a financial holding company — a move that could force it to scale down its aspirations to be a dominant force in the tech world.-cnn

 

 

 

Airbnb and DoorDash went public at the same time but see very different paths post-pandemic

 

(CNN Business)Airbnb and DoorDash went public the same week in early December and were both met with strong demand from investors. But in their first earnings reports as publicly traded companies on Thursday, the two sharing economy businesses signaled very different possible paths forward after the pandemic ends.

 

In a letter to investors, Airbnb said it is "preparing for the travel rebound" in 2021 after seeing bookings through its platform drop 41% in 2020 as people largely stayed home due to the pandemic.

 

"As the vaccine is rolled out and restrictions lift, we expect there will be a significant travel rebound," the company wrote in the letter.

DoorDash, by contrast, has benefited greatly from people ordering food and essential items while staying at home, with revenue of $2.89 billion last year, more than tripling from the year prior. "While the Covid-19 pandemic was a tailwind for all online commerce in 2020, we are proud of the outsized gains we made relative to category peers," the company said in its letter to investors.

 

But there's some cause for concern ahead. While the company said it hopes "markets will begin to open up soon," it also hinted at a resulting negative impact on its business. DoorDash said that this return to normal could result in "declines in consumer engagement and average order values, though the precise amount remains unclear."

 

While shares of Airbnb were essentially flat in after-hours trading Thursday following the earnings report, DoorDash stock fell more than 11%. Both companies remain well above their IPO prices.

 

For now, both companies continue to face challenges.

 

Despite strong revenue growth in the fourth quarter, DoorDash's losses grew, too. It lost $312 million in the quarter, compared to $134 million during the same period a year earlier. The company had turned its first profit -- $23 million -- in the second quarter of 2020, before reporting losses again in the third quarter.

 

Airbnb, meanwhile, posted a staggering loss of $3.9 billion in the fourth quarter, with $2.8 billion of that related to stock-based compensation. The company said it lost $4.6 billion in 2020.

 

In its earnings report, Airbnb focused on the fact that its revenue for the fourth quarter was down "only 22% year-over-year, demonstrating Airbnb's resilience." It brought in revenue of $859 million in the fourth quarter, despite surges in coronavirus cases.-cnn

 

 

 

Amanda Staveley loses High Court fight with Barclays over damages

 

A businesswoman who sued Barclays for hundreds of millions of pounds has lost her High Court battle.

 

Amanda Staveley, 47, said her private equity firm, PCP Capital, was owed money for work during the financial crisis.

 

Barclays raised billions of pounds during the crisis from Middle East backers, helping it avoid a UK government bailout.

 

The court also heard about complaints about the behaviour of bank bosses.

 

Barclays welcomed the decision, but Ms Staveley said immediately after the ruling that she was considering an appeal.

 

She said: "In spite of Barclays' efforts to question my character and credentials, the court has recognised my abilities as a businesswoman and the truth of my account of events.

 

"The judgment confirms what I have said from the outset and repeated in my evidence; a senior executive at Barclays repeatedly lied to me when seeking private investment in the bank during the 2008 financial crisis.

 

"The evidence at trial was clear and unequivocal; PCP was an investor in the transaction and played an integral role in the capital raising, which ultimately prevented the bank from being nationalised.

 

She added that she would be "taking advice on appealing the judge's decision not to award damages."

 

The financier had claimed Barclays concealed the terms of its complex fundraising, rather than disclose them to the financial markets as was required.

 

However, Mr Justice Waksman, who heard evidence at a trial in London during the summer of 2020, said her claim "as a whole must fail".

 

Lawyers representing PCP had told the judge that an initial damages claim was for a sum between £1.6bn and £400m. But that was scaled back over the course of the trial to amounts between around £830m and around £600m.-bbc

 

 

 

Kalifa review: UK 'needs a wake-up call' over fintech investment

 

The UK risks losing its dominance in financial services - unless the government backs one of its most important export industries.

 

That's according to a major new report on arguably the UK's most globally influential sector: Fintech - the combination of finance and technology.

 

Ron Kalifa, the chairman of upstart-turned-giant Worldpay was tasked with drafting a report on how the UK could (and should) reinforce its leading position in financial innovation by accelerating investment in fintech.

 

While the UK continues to beat European competition in attracting new investment, he reported an uncomfortable truth.

 

Of new financial companies selling shares to fund expansion and innovation in fintech, the US-based Nasdaq index attracted 40% of new listings compared to just 5% for the UK.

 

His recommendations include:

 

Launching a fintech growth fund, which UK pension funds would be free to invest in to stop early stage companies selling to rich foreign competitors too soon

 

Setting up a new retraining programme, which would see further education colleges offering short courses to help workers get to grips with new, essential tech skills

 

Developing 10 new fintech "clusters" located across the UK

 

Enabling high-growth companies to keep special shares, which would leave founders in control even if they sell majority stakes on. This is common in the US but against UK rules

 

This reboot of UK finance is essential according to Martin Mignot, a major investor in some of the UK's most celebrated and valuable start-ups.

 

He is a senior partner at investment firm Index Ventures, which has invested in companies like Deliveroo and Transferwise from inception to imminent multi-billion pound public share sales (IPO listings).

 

He warns that the UK and London should not be complacent about their place in the financial world: "The UK needs a wake-up call.

 

"There was a time that setting up new fintech businesses in the UK was a no-brainer, but the UK is falling down the pecking order - in part thanks to Brexit.

 

"There will be major IPOs of shares coming up, which will be seen as huge UK successes but the reality is these companies are 10 to 15 years old and were set up by non-UK founders," he says.

 

London was recently overtaken by Amsterdam as Europe's biggest centre for trading European company shares. That business is a small fraction of the total trading done in London, but European hubs and regulators are keen to prise more financial business away from the UK post-Brexit.

 

UK regulators are pessimistic that the European Union (EU) will agree to recognising UK rules as "equivalent" to rules within the trading bloc, which is likely to see more business leak out of London to subsidiaries of global banks, which have moved to the EU.

 

Influential bosses, including Barclays's chief executive Jes Staley, have told the BBC that the real competition is from the US and Asia.

 

Ron Kalifa would say, wherever it's coming from, the UK needs to be vigilant and proactive in defending a sector which makes up 10% of the UK's gross domestic product and pays 12% of all of its taxes.

 

The report comes ahead of the chancellor's Budget speech next Wednesday, which is expected to highlight the government's determination to be at the forefront of innovation.

 

As one Treasury official said: "The timing of the Kalifa report is not an accident."-bbc

 

 

 

Nearly 30,000 Macs reportedly infected with mysterious malware

 

New York (CNN Business)Nearly 30,000 Macs worldwide have been infected with mysterious malware, according to researchers at security firm Red Canary.

 

The issue was somewhat confounding to Red Canary researchers, who said it's not clear what the malware's goal is. In a blog post, the firm said it did not observe the malware delivering "malicious payloads" — essentially, harmful actions against a device.

 

The malware, which the company calls Silver Sparrow, does not "exhibit the behaviors that we've come to expect from the usual adware that so often targets macOS systems," Tony Lambert, an intelligence analyst at Red Canary wrote.

 

Silver Sparrow includes a self-destruct mechanism that appears to have not been used, researchers said, adding that it's unclear what would trigger that function. They are also uncertain of how the malware got onto infected computers, though they believe it may have been through malicious search results.

 

The researchers found that Silver Sparrow contains code that runs natively on Apple's in-house M1 chip that was released in November, making only the second known malware to do so. However, this doesn't necessarily raise red flags about the chip.

 

"New technology is going to be adopted by everybody — good guys, bad guys, everybody in between — it's definitely something that's going to happen," Red Canary Intelligence Expert Tony Lambert said.

 

Though it's unclear what the intent of the malware is, Red Canary said it decided to report the findings because its "forward-looking M1 chip compatibility, global reach, relatively high infection rate, and operational maturity suggest Silver Sparrow is a reasonably serious threat," researchers wrote.

 

Researchers believe Silver Sparrow emerged and began infecting devices sometime last year.

 

Silver Sparrow infected 29,139 Macs in 153 countries as of February 17, with higher concentrations reported in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, France and Germany, according to data from Malwarebytes, a website that blocks ransomware attacks. While that number seems large, it's a small fraction of the millions of Macs in use around the world, though it's possible there are infected devices not identified by researchers.

 

Apple revoked the developer certificates used by the malware, a company spokesperson said, which will prevent any future infections. Revoking the developer certificates also creates barriers for any existing malware infections to be able to take additional actions.

 

Red Canary detailed some "indicators of compromise" in its blog post. For the average consumer, Lambert said he recommends simply using a reputable anti-virus or anti-malware program as a backstop to the existing protections that Apple builds into the MacOS operating system, which are known for being strong.-cnn

 

 

 

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase files to go public

 

New York (CNN Business)Digital currency exchange Coinbase has officially filed to go public, riding a wave of bitcoin enthusiasm that has sent the cryptocurrency markets soaring.

 

Founded in 2012, Coinbase helps users buy, sell, and store cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and ethereum. The digital brokerage, which competes with Coinmama, CEX.IO and Gemini, announced plans to go public in December.

 

The company said it plans to list its shares on the Nasdaq exchange under the ticker symbol "COIN." More than 43 million investors in more than 100 countries use Coinbase, accounting for $455 billion in trades and $90 billion in assets on the platform, according to the company's website.

 

After years of skepticism, leading cryptocurrency bitcoin (ARSC) is finally gaining mainstream credibility. Interest in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has soared during the coronavirus pandemic, and some investors have flocked to digital currencies as the US dollar weakens.

 

The total number of bitcoins trading were collectively worth more than $1 trillion last week as the price per coin soared to nearly $60,000. Bitcoin has fallen somewhat since then, and is currently trading around $51,000.

 

Tesla (TSLA), Mastercard (MA), Bank of New York Mellon and several other mainstream companies have made significant investments in bitcoin in recent months, helping to lend legitimacy to the currency. Robinhood has averaged 3 million new cryptocurrency customers a month this year, according to the company. The best month of 2020 only saw 401,000 new crypto customers.

 

Still, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies remain hugely volatile and subject to enormous spikes and crashes.

 

For example, Tesla CEO Elon Musk on Wednesday again tweeted a photo of the mascot of cryptocurrency dogecoin, which originally started as an internet parody based on a viral dog meme. The currency spiked 10% in 30 minutes.-cnn

 

 

 

Hyundai's recall of 82,000 electric cars is one of the most expensive in history

 

New York (CNN Business)Hyundai will recall 82,000 electric cars globally to replace their batteries after 15 reports of fires involving the vehicles. Despite the relatively small number of cars involved, Hyundai's recall is one of the most expensive in history, signaling how electric car defects could create hefty costs for automakers — at least in the near future.

 

The recall will cost Hyundai 1 trillion Korean won, or $900 million. On a per-vehicle basis, the average cost is $11,000 — an astronomically high number for a recall.

 

Replacing an entire battery is an extreme measure, requiring a similar amount of work and expense as replacing an entire engine of a traditional internal combustion-powered car. Very few recalls of gasoline powered cars require an entire engine to be replaced. One of the few exceptions was a 2014 recall of 785 of the Porsche 911 GT3 sports cars. Porsche did not release the cost of that recall, but it was certainly more expensive on a per-vehicle basis than this Hyundai recall.

 

Still, a recall costing more than $11,000 per vehicle is extremely rare. Precise figures are not available because most automakers do not disclose the cost of their recalls.

 

Because there are so many more gasoline-powered cars on the road than EVs, the total cost of those recalls can easily exceed the $900 million this recall is costing Hyundai. For example General Motors recently took a $1.2 billion charge for the cost of replacing Takata airbags, but that covered 7 million vehicles, meaning the recall cost less than $200 per vehicle. The average cost of an auto recall over the last 10 years was about $500 per vehicle, according to Mike Held, a director in the automotive and industrial practice at AlixPartners, a global consulting firm.

 

"Overall, battery safety and durability will be increasingly important if auto companies want to avoid some of the large battery-recall costs that have befallen the consumer-electronics industry," he said.

 

The cost of Hyundai's recall is another indication of just how expensive EV batteries are relative to the cost of the entire car. Until the cost of batteries comes down, through greater production worldwide and economies of scale, the cost of making electric vehicles will remain higher than comparable gasoline cars.

 

Once batteries do become less expensive, as is expected in the coming years, EVs could become much cheaper to build because they have fewer moving parts and require as much as 30% fewer hours of labor for assembly compared to traditional vehicles.

 

The fewer parts on the EVs could also mean that recalls should be less common than for internal combustion-powered cars. But in the near term, there could be significant costs if battery fire problems require battery replacements.

 

Battery fires

 

No one was injured in any of the Hyundai fires, many of which took place after the cars were shut off and sitting empty. None of the fires took place in the United States. The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimated last October that there are 6,700 electric Hyundai Konas, the US version of the affected vehicles, on American roads.

 

Hyundai said an investigation into the fires showed the cars' defective LG-made battery cells could short circuit.

 

The recall also covers the Ioniq EV, and Elec City vehicles in South Korea. The recall includes 27,000 Korean vehicles and 55,000 elsewhere in the world.

Fires involving EV batteries are not unique to these vehicles. GM (GM) is also recalling an earlier version its electric Chevrolet Bolt because of fire problems caused by its own LG battery, although a different model than the one triggering the Hyundai recall.

 

GM is not replacing the batteries in the 68,000 Bolts being recalled globally. Of that total, nearly 51,000 are in the United States. While the automaker isn't saying how its problem will be addressed, it is likely to be handled with a software update.

 

Tesla (TSLA) also had a problem with battery fires early in its history, but that was tied to road debris kicking up and damaging the batteries. Most EV batteries are installed across the bottom of the car. Tesla dealt with the problem by adding more undercarriage shielding to protect the batteries.

 

Gasoline or diesel cars also present fire risks, typically after accidents when drivers and passengers are still in the vehicle, posing a greater safety threat.

 

Hyundai said it is still in talks with battery supplier LG Energy Solutions to determine which company will be responsible for the cost. The Korean Transport ministry seemed to blame LG for the fire problems in its statement on the recall, attributing them to a misaligned battery cell.

 

But LG's statement, which said it will cooperate with the Korean Transport Ministry's ongoing investigation, denied that was the reason for the fires.

"The fire was not recreated in the lab test, and the issue was an early mass production problem in Hyundai Motors dedicated line," said LG's statement. The company said it "will further strengthen safety in all processes from product plan to manufacture and inspection."-cnn

 

 

 

What happened when one company switched to a four-day workweek

 

Permanent three-day weekends may seem like a dream, but they're a reality for workers at Elephant Ventures.

 

The software and data engineering company, headquartered in New York City, started testing a four-day workweek in August to help prevent employee burnout and maintain work-life balance during the pandemic.

 

The company went full remote in March 2020, and will likely stay that way for the foreseeable future.

 

The plan was to try out 10-hour days Monday through Thursday for two months. To see what workers thought of the new schedule, the company surveyed employees about the shift before, during and at the end of that trial period.

 

"You have to really focus on empowering the team and make the decision together because everyone has to make modifications to their life," said Art Shectman, founder and president.

 

It took employees about three to four weeks to adjust, he said. After the first three-day weekend, workers returned feeling rested and excited, but at the end of that week they felt the toll of the longer days and the readjustment to their normal routines.

 

"By the third week, it was more routine. People were really starting to have adventures and plan ahead and leveraging to make use of the three-day weekend."

Ultimately, the compressed workweek was well received, so much so that the company adopted the schedule permanently.

 

More flexibility led to more worker satisfaction

 

While most employees now start their days at 7:00 am and go offline at 6:00 pm with an hour-long lunch break, schedules are somewhat flexible. For one thing, starting that early isn't possible for all employees all the time -- including Shectman.

 

"I am the fun morning dad, which means I get the kids up and give them breakfast ... I do the morning routine. From around 7:45 through 9:00 I clock out for family duty, so I try to either start early or extend a little later."

 

Employees can make up hours on Fridays or the weekend if they aren't able to get in their hours in four days. "We trust people to fill in the gaps if they missed hours," Shectman said.

 

Product and Project Manager Jonathan Cook has been with the company for almost four years. He said he was a little skeptical of the schedule change at first -- but intrigued.

 

He and his wife both work full-time and have two boys, ages 4 and 7. His day also starts a little later due to school duty so he tends to work for two more hours after the kids go to bed.

 

The extra day allows him to get personal commitments and errands done, and spend more quality time with his children. "It is breathing room ... where I can sit down and keep our life in order," he said.

 

Less meetings, more work space

 

Along with the schedule change, the company aimed to make meetings more efficient and try not to schedule meetings before 9:00 am. Having those first two hours of the day open for deep work has been a boon for productivity, Shectman said.

 

"The halo effect of that early-day productivity and deep work breeds more productivity throughout the rest of the day," he said.

 

The company also tries to avoid having meetings from 1:00 to 3:00 as well.

 

"You get that double shot of heads-down working time in a single day, which didn't always happen in the eight-hour work day," said Cook.

Longer workdays have also improved efficiency since projects aren't dragged out over multiple days.

 

"The time to get things done was shorter, projects move faster, you don't have to put it down and pick back up," said Shectman.

 

Making the shift

 

The company also has grown since making the shift -- adding 13 employees since the start of the year for a total of 54 full-time employees. It opened an office in New Zealand last week.

 

"[Shorter work weeks] absolutely help us win the recruiting battles that you engage in to win top talent and absolutely is a retention benefit," said Shectman. "Once you are adjusted to it, it's hard to go to another schedule."

 

But Shectman said company leaders have to encourage open conversations in order to make the new schedule function well.

 

"If you are a top-down management organization and used to issuing orders, it's not going to work," he said. "Employees definitely don't want their workplace dictating how their personal life should be organized and so for us, it was an everybody decision."-cnn

 

 

 

Netflix is doubling down on Asia with K-dramas and mobile-only deals. But China remains elusive

 

Hong Kong (CNN Business)Netflix has amassed some 200 million subscribers and cemented its status as the king of streaming video. Now it's looking to run up the score with a big push into Asia, its fastest-growing region.

 

The entertainment giant added 9.3 million paid subscribers in Asia Pacific last year, a 65% jump compared to 2019. Revenue in the region soared almost 62%, compared with 40% in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

 

That momentum has encouraged Netflix to direct more firepower to Asia. It's made plans to roughly double its budget for original content in the region this year in the hope of signing up even more new customers in India, South Korea, Japan and elsewhere. For the time being, though, mainland China remains off limits. (The company declined to specify how much it would spend.)

 

"We're excited — massively excited, I would say — about the potential in Asia," Greg Peters, the company's chief operating officer and chief product officer, told CNN Business. "There's literally hundreds and hundreds of millions of people that we're still trying to find a great way to connect with and entertain."

 

The content machine

 

Netflix (NFLX) moved into Asia Pacific five years ago by launching in Japan. At the time, the California-based company was essentially "a startup" in the region, said Peters, adding that it had no local workers or even office space.

 

Times have changed. Three years ago, CEO Reed Hastings predicted that the "next 100 million" users would come from India alone, and the company has since seen "big growth" in viewing there. Netflix spent some $2 billion from 2018 to 2020 to either license or produce content in Asia, and has now amassed a library of more than 200 original Asian titles. It also employs about 600 staffers across the region and keeps its APAC headquarters in Singapore.

 

The winning formula relies in part on taking hit shows from the West and marketing or adapting them for other audiences. In 2019, it rolled out a special season of "Queer Eye," where the cast performed makeovers in Japan. In December, it announced a South Korean version of "Money Heist," a Spanish crime drama that has won critical and audience acclaim.

 

But the company has found that Asian audiences don't just want to watch adaptations of Western shows.

 

When Minyoung Kim joined Netflix in 2016 as its first Asia-based content executive, the company "knew that local content was going to be a really important factor for growing our business in Asia," she said.

 

"We just didn't have ... proof," added Kim, who is vice president of content for Netflix in South Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand.

 

Today, that's no longer the case. Just as Netflix's international shows have worked in different markets, the company has found that its Asian shows have appeal worldwide. Japan's "Alice in Borderland," South Korea's "Kingdom" and "Indian Matchmaking," which was shot between India and the United States, have all been breakout successes around the globe.

 

Two other factors have been driving Netflix's growth in Asia. Last year, Korean dramas, or "K-dramas," dominated its top 10 lists in Southeast Asia. Regional viewership for Korean content quadrupled last year compared to 2019. Regional viewership of Japanese anime, meanwhile, doubled year-over-year.

 

Building an audience in Asia also means that Netflix has had to expand the number of languages it supports. The service is now available in 35 languages, including Hindi, Chinese, Vietnamese and Malay. It is continuing to add more, including subtitling and dubbing options.

 

The company has also unveiled a cheaper mobile-only plan to cater to Asian audiences who watch a lot of TV on their phones, even at home. The offering started in India in 2019, and has since expanded to other countries, such as Indonesia, Philippines and Thailand. (Amazon (AMZN) has picked up on the trend, too, launching a mobile-only subscription for Prime Video in India last month.)

 

Peters said that Asian viewers have also helped the company develop new technology that it has since rolled out globally. Someone trying to learn a foreign language, for example, might want to watch a show in slower motion. That led Netflix to introduce the ability to toggle video playback speed, which is now available worldwide.

 

The difficulties of going global

 

As competition continues to heat up, the need for new content has only gotten stronger. In recent years, Netflix has lost parts of its catalog to studios that have launched their own streaming services (including HBO Max, owned by CNN's parent WarnerMedia). By stocking up on original content, the company can hedge against the risk of losing subscribers to competitors.

 

In a letter to shareholders last month, the company acknowledged as much, saying it had been expecting more competition worldwide for years. "This is, in part, why we have been moving so quickly to grow and further strengthen our original content library across a wide range of genres and nations," it wrote.

 

Sima Taparia, the star of "Indian Matchmaking." The reality show, which followed the love lives of people in India and the United States, became an international sensation.

 

That line of thinking has allowed Netflix to build up an arsenal of new movies, series and documentaries, with more than 500 titles almost ready to launch. It even plans to release a new original film each week in 2021.

 

The company faces some significant challenges in international markets, though. In India, for example, Disney (DIS) has partnered with local player Hotstar to offer live cricket matches.

 

"One of the things that Disney/Hotstar has in India that they [Netflix] don't have is live sports," said Neil Macker, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar. "Their competitors are using other things [to hook viewers]."

 

To stand out, Netflix could partner with a wider range of players to find "some way of creating more value than just simply the [streaming] service itself," Macker added.

 

Netflix has also had to contend with political headaches.

 

In 2019, it blocked an episode of the comedy show, "Patriot Act," in Saudi Arabia that was critical of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The decision — made in response to a legal request from officials — was a "troubling compromise," Hastings told CNN.

 

Last November, Netflix found itself in hot water in India. It became the subject of boycott calls and even police complaints after some politicians objected to the series "A Suitable Boy," which featured a kissing scene between Hindu and Muslim characters at a Hindu temple. (The production was a BBC title acquired by Netflix.)

 

Asked how the firm dealt with demands for censorship, Peters pledged to support "creative freedom."

 

"We don't have a particular agenda we're trying to push," he said. "We are not looking to harm or insult any group of people, but we are working with a diverse set of creators. And those diverse sets of creators have a wide set of perspectives."

 

There is still one massive Asian market the company hasn't been able to crack: mainland China. Netflix has tried to dip into the country before, with disappointing results.

 

In 2016, the company told shareholders that the local "regulatory environment" had become an issue, though it still hoped to launch there "eventually." The following year, it embarked on a largely fruitless licensing partnership with iQiyi, a Chinese streaming giant. (Netflix's own service has never been available in mainland China.)

 

"The effect wasn't that great, so we didn't continue the partnership anymore," iQiyi CEO Gong Yu later told CNBC in an interview.

 

"We've got no plans [to launch there] for the foreseeable future," said Peters. "Really, we look at the opportunity outside of China."

Even accounting for the company's success elsewhere in Asia, though, Peters said it can't afford to be complacent.

 

"There's nothing I would say that I'm satisfied with. We have to constantly keep improving," he said. "We're connected with a lot of people around the world. But it's not everybody, right? So we have more work to do."-cnn

 

 

 

Anglo aims at further 10 year life extension of SA iron ore assets; open to consolidation

 

ANGLO American intended to extend its mining operations held in Kumba Iron Ore by a further ten years to bring it in line with the group’s 25 year average life of mine.

 

Kumba announced earlier this week that it had approved a R3.6bn project which would see it mine at its flagship Sishen mine to 2039. Including existing extension projects, this latest project increased mine life by six years.

 

“We would like to push out the life by another 10 years,” he said. “Exploration is very important [in the Northern Cape province].” He added that Anglo would be prepared to enter into cross-border consolidation with other regional miners.

 

“We would join up with others if that makes sense in order to share exploration. We have people thinking in smart ways about the right places to go and this is on the agenda.”

 

EXCHANGE CONTROLS

 

Cutifani also hailed steps by South Africa to modernise its system of exchange controls saying the development created a single balance sheet and made investment in the country easier to conduct.

 

“The Minister for Finance [Tito Mboweni] has done a helluva job to deregulate the market. He deserves great credit,” said Cutifani during the UK-listed group’s annual results presentation to media on Thursday. “We’ve got more flexibility.”

 

Mboweni said in the National Treasury’s 2020 budget speech last year that steps would be taken over a year-long to adopt a capital flow management system. He said on Wednesday, during his 2021 budget address that other structures affecting exchange control would be tackled.

 

“I have worked in South Africa since 2007 and the single most important issue has been exchange control. So the changes are massive. This is a critical step as there is only one balance sheet which is important to future investment.”

 

South Africa accounted for 55% of Anglo American’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) in its 2020 financial year from a “normal” contribution of between 30% to 40%, partly owing to the strength of iron ore and platinum group metal (PGM) prices.-miningmx

 

 

 

Anglo SA coal demerger plan given pause for thought as buyers “put up their hands”

 

ANGLO American was making “good progress” in the divestment of its South African thermal coal assets through a demerger and listing in Johannesburg – most likely before the year-end – but other options were being weighed, the group said today.

 

“We do have people putting their hands up to which we are giving due and proper consideration,” said CEO Mark Cutifani when asked if a trade sale of the South African thermal coal assets was a viable alternative to a demerger.

 

“The demerger route is still the most likely, but I wouldn’t rule out a trade sale,” he said, adding that a buyer would have to meet operational and governance standards, especially given the enormous scrutiny given to carbon-heavy assets.

 

Anglo American produced 16.5 million tons from its South African coal assets during its 2020 financial year, a 7% year-on-year reduction, producing a $15m underlying EBITDA loss, and taking EBITDA losses over two years to $20m.

 

South African coal contributes 3% of group EBITDA and has a mine life of about 13 years which is less than the average life of mine held by the company of some 25 years).

 

Anglo broke even at its Colombia coal operations which consist of a one-third stake in the large Cerrjeon mine, held with BHP and Glencore. Cutifani said he anticipated Anglo making a decision on its Cerrejon investment in two to three years. “We have partners and that is a different conversation,” he added.

 

Anglo reported strong full-year numbers. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) came in at $9.4bn for the year ended December – beating consensus by $400m. There was a beat, too, on earnings per share which at 253 US cents was 10% above consensus. A final dividend of 72c/share was announced, a 53% improvement year-on-year.

 

Strong contributions from the group’s copper, iron ore, and platinum group metals (PGM) assets drove performance, with thermal coal and diamonds struggling. Basic headline earnings per share of $2.47 compared to $2.74 in the comparative period. Net debt came in at $5.6bn equal to 0.6x in terms of EBITDA to net debt.

 

Cutifani was guarded on the metals and minerals market. The narrative currently being spun is that demand is so high that another super-cycle had begun.

 

“I have been in the industry for 44 years and I have seen cycles and supercycles. Demand is strong and supply is relatively constrained because of less than required capital investment, but we are keeping our feet on the ground,” he said.

 

“We can’t be seduced by good prices,” he said.

 

Glencore said at its year-end investment update that it would be entirely carbon neutral by 2040, including its Scope 3 emissions – those produced by end-users. Cutifani said he was reluctant to get into “an arms race” in achieving carbon neutrality.

 

“I don’t feel the pressure on Scope 3,” he said. “There are about 10 different methodologies for calculating Scope 3 but we want to define Scopes 1 and 2 (emissions by own assets and those of suppliers) and have a plan.-miningmx

 

 

 

	
	
	

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DISCLAIMER: This report has been prepared by Bulls ‘n Bears, a division of Faith Capital (Pvt) Ltd for general information purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy or subscribe for any securities. The information contained in this report has been compiled from sources believed to be reliable, but no representation or warranty is made or guarantee given as to its accuracy or completeness. All opinions expressed and recommendations made are subject to change without notice. Securities or financial instruments mentioned herein may not be suitable for all investors. Securities of emerging and mid-size growth companies typically involve a higher degree of risk and more volatility than the securities of more established companies. Neither Faith Capital nor any other member of Bulls ‘n Bears nor any other person, accepts any liability whatsoever for any loss howsoever arising from any use of this report or its contents or otherwise arising in connection therewith. Recipients of this report shall be solely responsible for making their own independent investigation into the business, financial condition and future prospects of any companies referred to in this report. Other  Indices quoted herein are for guideline purposes only and sourced from third parties.

 


 

 


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