It figures, as the WSJ explains, to be another banner year for the massive Chinese e-commerce player. Buoyed by China’s insatiable online shoppers, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. posted a strong third quarter, raised its revenue outlook and said it would step up investments to expand its digital media and cloud businesses. Alibaba, which runs China’s most popular e-commerce websites Taobao and Tmall, said Tuesday that fiscal year 2017 sales would rise 53%, up from an earlier forecast of 48%. The Chinese e-commerce giant is riding the wave in the country’s online retail growth as internet … [Read more...]
Is Wells Fargo Too Big to Succeed?
When a bank gets too big, it’s the customer who usually pays the price. Look no further than Wells Fargo: As Wells Fargo & Co.’s sales-tactics scandal unfolded, investors, regulators and politicians asked how improper practices could have persisted for so long. One possible reason: bank branches were given a heads up before Wells Fargo’s internal monitors landed for inspections. Managers and employees at the bank’s roughly 6,000 branches across the U.S. typically had at least 24 hours’ warning about annual reviews conducted by risk employees, current and former Wells Fargo employees … [Read more...]
Here is Why the Stakes are so High with NAFTA
In one of his first executive orders, President Trump has promised to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Since the signing of NAFTA in 1994, trade among the member countries has increased significantly and North American supply chains now sprawl across Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. The stakes of a renegotiation are high, but the opportunity for the U.S. to strike a better deal is significant. Donald Trump has put “renegotiating” the two-decades-old North American Free Trade Agreement between the US, Canada and Mexico at the top of his economic agenda and threatened to … [Read more...]
A Major Apple Supplier Plans Massive U.S. Expansion
The creation of 30,000 to 50,000 good paying jobs may be just over the horizon. The Wall Street Journal lays out the plan. BEIJING—Electronics manufacturer Foxconn Technology Group is considering investing $7 billion to build a flat-panel screen factory in the U.S., but the company founder says incentives will be needed to make the deal happen. Speaking at a Foxconn company event in Taiwan on Sunday, founder and chairman Terry Gou said the factory could create 30,000 to 50,000 jobs in the U.S., and discussions were already under way with state and local officials in Pennsylvania and other … [Read more...]
You Need to Know What Happens When You Make Savings Urgent
Saving early and often is always a great idea. One of the biggest obstacles to long-term peace of mind and safety in your retirement is: You. If you realize that, then you’re on your way to realizing the retirement you deserve. The good news: Academics are finding ways to make the future seem more immediate and demanding of attention in various contexts, including saving for retirement. The new techniques—hailing from the field of behavioral science—have been shown to motivate people to save more and earlier, advantages that give money more time to grow. The bad news: The savings crisis is … [Read more...]
This is why Investment in Infrastructure is Soaring
At Young Research, infrastructure assets have long-been one of our most favored investment sectors. The business models of many infrastructure businesses have appeal. The competition is limited, the cash flows are stable, the revenue streams are often inflation-adjusted, and the dividend payout ratios are generous. Recently, we have been less active in the space than in years past. Why? Great businesses don't always make great investments. As the Financial Times reports, institutional investors have been pouring billions into infrastructure assets in search of yield. A prolonged period of … [Read more...]
Wait Until You See The Amazing Year Energy has in 2017
It is going to be a great year for U.S. energy producers in 2017. The Wall Street Journal outlines some breathtaking prospects. Oil producers, optimistic that higher crude prices are here to stay, have issued 2017 budgets that call for dramatically greater spending to tap new wells. Preliminary capital-spending plans released in recent weeks by more than a dozen American shale drillers, including Hess Corp. and Noble Energy Inc., show an average 60% budget increase for the group. The trend comes after two years of austere budget cuts and layoffs at shale companies to help them cope … [Read more...]
What Happens When Wall St. Wolves Feast on Unsuspecting People?
The Department of Labor's fiduciary rule has many flaws, but one part of the rule that was to be commended (as I did here) was the restrictions placed on variable annuities in retirement portfolios. Now the Department of Labor wants to water down these rules, and allow the wolves of Wall St. to once again slaughter unsuspecting savers with extreme fees and terms that put customers at a distinct disadvantage. Today Michael Wursthorn writes in the Wall Street Journal that the rule roll-back is meant to appease the very wolves who have been taking advantage of retirees for years, the sellers … [Read more...]
The Transformation Opportunity of the Supergrid
Here The Economist explains how the supergrid could transform the energy landscape. With ultra-high-voltage direct-current electricity, grids can be connected to power generation facilities over long distances. This has broad implications for renewable power generation as well as fossil fuel powered generation. THE winds of the Oklahoma panhandle have a bad reputation. In the 1930s they whipped its over-tilled topsoil up into the billowing black blizzards of the Dust Bowl. The winds drove people, Steinbeck’s dispossessed, away from their livelihoods and west, to California. Today, the … [Read more...]
This Miracle Tech Revolution Will Change the World
Here comes the STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) revolution, writes Hewlett-Packard Enterprise. Some call the Internet of Things (IoT) the Intelligence of Things or the Internet of Everything. By whatever name, futurists say it heralds the moment when sensor-driven data connects everything to everything else and artificial and human intelligence become a seamless whole—the planet and virtually everything in and on it transformed into a single, thinking entity. That is the visionary view. The consensus is astonishing enough: we are in the earliest phases of a technological … [Read more...]
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