The euro zone economy has performed worse than expected in recent months and global uncertainty is weighing on economic sentiment, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said on Monday, repeating the bank’s recent warnings about growth.READ MORE...
Even as Beijing pushes out new measures to stimulate its economy, China’s growth slowdown will make it harder for the country’s companies to pay their debts this year, ratings agencies say.
The Chinese government on Monday announced official GDP figures for last year that showed the world’s second-largest economy expanded at its slowest pace in nearly three decades.READ MORE...
Apple on Monday said it spent $60 billion on 9,000 American component suppliers and companies in 2018, up 10 percent from 2017.
Those suppliers supported “more than 450,000 jobs” in the United States in 2018 and have created or supported more than 2 million jobs since 2011, the company said.READ MORE...
stocks fell on Monday as weak forecasts from Caterpillar Inc and Nvidia Corp fueled worries about a slowdown in China taking a bigger bite off corporate profits.READ MORE...
File hosting & cloud services company Dropbox plans to acquire HelloSign for $230 million.
Dropbox is apparently keen on diversifying into workflow processes to expand its storage capabilities – something that it hopes to achieve by buying HelloSign. According to Whitney Bouck, COO at HelloSign, the company will remain an independent entity within the Dropbox family, if the acquisition happens.
Subject to regulatory approval, the deal is expected to close in the first quarter.
A Bloomberg report on Friday suggested that preliminary talks were on, although it is still uncertain whether or not the initial interest would develop into a bidding process.
Private-equity firms including Blackstone, Stonepeak, KKR, I Squared, GTCR and Charlesbank have also reportedly shown interest in Zayo.Their buyout offers were reportedly in the range of low to mid $30 per share.
In pre-market trading on Monday, Zayo shares jumped around +5%.
The U.S. economy lost at least $6 billion during the partial shutdown of the federal government due to lost productivity from furloughed workers and economic activity lost to outside business, S&P Global Ratings said on Friday.READ MORE...
President Donald Trump’s tax cut package is apparently yet to produce a substantial boost in business spending, as suggested by a recent survey result.
According to the National Association of Business Economics' (NABE) quarterly business conditions poll published on Monday, 84% of respondents indicated that corporate tax cuts did not lead them to change plans.That percentage is even bigger compared to the 81% in the survey published in October.
The $1.5 trillion cut tax package – which included a reduction of corporate tax rate to 21% from 35% - is the largest U.S. tax code overhaul in more than three decades.
Horton Inc. reported earnings per share of 76 cents, which fell short of FactSet consensus estimate of 78 cents.Its net sales orders increased +3% to touch 11,042 – which was less than FactSet new orders consensus of 11,411.
Chairman Donald Horton attributed rising home prices in recent years and increasing interest rates as factors behind downward pressure on home demand.
Nevertheless, the home construction company still experienced a +52% year-over-year increase in net income which touched $287.2 million in the quarter.
The company also lowered its projection for the full year profit, citing pressures from increasing raw material costs and dollar appreciation.
Apparently compelled by higher transportation/commodity costs to hike product prices in Brazil and Argentina, Colgate suffered lower demand from these regions.Keen on boosting advertising in fiscal 2019, the company still portends challenges from currency exchange rate uncertainties and higher raw material costs – headwinds that the firm expects would drag down earnings per share by a mid-single-digit for the year.
Forecasters are less optimistic about U.S. expansion this year, though they’re nearly unanimous in their expectations that a recession can be kept at bay until at least 2020, a National Association for Business Economics survey showed Monday.Read More...
Software firm Autodesk (Nasdaq: ADSK) saw a pattern form in the last few days that could be a bad sign for the stock.You could also draw a trendline that connects the three closing highs, ignoring the intraday high on December 3.
We also see that the overbought/oversold indicators hit overbought levels with the recent rally and they have now turned lower with the stochastic readings making a bearish crossover.
Tickeron’s AI Trend Predictor made a bearish prediction on Autodesk two days ago and the previous predictions on ADSK have been accurate 74% of the time since 2005.
McCormick & Co. may not have been able to spice things up yet with its recent quarterly report. The producer of condiments and seasonal mixes saw its shares decline nearly -13% on Thursday, after it reported earnings that fell short of analysts’ estimates.
The company posted adjusted earnings of $1.67 per share for the fourth quarter, which was lower than Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.70 per share.It projects sales growth of 1%-3% for the year.
Cloud-based application software firm Akamai Technologies (Nasdaq: AKAM) has been trending lower since June and a downward-sloped trend channel has formed as a result.That has been the case in most of the instances where the stock hit the upper rail—the 10-day RSI has been elevated but not in overbought territory.
Akamai is set to announce earnings on February 12 and that could serve as a catalyst for the stock to break out of the channel.
Apparel and footwear manufacturer Under Armour (NYSE: UA) has jumped sharply over the past month, gaining over 20% since hitting its recent low on December 24.While the rally was welcomed by investors after the stock dropped almost 33% from December 6 through that low.
The rally could run in to some problems in the coming days as the stock has caught up to its 50-day moving average.
Shares of Lam Research surged nearly +15% on Thursday, after the company reported an estimate-beating Q2 performance.
According to the company, 2018 proved to be the strongest financial year in its history, after it reported +14%, +27% and +50% growth in revenue, EPS and operating cash flow, respectively.
For the second quarter, the company reported revenue of $2.55 billion compared to analyst estimates of $2.45 billion, and reported an EPS of $3.87 against an estimate of $3.38.
A gross margin of 46.3% also beat consensus by 0.3%, while operating margin stood at 28.8% against a consensus of 27.5%.Ending deferred revenue for the company for Q2 stood at $493 million compared to the $626 million in Q1.
Lam Research has also confirmed a $5 billion share repurchase program that will be carried out through combination of cash on hand, cash generation, and borrowings.
Ford published its fourth quarter earnings and reported a loss of $116 million.
But the news that caught everyone’s attention is that the company reported a 28% y-o-y drop in its operating income, excluding the pension charge and other one-time items, both for the quarter and for the year.In Europe, Ford lost $199 million in the fourth quarter, with a full year loss of $398 million.
Targeting low cost real estate and offering affordable coffee to young professionals, Luckin is a technology-forward startup that has already made name for itself in a short span of time.
Should Luckin's growth worry Starbucks?
It hasn't worried analysts yet, who maintain an overweight on Starbucks with a $70 price target.
Luckin is still a start-up, and in China per-capita coffee consumption is less than one cup/year compared to 300 cups in the U.S.So, there is an ample opportunity for growth for both companies.
Second, Starbucks also has a strong presence in China through its 3,251 stores, and its recent collaboration with UberEats is expected to act as a catalyst in further strengthening its foothold.
The U.S. dollar jumped to a five-year high against the euro on Thursday, following European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi’s comments.
Draghi hinted that uncertainties related to international trade tensions, emerging market turmoil and geopolitical risks continue to plague the outlook for the euro zone’s economy.That probably set off market expectations of a dovish stance from the ECB, at least for the near-term. The euro was -0.18% lower against the dollar at $1.136, after falling as low as $1.1308 - its lowest since Dec. 17.
What could have potentially added to the dollar’s upside was strong labor market conditions in the U.S. Latest official figures revealed that the number of applicants for unemployment benefits fell to more than a 49-year low last week in the U.S.