February 8, 2018

janusobserver12

8 years ago

Perspective

“In spite of the upset which saw the Eagles beat the Patriots 41 to 33 in a hard-fought battle in Minneapolis that came down to the final seconds of play, the broadcast drew 7% fewer viewers to NBC with 103.4m watching, according to Nielsen.”
“When people who watched the game online were included, NBC counted a total audience of 106m and said it was the most-streamed Super Bowl ever. But this compares with the 111.3m people who tuned in to Fox’s broadcast last year.”
“While football remains the most popular programming on US television, the figures from Nielsen underscore the ratings decline that has been plaguing the National Football League for two seasons. Audiences for regular season games shrank 10% in 2017, an acceleration from 2016’s 8% decrease.”

“Cryptocurrency is ‘a Ponzi scheme and an environmental disaster’ says Agustin Carstens.”

“The rule barring debate of the country’s role in the Holocaust is a policy disaster.”

“The release of the conglomerate’s de facto leader will do little to allay investors’ concerns about the country’s corporate governance standards.”
“Mr. Lee (Lee Jae-yong) walked free on Monday after appealing the five-year prison term handed to him in August when he was convicted on bribery and embezzlement charges: He received a reduced and suspended sentence instead. The next stage could see the case go to South Korea’s Supreme Court.”

“Sales of smartphones in China — the world’s biggest market, responsible for about one in every three shipments — fell last year for the first time since 2009, raising fresh concerns about the strength of the global handset market.”
“Data from IDC, the research company, showed that smartphone sales slumped 4.9% in 2017 from the previous year as the local market, a growth engine for the global mobile phone industry, contracted.”
“Analysts pointed to the fact that Chinese consumers were waiting longer to replace their smartphones than they have in the past, mirroring a similar trend in other markets including the UK.”
“IDC’s numbers come just days after data provider IHS Markit said global smartphone sales had dropped 4.5% in the last quarter of 2017, with only Xiaomi and Lenovo’s Motorola experiencing any growth in shipments.”
“Apple took the biggest hit in China last year according to IDC, with unit sales down 8.3% year on year, although the company continued to dominate the premium market for phones that cost more than $600.”
“In terms of overall value, the China mobile market grew 11% in 2017 — from $120bn in 2016 to $134bn.”

“Only very rarely has a trade gone from being so good to being so bad so quickly.”
“Among the most profitable trades during the bull market has been to short volatility, essentially betting the market would get calmer and stay calm. An exchange-traded instrument, the VelocityShares Daily Inverse VIX Short-Term exchange-traded note, grew to $2 billion by harnessing futures on the Cboe Volatility Index.”
“The note, with the symbol XIV, had a 46% compound annual return from its inception in 2010 to two weeks ago. Late on Monday, though, the combined value of the note fell 95% to less than $15 million as trading was halted early Tuesday. Sponsor Credit Suisse says the last day of trading will be later this month.”
“The lesson in the trade’s collapse isn’t that volatility is a flawed asset class. Instead, it is one as old as markets—crowded, ‘can’t lose’ trades often end in stampedes.”

“Are any of today’s cryptocurrencies going to be an Amazon or a Google, or will they end up like many of the now-defunct search engines? Just because we are in a speculative bubble does not mean current prices can’t increase for a handful of survivors…. At the same time, it probably does mean that most, if not all, will never see their recent peaks again.” – Steve Strongin, Goldman Sachs

“Chinese property developers have retreated sharply from Hong Kong’s booming land market, becoming the latest industry to be dented by Beijing’s capital controls and intensified scrutiny of outbound transactions.”
“Chinese developers won 11% of bids by value in Hong Kong government land auctions since April, down from about 50% in the preceding two years, according to an analysis of official data by Standard & Poor’s, the debt rating agency.”
“Esther Liu, an analyst at S&P, said the main reason for the pullback by Chinese developers was the clampdown on outbound investment by the Chinese government, which began in late-2016. Beijing has since intensified the crackdown as it seeks to stem capital outflows and discipline companies such as HNA that borrowed heavily to fund a flurry of overseas deals.”
“Ms. Liu said that Chinese developers were also deterred by the longer development cycle in Hong Kong, compared with mainland China.”
“She said it typically took six to nine months in China for developers to progress from buying land to launching their first off-plan sales. In Hong Kong, by contrast, it can take several years to plan the development of the site and obtain the required permissions.”
“Despite the retreat of the mainland developers, analysts forecast that Hong Kong property prices will continue to rise.”

“One of China’s richest men has revealed an attempt to sue a municipal government for Rmb4bn ($640m) over a suspended project to build a new city, the biggest case of its kind brought by an entrepreneur against the state.”
“Yan Jiehe said the company he founded, China Pacific Construction Group, had not been paid for its work on Lanzhou New City, a settlement once billed as ‘Las Vegas in the Gobi’, where diggers flattened dozens of hills before officials suspended the project in 2013.”