Americas

Life sciences undergo painful genetic modification

2 Apr 2025

Washington funds $160 bln of R&D a year and attracts more by backing early-stage work. Sweeping budget cuts immediately affect companies such as Becton Dickinson, which is selling its labs unit, and Thermo Fisher. Bigger costs await from delayed therapies or ones never developed.

StubHub IPO is destined for the cheap seats

2 Apr 2025

The online swap-meet for tickets to anything from WrestleMania to Lady Gaga was last valued at $17 bln in 2021. Headliners include cash flow and 30% growth. But gloomy consumers and investors mean controlling shareholder and CEO Eric Baker would be lucky to get half-price.

Brookfield may have to dig deeper to bag Grifols

2 Apr 2025

The Canadian firm is eyeing a $7.5 bln offer for the pharma group, as per Spanish media. The juicier bid could still yield an attractive return and Brookfield’s interest, despite fraud allegations, adds value to the company. That may embolden the seller to play hardball.

China stocks are still a trade, not an investment

2 Apr 2025

Global traders are returning to Chinese equities but long-term investment allocations have lagged. The $14 trln onshore market remains an IPO wasteland where fast foreign money prevails over buy-and-hold. Beijing’s private sector support will struggle to offset US aggression.

Goldman follows logical path to bad executive pay

1 Apr 2025

Proxy firms urged investors to vote against the $80 mln retention fillips for CEO David Solomon and deputy John Waldron. Increasingly formidable rivals would happily wreck succession plans and targeted rewards are awkward. It makes sense, until it ends in more money for the boss.

Plugging the gaping holes in economic data

1 Apr 2025

Measuring growth requires reliable information about an economy’s output. But the established methods are hopelessly out of date. In this episode of The Big View podcast, economist Diane Coyle discusses ways in which statistics could be improved, and why change is so hard.

Trump tariff liberation means endless complication

1 Apr 2025

The US president is preparing to reveal levies on imports worth trillions of dollars. That will kick off a process of retaliation and negotiation which may last years. Trump’s devotion to using tariffs to tackle a range of American woes means trade uncertainty is here to stay.

Make in India could do with a dose of MAGA energy

1 Apr 2025

New Delhi may let its $23 bln flagship manufacturing scheme lapse after Reliance, Adani and others missed targets. The government offered subsidies but failed to cut red tape. Creating jobs for the country's giant workforce will require a Donald Trump-style all-it-takes approach.

Larry Fink shows his momentum-trade stripes

31 Mar 2025

The BlackRock CEO’s latest missive details how the $12 trln fund manager goes with the flow. Stakeholder capitalism and climate are out; private markets and digital tokens are in. Febrile politics explain such shifts, but the shaky Panama ports deal exposes the extra volatility.

Rocket’s housing expansion cramps existing lodgers

31 Mar 2025

The home lending tech firm is buying mortgage servicer Mr. Cooper for $9 bln, its second all-stock deal in a month. Building a one-stop shop for house hunters makes sense. But the M&A rush dilutes existing investors, whose share of profit-boosting cost savings looks skimpy.

 

US threat oils wheels of Pirelli’s China derisking

31 Mar 2025

The $6 bln Italian tyremaker is pressing its Beijing-backed shareholder to cut its 37% stake. Pirelli’s US growth plans may admittedly suffer if it doesn’t. But a shift might also enable tycoon Marco Tronchetti Provera to once again use geopolitics to improve his influence.

Mini nuclear reactor rush has a short half-life

31 Mar 2025

AI’s ravenous appetite for always-on power has drawn the likes of Google and OpenAI boss Sam Altman into the race to build cheaper atom-splitters. But aspirations to triple nuke power could cost $7 trln, while cheap renewables already benefit from the vaunted economies of scale.

The Li’s brinkmanship with Beijing will be messy

31 Mar 2025

Offloading global assets from ports to telecoms will help the Hong Kong clan behind CK Hutchison exit a value trap, except China senses betrayal. The Li’s exposure to the country remains sizeable: retail, utility and property assets provide Beijing with ample pressure points.

GameStop completes meme-stock evolution

28 Mar 2025

The $10 bln firm, ostensibly a video-game retailer, is selling convertible debt to fund bitcoin purchases. Pioneered by crypto hoarder Strategy, this is the apex in the life cycle of companies turned message-board obsessions: sell retail trader frenzy as a product to hedge funds.

Fake chocolate is a sweeter bet than plant burgers

28 Mar 2025

Once-hyped startups failed to displace beef with eco-conscious alternatives. Artificial confections have a stronger pitch: as candy makers like Hershey struggle to hedge rising cocoa costs amid a supply crunch, economic reality will tempt the $130 bln treat industry into the lab.

Carmakers’ US dreams turn to nightmare dilemma

28 Mar 2025

Hyundai is investing $21 bln to ramp up production in the US. It's a risky bet that higher manufacturing costs will be easier to manage than tariff-induced higher import costs. It also underscores the sheer importance of the American market to the South Korean giant.

King Dollar’s long reign is set to continue

28 Mar 2025

President Donald Trump’s trade wars raise new concerns about the US dollar’s future as a reserve currency. Members of his administration are also ambivalent about the greenback’s status. Yet the dollar has defied doom-mongers for half a century. It will not be easily dethroned.

CoreWeave scripts AI’s Tinker Bell moment

27 Mar 2025

The cloud services firm cut its mooted target IPO valuation by 22% as supplier Nvidia steps in for support. Like the storybook fairy, the business lives on belief, in this case that a few companies will keep feeding a circular silicon economy. Rising doubt could be existential.

Basic rules of banking apply to Klarna too

27 Mar 2025

The buy now, pay later provider wants to be valued as a disruptor in its US IPO. But on conventional metrics, loan losses, which grew 40% to $495 mln last year, compare poorly with credit card users. There’s no sign Klarna and its peers have invented a better way to lend money.

Car investors only take US tariffs semi-seriously

27 Mar 2025

Shares in the likes of BMW and Volkswagen fell after President Donald Trump whacked 25% tariffs on auto imports. Those declines may not be pricing in the worst. Carmakers can soften the blow, and Trump may backtrack. Yet US trade imbalances suggest that may not happen soon.