- Business Insider•6 hours ago
Silicon Valley is so expensive that even Facebook and Apple employees can't afford to live near the office
Silicon Valley's housing crisis is serious. A new report from Open Listings reveals that workers at five major tech companies, including Apple, Facebook, and Google, would have to spend over 28% of their salary to pay a monthly mortgage on a home near work. Software engineers at Apple have it worst.
Reuters•yesterdayBuffett says Berkshire can handle $400 billion mega-catastrophe
Warren Buffett says: Bring it on. In his annual letter to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc , Buffett said "no company comes close" to his conglomerate in its ability to financially withstand even a mega-catastrophe that causes $400 billion of insurance losses. Buffett said the odds of such a catastrophe in any year is just 2 percent, but that Berkshire would lose only about $12 billion, a sum more than offset by annual profits from its non-insurance businesses.
- Investopedia•2 days ago
Tesla Billionaire Elon Musk Reveals How Much Bitcoin He Owns
Billionaire Elon Musk is a huge fan of cutting-edge technology and is usually ahead of the curve when it comes to finance, but he's not a bitcoin bull. The co-founder of Tesla Inc. revealed on Twitter that he owns only a tiny fraction of one bitcoin token. "I literally own zero cryptocurrency, apart from .25 BTC that a friend sent me many years ago," Musk confessed. Using today's bitcoin price of about $10,000 a coin, that translates to $2,500. The serial entrepreneur – whose net worth tops $20 billion – made the revelation in response to a question about a Twitter scam where random users posed as celebrities (like Musk) in a bid to steal people's cryptocurrencies. Musk's indifference to bitcoin
- Yahoo Finance•yesterday
These companies are cutting ties with the NRA
In the wake of the mass shooting in a Florida high school last week, companies are dropping their partnerships with the National Rifle Association (NRA), which touts 5 million members. According to a list compiled by ThinkProgress, an advocacy organization, there are at least 22 corporations, including car-rental companies and financial institutions that have been offering discounts to NRA members. –First National Bank of Omaha: The largest privately held bank announced it will stop issuing the NRA Visa Card due to “customer feedback” on Thursday.
Reuters•yesterdayBuffett says 'terrible mistake' for long-term investors to be in bonds
Billionaire Warren Buffett prodded ordinary investors on Saturday to stay invested in U.S. stocks, ignoring price swings, guidance from people with fancy credentials and the temptation to load up on bonds. Buffett said it is a "terrible mistake" for investors with long-term horizons - among them, pension funds, college and endowments and savings-minded individuals - to measure their investment "risk" by their portfolio's ratio of bonds to stocks. The long-time bull on U.S. companies and the economy issued his latest letter to Berkshire Hathaway Inc shareholders on Saturday.
- Zacks•2 days ago
Buy These 5 Stocks with Rising Estimates Today
Depending on our need for cash and risk appetite, we may try to make the most of daily market movements, or hold on in the hopes that the overall financial health/stability of a company will yield higher value in the form of dividends or share price appreciation.
Yahoo Finance•yesterday8 memorable quotes from Warren Buffett's newest shareholder letter
In his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A, BRK-B) shareholders, legendary investor Warren Buffett muses on the M&A environment, his aversion to leverage, opportunities to buy during downturns, and his disregard for fees charged by active managers.
Yahoo Finance•yesterdayWarren Buffett: Investors handicapped by debt miss 'extraordinary opportunities'
It’s impossible to accurately know when the next market decline will be, according to legendary investor Warren Buffett. It’s important to remember that even Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A, BRK-B) hasn’t been immune to significant swings in its stock price either. “This table offers the strongest argument I can muster against ever using borrowed money to own stocks.
- Fox Business Videos•2 days ago
GE asset sales catch the attention of private equity firms
Carlyle Group Co-CEO Glenn Youngkin discusses how his company plans to continue its success and what the future holds for General Electric.
Bloomberg•2 days agoGeneral Electric Cuts $2.4 Billion Off S&P-Worst Pension Deficit
General Electric Co. trimmed its pension deficit by $2.4 billion as the manufacturer tackles the worst shortfall in corporate America. The company closed 2017 with $100.3 billion in obligations across its pension plans and $71.6 billion in assets. Pension funding has become a central issue for GE stakeholders concerned about how the beleaguered company will meet its obligations while dealing with severe cash-flow and earnings challenges.
Reuters•yesterdaySaudi oil minister hopes OPEC, allies can ease output curbs in 2019
Saudi Arabia hopes OPEC and its allies will be able to relax production curbs next year and create a permanent framework to stabilise oil markets after the current supply cut deal ends this year, its oil minister said on Saturday. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is reducing output by about 1.2 million barrels per day (bpd) as part of a deal with Russia and other non-OPEC producers. The pact, aimed at propping oil prices, began in January 2017 and will run until the end of 2018.
Yahoo Finance•yesterdayA few major topics were missing from Warren Buffett's latest annual letter
There were a few notable topics that Warren Buffett did not want to talk about in his latest letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders. Warren Buffett’s latest letter to Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A, BRK-B) shareholders was released Saturday, and a few major themes were missing. The last 18 months at Wells Fargo, Berkshire’s largest public market equity investment by market value, have been tumultuous. The bank has been embroiled in a scandal over opening millions of fake accounts for customers, which cost former CEO John Stumpf his job, and continued missteps at the firm have led some lawmakers to call for current CEO Tim Sloan to be ousted from his post.
- Bloomberg Video•2 days ago
Dropbox Files Publicly for U.S. IPO
Feb.23 -- Dropbox Inc., the file-sharing private company valued at $10 billion, has filed publicly for a U.S. initial public offering. Bloomberg's Alex Barinka reports on "What'd You Miss?"
Associated Press•yesterdayEuropean Central Bank says Latvia's ABLV failing, to wind up
The European Central Bank said Saturday it has determined that Latvia's crisis-struck ABLV Bank is failing or likely to fail, and the bank will be wound up under its home country's law. Latvia's financial regulator on Monday ordered ABLV, Latvia's third-largest bank by assets, to cease all payments at the ECB's request amid U.S. accusations of money laundering and breaching sanctions on North Korea. "Due to the significant deterioration of its liquidity, the bank is likely unable to pay its debts or other liabilities as they fall due," the ECB said.
Business Insider•4 hours agoTHE TECH COMPANIES IN PAYMENTS REPORT: How technology giants are using their reach and digital prowess to take on traditional banks (GOOG, GOOGL, AAPL, FB, MSFT, AMZN)
As headlines like "Amazon Is Secretly Becoming a Bank" and "Google Wants to Be a Bank Now" increasingly crop up in the news, tech giants are coming into the spotlight as the next potential payments disruptors. To mitigate potential losses under this scenario, traditional players will have to grasp not only the level of the threat, but also which segments of the financial industry are most at risk of disruption. Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft, collectively known as GAFAM, are already active investors in the payments industry, and they're slowly encroaching on legacy providers' core offerings. Each of these five companies has introduced features and offerings that have the potential to disrupt specific parts of the banking system.
- barrons.com•2 days ago
No Amazon Worries for FedEx
Shares of FedEx (FDX) rose 2.77%, to $252.22, on Friday, thanks in part to an upgrade from Bernstein's David Vernon and his team. Vernon boosted his rating to Outperform and his price target to $290, writing that the shares are attractively valued and offer mid-teens earnings- per-share growth marking the "highest rate of return in company history," thanks to a strengthening global economy, rising interest rates, and strong business-to-consumer demand. Lower corporate taxes also figure into his thesis. It's the business-to-consumer part that may be most eye-catching for investors, as it's impossible to talk about shipping these days without talking about Amazon.com (AMZN). Vernon writes that
Associated Press•2 days agoBank halts NRA credit card, car rental firm ends discount
The nation's largest privately-owned bank holding company and a major car rental chain said Thursday they will stop promotions aimed at National Rifle Association members. The Nebraska-based First National Bank of Omaha will not renew its contract to issue the group's NRA Visa Card, spokesman Kevin Langin said in a statement. "Customer feedback has caused us to review our relationship with the NRA," Langin said.
- The Street•yesterday
What Coke's CEO Has Learned From His Most Important Shareholder, Warren Buffett
One eager reader of Warren Buffett's annual letter will probably be Coca-Cola (KO) CEO James Quincey. Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) is a long-time shareholder of Coke, in large part because of the wide moat around its business. The fact Buffett loves drinking Cherry Coke helps, too. Buffett recently disclosed that Berkshire still owns 400 million shares of Coke. Berkshire is Coke's largest shareholder. Asked by TheStreet what he has learned from Buffett in terms of leadership, Quincey said it's a litany of things. "He has literally written several books on leadership and investing, and I think they are always very pragmatic, and commonsense rounded in the fundamentals of business," Quincey said.
- CNBC.com•2 days ago
Dropbox shows how it manages costs by deleting inactive accounts
Dropbox employs a somewhat unusual technique to lower its costs, the cloud software company revealed on Friday in its filing to go public. In a process the company calls "infrastructure optimization," Dropbox said it deletes users' accounts if they don't sign in for a year and don't respond to emails. That keeps the company from incurring storage costs for inactive users, a tactic Yahoo has used in the past. Dropbox said that the costs of revenue dropped 6 percent in 2017 to $21.7 million, mostly due to a $35.1 million reduction "in our infrastructure costs." As it prepares to lure public market investors, Dropbox is paying particularly close attention to its expenses. The company operates in
Yahoo Finance•yesterdayWarren Buffett's bet against hedge funds had an 'unforeseen investment lesson'
What investors then need instead is an ability to both disregard mob fears or enthusiasms and to focus on a few simple fundamentals. In other words, the takeaway is that everyday investors can beat the so-called “smart money” and they don’t have to shell out hefty investment fees or execute a lot of trades to do it. Buffett, who has argued that investors — both small and large — would be better off putting money in low-cost index funds, wrote in his 2005 shareholder letter that active management professionals (hedge funds), as a group, would underperform the returns achieved “by rank amateurs who simply sat still.” His thought was that the active managers who collect massive fees would leave their clients “worse off” than the amateurs who simply invested in unmanaged low-cost index funds.
- CNBC.com•yesterday
Bank of America says it will talk to gunmakers about how to stop mass shootings
Bank of America will ask its clients that make assault weapons about what the companies can do to help stop deadly mass shootings. The bank sent this statement to CNBC: "We are joining other companies in our industry to examine what we can do to help end the tragedy of mass shootings, and an immediate step we're taking is to engage the limited number of clients we have that manufacture assault weapons for non-military use to understand what they can contribute to this shared responsibility." A number of companies have terminated their business partnerships with the National Rifle Association due to the rising outcry against the gun group after the deadly shooting at a Parkland, Florida high school
- Bloomberg•yesterday
Time to Bite the Bullet
For Warren Buffett, sitting down to write this year's annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway Inc. shareholders -- and his fans the world over -- couldn't have been easy. Following a deal-deficient 2017, it was his shortest missive in more than two decades, and arguably one of the least remarkable. While Buffett made his usual upbeat assessment of the American economy and the prospects for his conglomerate, the letter's overarching tone appeared to be one of frustration -- that new accounting rules will cause Berkshire investors confusion, that the M&A environment has lost its senses, and that some spectators don't appreciate the long-term perspective Berkshire takes with investments like Kraft Heinz
Reuters•yesterdayTrump tax cut fuels record profit for Buffett's Berkshire
Fourth-quarter net income increased roughly fivefold to $32.55 billion, or $19,790 per Class A share, from $6.29 billion, or $3,823 per share, a year earlier. Berkshire attributed roughly $29.11 billion of its net income to the reduction of the corporate tax rate, to 21 percent from 35 percent, that Trump signed into law in December.
- MarketWatch•yesterday
NRA backlash: United, Delta are latest companies to dump gun lobby promotions
Airlines United and Delta are the latest, and among the biggest, in a string of companies cutting largely promotional ties with the National Rifle Association in the wake of last week’s mass shooting at a Florida high school. With announcements Saturday, they UAL, +1.30% DAL, +1.73% join a major bank, insurer and car-rental giant, among others, in announcing they were dropping partnership programs with the NRA. Read: Delta passengers were trapped on runway for 12 hours — but did they get compensation? The NRA has been on the defensive amid renewed calls by a significant slice of the electorate to overhaul the nation’s gun laws to some degree while other Americans dig in on the basis of constitutional
- Bloomberg•yesterday
Lessons From the Oracle: Warren Buffett's Shareholder Letter, Annotated
Your guide to the famous investor's views on the economy, healthcare and tax policy, potential successors, and his portfolio. By , and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Chairman and CEO Warren Buffett just published his annual letter to shareholders. The widely-read document promises to chronicle twelve months in which natural disasters dented his insurance businesses, saw the Oracle of Omaha join forces with Jeff Bezos and Jamie Dimon on a health care venture earlier this year, and perhaps even offer a hint on succession plans for the conglomerate after Greg Abel and Ajit Jain were each promoted to be vice chairman at the start of 2018. We'll also get a rare glimpse of the top-down view on the state of
