March, 2018

• 26 March

  Markets not prepared for the end of stimulus

  

  Quantitative easing (QE) saved us from the 2008 crash and jump-started a recovery. It also encouraged a build-up of one-sided risk in the financial system. Are markets and the economy ready for the exit? The sudden rise in volatility in February and March showed that even with strong growth fundamentals, financial markets remain vulnerable. Since 2008, there have been seven ...

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• 26 March

  Dropbox has got a novel business model

  

  Investors have gone gaga over Dropbox Inc. in its first few hours as a public company. It looks as if their enthusiasm has become overheated. Shares of Dropbox, the digital file-cabinet company, shot up about 39 percent last week from their initial sale price. That gives Dropbox a valuation of about $13 billion, including the value of shares held by ...

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• 26 March

  Facebook’s chronic evasions are a dangerous business

  

  Facebook’s business model is pretty simple. It offers a free service to connect users with loved ones and others of similar interests. In return, it collects data about what its users do online (and, increasingly, offline). It then uses this data to sell targeted advertising. The whole thing works brilliantly. Yet the company — like so many others that profit ...

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• 26 March

  Investor visa programme in US deserves to be scrapped

  The omnibus spending bill currently before Congress includes a small but ill-conceived program that deserves to be noticed, then deleted. The EB-5 Regional Center program that gives visas to investors invites abuse and is failing to do what it’s meant to. Since 1990, foreigners who invest $1 million (or, in rural or high-unemployment areas, $500,000) in a new enterprise that ...

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• 26 March

  Trump’s tariffs may be playing into Xi’s hands

  

  US President Donald Trump has finally carried out his threats on trade with China, announcing the start of a process that will lead to sweeping tariffs on Chinese imports and restrictions on Chinese investments. Trump hopes to compel a recalcitrant China to end a range of unfair business practices and open its market wider to US companies, thus reducing the ...

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• 26 March

  Key to new era of Silicon Valley growth

  

  The secret use of Facebook data in the US presidential election has forced governments and consumers to think about how such companies gather and profit from personal information — a major concern overdue for close attention. This scrutiny may be the beginning of the end of the unregulated growth of Silicon Valley. Tech companies and their investors may shudder at ...

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• 26 March

  Non-compete agreements take a toll on the economy

  

  Despite sky-high housing prices, Silicon Valley remains the vital center of the US tech industry. Once an industry takes root in a particular place, it’s very hard to pull it away. Which makes it all the more important to understand: Why did Silicon Valley become Silicon Valley in the first place? One prominent theory is that California’s culture encouraged a ...

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• 26 March

  UBS eyes small deals as Ermotti builds on bank’s push in wealth

  

  Bloomberg UBS Group AG is considering small acquisitions to complement its focus on organic growth as it reverses a shrinking of assets following the financial crisis. “Our focus is on organic growth. Of course we look at small acquisitions here and there to complement our portfolio,” Chief Executive Officer Sergio Ermotti told Bloomberg TV on the sidelines of the China ...

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• 26 March

  German bank mulls robo-adviser for firms

  

  Bloomberg 220-year-old Hamburg-based private bank M.M.Warburg & CO, which now uses an online asset manager to also attract private clients with smaller wallets, might expand this offer to semi-institutional customers by the end of the year, according to investment chief Christian Jasperneite. The company’s so-called Warburg Navigator, which was launched last year, accepts private clients with a minimum investment of ...

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• 26 March

  Volatile volatility roils Europe investment banks

  

  Bloomberg Europe’s investment banks were upbeat after a spike in volatility at the start of the year promised to revive their battered trading units. Their exuberance had disappeared as quickly as it came. Deutsche Bank AG cautioned that its securities unit was facing headwinds this quarter from a stronger euro and higher funding costs for the business, less than a ...

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