TheChek News Flow

While we doubt the pope is much of a trader, based on his latest comments, speaking during a visit to Italy's largest military cemetery, where he was commemorating the centenary of World War I and where he said that a "piecemeal" World War III may have already begun, we assume he too would join the confusion of the BIS and every other carbon-based life form, wondering how it is possible that risk assets are at all time highs which the world is not only teetering on the edge of a new global conflict but may have already in fact entered it. Oh wait, the central banks, never mind.

A "piecemeal" World War III may have already begun with the current spate of crimes, massacres and destruction, Pope Francis has warned.

"War is madness," the Pope said at a memorial to 100,000 Italian soldiers at Redipuglia cemetery near Slovenia. The Argentine Pope has often condemned the idea of war in God's name.

Only last month, Pope Francis said the international community would be justified in using force to stop what he called "unjust aggression" by Islamic State militants, who have killed or displaced thousands of people in Iraq and Syria, including many Christians, the BBC's David Willey reports.

In Saturday's homily, standing at the altar beneath Italy's fascist-era Redipuglia memorial - where 100,000 Italian soldiers killed during WWI are buried, 60,000 of them unnamed, the Pope paid tribute to the victims of all wars.

"Humanity needs to weep, and this is the time to weep," he said. "Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction," he said.

And don't forget S&P500 at all time highs. Because the New Normal, where apparently world war news is the best imaginable news for risk assets.

But while the Pope may be pacifism personified, his grandfather is quote familiar with the concept of world war: he fought in - and survived - Italy's offensive against the Austro-Hungarian empire, in north-east Italy in 1917 and 1918.

That said, we now fully expect futures to open limit up because there is nothing more bullsh for central bank intervention that the world waking up one morning with mushroom clouds all over the place. Just think of all the printing...

SABMiller rebuffed by Heineken

SABMiller has considered a possible combination with rival beer maker Heineken, in a deal that would have brought together two of Europe’s biggest brewers and help it fend off a takeover bid from rival AB InBev.

However, the London group’s interest was thwarted before discussions – even of an informal nature – could begin, with Heineken making clear that it was not interested in considering a sale, according to people familiar with the matter.

Dutch-listed Heineken has been sought after by rival beermakers for years but remains a difficult target. Its controlling shareholders – the De-Carvalho family with a 50.1 per cent stake held by publicly traded Heineken Holding – are not interested in a sale of the fourth-generation business.

Bloomberg News reported that SABMiller had made a preliminary offer in the past two weeks and that it was rejected.

It is unclear whether an offer was made by SABMiller or it approached Heineken to see if it would be interested in a possible deal. Both companies declined to comment.

Heineken, the maker of Amstel, Birra Morretti and Newcastle Brown Ale, has a market capitalisation of €34.2bn. Its shares have risen 21 per cent this year as its strategy of establishing premium beer brands gains traction with consumers and investors.

The move by SABMiller comes amid speculation that AB InBev, the world’s largest brewer, is targeting a megadeal for SABMiller, the maker of Peroni, Grolsch and Miller Lite.

The top four brewers – AB InBev, SABMiller, Heineken and Carlsberg – account for 49 per cent of global beer sales and 60 per cent of operating profit, according to Bernstein Research. Bankers have said for months that there is one more round of consolidation likely to happen in the industry.

Takeover talk has increased in part because other consumer sectors such as food, spirits, healthcare and tobacco have seen a big pick-up in mergers and acquisitions.

Shares in SABMiller, the eighth biggest company on the FTSE 100 with a market capitalisation of £55bn, have climbed 27 per cent since February amid expectations that AB InBev is likely to attempt a deal.

A deal for SABMiller would allow AB InBev, which makes Budweiser, Stella Artois and Corona, to address its problem of a slowdown in growth in beer volumes. It would also allow AB InBev to gain a foothold in Africa and other fast-growing markets where it lacks a strong presence.

SABMiller’s two biggest shareholders are Altria, the US tobacco group, which has a 27 per cent stake, and Colombia’s billionaire Santo Domingo family, with 15 per cent.

Numericable Subscribers to Get Free Access to Hundreds of TV Shows in Attempt to Keep Customers From Leaving

PARIS—French cable operator Numericable Group SA NUM.FR +3.23% on Monday will launch an offer to give subscribers free access to hundreds of TV series in a bid to counter the arrival of Netflix NFLX -1.04% in France.

Numericable—owned by cable investor Patrick Drahi —will give customers of its fiber box access to about 3,000 episodes of TV series, including "Mad Men" and popular French series such as "Plus belle la vie," according to the company's Deputy Chief Executive Jerôme Yomtov.

"We will start with 3,000 episodes of TV series a month and add movies a few months from now," Mr. Yomtov said.

The move by Numericable, which dubbed the service "SérieFlix" internally, is an attempt to prevent losing customers to Netflix, which is set to be launched in France on Monday.

The arrival of Netflix has sparked much criticism in France, where politicians lament the creeping influence of U.S. culture and business. French film producers had warned of an "implosion of our cultural model" with the arrival of the U.S. company.

French telecom operators have also shown resistance to Netflix's launch in France. Telecom operators have refused to allow Netflix to offer its service via their triple-play boxes, the most common way in France for people to watch TV.

Nevertheless, in other countries, Netflix has attracted large numbers of subscribers with very few deals to be integrated into telecom set-top boxes. In the U.S. for instance, many cable operators have long resisted integrating Netflix, or have tried to slow its growth by creating rival services similar to Numericable's.

Netflix is viewable on its website, and via apps on Apple and Android devices, as well as on smart TVs, game consoles and other third-party TV boxes.

It is unclear at this stage how other French operators, including market leader Orange SA, ORA.FR -0.38% Bouygues SA EN.FR -0.32% 's telecom unit Bouygues Telecom and Iliad SA, ILD.FR -0.11% will react to Netflix's arrival. Spokeswomen for Bouygues Telecom, Orange and Iliad declined to comment Sunday on Numericable's new offer.

Orange Chief Executive Stéphane Richard said on French radio last week that for now the operator won't allow Netflix to offer its service on its boxes but that this could change depending on the success of Netflix's offer.

Vivendi SA VIV.FR -0.51% 's pay TV Canal Plus meanwhile has started to fight back on its own. Canal Plus, which already has about 500,000 subscribers for a Netflix-like competitor called CanalPlay, is launching a new offline-viewing feature for the service and bulking up its library of French TV shows and movies to highlight its domestic roots.

A growing number of European investment funds have signed up to use an electronic trading system designed by one of their own - Finland's Pohjola Asset Management - which offers the ability to dissect and control the way their market bets are routed to dark pools and other exchanges across the region.

The data they generate is shared among the group, giving them strength in numbers but also leeway to change strategies.

This might seem like little more than back-office tinkering to the uninitiated - after all, fund managers are paid to decide which stocks to buy, not the minutiae of where to trade them. That job is usually left to brokers and banks, which often run their own dark pools while also offering access to rival venues.

But investors want more control and transparency over the trading process, fearing the post-crisis proliferation of opaque private markets and high-speed electronic traders has exposed them to new risks that can rack up costly losses.

These risks include a lack of disclosure about how some venues operate and price trades, as well as the danger that some give an unseen advantage to high-frequency traders.

"For many years, investment banks and other electronic brokers have provided electronic order-routing mechanisms ... But once an order goes behind a firewall it's very difficult to maintain total control over it," said Adam Conn, head of trading at Barings Asset Management, a user of the Pohjola router.

"There is a growing empowerment within the buy side (investors) and that's a healthy development."

Enforcement actions against global banks that run dark pools have raised awareness of potential conflicts of interest. The UK's FCA markets watchdog warned in July that "many" banks and brokers were failing to put their clients' interests first when executing trades.

The implicit trading costs these risks represent may be just fractions of a percentage point on each trade, but for a fund turning over a $5 billion (3.07 billion pound) portfolio they could represent losses well into the millions. This is the kind of "slippage cost" Pohjola says it helps save.

NO CONFLICTS

Rather than try to outgun rivals with souped-up algorithms, Pohjola's system aims to reduce conflicts of interest by putting fund managers - not brokers - in charge of where to send trades. By comparing notes on each venue's performance, Pohjola and its clients make tweaks accordingly.

Designed by a team led by former Pohjola head trader Simo Puhakka, as well as ex-broker David Berney and electronic-trade specialist Keith Wright, the router is pitched as a bias-free and transparent alternative to putting trades in the hands of a broker who may have financial incentives to use certain venues.

"You can't rely on or trust solely what your broker delivers," said Puhakka in an interview. "We realised we should create a better solution, a better smart order router."

Rather than build the technology from scratch, Puhakka partnered with data group LiquidMetrix and used execution infrastructure provided by agency broker ITG. Clients pay trading commissions as they would to any other regular broker.

Three years after launching the system, with regulators scrutinising dark pools and the publication of Michael Lewis' "Flash Boys" keeping high-speed trading on policymakers' agenda, Puhakka has 20 clients using the system and meeting regularly to give feedback.

"The next logical step is that the buy side (investor) has to take control of the venues as well," he said, envisaging a new trading venue designed by the funds community. "The rule book would be written by the buy side ... We have had some discussions ... not just our group but a wider group."

NO REVOLUTION?

Traders at three investment funds that use the Pohjola router -- Barings Asset Management, Swedbank Robur and IPM in Stockholm -- told Reuters control over trading was key.

"We think that Pohjola has a different approach, that they work for the client and that they can take away toxicity from different dark pools," said Swedbank Robur's Hans Lindh.

While none of the traders said they would restrict themselves to only using the Pohjola router - some big block trades might for example fare better with a bank that has the balance sheet to directly take on the risk - they agreed that it was one way of independently getting more transparency and data.

Not everyone is convinced. Some brokers argue that they are already responding to clients by offering more detailed trade analysis and transparency. They also doubt that fund managers do enough trading on their own to justify a new stock market.

"A revolution in trading has not happened yet," said Mark Goodman, head of quantitative electronic services for Societe Generale in Europe. "The detailed control remains with the broker."

Even some asset managers say that the Pohjola route, while valid, is not something they would choose to use. Traders at three different funds said they would either seek to gather their own data from third-party providers or would focus on other parts of the trading process such as developing more algorithms to set the defining parameters of a trade.

However investors choose to get more control, fund managers are acutely aware of the commercial risks at stake.

"The buy side should be in a situation of more control going forward," said Simon Maughan, product specialist at financial-data supplier OTAS Technologies.

"Fund managers say they are serving clients' interests but then they outsource their trading ... Lowering the cost of trading is going to be a major competitive advantage."

Targeting T-Mobile, the dream group to export its model of this unusual market. After forming his strike team, Xavier Niel launched the assault. To the amazement of all.

The atmosphere is a bit dull on Monday September 1. Xavier Niel has not come to the show, giving one of his famous shots claw rivals. In the basement of the headquarters of Iliad, in a room plunged into darkness conferences, the placid CEO Maxime Lombardini holding the console, declining to the press the results of the first half. They are good: revenues up 10% to EUR 2 billion profit levels maintained at 140 million debt under control. The discussion leads to the statement of the magic name: T-Mobile. A month earlier, the group released its sights on the American subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom, officially on sale.

Closely involved in discussions summer, Thomas Reynaud, the Deputy Director General, applies to recount the scenes of the American offensive. The version history will remember. No, the transaction was not made by an investment bank, it is the result of discussions that began a decade earlier, when the introduction of Iliad Exchange, and slowly matured over development operator. According to him, teams Xavier Niel fourbiraient their weapons for months or years ... The story is a bit more complex.

Bridled ambition in France

Behind the bluster and story telling kept, the 9th of professional asset Challenges latest ranking is primarily motivated by the desire to prove the universal success of its model. Free is, he thinks, the model of the telecom operator of the twenty-first century. He toyed with the idea in 2011 to become the second French operator Orange to tickle. Alas, the competition watchdog has quickly dissuaded to buy SFR. In the spring, he hoped to get their hands on Bouygues Telecom, Bouygues but Martin found his shamefully low offers.

Above all, the acquisition of SFR Numericable sticks in his craw. "The operation of Patrick Drahi [Numericable owner] was very upset, says one expert in the case. There surely an element of ego in his project for T-Mobile, but it does not only to have articles in the press, there is a real belief around this deal. "

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, August 1, just after the revelation of its offer, Xavier Niel has the same operation as a vital movement "Iliad still has a few years of growth in France, but with this operation we prepare for growth in the coming decade. "Creator Free already has some experience abroad. He piloted remotely, in 2012, launching Golan Telecom in Israel founded by his protégé Michael Boukobza-Golan. And in April, he won Monaco Telecom for € 325 million.

A well-oiled scenario

The recipe is the same each time. It is summarized in a chart revealed at the presentation of the results of Iliad, which details the cost savings that the group intends to operate at T-Mobile: 24% in the network, 24% in IT services, 20% in the customer management, 13% in sales, marketing and advertising for the essentials. In all these areas, Free innovated, including developing tools internally.

The inventor of the Freebox however knows that integrating an operator takes a lot of energy. In this area, his personal history is also not very convincing: the redemption of the Internet service provider Alice, in 2008, resulted in the virtual disappearance of society. Remains a discrete commercial offer low cost Internet opportunely emerged in the spring when Bouygues Telecom began to cut prices in the fixed. Even engage in a complicated operation, so as to get their hands on one of the largest operators in the world in order to make the most energy expended!

Mid-June, the founder of Free gives his go. His strike team gets underway. This is perhaps the philosopher's stone of the success of Xavier Niel: a small group of men ready at any time to continue the odyssey traced by their leader. There, in the heart of the operating system, the very secret Rani Assaf Floor on the network and computer systems. This man, whom no picture exists, lives in Montpellier. Xavier Niel is considered as the most important man of the company, before himself. To work with the banks, the founder of Free sits on Thomas Reynaud, its paying agent, now assistant general manager, head of a team of five young guns - there is still a woman - under 35 years .

A lack of awareness

Around these pillars Iliad gravitate few key characters. First Vincent Le Stradic, the head honcho telecoms Lazard, he met two years ago through Matthieu Pigasse, co-shareholder with Xavier Niel in the World Group. He participated in the rise in emergency meeting in late June at the Paris headquarters of the Rue de la Ville l'Eveque, to complete the $ 15 billion of financing. Jean Bonnafé, CEO of BNP Paribas, and Samir Assaf, head of the investment group at HSBC, made ​​the trip in person. They expected a small European outlet, in the category of Monaco Telecom. They fail to get out of their chairs by reading the target ... Passed surprise, they sign with both hands.

Finally, there has Boukobza Michael, who lives in Tel Aviv but is regularly commandeered by Xavier Niel when to develop a restructuring plan. The man has earned the nickname Bazooka during its three-month mission conducted in the World, in 2010, just after the takeover by the trio Bergé-Niel-Pigasse.

The conquest of America is a different story. Xavier Niel certainly has major American shareholders, and he has made ​​a name in Silicon Valley investing in Nest, a startup sold € 2.4 billion to Google. But his reputation remains modest. "Who the hell are these guys?" (Who are these guys?) Exclaimed, John Legere, the CEO T-Mobile, from his office in Bellevue, near Seattle, learning disbelief, the tender submitted by the Iliad team in late July. "The synergies they're talking about are mainly on management, said a banker. Explain that they are able to increase the margin of 20-30% is an insult to the CEO." Bob Eatroff, banker Morgan Stanley maneuvering for Deutsche Telekom, was then quick to demand a detailed his Parisian colleagues on this troublemaker telecom brief.

The sense of timing

As financial analysts parading on Bloomberg TV trays, little secret of their skepticism about the ability of "bad boy" to win the bet. Will he join forces with pension funds or major American telecom players? Even the Paris Bourse scares. Title Iliad lost a quarter of its value since the announcement of the Offer Free on T-Mobile.

Fortunately for him, his sense of timing also works overseas. The surprise was complete when fuitent, July 31 in the Wall Street Journal, the intentions of the French. He was not intimidated by the emissaries of Deutsche Telekom warning:. "You're too late, we almost signed with Sprint" In late July, he's missing on the contract signing Masayoshi Son, the CEO truculent Japanese SoftBank Group, owner of Sprint, to marry the two small mobile USA. John Legere, CEO of T-Mobile is preparing, meanwhile, to touch his bonus and to lead the new group.

But on August 1, the FCC, the American Communications Authority, published a memo putting severely cautioned engaged: Constable vetoes the joint venture they created to purchase frequencies for sale in the coming months. "A substantial lessening of competition," Judge authority. "We have a boyfriend!" Welcomes Xavier Niel with his commando team. Thunderclap, August 5: Masayoshi Son throws in the towel.

In Bonn, the headquarters of Deutsche Telekom, the covered Niel eyes change. Certainly Tim Höttges, CEO of the German operator, offering sweeping 's Iliad , too low. But the candidates are not lining up. After the veto competition authorities in late 2011, following the sale signed with AT & T, Sprint is the removal of very bad news. The group sees a profiler consolidation of the European market and, if he wishes to lead the dance, he needs cash. Xavier Niel knows. There is a year the UK Vodafone has pulled $ 59 billion of new money from the sale of its 45% stake in Verizon Wireless, the number one in the United States. So, the German manager is willing to make concessions. A poker game is plays on both sides of the Atlantic. End of the first round in the coming days.

En ciblant T-Mobile, le groupe rêve d’exporter son modèle sur ce marché atypique. Après avoir constitué son équipe de choc, Xavier Niel a lancé l’assaut. A la stupéfaction de tous.

Etroitement impliqué dans les discussions estivales, Thomas Reynaud, le directeur général adjoint, s’applique à raconter les coulisses de l’offensive américaine. La version que l’histoire devra retenir. Non, l’opération n’a pas été apportée par une banque d’affaires, elle est le fruit d’une réflexion entamée dix ans plus tôt, lors de l’introduction en Bourse d’Iliad, et lentement mûrie au fil du développement de l’opérateur. A l’entendre, les équipes de Xavier Niel fourbiraient leurs armes depuis des mois, voire des années… L’histoire est un peu plus complexe.

Une ambition bridée en France

Derrière les rodomontades et le story telling soigné, la 9e fortune professionnelle du dernier classement de Challenges est avant tout animée par la volonté de prouver la réussite universelle de son modèle. Free est, pense-t-il, le modèle de l’opérateur de télécoms du xxie siècle. Il a caressé l’idée, en 2011, de devenir le deuxième opérateur français pour chatouiller Orange. Las, le gendarme de la concurrence l’a très vite dissuadé de racheter SFR. Au printemps, il a espéré mettre la main sur Bouygues Télécom, mais Martin Bouygues a jugé son offre honteusement basse.

Surtout, le rachat de SFR par Numericable lui reste en travers de la gorge. "L’opération de Patrick Drahi [propriétaire de Numericable] l’a beaucoup énervé, confie un bon connaisseur de l’affaire. Il y a sûrement une part d’ego dans son projet pour T-Mobile, mais il ne le fait pas seulement pour avoir des articles dans la presse, il y a une vraie conviction autour de ce deal."

Dans une interview au Wall Street Journal, le 1er août, juste après la révélation de son offre, Xavier Niel présente même l’opération comme un mouvement vital : "Iliad a encore quelques années de croissance en France, mais avec cette opération nous préparons la croissance pour les dix prochaines années." Le créateur de Free possède déjà une certaine expérience à l’étranger. Il a piloté à distance, en 2012, le lancement de Golan Telecom, en Israël, fondé par son poulain Michaël Boukobza-Golan. Et en avril, il a emporté Monaco Telecom pour 325 millions d’euros.

Un scénario bien huilé

La recette est à chaque fois la même. Elle est résumée dans un graphique révélé lors de la présentation des résultats semestriels d’Iliad, qui détaille les réductions des coûts que le groupe entend opérer à T-Mobile : 24% dans le réseau, 24% en services informatiques, 20% dans la gestion de la clientèle, 13% dans les ventes, le marketing et la publicité pour l’essentiel. Dans tous ces secteurs, Free a innové, notamment en développant ses outils en interne.

L’inventeur de la Freebox sait toutefois qu’intégrer un opérateur demande beaucoup d’énergie. Dans ce domaine, son historique personnel n’est d’ailleurs pas très convaincant : le rachat du fournisseur d’accès à Internet Alice, en 2008, s’est soldé par la quasi-disparition de la société. Ne reste qu’une discrète offre commerciale Internet low cost opportunément ressortie au printemps lorsque Bouygues Telecom a commencé à casser les prix dans le fixe. Quitte à se lancer dans une opération compliquée, autant donc mettre la main sur un des plus gros opérateurs de la planète afin de rentabiliser au maximum l’énergie dépensée !

Mi-juin, le fondateur de Free donne son go. Son équipe de choc se met en branle. Voilà sans doute la pierre philosophale de la réussite de Xavier Niel : un petit groupe d’hommes prêts à tout moment à poursuivre l’odyssée tracée par leur chef. Il y a, au cœur du dispositif opérationnel, le très secret Rani Assaf pour plancher sur le réseau et les systèmes informatiques. Cet homme, dont aucune photo n’existe, vit à Montpellier. Xavier Niel le considère comme l’homme le plus important de la société, avant lui-même. Pour travailler avec les banques, le fondateur de Free se repose sur Thomas Reynaud, son responsable financier, désormais directeur général adjoint, à la tête d’une équipe de cinq jeunes loups – il y a quand même une femme – de moins de 35 ans.

Un déficit de notoriété

Autour de ces piliers d’Iliad gravitent quelques personnages-clés. D’abord Vincent Le Stradic, le grand manitou des télécoms de la banque Lazard, rencontré il y a deux ans par l’entremise de Matthieu Pigasse, coactionnaire avec Xavier Niel dans le Groupe Le Monde. Il participe à la réunion montée en urgence fin juin au siège parisien de la rue de la Ville-l’Evêque, pour boucler les 15 milliards de dollars de financement. Jean-Laurent Bonnafé, directeur général de BNP Paribas, et Samir Assaf, le patron du groupe d’investissement de HSBC, ont fait le déplacement en personne. Ils attendaient une petite prise européenne, dans la catégorie d’un Monaco Telecom. Ils manquent de tomber de leur chaise en découvrant la cible… Passée la surprise, ils signent des deux mains.

Il y a enfin Michaël Boukobza, qui vit à Tel-Aviv mais est régulièrement réquisitionné par Xavier Niel quand il faut mettre au point un plan de restructuration. L’homme a gagné le surnom de Bazooka, lors de sa mission de trois mois menée au Monde, en 2010, juste après le rachat par le trio Bergé-Niel-Pigasse.

La conquête de l’Amérique est une autre paire de manches. Xavier Niel a certes d’importants actionnaires américains, et il s’est fait un nom dans la Silicon Valley en investissant dans Nest, une start-up revendue 2,4 milliards d’euros à Google. Mais sa notoriété reste modeste. "Who the hell are these guys ?" (qui sont ces types ?) s’est exclamé, John Legere, le PDG de T-Mobile, depuis son bureau de Bellevue, près de Seattle, en apprenant, incrédule, l’offre remise par l’équipe d’Iliad, fin juillet. "Les synergies dont ils parlent se font essentiellement sur le management, explique un banquier d’affaires. Expliquer qu’ils sont capables de faire passer la marge de 20 à 30% est une insulte faite au PDG." Bob Eatroff, le banquier de Morgan Stanley à la manœuvre pour Deutsche Telekom, s’est alors empressé de réclamer un brief détaillé à ses collègues parisiens sur ce trublion des télécoms.

Le sens du timing

Quant aux analystes financiers défilant sur les plateaux de Bloomberg TV, peu cachent leur scepticisme sur la capacité du "bad boy" à remporter la mise. Devra-t-il s’allier à des fonds de pension ou de grands acteurs américains des télécoms ? Même la Bourse de Paris s’effraie. Le titre Iliad a perdu un quart de sa valeur depuis l’annonce de l’offre de Free sur T-Mobile.

Heureusement pour lui, son sens du timing fonctionne aussi outre-Atlantique. La surprise est totale lorsque fuitent, le 31 juillet dans le Wall Street Journal, les intentions du Français. Il ne s’est pas laissé intimider par les émissaires de Deutsche Telekom avertissant : "Vous arrivez trop tard, nous avons quasiment signé avec Sprint." Fin juillet, il ne manque plus sur le contrat que la signature de Masayoshi Son, le truculent PDG du groupe japonais SoftBank, propriétaire de Sprint, afin de marier les deux petits du mobile aux Etats-Unis. John Legere, le PDG de T-Mobile, se prépare, quant à lui, à toucher son bonus et à prendre la tête du nouveau groupe.

Mais le 1er août, la FCC, l’autorité américaine des communications, publie un mémo mettant sévèrement en garde les fiancés : le gendarme met son veto à la société commune qu’ils ont créée en vue d’acheter des fréquences mises en vente dans les prochains mois. "Une réduction notable de la concurrence", juge l’autorité. "Nous avons un copain !" se réjouit Xavier Niel auprès de son équipe commando. Coup de tonnerre, le 5 août : Masayoshi Son jette l’éponge.

A Bonn, au siège de Deutsche Telekom, le regard porté sur Xavier Niel change. Certes, Tim Höttges, le PDG de l’opérateur allemand, balaie l’offre d’Iliad, trop basse. Mais les candidats ne se bousculent pas. Après le veto des autorités de la concurrence fin 2011, suite à la vente signée avec AT&T, le retrait de Sprint est une très mauvaise nouvelle. Le groupe voit se profiler une consolidation du marché européen et, s’il veut y mener la danse, il a besoin de cash. Xavier Niel le sait. Il y a un an, le britannique Vodafone a tiré 59 milliards de dollars d’argent frais de la vente de ses 45% dans Verizon Wireless, numéro un aux Etats-Unis. Alors, le manager allemand est prêt à des concessions. Une partie de poker menteur se joue donc des deux côtés de l’Atlantique. Fin de la première manche dans les prochains jours.

The newswire said SABMiller's approach was made as part of a strategy to protect itself from any potential bid from SAB's larger rival, world No.1 brewer Anheuser-Busch InBev.

A tie-up between SABMiller, which has a market capitalisation of 55 billion pounds ($90 billion), and Heineken, with a market capitalisation of 34 billion euros ($44 billion), would combine the world's second- and third-largest brewers.

SAB and Heinken both declined to comment on the matter.

Any potential takeover of Heineken would need the approval of the founding family, which controls the brewer via holding vehicle Heineken Holding.

Bloomberg reported from its sources that the offer would have made the Heineken family one of the largest shareholders in the combined group. The newswire also said that the approach was made in the last two weeks.

SAB, the maker of Miller Lite, Peroni and Grolsch beers is struggling to grow in Europe and North America. New revenues from emerging middle-classes in developing markets have been dented by weak currencies in many of those countries of late.

Heineken, the largest player in mature western Europe, has steadily expanded in faster-growing emerging markets, including Mexico and in Asia.

From an antitrust point of view, there would be considerable areas of overlap between the two, including in the Netherlands, parts of Africa and Latin America as well as Vietnam and India.

Apple wages war on the wallet

When Steve Jobs unveiled the iPod in 2001, he saw an opportunity to reshape an industry. The device sold hundreds of millions and its pairing with iTunes became so successful that it unbundled the album and killed the CD, destroying music industry revenue in the process.

Fast forward 13 years and Apple is again looking to revolutionise an industry with Jobs’ successor Tim Cook revealing this week its entry into the finance sector with Apple Pay. Payments, he said in language reminiscent of Jobs’ original comments, is a “huge business”, with $12bn worth of daily transactions in the US alone, restricted to using an “antiquated” card swipe system. The banks, technology companies and retailers that have “dreamed of replacing” the wallet with the smartphone have “all failed”, he declared.

It was an iPod moment for cash and credit cards. Analysts believe that Apple’s popularity and market share might allow it to do what so many others – among them Google – have struggled to achieve.

Apple controls the hardware and software in its iPhone, improving security from the silicon to its fingerprint reader. As the world’s most valuable company, it has the clout to cajole banks and retailers to adopt its technology. What Apple must now do is persuade consumers that tapping their mobile to pay is easier than fishing in a handbag for a card.

As the iTunes example shows, Apple’s profit is often another industry’s loss. Wall Street already views Silicon Valley as a competitor for the best graduates but tech companies could also grab profits from the banks. “[They] all want to eat our lunch,” Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, the largest US bank by assets, said this year.

But such is the sway of the tech company that JPMorgan, Visa and the other banks and payments networks sent senior executives to Mr Cook’s presentation on Tuesday to pay homage. Bank chief executives fawned about the “exceptional customer experience” and the “exciting move”.

They are also paying hard cash for the privilege of being involved: 15 cents of a $100 purchase will go to the iPhone maker, according to two people familiar with the terms of the agreement, which are not public. That is an unprecedented deal, giving Apple a share of the payments’ economics that rivals such as Google do not get for their services.

The iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus are shown during an Apple event at the Flint Center in Cupertino, California, September 9, 2014. REUTERS/Stephen Lam (United States - Tags: SCIENCE TECHNOLOGY BUSINESS)©Reuters

“That makes Apple Pay unique,” says Dickson Chu, chief product officer at start-up Ingo Money, who worked at PayPal and, while at Citigroup, on the Google Wallet. “It’s somewhat surprising that Apple was able to negotiate something Google couldn’t.”

The list of early Apple Pay partners is impressive, including the 11 biggest US card issuers, representing 83 per cent of the market, and retailers such as McDonald’s and Walgreens which together have 220,000 US stores ready to receive iPhone payments.

While it lacks retailers such as Walmart and Best Buy, which in 2012 teamed up to develop a mobile wallet of their own, Apple’s ability to wrangle representatives from three big groups of the payments world – banks, credit card companies and merchants – is no mean feat.

Part of the reason the 50-year-old credit card system remains “antiquated” is because it relies on a complex ecosystem of players that rarely agree on how best to change their industry. However the chief executive of one payment technology company, who asked not to be named, said he was surprised that the banks were so willing to concede to Apple after what happened to the record labels.

Led by its iTunes and App Store chief Eddy Cue, Apple has been negotiating with banks and credit card companies for more than a year. In development, the project was kept under wraps, with the iPhone maker striking fear into its new partners if they stepped out of line.

“There were people working on the solution [at the bank] that didn’t even know what they were working on,” says Jim Smith, head of virtual channels at Wells Fargo. “It was kept to a real, limited, absolutely need-to-know perspective.”

Once Apple pulled it together in a compelling package with key participants on board, everyone else came around

- Hans Morris, managing partner at venture capital firm Nyca Partners

Bruce Dragt, global leader of ecommerce at payments processor First Data, says: “Everybody understood the drill of what they could and couldn’t say, who they could and could not talk to.”

If the world’s biggest banks see Apple as a threat, why did they get into bed with the technology company and agree to give up a slice of revenues?

One of the reasons it was able to corral so many partners was the absence of anything in Apple’s plan that would be truly disruptive to their businesses – at least for now. Apple’s model “still puts us at the centre of payments”, says one bank executive.

The “near-field communication” technology that allows a customer to pay in-store by tapping a phone at a terminal is already in place, even though products that use it, such as Google Wallet, have failed to gain mass acceptance. Banks were already planning to adopt the secure “token” that generates and transmits a one-off code to pay for transactions rather than a signature or PIN, and see others following now that Apple has adopted it.

Absent from Apple Pay is the ability for users to send money to each other or Bluetooth technology, which would allow users to pay several metres from a terminal rather than a couple of centimetres.

“There’s nothing really technologically new in what they’re doing,” says Hans Morris, former president of Visa and now managing partner at venture capital firm Nyca Partners. But he says that the way Apple has assembled a group of companies more used to competing than collaborating is “analogous to iTunes”.

“Everyone knew that technology could deliver a better consumer experience, but you had record companies, artists and competing delivery systems in disagreement,” Mr Morris says. “Once Apple pulled it together in a compelling package with key participants on board, everyone else came around.”

Banks are willing to lose a slice of revenues in the hope that Apple Pay will become ubiquitous. That would drive up transaction volumes – and therefore overall revenue – and could reduce losses to fraud through its tighter security.

MasterCard and Visa now cover the cost of card fraud, but from next year will hold retailers responsible if they do not use the “chip and PIN” technology that is widespread in Europe but nearly unheard of in the US. The new retail terminals often allow both PIN and NFC transactions. That could speed uptake of Apple Pay.

Even though the in-store payments were the centre of Apple’s presentation, banks are more excited by streamlining online shopping. Giving customers an Apple Pay button to press online, rather than typing in card information – particularly on a small screen – will be a real catalyst to more spending, banks believe.

“This is about ecommerce,” says Jud Linville, head of cards at Citigroup. “If there is an app where somebody is shopping, being able to close out that shopping experience by tapping Apple Pay delivers convenience and security.”

That would make PayPal a more obvious target for disruption by Apple. By bundling its rival with every new iPhone and Watch, Apple is already stealing some potential growth from PayPal’s own attempt to create a wallet app.

Despite the lessons from iTunes, for now the banking and payments industry is confident that Apple is a benign partner. “What Apple really announced was the end of the plastic credit card, but not the end of paying by credit,” says Jason Oxman, chief executive of industry group Electronic Transactions Association.

Apple’s playing a long game. They could use [consumers’] adoption to run an end-game around the existing payment infrastructure

- Ben Milne, founder of payments processor Dwolla

The onerous regulation involved with becoming a bank creates one big moat that Apple is unlikely to try to cross. Data protection, security and anti-money laundering processes are a long way from slick smartphones and cloud storage services. “There’s not a lot of people that say, ‘I’m really interested to hold a lot of capital and risk-weighted assets’,” says a senior executive at a US bank.

But future versions of Apple Pay could threaten the established order more deeply. Just as iTunes moved from music into movies, TV and radio, Apple could creep into more areas of financial services in that grey area between simple payments and full-fledged bank.

“Apple’s playing a long game. They could use [consumers’] adoption to run an end-game around the existing payment infrastructure,” says Ben Milne, founder of payments processor Dwolla. Their ownership of hardware, software and hundreds of millions of customers’ payment details, he says, means “they’re the only company in the world that can actually do that . . . Apple is not a company afraid to exercise control.”

Banks are giving up some of the profits from payments made through Apple but the 0.15 per cent charge may seem meagre in the face of competing mobile payment systems that are more ambitiously trying to cut out the financial institutions altogether.

“It’s going to happen with or without you,” says Scott Galit, chief executive of Payoneer, which specialises in cross-border payments. “It makes sense to pick the guy who wants to play with you as opposed to the guys who are trying to cut you out.”

Just as the iPod killed the CD, Apple hopes to see off plastic and paper payments. While iTunes lightened the music industry’s wallet, banks must hope that Apple Pay will fatten theirs, rather than replace them entirely.

US companies are devising new tactics to limit the advance of activist investors, as hedge funds wage an increasing number of campaigns to unseat entire corporate boards.

The number of occasions on which activists have put forward a full slate of new board members has more than doubled in the past two years, reflecting the growing confidence and financial firepower of this sector of the hedge fund industry.

In response, companies are appealing directly to shareholders to cap activists’ influence to a minority of board seats, in what corporate governance lawyers describe as a “cat and mouse game” between the two sides.

Darden Restaurants, which owns the US chain Olive Garden, is the latest in a string of companies to concede a minority of seats to an activist and argue that handing full control of the board to a hedge fund would hurt shareholders’ interests.

“Companies are using a new tactic in the face of the risk of majority-slate contests,” said David Rosewater, partner at Schulte Roth & Zabel, which advises activists.

“It is a cat-and-mouse game. When they gift seats to the activist, it gives companies an argument that it doesn’t represent the same kind of mandate for change.”

Darden has put up only eight nominees for 12 board seats at next month’s annual meeting, leaving four free for nominees from Starboard Value, the activist fund run by Jeff Smith, which is running 12 candidates.

Darden is locked in a battle with Starboard over how it is running Olive Garden and other chains. Darden warned last week of “the risks and destabilisation that would result from full board turnover and giving control to a single shareholder’s nominees”.

Assailed by activists, many companies are entering settlement talks and agreeing to give them board seats, as Hertz did last week with corporate raider Carl Icahn.

Darden’s plan to leave seats vacant even though a settlement cannot be reached comes on the heels of similar concessions at Cliffs Natural Resources, an iron ore miner, and Bob Evans Farms, a restaurant chain. In both cases, activists were attempting to take a majority of board seats.

In the US, where shareholders are handed two competing voting cards and allowed to vote on only one, the aim is to encourage them to use the management ballot, even if they would like activists to receive some board representation. That maximises the chances of management keeping control.

At Bob Evans Farms, the manoeuvre kept Sandell Asset Management to a minority of the seats, but at Cliffs, Casablanca Capital did win control and replaced the chief executive.

According to global data from research group Activist Insight, there have been 21 contests in the past two years in which activist hedge funds have proposed nominees to completely replace a corporate board. All but two are US companies. That compares with eight contests globally in the two years before that.

US software group Attachmate is in advanced talks to merge with UK rival Micro Focus, according to people familiar with the situation.

A deal could be announced in the coming week, these people said, but they cautioned that talks could still fall apart. The value of Micro Focus in a deal is likely to be at a premium to its market capitalisation, which stood at £1.17bn ($1.9bn) at the close of London trading on Friday.

The exact structure of the deal could not be ascertained, but it could be either a straightforward takeover by the US group or a merger. A deal could also provide a vehicle for a public listing for Attachmate’s private equity and hedge fund owners, allowing for a path to exit their positions.

Attachmate is owned by a consortium of investors including Francisco Partners, Golden Gate Capital and Thoma Bravo as well as hedge fund Elliott Management.

It consists of four legacy software companies and took the name of its Seattle-based business, which builds software that helps companies integrate information based on older computer systems. It also owns Suse, a German open-source software company, and Novell, which it acquired with the help of Microsoft in a $2.2bn deal in 2010.

Micro Focus also develops and sells enterprise software for ageing computer systems. It has license agreements with more than 90 per cent of the Fortune Global 100 companies, according to its website. The company has its headquarters in Newbury, west of London.

The move comes against a backdrop of widespread deal activity in the technology sector.

While the headlines have been dominated by larger tech deals, such as Facebook’s $19bn purchase of WhatsApp, much of the dealmaking has been focused around the unglamorous but essential end of the technology sector.

Semi conductors, in particular, have enjoyed a wave of consolidation, including Infineon Technologies’ acquisition this month of International Rectifier for close to $3bn. Last month, the FT reported that CSR, the UK chipmaker, had hired banks after receiving bid interest.

Elliott and Golden Gate declined to comment. Representatives for Thoma Bravo and Francisco could not immediately be reached for comment.