>>> Eur$ below 1.19 --> Equities trading on highs in Europe watch 12575 & 12650 on the dax Resitance
North Korea’s hackers are reportedly targeting bitcoin exchanges
North Korea’s hackers have been linked with many attacks, including the 2014 Sony hack, but it looks like the totalitarian state is now targeting bitcoin, and crypto coin exchanges in particular, with its hacking teams.
That’s according to a new report from cybersecurity firm FireEye, which claims to have tracked at least five attacks on bitcoin exchanges, or individual bitcoin wallets, within the past six months. The targets reportedly include South Korea-based exchange Yapizon, and two others that were not named.
Korea’s top crypto exchange Bithumb, the world’s fourth largest exchange, was hacked in late June, while the country’s top Ethereum exchange is said to have lost over $1 million via a breach earlier this month, but it is unclear whether North Korea was involved in either heist.
The rise of bitcoin, which has surged to record highs this year and touched $5,000 per coin on some exchanges this month, and Ethereum, which has gone from $8 per coin in January to around $300 today, has made exchanges and other places were coins are stored hugely attractive targets for hackers. If figures, then, that North Korea — which already draws revenue from illicit businesses — is interested.
“It should be no surprise that cryptocurrencies, as an emerging asset class, are becoming a target of interest by a regime that operates in many ways like a criminal enterprise. While at present North Korea is somewhat distinctive in both their willingness to engage in financial crime and their possession of cyber espionage capabilities, the uniqueness of this combination will likely not last long-term as rising cyber powers may see similar potential,” FireEye concluded.
An affiliate of the Harald-Quandt Group is silvering their companies. So she wants to come to funds for a new fund. Half a billion euro is mentioned.
Die industrialist Quandt family provides other companies in the window: According to information from the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has the investment company Equita HQ in which the Harald Quandt family brings their business with investments, put two of them for sale. On the one hand the mechanical engineer Rovema: For this the investor commissioned the fusion advisory Alantra, can be heard in branch circles. Provisional bids were received last week. On the other hand HQ Equita wants to sell Kolbe-Coloco. For this, Unicredit had received the advisory mandate.
As a result, this investment vehicle of the Harald-Quandt Group continues to spoil its portfolio. HQ Equita specializes in medium-sized companies in the German-speaking countries and is part of the asset manager HQ Capital. About him, descendants of Harald Quandt's family assets, which were deceased in 1967, invest in private equity and real estate. Funds from external donors are also welcome.
Last year sold four companies
This year, HQ Equita has already sold Isolite, a car supplier, to Hitachi Chemical, as well as the sausage pellet producer Walsrode Casings, which went to the American competitor Viskase. Last year, HQ Equity sold four companies. This means that there are only five investments in the portfolio - and two of them are now entering the market: Rovema and Kolbe-Coloco.
As far as Rovema is concerned, the short halftrack falls. HQ Quandt had acquired the majority of the company from the forest in 2015. Thomas Becker, the company's managing director, remained "significantly involved", as he said. Founded in 1957, the company manufactures packaging machines and systems, for example for the food industry.
When HQ acquired Equita Rovema, the turnover for 2014 was stated at 70 million euros. As can be seen from informed circles, Rovema is targeting a turnover of just under 100 million euros for the current year, as well as a 15 percent margin based on earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA). A number of private equity companies and industrial companies have been addressed; the deadline for preliminary ("indicative") bids ended late last week.
Collect funds for a new money pot
Kolbe-Coloco, acquired in 2008, is significantly smaller than Rovema. In sectors of the economy, 30 million euros is the target of a yearly turnover and a double-digit EBITDA margin. The company supplies print media and other customers, such as cigarette packs and wine bottle labels.
HQ Equita uses the humming transaction market with its series of sales and sales. The prices - measured as multiples of Ebitda - have risen sharply, boosted by the austerity policy of the central banks. However, experts report that HQ Equita is also interested in the market. The company is primarily interested in "primary transactions": those in which a company does not change from one investor to the next.
Qatar injects $38bn into economy to counter embargo
Failure of mediation efforts makes prospect of quick resolution unlikely, says Moody’s
Qatar has injected about $38.5bn of its $340bn reserves into its economy to cushion the impact of its neighbours’ embargo, says a Moody’s report.
The credit agency estimates that the equivalent of 23 per cent of gross domestic product was used to support the economy during the first two months of the embargo, launched on June 5.
Doha had to deal with “sizeable capital outflows” of about $30bn during June and July, with further outflows expected as Gulf states choose not to roll over deposits, it said.
Moody’s said Qatar faces large economic, financial and social costs from the travel and trade restrictions imposed by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt, which accuse it of sponsoring extremism.
Qatar, which denies the charges, has been hit hardest in the tourism, trade and financial sectors, and has to deal with rising financing costs, it said.
Steffen Dyck, a senior credit officer and co-author of the report, said “The severity of the diplomatic dispute between Gulf countries is unprecedented, which magnifies the uncertainty over the ultimate economic, fiscal and social impact on the Gulf Cooperation Council as a whole.”
The dispute, the most serious in the Gulf in decades, has driven western allies apart and undermined business confidence in an oil-dependent region reeling from the sustained fall in crude prices.
Moody’s said the spat will damage GCC growth initiatives to boost pan-regional trade and infrastructure, and hinder development of capital and financial markets.
The agency, which assigned a negative outlook to Qatar in July, said the failure of Kuwaiti and US mediation efforts indicated there was no quick resolution in sight.
“In the short term, we expect tensions to persist, quite possibly to escalate,” the report said. “The severity of the dispute is unprecedented, which magnifies the uncertainty regarding the ultimate economic, fiscal and social impact on the GCC as a whole.”
Qatar’s trade dropped 40 per cent in the first month of the embargo, exposing the state’s dependence on its neighbours. About 70 per cent of its construction materials come from or through Saudi Arabia and the UAE, Moody’s estimates.
The embargo has forced Qatar to find other trading routes, pushing up costs. Food prices jumped 4.5 per cent year-on-year in July, having declined 1.9 per cent in May.
Tourism has also been badly affected. The number of visitors from the GCC fell more than 70 per cent since the travel restrictions were imposed, leading to a 40 per cent year-on-year drop in total arrivals in June.
Moody’s says long-term financing costs have stabilised, but the risk premium can be seen in June 2016’s five-year bond issuance, which has risen to 120 basis points above US Treasury equivalents, compared with 100bp before the dispute.
In June and July, $15.4bn, or 10 per cent, of non-resident and private deposits left Qatar, as well as $15bn, or 23 per cent, of funding from overseas banks. Qatar’s foreign exchange reserves fell by 30 per cent in June to $24.4bn from $34.8bn in the previous month.
Despite the capital outflows, Moody’s said it does not expect Qatar to raise funds from international capital markets this year, thereby cushioning Doha from the impact of higher funding costs “for the time being”.
--> This news look important to me as advertisers are coming back to old models and will need more advice from media agency, could be a new opportunity for a WPP, PUB and peers to be back in the game...the stock are been huge underperformer
YTD WPP -21% PUB -12%
1Y WPP -18% PUB -15.6%
it could be interesting to see how this will move but maybe the end of the tunnel for them
Social network allows advertisers to choose content areas where ads will appear
Facebook is looking to soothe advertisers’ fears about finding their ads next to violent, explicit or politically controversial content, with new rules that restrict which videos and articles can be monetised.
The world’s largest social network has announced guidelines for publishers and creators, as it pushes deeper into placing advertising next to videos and fast-loading “instant articles”.
The move comes after big brands — including Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson and Volkswagen — withdrew from Google’s YouTube after their ads were featured before extremist or derogatory videos. Big television companies and publishers subsequently positioned themselves as safer for brands than digital platforms.
Carolyn Everson, vice-president of global marketing solutions at Facebook, said it was important the entire digital advertising ecosystem was seen as “transparent, accountable and safe”.
“It has come under a lot of criticism over the past year and we want to ensure that we are doing our part to lead the industry,” she said.
The rules include nine categories where Facebook has banned ads.
These include content that depicts children’s characters engaging in violent or sexualised behaviour, content on “debated social issues” that is incendiary, inflammatory, demeaning or disparages people or groups and content that focuses on real-world tragedies, including depictions of natural disasters, crime and terminal illnesses — even if it is designed to promote awareness.
Ms Everson said Facebook was not censoring, as the content would still appear on the platform, but wanted to ensure advertisers felt they had control of the type of postings against which their brands were displayed.
“Say you were going to run a story on the aftermath of a plane crash and you had a video that maybe showed there was somebody dead in that, maybe blood, we know that advertisers would be uncomfortable running next to it,” she said.
Facebook will also give advertisers the option of choosing where to place adverts from a long list of publishers, allowing them to avoid certain creators — and to see where their adverts were featured after they had run.
Publishers and creators posting content flagged as misinformation or sensationalised may also lose their eligibility to earn revenue on the platform.
Apple: Color on product announcement
- RBC notes this year's event marked one of the most highly anticipated product announcements in recent years, and from a product perspective, the company did not disappoint. We think the new form factor and net new features/capabilities (wireless charging, AR enablement, 3-D sensing) added to the flagship device will drive accelerated device upgrades within AAPL's install base combined with increased switching activity. Notably, the iPhone X will not begin shipping until November 3; the later than anticipated launch date could partially shift new device unit/ASP lift from Dec-qtr to Mar-qtr. Fundamentally, they think the excitement surrounding the new form factor/features will drive increased unit demand in addition to mix shift toward the higher-end device ($999), which should enable one of the strongest iPhone cycles in recent years.
- Needham notes that given the size of AAPL's supply chain, it is nearly impossible for them to keep secrets. As a result, nearly everything announced yesterday had been leaked ahead of time. The 3 upside value drivers for shareholders (their view) were: 1) a broader range of iPhones with two 8- iPhones plus 1 iPhone X (said as 10 not X); 2) a wider choice of price points for AAPL's smartphone product line; and, 3) upgrades to watch and TV which add stickiness (ie, lower churn) to the AAPL ecosystem if they become more widely adopted. Each of these suggests valuation upside from wider consumer adoption, higher ASPs and margins, and falling churn (ie, longer consumer payment streams to AAPL).
- Mizuho notes that everything about the phone seems in-line with speculation. They find delayed release of the product and high price points to be incrementally negative for the company as it will likely limit any near-term upside to estimates. Overall, with consensus calling for iPhone unit/ASP growth of 14% and 6%, respectively, for FY18, we see limited upside to estimates. Further, with the stock trading at around 15x FY18 consensus EPS estimates (11x FCF), they think valuation fully reflects robust expectations.
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Suppliers:
- Cowen notes that while AAPL's announcement was largely expected, their supply chain work indicates a significant increase in iPhone X units for DecQ (1/2 of ~91MM) after remaining absent for most of CQ3 that indicates a later, but more significant iPhone ramp than iPhone 7/7+. Based on their checks, most interesting read-throughs include MU, TER, AVGO, QRVO, SWKS and OLED. Increases in DRAM and NAND content per SKU are overall positive for MU (Outpeform, $34.29) and memory-levered SPE names like AMAT (Not Rated), LRCX (Not Rated) and to a lesser extent, ICHR (Outperform, $23.65) and UCTT (Market Perform, $24.00). They think AAPL's new application processor, the A11 Bionic, is a modest, but not significant, positive for TER (Not Rated) as the addition of two more high efficiency cores vs. the A10 Fusion on the iPhone 7 could drive increased tester demand. iPhone X marks the start of a transition that should see AAPL move to all AMOLED displays (vs. LCD). LG Display (LPL/034220) has been the supplier of flexible AMOLEDs for the Watch, and should benefit from the refresh, although incremental related royalties may be more noticeable for OLED.
- Mizuho notes that Apple news is positive for memory suppliers (MU, WDC) as it eliminates 32GB and 128GB models, now offering only 64GB and 256GB NAND densities. Wireless charging on all three is positive for AVGO. The 8/8 Plus launch on September 22 is ~ a week later than last years 7/7 Plus with the X a month and a half behind (Nov. 3), which could potentially push some component supply chain orders into the DecQ and even into the typically weaker MarQ for this "supercycle."