North Korea appears to be preparing for the launch of a ballistic missile, South Korea’s central news agency reports.
According to Yonhap, just a day after Pyongyang said it had tested a hydrogen bomb capable of being mounted on a ballistic missile, the South Korean military has detected indications Pyongyang is readying for another long-range missile launch.
Sunday’s test has been met with widespread international condemnation. Jim Mattis, US defence secretary warned North Korea that any threats to the US or its allies would be met with a “massive military response”.
North Korea was expected to make an announcement at 15:00 local time Monday, according to Yonhap, but an announcement is yet to be made by Pyongyang.
Meanwhile, Seoul also announced Monday afternoon that it will advance the expansion of the controversial US missile defence system in South Korea.
Two rocket launchers have already been deployed under the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence system, known as Thaad. The construction of a further four launchers, which had been delayed by new South Korea President Moon Jae-in, will now go ahead. The deployment has led to a rift in relations between Beijing and Seoul as China sees it as a threat to its own military capability.
Bolloré dans le viseur de l’AMF
L’autorité des marchés financiers s’interroge sur la concomitance du rachat d’Havas par Vivendi et des mauvais résultats du groupe de publicité annoncés il y a dix jours.
Y a-t-il eu un délit d’initiés lors du rachat d’Havas par Vivendi? C’est la question qui plane depuis une semaine et la publication des mauvais résultats du groupe de publicité au deuxième trimestre. Il y a dix jours, Havas a renoncé à son objectif de croissance annuelle après une chute de 30% de son bénéfice au deuxième trimestre. Une alerte sur résultats qui intervient alors que Vivendi a présenté mi-mai un projet de rachat du géant de la pub de 3,9 milliards d’euros en cash. Une déconvenue qui sème le trouble alors que le groupe Bolloré est actionnaire des deux entreprises. Il contrôle Havas à 60% et détient 20% de Vivendi. À la fois acheteur et vendeur, Bolloré avait-il connaissance des informations sur la dégradation de l’activité d’Havas lorsqu’il a proposé son rachat?
"Il n’y a aucun lien entre les deux événements financiers" promet une source proche d’Havas. Pourtant, deux dirigeants d’Havas, le PDG Yannick Bolloré et Dominique Delport, siègent au conseil de Vivendi. "Ils se sont abstenus de voter pour le rachat d’Havas lors du conseil du 11 mai, justifie-t-on chez Vivendi, tout comme Vincent Bolloré". Pour autant, le calendrier de l’OPA est optimal: la vente d’Havas se fait à 9,25 euros, son cours le plus haut. Un niveau maintenu grâce à l’OPA alors que les analystes estiment désormais qu’il devrait être inférieur de 10% à cause de l’alerte sur résultats. "Le prix de l’offre reste raisonnable" se contente-t-on de répondre chez Vivendi. "Les actionnaires minoritaires peuvent penser que Vivendi paie trop cher" reconnaît une source proche du groupe.
Proxinvest s’interroge aussi
Quoi qu’il en soit, la concomitance des opérations n’a pas échappé à l’autorité des marchés financiers. Selon nos informations, l’AMF surveille de près le dossier. "Le calendrier de l’annonce du rachat d’Havas et de l’alerte sur ses résultats est troublant, voire suspect, confie une source proche du gendarme boursier. On va regarder le sujet". Pour le moment, aucune enquête n’est ouverte. Contacté, l'autorité des marchés financiers n'a pas souhaité commenter. Le doute s’installe aussi chez les investisseurs. "Il y a de quoi avoir des interrogations sur le calendrier de l’opération, explique Loïc Dessaint, directeur général de la société de conseil aux investisseurs Proxinvest. C’est un sujet sensible sur lequel seule l’AMF peut se pencher".
D’autant que la transparence des sociétés cotées impose que les alertes sur résultats soient communiquées aux marchés dès que possible. En interne, Havas a eu connaissance des mauvais chiffres du deuxième trimestre début juillet mais a attendu la publication de ses comptes le 25 août pour renoncer à ses objectifs. Pourtant, un cadre du groupe reconnait que la "dégradation a été observée mois après mois durant le deuxième trimestre", et pas du jour au lendemain. Un autre dirigeant va même plus loin: "On voit la première alerte au premier trimestre et on sait depuis six mois que l’activité va ralentir". Pourtant, l’objectif de croissance d’Havas pour 2017 est alors confirmé fin avril. "On peut se demander si cela a été fait pour maintenir le cours de Bourse au plus haut" ajoute Loïc Dessaint.
D’autant que la tendance était anticipée. Dès fin 2016, des grands annonceurs américains comme Procter & Gamble ont fait savoir qu’ils demanderaient des baisses de prix de leurs campagnes publicitaires. "Vincent Bolloré a décidé avant Noël 2016 qu’il lancerait le rachat d’Havas pour les résultats du premier trimestre de Vivendi" assure un de ses proches. Manière de dire que l’opération n’a pas été accélérée mais bien prévue de longue date. Ce que dément Vivendi: "Nous avons commencé à travailler sur le rachat d’Havas après l’assemblée générale du 25 avril" assure la direction. Ensuite le calendrier s’enchaîne. Vivendi annonce son offre sur Havas le 11 mai et signe le rachat des 60% détenus par le groupe Bolloré moins de quatre semaines après, le 6 juin. Le groupe évoque alors des "incertitudes" sur le marché de la publicité, sans en dire davantage. Une précaution un peu légère que Vivendi devra sans doute préciser.
From: LAURENT CHEKROUN (MAKOR SECURITIES LO) At: 09/02/17 18:03:06
Subject: (Challenges) Bruno Le Maire annonce une vague de privatisations afin de financerBruno Le Maire annonce une vague de privatisations afin de financer l'innovationPar Challenges le 02.09.2017 à 13h26, mis à jour le 02.09.2017 à 16h46Le ministre français de l'Economie, Bruno Le Maire, a indiqué samedi qu'il annoncerait dans "quelques semaines" la privatisation de certaines entreprises afin de financer l'innovation. La Française des Jeux fait partie des pistes étudiées, selon certains experts.Le ministre français de l'Economie, Bruno Le Maire, a indiqué samedi qu'il annoncerait dans "quelques semaines" la privatisation de certaines entreprises afin de financer l'innovation. "Je vais annoncer dans quelques semaines que nous allons privatiser certaines entreprises pour avoir de l'argent afin de financer l'innovation", a déclaré M. Le Maire lors du forum The European House - Ambrosetti, sorte de mini-Davos à l'italienne qui se tient jusqu'à dimanche à Cernobbio, sur le lac de Côme."Nous pensons vraiment que c'est une meilleure façon de dépenser de l'argent en finançant l'innovation plutôt que d'être emprisonné dans certaines compagnies qui ne sont pas stratégiques pour l'Etat français", a-t-il ajouté. "L'innovation est la clé du futur pour l'économie, la clé pour rendre la France plus forte", a-t-il martelé.M. Le Maire n'a donné aucun détail sur les entreprises qui allaient être privatisées. La Française des Jeux fait partie des pistes étudiées, selon certains experts. M. Le Maire avait déjà fait état le 6 juillet de la cession de "participations dans un certain nombre d'entreprises publiques à partir du mois de septembre". La veille, il avait annoncé ces "importantes cessions d'actifs" pour financer l'innovation, à laquelle l'Etat destinera 10 milliards d'euros.Fonds de 10 milliardsCes cessions permettront "au contribuable de savoir que son argent est placé pour le futur et non pas pour le passé", avait-il souligné. Pendant la campagne électorale, le président, Emmanuel Macron, avait promis d'alimenter ce fonds de 10 milliards par les dividendes tirés du portefeuille de l'Etat, mais aussi peut-être par quelques privatisations.M. Le Maire, qui s'exprimait devant la presse, a souligné "être ici (à Cernobbio) pour dire aux partenaires de la France que la France est de retour". "Avec notre nouveau président, Emmanuel Macron, nous sommes déterminés à rendre la France plus forte", a-t-il affirmé en détaillant les diverses mesures annoncées par le gouvernement pour "améliorer" le fonctionnement du marché du travail et le système fiscal et réduire la dépense publique
Oriental DreamWorks at centre of US-China split over strategy
Universal Pictures to offload stake in venture as Chinese backers court Warner Bros
Universal Pictures, the movie studio owned by Comcast’s NBCUniversal, is on course to offload its stake in Oriental DreamWorks, the animation group, following disagreements over strategy with one of the company’s other main backers, Li Ruigang’s China Media Capital.
CMC has had preliminary talks with Warner Brothers, the Time Warner-owned studio, about replacing Universal in Oriental DreamWorks, according to two people briefed on the discussions.
Universal and Warner declined to comment although a person with knowledge of the talks that Warner has had with CMC said it was unclear how serious Warner was in pursuing a deal.
Universal inherited its 45 per cent stake in Oriental DreamWorks, widely regarded as the flagship joint venture between Hollywood and China, when it acquired Jeffrey Katzenberg’s DreamWorks — the studio behind the Shrek and Kung Fu Panda films — in 2016 for $3.8bn. However, it quickly became clear that it had a different vision to Mr Li.
“We talked about changing the strategy of Oriental DreamWorks and decreasing the size of the company in order to focus more on the creative side,” Mr Li told the Financial Times.
“Also, I am focused more on China and less globally while they want to make films in China for the world. Today, the priority of Universal is a theme park in Beijing.”
Mr Li already has a relationship with Warner, having formed Flagship Entertainment, a Chinese film venture, with the media company in 2015. But if a deal cannot be struck with Warner to take on Universal’s Oriental DreamWorks stake, the future of the animation group is unclear.
“The only way this will be resolved is if someone buys Universal’s share or someone buys CMC’s share,” said one former employee. “If nothing happens [Oriental DreamWorks] will just die.”
Owning the Oriental DreamWorks stake is less essential for Universal because it has other film distribution and consumer products operations in China.
Mr Li recently raised $600m for his second US dollar fund for offshore investments, though many Chinese investors believe he could have raised far more.
“The system trusts him and he is commercial enough so that investors trust him as well,” said the head of a private equity firm that has many of the same investors as Mr Li, adding that media is the most sensitive area in China, making government connections particularly valuable. “For entertainment he is the only game in town.”
With talks between Oriental DreamWorks investors continuing, the company has been losing staff because of budget cuts, with many top executives poached, said one former employee who now works for a competing company.
The last movie the company released was last year’s Kung Fu Panda 3, which earned $154m at the box office, making it one of the most lucrative animation movies ever released in mainland China. Everest, the next Oriental DreamWorks movie scheduled for release, is not expected to be shown before 2019
Active management is not in a death spiral
Global assets are forecast to reach $112tn by 2020, with $74tn in active management
FTfm launches the “Chart to start the week” today, featuring the big themes facing the investment industry.
The series begins with a chart illustrating the scale of the asset management industry globally and the shifting balance between money that is run by traditional active managers and in index-tracking investments.
Assets managed in mutual funds, institutional mandates and so-called alternatives (hedge funds, private equity funds and infrastructure) stood at around $78.7tn at the end of 2015, according to PwC, the professional services provider.
This represents the universe of investments FTfm aims to cover. By 2020, global assets under management are expected to reach $112tn, an increase of 42 per cent.
Projected growth in investment assets is being driven by increases in population and life expectancy. The pool of savers is becoming larger, older and richer. Incomes are rising as economies expand, and wealth has grown substantially due to increases in the value of property, equities and bonds.
None of these trends — population, ageing, incomes, wealth — appears likely to go into reverse in the near future. As a result, some observers believe investment managers could be running as much as $400tn by the middle of the century.
But the industry’s tectonic plates are moving even as it grows in size. Widespread disappointment among investors with the poor performance and high fees of traditional active managers is driving the shift into low-cost index-tracking strategies.
PwC projects that passive assets under management will more than double, from $11.3tn in 2015 to $23.2tn by the end of 2020.
It is a common misconception that active management is in a death spiral. Instead, PwC forecasts that assets run by active managers will rise from $58.4tn in 2015 to $74tn by the end of 2020, a 26.7 per cent increase.
With future returns from publicM equity and bond markets widely expected to be weaker than those achieved historically, investors are hoping to boost their portfolios by increasing their allocations to alternative asset managers. Their assets are expected to increase 64 per cent to $14.8tn by 2020.
Vanguard: ‘I don’t see the passive bubble issue’
Chief executive Bill McNabb says the company does not focus on growth, only on low fees
Bill McNabb was a young Wall Street banker at Chase Manhattan in the mid-1980s when he was called to an interview with Jack Bogle, founder of Vanguard, at the time an obscure Pennsylvania-based group founded 10 years earlier.
It was the last of 30 interviews faced by the bright Wharton MBA graduate in his quest to join a company that today is a titan of the asset management world, boasting assets of $4.5tn.
“Mr Bogle looked at my résumé and said Vanguard had $20bn [under management] and it would be amazing if it got to $25bn,” Mr McNabb recalls.
His future boss was struggling to understand why an investment banker working on big leveraged buyouts and complex takeovers wanted to become a product manager focused on the nascent industry of guaranteed investment contracts.
“All my peers on Wall Street thought I was out of my mind [to join Vanguard],” Mr McNabb says. But he adds: “Sometimes it is better to be lucky than smart.”
And 30 years on, Mr McNabb’s bold call proved right. He has enjoyed a stellar career at Vanguard, rising through the ranks by working in marketing services, institutional sales and the international unit before landing the chief executive job in 2008 just as the global financial crisis was roiling the investment world.
At that time, Vanguard’s assets already stood at $1.3tn. With Mr McNabb at the helm they have ballooned to $4.5tn — the second-largest pool in the world behind BlackRock.
In a moved that stunned the global asset management industry, Vanguard announced a management overhaul in July. Chief investment officer Tim Buckley, 48, was promoted to succeed Mr McNabb as chief executive at the start of 2018.
The change comes at an important time for Vanguard, which has cemented its status as the world’s leading low-cost fund provider, specialising in passive management strategies.
Speaking from the company’s Valley Forge headquarters a few weeks after that decision, the tall and athletic 60-year-old admits there was surprise over the succession but says that after 10 years at the top, it was a natural “breaking point”.
“The fact that I am staying on as chairman for the foreseeable future, probably a couple of years . . . that is a big deal,” he says.
In particular, Mr McNabb will act as an “ambassador” focused on international opportunities, as Vanguard expands in markets including the UK and China.
Nearly all of Vanguard’s growth has stemmed from its home market. US investors account for more than 90 per cent of its assets.
“It’s hard as a chief executive to get around the world,” he says. “I have pretty good contacts with clients and regulators. It is a natural thing for me.”
A second area of focus is US regulation.
“I have spent a lot of time with regulators and think tanks on big policy issues,” says Mr McNabb, who has been active in Washington for years and is on the board of the Investment Company Institute, the US trade body.
“When I came in [as chief executive] it was the middle of the financial crisis,” he says. John Brennan, his predecessor as chairman and chief executive, “helped me a lot”.
He says Vanguard’s insights are valued because of its structure. It is owned by its clients, which allows it to cut fees continuously as it gets bigger. Many competitors have historically used fees to boost profits that fund payouts to shareholders.
“We represent the voices of 20m-plus investors that use our funds. They [the regulators] know we are not coming at it to boost our stock price.”
He will help his successor “navigate the board”, as well as provide advice to colleagues and mentor younger staff members.
Vanguard has ridden high on the explosive growth in exchange traded funds, which registered net inflows of more than $1tn in the three years to the end of 2016. According to the latest information from the company, it has $800bn in ETFs, up from $40bn in 2009. It has a further $3.7tn in mutual funds.
Mr McNabb bats away suggestions that Vanguard will find it tough to maintain its growth rate or indeed overtake arch-rival BlackRock, which has about $1tn more in assets.
“It’s not even something we think about. Growth is never an objective,” he says, wheeling out the company line that Vanguard is “fanatically focused” on costs and putting investors at the centre.
That is not to underestimate his competitive instincts.
“People used to ignore us. But all of a sudden, publicly traded asset managers and their operating margins are being competed away.
“Price competition has come to the business — and there is more to come on that,” he says.
Further afield, he admits there are “two or three” things that keep the top team up at night.
He cites lower world growth, “very high” valuations in bond and equity markets, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East and North Korea, and uncertainty over Brexit.
“None of that is reflected in the volatility of the markets, but we know it is there,” he says. “Volatility as a measure, it seems, is incredibly muted.”
He is much less worried about fears that record-breaking flows into ETFs and the growth in passive investment generally are inflating a market bubble.
“The kinds of ETFs that we are going to support are going to be broad based and highly liquid. I don’t see the bubble issue,” he says.
But he acknowledges there can be real pain in a market downturn.
His advice is to avoid esoteric ETFs, and those that are thinly traded and have leverage.
As the end of the summer nears and before he heads off on a trip to Kenya, including visits to a Maasai village and an elephant orphanage, Mr McNabb has one final word about his successor.
“We have worked closely together for 26 years,” he says, adding Vanguard had only had four chief executives in more than 40 years. “Continuity has been one of our great strengths.”
Swiss pharmaceuticals group Novartis has announced its chief executive Joe Jimenez will step down early next year and be replaced by Vas Narasimhan, its global head of drug development.
Mr Jimenez, 58, will have headed the Basel-based drugmaker for eight years. He was responsible for restructuring and streamlining the company after the rapid global expansion under his predecessor Daniel Vasella.
Novartis has faced a difficult past two years, however, after disappointing initial sales of a new heart drug and uncertainty over the future of its underperforming Alcon eyecare buswiness, acquired from Nestlé for $50bn in 2010.
Mr Jimenez said in a statement on Monday:
This is the right moment to hand the leadership reins of the company to Vas. Our strong pipeline and the strategic moves we have taken to focus the company have put Novartis on a strong path for the future. On the personal side, after 10 wonderful years in Switzerland, my family is ready to return to Silicon Valley and the US.
Mr Narasimhan, 41, joined Novartis from McKinsey consultants in 2005 and has a medical degree from Harvard Medical School.