Barron's : Shares of A.P. Moller-Maersk Look Ready to Sail

Shares of A.P. Moller-Maersk Look Ready to Sail
The Danish shipper could unlock value as it splits itself in two.

Danish conglomerate A.P. Moller-Maersk is splitting itself in two, in a move that could unlock value for shareholders.
Its two classes of shares (tickers: MAERSK.A.Denmark and MAERSK.B.Denmark) have surged about 18% since June 23, when the owner of Maersk Line, the world’s largest container-shipping company, appointed a new chief executive and tasked him with carrying out a strategic review. Class A shares have voting rights; class B shares don’t.
As a result of the review, A.P. Moller-Maersk last month announced it would separate its energy activities, which account for 24% of group revenues; last year those totaled more than $40 billion. It isn’t getting out of the oil business, at least for now.
The share-price gains since the review was announced have gone some way to erasing the company’s conglomerate discount, a situation where a diversified group’s subsidiaries trade at a discount to their intrinsic value.
However, there could be more to come. “I think we have seen some of that [erosion of the discount], but not all of it,” says Katrina Dudley, a portfolio manager at the Franklin Mutual European fund, which owns the stock. She sees potential upside of 20%.
At Friday’s close, the A shares were worth 9,330 Danish krone ($1,377) and the B shares DKK9,800. Its American depositary receipts (AMKBY), which have climbed 16% since the announcement of the review, traded at $7.21; 200 ADRs are equivalent to one ordinary share.
The Copenhagen-listed shares have fallen 17% in the past two years as shipping rates have slumped due to overcapacity, forcing some players out of business, and oil prices have dropped by half, despite a recent resurgence. The shares trade for about 15 times estimated earnings for 2017 and pay dividends at yields above 3%.
Jefferies analyst David Kerstens calculates net asset value at DKK13,350 on a sum-of-the-parts basis for both classes of shares. Allowing for a 10% conglomerate discount, his price target is DKK12,000, or 26% above the latest price.
He estimates the enterprise value of A.P. Moller-Maersk’s energy businesses at $16 billion, but adds: “The amount of cash it realizes will depend on the transaction structure.”
Copenhagen-based A.P. Moller-Maersk, founded in 1904, says it will consider joint ventures, mergers, or listings for its energy businesses. These include Maersk Oil, which produces oil from the North Sea, Qatar, Algeria, and Kazakhstan, and generated revenues of $5.6 billion in 2015, and Maersk Drilling, a provider of drilling services, which produced 2015 revenues of $2.5 billion.
Any transaction may not be straightforward. The family foundation that controls more than 40% of the shares and over 50% of the voting rights seems more enthusiastic about the energy business than A.P. Moller-Maersk, and may prefer to retain an interest in the oil-related assets.
A.P. Moller-Maersk is giving itself up to two years to “find solutions” for its oil businesses, but investors and analysts suggest it may want to take initial steps sooner to demonstrate that it is serious about its new direction. Investors will be hoping for more details when the company hosts a capital markets day on Dec. 13.
ESSENTIALLY, A.P. MOLLER-MAERSK IS STAKING its future on the transport and logistics industry, betting that it can squeeze synergies from its operations, which include APM Terminals, operator of 57 ports and terminals in 36 countries, and Damco, a provider of freight-forwarding and supply-chain-management services.

There’s plenty of scope for cooperation, as the transport and logistics businesses previously operated independently. That meant Maersk Line could use services provided by APM Terminals’ rivals if the price was cheaper. Consequently, only about 50% of APM Terminals’ volume came from Maersk Line.
A.P. Moller-Maersk is looking to improve its offering to customers based on the combined capabilities of Maersk Line, APM Terminals, and Damco. It aims to make better use of its assets, harvest synergies, and optimize its network.
Management—led by Soren Skou, who has run Maersk Line since 2012 and replaced Nils Smedegaard Andersen as CEO four months ago—projects that it can reap savings that will boost the return on invested capital by two percentage points over three years. On an invested capital base of $30 billion, that would represent an increase of $600 million. According to analysts at Credit Suisse, that is equivalent to 43% of estimated 2016 net income of $1.4 billion, although their estimate for net income is above consensus.
A.P. Moller-Maersk is forecast to report 2016 net income of $1.3 billion, or $60.85 a share. In 2017, it could earn $1.9 billion in net income, or $90.98 a share.
The company’s future may not be plain sailing, but it could lead to greater returns.

WSJ : German Government Has Ruled Out Taking Stake in Deutsche Bank

German Government Has Ruled Out Taking Stake in Deutsche Bank
Officials told lawmakers last week state support for lender was ‘inconceivable’

BERLIN—Aides to German Chancellor Angela Merkel have told lawmakers the state wouldn't take a stake in Deutsche Bank AG if it were to issue new stock to shore up its thin capital cushion, one person who attended the briefing said.
The fact that Berlin appears to have ruled out any aid for the embattled lender as both unnecessary and politically unfeasible could put Deutsche Bank under renewed pressure as it works to stabilize its share price and stay out of the news while negotiating an acceptable settlement in a U.S. misconduct investigation.

In a closed-door briefing with a small group of lawmakers last week, Chancellery aides and senior Finance Ministry officials said it was “inconceivable for the state to take a stake in Deutsche Bank,” said one person who declined to be named because the briefing was confidential.
“We have a different bank resolution system than in 2009 and this must apply to us in Germany too,” the government officials said according to this person. This referred to recent legal changes that now force European governments to bail-in creditors—and in some cases depositors—before they shore up a struggling bank with taxpayer money.

Deutsche Bank is currently negotiating with the U.S. Justice Department to bring down a settlement in several investigations over the mis-selling of mortgage-backed securities. Last month, The Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. authorities had floated a $14 billion amount as an opening bid, sparking a rout in the bank’s share price. The bank has said it would not pay anywhere near this amount, which would wipe out nearly all of its existing capital.
It is still unclear whether Deutsche Bank will need to increase capital and, if it does, whether it would need the government to pitch in. But the fact that Ms. Merkel’s government has ruled out any aid for the bank will come as a negative surprise to investors, given widespread expectations in the market that the state would offer some form of last-resort assistance given the scale of Deutsche Bank and the shock its failure could inflict on Europe’s financial system.
“It would be amazing of the German government to let the (world’s) fourth most systemic bank collapse,” said one London-based analyst, who declined to be named because of compliance reasons. “All investors I talked to are of the view that one minute to midnight the German government would step in and support Deutsche Bank in some way.”
But others expect the private-sector solution is the more realistic outcome.
“It is inconceivable that Germany’s largest bank will be allowed to fail, but, even with the U.S. fine at the high end of expectations, we think a private sector solution combining disposals and a deeply discounted capital raise is more likely than state aid,” said Jonathan Peace, analyst with Credit Suisse.
Government officials told lawmakers the political fallout of any state involvement in a capital increase would outweigh the benefits and said they would favor Deutsche Bank raising whatever capital it may need from private investors.
It would be legally possible for Berlin to participate in a capital increase at the bank without bailing in creditors as long as it did so under market conditions—for instance by participating alongside private-sector investors. But such a move could be unpopular at home less than a year before a general election and expose Berlin to accusations of double standards after it campaigned for years to end state-financed bank bailouts in Europe.
The Chancellery and Finance Ministry declined to comment. The government has said in the past it wasn’t working on a state rescue for Deutsche Bank. A Deutsche Bank spokeswoman declined to comment. The bank said last month it hadn’t asked for help and didn’t need a capital increase.

Concerns that Deutsche Bank might need fresh capital pushed the shares to a low of €9.90 ($10.94) on Sept. 30, down 56% this year. Prices have recovered somewhat since and closed at €12.24 on Friday.
Late last month, Deutsche Bank sought to silence speculation about its future by appealing to lawmakers to tone down their public comments on the lender.
“Deutsche Bank lobbyists visited me…and stated clearly that Deutsche Bank can handle on its own what needs to be done,” Lothar Binding, a lawmaker with the Social Democrats and the party’s financial expert, told The Wall Street Journal.
The government has also sought to keep a low profile and deflect attention from the bank.
“There is far too much talk,” Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble told a press conference in Washington last weekend. When asked about Deutsche Bank by German lawmakers during the trip, Mr. Schäuble also refused to comment, a person familiar with the talks said.

WSJ : Yellen Cites Benefits to Running Economy Hot for Some Time

Yellen Cites Benefits to Running Economy Hot for Some Time
Fed leader also warns that holding an accommodative stance for too long could have costs

Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen offered an argument for running the U.S. economy hot for a period to ensure moribund growth doesn’t become an entrenched feature of the business landscape.
That would mean letting unemployment fall lower and spurring faster growth to boost consumer spending and business investment.
This could encourage businesses to spend more on new equipment that would have lasting benefits for the economy and encourage future growth, she said. A fast-growing economy and low unemployment also could encourage individuals who have stopped looking for work to start looking again, expanding the labor force and national income.

Moreover, running the economy hot could encourage higher levels of research and development and increase incentives for new business formation.

Ms. Yellen didn’t directly address looming policy decisions, such as whether the Fed should raise short-term interest rates before year’s end. She also avoided a short-term diagnosis of the economy’s performance, something of great interest in financial markets.
Still, her speech at a conference held by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston offered a window into her mind-set and how policy might evolve in the months ahead. She effectively expressed sympathy for the idea of keeping short-term interest rates low to let the economy gather steam and reverse some of the long-run debilitating effects of the slow recovery, such as low labor-force participation and business investment. That implied very gradual rate increases in the months ahead.
Economic theory holds that weak demand can become a self-perpetuating problem for an economy. When businesses don’t invest and consumers don’t spend, it drives down the productive capacity of the economy and the pool of available labor, begetting still-slower growth. The idea is called hysteresis in economic circles. Weak demand begets weak supply, something Ms. Yellen said—with some careful hedges—might be reversed if demand is boosted.
“If we assume that hysteresis is in fact present to some degree after deep recessions, the natural next question is to ask whether it might be possible to reverse these adverse supply-side effects by temporarily running a ‘high-pressure economy,’ with robust aggregate demand and a tight labor market,” Ms. Yellen. “One can certainly identify plausible ways in which this might occur.”
A hot economy would boost sales, which in turn would prompt managers to invest more in their businesses, she said. “In addition, a tight labor market might draw in potential workers who would otherwise sit on the sidelines.”
One sign that the economy is beginning to run hot is that the U.S. jobless rate has fallen to 5%, signaling diminished slack in the labor market. Despite its descent in recent years, Fed officials have been prepared to keep interest rates low and encourage the jobless rate to fall further still.
The Fed leader didn’t come right out and endorse running the economy too hot. As a qualifier she said that “we of course need to bear in mind that an accommodative monetary stance, if maintained too long, could have costs that exceed the benefits by increasing the risk of financial instability or undermining price stability.”

In all, market analysts are likely to interpret her comments as “dovish,” meaning supportive of low rate policies.
The Fed has held its benchmark short-term interest rate in a range between 0.25% and 0.5% since December, after keeping it near zero for seven years. Most central bank officials at their September meeting expected to nudge it another quarter percentage point this year and proceed slowly toward further interest-rate increases after that.
“She seems to want to keep policy very accommodative for as long as she can while inflation is low,” said Charles Lieberman, chief investment officer at Advisors Capital Management in Ridgewood, N.J. “It is consistent with her previous public statements.”

Her comments serve in part as an antidote to a downbeat Boston Fed conference where many analysts argued that the U.S. economy is stuck in a period of slow growth, thanks to weak productivity gains and an aging workforce.
Ms. Yellen noted that the link between a tighter labor market and inflation seems to have weakened in recent years. Economists have found in the past that a falling unemployment rate tended to raise inflation, a connection known as the Phillips curve. But that hasn’t happened since the recession.
“The influence of labor-market conditions on inflation in recent years seems to be weaker than had been commonly thought prior to the financial crisis,” she said.
If true, that would suggest the Fed has more room to let the labor market tighten without pushing up inflation.

>>> Weekly Update

Weekly Market Update: Market Tensions High As Earnings Season Starts

US indices finished lower for the second straight week as investors' risk appetite faded heading into earnings season. Preannouncements from the likes of Honeywell, Dover, Ericsson, and Fortinet continued to spook market participants, along with a disappointing Q3 report from Alcoa, tempering expectations ahead of the quarterly deluge that begins in earnest next week. Friday's strong banking results took some of the sting away but traders nevertheless remain anxious to hear what managements have to say.

A stronger US Dollar, and in particular, continued selling in the British Pound served as a further headwind to overall sentiment. After last week's 'flash crash' in GBP/USD, cable moved back towards 1.20 early in the week before recovering. Separately, Thursday saw the PBOC set the yuan at the lowest levels since 2010, which also happened to coincide with a particularly soft September trade report from China, which sent many commodities tumbling. Some of the growing rumbling surrounding China dissipated on Friday though, after September inflation numbers moved notably higher.

Interest rates continued to back up. Markets seem to be getting more and more comfortable with a December FOMC rate hike, especially in light of the declining poll numbers for Donald Trump. US data reports were largely in line with the recent trends headlined by September retail sales and final PPI figures that generally topped estimates. By Friday various segments of both the US Treasury and UK GILTS yield curves were reaching the highest levels since before the Brexit vote. An October preliminary University of Michigan sentiment miss, that included the lowest 5-year inflation expectation since 1979, and a somewhat dovish speech from Fed Chair Yellen resulted in steeper US curve into the close. For the week, the S&P500 fell 1%, the DJIA lost 0.6%, and the Nasdaq dropped 1.5%.

MONDAY 10/10
(CN) China State Council releases guidelines on lowering companies' leverage and debt ratios; to allow companies to give equity in themselves to banks in exchange of lower debt - financial press
(EU) EURO ZONE OCT SENTIX INVESTOR CONFIDENCE: 8.5 V 6.0E
2202.HK: Reports Sept contracted sales CNY25.4B v CNY20.0B m/m

TUESDAY 10/11
IEA Sept Monthly Oil Market Report: Forecast both 2016 and 2017 Global oil demand growth at 1.2M bpd
(DE) GERMANY OCT ZEW CURRENT SITUATION SURVEY: 59.5 V 55.5E; EXPECTATIONS SURVEY: 6.2 V 4.0E
AA: Reports Q3 $0.32 v $0.35e, R$5.21B v $5.35Be
(US) Sept Labor Market Conditions Index Change: -2.2 v +1.5e

WEDNESDAY 10/12
005930.KR: Revises Q3 Op KRW5.2T v KRW7.8T prelim, Rev KRW47.0T v KRW49.0T prelim; Q3 guidance revision reflects effects of Galaxy Note 7 crisis
HUM: Raises FY16 EPS ~$9.50 v $9.28e (prior "at least $9.25"); Raises Q3 EPS ~$3.15 v $2.88e (prior "at least $2.85"); Reports plan year membership in 4-Star plans or higher at 37% v 78% y/y
(US) FOMC MINUTES FROM SEPT 20-21ST MEETING: REASONABLE CASE COULD BE MADE FOR BOTH HIKING AND WAITING
WFC: Chairman/CEO Stumpf to retire; President and COO Sloan to take over as CEO; effective immediately
(KR) BANK OF KOREA (BOK) LEAVES 7-DAY REPO RATE UNCHANGED AT 1.25%; AS EXPECTED; (4th straight pause in current easing cycle)
(CN) CHINA SEPT TRADE BALANCE (USD): $42.0B (6-month low) V $53.0BE; Trade Balance (CNY): 278.4B (6-month low) v 364.5Be

THURSDAY 10/13
UNA.NL: Reports Q3 Rev €13.4B v €13.2Be
*(US) SEPT IMPORT PRICE INDEX M/M: 0.1% V 0.2%E; Y/Y: -1.1% V -1.0%E
*(US) INITIAL JOBLESS CLAIMS: 246K (matches lowest since 1973) V 253KE; CONTINUING CLAIMS: 2.05M V 2.050ME
CVTI: Guides Q3 $0.12-0.17 v $0.27e (2 est)
(PE) PERU CENTRAL BANK (BCRP) LEAVES REFERENCE RATE UNCHANGED AT 4.25%; AS EXPECTED
(CN) CHINA SEPT CPI M/M: 0.7% (7-month high) V 0.1% PRIOR; Y/Y: 1.9% (3-month high) V 1.6%E
(CN) CHINA SEPT PPI Y/Y: +0.1% V -0.3%E (1st increase in 55 months)

FRIDAY 10/14
JPM: Reports Q3 $1.58 v $1.40e, R$25.5B v $24.0Be
C: Reports Q3 $1.24 v $1.15e, R$17.8B v $17.4Be
(US) OCT PRELIMINARY MICHIGAN CONFIDENCE: 87.9 V 91.8E (lowest since Sept 2015); 5 year inflation expectations 2.4% v 2.6% Sept final reading (lowest since 1979)
(US) SEPT PPI FINAL DEMAND M/M: 0.3% V 0.2%E; Y/Y: 0.7% V 0.6%E
(US) Weekly Baker Hughes US Rig Count: 539 v 524 w/w (+2.9%) (fourth straight week of increases)
TWTR: Salesforce CEO: have walked away from Twitter bid; Twitter was not the right fit - FT
(US) Fed Chair Yellen: 'high pressure' policy may be needed for full recovery from crisis - comments in Boston

>>> US Close Dow +0.22% S&P +0.02% Nasdaq +0.02% Russel -0.27%

Closing Market Summary: Indices Walk Back Gains Despite Upbeat Bank Earnings

The stock market ended a downbeat week on a tepid note as an opening rally on Friday ultimately fizzled out. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (+0.2%) finished ahead of the S&P 500 (+0.02) and the Nasdaq Composite (+0.02). The three indices finished the week lower between 0.6% and 1.5%.

Equity indices rallied at the start of the session as positive inflation data out of China, a string of better-than-expected expected quarterly reports, and upbeat domestic data boosted investor sentiment. 

The three catalysts also helped solidify the rate hike picture as above-consensus inflation data stood in contrast to persistently low inflation readings. The Producer Price Index (PPI) came in slightly ahead of estimates as PPI rose 0.3% in September (consensus +0.2%). Meanwhile, core PPI ticked higher by 0.2% (consensus +0.1%). The two readings are up a respective 0.7% and 1.2% on a year-over-year basis. 

According to the CME's Fed Watch Tool, the probability of a rate hike at the December meeting has increased to 69.2% from 61.7% at the end of September. The firming rate hike picture also helped move the dollar and long-term rates higher. 

The U.S. Dollar Index (98.11, +0.59, +0.60%) strengthened throughout today's session, which in turn weighed on dollar-denominated oil prices ($50.32/bbl, -$0.08, -0.2%).

The early rally reversed stating around 10:20 a.m. ET and coincided with some strengthening in the dollar, a reversal in oil, and fading gains in the financial sector (+0.5%), which had been up as much as 1.5% following some better than expected earnings results from JPMorgan Chase (JPM 67.52, -0.22), Citigroup (C 48.61, +0.14), and Wells Fargo (WFC 44.71, -0.04). 

Rising treasury yields also worked to thwart the early rally. Higher-yielding sectors -- utilities (-0.6%), real estate (-0.3%), and telecom services (-0.2%) -- found it difficult to make any headway and general valuation concerns percolated with the jump in rates. 

The yield on the benchmark 10-yr note rose six basis points to 1.80% as the boost in producer price inflation, the stronger than expected inflation report out of China, and waning price momentum unsettled investors. 

The S&P 500 (+0.02%) finished basically flat, surrendering just about all of an initial 0.8% gain. 

Five sectors finished in the green with financials (+0.5%), technology (+0.5%), and materials (+0.4%) staging the largest moves on a percentage basis. 

The financial sector (+0.5%) outperformed in the wake of positive economic data, a steepening in the yield curve, and a string of above consensus quarterly reports.

Citigroup (C 48.61, +0.14, +0.3%), Well Fargo (WFC 44.71, -0.04), and JPMorgan Chase (JPM 67.52, -0.22, -0.3%) each beat analysts' estimates for the quarter. The three were up between 1.7% and 3.1% at the onset, but were unable to hold onto the bulk of those early gains as concerns about a potential slowdown in commercial lending reportedly tempered investors' enthusiasm. 

In the technology sector (+0.5%),  Salesforce.com (CRM 74.27, +3.64) finished higher by 5.2% after the Financial Times reported that the company is no longer interested in acquiring Twitter (TWTR 16.88, -0.91). Chipmakers also outperformed in the group as the PHLX Semiconductor Index (+0.8%) narrowed its weekly loss to 3.3%. 

Department store names underperformed in the discretionary sector (UNCH) after JPMorgan cut quarterly estimates for Macy's (M 35.57, -1.27, 3.3%) and Kohl's (KSS 43.64, -1.44, -3.2%). The broader SPDR S&P Retail ETF (XRT 43.12, -0.09) also finished on a negative note. 

Today's trading volume fell came in below the recent average of 862 million as 785 million shares changed hands at the NYSE floor.

Today's economic data included the PPI Report for September, the Retail Sales Report for September, Business Inventories for August, and the initial reading of the University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index for October: 

  • The Producer Price Index (PPI) for September showed a 0.3% increase in final demand prices (consensus +0.2%), led by a 0.7% jump in the index for final demand goods.
    • Excluding food and energy, the index for final demand was up 0.2% (consensus +0.1%).
  • Total retail sales increased 0.6% in September while sales, excluding autos, rose 0.5%. Both results were in-line with the consensus estimates.
  • Total business inventories increased 0.2% in August (consensus +0.1%) after being unchanged in July.
    • Sales were also up 0.2% after declining a downwardly revised 0.3% (from -0.2%) in July.
  • The University of Michigan's Index of Consumer Sentiment dropped to 87.9 in the preliminary reading for October (consensus 92.4) from the final reading of 91.2 for September.
    • The October reading is the second lowest level in the past two years.

Monday's economic data will include the 8:30 a.m. ET release of October Empire Manufacturing consensus 2.0). The Industrial Production (consensus 0.2%) and Capacity Utilization (Consensus 75.6%) report for September will be released at 9:15 a.m. ET. 

(MAKOR) MERGER ARBITRAGE RESEARCH - SYNN VX - THE HOUSE OF THE FLYING CHATTER





SYNGENTA / CHEMCHINA

THE HOUSE OF THE FLYING CHATTER…

 

PIVOTAL QUESTIONS:

We think the pivotal questions in the context of the recent news flow that investors should ask are:

Why now?

Who has a vested interest to create turmoil and uncertainty for the deal and who is likely to benefit from this? 

 

MAKOR VIEW:

We wanted to clarify our view on the transaction following a spate of contradictory news-flow around the transaction over the past week.

We remain convinced that the transaction remains on track, and today’s news-flow in particular has created significant confusion among investors and had an adverse effect on Syngenta’s share price. 

Ultimately, the current uncertainty around the transaction conclusively benefits and strengthens the negotiating position of the potential investors in CITIC’s $25bn syndication as the reported difficulties around securing the financing only entrenches their position.

We continue to believe that the Chinese Government remains fully committed to the transaction. 

 

>>> Twitter suitors vanish as Salesforce rules out bid

Twitter suitors vanish as Salesforce rules out bid
The boss of Salesforce has ruled out his company as a bidder for Twitter, all but bringing an end to attempts to find a buyer for the struggling internet company.

The US cloud software company had been left as the most likely bidder last week, after other potential acquirers, including Google and Walt Disney, decided not to pursue a deal.

“In this case we’ve walked away. It wasn’t the right fit for us,” Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce, said in an interview with the FT.

FT : Caravaggio: the light that never goes out

Caravaggio: the light that never goes out
In a show about the artist’s revolutionary influence, his own enduring mystery stands shines

‘Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness’ (1603-04) by Caravaggio © Nelson Gallery Foundation
The pre-Christmas arrival from the Prado of Juan Bautista Maino’s 10ft altarpieces “The Adoration of the Shepherds” and “The Adoration of the Kings” brings to London’s National Gallery its most majestic, affecting, surprising visitors of 2016.

With striking, tender realism, the Spanish painter contrasts the lavish Magi — balding Italian noble in gold silk, turbaned Asiatic prince, young African in feathered headdress — rising as a pyramid of exotic figures beneath a beaming gold star, with the shepherds depicted in an earthy palette. Under the steaming warm breath of a protective ox, these half-naked youths play the pipes and recline languorously with a lamb. Their celestial parallels, fleshy adolescent angels, tumble from the clouds, eager to join the human throng.
This display in room one is a free, fabulous foretaste of the Sainsbury Wing’s new show Beyond Caravaggio. For when Maino painted these rapturously involved panels for a Toledo church in 1612-14, he had just returned from Italy, bringing a decorous, restrained version, appropriate to Spain, of Caravaggesque naturalism and chiaroscuro. The sultry classicised shepherds and angels come straight from Caravaggio’s rippling boys; the storytelling, rooted in daily detail, depends too on his example.
But the linearity and verticality recall El Greco, who died in Toledo in 1614, and the serene spiritual charge — Maino was a Dominican friar — is the opposite of Caravaggio’s doubt and turbulence. In the “Kings”, Maino includes a self-portrait as a casual onlooker, reverently pointing at the divine infant. Caravaggio’s self-portraits in biblical scenes are desperate, shocking: the excited voyeur holding up a lantern among armoured soldiers — men as metallic automatons — in the oppressive, claustrophobic “The Taking of Christ”, a National Gallery loan from Dublin; the severed head in “David with the Head of Goliath”.
Centred on half a dozen Caravaggio paintings, four from the National Gallery, this persuasive exhibition traces how, during Caravaggio’s brief career and in the two decades following his death in 1610 while on the run for murder, Italian, Spanish, French, Dutch artists took parts of his revolutionary manner and reworked them according to their sensibilities. All but five works are from British and Irish collections, and the homegrown range is impressive.
So radical was Caravaggio’s suggestive use of light and co-opting of everyday people and things into an oeuvre collapsing hierarchies between religious narrative, still-life, genre, that his influence was irresistible even to enemies. The earliest response here is Giovanni Baglione’s “The Ecstasy of St Francis” (1601): the meditating saint, in an image converging sensuality and devotional fervour, bathed in a glow symbolic of his transportation. Francis, outstretched body forming a dynamic diagonal, is depicted with vigorous naturalism, but the angel supporting him, with crimped hair and mask-like face, is a mannerist construction, a style to which Baglione soon retreated. By 1603 he was pursuing a libel case against Caravaggio.

‘Lot and his Daughters’ (1617-18) by Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri © Manchester City Galleries
Disputes, brawls, but also adoration, followed Caravaggio everywhere. Exhibited alongside his squealing tease with rosebud lips “Boy bitten by a Lizard” are “A Musician” and “Interior with a Young Man holding a Recorder” by Francesco Buoneri, nicknamed Cecci del Caravaggio and probably the older artist’s lover. They are pure homages: in the formats based on half-length figures, the youths’ knowing gazes, the context of careful, delicious fruit and flower still lifes. So too are the vividly direct bloody gashes brutally pulled open for our inspection in Giovanni Antonio Galli’s “The Incredulity of St Thomas” and “Christ displaying his Wounds” from the 1620s, both modelled after Caravaggio’s 1601 painting.
“The younger ones flocked to him and praised him alone as the only true imitator of nature, looking upon his works as miracles; they vied with each other in following him, stripping their models and placing their light sources high; with no regard for study or teaching, each readily found his master in the piazza or street”, according to 17th-century biographer Giovanni Bellori.
Caravaggio had a fracas with a landlord for breaking a ceiling to let in light; in 1612 Jusepe de Ribera, newly arrived in Rome, demanded permission from his landlady to cut a hole in his roof. In his stark compositions, spotlit wizened, bony old saints and martyrs with sagging skin — “Saint Onuphrius”, “Lamentation over the Dead Christ”. “The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew” — emerge from gloomy grounds.

Their macabre religious intensity met Counter-Reformation piety and Ribera cornered a market by his unrivalled skill in applying thick paint for hands and brows to imitate furrows, creases, wrinkles, the real shadows of the impasto contributing to the visceral naturalistic effects. Caravaggio had scant interest in the potential of impasto; Ribera, like all the memorable artists here, forged something individual out of the encounter with Caravaggio.
For Artemisia Gentileschi in “Susannah and the Elders” it was female empathy: this heroine’s expression of inner torment and panicky gestures drawing up her chemise to cover her nudity is exceptionally rare in Old Master iconography. For Guido Reni, Caravaggio’s naturalism animated his own elegant figures and poetic grace, as in “Lot and his Daughters Leaving Sodom”.
The Dutch Caravaggisti developed chiaroscuro composition into candlelit set pieces, concerned with almost abstracted light effects — Hendrick ter Brugghen’s “The Concert”, Gerrit van Honthorst’s “Christ Before the High Priest” — which would be the conduit of Caravaggio to Rembrandt. French baroque painter Georges de la Tour took Caravaggio’s cast of gamers and gamblers and smoothed out his play of light and shadow to produce flattened, tenebrous genre scenes of intrigue, stillness and silence: “The Dice Players”, “The Cheat with the Ace of Clubs”.
‘Dice Players’ (1620-25) by Nicolas Tournier © National Gallery
The greater the artist, the more diverse his influence — yet the more distinctive he is from everyone. In lunar light, Caravaggio’s “Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness”, the show’s top loan, from Kansas, depicts a beautiful brooding teenager, muscular body perfect as the Belvedere Torso, pose that of a pre-romantic hermit, introspective gaze matched by tremendous inner energy, as if answerable to no one.
In the National’s own greatest Caravaggio, “The Supper at Emmaus”, disciples leap from their seats in astonishment at the luminous Christ breaking bread; the innkeeper in the shadows is immobile, prosaic. Chiaroscuro heightens the drama but light is also the metaphor for recognition, truth. The enduring mystery here is the perfection of composition, psychological pitch, fusing of form, meaning, narrative, with which Caravaggio’s works stand out: timeless, immediate, impossible to pin down.
To January 15; National Gallery, Dublin, February 11-May 14; Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh, June 17-September 24

(La Tribune) "Chez SFR, si nous ne bougeons pas, nous sommes condamnés" (Combes,


Directeur général d'Altice et PDG de SFR, deuxième opérateur français et engagé dans une lourde restructuration, Michel Combes explique qu'après avoir multiplié les acquisitions, l'heure est désormais à l'intégration des différentes entités du groupe. L'objectif : construire une plateforme numérique mondiale des télécoms et des médias. Cette convergence, vieux rêve de Jean-Marie Messier chez Vivendi, Patrick Drahi semble en passe de la réaliser... au prix d'une dette colossale qu'il lui reste à maîtriser.
Fini le temps où Altice faisait flamber le carnet de chèques dans les télécoms à travers le monde. En 2014, après avoir raflé SFR (pour 17,4 milliards d'euros) et Portugal Telecom (7,4 milliards), puis les câblo-opérateurs américains Suddenlink (8 milliards) et Cablevision (15,6 milliards) l'année suivante, le groupe du milliardaire Patrick Drahi lève le pied. Tel est désormais le message de son directeur général, Michel Combes, par ailleurs PDG de l'opérateur au carré rouge en France.
Il faut dire que depuis un an, Altice essuie une période difficile, dans un contexte où beaucoup s'interrogent sur la capacité du groupe à éponger sa dette colossale de 50 milliards d'euros. En septembre 2015, Goldman Sachs soulignait dans une note qu'«Altice a peut-être atteint les limites du marché de la dette pour financer ses fusions et acquisitions ». En outre, SFR est depuis passée dans le rouge, après avoir perdu plus d'un million de clients sur un an.
Dans ce contexte, Michel Combes a mis le groupe sur de nouveaux rails. À La Tribune, il confirme qu'Altice fait une pause dans ses emplettes. Aujourd'hui, priorité à « l'intégration » des différentes entités du groupe, qui réalise maintenant la moitié de son activité aux États-Unis. Le tout, dans le cadre d'un « projet industriel » fondé sur la « convergence globale » entre les télécoms, les médias et la publicité. En France, pour sortir SFR de l'impasse, Michel Combes plaide pour une «transformation » de l'opérateur. Une mutation « nécessaire » pour rester compétitif, affirme le dirigeant, qui compte notamment supprimer 5.000 postes, soit un tiers des effectifs...