Creating World’s Premier Computing Company for the Age of AI

NVIDIA and SoftBank Group Corp. (SBG) today announced a definitive agreement under which NVIDIA will acquire Arm Limited from SBG and the SoftBank Vision Fund (together, “SoftBank”) in a transaction valued at $40 billion. The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to NVIDIA’s non-GAAP gross margin and non-GAAP earnings per share.

The combination brings together NVIDIA’s leading AI computing platform with Arm’s vast ecosystem to create the premier computing company for the age of artificial intelligence, accelerating innovation while expanding into large, high-growth markets. SoftBank will remain committed to Arm’s long-term success through its ownership stake in NVIDIA, expected to be under 10 percent.

https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/

‘The US is not taking the virus seriously’

The governor of Japan’s Okinawa island demanded a top U.S. military commander take tougher prevention measures and more transparency hours after officials were told that more than 60 Marines at two bases have been infected with the coronavirus over the past few days.

Okinawan officials on Sunday reported the 61 cases – 38 of them at Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, which is at the center of a relocation dispute, and another 23 at Camp Hansen – since July 7. They said that U.S. military officials told them the two bases have since been put in lockdown. The disclosure of the exact figures came only after Okinawa’s repeated requests to the U.S. military.

Gov Denny Tamaki, in telephone talks late Saturday with Lt Gen H Stacy Clardy, commander of III Marine Expeditionary Force, demanded the U.S military increase disease prevention measures to maximum levels, stop sending personnel from the mainland U.S. to Okinawa and seal the bases, as well as provide more transparency.

https://japantoday.com/

Currencies await ECB

Asian stocks rose to a seven-week high on Thursday, boosted by encouraging early results from a COVID-19 treatment trial, though bonds and currencies stuck to cautious ranges ahead of a European Central Bank meeting later in the day.

U.S. and European stock futures gained throughout the session, with EuroSTOXX futures STXEc1 and FTSE futures FFIc1 last up more than 1% and S&P 500 futures ESc1 up about 0.7%.

A 1.4% rise in MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares, excluding Japan, .MIAPJ0000PUS has it tracking toward a weekly gain of more than 5%, its best in three weeks.

Optimism in equity markets was driven by positive partial results from a trial of Gilead’s (GILD.O) antiviral remdesivir, which showed the drug could help speed recovery from COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus.

http://www.reuters.com

Antiviral remdesivir tested on patients with COVID-19

At the beginning of February, Gilead Sciences struck a partnership with Beijing’s China-Japan Friendship Hospital to test its experimental antiviral remdesivir on patients with COVID-19, the respiratory ailment caused by the novel coronavirus strain. On Tuesday, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) confirmed the drug was undergoing human clinical trials in the U.S. as well—the first of their kind in America. And just one day later, Gilead announced it was launching two other  late-stage studies of remdesivir across multiple countries as the coronavirus spreads globally.

Remdesivir’s unusually rapid advance across the clinical trial process highlights the urgent nature of the coronavirus outbreak’s public health threat—and the promise that regulators and global health agencies have credited to the treatment.

The two phase 3 clinical trials Gilead announced on Wednesday will enlist about 1,000 patients who have already contracted COVID-19. The participants will mostly be in Asia, the heaviest-hit region in a global health emergency that originated in China, although other nations with a high number of cases will also be involved. The trials are set to launch in March.

http://fortune.com

Massive bet on Sprint is paying

A massive bet on Sprint is finally paying off for Masayoshi Son. Shares in his company SoftBank (SFTBF) rallied on Wednesday, after a US court approved the $26 billion merger between T-Mobile (TMUS) and Sprint (S), the carrier SoftBank acquired nearly a decade ago.

SoftBank stock spiked nearly 14% in morning trade in Tokyo.
Son has been trying to combine the United States’ third- and fourth-largest wireless carriers for years, with the goal of creating a heavyweight challenger to AT&T (T) and Verizon (VZ).
“All necessary federal approvals required for the [merger] to close have been obtained,” SoftBank said in a press release Wednesday.
https://www.cnn.com/

Ghosn’s sudden departure from the country where he was awaiting a highly publicized criminal trial marks a dramatic twist in a yearlong saga that resulted in his ouster as chairman of Nissan (NSANF) and chairman and CEO of its alliance partner Renault (RNLSY

Microsoft’s four-day working week trial in Japan has produced significant productivity growth

In Japan, a country that infamously has its own term, ‘karochi’, to describe death by overwork, Microsoft has conducted a little experiment. For a month in the summer, it gave its 2,300 employees every Friday off, with no reduction in pay. The results, published last week, exceeded Microsoft’s expectations.

The company saw a rise in productivity, measured by sales per employee, that came close to 40%. An overwhelming 92.1% of employees said they were in favor of a four-day week. The program was so successful that Microsoft is planning on repeating it next summer.

The initiative, called the Work-Life Choice Challenge 2019, was announced last April with the objective of improving productivity and creativity through applying the motto ‘Work shorter times, take a rest, and learn well’.

https://www.zdnet.com/

Asian shares stumble, dollar firms

Asian shares fell to six-week lows on Thursday while the dollar jumped to two-year highs as the U.S. Federal Reserve poured cold water on market expectations of a lengthy easing cycle following a 25 basis-point rate cut. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan faltered 0.6%, extending losses for a fifth day to the lowest since mid-June.

Japan’s Nikkei reversed early losses and were a shade higher, while Australian shares declined 0.2%. Losses in Chinese shares accelerated after it opened lower with the blue-chip index down 0.8%. E-minis for the S&P500 clawed back early losses and were marginally higher, after a sharp drop on Wall Street.

Global share markets recoiled overnight after U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Wednesday’s easing was “not the beginning of a long series of rate cuts”.

https://www.reuters.com

U.S. political tumult adds to growth worry

Asian stock markets retreated again on Wednesday, extending a rout that began last week as U.S. political uncertainty exacerbated worries over slowing global economic growth.

Investors were unnerved by the U.S. federal government partial shutdown and President Donald Trump’s hostile stance toward the Federal Reserve chairman. U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had also raised market concerns by convening a crisis group amid the pullback in stocks.

S&P 500 emini futures were last down 0.6 percent, pointing toward a lower start for Wall Street when the U.S. market reopens after Christmas Day, when many of the world’s financial markets were shut.

http://reuters.com

Losing the ranking to Japan is the damage caused by the trade war

China just lost its ranking as the world’s number two stock market. After a Thursday slump, Chinese equities were worth $6.09 trillion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That compares with $6.17 trillion in Japan. The U.S. has the world’s largest stock market at just over $31 trillion.
China’s stock market overtook Japan’s in late 2014, then soared to an all-time high of more than $10 trillion in June 2015. Chinese equities and the nation’s currency have taken a beating this year amid a trade spat with the U.S., a government-led campaign to cut debt and a slowing economy.
http://www.bloomberg.com

The deal eliminates nearly all tariffs

Stock decline nearly 20 percent due to doubts about the deal

After five proposals and more than month of back-and-forth, it looks like this thing is happening. Takeda Pharmaceutical Co Ltd. agreed Tuesday to purchase rare-disease drugmaker Shire Plc for $62 billion. But this blockbuster deal comes with blockbuster risk. Takeda will be paying a steep premium and taking on big debt to acquire a company with uncertain prospects.
Takeda’s desire for geographic and drug diversification led it to overlook a lot of warts. Shire’s hemophilia business provides more than a quarter of its revenue. It faces near-term peril from Roche Holding AG’s recently launched Hemlibra, and long-term threats from potential one-time treatments being developed by companies such as BioMarin Pharmaceutial Inc. that could reduce demand for Shire’s older drugs.
Shire has an attractive pipeline of high-margin rare-disease drug candidates, but its research projects will have to over-deliver in order to compensate for competitive threats to current core business. The substantial research and development cuts that Takeda plans if the deal goes through won’t help.
 https://www.bloomberg.com/

After the Canceled Fork Announcement Bitcoin Trade Volume Spikes Exponentially

Action across bitcoin markets have been all over the place. For instance, on Tuesday, November 7, the price dipped below the $7K zone and rebounded back above that territory a few hours later. The very next day on November 8, immediately following the announcement that Segwit2x was canceled, bitcoin’s market value spiked to a high of $7,900 per BTC. The peak didn’t last long, and the price per bitcoin has been hovering between $7,100-7,450 over the course of the past 12-hours. The last few days bitcoin has been trading over $3B a day in 24-hour trade volume, but on November 9 the decentralized currency swapped over $5B in BTC trades. Presently, bitcoin’s value is trading at $7,150-7,210 across a variety of global exchanges.
http://www.bitcoin.com…  Tue., 14  November 2017

Federal Reserve showed a more guarded view towards inflation

Asian stocks reached a 10-year high on Thursday, riding the bull run in global equity markets, while the dollar sagged after the Federal Reserve showed a more guarded view towards inflation. Spreadbetters expected a mixed start for European stocks, forecasting Britain’s FTSE to open down 0.05 percent, Germany’s DAX to start 0.03 percent higher France’s CAC to open flat. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.55 percent and at its highest since December 2007.

Japan’s Nikkei was up 0.4 percent after brushing 20,994.40, its highest since November 1996. South Korea’s KOSPI added 0.55 percent to mark a fresh record peak and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng scaled a decade-high. Asia took cues from Wall Street, where major indexes rose to yet another set of record closing highs overnight following a report that a market-friendly candidate was being pushed as successor to Janet Yellen at the helm of the Fed.

http://www.reuters.com…  Thu.,  12  October 2017

Japan wants to launch a new digital currency: J-Coin

A consortium of Japanese banks are set to launch a new national digital currency in a bid to wean citizens off cash, the Financial Times reports.  The FT says that a consortium led by Mizuho Financial Group and Japan Post Bank plans to launch the new digital currency in time for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
The new project, which has the support of Japan’s central bank and regulators, aims to develop technology to allow Japanese people to pay for goods and services with their smartphone.

http://www.businessinsider.com… Wed.,  27  September 2017