vestact posted: " Market Scorecard Yesterday, US markets had their worst day since March after ongoing political wrangling in Washington caused a rally in bond yields. All three major US indexes are on course to end the month of September lower. The S&P 500 ros"
Yesterday, US markets had their worst day since March after ongoing political wrangling in Washington caused a rally in bond yields. All three major US indexes are on course to end the month of September lower. The S&P 500 rose for seven straight months to the end of August, so perhaps it's no surprise. Markets go up over time, but not every month.
In company news, the Chinese property developer Evergrande is selling a stake in its regional bank for around $1.5 billion as it tries to dig itself out of the dwang, and raise funds to address its debt burden.
At the end of a nasty day for equity shareholders, the JSE All-share was down 0.64%, the S&P 500 was down 2.04%, and the Nasdaq was down an eye-watering 2.83%.
Our 10c Worth
One Thing, From Paul
Facebook is a stock in US portfolios that has done very well for us. However, some people feel ambivalent about buying the shares because the company is often accused of not correctly policing the content that appears on their social media platforms.
In actual fact, Facebook has spent over $13 billion on content moderation in the last five years and employs over 40 000 people in related roles. These peoples' job (assisted by software tools) is to terminate fake accounts, combat covert operations by political agents and remove misinformation, hate speech and other dangerous content. They also help users to manage their privacy settings.
I feel that the criticism of the company by journalists and politicians is misplaced. Let's be honest, Facebook could employ ten times more content moderators, and there would still be people misbehaving on their platforms. Also, the moaning is often ideological - people only want to see their own views represented.
Sensitive viewers and children who encounter difficulties in the real world, will also face challenges online. That's only natural, right? Ultimately, participation is voluntary.
Online content is a reflection of humanity - messy, provocative, discordant, vibrant, exciting and sometimes problematic. Embrace it, stop complaining.
Byron's Beats
Last week Paul wrote about the snazzy building which Google purchased in Manhattan. Well, they are not the only big tech company that is lapping up properties. Last year Amazon paid $928 million for a building that was the site of a famous department store in Manhattan. That's ironic. Amazon was probably the reason for the demise of the store, now they have bought it.
Facebook is also getting in on the action; they just bought a $368 million campus in Washington. Mark Zuckerberg gets called to Capitol Hill so often, an office in Washington makes sense.
Property prices in city centres have taken a big hit since Covid. Big tech companies have oodles of cash, so they are taking advantage of the good deals on offer and saving money on leasing. It must be nice to be so cash flush.
Michael's Musings
A few months ago I wrote about how the Netflix series, Drive to Survive resulted in a surge of new F1 viewers. In a similar vein, there was also a spike in interest in playing chess after the airing of The Queen's Gambit. A recent Netflix survey found that viewers who watched a show based in South Africa were three times more likely to want to visit our country. Amazing!
Netflix has demonstrated the power of visual storytelling. People are drawn to things that they can see and relate to. How many people have a visit to Iceland on their bucket list after watching Game of Thrones? I am one of them.
I imagine more countries will push to develop their local film industry to provide a boost to inbound tourism. From South Africa's perspective, we need the jobs created by growing the film and tourism industries. It could even make sense for the Department of Tourism to pay Netflix to create shows here?
Bright's Banter
Ford announced that it plans to spend more than $11.4 billion on new production sites in Tennessee and Kentucky to manufacture the next-generation F-Series electric pickup trucks and cars. The project is in partnership with battery manufacturer SK Innovation.
This is the beginning of their plan to spend over $30 billion by 2025 on electric car manufacturing and create 11 000 jobs. Those two US states have suffered from the collapse of the US coal industry. The new factories are designed to be carbon neutral with zero-waste-to-landfill once they're fully operational.
The Glendale, Kentucky plant will focus on producing SK batteries to power the vehicles, while the Stanton, Tennessee mega-campus will produce both cars and the electric batteries. The company is also setting aside $525 million to train technicians who will service these new cars. Love to see it!
Linkfest, Lap It Up
A new life-size robot Gundam statue is coming to Japan. The RX-93 Nu Gundam is set to debut in the city of Fukuoka at Mitsui Shopping Park Lalaport - Something special for the Gundam fans.
Asian markets are down this morning. The MSCI Asia index had its biggest drop in six weeks and is headed for its first quarterly dip in many years. Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and mainland China are all down by varying amounts.
Today some central bank bigwigs including Andrew Bailey (BOE), Haruhiko Kuroda (BOJ), Christine Lagarde (ECB) and Jerome Powell (Fed) will participate in an ECB Forum panel. It's interesting to see how prominent these officials have become.
The Rand is trading at around R15.05 to the US Dollar. US futures have bounced back in early trade, suggesting that last night's sell-off might have been a little overdone. Let's hope so!
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