MARKET MOVERS
- Elon Musk lands Twitter deal for $44 billion. Twitter’s board has accepted an offer from Elon Musk to buy the social media company and take it private, the company announced Monday. The cash deal at $54.20 per share is valued at around $44 billion. Twitter would become a private company on completion of the deal, which requires shareholder and regulatory approval. The deal is expected to finalize this year. Read more here.
- Coca-Cola posts higher quarterly sales as demand holds up. Sales have remained strong as Coke’s business selling drinks and concentrates to stadiums, movie theaters and restaurants rebounds as more consumers grow comfortable going out as pandemic restrictions wane. Overall for the quarter, Coke posted a profit attributable to shareholders of $2.78 billion, compared with $2.25 billion a year earlier.
- SpaceX Starlink Wi-Fi is going on Hawaiian Airlines. And it’s free. Hawaiian Airlines parent Hawaiian Holdings is using Starlink to offer free Wi-Fi on trans-ocean flights. Starlink service is showing up on planes as well, competing with the likes of Gogo. Delta Air Lines tested the Starlink service recently. SpaceX has plans to launch tens of thousands of satellites in coming years.
- Mortgage delinquencies hit record low in March. The national delinquency rate dropped by more than half a percentage point in March, falling to 2.84% and shattering the previous record low of 3.22% in January 2020. Robust employment, continued student loan deferrals, strong post-forbearance performance and millions of refinances into record-low interest rates have all helped put downward pressure on delinquency rates. Read more here.
- NFTs are continuing to gain traction. Big names like BAYC are now trading at a 139ETH floor with Azuki’s sitting at 24ETH and Punks at 62ETH. In general, if ETH goes down in US Token terms, NFTs go up and the recent sideways action made a lot of people forget this dynamic (ETH down under $2900 seems to push NFTs higher consistently). Read more here.
- EU approves groundbreaking new rules to police Big Tech. Over the weekend, European lawmakers approved the landmark legislation that will force tech giants like Google and Facebook to monitor online content more aggressively. It’ll force platforms like Twitter or Google or Facebook to tell regulators, what is it exactly they are doing to tackle fake news or misinformation. Source(4:49)
MARKET MOVERS
- Blackstone is paying $7.6 billion for PS Business Parks. Blackstone is buying PSB's 27 million square foot portfolio of industrial, business park, traditional office, and multifamily properties mostly in California, Miami, Texas and Virginia. The deal includes a go-shop period that will expire on May 25 to consider other offers. Public Storage PSA will vote its shares in favor of the transaction, which expected to close in the third quarter.
- Crypto exchange Kraken is set to launch in UAE. The company will open an office in Abu Dhabi and become the first exchange to offer UAE dirham trading after receiving a full license to operate in the country. A sense of greater regulatory clarity is the reason for the influx of cryptocurrency businesses in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, according to Citi. The Middle East is one of the fastest-growing cryptocurrency markets in the world, making up 7% of global trading volumes.
- GM says it will produce electric Chevrolet Corvettes. The company said they will continue to produce traditional models with internal combustion engines alongside the electrified models. GM President Mark Reuss said they will have an electrified Corvette next year, so it’s coming very quickly. He declined to disclose when the all-electric Corvette would be released or whether it would be a traditional hybrid or plug-in hybrid electric vehicle.
- GE hopes to 3D print concrete components for wind turbines. GE says the printer in Bergen, New York, is the size of a three-story building and able to print tower sections as tall as 20 meters. The facility in Bergen is described as being at the heart of a collaboration with cement giant Holcim and Cobod, a firm that specializes in 3D printing. The printer could reportedly print in excess of 10 tons of real concrete per hour. Read more here.
- Goldman says oil and gas investment is about to boom. The industry is at a turning point, according to the bank. Seven years of declining activity have depleted spare capacity in most parts of the industry, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict provides a renewed sense of urgency around the security of supply. It comes as capital expenditure in oil and gas projects is set to boom, the bank said.
