Google's Cookie Replacement

MARKET MOVERS

Home prices notch record-breaking growth but show signs of slowing. Homes sold in November 2021 went for 18.8% higher than the same period in 2020, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Index, more modest than the previous month's rate of 19.1%. For the past several months home prices have been rising at a very high, but decelerating rate. That trend continued in November 2021. Read more here.

Uber partners with Smart & Final to expand grocery delivery on the West coast. Right now, 173 stores in Arizona, California, and Nevada are available for service on Uber and Uber Eats, with all 254 locations slated to be added to the service. Alcohol delivery is available in California and will be added across the other two states later this year.

US stocks reverse severe losses as buyers step in and point out the relative calm of larger markets elsewhere. It looks like this is still a reasonably concentrated sell-off in equities rather than a general panicked flight from risk. If you look at any chart of any price in the world in 2001, you know they all collapsed at once synchronously as it were, and that’s not happening right now, which is a good thing, says FT's Rob Armstrong. Source(3:34)

Crypto is starting to become more common in the real estate world. Apparently, almost 12% of first-time homebuyers last year sold some sort of cryptocurrency to make their down payment. That's up from less than 5% pre-pandemic, according to Redfin data. There's now a crypto mortgage on the market too by a company called Milo, the program lets you leverage your crypto holdings (rather than sell them off) to buy a house or invest in real estate. Read more here. Read more here.

Covid-19 fuels best-ever commercial real-estate sales. Commercial property sales totaled a record $809 billion in 2021, according to Real Capital Analytics. Real-estate buyers loaded up on warehouses, which serve as fulfillment centers for the e-commerce boom as well as apartment buildings, resorts, and vacation-oriented hotels. The surge reflects investors’ views that work and lifestyle changes brought on by Covid-19 aren’t fleeting.

Google overhauls cookie replacement plan after privacy critiques. The company said Tuesday that the new system it is proposing, Topics, would allow web advertisers to target broad categories of users—those interested in “fitness” or “travel,” for example—instead of grouping them into thousands of cohorts with similar browsing histories. Read more here.

Nvidia prepares to abandon $40 billion takeover of Arm, according to reports. The U.S. chipmaker has told partners it’s not expecting the deal to be finalized, after making little to no progress in winning approval for the $40 billion chip deal. SoftBank, meanwhile, is stepping up preparations for an Arm IPO as an alternative to the Nvidia takeover.

Unilever said it would restructure its operations into five stand-alone divisions, reshuffle top executives and cut jobs in a sweeping reorganization aimed at accelerating sales growth as the Dove soap owner girds itself against an activist investor and looks to quell shareholder dissatisfaction. The five divisions are beauty and well-being, personal care, home care, nutrition, and ice cream. Read more here.

GM to spend $6.6 billion on EV plant investments in bid to dethrone Tesla in electric car sales by 2025. It will invest in its home state of Michigan over the next several years to increase electric pickup truck production and build a new EV battery cell plant. GM has said it will sell more than 1 million EVs globally by mid-decade and overtake Tesla as America’s top seller of electric vehicles during that time frame.

Rising mortgage rates could 'supercharge' the spring buying season. While rates are expected to increase steadily throughout 2022, many potential home buyers may try to jump into the market now before rates rise further. The fear of missing out on low rates, and the potential loss of house-buying power may supercharge the housing market ahead of the spring home-buying season. Read more here.