News

Exclusive: TikTok owner ByteDance considers listing China business in Hong Kong or Shanghai

Anne
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© Reuters. The logo of Bytedance, which owns short video app TikTok, is seen at its office in Beijing

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By Yingzhi Yang and Julie Zhu

BEIJING/HONG KONG (Reuters) – Chinese tech giant ByteDance is considering listing its domestic business in Hong Kong or Shanghai, people familiar with the matter told Reuters, against a backdrop of rising Sino-U.S. tensions over its hit non-China video app TikTok.

Of the two venues, the company prefers Hong Kong, according to two of the people. One of the two also said ByteDance is simultaneously studying the option to list its smaller, non-China business – which includes TikTok that is not available in China – in Europe or the United States.

The eight-year-old Beijing-based tech and media company had originally wanted to list as a combined entity, including TikTok and other operations, in New York or Hong Kong in a blockbuster deal. TikTok allows

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Investing

Why you should factor in your real estate when you make all investment decisions

Anne

Your real estate

What you own, and how you own it, are also important considerations. For instance, the amount of debt against a property influences how you factor it in. A house or condo with no mortgage is more stable than one that has a large loan attached (as a percentage of the value). In the latter case, the home equity can double or disappear in a heartbeat.

How you categorize an income property depends on whether it produces a positive annual return (after expenses, depreciation, and taxes) or has only a modest (or negative) cash flow. The former can be slotted in with your stable income securities. The latter is a speculation on higher prices and belongs in your higher-risk bucket.

No hard-and-fast rules

A typical Canadian income portfolio that is heavily invested in utilities, banks, telecommunications and REITs is fuelled by the same forces as

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Finance

Alphabet’s revenue falls for first time ever as ad sales suffer

Anne

Alphabet Inc.’s revenue fell for the first time ever as the coronavirus pandemic and ensuing economic fallout forced advertisers to pull back spending.

Ad sales, which make up the bulk of revenue at the Google parent, were $29.9 billion in the second quarter, down 8.1% from the same period last year. That’s the lowest they’ve been since the third quarter of 2018.

Still, overall revenue, which slipped 2%, was slightly higher than analysts had expected. YouTube, the fastest-growing part of Google’s advertising empire before the coronavirus set in, brought in $3.8 billion, 6% more than last year.

“We are cautiously encouraged by our results for the second quarter, although mindful of the fragile global economic environment,” Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat said on a conference call. Ad sales improved near the end of the quarter.

Porat had tamped down expectations in April, warning the second quarter would be “difficult” for … Read More

News

Auto industry set to put brakes on central Europe’s COVID-19 recovery By Reuters

Anne
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Employees work on an assembly line as the Volkswagen construction plant reopens after closing down due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Bratislava

By Krisztina Than and Jason Hovet

BUDAPEST/PRAGUE (Reuters) – The auto industry, long a driver of economic growth in central Europe, is likely to be one of the main drags on the region’s efforts this year to recover from the impact of COVID-19.

After communist rule ended in central Europe three decades ago, foreign carmakers invested heavily in a region that had a cheap and efficient workforce. The auto sector became an important source of foreign investment, employment and growth.

But with car production hit by factories idling during coronavirus lockdowns, and many still not back at full throttle, the industry is expected to be worse hit by COVID-19 than many others in central Europe.

That is bad news for the Czech

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Investing

Preparedness is the only cure for investor anxiety in these uncertain times

Anne

It’s a problem that is even more apparent in our rapidly growing digital media world, where the truth can be even harder to come by. Political spin, corporate agendas and even deliberately misleading material on social media all serve to muddy waters that are complicated enough, given that our understanding of the virus itself is constantly evolving.

Then there are is the uncertainty over the financial implications for both households and governments. While there is a good probability that tax hikes are on the horizon given the dire state of budgets at the municipal, provincial and federal levels, it is impossible predict with a high level of certainty what those hikes will look like nor when they will be implemented.

While Finance Minister Bill Morneau has indicated that using new taxes to pay for the record-setting deficit pose too much of a risk given the precarious state

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Finance

PayPal cites ‘death of cash’ as firm posts record earnings

Anne

PayPal shares jumped nearly 5% after market close on Wednesday as the payment giant announced record revenues of $5.26 billion for the second quarter, and said it added 1.7 million new merchants during this period.

In a call discussing the results, PayPal executives said society has reached an “inflection point” when it comes to the “death of cash,” and noted that 70% of consumers now fear for their health when it comes to paying in stores.

“Consumers no longer want to handle cash or any forms of payment that require physical touch at checkout,” said Schulman.

He also cited an explosion in the use of PayPal-owned Venmo in the second quarter, saying the popular payment app now has over 60 million users. Schulman noted that Venmo usage had long revolved around social occasions—such as splitting the check at a restaurant—but that it’s now being used for a much broader range … Read More