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☆ Explainer: How Kakao won a takeover battle against HYBE for K-pop pioneer SM Entertainment
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-12 | by ( Hyunsu Yim | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

For more than two decades, the K-pop industry was dominated by the trio until BTS rose to global fame in recent years, making its agency HYBE the largest music label in the country. It is the second-largest entertainment group in South Korea by market value at $2.8 billion, trailing HYBE, which is worth $5.5 billion. Lee filed an injunction request to block the deal that was approved by a court, and sold a 15% stake in SM to rival agency HYBE, setting up a takeover battle. Kakao, the most popular social media platform in South Korea, is expanding aggressively into the entertainment industry where it already owns a smaller K-pop agency, Starship Entertainment. In January, Kakao Entertainment announced a 1.2 trillion won ($966.27 million) investment from Singapore's GIC and Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, giving it more firepower for the SM bid.

☆ Oscars 2023 Red Carpet: See All the Best Looks
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-12 | by ( Kevin Huynh | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Jamie Lee Curtis, nominated for best supporting actress for “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” in Dolce & Gabbana. Angela Weiss/AFP/Getty Images

LOS ANGELES, March 9 (Reuters) - Hot dogs for fingers, plastic googly eyes, and conversing rocks are hardly staples of mainstream movie-making. Yet, they have became cultural touchstones of "Everything Everywhere All at Once," the at-times baffling and absurdist film that has captivated Hollywood. "It is using all of this apparatus of big storytelling that we've been kind of very accustomed to," Willmore said. "Bringing that large scale to bear on this very small story, I think that is really what has swept people up," she added. Star James Hong alluded to the confusion when the movie was honored at the Screen Actors Guild awards.

"Everything Everywhere All at Once" is now available to stream with a Showtime membership. The Oscar-nominated movie stars Michelle Yeoh as a laundromat owner who jumps across the multiverse. You can also buy film to watch at home from digital retailers like Amazon, Apple TV, and Vudu. How to watch 'Everything Everywhere All at Once'""Everything Everywhere All at Once" is now available to watch at home with a Showtime subscription. Once you've made your digital purchase, you can stream the film as many times as you like with no restrictions.

☆ Top Wall Street analysts pick these stocks for attractive returns
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-05 | by ( Tipranks.Com Staff | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

In these tough times, investors would be well advised to find stocks that are positioned to navigate a potential economic downturn. To help with the process, here are five stocks chosen by Wall Street's top professionals, according to TipRanks, a platform that ranks analysts based on their past performance. However, the company issued conservative guidance for fiscal 2023 due to the impact of high inflation on its low-to-moderate income customers. Further, he thinks that Kontoor's fiscal 2023 outlook "will likely prove conservative." Poser raised his fiscal 2023 and 2024 earnings per share estimates, reiterated his buy rating for Kontoor Brands and increased the price target to $60 from $53.

☆ ‘True Lies’ Review: A Counterintelligence Couple Comes Back
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( John Anderson | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +1 min

The old James Cameron / Arnold Schwarzenegger collaboration “True Lies” has needed a reboot since, oh, about the time it was released. Its premise was close to preposterous: A long-married woman wouldn’t know her husband was a globe-trotting, veteran counterterrorism agent? Linguistics professor, yoga enthusiast and mother of two Helen Tasker (Ms. Gonzaga) has been married to Harry Tasker (Mr. Howey) for 17 years. Yet she has no idea that all his business travel for that job in “computer sales” really involves him and his cohort saving the world. This doesn’t earn her a lot of our respect, but the show wisely dispenses with the whole façade in the first episode: Helen becomes an agent, too.

[1/2] Chinese tourists stand next to street vendors at Myeongdong shopping district in Seoul, South Korea, January 9, 2023. REUTERS/Kim Hong-JiSEOUL, March 2 (Reuters) - South Korea's government on Thursday promised to boost exports and attract tourists as the country's statistics agency released January data that showed gloomy prospects for the economy. Reflecting the sense of urgency within the government, South Korea's trade minister convened a separate emergency meeting of officials from almost all ministries to press for more exports. South Korea's official forecast is for exports to drop 4.5% in 2023 compared with last year. South Korea's trade-reliant economy contracted by an estimated 0.4% in the fourth quarter of 2022 from the previous quarter as exports collapsed.

☆ Factbox: Winners at the 29th Screen Actors Guild Awards
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-27 | by ( Danielle Broadway | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/10] Chris Perfetti, Lisa Ann Walter, Quinta Brunson, Janelle James, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Tyler James Williams and William Stanford Davis accept the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series award for "Abbott Elementary" during the 29th Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles, California, U.S., February 26, 2023. REUTERS/Mario AnzuoniLOS ANGELES, Feb 26 (Reuters) - These are the key winners of the 29th Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards for the best performances in film and television in 2022, handed out at a streamed ceremony on Sunday:BEST MOVIE CAST"Everything Everywhere All At Once"BEST MALE ACTOR, MOVIEBrendan Fraser, "The Whale"BEST FEMALE ACTOR, MOVIEMichelle Yeoh, "Everything Everywhere All At Once"BEST FEMALE SUPPORTING ACTOR, MOVIEJamie Lee Curtis, “Everything Everywhere All at Once”BEST MALE SUPPORTING ACTOR, MOVIEKe Huy Quan, "Everything Everywhere All At Once"BEST FEMALE ACTOR, TV MOVIE OR LIMITED SERIESJessica Chastain, “George and Tammy”BEST MALE ACTOR, TV MOVIE OR LIMITED SERIESSam Elliot, “1883”BEST FEMALE ACTOR, TV DRAMAJennifer Coolidge, “The White Lotus”BEST MALE ACTOR, TV DRAMAJason Bateman, “Ozark”BEST FEMALE ACTOR, TV COMEDYJean Smart, “Hacks”BEST MALE ACTOR, TV COMEDYJeremy Allen White, “The Bear”BEST TV DRAMA ENSEMBLE“The White Lotus”BEST TV COMEDY ENSEMBLE“Abbott Elementary”Reporting by Danielle Broadway; Editing by Mary Milliken and Jonathan OatisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

The movie about a Chinese-American laundromat owner struggling to finish her taxes also claimed three acting awards, for lead female actor Michelle Yeoh and supporting actors Ke Huy Quan and Jamie Lee Curtis. The film honorees are closely watched because actors make up the largest group of voters for March 12's Academy Awards. Quan, a former child star who had given up on acting for years, claimed the trophy for male actor in a supporting role. Jamie Lee Curtis, who played an exacting tax agent in "Everything Everywhere," claimed the award for female actor in a supporting role. Brendan Fraser won best male movie actor for "The Whale."

☆ Hollywood producers honor Tom Cruise and 'Everything Everywhere'
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-26 | by ( Lisa Richwine | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., Feb 25 (Reuters) - Hollywood producers celebrated Tom Cruise's career and handed their top film honor to multiverse adventure "Everything Everywhere All at Once" on Saturday at one of the key awards ceremonies ahead of next month's Oscars. The Producers Guild of America honored Cruise with a lifetime achievement award, and several speakers thanked the actor for boosting the pandemic-hobbled movie business with last summer's blockbuster "Top Gun: Maverick." "Tom Cruise showed all of us that moviegoing was back," Sherry Lansing, the former CEO of Paramount Pictures, said in her introduction. The 60-year-old Cruise rose to fame as the star of "Risky Business," "Cocktail," "A Few Good Men" and other films. As he accepted his award, Cruise applauded the work of the TV and film producers in the audience.

☆ 'Everything Everywhere' vies for Hollywood's SAG awards on road to Oscars
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-26 | by ( Lisa Richwine | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The movie starring Michelle Yeoh as an exasperated laundry owner trying to finish her taxes is the favorite to take best film ensemble at the SAG awards, according to experts polled by the Gold Derby website. If the movie wins big, that would give it a boost on the way to the Academy Awards on March 12. SAG winners are chosen by members of the SAG-AFTRA acting union, and actors make up the largest group of voters for the Oscars. In television categories, "Better Call Saul," "The Crown," "Ozark," "Severance" and "The White Lotus" will compete for best drama cast. TV comedy nominees for best cast are "Abbott Elementary," "Barry," "The Bear," "Hacks" and "Only Murders in the Building."

☆ Private equity is finally stepping up its tech game. Here's who is leading the charge.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

What's the first thing that pops into your head when you hear the term "private equity?" PE firms do plenty of things quite well (and they are certainly compensated for their work), but their internal tech has never been a top priority. What I find most fascinating about the so-called "digitization" of PE isn't so much the actual tech but the culture. Click here to learn more about the 12 executives helping PE firms get up to speed on cutting-edge tech they can use to source and close deals. Silicon Valley Bank, which is the go-to bank for tech startups, is under pressure amid the market downturn, the Financial Times reported.

☆ Hot dog fingers and googly-eye rocks from 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' could be yours as A24 auctions dozens of props and costumes
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( Aaron Mcdade | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A24 announced an auction of dozens of props and costumes from "Everything Everywhere All at Once." There are over 40 items for sale, including the famous "hot dog finger" gloves and several costumes. A mix of props and costumes are available in the auctions, including the famous "hot dog finger" gloves worn by Yeoh's character Evelyn. Many of the other props and costumes, including a rock with googly eyes and the fanny pack worn by Quan's character Waymond, are selling for a few hundred or thousand dollars. A24 has also auctioned items for charity from some of its past films including "Uncut Gems" and "Midsommar," as well as other general Hollywood memorabilia.

Worldwide boy-band sensation BTS may be on hiatus, but refreshing new financial acts threaten to upend the world of K-pop, and perhaps South Korea. The battle over 28-year-old SM Entertainment, the $2.3 billion force behind Girls' Generation and EXO, is at heart a family feud. It helps, too, that K-pop has turned into one of South Korea’s strongest exports, thanks largely to “Butter” and “Dynamite” singers BTS. "We oppose all aggressive outside mergers and acquisitions, including Hybe," SM said in a statement, according to Reuters. Separately, internet conglomerate Kakao said on Feb. 7 it would acquire a 9.05% stake in SM via 112 billion won of new shares and 105 billion won of convertible bonds.

☆ World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee calls crypto 'dangerous' and likens it to gambling
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-20 | by ( Arjun Kharpal | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Tim Berners-Lee is credited with inventing the World Wide Web in 1989. But he has been dissatisfied with the way his original vision for the web has panned out. Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, called cryptocurrency "dangerous" and likened it to gambling in an episode of CNBC's "Beyond The Valley" podcast published last Friday. Discussing the future of the web, Berners-Lee said digital currencies are "only speculative" and compared it to the dot-com bubble, in which internet stocks, often without a solid business behind them, were highly inflated. Obviously, that's really dangerous," Berners-Lee told CNBC.

Align Partners' stake in SM, a pioneer in K-pop behind acts like Girls' Generation and Red Velvet, is just 1% - but still worth tens of millions of dollars. HYBE hasn't disclosed whether it intends to buy more of SM after the current tender offer. Taken together, the 40% stake would cost HYBE about 1.137 trillion won ($884 million) under current plans - though SM shares traded above HYBE's tender offer price on Thursday. Align's Lee said this would become a proxy fight, with SM's current executives wooing shareholders with plans to improve SM's sales and profitability. ($1 = 1,284.9500 won)Reporting by Hyunsu Yim and Joyce Lee; Editing by Kenneth MaxwellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Republicans called Biden a 'liar' for saying some of them wanted to sunset Social Security and Medicare. But there are several examples of lawmakers supporting cuts or weakening programs.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( Kelsey Vlamis | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said cuts to Social Security and Medicare are off the table. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has insisted that cuts to Medicare and Social Security are off the table. But there are several examples of Republicans suggesting cutting or weakening Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. "I want to save Social Security," Johnson said, according to local WKOW. It also involved decreasing Social Security benefits over time and for higher-earning retirees, as well as increasing Medicare premiums for some.

Exports fell 16.6% in January from a year earlier, trade ministry data showed, worse than an 11.3% decline predicted in a Reuters survey and the fastest drop in exports since May 2020. Imports fell 2.6% compared with a year earlier, less than a 3.6% drop predicted in the survey. As a result, the country posted a monthly trade deficit of $12.69 billion, setting a record amount for any month. Leading the sluggish trade performance in January were a 44.5% dive in semiconductor exports and a whopping 31.4% plunge in sales to China, the trade ministry data showed. The government has forecast this year's exports would fall 4.5% after posting a 6.1% gain in 2022, and the trade ministry has said it would do what it can to avert a decline.

loadingThe motion picture is up for 11 Oscars at the March 12 Academy Awards, including best picture and lead actress for Michelle Yeoh. Both Jamie Lee Curtis and Stephanie Hsu are vying for best actress in a supporting role, while Ke Huy Quan is a favorite for best supporting actor. Kwan believes that without Yeoh, the film would not have been the success it is. "And I'm going through all these costumes, I'm like doing kung-fu, I'm like blowing up a cop's face into confetti." Reporting by Rollo Ross and Danielle Broadway; Editing by Mary Milliken and Sandra MalerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

OAKLAND, Calif/BANGALORE, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Microprocessor giant Intel Corp (INTC.O) has stumbled badly at a time when smaller rival AMD and others are picking up speed. Intel still dominates the markets for PC and server processing chips, with a market share greater than 70%, tech research firm IDC calculated. "I don't think Intel is in a position yet to start recovering share" in the market, he said. Customers of processors cannot launch products if new chip designs are late, and Intel has stumbled on delivering its latest data-center chip, code named Sapphire Rapids. Worse for Intel, the benchmarks published by the two companies show that AMD's latest server chip outperforms Sapphire Rapids on "general purpose workloads", according to Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon.

REUTERS/Andrew KellyOAKLAND, Calif/BANGALORE, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Microprocessor giant Intel Corp (INTC.O) says it will regain its footing against AMD and other chip rivals which are gobbling up market share, but Wall Street is skeptical. That's a headwind for Intel and AMD, both of which are rolling out new chips, but Intel is facing a larger inventory correction. Intel still dominates the markets for PC and server processing chips, with a market share greater than 70%, tech research firm IDC calculated. Chipmaker shares were hammered across the board on Friday, but Intel led the decline, slumping by 10% while AMD lost 1.8%. AMD set to overtake Intel in market cap, again AMD set to overtake Intel in market cap, againReporting By Jane Lanhee Lee and Chavi Mehta; Editing by David Gaffen, Peter Henderson, Kirsten Donovan and Jonathan OatisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

The company offered a positive outlook in the North American market, where it sees a growing number of customers requesting made-in-USA batteries to be qualified for federal EV subsidies. The company had secured additional orders worth about 20 trillion won in the fourth quarter, Chief Financial Officer Lee Chang-sil added. LGES reported operating profit of 237 billion won ($193 million) for the October-December period, versus 76 billion won a year earlier. That compared with an average analyst forecast of 256 billion won compiled by Refinitiv SmartEstimate. Revenue for the quarter rose 92% to 8.5 trillion won, LG Energy said in a regulatory filing.

"Everything hinges on the PC market recovery. Meanwhile, the data center market has also slowed from double-digit growth as businesses cut costs to ride out an economic slowdown. The company forecast first-quarter revenue in the range of about $10.5 billion to $11.5 billion. The company expects an adjusted loss of 15 cents per share versus expectations of a 24 cents per share profit. Revenue in the fourth quarter fell 32% to $14 billion.

"Everything hinges on the PC market recovery. AMD isn’t immune to this either," said Wayne Lam, an analyst at CCS Insight about Intel rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD.O). Shares of other microchip companies fell as well, with AMD down 2.4% and Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) down 2%. PC shipments fell 16.5% to 292.3 million units in 2022, per data from research firm IDC, forcing chipmakers to cut back production and slash revenue forecasts. Meanwhile, the data center market has also slowed from double-digit growth as businesses look to cut costs to ride out an economic slowdown.

Playing down the economic slowdown as part of a global trend, Finance Minister Choo Kyung-ho pledged prompt support measures for exporters, such as tax breaks and administrative help. Central bank estimates showed gross domestic product (GDP) shrank 0.4% in the October-December period from the previous quarter. Markets showed a muted reaction to the data, which was largely in line with repeated warnings in recent weeks by the government and central bank. The central bank estimated that in 2022 the full-year value of the economy, Asia's fourth-largest, had been 2.6% larger than in 2021, when it showed growth of 4.1%. Reporting by Jihoon Lee and Choonsik Yoo; Editing by Bradley PerrettOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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