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TORONTO, Nov 11 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Some members of the shared economy are seeing a resurgence in the side hustle as inflation bites. People are becoming more interested in driving for Uber Technologies (UBER.N) and listing their abodes on Airbnb (ABNB.O) in order to make an extra buck. U.S. President Joe Biden last month proposed a new gig worker rule that could fundamentally change how companies classify their workers. But the shared economy seems to be holding up fine, even if the economy isn’t. Uber Technologies on Nov. 1 said revenue grew 72% year-on-year to $8.3 billion in the third quarter.

☆ Dow soars 1,200 points, S&P 500 jumps 5% in biggest rally in two years after light inflation report
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-10 | by ( ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

Stocks mounted their biggest rally since 2020 after October’s reading of consumer prices raised investor hopes that inflation has peaked. The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 1,201.43 points, or 3.7%, to 33,715.37 for its biggest one-day gain since stocks were emerging from the depths of the pandemic bear market. The S&P 500 jumped 5.54% to 3,956.37 in its biggest rally since April 2020. Treasury yields plunged after the CPI report, with the 10-year Treasury yield falling more than 18 basis points to 3.946% as traders bet the Federal Reserve would slow its aggressive tightening campaign that’s weighed on markets all year. The yield on the 2-year Treasury dropped more than 23 basis points to 4.395% (1 basis point equals 0.01%).

☆ Stubborn inflation puts Fed on deadline
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-10 | by ( Ben Winck | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

NEW YORK, Nov 10 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Inflation is coming down in the United States, but is still too high for comfort. The year-over-year inflation rate eased more than expected – economists polled by Refinitiv had expected 8% - but the cost of food, energy, and housing still increased dramatically. Fed Chair Jerome Powell warned on Nov. 2 that there’s a risk that expectations of higher inflation become entrenched. When Americans expect higher inflation, businesses are inclined to raise prices and workers are liable to ask for higher wages, which amplifies the increase still further. If Powell really wants to tackle the fear of inflation as well as inflation itself, something bolder might be in order.

☆ Breakingviews: FTX crash is old lesson for financial newcomers
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-10 | by ( Liam Proud | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

LONDON, Nov 9 (Reuters Breakingviews) - FTX is a young company facing an ancient financial problem. While it may be of little consolation to Bankman-Fried, the industry could end up better off for FTX’s agonies. Any investors who used trades on FTX’s exchange to hedge positions held elsewhere may now have to liquidate those other holdings, creating a wave of selloffs. While crypto is a new industry, the de-facto run that FTX experienced is a phenomenon as old as finance. Follow @liamwardproud on TwitterloadingCONTEXT NEWSCryptocurrency exchange Binance on Nov. 9 scrapped its deal to buy rival FTX.

☆ Insana: The manic speculation behind the fall of FTX is as old as the markets themselves
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-10 | by ( Ron Insana | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder and chief executive officer of FTX, in Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, May 11, 2021. Lam Yik | Bloomberg | Getty ImagesWith a nod to Gertrude Stein, "there's no there there," in the world of cryptocurrencies. Whether it's manias in Sumerian grain markets, Dutch tulip bulbs, railroad bonds and everything from internet service providers to digital currencies, leveraged speculation is as old as markets themselves. Digital assets that don't exist in reality have been used as collateral to buy and sell other non-existent assets with a heavy dose of borrowed money. This creates a daisy chain of interlocked digital tokens that have no inherent value except what people are willing to ascribe.

☆ Cathay Pacific's new chief Lam to spearhead COVID recovery, two-brand plan
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-09 | by ( Jamie Freed | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Now that the Asian financial hub has scrapped onerous hotel quarantine rules, the airline is looking to build up passenger numbers. "Cathay has a mountain to climb to replace the staff, particularly pilots, that have left and continue to leave," he said. Lam, 50, joined Cathay in 1996, and was previously its chief customer and commercial officer. The two men took the top jobs in August 2019, after the resignation of then chief executive Rupert Hogg and Paul Loo, chief customer and commercial officer, amid mounting Chinese regulatory scrutiny of employees' involvement in the protests. Cathay's new chief customer and commercial officer is Lavinia Lau, 52, who moves from the role of director of customer travel, into a strong position to become its first female chief executive.

☆ Cathay Pacific appoints long-serving executive Ronald Lam as next CEO
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

Nov 9 (Reuters) - Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd (0293.HK) said on Wednesday that long-serving executive Ronald Lam would take over as chief executive from Jan. 1, with current boss Augustus Tang set to retire, as the pandemic-hit airline rebuilds capacity. Lam, 50, who joined Cathay in 1996, was previously the airline's chief customer and commercial officer and viewed by analysts as the most likely successor to Tang, 64, at an airline where the chief executive's tenure is usually around three years. Reporting by Jamie Freed in Sydney; Editing by Muralikumar AnantharamanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

TORONTO, Nov 9 (Reuters Breakingviews) - The U.S. cannabis industry would do well to heed the lessons of Canada’s growing pains. Even as the United States becomes more pot-friendly, however, there’s no guarantee that financial success will follow. Approved cannabis growers destroyed a record quantity of unsold buds last year, the Financial Post reported. Fewer available licenses in the United States also mean barriers to entry are higher. The Canadian government on Sept. 22 announced the launch of the legislative review of the Cannabis Act, which came into force on Oct. 17, 2018.

☆ Clean-energy deal seals fate for cross-border M&A
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, Nov 9 (Reuters Breakingviews) - A strong dollar may tempt U.S. companies to shop abroad, but a deal unveiled on Wednesday will take any remaining steam out of such notions. The war in Ukraine, inflation and other factors already have hit cross-border M&A. Roughly $1 trillion of cross-border deals have been announced this year, a nearly 40% drop from a year earlier, per Refinitiv. Such risks probably help explain why Chart lost $2 billion in market capitalization, despite $250 million a year of promised cost savings. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

☆ Cathay’s outgoing boss can flash half-decent card
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

HONG KONG, Nov 9 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Cathay Pacific’s (0293.HK) new boss has reason for optimism. The outgoing chief executive can flash a half-decent report card. He navigated the Air China- (601111.SS) and Swire Pacific-backed (0019.HK) company through backlash from Beijing after employees took part in the 2019 Hong Kong protests. The $6 billion airline has seen a modest rebound of travellers since Hong Kong dropped hotel quarantine requirements. Since Tang’s appointment in August 2019, Cathay has logged a negative total return of 16%.

☆ EXCLUSIVE Nvidia offers new advanced chip for China that meets U.S. export controls
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Jane Lanhee Lee | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

OAKLAND, Calif., Nov 7 (Reuters) - U.S. chip maker Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) said on Monday it is offering a new advanced chip in China that meets recent export control rules aimed at keeping cutting-edge technology out of China's hands. In late August, Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices Inc AMD.O both said that their advanced chips, including Nvidia's data center chip A100, were added to the export control list by the Commerce Department. The Nvidia A800 can be used in place of the A100, and both are GPUs, or graphics processing units. "The Nvidia A800 GPU, which went into production in Q3, is another alternative product to the Nvidia A100 GPU for customers in China. At least two Chinese websites by major server makers offer the A800 chip in their products.

☆ Exclusive: Nvidia offers new advanced chip for China that meets U.S. export controls
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Jane Lanhee Lee | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

OAKLAND, Calif., Nov 7 (Reuters) - U.S. chip maker Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) is offering a new advanced chip in China that meets recent export control rules aimed at keeping cutting-edge technology out of China's hands, the company confirmed on Monday. In late August, Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices Inc AMD.O both said that their advanced chips, including Nvidia's data center chip A100, were added to the export control list by the U.S. Commerce Department. The Nvidia A800 can be used in place of the A100 and both are GPUs, or graphics processing units. "The Nvidia A800 GPU, which went into production in Q3, is another alternative product to the Nvidia A100 GPU for customers in China. At least two Chinese websites by major server makers offer the A800 chip in their products.

☆ Democrat Abigail Spanberger wins reelection in bellwether Virginia district, NBC News projects
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Christina Wilkie | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) during a press conference with Moore Hallmark, Vice President of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Brian Lam, a local business owner, outside of Collage Spa on November 3, 2022 in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger has been reelected to the House in Virginia's 7th District, defeating Republican Yesli Vega, NBC News projected. The central Virginia district was widely considered a litmus test for how Democrats might fare in swing districts during an election cycle that historically favors Republicans. The GOP came into Election Day heavily favored to win House control, but Spanberger's swing district was seen as a crucial one for Democrats to hold in order to curb their losses. But redistricting in 2020 shifted Spanberger's district north to the outer suburbs of Washington D.C., where the electorate is 20% Latino and voters are more socially conservative than in her current district.

☆ Conscious capitalism falls behind in the polls
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( John Foley | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

NEW YORK, Nov 4 (Reuters Breakingviews) - As America heads to the polls on Tuesday, and the political climate gets more acrimonious, powerful companies have two choices. Their bid to avoid unwanted attention comes with a cost, because the alternative to conscious capitalism isn’t democracy but apathy. BlackRock affirmed its commitment on Thursday to letting individual customers vote shares in companies at annual meetings, rather than BlackRock voting on their behalf. Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, has taken aim at “woke” capitalism by barring state pension funds from investing based on non-pecuniary goals. From the other side, New York’s City comptroller is “reassessing” its relationship with Fink’s firm because BlackRock isn’t being progressive enough.

☆ Apple has instituted a hiring freeze. Here's what to know.
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-03 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Netflix's lower-priced subscription tier, Basic with Ads, is now available, so you can spend less to watch your favorite shows. Hiring freezes are underway at Apple. Since the summer, the company has touted its "deliberate" decisions about investment and hiring. But three sources with close knowledge of conversations at the company told Insider it has paused almost all hiring. Musk's Twitter has a list of thousands of employees who will be laid off, representing about 50% of the company's workforce.

NEW YORK/ LONDON, Nov 3 (Reuters Breakingviews) - First Boston is an old Wall Street name that’s re-emerging from Credit Suisse (CSGN.S) with some new features. Credit Suisse Chief Executive Ulrich Körner is reshaping the $11 billion group to put some bad years and big losses firmly in the past. Credit Suisse is setting up joint ventures between CS First Boston and the parent’s trading and wealth management businesses, according to a person familiar with the matter. An added complication is that CS First Boston bankers could be getting paid in their own division’s stock, rather than Credit Suisse shares. Michael Klein will step down from the Credit Suisse board of directors to help launch CS First Boston, the bank said.

☆ DuPont takes welcome M&A break
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, Nov 2 (Reuters Breakingviews) - The seemingly eternal makeover at DuPont de Nemours (DD.N) has been forced into a welcome pause. The chemicals giant just scrapped its $5.2 billion acquisition of engineered materials manufacturer Rogers (ROG.N) after failing to secure clearance from Chinese authorities. Under boss Ed Breen, DuPont has undertaken a series of mergers and spinoffs. To pay for the deal, DuPont sold most of its so-called Mobility & Materials division to Celanese (CE.N) for $11 billion. The problem is that DuPont ditched old businesses at lower valuation multiples to fund purchases at much higher ones.

☆ If 8% inflation is worrying, 3% could be worse
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-02 | by ( John Foley | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

But what if inflation doesn’t go back to 2%, and instead sticks somewhere higher, like 3%? Some measures suggest that inflation is coming down, such as the sharp drop in how long it’s taking manufacturers to get deliveries. For a central bank, the nightmare scenario is one where inflation subsides to a level above its target and then plateaus. Some Democrats already argue the Fed’s rate hikes hurt the poor; some Republicans blame Powell for letting inflation run amok in the first place. Rate hikes could trigger a recession, a state that’s painful but has tended to bring inflation down quickly in the past.

☆ Hong Kong Editors Go on Trial for Sedition Over Interviews With Activists
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Selina Cheng | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Stand News editor Patrick Lam Shiu-tung, with glasses, was escorted by police officers into a van in December after they searched his Hong Kong office. HONG KONG—Two former editors of a Hong Kong news outlet went on trial for sedition over articles that prosecutors say promoted pro-democracy activists and attacked the government, a key case in authorities’ national security crackdown on the city’s once relatively free press. Two top editors for the now-defunct online news website Stand News, Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam Shiu-tung, were arrested in December after hundreds of national security police raided their newsroom. The duo, who have been detained for almost a year, have pleaded not guilty to a charge of conspiring to publish or reproduce seditious publications.

New Delhi CNN Business —Foxconn, one of Apple’s largest suppliers, is wrestling with major disruption at its biggest iPhone assembly factory in China, as anxious workers reportedly flee the facility, according to social media videos. “[We] fully understand your eagerness to go back home,” Foxconn told its employees over the weekend, according to a post on Zhengzhou government’s official WeChat account. The Zhengzhou campus is the world’s biggest iPhone factory and typically accounts for as much as 85% of iPhone assembly capacity, according to Lam’s estimates. State media has said that many Foxconn workers are among those walking miles to escape the city. While these disruptions will impact iPhone production in the near term, analysts say it may not dent Apple’s iPhone shipments in the key holiday season.

☆ How a hospitality startup founder hooked Google's VC firm to lead its $5.8 seed round with a 4-minute pitch
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Ellen Nguyen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Jason Shames founded Skipper in 2020 and raised $5.8 million in seed funding this August. Before raising an official seed round for the company, Shames received investments from family, friends, and Pear, an early-stage venture fund based in California. After the presentation, Shames told Insider, 70 lead firms reached out — including an investor at Gradient Ventures, Google's venture fund focused on early-stage companies primarily in the AI space. Wen-Wen LamIn August, Skipper announced a $5.8 million seed round led by GV. Shames knew Lam from his days running the travel company Jetaport.

☆ Our guide to semiconductor companies and how their chips run our everyday lives
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Zev Fima | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +17 min

Semiconductor companies are also in the news a lot lately, whether it's the U.S. government cracking down on chip exports to China or innovations in connected cars and artificial intelligence. Since these companies don't need to invest in expensive fabrication facilities, they can run a more agile asset-light business model. Memory : The two main categories of memory chips are NAND and DRAM. Examples include those used for 5G, WiFi, Bluetooth, radiofrequency chips, near field communication chips (NFC), application-specific integrated circuit chips (ASICs), and so on. These chips are made by companies like Qualcomm, Marvell Technology, Broadcom (AVGO), ON Semiconductor, NXP Semiconductor (NXPI), and others.

☆ US curbs on China's microchip industry could throttle Xi Jinping's tech ambitions
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-31 | by ( Laura He | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

One dramatic, and potentially disruptive aspect of the rules is the ban on American citizens and legal residents working with Chinese chip firms. The ban could lead to a mass resignation of top executives and core research staff working at Chinese chip firms, which will hit the industry hard, Dong from Georgetown University said. So far it’s not clear exactly how many American workers there are in China’s domestic chip industry. At Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment China (AMEC), one of the country’s largest semiconductor equipment manufacturers, at least seven executives, including founder and chairman Gerald Yin, hold US citizenship, the latest company documents show. But some Western suppliers have already started preparing to halt sales to China in response to the US export curbs.

Welcome back to Insider Weekly, a roundup of some of our top stories. The industry took a beating after Meta, Alphabet, Amazon, and Microsoft reported poorer-than-expected earnings, wiping nearly $1 trillion off their collective market caps. Microsoft and Amazon reported slower growth in their usually outperforming cloud divisions, with Amazon also warning of slower holiday sales. Stephen Lam/Getty ImagesAmid a streak of disappointing financial results, inflation, and global turmoil, companies like Meta, Microsoft, and Google are looking to rein in runaway costs. For years, Big Tech companies competed on pay and perks to lure workers in a tight labor market.

☆ Exxon and Apple are in a similar boat
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Robert Cyran | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

NEW YORK, Oct 28 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) might be able to give Apple (AAPL.O) a lesson in disruption. Exxon’s profit was nearly triple last quarter what it was in the same quarter last year, and it wasn’t alone. Oil investors have been clear that they want discipline, as demand will likely peak soon if it hasn’t already. That means Exxon will presumably never reclaim its crown as the world’s most valuable firm, and Apple still earned far more than the company in the past year. Exxon earned $19.7 billion in the quarter, nearly tripling what it earned in the same period last year.

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