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☆ Ryanair posts record Christmas quarter, sees 'very robust' summer demand
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Ryanair on Monday posted its largest after-tax profit for the October-December quarter and said bookings for Easter and summer flights in recent weeks were "very robust", boosted by demand from Asian travelers and a strong U.S. dollar. "We had record bookings in week two and week three of January, very robust demand into Easter and the summer without fare stimulation," he said. The Irish airline, Europe's largest by passenger numbers, said it had earned 211 million euros ($229.40 million) in the three months ended Dec. 31, the third quarter of its financial year. "With Asian tourists now returning and a strong U.S. dollar encouraging Americans to explore Europe, we're seeing robust demand," Chief Executive Officer Michael O'Leary said in a statement. Last week, rivals Wizz Air and EasyJet reported strong summer bookings.

The balance shown in the unredacted BlockFi filing includes $415.9 million worth of assets linked to FTX and $831.3 million in loans to Alameda. Both of Bankman-Fried's firms were wrapped into FTX's November bankruptcy, which sent the crypto markets reeling. Bankrupt crypto lender BlockFi had over $1.2 billion in assets tied up with Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX and Alameda Research, according to financials that had previously been redacted but were mistakenly uploaded on Tuesday without the redactions. In all, the crypto lender has unadjusted assets worth almost $2.7 billion, with close to half tied to FTX and Alameda, the presentation shows. After all adjustments, BlockFi has just shy of $1.3 billion in assets, only $668.8 million of which is described as "Liquid / To Be Distributed."

☆ FTX says $415 million of crypto was hacked
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-17 | by ( Rohan Goswami | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Bankrupt crypto firm FTX said on Tuesday that $415 million worth of crypto was hacked from the exchange's accounts, representing a sizeable portion of the identified assets the company is trying to recover. However, that includes "unauthorized third-party transfers" of $323 million out of FTX.com (the international business) and $90 million out of FTX US, the company said in a statement. Another $2 million of hedge fund Alameda Research's crypto was also stolen. At the time, the stolen crypto was valued at $477 million, according to blockchain analytics firm Elliptic. FTX's advisors are also reviewing a $2.1 billion share repurchase payment from FTX to crypto exchange Binance in the third quarter of 2021.

☆ Microsoft reportedly plans to invest $10 billion in creator of buzzy A.I. tool ChatGPT
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Ryan Browne | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Microsoft plans to invest $10 billion in OpenAI, the startup behind popular artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT, according to a report from Semafor. A bet on ChatGPT could help Microsoft boost its efforts in web search, a market dominated by Google . Brian Nowak, the bank's lead analyst on Alphabet, wrote that language models could take market share "and disrupt Google's position as the entry point for people on the Internet." OpenAI, which was founded by Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sam Altman in 2015, launched its ChatGPT to the public in late November. Five days after OpenAI released ChatGPT, Altman said that the chat research tool crossed 1 million users.

☆ Solana's slide accelerates — $50 billion in value wiped from the cryptocurrency in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-30 | by ( Rohan Goswami | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

The token's market cap collapsed from over $55 billion in January to barely above $3 billion at year-end. Bankman-Fried's companies held nearly $1.2 billion worth of the token and associated assets in June, according to documents reviewed by CoinDesk. But the recent slides came after that news had already broken, making Solana's recent slide something of a mystery. During the crypto market's heyday in 2021, Bankman-Fried was hardly alone in his bullishness. Solana's token fell from $141 to a low of a little over $94.

☆ These photos show the many ways Christmas is celebrated around the world
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-23 | by ( Natalie Tham | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

In a yearly series, CNBC Travel highlights diverse Christmas celebrations around the world. The Gavle goat is moving to a new location this year for the first time in 56 years, according to Visit Gavle, the city's visitor's guide. "He means a lot for us in Gavle, and he's a big part of the Christmas spirit," she said. Teachers, students and parents hold Christmas lanterns made from recycled materials during a campaign for sustainable Christmas celebrations at an elementary school in Quezon City, Philippines. "If I'm in Brazil during Christmas, I take my nephew and niece to a Christmas parade, and we have a blast!

From almost nothing five years ago, the institutional residential property market has grown to the point where investors say housing is starting to challenge office buildings as a focus for their cash. And higher yields and scope for growth are spurring new projects, market players say. "We are currently surprised ourselves by the speed of the change and how the market is changing," he told Reuters. "Many institutional investors are looking to gain the first mover advantage and moving in," Wysokińska-Kuzdra told Reuters. The war in Ukraine has also created uncertainty, so that some investors are focused only on finishing current projects.

☆ Twitter says it will no longer allow 'free promotion' of other social media platforms
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-18 | by ( Ashley Capoot | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter said it will no longer allow users to promote other social media accounts on its platform, according to a thread of tweets Sunday. "We recognize that many of our users are active on other social media platforms," the company said. "However, we will no longer allow free promotion of certain social media platforms on Twitter." Many users have been promoting their other social media accounts on Twitter following Elon Musk's $44 billion takeover of the company in October. Twitter suspended the Washington Post's Taylor Lorenz late Saturday night, but her account was reinstated as of Sunday afternoon.

Lignite contains several times more sulphur and ash, and five times more mercury, than black coal, and provides three times less energy. It also loosened restrictions on selling coal waste, which can be highly polluting, taking Poland back to the days before 2018, when the rules for coal were tightened to fight smog. In September, PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski even told residents of Nowy Targ, the town with the lowest air quality in Poland in 2020, to burn pretty much whatever they wanted. Smog has been intense over the past days and we have a lot of children in need of intensive treatment," she said. COAL RUSHAbout 80% of the coal used by European Union citizens to heat homes is burned in Poland.

☆ 'Bloody parcels' containing animal eyes mailed to Ukrainian embassies
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-03 | by ( Leila Sackur | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

Bloody parcels containing the eyes of animals and explosives have been sent to several Ukrainian embassies and consuls across Europe, officials said late Friday. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oleg Nikolenko said in a statement on Facebook that embassies in Spain, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Croatia and Italy had received packages containing the disembodied eyes of animals. Consulates in Naples, Italy, Krakow, Poland, and the Czech city of Brno had also been targeted, he said. Letter bombs were mailed to six addresses in Spain earlier this week, including the Ukrainian Embassy and the U.S. Embassy, as well as to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, causing security to be tightened. Farther south, the Ukrainian consul in Naples, Maksym Kovalenko, told the AP that his office received two letters containing fish eyes at around 10:30 a.m. Thursday.

☆ Ukraine says its embassies in countries across Europe have been receiving bloodstained packages with animal eyes in them
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-02 | by ( Natalie Musumeci | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Ukrainian embassies in Europe have gotten packages with "animal eyes," in them, an official said. This comes after an apparent bomb inside an envelope exploded at the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid. "The packages contained animal eyes," Oleg Nikolenko, a spokesperson for Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in a Facebook post on Friday. The gruesome packages were received by the Ukrainian embassies in Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Croatia, Italy, and Austria, Nikolenko said. "We have reasons to consider what's going on a well-planned campaign of terror and intimidation of embassies and consulates of Ukraine," Ukraine's Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

CNN —Ukraine’s foreign minister has accused Russia of being behind a series of more than a dozen letters containing explosives or animal parts that were sent to Ukrainian diplomats around the world. “This campaign is aimed at sowing fear,” Dmytro Kuleba told CNN’s Matthew Chance in an exclusive interview in Kyiv on Friday. CNN was shown an image of one of the letters containing what officials said was the eyeball of a pig inside a padded envelope. ‘Who benefits?’Kuleba earlier urged foreign governments to guarantee maximum protection of Ukrainian diplomatic institutions in accordance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Nikolenko also stated that the Ukrainian Embassy in the United States received a letter with a photocopy of a critical article about Ukraine.

☆ Ukrainian embassies receive 'bloody packages' containing animal eyes - Kyiv
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

KYIV, Dec 2 (Reuters) - Several Ukrainian embassies abroad have received "bloody packages" containing animal eyes, the foreign ministry said on Friday, after a series of letter bombs were sent to addresses in Spain including Ukraine's embassy in Madrid. An embassy source in Rome said human faeces were left in front of the door. Nikolenko also said that the embassy in Kazakhstan had received a bomb threat, which was subsequently not confirmed. The embassy in the United States received a letter containing an article that was critical about Ukraine, he said. Reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv; additional reporting by Philip Pullela in Rome; writing by Tom Balmforth; editing by Timothy HeirtageOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Elon Musk showed off updates to his brain chips and said he’s going to install one in himself when they are ready
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-01 | by ( Ashley Capoot | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Elon Musk's health tech venture Neuralink shared updates to its brain-implant technology during a "show and tell" recruitment event Wednesday night. "We're confident there are no physical limitations to restoring full body functionality," Musk said. Neuralink could begin to test the motor cortex technology in humans in as soon as six months, Musk said. "You could have a Neuralink device implanted right now and you wouldn't even know. Musk showed footage of a monkey with a computer chip in its skull playing "telepathic video games," which Neuralink first debuted over a year ago.

Distressed crypto firm BlockFi has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey following the implosion of putative acquirer FTX. Like FTX, BlockFi also has a Bahamian subsidiary. BlockFi's bankruptcy filing shows that the company's largest disclosed client has a balance of nearly $28 million. The company started talking with restructuring professionals in the days after FTX's bankruptcy filing, according to people familiar with the matter. Approximately 130 additional affiliated companies are part of the proceedings, including Alameda Research, Bankman-Fried's crypto trading firm, and FTX.us, the company's U.S. subsidiary.

☆ Musk says Twitter to launch 'Verified' service next week with a 'gold check' for companies
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-25 | by ( Arjun Kharpal | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Elon Musk Twitter account displayed on a phone screen and Twitter logo displayed on a screen in the background are seen in this illustration photo taken in Krakow, Poland on November 22, 2022. Elon Musk said in a tweet Friday that Twitter would launch its delayed "Verified" service next week with different colored checks depending on the type of account. The CEO said Monday that Twitter would delay the relaunch of its $8 per month Blue Verified service. Musk had earlier said he planned to relaunch Twitter Blue on Nov. 29. The subscription service is Musk's attempt to find a new revenue stream at Twitter as part of the billionaire's controversial shakeup at the social media firm.

☆ Stick-wielding men smash surveillance cameras at China iPhone plant
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-23 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Foxconn logo displayed on a phone screen and Apple logo on a laptop are seen in this illustration photo taken in Krakow, Poland on November 2, 2022. Men wielding sticks smashed surveillance cameras and windows at a massive campus owned by Apple supplier Foxconn in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, scenes broadcast live on the Kuaishou short video platform showed on Wednesday. Hundreds of workers protested at the campus, home to the world's largest iPhone factory, where many chanted "give us our pay". Two sources with knowledge of the matter said there were protests at the Zhengzhou campus but declined to provide more details. Foxconn and Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It's a stark reversal for five-year-old Multicoin, which announced a $430 million fund in July, its third and largest to date. "We put entirely too much trust in our relationship with FTX," Multicoin managing partners Kyle Samani and Tushar Jain wrote in the 3,400-plus word letter, which CNBC obtained. Multicoin said it doesn't expect the crypto market to turn anytime soon. "Many trading firms will be wiped out and shut down, which will put pressure on liquidity and volume throughout the crypto ecosystem. The crypto market has experienced multiple pullbacks in the last few years and has bounced back.

☆ Consumers are looking to chocolate, Oreos, and Twinkies to 'not feel terrible all the time' — Hershey, Hostess, and Mondelez are cashing in
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-15 | by ( Alex Bitter | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Consumers are buying more chocolate and cookies as recession fears hang over the economy. But they are still buying smaller pleasures, including sweet treats like cookies and chocolate. Now, many of the same companies are seeing sales of chocolate, cookies, and other sweet snacks rise. "Our products remain an affordable treat for families and consumers," Michele Buck, the CEO of Hershey, told analysts on a call. While consumers cut back spending in many areas, such as travel, sales of lipstick actually grew.

☆ Musk reportedly considers locking all of Twitter behind a paywall
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Ashley Capoot | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Elon Musk, the new owner of Twitter, has considered putting the entire platform behind a paywall, according to a report from Platformer. But, it shows how Musk is exploring ways to generate new revenue from the platform he acquired for $44 billion. A platform-wide paywall marks Musk's latest musings about how to generate revenue for Twitter. In a thread of tweets, Musk said he will give "power to the people" by offering verification through Twitter Blue for $8 a month. Twitter began rolling out changes to its platform for some users on Saturday in preparation for the launch of its revamped Twitter Blue service, but reportedly plans to delay the launch the until after Tuesday's midterm elections.

☆ Twitter rolls out changes for some users ahead of launching new paid verification system
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-05 | by ( Ashley Capoot | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter began rolling out changes to its platform for some users on Saturday in preparation for the launch of its revamped subscription service Twitter Blue. Updates outlined in the App Store confirmed that users will be able to purchase Twitter Blue and receive a blue checkmark for $7.99 per month. In an earlier thread of tweets, Musk criticized the current system, which gives a blue checkmark, or verification, to notable users like politicians, members of the press, executives and organizations. Musk said he plans to give "power to the people" by offering verification to anyone on the platform through Twitter Blue for $8 a month. Musk said in a tweet Saturday that Twitter Blue will roll out worldwide once it is confirmed to be working in the initial set of countries.

☆ Companies are suspending ads on Twitter after Elon Musk's takeover. Here's the full list of brands pressing pause on advertising.
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

"As always, we will continue to monitor this new direction and evaluate our marketing spend," a spokesperson for General Mills told The Wall Street Journal. As is normal course of business with a significant change in a media platform, we have temporarily paused our paid advertising. VolkswagenVolkswagen has reportedly taken similar steps and pulled its ads from the social media platform, per The Wall Street Journal's anonymous sources. Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty ImagesAccording to the report, Oreo maker Mondelez International has also suspended advertising on Twitter for the time being. Interpublic GroupMajor advertising agency Interpublic Group has also advised clients to pause spending on Twitter advertising during the company's "chaotic" interim.

☆ China's YMTC denies report it took part in meetings on chip curbs
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-21 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Flags of United States and China displayed on phone screens in this multiple exposure illustration photo taken in Krakow, Poland on May 15, 2022. Chinese chip maker Yangtze Memory Technologies (YMTC) denied a media report that it had participated in emergency meetings convened by China's industry ministry to discuss the impact of U.S. sanctions. The company in a statement late on Thursday described the report as "false and sinister," adding that the report had damaged its corporate image and would have serious adverse effects on the semiconductor industry environment at home and abroad. Bloomberg News reported that YMTC, along with a number of other Chinese chip companies, met with China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to discuss the impact of recent sanctions from Washington on China's chip industry. According to the Bloomberg report, many of the participants at the meetings argued that the U.S. curbs spell doom for their industry, as well as China's ambitions to untether its economy from American technology.

☆ Stocks making the biggest moves after hours: Snap, CSX, Whirlpool and more
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-20 | by ( Alex Harring | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

The company's third-quarter revenue was about 6% higher than last year. The employment agency missed expectations on top and bottom lines, posting per-share earnings of $1.53 on revenue of $1.83 billion. SVB posted per-share earnings of $7.21, compared to analysts' expectations of $7.09 per share. Adjusted per-share earnings came in at $1.44, compared to analysts' expectations of $1.24, according to Refinitiv. Tenet also announced a $1 billion share buyback program.

☆ Inflation drives global firms eastward in Europe in search of cost savings
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-18 | by ( Michael Kahn | Anna Koper | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

PRAGUE/WARSAW (Reuters) - Central European companies that provide remote, lower-cost business services for multinationals are ramping up their expansion plans as high inflation drives global firms to push more work to the region to cut costs and bolster margins. “If we started out here as an experiment, the experiment is working.”INFLATION ATTRACTS NEW INVESTORSThe business services sector has grown from almost nothing 25 years ago to an industry employing nearly 800,000 workers across Central and Eastern Europe, an increasingly important engine for local economies. At Comdata, whose 1,500 workers in the Czech Republic and Hungary operate telephone service lines, rising inflation and costs from Western companies have kept business humming. “As more and more companies try to cut and to lower the labour costs they will be moving the services from western Europe,” Nedelnik told Reuters. “I see during the last two or three months the tenders are rapidly growing for German, French, Spanish and English-speaking roles.

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