MS - Morgan Stanley
55.60 +0.08 (0.14%)
After hours: 7:02PM EST
| Previous Close | 55.84 |
| Open | 55.80 |
| Bid | 55.52 x 3200 |
| Ask | 55.75 x 2900 |
| Day's Range | 54.94 - 55.96 |
| 52 Week Range | 38.76 - 57.57 |
| Volume | 5,938,560 |
| Avg. Volume | 8,893,785 |
| Market Cap | 88.499B |
| Beta (5Y Monthly) | 1.34 |
| PE Ratio (TTM) | 10.70 |
| EPS (TTM) | 5.19 |
| Earnings Date | Apr 14, 2020 - Apr 19, 2020 |
| Forward Dividend & Yield | 1.40 (2.51%) |
| Ex-Dividend Date | Jan 29, 2020 |
| 1y Target Est | 61.95 |
- Barrons.com
Dell Sells RSA Security Business to Private-Equity Firm Symphony for $2.1 Billion
Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board and AlpInvest Partners are also part of the group buying the cybersecurity business.
- Bloomberg
Tencent Music Analysts See Livestream Regulation Hurting Revenue
(Bloomberg) -- Tencent Music Entertainment Group received a string of rating downgrades recently as analysts see a stricter regulatory environment hurting the Chinese music entertainment service.“We believe regulatory headwinds and competition will continue to weigh on TME’s (social entertainment) and see risk to the new model despite a material reset,” KeyBanc Capital analyst Hans Chung said.KeyBanc and two other firms, BOCOM International and CCB International Securities, issued downgrades. Analysts anticipate that a government restriction on the use of “lucky draws” -- a popular marketing strategy -- will hurt revenue in the social entertainment division next year. The company is slated to post fourth-quarter results next month.Tencent Music ADRs fell as much as 3%, and are poised to extend their losing streak to three days and further pare this year’s gains.Here’s what analysts are saying:KeyBanc, Hans ChungThe Chinese government’s recently imposed ban on lucky draw activities on livestreaming platforms could result in “materially lower 1Q20 revenue,” as it was “one of the most popular and monetizable features” for the company’s social entertainment platforms.The firm sees continued risk “given uncertainty around the re-introduction of the lucky draw type of features and ongoing competition from short video, which has impacted user growth and engagement.”“Given structurally lower growth prospects and ongoing challenges in the near to mid-term, we think our prior targeted valuation is difficult to justify.”Cut rating to sector weight from overweight.Jefferies, Thomas ChongSees the first-quarter social entertainment revenue growth hurt by the removal of lucky draw features toward end of January to the middle of February. Some features are back online after product adjustments.However, TME is “on track” in music subscriptions with paying users targeting to reach 50 million in the fourth quarter of 2020. The firm estimates subscription revenue under online music services to grow 49% year-over-year, driven by the “continued acceleration in paying subscribers.”The firm sees monetization models through QQ livestreaming and advertising becoming the next drivers.Morgan Stanley, Alex PoonThe firm cut its 2020 and 2021 earnings estimates “because of the weak livestreaming outlook.”Removal of the lucky draw feature will hurt livestreaming platforms, including Tencent Music’s. Meanwhile, Tencent Music doesn’t have an aggressive target for its QQ Music livestreaming business ramp, so “we don’t think this will be very meaningful.”Rates the stock equal weight. Cut price target by 6% to $15.To contact the reporter on this story: Andres Guerra Luz in New York at aluz8@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Will DaleyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Bloomberg
Tesla Analysts Do About Face and Shares Resume Their Rally
(Bloomberg) -- Tesla Inc. shares resumed their steep ascent on Tuesday, after two prominent Wall Street analysts raised their price targets on the electric vehicle maker, and the company resumed deliveries of its China-built model 3 sedans after a pause due to the coronavirus outbreak.The company’s potential to become a key battery supplier for electric vehicles prompted Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas to nearly double his bull case for the shares.Jonas increased his most optimistic projection for Tesla to $1,200 a share from $650. That’s about 50% above the U.S. company’s $800.03 closing price Friday and would give Tesla a market capitalization of $220 billion. Jonas raised his base case target to $500 a share from $360 but reiterated his sell-equivalent recommendation.The new bull scenario is based on an “aggressive assumption” that Tesla could win 30% of the global electric-vehicle market, Jonas wrote in a report to clients. This would include 4 million car deliveries by 2030 plus the potential for Tesla to supply powertrains, including batteries and electric motors, to other auto manufacturers. In 2019, the company handed over 367,500 vehicles to customers.Separately, Sanford C Bernstein analyst Toni Sacconaghi raised his price target to $730 from $325, saying that while it is difficult to justify the company’s current share price, investors now feel much better about its ability to be sustainably profitable. The analyst also noted that Tesla’s Model 3 demand remained healthy, gross margin and operating expense were both poised to materially improve, competition was sputtering and product and production pipelines were robust.“Tesla is the ultimate ‘possibility’ stock,” Sacconaghi wrote in a note to clients, adding that the company’s core addressable market was likely to grow more than 30-times over the next 20 years, implying that even if Tesla’s current market share gets cut by half, it would still grow 15-times during the period. The analyst maintained his hold-equivalent rating.Tesla shares have had a wild ride this year. The stock is up 91% in 2020, a jump variously attributed to good results, a short squeeze, the opening of a key new factory in China or an extreme case of investor FOMO -- or all of the above. The surge cooled before the Palo Alto, California-based company undertook a $2 billion share offering Friday, priced at the steepest discount the carmaker has ever given to its investors.Analysts either have yet to adjust to the gain or remain highly skeptical. The average share-price target among analysts tracked by Bloomberg is $489.47.Morgan Stanley’s bear case for the stock is now $220. While that’s a 91% improvement from the broker’s most recent worst-price scenario, Jonas is sticking to his recommendation against buying the stock, saying the risk-reward balance on the manufacturer continues to be “unfavorable.”Tesla shares gained as much as 7.3% in New York, to touch $858.(Updates stock move.)\--With assistance from Lisa Pham and Catherine Larkin.To contact the reporters on this story: Sam Unsted in London at sunsted@bloomberg.net;Esha Dey in New York at edey@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Beth Mellor at bmellor@bloomberg.net, Tom Lavell, Scott SchnipperFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Bloomberg
Hong Kong's Teflon Home Prices Are Virus-Proof
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Hong Kong’s home prices have proved resilient to months of protests and now the coronavirus epidemic, a one-two punch that the city’s finance chief likened over the weekend to “tsunami-like” shocks. While a hit is probably coming, the world’s least affordable housing market still looks a better place to be than in Hong Kong office or retail property.Home prices have dropped just 6.1% from their record high in June, as measured by the Centa-City Leading Index compiled by Centaline Property Agency. The index has risen for four weeks in a row through Feb. 9, the latest data, even as the virus shut down swathes of the Chinese economy, slowed Hong Kong tourist arrivals to a trickle and forced many of the city’s financial employees to work from home.A number of factors undergird the outlook for housing: the dominance of a small number of family-controlled companies that can influence supply; low interest rates; and limited leverage among home owners. Developers completed 14,000 units last year, 33% lower than 2018, according to Morgan Stanley analyst Praveen Choudhary. By contrast, 31,000 units were built in 2002, just before the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome. That was 35% more than the year before. High equity levels mean there’s little pressure for home owners to sell, as I noted in November. The loan-to-value ratio for new mortgages dropped to 46% in September, from a peak of 69% in 2002, according to the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. Meanwhile, Hong Kong’s one-month interbank rate, against which most mortgages are priced, has fallen back below 2% this month.To be sure, a drastic worsening of the economy would change the calculation. Hong Kong’s unemployment rate is estimated to have climbed for a fourth month to 3.4% in January. That’s still far short of the 8.5% peak reached during SARS. Having risen more than fivefold from their 2003 low, Hong Kong housing prices have attained a Teflon-like response to bad news. That resilience is far less evident in commercial property, a sector that tends to move more in line with the state of the underlying economy. Once beloved by private equity firms for stable returns in a low-yield world, Hong Kong’s office and retail real estate is losing appeal as companies reduce space and shoppers desert malls.The total transaction value of office and retail properties slumped 12.9% last year to HK$49.6 billion ($6.4 billion), according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Patrick Wong. Grade-A offices recorded a 6% vacancy rate in December, the highest level since April 2010, when the number was the same, figures from real estate broker Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. show. Chinese companies, which have become increasingly important in the commercial property market, reduced their take-up of new office space by almost 40%. WeWork, the office-sharing company that scrapped its IPO last year, gave up some space.With Hong Kong’s gross domestic product shrinking 1.2% last year, empty workplaces became a common sight even before the coronavirus outbreak forced people to work from home. By the fourth quarter, office prices had reached the lowest since the second quarter of 2018, according to JLL.Retail landlords, meanwhile, started slashing rents by 60% this month for tenants that are trying to cope with the dearth of shoppers. The fourth-quarter vacancy rate of of 9% in core shopping areas was the highest in five years, JLL’s figures show. Average rents of prime street shops in the city fell 21% from a year earlier at the end of 2019, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.Tourism, particularly from mainland China, is far more important to Hong Kong’s economy than during SARS and has been hit hard by both the protests and the coronavirus. Preliminary visitor arrivals data for February from the Hong Kong Tourism Board show average daily traffic has plummeted almost 99% to fewer than 3,000 people.The retail sector was already facing a secular downturn. China has cut luxury taxes, reducing the incentive for mainland shoppers to buy in Hong Kong. Local consumption, barring panic-buying of toilet paper and face masks, is also suffering and will take time to recover.For real estate investors, the best place to shelter may be in cash-rich Hong Kong developers such as Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd. and Li Ka-shing’s CK Asset Holdings Ltd. that have a higher exposure to housing. These look better placed to ride out the slump than rivals such as Wharf Real Estate Investment Co., owner of the Times Square mall in the prime Causeway Bay shopping district, or Hongkong Land Holdings Ltd., the biggest office landlord in the central business district.In a testing environment, homes can be a refuge in more ways than one. To contact the author of this story: Nisha Gopalan at ngopalan3@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Matthew Brooker at mbrooker1@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Nisha Gopalan is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals and banking. She previously worked for the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones as an editor and a reporter.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Zacks
Morgan Stanley (MS) Down 1.1% Since Last Earnings Report: Can It Rebound?
Morgan Stanley (MS) reported earnings 30 days ago. What's next for the stock? We take a look at earnings estimates for some clues.
- Bloomberg
Morgan Stanley Names Oweida, Abruzzo FX Co-Heads in Overhaul
(Bloomberg) -- Morgan Stanley, the Wall Street lender overhauling its currency-trading business after losses and an internal probe, named new co-heads for the unit.The New York-based bank said Samer Oweida, global head of FX sales, and Craig Abruzzo, who leads futures and derivatives clearing in Morgan Stanley’s equities business, would now lead the division, according to an internal memorandum obtained by Bloomberg News. Both will report to Jakob Horder, head of the macro division that houses FX trading, the memo shows.Mark Lake, a spokesman for the lender, confirmed the contents of the memo.The promotions come at a time of tumult for the business. Officials are reviewing a batch of option trades tied to the Turkish lira, and examining whether traders improperly valued the transactions and concealed losses, Bloomberg News reported. The bank last month appointed new co-heads of the FX options business that has been linked to those transactions.Morgan Stanley’s currency business hasn’t had a global head since the departure a year ago of Senad Prusac, who oversaw it as leader of the macro division. Although the unit has historically been one of Wall Street’s smaller players in the $6.6-trillion-per-day foreign-exchange market, the firm has surged into the world of FX options, esoteric securities that can be lucrative to trade yet hard to value, Bloomberg has reported.Read More: Morgan Stanley Soared in Currency Derivatives Before Lira Mess(Adds detail on previous leadership in fifth paragraph.)To contact the reporter on this story: Donal Griffin in London at dgriffin10@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ambereen Choudhury at achoudhury@bloomberg.net, Marion Dakers, Vernon WesselsFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Reuters
Lion Air to decide on IPO plans by month-end -sources
Indonesia's Lion Air will decide by the end of the month when to proceed with its planned initial public offering (IPO) in the face of reduced investor appetite for the sector because of the coronavirus outbreak, said sources close to the matter. Banks involved in the expected $500 million IPO of one of Asia's largest budget airlines have completed investor presentations in Singapore, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Europe and the United States, the sources said. Sources had previously said that Lion Air could launch the IPO as early as March.
- Reuters
Online luxury fashion retailer MyTheresa plans NYSE listing -sources
MUNICH/FRANKFURT, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Online luxury fashion retailer MyTheresa plans to list on the New York Stock Exchange, taking advantage of robust equity markets, people close to the matter said. Its owner Neiman Marcus is working with Morgan Stanley on the planned listing, which could take place as early as April, they added. The buyout fund Ares, which owns Neiman Marcus, and Morgan Stanley declined to comment, while MyTheresa was not available for comment.
- Bloomberg
Commerzbank Plans Further Cost Cuts After Boost to Profit
(Bloomberg) -- Want the lowdown on European markets? In your inbox before the open, every day. Sign up here.Commerzbank AG Chief Executive Officer Martin Zielke plansfurther cost cuts after boosting revenue and capital buffers as he seeks to accelerate the German lender’s turnaround.The bank will disclose the details of a new cost plan when it reports second-quarter earnings, Chief Financial Officer Bettina Orlopp said on a conference call on Thursday, without providing details. The shares jumped as much as 6.1%, spiking after Orlopp’s comments.Commerzbank in September unveiled a new strategy the lender described as “soberingly realistic” because of its low growth targets for revenue and profitability. Several large shareholders privately lambasted the plan as insufficient, people familiar with the matter have said.Revenue at the German lender beat estimates with a 6.8% increase in the fourth quarter as income from its core lending business grew. That led to an increase in operating profit, Commerzbank said Thursday. The bank’s key CET1 capital ratio also improved more than expected.“We will take advantage of the extra leeway” provided by the improvements in profit and capital, Zielke said in the statement. “I’m more optimistic about our return expectations than I was last autumn.”The CEO said later that the bank’s outlook for returns four years from now has improved. He has previously promised a return on tangible equity of more than 4% in 2023.Commerzbank rose to the highest since Aug. 1 in Frankfurt trading and was up 5.6% as of 12:39 p.m. The stock has gained 23% in the last six months.Dividend CutNot everything was positive. The bank reduced its dividend on 2019 earnings to 15 cents from 20 cents a year earlier, which “sends a negative signal,” Morgan Stanley analyst Magdalena Stoklosa wrote. Citigroup analysts called the bank’s 2020 outlook “worse than expected” and said it implies a 15% cut to the consensus for operating profit.Zielke’s strategy to aggressively add new clients has helped the bank to drive up net interest income, blunting the effect of negative rates on lending margins. But the initiative partly explains why the bank has needed to raise its cost targets several times. Commerzbank on Thursday said it added 200 million euros of expected IT expenditure to its 2020 cost target.Unexpected CostsThere are more challenges ahead for Zielke. His decision to take full control of online lender Comdirect Bank AG cost more than planned and the expected sale of the mBank unit in Poland has been met with muted interest from potential buyers.CFO Orlopp said Commerzbank is sticking to its plan to dispose of the Polish lender but only “if the conditions are the right ones and, specifically, if we get the right price.” Zielke added that Commerzbank’s improving capital buffer gives it more leeway on a sale and, as the lender further strenghtens its equity cushion, he’s not sure the bank needs the transaction to fund his strategic plan.As in the preceding years, the bank in 2019 failed to produce a return that covers its cost of capital or delivers returns investors would typically expect from an investment in an asset seen as similarly risky. Zielke has vowed to achieve a return on tangible equity -- a common measure of profitability -- of 2% to 4% over the next few years. The cost of capital for European banks is typically estimated to be 8% to 10%.(Adds CEO comments on profitability in 6th paragraph)To contact the reporter on this story: Steven Arons in Frankfurt at sarons@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Dale Crofts at dcrofts@bloomberg.net, Ross Larsen, Daniel SchaeferFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Bloomberg
The World Is Conspiring to Make Gas Cheaper
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- How cheap would you like your natural gas today? Is zero low enough? OK, how about we pay you to take it off our hands?That's what’s happening in the middle of the U.S. shale patch at the moment — and it’s a symptom of a glut that could reshape energy markets across the world in the coming years.Gas prices at the Waha hub in Texas’s Permian basin fell to minus 26.8 cents per million British thermal units this week. They’re heading in an even more “aggressively negative” direction, commodities broker OTC Global Holdings told Bloomberg News, as a shortage of pipeline capacity makes producers jostle for a place in the queue.Selling a commodity for a negative price isn’t quite as crazy as it sounds. Indeed, it’s a relatively common occurrence. Fuel oil — the gloopy fraction of crude used by boilers in ships, buildings and power stations — has hardly ever earned positive margins for refiners. Instead, they aim to make their money on gasoline and diesel, treating fuel oil as a waste product from which they can extract a few extra dollars.That's the current situation with natural gas in the U.S. A growing proportion of output is produced not for its own sake but as a byproduct from shale oil fields, where operators don’t care about the price of gas as long as it doesn’t stop them earning a positive margin on their crude production.Output of this so-called associated gas has increased nearly fourfold from 4.3 billion cubic feet per day in 2006 to 15 billion in 2018, according to the Energy Information Administration, making up about 37% of shale gas production and 12% of total U.S. gas output. With this super-cheap gas meeting the first leg of demand, the price at which the entire gas market clears is being driven lower. Thanks in part to an unusually mild winter, the Henry Hub U.S. gas benchmark has fallen by more than a third since its usual early-winter peak at the start of November, hitting its lowest level since 2016 this week.Even this effect would have been a strictly local issue a few years ago — but as the global liquefied natural gas industry grows up, that’s changing, too. Traditionally gas prices in different regions had little relationship with each other, but the situation is giving way to one where the cost of U.S. exports, plus a margin for transport and conversion to and from LNG, is increasingly setting a unified global price.That's likely to shake up many long-standing assumptions about the market. Asia has been mostly immune to the switch of coal-fired generation to gas which, along with the headlong growth of renewables, has caused the rapid shutdown of coal fleets in the U.S. and Europe.Without the significant domestic gas reserves seen in those regions, prices in Asia simply haven’t been competitive enough. Except for brief periods in summer when gas demand is low, the Japan-Korea Marker gas benchmark has historically mostly priced its energy content at about twice what you'd pay for the same heating value of coal at China’s Qinhuangdao port. That’s flipped so dramatically in recent months that even imported gas is now cheaper than coal on a heating value basis. When you take into account the greater efficiency with which most gas plants convert the energy in their fuel into electricity, the discount is even more pronounced. Any utilities expecting current low prices to be sustained ought to be looking hard at switching away from solid to gaseous carbon for any generation that renewables can’t easily supply.There’s good reason to think this glut isn’t going away. China, a major driver of Asian gas demand in recent years, may be coming off the boil. Slowing industrial demand and a shift toward electricity rather than gas for replacing coal in centralized heating will push down demand, Morgan Stanley analysts wrote last month. Prices in Europe and Asia will potentially fall below $3 per million British thermal units, they wrote, approaching North American levels.Add in the impact of coronavirus and Wood Mackenzie estimates demand this year will come to between 316 billion cubic meters and 324 billion, as much as 19% below the Chinese National Energy Administration’s estimates of 350 billion cubic meters to 390 billion.LNG will take a smaller share of that shrinking pie, thanks both to rising domestic gas production and imports from Russia’s 38 billion-cubic meter Power of Siberia pipeline, which opened in December.These conditions should cause producers to slow down — but if anything, things are going in the opposite direction. A record 71 million tons a year of LNG export capacity was commissioned in 2019, adding about 97 billion cubic meters to the global market, according to Morgan Stanley.That pace will surely decelerate, with projects such as Exxon Mobil Corp.’s P’nyang looking increasingly unlikely to be developed. Still, should we see more success from the faltering crackdowns on flaring — the wasteful practice of burning off associated gas from oilfields — there's another 140 billion cubic meters of gas supply out there that's currently being vented into the atmosphere.Rock-bottom prices for gas, wind and solar swept through the energy sector in the western hemisphere over the past decade. To date, only renewables have really made an impact in Asia. With a flood of new gas supply approaching, that dam could be about to break.To contact the author of this story: David Fickling at dfickling@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Rachel Rosenthal at rrosenthal21@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.David Fickling is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering commodities, as well as industrial and consumer companies. He has been a reporter for Bloomberg News, Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and the Guardian.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Reuters
Insurance comparison firm SelectQuote taps banks for IPO -sources
SelectQuote has hired investment banks for an initial public offering (IPO) that could value the owner of the eponymous insurance policy comparison website at more than $2 billion, including debt, according to people familiar with the matter. SelectQuote is working with banks that include Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse Group AG on an IPO that could come in the first half of this year, subject to market conditions, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information is not public.
- Bloomberg
Oil Clinches Gain Despite Russia Indecision on OPEC+ Output Cut
(Bloomberg) -- Oil held gains as investors weighed hopes for a decision by Russia to accept an OPEC+ proposal for production cuts against an increase in American crude stockpiles.Futures were little changed in New York on Tuesday after the American Petroleum Institute reported that U.S. crude inventories rose 6 million barrels last week, according to people familiar with the data. Energy Minister Alexander Novak said that Moscow is “studying” the OPEC+ output-cut plan after days of hesitation, calling the situation “extremely unstable.” Novak is set to meet with Russia’s oil companies on Wednesday.“OPEC+ needs to balance production with the demand trajectory, which looks down,” Frances Hudson, global thematic strategist at Aberdeen Standard Investments, writes in an email. “If a decision is not taken until the next scheduled meeting in March, I would expect this to limit the scope for what can be achieved.”The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies have signaled a desire to stabilize the oil market that has tumbled over 18% since the beginning of the year as the coronavirus outbreak inflicts severe economic disruption in China.Impact from the virus has intensified concerns of weak crude demand hitting the second largest economy in the world, prompting technical experts from the coalition to propose deepening the current supply cuts by 600,000 barrels a day to relieve excess inventories.The Energy Information Administration cut its global petroleum demand growth outlook by 23% to 1.03 million barrels a day, citing partial effects from the coronavirus in its monthly Short-Term Energy Outlook.The exact impact of the virus has been difficult to quantify, so analysts have narrowed in on other demand indicators for clues. Morgan Stanley cut its oil demand growth forecast for 2020 by 15% amid plunging passenger transport volumes. Chinese refined product demand is seen down around 1.2 million barrels a day in the first quarter compared with same quarter last year, according to IHS Markit.The API report also showed distillate supplies fell by 2.33 million barrels last week, while gasoline stockpiles increased by 1.08 million barrels.West Texas Intermediate crude for March delivery traded at $50.00 a barrel at 4:44 p.m. after ending the session at at $49.94 on the New York Mercantile Exchange.Brent crude for April settlement rose 74 cents to settle as $54.01 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe exchange in London, putting its premium over WTI at $3.84, the smallest spread between the two contracts since early 2018.“There’s a new calculus for importers, particularly Mediterranean and Asian buyers who were happy to take U.S. barrels when they were $6 dollars cheaper. Now it’s only $3 less,” said Bob Yawger, futures director at Mizuho Securities USA.OPEC’s response could face another hurdle if Libya’s United Nations-led peace talks result in a resumption of oil exports that halted after a blockade by supporters of commander Khalifa Haftar. Libyan economic experts are weighing the distribution of oil revenue in an effort to end the conflict between the internationally recognized government in Tripoli and Haftar.\--With assistance from Serene Cheong, James Thornhill and Elizabeth Low.To contact the reporter on this story: Jackie Davalos in New York at jdavalos10@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: James Herron at jherron9@bloomberg.net, Mike Jeffers, Catherine TraywickFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Zacks
BofA (BAC) CEO Moynihan's 2019 Compensation Remains Stable
Bank of America's (BAC) chief executive officer Brian T. Moynihan's total compensation package for 2019 remains unrevised at the 2018 level of $26.5 million.
- Zacks
5 Great Dividend Growth Stocks Under $100
Amid volatility and low interest rate environment, investors are picking stocks that offer dividends and consistently raise their payout.
- Zacks
Has Morgan Stanley (MS) Outpaced Other Finance Stocks This Year?
Is (MS) Outperforming Other Finance Stocks This Year?
- Bloomberg
There’s a Lesson for Luxury in the Coronavirus Crisis
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- With the death toll from the coronavirus rising, the fate of high-end handbag sales still seems of minor consequence. But the $300 billion luxury industry’s over-dependence on Chinese spending was underlined again on Friday when British fashion house Burberry Group Plc said it could no longer stand by its previous financial forecast because of the spread of the illness.Just two weeks ago, the company shrugged off disruption in Hong Kong to lift its outlook for sales growth excluding currency movements to a percentage in the low single digits, while anticipating that the operating margin would be broadly stable in the year to March 2020. Analysts at Morgan Stanley said Friday’s warning could imply a 5% cut to 2020 earnings.Burberry is particularly exposed to the epidemic. It generates about 40% of its sales from Chinese consumers at home and abroad. That’s above the 35% for the industry as a whole, according to Bain & Co. and Altagamma. So shutting some shops on the mainland and reducing hours at others has an out-sized effect.It’s too early to know what the end result will be for Burberry and the industry as a whole, but one key lesson is coming into sharp relief: While Chinese shoppers are a powerful force for the industry, no brand should neglect their customers closer to home, or stop trying to drum up demand in other corners of the world. When the Chinese market slumped in 2015 and 2016 because of a government crackdown on extravagance and gyrating stock markets, luxury houses all pivoted toward shoppers in Europe and the U.S. They have lost sight of the need to foster these markets since.For Burberry, it’s a particularly sensitive time to face such uncertainty in its biggest market. The group is in the midst of trying to revive its brand, best known for its black, white, tan and red check. While new iterations, such as the TB Monogram, are gaining traction, Burberry is having to prioritize. It’s now unclear whether a fashion show in Shanghai in April, will go ahead. The first Chinese showcase under new designer Riccardo Tisci will have specially created merchandise, clearly a way to build Burberry’s profile amid its rejuvenation efforts.Given these characteristics — high Chinese exposure plus a turnaround strategy — Prada SpA also looks to be at risk, and the Italian maker of the iconic nylon bag has already closed some stores in mainland China and Macau. The list of other luxury companies that are very dependent on China and Hong Kong is long. Swatch Group AG and Richemont are the most exposed, according to analysts at Bernstein. And Gucci, which accounts for 60% of French parent Kering SA’s sales and 80% of its operating profit, has been a hit with Chinese shoppers over the past three years. Anyone who has witnessed the proliferation of Gucci T-shirts, not all the real thing, in cities from Shanghai to Beijing would attest to its popularity.By contrast, Bernard Arnault’s LVMH looks to be better prepared to handle such a shock. With brands including Moet & Chandon champagne, pop star Rihanna’s beauty line and soon Tiffany & Co. jewelry, it has broad diversification by both geography and product range. Last year, for example, 24% of its sales from the U.S.But given the whole industry’s reliance on Chinese big spenders, no luxury or consumer brand with exposure to the them, wherever they shop, will be immune. Burberry said spending in Europe and other tourist destinations was less affected by the outbreak, but it expected conditions here to worsen too. This week, Coach owner Tapestry Inc., Michael Kors and Versace parent Capri Holdings Ltd. and Estee Lauder Cos. all lowered earnings guidance, citing the virus. Even luxury parka maker Canada Goose Holdings Inc., which has a strong following in the U.S. and Europe, has felt the impact of the outbreak. On Friday it lowered its full-year sales and profit guidance.Global luxury sales could expand by just 1% this year, according to analysts at Jefferies, after what they now expect to be a brutal 20% decline in Chinese demand in the first half. Before the outbreak, they were expecting the industry’s sales to grow by 5% in 2020. While luxury shares have fallen over the past three weeks, valuations remain close to 10-year highs. As I have noted, the stocks have proved remarkably resilient in the face of everything from trade skirmishes to protests in Hong Kong.Burberry’s warning is a stark reminder that that could be about to change.To contact the author of this story: Andrea Felsted at afelsted@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Melissa Pozsgay at mpozsgay@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Andrea Felsted is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering the consumer and retail industries. She previously worked at the Financial Times.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Yahoo Finance
Fed Vice Chairman: Interest rates in 'good place' despite 'notable risks'
Fed Vice Chairman Randal Quarles said he is "optimistic" about the economic outlook despite Coronavirus risks. He also floated possible bank changes to bank rules.
- Bloomberg
Qualcomm Analysts Stay Optimistic Despite a Confusing Quarter
(Bloomberg) -- Qualcomm Inc. fell as much as 5.2%, the biggest intraday drop in six months, after a weak forecast for sales growth and renewed European Union scrutiny on whether it broke antitrust rules.Wall Street analysts shrugged off the weakness and continue to be optimistic about the chipmaker’s longer-term outlook with the rollout of 5G networks.Once again Qualcomm posted a “confusing report” that showed “the Street had mismodeled seasonality,” Raymond James Chris Caso said. Wednesday night’s earnings helped validate the company’s claim that new handsets will eventually spur growth, Caso said.Citi’s Christopher Danely told investors that the stock weakness and tamped-down expectations from coronavirus-fueled disruption “will be temporary.” Morgan Stanley offered a more tempered view, pointing to a “gradual transition” to 5G.Raymond James, Chris Caso“March quarter guidance was well ahead” of what Qualcomm indicated last quarter, Caso wrote, citing the 5G flagship rollout and a “significant 36% rise in content, driven from both 5G modems and new RF content.”While the June quarter outlook missed expectations, “the upside in March was more than the downside in June.”Caso sees higher volume offset by lower-content per device and 5G “moves downscale.” He has a strong buy rating on the stock.Citi, Christopher DanelyQualcomm should be able to shake off the stock weakness as the chipmaker is “one of the largest beneficiaries” of the roll-out of 5G networks. Buy rating reiterated.Citi raised its fiscal 2020 sales estimate to $21.7 billion from $21.2 billion and 2020 earnings per share estimate to $3.19 from $3.07. The bank kept its 12-month price target at $108.00.Morgan Stanley, Joseph Moore“Indications that the June quarter will be flat are modestly disappointing vs. consensus, but consistent with historic seasonality.” Qualcomm likely will meet estimates in 2020.“We are probably less enamored than consensus around the 5G theme for 2020, given relatively slow deployments of 5G infrastructure, and an end user experience that will not be dramatically different than 4G until higher spectrum is deployed.”“We are unlikely to see an accelerated move to 5G - more of a gradual transition, in line with the company’s targets.” That leaves Morgan Stanley with an equal-weight rating.To contact the reporter on this story: Cristin Flanagan in New York at cflanagan1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Steven FrommFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Bloomberg
YouTube’s Sales Shock Leaves Wall Street Demanding Growth
(Bloomberg) -- For years, analysts had to guess blindly at YouTube’s size. When the official numbers finally emerged this week, they were underwhelming. Now Google must persuade Wall Street it has a viable plan to keep YouTube growing.On Monday, Google parent Alphabet Inc. disclosed YouTube sales for the first time. At $15.1 billion last year, that was well below most analysts’ projections, even including extra subscription revenue. Needham & Co., in an October report, put it at $30 billion.“We believe buy-side estimates for YouTube ad revenue were higher than ours,” Jason Bazinet, an analyst at Citigroup, wrote in a research note. He thought the video service generated about $19 billion in sales last year. YouTube’s figures fell 30% short of Morgan Stanley’s estimates. Google “must continue to innovate to drive engagement and monetization,“ Morgan Stanley analyst Brian Nowak wrote.While most other stocks jumped on Tuesday, Alphabet shares dropped more than 3%, partly on disappointment with YouTube’s results.The world’s largest online video service has been considered one of Google’s most exciting growth stories for years, giving the internet giant exposure to the buzzy trends of social media, user-generated content and TV cord-cutting.However, YouTube has spent the past three years struggling to limit the spread of toxic videos upsetting to regulators and advertisers, which has often meant restricting commercial messages. Unlike Google search, YouTube has a more complex business model, sharing more than half its ad sales with video creators. In social media, Instagram now rivals YouTube, with $15 billion in 2019 ad revenue, according to a recent estimate from research firm EMarketer. And the Facebook Inc. service is half a decade younger than YouTube.“We were too optimistic on our YouTube revenue estimates,” Mark Shmulik, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, wrote in a research note Tuesday. “We must ask some tough questions – especially given that the 31% 4Q growth rate is lower than the annual revenue growth rate of 36%.”YouTube’s average revenue per user, a closely followed metric across the internet industry, is only about a third of Facebook’s, and is also lower than other competitors, Shmulik noted.During a conference call late Monday, some analysts asked how Google will improve YouTube’s results. Executives gave a strong hint -- and it’s a departure from the current approach.“Try searching for Puma shoes review on YouTube,” Sundar Pichai, chief executive officer of Alphabet and Google, said. He outlined a strategy to turn YouTube into an e-commerce hub where video creators hawk merchandise and advertisers entice viewers into more valuable activities than just clicking.“People can now easily buy products in YouTube’s home feed and in search results making it possible for advertisers to reach even more audiences,” Pichai said. “With all the related content on YouTube like unboxing and beauty videos -- this is a format people love and it delivers a simple in video buying experience.”A search for “Puma shoes review” inside YouTube’s mobile app late Monday showed a swipe-able carousel of 40 ads with photos, prices and “Shop Now” buttons that linked to Puma’s website and other merchant sites.These types of ads aim to get people to download an app, purchase a ticket or buy something else. In the past, YouTube has mostly relied on more general branding-style commercials from the traditional TV industry.Ruth Porat, Alphabet’s chief financial officer, said the new formats are growing at a “very substantial” rate, without sharing specific numbers.That gave some analysts hope that YouTube can still turn its giant audience into an equally huge business. “When you see that YouTube is only a $15 billion revenue business -- despite touching over 2 billion users globally each month that collectively watch over a billion minutes daily -- you realize just how large the long-term opportunity is,” said Richard Greenfield, an analyst at Lightshed Partners.Wall Street has been so starved of real statistics to crunch from Google over the years, that many analysts were simply happy to have any new numbers at all.“Delighted they disclosed for the first time!” Needham analyst Laura Martin wrote in an email.(Updates with ARPU estimates in eighth paragraph.)\--With assistance from Lucas Shaw, Sarah Frier and Gerrit De Vynck.To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Bergen in San Francisco at mbergen10@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Alistair Barr at abarr18@bloomberg.net, Molly SchuetzFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Zacks
Solid Start to February as Stocks Stage Partial Rebound
Solid Start to February as Stocks Stage Partial Rebound
- Reuters
Morgan Stanley donates $20 million to children's mental health programs
Morgan Stanley said on Monday it will give $20 million to seven nonprofit groups working to prevent youth suicide and fight depression and other children's mental health problems. Calling the initiative the Morgan Stanley Alliance for Children's Mental Health, the bank aims to recruit other donors to help fund the rapid expansion of the groups in the United States, Britain and Hong Kong. Roughly 17 million people in the United States under age 18 have a mental health disorder, but the vast majority will never receive treatment, said Joan Steinberg, president of Morgan Stanley's foundation.
- Zacks
This is Why Morgan Stanley (MS) is a Great Dividend Stock
Dividends are one of the best benefits to being a shareholder, but finding a great dividend stock is no easy task. Does Morgan Stanley (MS) have what it takes? Let's find out.
- Zacks
Zacks.com featured highlights include: Denny's, Garmin, LPL Financial and Morgan Stanley
Zacks.com featured highlights include: Denny's, Garmin, LPL Financial and Morgan Stanley
- Business Wire
Morgan Stanley Establishes Alliance for Children’s Mental Health
Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) today announced the establishment of the Morgan Stanley Alliance for Children’s Mental Health (the "Alliance"). The Alliance, which brings together key leaders in the children’s mental health space, will combine the resources and reach of Morgan Stanley and its Foundation with the knowledge and experience of its distinguished nonprofit partner organizations. The Alliance will help address strategically children’s mental health concerns and the far-reaching challenges of stress, anxiety, and depression.
