WORLDWIDE : HEADLINES
SoftBank to sell chip designer Arm to Nvidia in $40 billion deal
TOKYO/SAN FRANCISCO – SoftBank Group Corp said on Monday it has agreed to sell chip designer Arm to Nvidia Corp for as much as $40 billion in a deal set to reshape the semiconductor landscape.
Nvidia will pay SoftBank $21.5 billion in shares and $12 billion in cash, including $2 billion on signing. The deal will see SoftBank and the $100 billion Vision Fund, which has a 25% stake in Arm, take a stake in Nvidia of between 6.7% and 8.1%.
SoftBank could also be paid an additional $5 billion in cash or shares depending on the chip designer’s business performance, with Arm employees to be paid $1.5 billion in Nvidia shares.
The sale marks an early exit for SoftBank, four years after the $32 billion acquisition of the British chip technology firm. Chief Executive Masayoshi Son has lionised the potential of Arm but is slashing his stakes in major assets to raise cash.
Full coverage: REUTERS
British business calls for green recovery, policies to meet net zero
LONDON – Britain’s leading business group has called on the government to implement green measures to help the economy recover from the coronavirus pandemic, and bring forward policies to enable to country to meet its climate targets.
Britain last year set a target to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 but its economy is suffering from the effects of measures designed to slow the spread of the coronavirus.
Britain’s economy saw sharpest second-quarter fall of any Group of Seven nation in the April-June period.
“To ensure that the 2020s continue to be a decade of delivery on net zero there needs to be step-change in the pace of investment, supported by government,” the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said in its Green Economic Recovery Roadmap published on Monday.
Full coverage: REUTERS
WORLDWIDE : FINANCE / ECONOMY / MARKET
Asian shares on firm footing as vaccine trials resume
SYDNEY – Asian shares started higher on Monday as hopes of a coronavirus vaccine were rekindled after AstraZeneca resumed its phase-3 trial while sentiment was still cautious ahead of a big week of central bank meetings in UK, Japan and the United States.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.5%, poised for its second straight session of gains.
Australian shares .AXJO climbed 0.2% while Japan’s Nikkei .N225 added 0.3%.
U.S. stock futures, the S&P 500 e-minis ESc1, rose a solid 0.8% after a mixed session on Wall Street last week.
Friday marked six months since the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus a pandemic on March 11.
Full coverage: REUTERS
Pound haunted by Brexit, yen looks to Abe successor vote
TOKYO – The British pound flirted with a 1-1/2-month low against the dollar on Monday on fears about no-deal Brexit while investors waited for Japan’s ruling party to choose a successor to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
The British pound changed hands at $1.2806 GBP=D4, having hit a 1 1/2-month low of $1.2767 on Friday.
Against the euro, it slid to 5 1/2-month low of 92.54 pence per euro EURGBP=D4 and last stood at 92.47.
The pound was under pressure from fears that Britain will end its post-Brexit transition period without agreeing any trading arrangements.
London explicitly acknowledged last week that it could break international law by ignoring some parts of its European Union divorce treaty, prompting a rapid rebuke from the EU’s chief executive.
Full coverage: REUTERS
Oil mixed as storm threatens U.S. gulf production
TOKYO – Oil prices were mixed on Monday with U.S. crude rising as a tropical storm in the Gulf of Mexico forced rigs to shut down, but the gains were kept in check by wider concerns about excess supply and falling demand for fuels.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were up 9 cents, or 0.2%, at $37.42 a barrel by around 0050 GMT. Brent crude LCOc1 was down 3 cents at $39.80 a barrel.
Both contracts ended last week lower, a second consecutive week of declines.
Tropical Storm Sally gained in strength in the Gulf of Mexico west of Florida on Sunday and was poised to become a category 2 hurricane. The storm is disrupting oil production for the second time in less than a month after hurricane Laura swept through the region.
Full coverage: REUTERS
