Chinese Activists Challenge Beijing by Going to Dinner; Over Unassuming Meals Members of Civic Group Try to Lay Groundwork for Democratizing China

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Chinese Activists Challenge Beijing by Going to Dinner

Over Unassuming Meals Members of Civic Group Try to Lay Groundwork for Democratizing China

JOSH CHIN

Nov. 6, 2013 1:14 p.m. ET

BEIJING—A new crop of grass-roots activists is vexing China’s authoritarian government by organizing around a simple event: dinner. On the last weekend of every month, government critics gather for unassuming meals in as many as 20 cities across the country to discuss issues from failures in the legal system to unequal access to education. The gatherings are intentionally low-key, organizers say, but their overall goal—to lay the groundwork for democratizing China—isn’t. “It’s not illegal to eat dinner together,” says Zhang Kun, a 26-year-old former employee of an advertising company who started helping to organize the meals after meeting other activists online. “That’s our motto: Change China by eating.” Read more of this post

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Autistic babies reduced their eye contact with people by 6 months of age, a finding that may lead to ways to identify the disorder earlier in life

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Autistic Babies Reduce Eye Contact in Early Months

Babies later diagnosed with autism reduced their eye contact with people by 6 months of age, a finding that may lead to ways to identify the disorder earlier in life, researchers said. Almost 60 babies who were thought to be at high risk of autism were examined in the study, as were 51 babies considered at low risk, according to the report released today by the journal Nature. Later, 13 children were diagnosed with autism. While a lack of eye contact has been a hallmark of autism since the disease was first described, it’s not known exactly when it begins to occur, wrote study authors Warren Jones and Ami Klin, both of Emory University in Atlanta. Today’s report suggests that while newborns don’t initially show any difference in looking directly at people’s eyes, changes occur from 2 months to 6 months of age. Babies who had the steepest declines in eye contact tended to have the most severe autism. Read more of this post

Filed under Health, Life

Beer Gives Model for Legal Canada Marijuana, Sleeman Says

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Beer Gives Model for Legal Canada Marijuana, Sleeman Says

Canada could use the beer industry as a model if it ever decides to legalize and tax marijuana, according to the founder of the nation’s third-largest brewer. John Sleeman of Sleeman Breweries Ltd. said rules imposed after Prohibition transformed a crime-ridden industry into one that pays high taxes, helps battle social problems such as drunk driving and accounts for almost 1 percentage point of gross domestic product. While not advocating the move, he said in an interview in the Bloomberg News Ottawa bureau that the model could be applied to pot. Read more of this post

Filed under Life

How to Become the CEO of Your Career; “Instead of thinking about being a champion of a career, I’d think about just being a champion of your life.”

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

How to Become the CEO of Your Career

Nov 04, 2013 Executive Education Human Resources North America

Women who seek leadership roles in business often face the prospect, whether real or perceived, of having to choose between nurturing their careers or building a robust family and personal life. The publication in March of Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead, by Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer, inspired a renewed debate about feminism. It suggested in a strong, if controversial, fashion that women can have it all. Read more of this post

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Billionaire’s Gallery Serves as Haven for Dissident Chinese Art

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Billionaire’s Gallery Serves as Haven for Dissident Chinese Art

Judith Neilson weaves through the lunchtime crowd at the White Rabbit Gallery in Sydney and pauses before what appears to be a large pile of building rubble spread across the floor.

“Watch closely,” she instructs. 

The mound of dirt, concrete and wood gently rises and falls — as if breathing. Created in 2009 by Shanghai-born Xu Zhen, “Calm” aims to convey that people in the Middle East have been buried under stereotypes as well as debris from bombings, Bloomberg Markets will report in its Billionaires Issue in December. Read more of this post

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New York exhibit explores first global market: textiles

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

New York exhibit explores first global market: textiles

1:24pm EST

By Ellen Freilich

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Four centuries of textiles from Asia, Europe and the Americas are the focus of a new exhibition that explores the world’s first truly global market – textiles. “Interwoven Globe: The Worldwide Textile Trade, 1500-1800,” which runs through January 5 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, features 134 works, including wall hangings, bed covers, tapestries, church vestments, pieces of seating furniture, costumes, paintings and drawings. Read more of this post

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Investors Cool to 2 Chinese Bank Offerings Anhui Huishang Bank and Bank of Chongqing; “The stand-alone financial profiles of many L.G.F.V.’s are very weak”

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

NOVEMBER 6, 2013, 6:49 AM

Investors Cool to 2 Chinese Bank Offerings

By NEIL GOUGH

Two Chinese banks that sold nearly $2 billion worth of shares in Hong Kong stock market listings received lukewarm receptions on Wednesday from investors concerned about how China’s financial system would cope with a potential deluge of bad debt that could swamp the country’s economy. The Huishang Bank Corporation, a regional banking group based in eastern Anhui Province, priced its initial public offering at the bottom end of the marketed range on Wednesday, raising 9.2 billion Hong Kong dollars, or $1.19 billion, according to two people with knowledge of the deal, who declined to be identified because the information was not yet public. Also on Wednesday, shares of Bank of Chongqing closed down slightly on their first day of trading in Hong Kong after the company raised 4.2 billion dollars in a share sale. Read more of this post

Filed under Macro Trends

Park’s promise of second South Korea miracle risks ringing hollow

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Park’s promise of second South Korea miracle risks ringing hollow

4:08pm EST

By Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean President Park Geun-hye took office in February pledging a “Second Miracle on the Han River”, a reference to her father’s rapid 1970s industrialization, but nine months into office little has materialized. On the face of it, there is little wrong with what is one of Asia’s industrial powerhouses, but longer term the lack of a viable domestic economy based on services means the world’s fastest ageing country could face a major collapse in growth. Read more of this post

Filed under Macro Trends

Trading Delayed as 650,000 South Koreans Take College Entry Test

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Trading Delayed as 650,000 South Koreans Take College Entry Test

By Heesu Lee

Nov. 7 (Bloomberg) — South Korea’s stock market opens an hour later than usual and flights will be barred from take-offs and landings for 40 minutes to reduce noise as more than 650,000 students take their college entrance exams today. Police will be mobilized and rush-hour schedules for buses and trains extended to help students reach 1,257 test centers 30 minutes before the 8:40 a.m. start. The military will halt drills to avoid disturbing the candidates, for whom a high score and entry to a top university all but guarantees a prestigious job with the civil service or at one of South Korea’s chaebol, including Samsung Electronics Co. and Hyundai Motor Co. Read more of this post

Filed under Macro Trends

SEC chair questions growth metrics used by technology companies

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

SEC chair questions growth metrics used by technology companies

10:59am EST

By Sarah N. Lynch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Securities regulators are concerned that some metrics of growth used by technology companies are confusing investors, and may not translate into big profits, Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Mary Jo White said Wednesday. “Consider a company that correctly claims it has a hundred million users, and that the rate of user growth is expected to continue to grow at double-digit rates. That certainly sounds good and it would seem to bode well for the prospects of the company,” White said at a New York conference sponsored by the Practising Law Institute. Read more of this post

Filed under Investing Process, TMT Trends

The end of traffic jams? Dutch test new GPS system; By letting drivers know in time that they should change lanes and drive at a certain speed, researchers hope they can prevent traffic jams forming

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

The end of traffic jams? Dutch test new system

Wednesday, November 6, 2013 – 22:18

AFP

THE HAGUE – Researchers in the Netherlands will next year test a GPS navigation system aimed at preventing the international curse of motorway traffic jams by telling drivers which lane to move to. Tests will be carried out as early as April on a 75-kilometre (around 50 mile) stretch of motorway passing through the Netherlands, from Germany to Belgium, which is popular with freight lorries. Read more of this post

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Berkshire’s Verisk Heads for Record Plunge on Revenue Slump

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Verisk Heads for Record Plunge on Revenue Slump

Verisk Analytics Inc. (VRSK), the supplier of actuarial and risk data to banks and insurers, headed for the biggest drop since its 2009 public offering after revenue missed analysts’ estimates as growth slowed in the health segment. Verisk slumped 8.4 percent to $62.12 at 10:02 a.m. Shares of the Jersey City, New Jersey-based company advanced 22 percent this year, compared with the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index’s 24 percent climb. Third-quarter revenue of $438.6 million fell short of the average $444.8 million estimate in a Bloomberg survey of 13 analysts. Sales tied to health care at the decision-analytics operation climbed 6.2 percent from the third quarter of 2012 to $73.6 million, the company said in a statement late yesterday. That compares with a 21 percent increase in the second quarter. “We’d expect this slowdown to generate some concerns and questions,” William Clark, an analyst at Keefe Bruyette & Woods, said in a research note following Verisk’s earnings report. “Certainly something to keep an eye on.” Net income for the quarter rose 16 percent to $96.4 million on growth in its insurance and financial-services business, Verisk said in the statement. “Our health-care business delivered growth that was below our plan,” the company said in the statement. “But we remain enthusiastic about our longer-term outlook.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Marci Jacobs in New York at mjacobs63@bloomberg.net

Filed under TMT Trends

How Teen Nick D’Aloisio Has Changed the Way We Read

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

WSJ. MAGAZINE 2013 TECHNOLOGY INNOVATOR

How Teen Nick D’Aloisio Has Changed the Way We Read

When a Hong Kong billionaire emailed a London tech startup to inquire about investing, he didn’t realize its entire workforce consisted of a single kid working in his bedroom. Meet the 18-year-old WSJ. Magazine Technology Innovator of 2013 who became an overnight millionaire by inventing an app that may revolutionize how we read on the go

SETH STEVENSON

Nov. 6, 2013 7:47 p.m. ET

BOY WONDER | D’Aloisio, age 13, working at his laptop. Courtesy Nicholas D’Aloisio

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GOING MOBILE | D’Aloisio, who turns 18 this month, is the mastermind behind Summly, a summarization app that sold to Yahoo! earlier this year for a reported $30 million.Photography by David Bailey

UPON HEARING, IN MARCH of this year, reports that a 17-year-old schoolboy had sold a piece of software to Yahoo! for $30 million, you might well have entertained a few preconceived notions about what sort of child this must be. A geeky specimen, no doubt. A savant with zero interests outside writing lines of code. A twitchy creature, prone to mumbling, averse to eye contact.  Read more of this post

Filed under Life, Macro Trends

Blockbuster Video-Rental Chain Will Shut All U.S. Stores

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Blockbuster Video-Rental Chain Will Shut All U.S. Stores

Blockbuster LLC, the video-rental company owned by Dish Network Corp. (DISH), will close its remaining 300 U.S. stores, ending an era for a chain that was once a ubiquitous part of American shopping centers. Blockbuster will shut the outlets by early January and discontinue its DVD-by-mail service by mid-December, Englewood, Colorado-based Dish said today in a statement. Each Blockbuster store has eight to 10 employees, so the move is expected to cost about 2,800 jobs. Dish will keep the licensing rights to the Blockbuster brand and use it to sell other services. Read more of this post

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Seven Ways Marketers Would Fix Twitter; Ad Executives Speak Out About How the Messaging Service Can Win Them Over

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Seven Ways Marketers Would Fix Twitter

Ad Executives Speak Out About How the Messaging Service Can Win Them Over

SUZANNE VRANICA

Updated Nov. 6, 2013 7:47 p.m. ET

As Twitter Inc. prepares to make its stock-market debut, a fundamental question looms: Can the messaging service turn its army of followers into a moneymaking business? Although the service and its 140-character messages has become part of popular culture, many marketers still view Twitter as experimental. It doesn’t have enough scale for some marketers, and some advertisers want more information about Twitter’s users and more proof that ads on the service work. Over the past year, Twitter has taken steps to be more advertiser friendly, such as adding new services. Read more of this post

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Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Invest in Twitter

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Invest in Twitter

FARHAD MANJOO

Nov. 6, 2013 7:30 p.m. ET

Twitter Inc.’s rise has been a remarkable story. Both because it was beset by chaos (see Nick Bilton’s new book for the operatic details) and because, despite the chaos, Twitter has somehow managed to become a legitimate, even straitlaced business, its IPO is a good time to congratulate the firm on its unlikely success. But it isn’t a good time to invest in Twitter when it starts trading Thursday. Here are three reasons to sit this one out: Read more of this post

Filed under TMT Trends

Twitter Vies to Open Door for Consumer-Web Companies’ IPO Plans

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Twitter Vies to Open Door for Consumer-Web Companies’ IPO Plans

Twitter Inc. (TWTR) has the potential to pry open the door for consumer-Internet initial public offerings after it slammed shut following Facebook Inc. (FB)’s troubled share sale last year. Zulily Inc., an online seller of apparel for moms and babies, and digital-education service Chegg Inc. are set to debut next week. Care.com Inc., owner of a site used to find babysitters, plans to hold an IPO early next year, people familiar with the matter said in August. Read more of this post

Filed under TMT Trends

Vote of Confidence in Linio, Mexico’s Version of Amazon.com

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

NOVEMBER 6, 2013, 3:26 PM

Vote of Confidence in Mexico’s Version of Amazon.com

By VINOD SREEHARSHA

The Mexican venture capital firm Latin Idea Ventures said this week that it had made its first investment in an e-commerce company, Linio, a Mexico City start-up that, like Amazon.com in the United States, sells a wide array of products. The investment, announced on Tuesday, was a sign that Latin Idea, founded in 2000, is growing and poised to make significantly larger investments as Mexico’s nascent start-up scene gains momentum. Read more of this post

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China becomes Evernote’s biggest market outside the US as its userbase doubles in six months

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

China becomes Evernote’s biggest market outside the US as its userbase doubles in six months

November 4, 2013

by Josh Horwitz

Today Evernote revealed that the company has passed the 8 million registered user benchmark in China, effectively doubling its userbase in the country since last May. In an interview with DoNews (hat tip Technode), Evernote China managing director Gu Yi stated that China has now become Evernote’s largest market outside of the US, surpassing Japan to take the number two spot. Read more of this post

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From Martians to Japanese Eye-lickers: Media Mania Is Nothing New

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

From Martians to Japanese Eye-lickers: Media Mania Is Nothing New

Oct 30, 2013 Opinion North America

Seventy-five years ago today, Martian invaders landed in Grovers Mill, N.J., marched death machines across the Hudson River and destroyed much of New York City. Or so many people thought as they listened to Orson Welles’ radio dramatization of H. G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds. The reasons this story – and the subsequent media reports of it — gained such traction may offer insights into contemporary media obsessions and the misunderstandings they can cause. Read more of this post

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India’s Telecom Rules Could Derail Potential Deals; Telecom Commission Recommends Fee on Mergers and Acquisitions

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

India’s Telecom Rules Could Derail Potential Deals

Telecom Commission Recommends Fee on Mergers and Acquisitions

R. JAI KRISHNA and KENAN MACHADO

Updated Nov. 6, 2013 8:52 a.m. ET

NEW DELHI—India approved new rules on acquisitions of cellular companies Wednesday, in a move analysts say could increase the cost of buying phone companies in the world’s second largest telecommunications market. India’s Telecom Commission—the government’s top telecommunications policy-making body—recommended that any company acquiring an Indian cellular company be asked to pay a fee to the government on top of what it pays for the company. The fee will be connected to the current value of the bandwidth which the target company holds. Read more of this post

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Wal-Mart Online Price Error Leads to $100 Can of Lysol

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Wal-Mart Online Price Error Leads to $100 Can of Lysol

Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s (WMT) website was selling kayaks for about $11 and computer monitors for about $9 earlier today owing to a technical error that led the world’s largest retailer to shut down its online store for maintenance. The pricing abnormalities were caused internally, said Ravi Jariwala, a Wal-Mart spokesman. “We’re working quickly to correct” it, he said in a telephone interview, adding that there would be “intermittent site unavailability” until then. Read more of this post

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U.S. Investors Brush Aside Fears About Chinese Internet Companies

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

NOVEMBER 6, 2013, 12:06 PM

U.S. Investors Brush Aside Fears About Chinese Internet Companies

By PETER THAL LARSEN

For American investors, love of technology has conquered a fear of China. Shareholders are snapping up shares of Chinese Internet companies going public stateside. It is a striking contrast with the recent past, when accounting scams and poor governance prompted many to shun Chinese stocks. The travel booking website Qunar, which doubled in value on its first day of trading last Friday, is the prime example of the new boom. The same week, shares in the local listings group 58.com – billed as China’s Craigslist – jumped almost 50 percent on their debut. Read more of this post

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Muddy Waters: NQ’s largest purported source of revenue, Yidatong (“YDT”), is controlled by NQ, and its primary purpose is facilitating NQ’s fraud

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

November 6, 2013

If You Believe in Yidatong, You’ll Believe in Santa Claus (NYSE: NQ)

NQ’s largest purported source of revenue, Yidatong (“YDT”), is controlled by NQ, and its primary purpose is facilitating NQ’s fraud.  Believing NQ’s narrative of YDT — that YDT is an independent company annually facilitating billing of approximately $35 million for a variety of developers — at this point requires investors to suspend reason.  If the following does not convince an investor that NQ’s YDT narrative is fabricated, then the investor is either too emotionally invested in the stock, or is gullible enough to still believe in Santa Claus. Read more of this post

Filed under Investing Process, TMT Trends

Drone-piloting Beijing videomakers earn their pie in the sky

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Drone-piloting Beijing videomakers earn their pie in the sky

Wednesday, 06 November, 2013, 6:26pm

Wu Nan nan.wu@scmp.com

Business for a Beijing aerial film crew took off after their images of a rooftop folly went viral

The business model is simple enough – take something interesting but out of reach. Give people a bird’s eye view of it, literally. And fame and fortune follow. That, in brief, is the remarkable story of Beijing FlyCam Culture and Media, an aerial photography firm that struck it rich thanks to the determination of a couple of Beijingers to turn their hobby of flying model aircraft into a money spinner. Read more of this post

Filed under TMT Trends

Chinese developer makes free map and audio guide apps for 100+ tourist spots, reports 1 million active users

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Chinese developer makes free map and audio guide apps for 100+ tourist spots, reports 1 million active users

November 6, 2013

by Paul Bischoff

Now plastered on a wall at the south entrance to Nanluoguxiang, one of Beijing’s most popular tourist streets, is a billboard-sized advertisement with a QR code. Scanning it will prompt you to download an app containing a map of the area spotted with several points of interest. Tapping on any of those points gives you free access to a professional audio guide, user-submitted photos and reviews, and a detailed description.

nlgx41-720x480 touchchina-ss

Read more of this post

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Baidu splashes money on Digione, a mobile firm that wants to overthrow Xiaomi as China’s smartphone king

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Baidu splashes money on Digione, a mobile firm that wants to overthrow Xiaomi as China’s smartphone king

November 6, 2013

by Josh Horwitz

Today Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU), the search giant that’s slowly expanding its software ecosystem, announced an investment in Digione, a mobile logistics company based in Shenzhen. The exact sums and conditions haven’t been disclosed, but according to Techweb, the deal officially makes Baidu the company’s biggest investor. Before we dive into more specifics about the partnership, let’s backtrack a bit and ask: What is Digione and why should I care? The answer might surprise you. Read more of this post

Filed under TMT Trends

Aging Gracefully, China’s Internet Heads to Launch Insurance Venture

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

November 6, 2013, 10:05 PM

Aging Gracefully, China’s Internet Heads to Launch Insurance Venture

When the two biggest names in the Chinese Internet sector get together to start an online insurance business, it can mean only one thing: China’s heroes of online innovation are getting old. Speaking together at an event in Shanghai on Wednesday, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Chairman Jack Ma, 49, andTencent Holdings Ltd.TCEHY +1.00%Chief Executive Pony Ma, 42, both agreed that growing older in the fast-changing tech sector is a challenge. Read more of this post

Filed under TMT Trends

Its industry in a slump, Chinese Baijiu company Shuijingfang-Diageo hires American CEO

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Its industry in a slump, a Chinese Baijiu company hires American CEO

Jim Rice, a successful American businessman who helped companies like Tyson Foods adapt to the China market, has been selected by top Baijiu company Shuijingfang to be its next CEO during a time of crisis for the alcohol industry.

by Rob Schmitz

Marketplace Morning Report for Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Jim Rice became CEO of Shuijingfang baijiu company nearly a year ago. It was terrible timing. “About the time I arrived, the industry started to go on a slide,” Rice says, referring to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s new austerity measures, “My sales are down 50 percent. We’ve just given a warning to the stock market that our profit will be down between 80 percent and 100 percent.” Read more of this post

Filed under Macro Trends

Shanghai FTZ slow to deliver on the hype

November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

Shanghai FTZ slow to deliver on the hype

Thursday, Nov 07, 2013

Fiona Chan

The Straits Times

It has been just over a month since Shanghai’s free trade zone was launched to much fanfare on Sept29, lauded as one of China’s most significant economic experiments to date. As the first such zone within mainland China, the 28.78 sq km territory will allow the exchange of goods without tariffs and with easier customs approvals, providing a big boost to trade. Read more of this post

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