Back in January, Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Holdings sent this letter to investors: Dear Pershing Square Investor, Beginning on Friday and over the last several days, we acquired more than 3.1 million shares of Netflix, making us a top-20 shareholder in the company. The opportunity to acquire Netflix at an attractive valuation emerged when investors
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I’ve been thinking a lot about age, and ageing, at work. When I see people decades younger than me in senior corporate positions, I realise that they must have planned and been smart about their goals and ambitions. I didn’t have a career plan in my 20s or 30s — and neither did any of
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The head of the IMF has said Ukraine will need $5bn a month for the next three months to plug the hole left by the crippling impact of Russia’s invasion on the country’s finances. Kristalina Georgieva, the fund’s managing director, said the IMF would discuss Ukraine’s financing needs with the country’s partner governments. Georgieva suggested
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Michael Pettis is a finance professor at Peking University and a senior associate at the Carnegie China Center. China’s recently released economic data illustrate just how difficult it has been for the authorities in China to implement economic policies to expand sustainable domestic demand. While first-quarter GDP grew nominally by 8.4 per cent year on
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Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, bars and retailers have been delisting Russian brands in protest and, in some cases, theatrically pouring the liquor down the drain.  At the last count, UK sales of Russian vodka were down seven per cent according to NielsenIQ. Bestseller Russian Standard, which is distilled in St Petersburg, leaves a gap in the
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A few moments ago, money markets began pricing in, with 100 per cent certainty, a half percentage point interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve next month. It seems certain that we’re in for the most aggressive global central bank tightening cycle in decades. Data snaphot from Bloomberg: And a prescient chartbook just dropped through
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The IMF has warned governments against relying on short-term improvements to their public finances stemming from higher inflation, saying these rarely provide lasting relief from fiscal pressures. The fund’s Fiscal Monitor, published on Wednesday, showed the surge in inflation over the past year had lowered both borrowing and debt burdens in advanced and emerging economies.
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The best thing about Frieze Art Fair, or any international art show for that matter, is the potential for superlative people-watching. Forget the crazy installation pieces by artists with single syllable names and Old Masters selling for the annual GDP of a small nation; when it comes to stealth-wealth dressing, no environment is better for
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ESG “is the Devil Incarnate”, Elon Musk wrote on Twitter this month. The Tesla and SpaceX chief executive has obvious reasons for discomfort with the ESG agenda. While Tesla can boast uniquely impressive environmental credentials, having kick-started the global electric car industry, its social and governance record is more problematic. There have been serious allegations
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Several hundred GlaxoSmithKline workers have voted to go on strike after rejecting a below inflation pay rise, setting the stage for an industrial battle unusual in the pharmaceutical industry. Unite, the union representing the workers at manufacturing sites across the UK, said the strike would be the first in the drugmaker’s history. Unite members voted
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Momentum is building in Sweden for the country to apply for Nato membership after its biggest selling newspaper endorsed the move and an opinion poll showed a record number of Swedes supported the idea. The debate over membership of the western military alliance in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been slower to
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