SeaPRwire

Crypto exchange FTX raises $566m in funding round co-led by Temasek

elean
2 minutes

BENGALURU (REUTERS) - Crypto firm FTX Trading raised fresh capital at a valuation of US$25 billion (S$33.7 billion) from a clutch of big-name venture capital investors, making it one of the most richly-valued crypto start-ups in the world. The financing, led by investors including Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board, Temasek Holdings and Tiger Global, is a continuation of an earlier Series B funding round from July, when the 2-year-old start-up raised US$1 billion from SoftBank, Temasek and other investors at a valuation of US$18 billion. The latest US$420 million (S$566 million) funding round, which attracted 69 investors, comes at a time when cryptocurrencies are facing tighter regulatory scrutiny in the United States and around the world. Founded by crypto entrepreneurs Sam Bankman-Fried and Gary Wang and headquartered in the Bahamas, FTX is the owner and operator of the FTX.com cryptocurrency exchange that caters to a wide customer base including retail investors, family offices and institutional investors. The platform is currently not available to residents in the United States. FTX also counts celebrity couple Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen among its backers. In a statement ...

SeaPRwire

Wall Street closes lower on jitters ahead of earnings, Fed minutes

elean
3 minutes

NEW YORK (REUTERS) - United States stocks finished lower on Tuesday (Oct 12), extending losses late as investors grew more jittery in the run up to third-quarter earnings, while a jump in Tesla shares helped support the market. Adding to investor caution, the Federal Reserve is expected to release minutes on Wednesday from its last policy meeting, which market participants will scour for hints about when the US central bank could begin tapering its massive bond-buying programme. All three major US stock indexes ended in the red with the Dow down the most, weighed by healthcare and industrials. Earnings unofficially kick off this week with results from JPMorgan Chase & Co on Wednesday and other banks to follow. JPMorgan's shares shed 0.8 per cent on the day, while the S&P 500 banks index edged down 0.6%. Analysts expect to see strong US profit growth for the third quarter. But a number of companies have warned of issues and investors are worried about how supply chain problems and higher prices will affect businesses emerging from the coronavirus pandemic. "For the most part, institutional portfolio managers are of the view - let's see what earnings look like and how much of a negat...

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CRAFTLAND Announces the Launch of Its Platform, Recycling Altcoins to Help Investors

pandora
5 minutes

New York, NY / SEAPRWire / September 15, 2021 /- Recently, CRAFTLAND has announced the launch of its platform which will recycle altcoins to help investors who were severely affected by poor management or low liquidity crypto projects. The word “Booming” is not even enough to describe the rapid popularisation of the blockchain and crypto industry. Whether it is business executives, blue-collar or white-collar workers, as well as street folks are all talking about crypto investment. However, underneath this giant industry with nearly millions of assets changing hands daily are the wreckage left by numerous altcoin projects and their large number of stranded investors. Projects rise and fall all the time, many investors invest into new altcoins just to find themselves stranded in projects that were abandoned later due to poor management or low liquidity; especially when Bitcoin experienced a bear market for two-month in June this year, that aggravates the number of projects being abandoned. Altcoins issued by these abandoned projects became the worthless and people coined them as “shitcoins”. Investors holding these altcoins could’t regain their losses from these failed investments a...

SeaPRwire

How Evergrande’s debt delinquency could play out: Best and worst-case scenarios

elean
5 minutes

HONG KONG (BLOOMBERG) - China Evergrande Group may undergo one of the country's biggest-ever debt restructurings, if the developer's distressed-level bond prices are any indication. It's "almost unavoidable", said Nomura International Hong Kong credit analyst Iris Chen. Her base case is a government-supervised deal that ensures Evergrande delivers homes and pays suppliers, where dollar debt investors would get 25 per cent of their money back. CreditSights Singapore, senior research analyst Luther Chai also says Evergrande will default and enter restructuring. That risk is being priced in, with many of Evergrande's dollar bonds trading near 30 US cents. Debt delinquencies at developers the size of Evergrande are so rare in China that investors, analysts and regulators would only have a few case studies to go on. Kaisa Group Holdings in 2015 became the first Chinese builder to default on dollar bonds. The restructuring of another, China Fortune Land Development, is currently under negotiation. Any disorderly failure by the firm may pose a threat to the financial system. The lack of clear precedents also means the Chinese authorities have yet to test mechanisms in solving a debt probl...

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Key reasons why investors are turning to digital assets

elean
6 minutes

In times of economic uncertainties, it is almost a no-brainer for investors to turn to safe-haven assets like gold. It may thus seem surprising that many institutional investors – including the likes of conservative pension funds and family offices in the United States and Europe – are turning to digital assets such as cryptocurrencies as new forms of investments. These seasoned investors view digital assets as an alternative to existing asset classes that will be increasingly attractive in the years ahead – in terms of the possible returns in the long run and their function as an immutable store of value. With the growing appetite for digital assets, many key jurisdictions have started to regulate digital assets trading. In Hong Kong, for instance, OSL became the city’s first digital asset exchange and brokerage licensed to trade cryptocurrency and security tokens. This ensures investors can trade with confidence under the protections and safeguards to which they are accustomed. Like Hong Kong, Singapore is well-positioned to be a future hub for this rapidly growing asset class, as it looks to regulate platforms that offer related products and services. Here are four reasons inves...

SeaPRwire

Robinhood surges 50% in frenzied trading, as investors scoop up ‘the meme of memes’

elean
3 minutes

BENGALURU (REUTERS) - Shares of Robinhood Markets rose more than 50 per cent on Wednesday (Aug 5) during a wild trading session as investors scooped up shares after its underwhelming stock market debut last week. The online brokerage's shares closed at US$70.39, off the session high of US$85 when the stock was up nearly 82 per cent, with one analyst dubbing it "the meme of memes" in a reference to stocks popularised this year by retail investors congregating in online platforms such as Reddit's WallStreetBets. The stock has risen far above its initial public offering price (IPO) of US$38 per share and has logged its fourth straight day of gains. Its market capitalisation rose to US$58.8 billion (S$79.5 billion), catapulting it ahead of Twitter, restaurant chain Chipotle Mexican Grill and asset manager T. Rowe Price. Interest in the stock among retail investors soared on social media despite its weak market debut last week, when it fell below its IPO price. It was unclear exactly how much of Wednesday's buying was from retail investors, though. On Tuesday, retail trading volume rose tenfold, helping the stock gain 24 per cent, according to Vanda Research. Over the past 24 hours, Rob...

SeaPRwire

Robinhood closes more than 8% down in grim stock market debut

elean
3 minutes

NEW YORK (REUTERS) - Robinhood Markets' shares closed more than 8 per cent lower at US$34.82 per share on their first day of trading, as many investors who used the popular trading app to participate in this year’s “meme” stock trading frenzy snubbed its initial public offering (IPO). Only 16 of the 99 US-listed companies that were worth at least US$10 billion (S$13 billion) when they went public declined on their first day, according to Dealogic, whose data goes back to 1995. “A year ago we were trading the stock at 15 bucks a share. And our most recent trades in early June were US$55 a share (in the private market),” said Glen Anderson, president of Rainmaker Securities, a secondary trading platform for private pre-IPO shares. Anderson said they traded about US$200 million in Robinhood stocks in the private market last year. Robinhood’s easy-to-use interface has made it a hit among young investors trading from home on cryptocurrencies and stocks such as GameStop during the Covid-19 pandemic. Some IPO investors stayed on the sidelines, citing concerns over its frothy valuation, the risk of regulators cracking down on Robinhood’s business, and lingering anger with the company’s imp...

SeaPRwire

China crackdown rocks investors: ‘Everybody’s in the crosshairs’

elean
7 minutes

SINGAPORE (BLOOMBERG) - Beijing's clampdown on the booming private education industry has shocked even some of the most seasoned China watchers, prompting a rethink of how far Chinese President Xi Jinping's Communist Party is willing to go as it tightens its grip on the world's second-largest economy. The crash in tuition stocks that began late last week spread on Monday (July 26) across the tech sector and beyond, after the authorities confirmed reports they would ban a swathe of the education industry from making profits. It is the government's most extreme step yet to rein in private businesses that regulators blame for exacerbating inequality, increasing financial risk and - in the case of some tech titans - challenging Beijing's authority. With losses in Chinese tech and tuition stocks now exceeding US$1 trillion (S$1.36 trillion) since February, the questions reverberating across trading desks from Shanghai to New York are where regulators might strike next and whether markets are properly discounting regulatory risk. Property-management and food-delivery companies were among the biggest losers on Monday after Beijing signalled tighter rules for both sectors. While some inves...

SeaPRwire

China’s luxury retirement homes draw millions from investors

elean
5 minutes

BEIJING (BLOOMBERG) - Retiree William Tang recently decided to swap his life in downtown Shanghai for a luxury elder-care development in the city's far west, paying US$220,000 to rent a two-bedroom apartment for 15 years. "It is more like a resort," Tang said after viewing the Ardor Gardens showroom, which highlights amenities including an indoor swimming pool, yoga rooms, wine tastings and round-the-clock care. For a growing number of Chinese and international investors, elder-care developments like Ardor Gardens are becoming irresistible bets. Money is pouring into the sector amid renewed attention on just how quickly China is aging. Sydney-based property and infrastructure company Lendlease Corp Ltd., which put US$280 million into Ardor Gardens, is among investors that see the policy environment becoming more favorable as the Chinese government tackles its demographic challenges. "The market will likely be completely different 10 years from now," said Lendlease's China President Ding Hui. "If you wait for 10 years before starting to think of buying land, learning, training up a team and developing a business model, very likely you would have missed the opportunity." According to...

ACN Newswire
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Tiger Brokers Singapore to Offer Singapore’s First Dividend-Paying China-Focused ETF through Lion Global Investors

indie
9 minutes

SINGAPORE, Jul 16, 2021 - (ACN Newswire via SEAPRWire.com) - Xiaomi-backed online brokerage Tiger Brokers Singapore (Tiger Brokers) today announced that they had been invited by Lion Global Investors, one of the largest asset managers in Southeast Asia, to be among the Authorised Participating Dealers (PDs) for the Lion-OCBC Securities China Leaders ETF, listed on Singapore Exchange Securities Trading Limited (SGX-ST). Investors on Tiger Brokers' platform, Tiger Trade, will be able to access Singapore's first China-focused dividend-paying ETF. This ETF allows investors to partake in China's growth story as well as diversify their investment portfolio by including Chinese stocks in an easy and affordable way. Tiger Brokers' investors will be able to subscribe for units in the Lion-OCBC Securities China Leaders ETF via the trading platform between 15 to 27 July 2021, 12 noon before the listing date.Eng Thiam Choon, CEO of Tiger Brokers (Singapore), shared, "Tiger Brokers (Singapore) is always looking for ways to help our investors diversify their portfolio. We are honoured to be one of the first online brokerages to be appointed as the authorised participating dealer among other well...

SeaPRwire

Oil edges higher with investors betting on accelerating demand

elean
2 minutes

NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG) - Oil edged higher after a two-day gain amid optimism that fuel demand will keep rising, despite a Covid-19 resurgence in many regions. Futures in New York traded near US$75 a barrel after climbing more than 2 per cent on Friday. The rollout of vaccines and rebound in economic activity in major economies, particularly the U.S., has underpinned the increasing fuel consumption. The spread of the virus's delta variant and uncertainty over supply from the OPEC+ alliance are clouding the outlook, however. Oil's upward momentum was interrupted last week after an OPEC+ meeting on output levels was abandoned. Crude capped its first weekly loss since May - despite an end-of-week rally - with the stalemate raising concern the group's unity may fracture and lead to a price war. The alliance had been widely expected to restore more of the production sidelined during the pandemic. The International Energy Agency will provide investors with a snapshot of the market on Tuesday with the release of its monthly report, while OPEC will also release its monthly report on Thursday. The market's bullish structure has eased slightly on the OPEC+ uncertainty. The prompt timespread for...

SeaPRwire

Investors over the age of 50 take a shine to robo-advisers

elean
1 minute

SINGAPORE - Investors over the age of 50 are taking a greater liking to robo-advisers, which have tended to be more popular among younger folk. It helps that these digital investment platforms are becoming more mainstream and making it easier for people to invest in higher-yield assets like equities amid the low interest rates now prevailing, Mr Kelvin Goh, head of wealth advisory at OCBC Bank, told The Straits Times. Please subscribe or log in to continue reading the full article. Get unlimited access to all stories at $0.99/month Latest headlines and exclusive stories In-depth analyses and award-winning multimedia content Get access to all with our no-contract promotional package at only $0.99/month for the first 3 months* Subscribe now *Terms and conditions apply.

SeaPRwire

When investors own over 100 homes

elean
4 minutes

(BLOOMBERG) - In Canada, a home is no longer just a home - it is an investment. The country now has one of the world's hottest real estate markets and its residents are snapping up more homes than they can ever live in. Take Mr Brady McDonald, who owns more than 100 houses. "My net worth has obviously gone up a lot, just based on what's happened this year, because the market's gone berserk," said the former arborist who started acquiring single-family homes in the small city of Barrie, Ontario, in 2015, and now says he has a net worth "in the millions". "We have a housing crisis here," he said from Barrie, where prices have gone up almost 40 per cent in the last year. "The demand for housing is not going down. So there's always opportunity." But in a country that faces one of the world's most acute housing shortages, investors like him are coming under increased scrutiny. Concern is growing that the professionals are crowding out first-time buyers and would be quick to sell if property values start to slide, which could threaten the economy. Investors account for about a fifth of new mortgages in Canada - the same share that prompted a crackdown in Britain, and roughly five times t...

SeaPRwire

Tech stock rally sends S&P and Nasdaq to record highs

elean
3 minutes

NEW YORK (REUTERS) - The Nasdaq and S&P 500 headed to all-time highs on Monday, fueled by tech stocks as interest rates remain low, while investors awaited data on the US labor market due on Friday. Big tech companies including Facebook Inc, Apple Inc , Amazon.com Inc and Nvidia Corp were among the biggest boosts to the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq. Facebook gained over 4 per cent as a US judge granted the company's motion to dismiss a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit. The social media giant touched $1 trillion in market cap on Monday. In contrast, cyclical sectors dropped sharply amid fears over a spike in Covid-19 cases across Asia. Financials, energy and airlines fell sharply. Technology led the biggest sectoral gains on S&P. "It's end of the quarter and investors may want to take some profits and rotate out of energy and stick with tech, which has been the winner," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research in New York. Stovall expects stocks should continue their near-term climb as investors await the new earnings season, in which year-over-year earnings growth of S&P 500 companies is expected to top 60 per cent. The S&P 500 on Friday logged its best weekly perfo...

ACN Newswire
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Pertama Digital makes leap forward with two new investors for its digital bank

indie
3 minutes

PENANG, Malaysia, Jun 24, 2021 - (ACN Newswire via SEAPRWire.com) - Pertama Digital Berhad announced today that it has signed Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with Perfect Hexagon Commodity and Investment Bank Limited ("PHCIB") and Alsirat Sdn Bhd ("ASB") to secure investment for its proposed digital bank.Licensed as a Labuan investment bank under the Labuan Financial Services Authority, PHCIB is wholly owned under Perfect Hexagon Limited ("PHL"), a Hong Kong based entity. PHL is a global commodity and trade finance leader. PHL is also an Associate Participant of Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Berhad and a Liquidity Provider for the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited.Meanwhile, ASB is a wholly owned Bumiputera company that has more than 30 years' experience in delivering mission-critical projects for customers since its inception. It provides digital evidence management solutions, big data analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence and Internet of Things services.According to the two MoUs, PHCIB and ASB both wish to support financial inclusion initiatives by investing in the digital bank proposed by Pertama Digital. Both investors will participate by contributing to th...

ACN Newswire
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7th Global Blockchain Congress by Agora Group & TDeFi Schedule for June 21st and 22nd, 2021, Dubai

indie
3 minutes

DUBAI, Jun 10, 2021 - (ACN Newswire via SEAPRWire.com) - The 7th edition of the world-renowned flagship Global Blockchain Congress by Agora Group is taking place on June 21st and 22nd, 2021 in Dubai & co-hosted by TDeFi. We are also happy to have Woonkly as a Title Sponsor for this event. This edition's theme is "Celebrating DeFi and NFTs" and will boast an amazing line up of speakers including Keynote Addresses by His Excellency Ahmed Bin Sulayem, Executive Chairman & CEO of Dubai Multi Commodities Centre, Hubertus Thonhauser, Chairman of the Board of Tezos Foundation, Fiorenzo Manganiello, Partner at Lian Group and many others. The event is a closed door, exclusive congress that can be attended by invitation only. Agora will be hosting more than 100 investors and 30 Sponsors (Global Blockchain, DeFi and NFTs projects looking to raise funds). The first six editions of the Global Blockchain congress were a tremendous success and we were able to host more than 450 investors and more than 90 blockchain startups and were able to raise Millions in funds for our participating projects.This is an exclusive, closed-door Congress to connect startups with investors and sec...

ACN Newswire
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Online Brokerage Tiger Brokers Adopts Alibaba Cloud Technologies to Provide Superior Trading Experience to Its Online Investors

indie
8 minutes

SINGAPORE, Jun 1, 2021 - (ACN Newswire via SEAPRWire.com) - Xiaomi-backed online brokerage Tiger Brokers today announced their technology collaboration with Alibaba Cloud, the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group. Alibaba Cloud provides Tiger Brokers with end-to-end technology support to its trading platform, Tiger Trade, to meet the secure and low latency trading demands of its investors on the platform.Tiger Brokers has been seeing a consistent increase in the number of investors onboarding the trading platform. Alibaba Cloud solution will help to ensure the speed of data flow on the app is not compromised. Its Big Data analytics will also provide relevant insights into Tiger Brokers' investors trading behaviour, allowing them the chance to offer better service offerings and trading opportunities to meet the demands of their investors.Kelvin Liu, Vice President, Engineering of UP Fintech Holding Limited, known as "Tiger Brokers" in Asia, shared, "At Tiger Brokers, we are all about bringing superior user experience to our investors, from customer service, trading experience to up-to-date market insights. With Alibaba Cloud's service, we will be able to pro...

SeaPRwire

Tips from a trillion-dollar fund manager

elean
4 minutes

(REUTERS) - When it comes to financial advice, you could listen to someone who helped steer more money than almost anyone else on the planet. When he was chairman and CEO of investment giant Vanguard Group, Mr Jack Brennan oversaw a company that has since grown to over US$7 trillion (S$9.3 trillion) in assets. That torch has since been passed to current chairman and CEO Tim Buckley, but Mr Brennan still has plenty of wisdom to share in his new book, More Straight Talk On Investing. An avid marathoner, Mr Brennan sat down with Reuters to talk about how to pace yourself for the long-distance race of financial security. Q: A lot has happened since you wrote your previous book, so did your advice change at all? A: What has changed for investors in the last 20 years has been very beneficial. The cost of investing has been falling dramatically, which is a critical part of being successful. There have been a lot of great product enhancements, like the ubiquity of exchange traded funds and target-date funds. And the choice of how to get financial advice today is completely different. Everything is lower-cost and more available. Q: Investors since 2000 have gone through so many different ty...

SeaPRwire

European investors prove picky even with inflation fears on hold

elean
4 minutes

(BLOOMBERG) - Sales of new bonds in Europe's primary market resumed at a brisk pace on Thursday, though investors appear increasingly price sensitive amid the first murmurings of an end to stimulus programs. Some investors walked away from AstraZeneca's €800 million (S$1,292 million) bond deal on Wednesday, after the spread on offer was cut by more than a third. That followed JPMorgan Chase & Co pulling out of a sale mid-marketing on insufficient demand this week, leaving BNP Paribas to place the deal at a lower price. "We're now much more selective on individual names, rather than expecting a general compression," said Ms Denise Yung, portfolio manager at Lombard Odier Investment Managers. "Rising rates will continue to pressure total returns." Inflation concerns may have waned in recent days, with one gauge of European inflation expectations falling to a three-week low, but the question of whether price rises will prove transitory is far from settled. European Central Bank officials have played down the prospect of any imminent adjustment to the pace of its pandemic bond-buying. ECB President Christine Lagarde has also signalled there will be no major policy shift at the bank's n...

ACN Newswire
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BAYBANNFA moves to legal review in becoming an NFA Member

indie
2 minutes

NEW YORK, May 27, 2021 - (ACN Newswire via SEAPRWire.com) - BAYBANNFA has completed its application, and has now moved to legal review in becoming a member of the National Futures Association (NFA; NFA ID: 0527835). The NFA will conduct a background and compliance check to determine that BAYBANNFA meets with the relevant provisions of the CEA, after which it will become an official NFA member.https://www.nfa.futures.org/BasicNet/basic-profile.aspx?nfaid=5rbvtgr%2FZSQ%3D The major responsibilities of the NFA are to establish ethical standards for futures and other markets, to protect the interests of traders and investors. NFA ensures its members strictly abide by federal laws and rules set by the CFTC, and strictly supervises member brokers to ensure market integrity for traders and investors. In the 20 years since the establishment of NFA, the trading volume of the US Futures Exchange and foreign exchange market has expanded many times over, while the customer complaint rate has been reduced by 72%.BAYBANNFA's application to become an officially supervised member of the NFA, one of the world's well-known financial authorities, is taking BAYBANNFA to another level internationally, ...