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Elon Musk now owns a 9.2 percent stake in Twitter
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk now owns 9.2 percent of Twitter after purchasing $2.89 billion in stock, according to an SEC filing.
Panasonic turned its $30 million Tesla investment into a $3.6 billion windfall
Panasonic has sold its entire stake in Tesla for around $3.6 billion to raise cash for an acquisition.
Uber's IPO went off amid outcry over labor conditions and wages
Uber's much-anticipated IPO happened this morning, with shares hitting the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol UBER. The IPO raised $8.1 billion, with shares set at $45 and the company valued at $82.4 billion. This comes amid outcry over Uber's low driver wages and a $1.1 billion profit loss in the first three months of 2019. According to The New York Times, the IPO was "less lofty" than expected.
Airbnb hopes to give hosts a stake in the company
If Airbnb has its way, hosting travelers won't just get you some spending money -- it'll get you a stake in the company's future. Axios has discovered that Airbnb sent a letter to the SEC asking for the regulator to permit offering equity to hosts. Airbnb primarily supported changes to Securities Act Rule 701 that would allow offering shares to gig economy workers, not just investors and staff. CEO Brian Chesky characterized it as vital to rewarding the company's supporters.
Sony will make almost $1 billion on Spotify's IPO
Spotify finally realized its IPO, after going the road less travelled and listing directly. Shares have already increased in value from $132 initially to settle around $140 for now. For those that already owned some Spotify stock, it was a good day. Like Sony: It held 5.7 percent of the streaming service through its Sony Music Entertainment arm, and sold under 20 percent of that when Spotify was listed, resulting in a payout of roughly $177 million. Good day is putting it mildly.
BT to take £530 million hit over 'improper' Italian accounting
An accounting scandal uncovered at BT's Italian division is worse than previously thought. Far worse. In October last year, the mobile, TV and broadband provider said it had discovered "historical accounting errors" and "inappropriate management behaviour" to the tune of £145 million. A sizeable figure, but one that BT has admitted was a "best estimate" at the time. Now, following an independent review by KPMG, that number has been revised to £530 million. Alongside some dodgy accounting work, investigators found "a complex set of improper sales, purchase, factoring and leasing transactions," conducted over multiple years. Ouch.
Zynga back in court over alleged insider trading
Social game developer Zynga is being dragged back into a lawsuit that claims select board members acted unfairly on inside information by selling shares before a stock price tumble in 2012. As Reuters reports, the Delaware Supreme Court is reviving a case that alleges co-founder Mark Pincus, and a group of his fellow board members, were aware of the company's lacklustre performance. It's said that Zynga had a rule prohibiting stock sales until three days after an earnings report. Those who stand accused were given an exemption, however, and sold 20.3 million shares for $236.7 million three weeks before the announcement.
The hostile takeover of 'Watch Dogs' studio Ubisoft continues
Ubisoft, the studio behind Assassin's Creed, Watch Dogs, South Park, Rabbids and plenty of other off-the-wall franchises, is slowly losing itself. The company is being swallowed up by Vivendi, the entertainment conglomerate responsible for Universal Music Group and Dailymotion, among other ventures. Vivendi has been buying Ubisoft stock with the goal of securing a seat on the studio's board, and it now controls 20.1 percent of Ubisoft shares and 17.76 percent of its voting rights. The latest stock purchase comes just days after E3 ended on June 16th.
Tesla is selling $2 billion in stock to make the Model 3 (updated)
When Tesla talked about its earnings in early May, one big question came up: just how will the company afford to make hundreds of thousands of Model 3s (over 373,000, at last count)? By raising a ton of investment money, that's how. Tesla has announced that it's selling a total of $2 billion in stock, about $600 million of it from Elon Musk himself, to pay for its expansion plans. It had to move up its goal of 500,000 electric vehicles per year to 2018 in response to Model 3 deposits, and that means having a "good buffer of cash" (as Musk said during the earnings call) to keep things humming.
Play Cupid on Tinder by sharing profiles with your friends
Tinder is slowly rolling out the option to share other people's profiles with friends via text messaging. A small number of users will spot a "share" icon under some profiles -- tapping it lets you send a temporary link to that profile via text. The links expire after 72 hours or five clicks, and the person who receives it can then swipe right on the profile as he or she sees fit.
Activision, Vivendi lawsuit settlement amounts to $275 million
Activision Blizzard reached a settlement this week over a shareholder's lawsuit in regards to the Call of Duty publisher's October 2013 buyout. As a result, Vivendi and others will pay $275 million to Activision to settle the litigation, which began in August 2013 before Activision's $8.2 billion purchase of itself from Vivendi was completed. Under the settlement terms, Activision will also add two directors to its board and must change the terms of its voting rights. According to the lawsuit, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick and Co-Chairman Brian Kelly seemingly benefited from insider knowledge of the company's purchase, obtaining a 10 percent discount when Kotick's investment firm purchased 172 million shares of Activision for $2.34 billion. The lawsuit alleged a "breach of fiduciary duties, waste of corporate assets and unjust enrichment." Emails from the suit presented in July revealed that Vivendi wanted to fire Kotick in 2013 during the purchasing negotiations. [Image: Activision]
Majority share in Warframe dev purchased by Chinese companies
The majority of shares in Warframe developer Digital Extremes have been acquired by two Chinese companies, Multi Dynamic Games and Perfect Online Holding. As a subsidiary of Sumpo Food Holdings Limited, Multi Dynamic Games purchased 58 percent of Digital Extremes' shares for $69.6 million, whereas Perfect Online acquired three percent of the developer for $3.6 million. Negotiations for the agreement began in late June. The value of the transactions, a total of $73.2 million (approximately HK $567.3 million according to Sumpo Food Holdings), is subject to future adjustment by the companies. Warframe launched in March 2013 for PC before the free-to-play shooter arrived on PS4 when the system launched in November 2013. The game hit Xbox One last month, after it reached 10 million registered users in July. Digital Extremes was founded in Ontario, Canada in 1993 and had a hand in the development of the Unreal and BioShock series. [Image: Digital Extremes]
Three EA execs unload stocks as publisher hits five-year high
Two senior members of Electronic Arts sold off the entirety of their shares in the publisher late last week when the company hit the highest share price it's seen in well over five years. SEC filings revealed that Patrick Soderlund, executive vice president of EA Games and EA senior vice president and General Counsel Stephen Bene dumped their stocks after the company's shares traded at roughly $34.53 and $33.40, respectively. Soderlund unloaded 36,133 shares, while Bene sold 7,771. EA's shares opened at $35.31 today, the highest price per share the company has traded at since September 2008. Another high-ranking executive at EA disposed of stocks as well: Chief Operating Officer Peter Moore sold nearly half (100,000) of the shares he owned at $34.53 as well. This follows EA's fiscal 2014 earnings report last week, in which it revealed a 5.79 percent decrease in net revenue year over year ($3.58 billion). [Image: Electronic Arts]
From Software acquired by Japanese publisher Kadokawa Corporation
Dark Souls and Armored Core developer From Software is to become a subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, after the Japanese publisher announced its acquisition of the studio. According to a report by GameBiz.jp, Kadokawa will conclude the transfer of 80 percent of the company's shares from former shareholder Transcosmos on May 21. Kadokawa Corp. is best known in Japan for publishing manga for the likes of Neon Genesis Evangelion and Mobile Suit Gundam. However, its Kadokawa Games subsidiary, formed in 2009, is a growing force in the Japanese gaming market. The studio published Suda51 titles Killer is Dead and Lollipop Chainsaw in Japan, and it also has a hand in development, most recently with RPGs Demon Gaze and Natural Doctrine. In a press release (translated by CVG), Kadokawa Corporation said, "We are planning to expand our position in this business with both Kadokawa Games and From Software. We have planned a series of discussions aimed at cooperation: expanding and developing both companies while taking advantage of their areas of expertise." As Gematsu notes, the publisher expects From Software and Kadokawa Games to benefit from the move, with the studios sharing expertise and resources to bolster development. It's too early to tell what the full implications of the acquisition will be for From Software, and for its headline series of Souls games. This time last year, the studio announced more than 2.3 million sales of Dark Souls, and it'll no doubt hope to better that number with the recent release of Dark Souls 2. [Image: Bandai Namco]
Sony to sell all its Square Enix shares
Sony announced it's selling its entire stake of 9.52 million shares in Square Enix, with the PlayStation company booking a gain of 4.8 billion yen (around $47 million) in the current fiscal quarter. At the time of writing, Sony is the third-largest shareholder in Square Enix with an sizable equity of 8.2 percent. Sony says it's agreed to sell the shares to SMBC Nikko Securities Inc, one of Japan's leading financial security companies; the sale price will be disclosed tomorrow. We'll learn more of the reasons behind the sale when Sony announces its full-year financial results on May 14. While the PS4 is doing better than expected, Sony's financial troubles of late have seen the company enact numerous changes to its operations. Following the sale of its Tokyo offices and several thousands of layoffs, earlier this year Sony announced plans to sell off its Vaio PC business and overhaul its TV arm into its own subsidiary. Those moves will result in a further 5,000 layoffs over the next year or so. [Image: Sony]
Nintendo buys shares in company with mobile video content platform
Nintendo has purchased stock in Dwango Co., the parent company of Japanese mobile video content platform Nico Nico Douga, Business Week reported yesterday. Before you spread news of Nintendo finally venturing into smartphones however, know that Nintendo spokesperson Yasuhiro Minagawa has stated that the company is not planning to use the service to distribute games. Minagawa explained that the purchase was made at the request of Dwango's chairman, Nobuo Kawakami. Nintendo's stock prices rose by 5.15 percent after the purchase, the highest they've been since the month of August. The bump in stock prices follows Nintendo's call with investors last month, during which Nintendo stated that the Wii U "still has a negative impact" on their profits. During the same call, Nintendo reported an operating loss of 23.3 billion yen ($236 million) due to advertising initiatives and research and development for Wii U software.
Activision Blizzard now free from Vivendi
Back in July, Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick led a charge to buy the company back from parent company Vivendi. After a few bumps in the road, the share buyback is complete and Activision Blizzard is now (mostly) free of Vivendi. $5.83 billion of stock is owned by Activision Blizzard, while Kotick and his partners hold on to $2.34 billion. Vivendi's not completely out of the loop yet, but its shares have been cut down to 12%. After five years under Vivendi's wing, Kotick says he is excited to "get back to focusing on making great games," according to a recent interview with Bloomberg.
Facebook to join Twitter in providing TV networks with user data
Now that Facebook has granted broadcasters access to your public wall posts, it wants to give them even more of your data -- but anonymously this time. Zuckerberg and Co. told the Wall Street Journal it'll supply the likes of ABC, NBC, FOX and others with detailed analytics on how much buzz a show is generating in terms of likes, comments and shares. It'll mine that info from private postings as well public ones, though it said that the data will be aggregated without revealing anyone's identity. Of course, Twitter and Nielsen have been supplying networks with such info for a while now, but Facebook claims its results are more meaningful, since viewers must ostensibly use their real identities. One CBS exec added that Facebook's wider demographic also seemed to jibe better with actual audience numbers, meaning that programming could become less affected by tech-savvy types and more by your mom.
Beats Electronics unplugs HTC with $265 million share buyback
Looks like the rumors were true. HTC announced today that Beats Electronics will buy back the remaining 25 percent stake it had in the headphone maker for $265 million, all but bringing to an end a two-year partnership that has never really worked out. It's quite a bit of cash for HTC, after it took a 50.1 percent share of Beats for $300 million in 2011, later agreeing to sell a 25 percent stake back to its partner just shy of its one-year anniversary. Beats, on the other hand, has recently embarked on a global expansion, broadening its product lines beyond headphones and its exclusive mobile partnership with HTC to include speakers, in-car audio systems, and soon an online music streaming service. Dr Dre. and Co. are rumored to be lining up a new investor that has the funds to help boost its growth. HTC said it will "continue to partner [with Beats] as future opportunities arise" but remains silent on its reasons to sell. It's strange how things turn out: not long ago we'd have guessed HTC would be the success and Beats the fly-by-night. Now, it appears those roles have been reversed.
Icahn's AAPL buyback advice could benefit Apple quickly, significantly
An analysis by Deutsche Bank's Chris Whitmore shows a potential US$50 billion stock buyback would boost Apple's earnings per share by as much as $4.25 in 2014, AppleInsider reports. This comes in the wake of a meeting last week between Tim Cook and investor Carl Icahn where the possibility of expanding the company's share buyback program was discussed. Icahn made headlines last week when he reportedly invested over $1.5 billion in the Cupertino-based tech giant. This strong vote of confidence had a rather dramatic effect on AAPL, boosting it by over 20 points in less than a day. Of course, the most important factor in further pushing Apple's stock upwards is the continued announcement of innovative products, and with an iPhone event reportedly scheduled for September 10, we won't have to wait long on that front.
