tybs
Nasdaq pulls out of Oslo Bors battle, handing Euronext victory
OSLO (Reuters) - Nasdaq withdrew its offer for Oslo Bors on Monday, giving pan-European exchange Euronext free rein to pursue its bid for the Norwegian stock market operator after a five-month battle.
Euronext secured approval from Norway’s Ministry of Finance this month to buy more than 50% of Oslo Bors for 158 Norwegian crowns per share, effectively blocking Nasdaq’s bid. Both had valued one of Europe’s few independent stock market operators at around 6.8 billion Norwegian crowns ($783 million).
Both Euronext, which runs exchanges in Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Lisbon and Dublin, and Nasdaq are looking to expand their portfolios but opportunities are scarce as market operators either already belong to international groups or their shareholders want to remain independent.
With technology speeding up trading and deregulation leading to market integration, size has become an important feature for bourse operators as big data allows larger players to squeeze costs and reduce transaction fees.
The Oslo Bors acquisition is expected to diversify Euronext’s revenue from shares and derivatives trading, given the Norwegian operator’s leading position in seafood derivatives as well as oil services and shipping.
Euronext’s success blocks Nasdaq’s ambition of completing a sweep of the Nordic-Baltic region, where the U.S. firm already owns the stock markets of Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland, as well as those of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Nasdaq, which had won the support of the Norwegian market operator’s major investors DNB and KLP, said it would now release those owners from their obligations.
‘GOOD SOLUTION’
Norway had rejected Nasdaq’s argument that no takeover should be allowed unless a two-thirds stake was obtained, a demand that could have blocked Euronext as the U.S. company had secured backing from around 35% of owners.
Neither Oslo Bors’ management, nor DNB, which holds a 20% stake, or KLP, which holds 10%, had been consulted head of Euronext’s surprise Dec. 24 bid, and the three immediately began searching for an alternative bidder.
While Nasdaq entered the fray in late January, eventually driving up the bid to 158 crowns from Euronext’s initial 145 crowns offer, it was unable to overcome Euronext’s early support of more than half the Oslo Bors shareholders.
DNB and KLP said they had not yet decided whether to sell their shares or not, but would meet to discuss the way forward.
“We’ve not yet decided what to do, but we hope to find a good solution with Euronext,” DNB spokesman Thomas Midteide said, while a spokeswoman for KLP said the pension provider would coordinate its approach with DNB.
Euronext has said it aims to complete its transaction by the end of June, and to appoint the Oslo Bors chief executive to its managing board. It also promised to set up a hub in the Norwegian capital to supervise commodities transactions.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-oslo-bors-vps-m-a-euronext-nasdaq/nasdaq-pulls-out-of-oslo-bors-battle-handing-euronext-victory-idUSKCN1SX0JE
Chinese Robot Censorship Hits Overdrive As Tiananmen Anniversary Approaches
The Chinese censorship machine is cranking up as the anniversary of the pro-democracy protests at Tiananmen Square approaches on June 4, according to Reuters. And, with the help of modern technology, censorship and authoritarianism is as easy as it’s ever been. Censors at Chinese internet companies say that blocking content related to the 1989 protests is now the easiest and most accurate it’s ever been with the help of machine learning, voice recognition, and image recognition.
One content screening employee at Beijing Bytedance Co Ltd said: “We sometimes say that the artificial intelligence is a scalpel, and a human is a machete.”
Two other employees of the company said that censorship is now largely automated. Posts in China that include the dates, images and names associated with the protests are automatically rejected.
One anonymous employee commented: “When I first began this kind of work four years ago there was opportunity to remove the images of Tiananmen, but now the artificial intelligence is very accurate.”
Four censors, working across companies like Bytedance, Weibo Corp and Baidu Inc, said that they censor between 5,000 to 10,000 pieces of information a day – which equates to about 5 to 7 pieces a minute. Most of the pieces of information they claim are pornographic or violent. And despite advances in artificial intelligence, current day tourist photos in the square are sometimes blocked by accident.
The crackdown is a relatively taboo subject in China, even three decades after the government sent the military to quiet student-led protests calling for democratic government reforms. Although Beijing has never released the death toll, estimates range from several hundred to several thousand.
June 4 will likely be a cat and mouse game – people use more obscure references on social media sites to allude to the protests, with the obvious ones blocked immediately. Some years, internet users haven't even been able to use the word "today".
And when China’s most watched stock index fell 64.8 points on the anniversary in 2012, censors blocked access to the term "Shanghai Stock Market" and the index numbers themselves. This is all despite the fact that the drop was likely a coincidence.
Tools for censorship are becoming more refined, analysts, academics and users say. They claim that sensitive periods before anniversaries and political events have become a dragnet, catching a wide range of sensitive content.
For instance, leading up to this year's anniversary, censorship on social media has targeted LGBT groups, environmental activist activists and labor groups.
The Cyberspace Administration of China ("CAC") has been responsible for most upgrades to censorship technology. The group was set up by President Xi Jinping, whose tenure has been defined by increasingly strict control of the internet. Last November, the CAC introduced new rules aimed at stopping dissent online in China, where “falsifying the history of the Communist Party” is a punishable offense. The new rules require assessment reports and site visits for any internet platform that could be used to “socially mobilize” or lead to “major changes in public opinion”.
One official that works for the CAC said that a recent boost in online censorship is very likely linked to the upcoming anniversary. They said: "There is constant communication with the companies during this time."
Companies that are responsible for their own censorship get little direction from the CAC but are still responsible for creating guidelines on their own. And with President Xi's continued grip on the internet, information continues to be centralized under the Communist Party's Propaganda Department and state media network. Censors and company staff say that this reduces some pressure to censor events, including major political news, natural disasters, and diplomatic visits.
One employee at Baidu said: “When it comes to news, the rule is simple… If it is not from state media first, it is not authorized, especially regarding the leaders and political items. We have a basic list of keywords which include the 1989 details, but (AI) can more easily select those.”
The punishment for not censoring can be severe. Companies including a Netease Inc news app, Tencent Holdings Ltd’s news app TianTian, and Sina Corp have all been hit with suspensions ranging from days to weeks as a result of failing to properly censor. For individual internet users and activists, it could mean jail time.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-27/chinese-robot-censorship-machine-hits-overdrive-tiananmen-anniversary-approaches
agree, some of that is still murky for me. The uyghurs and the relationship to tibet, mongolia etc. The taiwan issue with CKS I believe I have down fairly well- it's when those other regional things get thrown in and an overall lack of context is where it gets derpy for me.
Learn moar all the time.
Xi is /ourguy no question. Black/white hats in every gov't of the world. The russians in VZ are the black part of that gov't., for example.
ty anon for this.
did not know that about her and the bldg-and especially hussein wanting to live there…. :/
Rat-hole city with some of this stuff.
Forget the name but there was a woman(uyghur) who was exiled on an island for years and was released only a few yrs ago-think it was a result of tiananmen square. The absolute compartmentalization of everything is staggering at times.