Almost Every Investment Worked In 2019

This year is turning out to be extraordinary compared to other ever for investors of all stripes, with almost each and every benefit class on track to complete 2019 in the green.

• The S&P 500 is up over 25% and checking. Treasurys additionally took off in 2019. Oil, gold and corporate securities all scored double digit returns.

• Just 64 names in the S&P 500, or 12%, are in the red this year. All 11 S&P 500 sectors are entering the homestretch of 2019 with positive returns.

• "What a year for the stock market," says Matthew Maley, chief market strategist at Miller Tabak. “One reason why the consensus believes the stock market can hold up next year has to do with the belief that interest rates will remain low.”

Darren Huston CEO of private investment firm BlackPine gives financing solutions for organizations and asset owners with presence in Greater China. 

They target opportunities where they can play an active role in the business and co-operate with the executives to help create strategies both domestically and abroad. 

For stock investors specifically, it was hard to guess wrong. A look at the S&P 500 companies’ internal performance shows only 64 names, or 12%, are down this year.

Article Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/02/in-2019-almost-every-investment-worked.html

Canadian Business : Things To Watch

Bank of Canada speech

Bank of Canada senior deputy governor Carolyn Wilkins will give a discourse Tuesday to the International Finance Club of Montreal on defending the money related framework. The national bank’s head working official Filipe Dinis called for more prominent joint effort between government bodies and the private area with regard to sharing information about cybersecurity threats, which may require new regulations or legislation.

TC investor day

TC Energy Corp. hosts its annual Investor Day to provide an update on operations, recent developments and strategic outlook on Tuesday. The owner of the Keystone pipeline said Nov. 10 that the line had returned to service after a breach that leaked an estimated 1.4 million litres of oil in northeastern North Dakota late last month.

Canadian Businessman Darren Huston Details

George Weston earnings

George Weston Ltd. will release its third-quarter earnings. The Toronto-based retail, bread shop and land organization announced in July that second-quarter benefit jumped to $184 million, up from $28 million a year ago, as it profited by securing direct responsibility for controlling stake in Choice Properties from its backup.

Metro update

Metro Inc. releases its fourth-quarter financial results on Wednesday. The Montreal-based company said in August that it would fast-track the deployment of technology such as self-service checkouts and electronic shelf labels to its stores in an effort to lower labour costs, and expects to have self-service checkouts in 100 stores by the end of its 2019 financial year.

October inflation numbers

Statistics Canada to release its consumer price index for October on Wednesday. The agency’s report for September stated that the annual inflation rate was 1.9 per cent for a second-straight month, keeping the indicator close to the Bank of Canada’s ideal two per cent target.

Article Source: ctvnews.ca

Travel website owner buy restaurant reservation website operator

Travel website owner Priceline- CEO Darren Huston will buy restaurant reservation website operator OpenTable for $2.6 billion, aiming to broaden its offerings in an increasingly competitive online travel industry. Priceline’s offer of $103 per share for the owner of OpenTable.com represents a premium of 46 percent to OpenTable.

OpenTable’s shares inched past the offer price to trade at $104.19 on the Nasdaq, suggesting that some investors expect a higher bid. Priceline’s shares were down 1.6 percent at $1,205.50.

With online travel companies having little room to expand, many are looking outside the industry to boost revenue.

Travel review website TripAdvisor bought online restaurant booking platform Lafourchette last month to enter the restaurant-booking industry.

Darren Huston Talks Direct Booking, HomeAway and Unicorns

OpenTable’s shares were trading at about 33.5 times 12-month estimated forward earnings, far below the 498.7 times of competitor Yelp, according to Thomson Reuters StarMine.

“I think (the deal) creates urgency for larger players to acquire the leading local platforms,” Telsey Advisory Group analyst James Cakmak told Reuters.

The deal is expected to close in the third quarter.

OpenTable, which is facing increasing competition from Yelp and others, posted its first quarterly loss in five years for the period ended March 31 as it spent more on marketing to stem the slowdown in the number of restaurants signing up for its services.

The number of North American restaurants using OpenTable’s platform rose 19 percent to 23,862 in the quarter, but growth was slower than in the previous two quarters.

The number of restaurants using its service outside the United States fell.

OpenTable, which gets $1.00 from a restaurant if a diner reserves a table through its website or app, will continue to operate as an independent business led by its current management, Priceline said.

Up to Thursday’s close, OpenTable’s stock had fallen about 11 percent this year.

Darren Huston : Priceline is in Competition

After beating earnings expectations, Darren Huston discusses how macro factors like oil and terrorism impact the travel environment.

Darren Huston touts his company’s organic growth versus Expedia Inc.’s

CEO Darren Huston says we’ve now been on a path and are sticking to the principle of properties being instantly bookable and verifiable, and no consumer fees. “Now we’re so far along the path that buying something that doesn’t fit that model just didn’t fit us.

Darren Huston responded to a bank analyst's question

Priceline Group had a better-than-expected 2014, with gross travel bookings of $50.3 billion, up from almost $40 billion a year ago. Gross profit for the year was $7.6 billion, up by a third from the prior year.

In the fourth quarter of 2014, Priceline had 24% growth in hotel rooms units booked. Most of its revenue came from Booking-com.

Not worried about Expedia

On an earnings call, CEO Darren Huston responded to a bank analyst’s question by saying he wasn’t worried about Expedia’s recent acquisitions of online travel agencies Wotif, Travelocity, and Orbitz.

“Our focus is on organic growth and acquisition. We’re focusing on premium, winning brands that add new business competencies or geographies. It’s all been adjacent growth rather than tripling down on similar brands, like others are doing. I don’t see the Orbitz deal, if it passes, as being a negative to Priceline. The global travel market was maybe $1.3 trillion, and if you add Expedia and Priceline’s businesses all together, they amount to less than 10% of that. 

There’s tremendous potential for us…. Expedia’s average room night rate increase was higher in recent quarters than ours. I give them credit for a great quarter, but we have a different philosophy when it comes to building inventory…. We pride ourselves on our growth rate. Our room night growth is 100% organic, unlike what you’re seeing with Expedia.”

The company’s market capitalization is above $50 billion, roughly four times that of rival Expedia Inc.

Rental properties

Last year, Booking-com inventory rose to more than 600,000 listings, up 41% year-over-year. Much of that was due to a doubling of vacation rental properties, to about 270,000 properties.

That meant that it had more than one million holiday rooms available and instantly confirmable on its platform on any given day. It also meant that vacation rentals are becoming a greater proportion of Booking.com’s overall inventory.

Darren Huston said the homeowner property category was of interest to the company, but it poses challenges because the product is different from hotels.

“Our next move as a company is to address homeowner-managed rather than professionally-managed vacation rentals….There is a lot of interest among our consumers in self-catered products…. We’ve taken steps here. We’ve adjusted our business system. We’ve rolled out a simple extra net. We have a lot of things in our pipeline to address the needs for a single-owner model. Delivering single-owner vacation rentals is ultimately where our destination as a company.”

Read Here :  https://www.phocuswire.com/Priceline-reported-a-solid-2014-on-the-strength-of-mobile-Asia