The FTC Is Making M&A More Difficult

The FTC Is Making M&A More Difficult

As we predicted new FTC Chair Lina Khan is making it increasingly difficult for firms to execute M&A transactions. Recently the FTC rolled out new policy changes that provide the agency with veto power over a given company’s future M&A transactions once that company attempts an anticompetitive (as defined by the FTC) merger or acquisition. … Continue reading The FTC Is Making M&A More Difficult →

Inflation Is A Primary Driver Behind The Economic Slowdown

Inflation Is A Primary Driver Behind The Economic Slowdown

Whether it is the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg or CNBC, the business press fails to mention price inflation as a primary factor behind the economic slowdown as measured by Real GDP of 2%. Supply chain bottlenecks and the Delta variant are not exclusively responsible for the stagflationary period we are about to embark on where … Continue reading Inflation Is A Primary Driver Behind The Economic Slowdown →

Amazon, Apple and Microsoft Are Online Advertising Challengers

Amazon, Apple and Microsoft Are Online Advertising Challengers

Amazon may not be a surprise to investors given the ubiquity of Amazon's ecommerce platform. Apple is an online advertising challenger given the services that sit on top of its devices from Gaming (Arcade) to Apple TV to Apple News to Apple's forthcoming push into AR/VR. Microsoft is another Tech giant that does not enjoy … Continue reading Amazon, Apple and Microsoft Are Online Advertising Challengers →

Technology Platform Companies Include More Than The Usual Suspects

Technology Platform Companies Include More Than The Usual Suspects

Technology platform companies include more than Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. We contemplate a few FinTech platform companies below. PayPal (ticker: PYPL): A "Payments" platform company that re-invented itself by acquiring another payments company - Venmo - that was built on top of another platform company - Facebook. The architect that drove PYPL's strategy … Continue reading Technology Platform Companies Include More Than The Usual Suspects →

CEO Compensation: What Happened To “Pay For Performance”?

CEO Compensation: What Happened To “Pay For Performance”?

CEORater has published a number of CEO compensation studies over the years. The truth is we probably do not allocate sufficient weighting to compensation in our CEOs of The Year awards. The Wall Street Journal published an insightful piece on Technology Founder/CEO compensation, which we have previously written about. Our view is that public company … Continue reading CEO Compensation: What Happened To “Pay For Performance”? →

Google Search Trends: Stagflation

Google Search Trends: Stagflation

The word "stagflation" is at peak interest at the moment as measured over the most recent 12-month period using Google Trends to calculate search interest. We have beat the drum on stagflation for the past year and some on Wall Street have picked up the baton in recent days. Below we have created a chart … Continue reading Google Search Trends: Stagflation →

The Fed’s Digital Dollar Will Remake The Capital Markets

The Fed’s Digital Dollar Will Remake The Capital Markets

From instant trade settlement, to real-time AML transparency and reporting, the Fed's CBDC / "Digital Dollar" will drive efficiency, enhance transparency and reduce privacy. "We are the Federal Reserve and we are here to help" (translation: run for cover). The Federal Reserve will have rolled out its CBDC - the Digital Dollar - by 2025 … Continue reading The Fed’s Digital Dollar Will Remake The Capital Markets →

How The CPI’s Fuzzy Math Understates Inflation

How The CPI’s Fuzzy Math Understates Inflation

The CPI data category "Owners' Equivalent Rent" ("OER"), uses data derived from surveys of homeowners in select markets rather than real world data. This technique allows the BLS and the Federal Reserve to understate price inflation. OER understates CPI by 1% or more. September's 5.4% CPI increase was understated by at least 1% per our … Continue reading How The CPI’s Fuzzy Math Understates Inflation →