P40: Another triumph that won’t sell. Huawei has launched its latest flagship, the P40 which has all the bells and whistles but without Google Mobile Services, no-one outside of China is going to buy it. The P40, P40 Pro, P40 Pro+ have some very cool features including: First, quad curve display: This is effectively a display with no bezels...
Upgrade demand could help 5G. Despite British Telecom’s denials and the efforts of the broadband providers in the USA, it is clear that the Internet is creaking under the strain of the great home working and e-learning experiment opening further the way for 5G’s best use case by far. British Telecom has denied that its network is under pressure and...
It is raining money that does not exist. The scale of the insanity sweeping the market became clear yesterday as dire predictions for digital advertising were made and yet both Google and Facebook rallied strongly (7% and 9% respectively) While Facebook is seeing a huge spike in usage of its Digital Life services in the hardest-hit countries, its customers are...
SoftBank is in urgent need of cash. Now is the worst time to try and sell anything and this move by SoftBank shows just how desperately it needs cash to prop up both its balance sheet and investor confidence in the company as a going concern. SoftBank has announced a JPY4.5tn (US$41bn) asset sale program of which JPY2tn ($18bn) will...
Great bargains to be had. The US dollar has become the most desired monetary instrument surpassing traditional safe havens like US Treasuries and even Gold meaning that those that have it have greatly increased their bargaining power. Furthermore, the now inevitable recession is going to mean that many loss-making businesses will need cash to see them through. Here are a...
Bikes and scooters likely to fare better. When the crisis is past it is quite possible that the asset-sharing industry will fall victim to virus-phobia as users are less willing to share given the increased risk of infection. Against this backdrop, bikes and scooters could fare much better. Furthermore, Uber’s 38% rally on the back of truly awful news clearly...
Tencent gives little relief from virus uncertainty. Tencent reported good Q4 19 results but with all eyes focused on the economic impact of Covid-19 on the Chinese economy, Tencent’s lack of disclosure did little to alleviate the uncertainty which is why the shares continue to follow the rest of Hong Kong down. Q4 19 revenues / EPS were just ahead...
ERRATUM: Corrects previous version which incorrectly stated that SoftBank has $2.8bn in cash (Q4 19) when the correct figure is $35.9bn. SoftBank goes into cash conservation mode. The dangers of financing growth with debt are coming home to roost as I suspect that the current rush for liquidity has caused SoftBank to move into cash conservation mode, explaining the real...
Similar companies, different issues Amazon is going to suffer from all of the same problems that Alibaba has but is in a better position to mitigate the logistics impact. However, its demand picture is far less clear. With social distancing, isolation and closures becoming the norm, the role of e-commerce is going to become extremely important. Alibaba In China, Alibaba...
Richard is founder, owner of research company, Radio Free Mobile. He has 16 years of experience working in sell side equity research. During his 11 year tenure at Nomura Securities, he focused on the equity coverage of the Global Technology sector.
SoftBank – The family silver.
The sharing economy is in meltdown. I think that it is extremely unlikely that SoftBank will become insolvent but a continued decline in confidence in its business model and potential further failures within its portfolio could trigger a serious liquidity crisis. The bankruptcy of OneWeb combined with the news that WeWork burned through $1.4bn in cash in Q4 2019 adds...