US regulators have not yet shown all their cards, but they should pause before arguing that too big equals anticompetitive, or seeking to break up or substantially restructure the tech giants. Instead, they might want to look to Europe.
Read moreWhy We Should Like Facebook’s Cryptocurrency
The ambition is grand: “Reinvent money. Transform the global economy. So people everywhere can live better lives.” So said Facebook last month in unveiling Libra, its new digital payment service. The company heralded it as “a simple global currency and financial infrastructure that empowers billions of people.” If fully launched, Libra would allow Facebook users to buy and sell goods and services around the world and across borders using a digital cryptocurrency…
Read moreBig Tech Can Stay Ahead of Regulators by Breaking Itself Up
Rumblings about the role of Big Tech in American society have coalesced into a storm long coming, with revelations that the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission are contemplating sweeping antitrust investigations of Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Apple.
Read moreWhy Are We So Surprised by Facebook's Data Scandals?
Surveying the reactions to the latest revelation that Facebook played fast and loose with user data, it was hard not to harken back to what Scott McNally, the founding CEO of Sun Microsystems, told a group of reporters, including one from WIRED, in 1999: “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.”
Read morePeter Thiel is a Flawed Messenger with Crucial Message for Tech
PETER THIEL, NEVER one to keep a low profile, made his most recent set of waves with reports that he is prepared to decamp from Silicon Valley to more benign haunts in Los Angeles along with several of his companies. His rationale, according to a piece in the Wall Street Journal, is that the Valley is
Read moreIs FANG Taking Too Big a Bite Out of the Market?
With the S&P 500 up nearly 10% for the year through mid-June, many investors are nervous about what lies ahead. Even more nerve-wracking is that an outsized portion of the total returns have been generated by just a few stocks.
Read moreLook to Zuck’s F8, Not Trump’s 100 Days, to See the Shape of the Future
The Circle, a film adaptation of the best-selling novel by David Eggers about a mega-Silicon Valley company that has sinister plans to control the world, opened recently to tepid reviews and unimpressive box office. That shouldn’t obscure the fact that the issues it attempts to address—and which the novel brilliantly took on—are ones that need to be dealt with, urgently.
Read moreDiversification is the Winning Ticket in 2016
Recent volatility notwithstanding, what has been striking about 2016 as an investing year is how relatively good it has been. In fact, the return on a diversified portfolio this year is competitive with many major asset classes, and has restored (for now) some confidence in the age-old mantra of diversification being among the most prudent of investing strategies.
Read moreColumn: Tweeting our way forward
Twitter's initial public offering last week was everything that Facebook's botched offering a year and a half ago was not: the stock was reasonably priced; management wooed investors; and the company neither promised the moon nor the stars, and was rewarded with a substantial amount of cash raised, a stock that went up more than 75 percent, and a valuation of $25 billion.
Read moreAmericans' Fickle Stance on Data Mining and Surveillance
As the week continues, so does the furor over the government's electronic and big data surveillance. It's largely framed in the terms that President Obama described on June 7th: "You can't have 100 percent security and also then have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience." That observation may be true, but we are approaching this issue 100 percent wrong.
Read moreThe Upside: The Real Threat to Your Online Privacy
Reuters Columnist Zachary Karabell has the latest on what you should really fear when it comes to other organizations using your data.
Read moreWall Street, Not Facebook, Bears Most of the Blame for the Company’s IPO Debacle
All the actors in the Facebook IPO debacle look bad, Zachary Karabell writes, but most of the blame should be directed at Morgan Stanley and the other banks that underwrote the stock offering. Plus, Dan Lyons breaks down 7 things to know about the scandal.
Read moreJPMorgan Says Bye Bye Buyback
Big business is making big news. Newsweek & The Daily Beast’s John Avlon and Zachary Karabell on JPMorgan’s multi-billion dollar mistake, why Facebook’s IPO was actually a huge success and the fallout resume padding that led to the demise of Yahoo’s CEO.
Read moreDon't De-Friend Facebook Yet: Its IPO Might Not Mean Trouble Ahead
Facebook’s epically hyped IPO debuted not with a bang but with a whimper. While the company sold $16 billion worth of initial shares, the stock ended the day largely where it began, at $38 a share, leaving the company with a market cap of about $100 billion. The offering was widely derided by the Wall Street community of traders, who viewed the stock's failure to soar on day one as a sign of troubled times ahead for Facebook.
Read moreGoogle 2011 Results Show Growth, But Can Tech Giant Thrive in Long Run?
‘Tis the season for large technology companies to announce their results for the end of 2011, and last night it was Google’s turn, along with other behemoths Microsoft, Intel and IBM. With expectations lofty, Google’s performance was found lacking by investors, who sent the stock down nearly 10 percent after the company reported that while revenues grew, the prices it was able to charge for advertising had declined about 8 percent.
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