Dow Jones hits five-year high in light trading September 11, 2012 THE DOW Jones Industrial Average closed at the highest level in nearly five years yesterday in a lightly traded session before key decisions in Germany and the United States that could give markets a further boost. Energy, industrial and financial firms led the advance. Contributing to gains by the Dow, shares of IBM rose 1.15 [...]
City Moves | Who’s switching Jobs August 30, 2012 Ernst & Young The professional services organisation has added seven information security specialists to its risk advisory practice. The expansion is in response to growing demand from UK companies for information security services. Among the cohort is Robin Gaddum, who joins as senior manager. Gaddum, a fellow of the Business Continuity Institute, previously led IBM’s [...]
Happy birthday to the Commodore 64 August 1, 2012 MITS ALTAIR 8800 The first home computers came as build-it-yourself kits, led by the MITS Altair 8800, launched in 1975. The technology, which was later sold as an assembled unit, was the inspiration for future PCs. APPLE II The Apple I had already been released as a kit computer but the Apple II was where [...]
IBM and American Express up as Microsoft’s profits struggle January 19, 2012 IBM beat fourth quarter profit estimates last night and said it aims to grow earnings by at least 10 per cent in 2012. The company brought in revenues of $29.5bn (£19bn) in the fourth quarter, up from $29bn in the same period last year. Shares were up 2.6 per cent in extended trading. And American [...]
Tech shares push S&P to 10-week high July 19, 2012 US stocks rose yesterday for a third straight day, with the S&P 500 at a 2-1/2 month high, as earnings from technology companies and expectations for more monetary stimulus outweighed weak economic data. So far in this earnings season a majority of companies have beaten analysts’ lowered expectations. In the latest boost, IBM raised its [...]
IBM buys DemandTec for $440m December 8, 2011 International Business Machines (IBM) plans to buy analytics software provider DemandTec for about $440m (£281.5m) in cash. IBM said DemandTec will extend what it calls its smarter commerce initiative, which helps retailers analyse and predict consumer behavior to adjust prices and products accordingly.
Even dead cats can bounce back to life August 20, 2012 WHEN things go disastrously wrong, the market is always ready to obliterate a stock. It could be because of mistakes made in a company’s operations, as in the case of Carnival earlier this year when one of its liners ran aground off Italy’s west coast. It could be like Facebook’s IPO, where the price rose [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS July 25, 2012 Tullow Oil Anne Drinkwater has been appointed non-executive director at the oil and gas exploration group. She joins after a long career at BP, where she was most recently president and chief executive of BP Canada. Akbank Josef Ackermann has been appointed to the international advisory board of the Turkish bank. He will work alongside [...]
Buffett builds $10bn stake in IBM November 14, 2011 Berkshire Hathaway has accumulated a 5.5 per cent stake in IBM, Warren Buffett said on Monday, his biggest bet on the technology field that he has historically shunned. Buffett, in a CNBC interview, said he bought about 64 million shares of IBM, which cost around $10.7bn (£6.7bn). Berkshire started buying the shares in March with [...]
JP Morgan US trust issues 1.2m shares May 30, 2012 JP MORGAN American Investment Trust plans to test the appetite of the market by issuing nearly 1.2m new shares. The trust, run by Garrett Fish, will issue up to 1.19m new ordinary shares to professional investors at a price to be announced today and at a premium of at least 1.5 per cent to net asset value. [...]