——The last Buffett lunch bid exceeded 10 million; the Fed’s interest rate hike has affected American life; Gorillas survived the cold winter of venture capital through mergers and acquisitions; Merck plans to acquire the anti-cancer drug company Seagen; 100% of TikTok data is transferred to Oracle; cryptocurrency Hedge funds hire legal counsel; 60% of corporate CEOs worry about recession.
1. Buffett’s lunch bid exceeds 10 million
The qualifying auction for lunch with Buffett at Smith & Wollensky’s steakhouse became intense on Thursday afternoon, with the highest bid reaching $12.3 million and 34 bids.
In 2019, cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun won the auction for $4.57 million, and the auction price will far exceed the previous record.
Buffett created the annual “custom” in 2000 to raise donations and help the charity Glide address poverty in the San Francisco area. So far, Buffett has helped raise $34 million.
Earning the qualification to dine with Buffett not only makes for great publicity, but also the opportunity to ask Buffett for advice
Source: Bloomberg – What Would You Pay for Lunch With Warren Buffett? Bidding Stands at Record $12 Million
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2. The Fed’s rate hike has affected American lives
The latest data shows that the Fed’s interest rate hikes have begun to have a certain impact on our lives – US credit card interest rates have exceeded 20%, and mortgage interest rates have also climbed to the highest point since 2008. For people who need loans to buy a home, go to college, pay bills, or start a business, rising interest rates can be a real headache.
Credit card issuers usually use the prime-rate manipulated by the Federal Reserve as a benchmark for adjusting interest rates, so a Fed rate hike can immediately affect the cost of using credit cards.
As credit card balances and interest rates continue to rise, more and more Americans will be unable to pay their daily necessities and bills, said Sara Rathner, a credit card expert at private finance firm NerdWallet.
The average interest rate on credit cards reached 20.2% on June 15
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3. Gorillas survive in winter due to M&A
The recent turmoil in capital markets and the global economy has affected the startup ecosystem. German food delivery company Gorillas Technologies is considering being acquired by a rival in order to better weather this special period, according to people familiar with the matter.
Representatives for Gorillas have held discussions with a number of companies over the past few weeks and hired JPMorgan Chase & Co. to lead the deal.
This year, many venture capital firms have reduced or terminated funding, which can be deadly for a cash-burning food delivery startup.
According to PitchBook data, Gorillas was valued at $9.7 billion at the height of its business needs during the pandemic, but the valuation of the entire industry has been shrinking recently, reflecting the pessimistic macroeconomic state.
In order to avoid the risk of economic recession, venture capital has reduced its investment intensity
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4. Merck plans to buy cancer drug maker Seagen
Merck & Co. is considering buying biotech company Seagen Inc. and expanding the company’s line of cancer drugs.
According to people familiar with the matter, regulation may be the biggest challenge facing the transaction, and if the transaction fails, the two companies may also reach a cooperation agreement. If the deal goes through, the price is likely to be above $30 billion. At the same time, there are many other companies “eyeing” to acquire Seagen.
New Jersey-based Merck, which has a market value of nearly $215 billion, has its best-selling cancer drug, Keytruda, with $17.2 billion in sales last year.
Seagen is developing cancer treatments that allow special toxins to attack tumors like missiles in a way that maximizes efficacy and minimizes side effects. Last year, Seagen’s Adcetris product sales were $1.4 billion, and the company’s full-year sales were $16.4 billion.
Merck’s market cap exceeds $200 billion, making it easy to acquire a single-product pharmaceutical company
Source: WSJ – Merck Explores Purchase of Biotech Seagen
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5. TikTok data is fully transferred to Oracle
TikTok announced today that the company has moved all of its users’ data from servers in the United States and Singapore to Oracle’s public cloud servers, in an effort to reassure American users of their data.
TikTok said in a blog that the company and Oracle have maintained a commercial partnership in recent years, aiming to improve the security of platform user data. Today, 100% of the company’s user traffic and data has been moved to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure.
For Oracle, partnering with TikTok could better compete with Amazon’s AWS and Microsoft’s Azure.
TikTok will keep data centers in Singapore and the United States for emergencies.
U.S. government was concerned about the exodus of U.S. user data owned by TikTok’
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6. Crypto hedge fund asks for legal assistance
Three Arrows Capital, a cryptocurrency-focused hedge fund, also had $3 billion in assets under management in April. After the stable coin TerraUSD collapsed in mid-May, the company suffered heavy losses and urgently needed to repair its relationship with creditors and investors.
The company’s founder, Kyle Davies, said that the company endured the first round of losses from TerraUSD, but the subsequent plunge in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies caught the company by surprise.
The company recently hired financial and legal consulting firms to come up with a solution that would be most beneficial to creditors and investors. It was revealed that the company is trying to quantify recent losses and price illiquid assets.
The company’s main investors include institutional and high-net-worth investors. The company had planned to relocate its headquarters to Dubai before the cryptocurrency market plunged.
Many companies that relied on cryptocurrencies in the past two years are gradually being beaten back
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7. 60% of CEOs worry about recession
According to the latest survey report by the conference board, a business research firm, 60% of the 750 corporate CEOs surveyed believe that the economy will decline in the next 12 to 18 months, and 15% believe that the region where their business operates has entered the economy. Recession. At the end of 2021, only 22% of CEOs believe the economy is at risk of a recession.
Some corporate executives believe that the company’s overall operations are healthy, aside from layoffs.
In an interview with Associated Press this week, President Biden said that a recession is not inevitable and that the United States is the best country in the world to emerge from this crisis.
To survive the recession, businesses will likely need to lay off workers or make other adjustments
Source: WSJ – Recession Fears Surge Among CEOs, Survey Suggests
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The content of this article comes from various financial news media such as The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and Bloomberg.