DWS to acquire SMS Management and Technology, valued at $124 million

Danny Wallis (DWS) and
Rick Rostolis (SMS Management and Technology)

SMS Management and Technology has entered into a scheme to be 100 percent acquired by Melbourne IT provider DWS.

If successful, shareholders will receive $1 in cash and 0.39 DWS shares for each SMS share, representing a total consideration of $1.66 per share. This gives SMS a valuation of $124 million.

The companies are among two of Australia’s biggest IT services and body shopping firms, and the parallels do not end there.

Along with the three-letter acronyms, both ASX-listed companies have reported mixed business performancein recent years. They both brought in fresh blood to replace long-term leaders, only to then bid farewell to these new CEOs after short stints.

SMS hired Infosys heavy-hitter, Jacqueline Korhonen, to replace Tom Stianos after 26 years with the company. Korhonen resigned just over 12 months after SMS’s "national sales and delivery restructure" led to a "serious deterioration" of the sales pipeline.

NINTENDO ANNOUNCES AND DETAILS THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: BREATH OF THE WILD SEASON PASS

Nintendo has announced an "Expansion Pass" for Breath of the Wild, offering the first ever DLC in a main series Legend of Zelda game.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Step into a world of discovery, exploration and adventure in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, a boundary-breaking new game in the acclaimed series.

Get Deal

ON NINTENDO SWITCH

This link directs to a retail affiliate. IGN may receive a commission from your purchase.

Available from March 3 for $19.99 USD / £17.99 (Australian price unknown at time of writing), the Expansion Pass, which will be available for both the Wii U and Nintendo Switch versions of the game, will offer two extra content packs, to be released later in 2017, neither of which can be purchased individually. The details of each are:

Pack 1 - Summer 2017

• A new Cave of Trials challenge
• Hard mode
• "A new feature for the in-game map"

Pack 2 - Holiday 2017

• A new dungeon
• A new "original story"
• Additional challenges

NETFLIX IS KILLING IT—BIG TIME—AFTER POURING CASH INTO ORIGINAL SHOWS

NETFLIX

ORIGINAL CONTENT IS paying off for Netflix in a big, big way.

The company just recorded the biggest quarter in its 19-year history, handily beating Wall Street’s expectations while adding a record 7.05 million subscribers. That’s almost two million more new viewers than even Netflix expected, with a fair number of them overseas. The earnings results capped a banner year that saw Netflix launch its streaming service in 190 countries one year ago. Already, 47 percent of its subscribers live somewhere other than the US.

Sales, too, rose—36 percent over the same period last year, to $2.48 billion. Shareholders loved all this good news and boosted Netflix stock 8 percent to an intraday high of $143.46 on Thursday, one day after Netflix’s report dropped. The company’s now worth about $60 billion.

All of which is to say, Netflix is killing it—thanks to its enormous investments in original content. And Netflix is finally getting to reap the rewards from those investments.

“There seemed to be an attitude around the industry that after House of Cards and Orange is the New Black, there was no way Netflix could catch lightning in a bottle again,” says Glenn Hower, a senior digital media analyst with research firm Parks Associates. “Well, after cranking out more hits like Luke Cage, Stranger Things and The OA, it looks like the streaming giant really knows what they are doing in the content creation space.”

That’s for sure. In 2016, Netflix spent $5 billion on original programming. Five of the 10 shows people searched for most often last year are Netflix originals, company officials said, citing Google data during an earnings call. Eager to build on that, Netflix plans to spend $6 billion creating 1000 hours of new content this year, more than doubling its 2016 lineup. At this point, it’s clear Netflix isn’t just a streaming service anymore. “For many millions of consumers around the world, Netflix has already become television,” says Tony Gunnarsson, a television analyst with Ovum.

These 8 men are richer than 3.6 billion people combined

Eight men now control as much wealth as the world's poorest 3.6 billion people, according to a new report from Oxfam International.

The men -- Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Carlos Slim, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Amancio Ortega, Larry Ellison and Michael Bloomberg -- are collectively worth $426 billion, the anti-poverty group said on Sunday.

"Such dramatic inequality is trapping millions in poverty, fracturing our societies, and poisoning our politics," said Paul O'Brien, Oxfam America's Vice President for Policy and Campaigns.

The release of the group's annual inequality report coincides with the World Economic Forum in Davos. The annual meeting in the Swiss mountain resort brings together political and financial leaders and some of the wealthiest people in the world.

Eight men now control as much wealth as half of the world's population.

Firefox 50.1.0 Lands in Ubuntu's Repos, Multiple Security Vulnerabilities Fixed

On December 13, 2016, Canonical published a new USN (Ubuntu Security Notice) advisory to inform users of the popular Ubuntu Linux operating system about the availability of Mozilla Firefox 50.1.0 in the software repositories.

Mozilla released the Firefox 50.1.0 web browser a couple of days ago, and it looks like they patched a total of 13 security vulnerabilities, which could have been used by an attacker to crash the application or run programs as your login if the users were to open a malicious website.

"Multiple security vulnerabilities were discovered in Firefox. If a user were tricked in to opening a specially crafted website, an attacker could potentially exploit these to conduct cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks, obtain sensitive information, cause a denial of service via application crash, or execute arbitrary code," reads USN-3155-1.

Gundlach says brace for turmoil if 10-year yields top 3%

An earlier version of this article incorrectly said DoubleLine Capital’s Jeff Gundlach forecast that yields on the 10-year Treasury note will reach 3%. Gundlach said the market would be hurt if yields reach or exceed 3%.

Jeffrey Gundlach, founder and chief executive officer of DoubleLine Capital.

Wall Street investors have largely ignored the recent carnage in the bond market, but they could face a rude awakening next year when Donald Trump takes over the U.S. presidency, warns bond guru Jeffrey Gundlach.

In a webcast presentation on Tuesday, the DoubleLine Capital chief executive said if yields on the 10-year U.S.Treasury note TMUBMUSD10Y, +0.00% jump to 3% or higher , as inflation rates and government debt start to rise under a Trump administration, equity and fixed-income markets could be hurt.

–– ADVERTISEMENT ––

“We’re getting to the point where further rises in Treasurys, certainly above 3%, would start to have a real impact on market liquidity in corporate bonds and junk bonds,” he said in the presentation, according to Bloomberg.

The Gold Bull is Dead

The Gold Bull is Dead; that depends from angle you are looking at it

But what we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope.

- George Eliot

Gold and precious metals in general had a spectacular run from 2003-2011, and it was around that time we published our first article on Gold-eagle. At that period, we were pounding the table on Gold, Silver and the entire precious metal’s sector. Is this the end? Is this monstrous bull dead?  We have stated repeatedly, that every major bull market has to experience one back-breaking correction… Usually the correction ends with a 50% pullback from the highs, which would translate to a low of roughly $960.00. Apparently, Jim Rogers holds a similar view.

Gold is in a correction, and the correction has gone on for four years,” Rogers said. “Although I am not buying gold, I am expecting an opportunity to buy gold sometime in the next year or two. For instance, if gold goes under $1,000, I hope I’m smart enough to buy a lot more gold.

Can Virtual Reality Help Women Cope With Childbirth?

Clinical trials in Los Angeles plan to explore how virtual reality can be used to deal with acute pain through coaching and distraction. Photograph: Tracey Nearmy/AAP

Clinical trials are using a VR headset to help manage pain during labor

rin Martucci had been enjoying the beach vista and gazing at a flock of birds overhead when something shook her view. The voice of Ralph Anderson, her gynecologist, broke through the sound of the waterfall next to her.

“We’re ready to push!” he said, gently taking Martucci’s virtual reality headset off and bringing her back to a hospital room at Orange Regional Medical Center in Middletown, New York. Martucci, 40, looked around at her husband and mother, their voices swirling excitedly around her: “She’s crowning! She’s ready!”

“I was like, ‘Wait, what are you doing?’. I thought I needed the goggles to push!,” Martucci says. She had been so engrossed in her virtual beachside hideaway, she hadn’t realised that her baby’s head was starting to show. It was time to take off the goggles.

Martucci is believed to be the first woman to use virtual reality (VR) for pain management during labor. With more women moving away from scheduled C-sections – which accounted for 32% of US births in 2015 – VR might offer another drug-free pain option during birth.

“I was on a beach, and there was a fire going,” Martucci recalls. “Wherever you moved, the scene moved with you. If I looked up, I saw the galaxy and the sun setting. On the right, there was a waterfall and a lot of movement with birds,” Martucci says. From time to time, a woman with an English accent peppered Martucci’s virtual world with guidance.

“You wanted to listen to her,” she says. “I remember her focusing on the breathing and your body tensing and relaxing, and tensing and relaxing. She kept saying ‘Focus on the birds,’” says Martucci. “It was really very calming. She would teach me how to breathe and be really in touch with your body.”

‘It made me feel I’m OK here’

Martucci had declined an epidural earlier in the day when she started to think her labor contractions were becoming too painful to manage on her own, but she was open to Anderson’s suggestion to try a pre-programmed VR headset.

French police defy government in growing protest movement over lawlessness

Hundreds of police officers have been protesting in Paris and other cities to denounce what they say are insufficient resources to fight mounting lawlessness, defying government demands that they stop the unauthorised demonstrations.

Six months from an election, the protest, now in its third day, has put President François Hollande’s Socialist government on the defensive at a time when security forces are struggling to combat the threat of further terrorist attacks.

Political opponents have seized on the discontent to accuse the government of letting violent crime and everyday lawlessness proliferate despite a large police recruitment drive.

“I understand the anger of the police,” conservative former president Nicolas Sarkozy said. “I’ve never seen such an erosion of authority in this country,” Sarkozy, who is campaigning to become president again, told Europe 1 radio.

Carrier to ultimately cut some of jobs Trump saved

It sounded like great news when Carrier said last week that it would invest millions in the Indiana plant it decided to keep in the U.S.

Watch this: http://money.cnn.com/video/news/2016/12/08/carrier-union-boss-jobs-trump-feud.cnnmoney/ -- Title: Union boss on Trump feud: I called him out

The company's deal with President-elect Donald Trump to keep a furnace plant from moving to Mexico also calls for a $16 million investment in the facility.

But that has a big down side for some of the workers in Indianapolis.

Most of that money will be invested in automation said to Greg Hayes, CEO of United Technologies, Carrier's corporate parent. And that automation will replace some of the jobs that were just saved.

Millennials don't think Trump will affect their wallets. But they should

Why Trump's tax plan could raise taxes for 8.7 million households

Millennials don't think a Trump presidency will matter for their wallets.

At least, that's the conclusion reached by a recent survey. Young Americans are among those most likely to think the outcome of the election won't make a difference for their financial security, according to Bankrate.com's December Financial Security Index.

About 45% of respondents aged 18-35 said they think the results of the election won't affect their personal finances either way.

The Bridge Headset Powers Up iPhone VR With Positional Tracking

BRIDGE

IF YOU’VE BEEN holding onto your trusty iPhone 6, 6S, or 7 and wondering when a cool VR headset will be available for it, this is your lucky day. The Occipital Bridge headset looks like it’s well worth the wait, as it’s more powerful than any other phone-driven headset on the market.

That’s because it’ll have positional-tracking capabilities other mobile-driven headsets lack. The Bridge comes from the same company that created the Occipital Structure Sensor, an iPad and iPhone add-on that uses infrared to scan objects and gauge distances automatically.

Reward Credit Cards: How Much Cash Can You Get?

Miles take a back seat to cash for credit-card holders; competition heats up and rewards get juicier

Cash-back credit cards are growing in popularity. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Forget about that free plane trip or the private dinner with a famous chef. When it comes to collecting rewards from credit cards, most consumers just want cash.

Cash-back rewards cards are increasingly popular with shoppers, prompting financial institutions to develop programs that, in some cases, return as much as 10% of spending. But the recent explosion in cash-back cards has some industry executives worried the market is getting overheated.

They say the hefty rewards aren’t sustainable for the banks and may not ultimately drive the brand loyalty that is the goal of such programs.

“I’m sure someone has a spreadsheet that tells them how they are going to make money, but you have to put in a lot of assumptions,” says David Nelms, chief executive officer of Discover Financial Services Inc., which issued the first cash-back card in 1986 and now offers several varieties.

Cash-back cards reward consumers by essentially rebating some of the money they spend. Instead of points, customers get cash they can use to reduce their credit-card bill, deposit in a bank or buy a gift card.

Housing déjà vu-Banks ready to drain the Masses again

Nearly ten years after the housing crisis, banks are getting ready to offer what they call fewer doc loans, which is just a stepping stone to the no doc loan.  As we stated before banks need to put money into the hands of the masses so they can fuel the next bubble. A bubble needs mass participation and banks thrive of bubbles. Every bubble and bust cycle is created and masterminded by banks.  Banks never lose, they just pretend to, because they know they will be bailed out. The Fed is a private institute run and owned by the banks, so they have nothing to worry about.

“Lite Doc.” That is what Quontic Bank, an FDIC-insured community lender in New York City is calling its product. It requires only verification of employment and two months worth of bank statements. For self-employed borrowers, it requires documentation of one year of profit and losses. The Lite Doc loans are five-year adjustable-rate mortgages with interest rates in the low- to mid-5 percent range, according to the bank. Thirty-year fixed-rate loans, which when fully documented can offer rates in the high-3 percent range, are not part of the offering.

Wall Street Experts Know Nothing except Fleecing the Masses

Clear proof that the so-called experts of Wall Street would make no money were it not for the gullible masses they can milk. Overall hedge funds have been having a very hard time playing this market. They cannot deal with the extreme volatility as they try to outguess the market; they seem to get whacked on both ends of the trade. Look at how many funds jumped into Valeant Pharmaceuticals assuming that it was safe to follow other experts; the blind lead the mute.  In the land of the blind, the one-eyed Jackass reigns supreme

Pershing Square (Bill Ackman): 21,591,122 shares, 6.33% (added 5 million shares on February 5)

ValueAct Holdings (Jeff Ubben): 14,994,261 shares, 4.39%

Paulson and Co. (John Paulson): 13,265,900 million shares, 3.89% (added 4.375 million shares in Q4)

Brahman Capital: 8,117,753, 2.38% (added 4.1 million shares in Q4)

Viking Global (Andreas Halvorsen): 7,793,397, 2.28% (added 2.8 million shares in Q4)

Lone Pine Capital (Steven Mandel): 5,829,079 shares, 1.71% (sold 1.63 million shares in Q4)

Hound Partners (Jonathan Auerbach): 4,881,835, 1.43% (added 983,187 in Q4)

Iridian Asset Management: 4,324,602, 1.27% (added 1.6 million shares in Q4)

Okumus Fund Management (Ahmet Okumus): 1,875,600, 0.55% (bought position in Q4)

Coatue Management (Philippe Laffont): 1,673,007, 0.49% (bought position in Q4)

If they haven’t changed their positions, as a group, then they’ve seen more than $1.25 billion on paper wiped out since Friday’s close. Bill Ackman, the founder of Pershing Square, has lost more than $321 million in his position since Friday’s close. To date, he’s suffered losses estimated at north of $2 billion on his Valeant investment. Others are likely feeling the pain, too. http://www.businessinsider.com/hedge-funds-in-valeant-2016-2/

Overpaid Oil CEOs for Top Diplomat?

Reuters is reporting that Donald Trump is considering ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson and former ExxonMobil CEO Lee Raymond for the post of Secretary of State.

As someone who's been analyzing CEO pay for more than 20 years, I feel like I know these guys.  So I couldn't resist pulling out excerpts from two of our annual "Executive Excess" reports in which Raymond and Tillerson played starring roles. First, in 2006, our report zeroed in on the CEOs who were profiting from the war in Iraq. Lee Raymond, as the outgoing CEO of ExxonMobil, was cashing in bigtime on war-related oil price volatility, something he readily admitted he had no control over. While ordinary Americans were feeling "pain at the pump," high oil prices had sent the value of his pay package soaring. Here's the timely excerpt:

Lee Raymond, ExxonMobil CEO, 1999-2005:

In 2005, ExxonMobil collected $36 billion in profit, the grandest annual profit total ever recorded anywhere. Last November, called before Congress to explain the rising gas prices that appear to have fueled these record profits, ExxonMobil's Lee Raymond explained that rising prices reflect global supply and demand, nothing more.

"We are all," Raymond assured Congress, "in this together, everywhere in the world."

We're all in this together, except Raymond. As ExxonMobil CEO in 2005, his basic salary alone ran 63 times the average paycheck in the oil industry. Raymond's $4 million salary last year amounted to a weekly take-home of $83,333.

The Promise and Peril of the Trump Trade

Long-term interest rates have risen sharply on his pledge to bolster the economy—but can he deliver?

President-elect Donald Trump has made a lot of big promises. If he fails to deliver quickly on the economy, his biggest promise might be a bust. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Markets are predicting that President-elect Donald Trump will be able to juice the economy soon after he gets in office. That is putting extra pressure on him to succeed quickly before higher rates quash any economic liftoff.

Since the election, investors have embraced a view that the spending and tax-cut package Mr. Trump is promising will both boost growth and fan inflation. That has been good for stocks, but very bad for bonds, which have sold off sharply. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note is approaching 2.5%. Data Tuesday about rising labor costs coupled with last week’s 4.6% unemployment rate mean inflation, and yields, could rise further.

Rising interest rates change the longstanding dynamic in the economy and markets. The higher yields go, the more costly it becomes for companies and households to borrow. The higher yields go, the stronger the dollar is likely to become, widening the trade deficit and weighing on the economy. And the higher yields go, the more attractive bonds become relative to stocks.

If growth is accelerating, higher rates won’t matter to investors and businesses eager to cash in on the stronger economy. But if the Trump trade, which has already driven up 10-year Treasury yields by nearly a full percentage point, proves a mistake, or even just premature, higher rates and everything that comes with them could actually slow growth.

A simulation that forecasting firm Macroeconomic Advisers ran for The Wall Street Journal shows what happens if Treasury yields rise further, not because of an improving economy but because investors believe, based on an incorrect growth forecast or for whatever reason, that the Federal Reserve will raise rates more aggressively. The firm’s econometric model, which incorporates hundreds of variables, is widely used on Wall Street and elsewhere to test economic scenarios.

CEOs’ New Vow: Advancing More Women At Work

Paradigm for Parity aims to bring gender equality to the upper echelons of companies by 2030

Ellen J. Kullman, coalition co-chair and former head of DuPont Co., spoke at an event earlier this year. PHOTO: KIMBERLY WHITE/GETTY IMAGES

More than two dozen chief executives of companies, including Bank of America Corp.,LinkedIn Corp. and Newmont Mining Corp., have signed a pledge to speed women’s progress up the corporate ladder.

The corporate commitment is the opening salvo of “Paradigm for Parity,” a drive by a new group dedicated to achieving gender equality in the upper echelons of American companies by 2030.

Its game plan, to be announced Wednesday, demands that businesses set measurable targets for women’s representation at every level, train employees in spotting hidden biases, and ensure influential senior men sponsor promising women.

Ghana’s ‘Obama Mahama’ Faces Election Test

Faltering economy and claims of voter intimidation threaten President John Mahama’s re-election bid

A supporter of Ghana’s incumbent president, John Mahama, chants slogans during a campaign rally Monday at Accra Sports Stadium in the capital Accra. PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS

TAMALE, Ghana—Four years ago, on the back of a growing economy and a slick U.S.-style political campaign, Ghanaians hailed their charismatic, newly-elected president “Obama Mahama.”

Now, with the economy in the doldrums and the country’s reputable election process facing mounting scrutiny, John Mahama is making a final push for re-election in a Wednesday poll being framed as a delicate moment for Africa’s most stable democracy.

“This election is critical. It will be close, but I don’t think Ghana is at risk of breaking into violence,” the 58-year-old Mr. Mahama said in an interview after a boisterous rally in this dust-caked northern city. “We’ve done the hard work restructuring the economy. I’m cautiously optimistic.”

What Retirement Without Savings Looks Like

By Paul Sisolak, Contributor

In a perfect world, the perfect retirement is where life begins. But for people like Debra Leigh Scott, there’s the very bleak possibility that retirement is where life might end.

“Suicide is my retirement plan,” Scott, a 60-year-old adjunct professor, said in an interview with Vitae. “Unless you have a spouse or partner, you’re looking at dire poverty in old age. In addition to poverty, you’re looking at getting no additional work because of your age, or you’re looking at dropping dead in the classroom.”