The Retail Industry – many shaky elements before this pandemic
Like businesses in every industry, retail companies are anxiously waiting for the signal that they can re-open operations from the global pandemic. The composition of retail is as diverse as any industry and the impact of the economic hit from the coronavirus will be quite different for the different sectors within retail. We are now […]
Airline Industry Update – pre & post COVID-19
As we sit at the front end of what will be the totally economic and social upheaval year 2020, the airline industry serves as perhaps the starkest example of the coronavirus impact. Virtually all commercial airline traffic has been shut down. While the extent of the economic toll of COVID-19 will not be known for […]
Impact on Real Estate Markets
It is pretty clear that once countries around the globe come out of the COVID-19 economic shutdown, recovery and growth will be uneven and will travel a rocky road. Part of the ‘rocky road’ aspect will be the devastation of some industry groups – restaurants for example. In some cases, the public have embraced different […]
Global Markets Perspective – COVID-19 Impact
As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept over the globe (at now an estimated 150 countries) the economic impact will be severe. All countries will feel it. To put some economic value on the potential impact, we have assembled the GDP values for some of the major countries that have reported a significant number of coronavirus […]
The US Economy — Prior to Coronavirus
Writing this in March 2020 in the midst of a shutdown of many US cities, it is clear that the US economy (and indeed the Global economy) will take a major hit and most likely we will fall into a recession. The coming months and year (or more) will see a rocky, uneven recovery that […]
Is This the FinTech Effect Showing Up?
Franklin Resources announced they are acquiring Legg Mason which will create an investment management firm with revenues approaching $9 billion annually. Franklin Resources revenue for FY19 (their FY ends in September) was $5.7 billion. Legg Mason had 2018 revenue of $2.9 billion and their 3 quarters to date in 2019 showed flat revenues. Franklin’s revenue’s […]
The Incredible Shrinking Sears Company
This past week, Sears announced the closing of another 96 stores following a seemingly continual series of the same type of announcements over the past few years. It is easy to find any number of pundits pointing to various causes of the demise – online shopping being the number 1 culprit. But others have fought thru […]
Putting WeWork into Business/Revenue Context
The past couple of weeks have been a near constant stream of news, stories and updates about WeWork as the company struggled to regain some valuation footing on its way to an IPO. One has to wonder about the press build-up and hype around companies like this that are on the track to an IPO. […]
European Banks Lagging
With a cloudy economic growth outlook and talk of recession as markets head into the final months of 2019, there have been analyses pointing out that European banks are looking weak. From that, we decided to look at the banking industry players by various region and see where the growth has been. And it is […]
I Am Waiting For FinTech
Really. I am waiting to see the effects of FinTech. It was just a couple years ago when we could not read anything in the business press that was not FinTech related. There were thousands of start-ups and billion$$$ of venture money invested in the space. We were sure to see a world run on […]