Goldman Sachs Group Inc. has finally agreed to pay $5.1 billion on Wednesday to resolve a seven years’ pending dispute over faulty mortgage securities. The penalty amount remains lower compared to those counted by other Wall Street competitors. Fourth quarter profit of the firm may be hit by the penalty counting. But investors welcome the settlement and its share price rises by 1.5% on Thursday.
Industry
European Car Sales Grew 9.2% in 2015, but Volkswagen Lost The Market
European car sales rose to 9.2% in 2015. Demand in December is recorded as the strongest one in the entire year. However, Volkswagen is excluded from the strong gain.
Hong Kong Dollar Has The Biggest Weekly Plunge in More Than A Decade
Hong Kong dollar dropped to four-year low against US dollar and continue to dive. Its continuous plunge lead to the biggest weekly loss for more than a decade.
Fed May Hold Rate Hike to Ease the Market
The Fed may hold its next interest rate hike, following a current plunge in oil market that affectsthe stock market. This will give market a breather.
California Fines Uber $7.6M for Failure to Share Data
The California Public Utilities Commission has fined Uber $7.6 million for failing to follow requirements that would protect passengers from discrimination. The company will pay the fine, but appeal the decision.
Latest News
Ford has succeeded in test driving its autonomous cars in snowy conditions surpassing all of its competitors. The carmaker’s self-developed 3D maps have enabled in built LIDAR and cameras to drive the autonomous car through controlled environment. But the problem hasn’t been solved totally. Still snow or rainfall makes the guidance system to falter till now.
The UK-based technology firms mobilized $3.6 billion (£2.5 billion) funds from venture capitalists (VC) in 2015 and this is 70 percent higher than $2.1 billion in 2014. London technology companies accounted for more than half of the mobilized VC funds. The increasing investor appetite for technology startups and fintech firms has been the main factor that propelled the VC funding.
The San Francisco-based cloud software company Anaplan has closed the latest round of VC funding to the tune of $90 million giving a valuation of the company at $1.09 billion. The latest investment round was led by Indian firm Premji Invest.
Several firms from Canada, China and Europe among 77 renewable energy firms have submitted bids for solar projects in Australia. The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) has shortlisted 22 projects, which will have capacity of 766 megawatts at combined project cost of $1.68 billion. The solar energy projects developers will also receive a grant of $30 million for each project from the Australian government.
Standard & Poor's (S&P) has downgraded credit rating of Tata Steel's bonds. S&P cited reasons such as the poor operating performance and high leverage at Tata Steel for downgrading. Indian steel industry is suffering from glut in production and surging imports.
Bank of England has been keeping its interest rates at the lowest point at 0.5% since March 2009. However, some signals of the interest rate upsurge will be a shock to some people in Britain.
Samsung Electronics announced that it will produce the latest Qualcomm processor. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 will be mass produced using Samsung technology.
Google’s product management VP, Clay Bavor, is appointed as the head of its newly created virtual reality (VR) computing division, showing that the tech company is now taking aggressive moves in the VR industry.
Self-driving car manufacturers submitted their first disengagement reports to California’s Department of Motor Vehicles.
