Chinese Firms In Talks to Join Group to Buy Li Ka-Shing's Ports
China Cosco Shipping Corp. is one of several Chinese state-backed companies in discussions with the consortium led by Italian billionaire Gianluigi Aponte's Terminal Investment Ltd. on matters including how they might participate in the port deal, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private information. The buying group also includes US firm BlackRock Inc. and its Global Infrastructure Partners unit.
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Yahoo
19 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Buy and Hold Strategy: How Procter & Gamble (PG) Delivers Long-Term Value
The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE:PG) is included among the 10 Best Dividend Stocks to Buy and Hold Forever. A happy couple viewing the products of this household and personal product company in a mass merchandiser store. The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE:PG) is a familiar name found on the shelves of nearly every store, with a portfolio that includes well-known household brands such as Tide, Pampers, Gillette, Old Spice, Swiffer, Cascade, and Dawn. While the products themselves— ranging from cleaning supplies to personal care items— aren't particularly unique, the company's strength lies in its brand recognition and the premium shelf placement its products receive. These everyday essentials are used regardless of economic conditions, giving The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE:PG) a level of resilience that has helped it consistently raise its dividend year after year for 69 years. Over the past decade, it has increased its dividend by an average of just under 5% annually, reflecting its steady and reliable growth approach. The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE:PG) offers a quarterly dividend of $1.0568 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.81%, as of July 31. While we acknowledge the potential of PG as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: and Disclosure: None.
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Trump's tariffs are sending African countries into China's hands
Tariffs Asia China AfricaFacebookTweetLink Follow Africa is adjusting to the new reality of US President Donald Trump's tariffs, with countries on the continent facing some of the highest export charges. But what could become a crisis is an opportunity for United States rival China, which has long courted African countries and is now offering them a lifeline. 'We (Africa) are going straight into the hands of China,' Nigerian economist Bismarck Rewane told CNN. 'That is the unfortunate outcome,' Rewane said of Africa's expected further shift toward China, which has emerged in recent years as the continent's largest bilateral trading partner. Four African nations - Libya, South Africa, Algeria and Tunisia - face some of the steepest tariffs imposed by the Trump administration, with charges on exports ranging from 25% to 30%. Eighteen other countries from the continent were hit with 15% levies, a modified tariff package released Thursday by the White House showed. In April, when the US import levies were first announced, Trump pitched them as 'reciprocal' and targeting countries that he said had trade deficits with the US. But Trump instead based his tariffs on countries' trade deficits with the United States – not the tariffs they charge. South Africa, one of the continent's powerhouses, challenged the imposition of a 30% tariff on its US-bound exports, saying Trump's decision was not based on 'an accurate representation of available trade data.' China has offered to soften the impact of US tariffs on Africa, saying in June it would halt charges on imports for nearly all its African partners. 'There is no other opportunity for African countries to strengthen South-South trade (among developing nations) than now,' South African researcher Neo Letswalo told CNN, while urging countries to 'solely turn to China and make it the next US.' 'America is gradually forfeiting its global leadership status,' Letswalo said, adding that the more countries 'become less dependent on the US, the greater opportunity for China to become an alternative.' Before the tariff deadline, the US did not make a trade deal with any African nation despite efforts from the continent to avoid the tariffs, underscoring Africa's place on the White House's priority list. Letswalo described America's failure to negotiate a deal with Africa as 'an open goal for China.' The impact of Trump's tariffs is already being felt in some of Africa's most buoyant economies and some of the continent's poorest, such as Lesotho, which was slapped with a 15% tariff. It had previously been hit with a 50% tariff – one of the steepest rates – before the charges were modified. Lesotho's Prime Minister Samuel Matekane said in June that the huge tariff, combined with the halt of US aid to the nation of just over 2 million people, 'have crippled industries that previously sustained thousands of jobs.' Trump has described Lesotho, a landlocked nation surrounded by South Africa, as a country 'nobody has ever heard of' – even though trade between the US and Lesotho totaled over $240 million last year, mostly in textiles. Before the tariffs, Lesotho benefited from a US trade agreement that allowed it and other eligible sub-Saharan countries to export goods to the US duty-free. Authorities in Lesotho have declared a two-year national state of disaster over the tariffs, as the country braces for their impact, with the textile industry already grappling with massive job losses. Thousands of roles are also threatened in Lesotho's richer neighbor, South Africa, where citrus growers said they were gripped with 'great anxiety' ahead of the August 1 tariff deadline. In a statement this week, the country's Citrus Growers' Association (CGA) warned that 'job losses will be a certainty' if the tariffs came into effect. It added that, 'hundreds of thousands of cartons of citrus are ready in packhouses to be shipped to the US over the next few weeks,' and that implementing the charges 'will mean most of this fruit will be left unsold.' Other industries in South Africa, such as the automobile sector, also face the risk of economic shocks, analysts said. 'Already, we have companies within the automobile sector threatening to leave (the country) as a result of plummeting business,' Letswalo said. 'The tariffs will add to the burden of pre-existing issues, and if these entities decide to exit South Africa, our already existing unemployment calamities will worsen,' he said. Gwede Mantashe, South Africa's minister of mineral and petroleum resources, told reporters Tuesday that other routes are being sought for South African goods. 'If the US imposes high tariffs, we must look for alternative markets,' he said. 'Our biggest trading partner is China, not the US. The US is number two,' Mantashe added. As South Africa scouts for broader opportunities, however, the citrus growers' group has voiced its reservations, specifically that their products suit designated markets so finding another is not straightforward. Its CEO, Boitshoko Ntshabele, told CNN in a statement that 'the US market remains a priority, and so should improving access to China' and elsewhere. 'There is a deep appreciation of South African citrus by US consumers. Since 2017, our exports to that market have almost doubled. The market has immense potential,' Ntshabele added. Letswalo believes there are accompanying risks behind the enticing option of relying on Beijing to cushion the impact of Trump's tariffs. Alternating US with China 'could be risky,' he said, 'especially for some nascent industries within the (African) countries.' 'If they're not protected, Chinese products will flood and outcompete them as many African countries are price sensitive markets,' he warned. China has imposed some imbalanced trade deals of its own in Africa with trade deficits skewed in its favor, according to the China-Global South Project (CGSP), an organization monitoring China's engagement with developing countries. Additionally, the bulk of Beijing's exports to Africa comprise mainly manufactured products, while the continent's exports to China are commonly raw materials. South Africa's Ramaphosa advocated for balanced trade with China when he met his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Beijing last year. Letswalo advised that, while Africa leans on China for trade, it must also seek domestic alternatives. He recommended a swift implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), an agreement signed by nations on the continent to boost trade among themselves. Although established in 2020, implementing AfCFTA has been slow, with just over 20 countries of the continent's 55 trading under the deal. Rewane believes that the US tariffs could inspire Africa 'to build economic resilience and be less dependent on lopsided trade.' Above all, he added, the continent must be 'more inward-looking rather than outward-dependent.'
New York Times
an hour ago
- New York Times
Business of Football: John Textor's new grand plan, and Premier League made to fork out for lawyers
You would be forgiven for thinking that news of John Textor quitting all positions of authority at Lyon, selling his stake in Crystal Palace to Woody Johnson, and putting his Florida mansion on the market might suggest that this self-styled cowboy was riding off into the sunset. For the Multi-Club Kid, however, these apparent setbacks are mere flesh wounds. He is getting a new posse together to buy Botafogo and RWDM Brussels, his Brazilian and Belgian clubs, from his partners at Eagle Football Group. He is also trying to rope in a new English club, mix in his facial-recognition turnstile technology, and then drive the whole herd to market in New York to make a killing. Advertisement As well as all this, on July 4, Textor filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida against Iconic Sports, the group of investors that gave him $75million (£56.5m) to help him buy Lyon in 2022 in exchange for a minority stake in Eagle. Textor's complaint is against Iconic and its two principals, American investors James Dinan and Alexander Knaster, and it is for alleged securities fraud and fraudulent misrepresentation in connection with a put option — the right to sell something at a fixed price by a certain date — they agreed with Textor in 2022. This Florida action came after Iconic hit Textor with a similar claim in London the day before; a claim it had been unable to publish as it sent it to the Jupiter Island property Textor bought from Microsoft founder Bill Gates for $4m in 2018 and is now selling for $23.5m (because he has built an even bigger one nearby). Under English law, you cannot publish unserved lawsuits. Iconic says it informed Textor of its desire to get out via the put option in July 2023, reminded him and Eagle's board about it in December 2023, and then again in March and July of 2024, by which time Textor was meant to have completed the buy-back. He did not, which is why Iconic believes it is owed nearly $94m and has written to Eagle's board with share-transfer documents for Textor's 65 per cent holding in the whole shebang. Textor, on the other hand, says Dinan and Knaster breached first. He says they knew they would never be able to meet the conditions because they had been unable to get any banks to underwrite the transaction. Textor's initial counter-suit was thrown out by the Florida court on July 10 because of some shoddy work by his legal team, but he was allowed to refile it a day later. And following Iconic's letter to the Eagle board on July 15, Textor hit back with a request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against Iconic on July 22. Advertisement On July 28, the court rejected Textor's request for the simple reason that the original Textor/Iconic agreements make it clear that any disputes between them should be hammered out in the English courts, as Eagle is an English company. In the meantime, Lyon have finally filed some partial accounts for last season, which show they are going to make another huge loss despite selling all of their best players. This, understandably, has greatly upset the rest of Eagle's initial investors, including Ares Management Corporation, the huge American investment firm that loaned Eagle $425m to complete the Lyon purchase. Ares has already snaffled nearly all of the proceeds from Textor's sale of his Palace stake, but is still owed about $300m. Given the collapse of French football's latest domestic TV deal, Textor's sale of Lyon's indoor arena and women's football teams, and Rayan Cherki et al, can Lyon cover that amount? The answer is probably 'non'. Textor, however, is nothing if not resilient. He also genuinely likes football, and in Botafogo, the 2024 Brazilian and South American champions, can point to a success story. His response to all of the above is to buy Botafogo and RWDM Brussels from Eagle. He would then move these clubs into a new Cayman Islands-registered Eagle entity, throw in his Facebank technology company that has moved into facial recognition ticketing systems, and push for his long-promised New York IPO. Oh, and he will try to add a new English club (teams like QPR, Southampton, or Watford, as opposed to Sheffield Wednesday) to the mix to make something that should fly off the New York Stock Exchange's proverbial shelves. Football plus tech, a unicorn combo. And, just to complete the vision, he may hold onto his two-thirds share in the old Eagle — Lyon, in other words — or be open to suggestions from Ares and Co as to how much those shares are worth (about the same as Botafogo, perhaps?). Advertisement Or, as has been reported in Brazil this week, he might just merge his new Eagle with Greek billionaire Evangelos Marinakis' multi-club group (Olympiacos, Nottingham Forest, and Portugal's Rio Ave), although he might not have run this past the Greek billionaire properly, as it has come as news to Forest. No spoilers, I promise, but the Brad Pitt character in the film F1 (great fun, by the way, much better than the actual sport) has a line that becomes part of the plot, 'sometimes when you lose, you win'. For the Premier League, it seems the opposite can be true, as it found itself almost £1m out of pocket on fees related to its successful prosecution of a profit and sustainability case against Nottingham Forest in March 2024. Ordinarily in these circumstances, the losing party would pay for the winner's legal costs, or at least a big portion of them, and the cost of the PSR hearing. And that is certainly what the Premier League had in mind when it sent Forest a bill in excess of £1.4m. The majority of this was a fixed fee the league negotiated with Linklaters, the global law firm it has used for all of its recent PSR cases. For the Forest case, the league agreed to pay the firm £1.1m, but that was reduced to £985,000 because Linklaters did not need to put in quite as many hours as initially estimated. And there was also a bill of just over £140,000 for a report from an expert. The club, however, said words to the effect of 'that's a bit steep, isn't it?', as their bill from their well-known legal firm, Squire Patton Boggs, was about half as much, and their expert report cost a third of the Premier League's. After all, Forest noted, we confessed to the PSR breach pretty fast, so did the Premier League need to 'lawyer up' for this one at all? Long story short, Forest lawyered up for the costs row, calling in Nick 'The Wolf' De Marco for a costs hearing in May. Advertisement And despite failing on his attempt to argue that Forest did not really lose the PSR hearing, he successfully argued that the Premier League's legal bill was too high and it did not need the expert report at all. So, when the three-person panel's result was published last month, it revealed that the league had been awarded only £530,000 of its claim, 37 per cent, and had been ticked off for overspending on lawyers and experts. This would be only mildly embarrassing if it were a one-off, but it was not. The league also only got about a third of its £4.9m legal bill for successfully prosecuting Everton's two PSR breaches in 2023 and 2024. For those keeping count, that is more than £4m in unrewarded legal costs for cases the Premier League actually won. The mind boggles as to how much a defeat would cost them. No pressure, then. There should be no giggling about the Premier League's legal bills over at the English Football Association, as it has recently been dumped on its backside by De Marco, too. I am not talking about his win in the high-profile Lucas Paqueta case. No, this was an appeal by the FA to an earlier decision by a disciplinary panel into a case involving Accrington Stanley's inadvertent use of an unlicensed agent in a transfer deal in 2024. The unnamed agent was representing the player but had recently failed his agent's exam, so had lost his licence. When the FA got wind of this, it charged the League Two club and Accrington initially admitted the charge, asking only for a personal hearing to discuss mitigation. But while they waited for this hearing, they reconsidered. After all, the rules state that nobody should 'engage or appoint' an unlicensed agent and they did not hire the agent. The player might have a case to answer, they thought, but we did not 'engage' the agent, he did. So, they changed their plea and won. Advertisement The FA then appealed against this ruling, saying 'engage' really means 'engage with', as in have any dealings with someone. That is why there is an 'or' between 'engage' and 'appoint' — they mean two different things. But, as we learned in the Leicester City case, words matter, especially prepositions. The appeal panel, and it is all explained in their written reasons, decided that 'engage' is not the same as 'engage with', handing Accrington a reprieve and De Marco another head for his trophy cabinet.
