With technology companies able to raise billions of dollars without going public, lenders need to think more creatively about how to get funds to the industry, a senior official at Credit Suisse Group AG said.
“We don’t want to have an exciting opportunity like tech-related investing not be part of our strategy,” said John Metz, the San Francisco-based head of the Swiss bank’s global enterprise technology banking division.
“There is no question that the evolution of this private and public capital raising environment has caused consternation among all the players on the food chain,” he said.
Citigroup Banking Corp’s Citi Ventures Inc backs start-ups in financial technology, cybersecurity, enterprise data and big data and analytics, while Goldman Sachs Group Inc has participated in 132 fundraising rounds in private technology companies since 2009, according to research from CB Insights.
Credit Suisse currently invests through three technology investment arms: a corporate fund that gives individual companies as much as US$5 million each in financing; a growth stage financial technology fund comprising mostly third-party capital; and an investing club that allows the wealthiest clients to invest alongside the bank in industries that include technology.
“The world is awash in liquidity due to the low cost of the capital environment that is causing larger levels of speculation than we’ve seen,” Metz said.
Private investment can lead to the “delaying and sometimes even replacing of the IPO [initial public offering] as a favorite path,” he said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last