The Israeli government and Hezbollah have traded blame over breaches to the truce, which is set to run for several more weeks Lebanon’s health ministry said Israeli strikes on the country’s south killed 14 people on Sunday, the deadliest day since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah came into force over a week ago. The health ministry said the dead on Sunday included two women and two childre...
The Israeli government and Hezbollah have traded blame over breaches to the truce, which is set to run for several more weeks Lebanon’s health ministry said Israeli strikes on the country’s south killed 14 people on Sunday, the deadliest day since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah came into force over a week ago. The health ministry said the dead on Sunday included two women and two children, adding that 37 other people were wounded. Israel said one of its soldiers was also killed. Continue reading...
Maskot/DigitalVision via Getty Images The JPMorgan US Tech Leaders ETF ( JTEK ) is one of the best investment vehicles to access the portfolio of tech leaders through a single investment. The actively managed ETF seeks to hold stakes in companies with strong fundamentals and disruptive technologies. Since its inception in late 2023, JTEK’s impressive share price return of 85% demonstrates the effe...
Maskot/DigitalVision via Getty Images The JPMorgan US Tech Leaders ETF ( JTEK ) is one of the best investment vehicles to access the portfolio of tech leaders through a single investment. The actively managed ETF seeks to hold stakes in companies with strong fundamentals and disruptive technologies. Since its inception in late 2023, JTEK’s impressive share price return of 85% demonstrates the effectiveness of its strategy. I believe the fund’s share price uptrend is likely to continue in 2026 and ahead, driven by the robust earnings growth power and wider digital adoption. Therefore, I maintain my rating for JTEK. Tech Market Growth Outlook Seems Robust Over the past five years, tech stocks delivered exponential returns for investors, as the technology market is accelerating at an explosive pace, both in terms of demand and innovations. The tech innovations, including cloud computing, the emergence of artificial intelligence, massive data processing capabilities, and high-speed connectivity, are transforming our daily life, corporate structure, and military capabilities. Earnings growth forecast (FactSet) Given the rising demand for tech products with expectations for continued acceleration in years and decades to come, the tech stocks are likely to dominate stock market returns. According to the FactSet data , the information technology sector is expected to deliver a staggering 45% earnings growth in the first quarter of 2026. The full-year earnings growth forecast is around 38%, up from a 25% increase in the previous year. In fact, hypergrowth AI companies, such as NVIDIA ( NVDA ) and Broadcom ( AVGO ), are likely to experience 60% to 80% year-over-year earnings growth in 2026. From an investment perspective, holding positions in tech companies can enable investors to earn lofty returns. However, investing in a single high-beta stock or group of tech stocks involves a complicated stock analysis procedure. Therefore, using investment vehicles, such as the JPMorgan...
A strong earthquake rattled Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido early on Monday, US and Japanese meteorological agencies reported, the latest in a series of powerful tremors to hit the island nation. The 6.2-magnitude quake struck at 5.23am in Hokkaido’s southern region, at a depth of 83km (52 miles), the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) reported, revising its preliminary estimate of magnitude 6....
A strong earthquake rattled Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido early on Monday, US and Japanese meteorological agencies reported, the latest in a series of powerful tremors to hit the island nation. The 6.2-magnitude quake struck at 5.23am in Hokkaido’s southern region, at a depth of 83km (52 miles), the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) reported, revising its preliminary estimate of magnitude 6.1. No tsunami alert was issued, JMA said, and the US Geological Survey predicted that damage to...
BlackJack3D/iStock via Getty Images The following segment was excerpted from the Brown Advisory Mid-Cap Growth Strategy Portfolio Q1 2026 Commentary. We also built six new positions, including in two companies we believe are being disproportionately penalized in the software rout—Toast, Inc ( TOST ) and Guidewire Software, Inc ( GWRE ). After its stock price more than doubled and it breached our t...
BlackJack3D/iStock via Getty Images The following segment was excerpted from the Brown Advisory Mid-Cap Growth Strategy Portfolio Q1 2026 Commentary. We also built six new positions, including in two companies we believe are being disproportionately penalized in the software rout—Toast, Inc ( TOST ) and Guidewire Software, Inc ( GWRE ). After its stock price more than doubled and it breached our three-year price objective, we sold insurance-software provider Guidewire Software last year in the mid-$250 range. The stock retrenched meaningfully in the software sell-off. However, the company continues to deliver better-than-consensus-expected—even accelerating—growth. We think investors underappreciate Guidewire Software's strong competitive positioning and the durability of its growth, driven by insurers being earlier in their cloud transformation journeys relative to most industries. We expect Toast, a leader in restaurant software, to continue growing locations more than 15% for several years through continued penetration of the core small- to mid-sized restaurants and its recent entrance into new verticals like food & beverage, enterprise, and international. Its sole focus on restaurant software could widen its competitive advantage versus both legacy on-prem restaurant vendors and more generic payments providers. This along with scale and new products should continue pushing modest growth in payment take rates. Reddit, Inc.'s (RD DT ) stock price recently halved due to macro concerns, not because of the AI panic that hit the two software companies captioned above. In fact, Reddit might be considered an "AI play," and its shares now trade at a reasonable price from which we believe investors could earn a healthy double-digit internal rate of return (IRR). The company's trust-driven, highly contextual threads offer an engaged audience, and Reddit is only in the "middle innings" of monetizing that content, driving high double-digit percentage growth in advertising re...
Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. agreed to acquire New York-listed women’s health-care company Organon & Co. , in what is likely to be one of the biggest India outbound deals in years. Sun Pharma will pay $14 per Organon share in cash, giving the company an enterprise valuation of $11.75 billion, according to a statement on Monday. Sun Pharma plans to fund the acquisition through a combination o...
Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. agreed to acquire New York-listed women’s health-care company Organon & Co. , in what is likely to be one of the biggest India outbound deals in years. Sun Pharma will pay $14 per Organon share in cash, giving the company an enterprise valuation of $11.75 billion, according to a statement on Monday. Sun Pharma plans to fund the acquisition through a combination of available cash resources and committed financing from banks. The transaction has been approved by the boards of both Sun Pharma and Organon, and is expected to close in early 2027, pending closing conditions such as regulatory and Organon shareholder approvals. Organon, which has a market capitalization of roughly $3 billion, had also drawn interest from other bidders including Germany’s Grünenthal and private equity firms, people familiar with the matter have said. The New Jersey-based company was spun off from Merck & Co. in 2021 and had total debt of about $8.8 billion as of the end of last year. Sun Pharma is India’s biggest pharmaceutical company and has a market value of $41 billion. Organon focuses on women’s health in areas such as breast cancer, contraception, osteoporosis and menopause, according to its website.
Eoneren/E+ via Getty Images Sun Pharmaceutical Industries on Sunday said it agreed to acquire Organon & Co. ( OGN ) in an all-cash transaction valuing the company at an enterprise value of $11.75 billion, marking one of the largest healthcare deals of the year. Under the agreement, Organon shareholders will receive $14 a share in cash. The transaction has been approved by the boards of both compan...
Eoneren/E+ via Getty Images Sun Pharmaceutical Industries on Sunday said it agreed to acquire Organon & Co. ( OGN ) in an all-cash transaction valuing the company at an enterprise value of $11.75 billion, marking one of the largest healthcare deals of the year. Under the agreement, Organon shareholders will receive $14 a share in cash. The transaction has been approved by the boards of both companies and is expected to close in early 2027, pending regulatory clearances and approval from Organon shareholders. Organon ( OGN ) was formed in 2021 through a spinoff from Merck & Co. ( MRK ), known as MSD outside the United States and Canada. The company focuses on women’s health, established medicines and biosimilars, with products sold in about 140 countries. Sun Pharma said the acquisition would broaden its international footprint and add new capabilities in women’s health and biosimilars. The combined company is expected to generate about $12.4 billion in revenue, placing it among the world’s larger pharmaceutical companies by sales. The deal would also increase Sun Pharma’s exposure to branded generics and established medicines, while giving it a stronger presence in developed markets including the United States and Europe. Sun Pharma plans to finance the acquisition through a mix of existing cash and committed bank financing. The company said post-transaction net debt to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization is expected to be about 2.3 times. For the year ended December 31, Organon reported revenue of $6.2 billion and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of $1.9 billion. The company had debt of $8.6 billion and cash of $574 million at year-end. The acquisition comes as pharmaceutical companies pursue scale to offset pricing pressure, patent expirations and rising research costs. For investors, the transaction will likely be judged on Sun Pharma’s ability to integrate Organon’s portfolio, manage leverage and ...