This game is end to end! Today’s offering is for fans of the number 4. It’s a cute puzzle that offers up its solution in an elegant way. Nose to tail mathematics Continue reading...
This game is end to end! Today’s offering is for fans of the number 4. It’s a cute puzzle that offers up its solution in an elegant way. Nose to tail mathematics Continue reading...
German factory orders fell more than expected in April, adding to concerns that Europe’s largest economy could contract in the second quarter due to the Iran war and the surge in energy costs. Demand decreased 3.8% from a month earlier, following a downwardly revised 4.5% gain in March, the statistics office said Monday. That’s worse than the 2% decline predicted in a Bloomberg survey . The drop w...
German factory orders fell more than expected in April, adding to concerns that Europe’s largest economy could contract in the second quarter due to the Iran war and the surge in energy costs. Demand decreased 3.8% from a month earlier, following a downwardly revised 4.5% gain in March, the statistics office said Monday. That’s worse than the 2% decline predicted in a Bloomberg survey . The drop was due to the automotive industry and electrical equipment, with machinery and equipment also weighing on the result. Large-scale orders had no impact, Destatis said. A less volatile three-month reading showed a 3.1% fall. Germany’s economy had a good start to the year with 0.3% growth between January and March, but the conflict in the Middle East is increasingly weighing on consumers and corporates. Business activity shrank in April and May, raising the prospect of a contraction in the second quarter. “There are growing signs that rising energy and commodity prices, as well as significantly heightened geopolitical uncertainty, are increasingly leading to lower demand, particularly for capital goods,” the economy ministry said in a statement. “Against the backdrop of rising costs and uncertainties, as well as growing supply chain bottlenecks, industrial activity is likely to continue to show only modest growth in the coming months.” Joerg Kraemer , chief economist at Commerzbank, took a similar pessimistic view, warning that the German economy will probably “contract slightly” in the second quarter. Further headwinds come from ongoing trade tensions between the US and the European Union, and likely increases in interest rates, with the European Central Bank widely expected to raise borrowing costs later this week. While some support is still expected from hundreds of billions of euros in stimulus flowing to German defense and infrastructure, those effects are increasingly being overshadowed by factors like the war. Data last week also showed that the €500 billion ($577 bill...
Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news The oil price is climbing back towards the $100 a barrel milestone, after new missile strikes in the Middle East today. Brent crude, the international benchmark, has jumped by 4.8% to $97.60 a barrel, after Iran launched missiles at Israel on Sunday in response to Israeli strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs. Things could get a bit hairier...
Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news The oil price is climbing back towards the $100 a barrel milestone, after new missile strikes in the Middle East today. Brent crude, the international benchmark, has jumped by 4.8% to $97.60 a barrel, after Iran launched missiles at Israel on Sunday in response to Israeli strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs. Things could get a bit hairier today in the markets after a flare-up in geopolitical tensions over the weekend. Iran launched strikes on Israel for its attacks on Hezbollah targets in Beirut, leaving a nervous wait for the Israeli response. There is the heightened risk the war escalates again as peace talks between the US and a clearly emboldened Iran stall. 7am BST: German factory orders 4pm BST: US inflation expectations Continue reading...
imaginima/E+ via Getty Images Introduction Shurgard Self Storage ( SSSAF ) is down by more than 30% over the past year. That would normally indicate the business is in serious trouble, but the operating figures don 't support this conclusion. Revenue is still growing, the company continues to add space across Europe, and the Lok 'nStore acquisition is progressing. The problem is further down the i...
imaginima/E+ via Getty Images Introduction Shurgard Self Storage ( SSSAF ) is down by more than 30% over the past year. That would normally indicate the business is in serious trouble, but the operating figures don 't support this conclusion. Revenue is still growing, the company continues to add space across Europe, and the Lok 'nStore acquisition is progressing. The problem is further down the income statement. Shurgard is growing its portfolio faster than earnings per share. New capacity takes years to mature, competition increased in several markets during late 2025, and financing costs are absorbing part of the benefit from EBITDA growth at the per-share earnings level. Portfolio Growth Remains Strong Shurgard 's 2025 results were solid. Revenue increased 10.8%, while underlying EBITDA rose 10.4%. The company ended the year with close to 350 properties and almost 1.8 million square meters of rentable space across Europe. The longer-term record is also encouraging. Over the past five years, Shurgard increased its store count and rentable space at a compound annual rate of almost 7%, while revenue grew at close to 11%. The company has also filled newly opened space and raised rents as properties matured. Available square meters rose 5% in 2025, average rented space increased 8.8%, and in-place rent was 1.9% higher. Management has increased the required return on newly approved projects from 8% to 9% to a new range of 9% to 10%. That makes sense after the rise in Shurgard 's cost of capital, although it could reduce the number of viable projects from 2028 onward. Lok 'nStore is also progressing. Occupancy increased from 67% at acquisition to 80% by the end of 2025. It then declined to 78.1% in Q1 2026 after Shurgard added more rentable space to the portfolio. Management now expects occupancy of 80% to 85% by the end of 2026. The operational integration is mostly complete. The stores have been rebranded, access-control systems have been installed, and the former Lo...
The SpaceX IPO is quickly approaching. While there are ways to invest in SpaceX today , most investors are simply better off waiting for shares to be publicly available. According to reports, SpaceX is targeting a $1.77 trillion valuation, raising as much as $75 billion in new capital. That capital will be quickly deployed as SpaceX believes it has a total addressable market of $28.5 trillion. Not...
The SpaceX IPO is quickly approaching. While there are ways to invest in SpaceX today , most investors are simply better off waiting for shares to be publicly available. According to reports, SpaceX is targeting a $1.77 trillion valuation, raising as much as $75 billion in new capital. That capital will be quickly deployed as SpaceX believes it has a total addressable market of $28.5 trillion. Not every expert is excited about the IPO. A recent Morningstar report concludes that the entire company is currently worth just $780 billion -- less than half of SpaceX's top-end valuation range. "[L]ong-term investors eager to participate in SpaceX's future endeavors and potential success will have opportunities to do so with a greater margin of safety than the initial offering is likely to provide," one of Morningstar's analysts warns. Continue reading
J Studios/DigitalVision via Getty Images PhysicsX, a UK-based startup specializing in AI models for designing and manufacturing complex industrial components such as jet engines and semiconductors, has secured $300M in funding, bringing its valuation to approximately $2.4B. The company operates in a highly competitive sector that includes ventures backed by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon ( AMZN...
J Studios/DigitalVision via Getty Images PhysicsX, a UK-based startup specializing in AI models for designing and manufacturing complex industrial components such as jet engines and semiconductors, has secured $300M in funding, bringing its valuation to approximately $2.4B. The company operates in a highly competitive sector that includes ventures backed by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon ( AMZN ). Singapore’s Temasek led the Series C financing into PhysicsX, the London-based company said on Monday. Intrepid Growth Partners and M&G Catalyst joined as new investors alongside earlier backers, including Nvidia ( NVDA ) and Applied Materials ( AMAT ). The company was valued at almost $1B at its last funding round. PhysicsX is developing and deploying its AI-native engineering platform to accelerate hardware innovation and drive engineering and manufacturing productivity in industrial organizations. The company's AI models "predict physical behavior in seconds rather than hours or days, enabling engineering teams to evaluate orders of magnitude more design variants and carry physics insight across the full product lifecycle: from early-stage design and manufacturing through to real-time digital twins in operation." The financing comes amid rapid growth, the company said. PhysicsX has doubled year-over-year recognized revenue, tripled booked revenue, while more than doubled its customer count over the past year. The team has grown to more than 300 people, doubling in size in the past twelve months. More on Nvidia, Applied Materials Nvidia: Downgrade To Hold As Earnings Fail To Push Price Higher Nvidia: I Do Not Fear The AI Bubble Yet NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) Presents at Bank of America 2026 Global Technology Conference Transcript South Korea's Naver will build AI factories using Nvidia's DSX platform Nvidia is working with LG on humanoid robots, next-generation data centers
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) dropped to $1.08 on Friday—its lowest price in 19 months. The last time the cryptocurrency traded this low was November 2024, when it briefly crashed all the way to $0.50. The XRP price now looks to be stabilizing around $1.12 to $1.16. XRP’s chances of a sustained recovery depend on institutional buyers, ... Can XRP (Ripple) Bounce Back After Reaching a 19-Month Low?
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) dropped to $1.08 on Friday—its lowest price in 19 months. The last time the cryptocurrency traded this low was November 2024, when it briefly crashed all the way to $0.50. The XRP price now looks to be stabilizing around $1.12 to $1.16. XRP’s chances of a sustained recovery depend on institutional buyers, ... Can XRP (Ripple) Bounce Back After Reaching a 19-Month Low?