Malaysia plans to seek clarification from Norway over a halt in the supply of naval strike missiles following a change in defense export policies — a further setback for a long-delayed combat ship project. Defence Minister Mohamed Khaled Nordin said Malaysia has a missile supply deal with Norway’s Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace AS , to equip its littoral combat ships. “The Malaysian government will...
Malaysia plans to seek clarification from Norway over a halt in the supply of naval strike missiles following a change in defense export policies — a further setback for a long-delayed combat ship project. Defence Minister Mohamed Khaled Nordin said Malaysia has a missile supply deal with Norway’s Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace AS , to equip its littoral combat ships. “The Malaysian government will use diplomatic channels with the Norwegian government to get further explanation as well as to discuss the reasonable next steps in national interest,” Khaled said in a statement on Wednesday. Although the deal was signed in 2011, the first LCS vessels are set to be delivered later this year. Costs have risen to 11.2 billion ringgit ($2.8 billion) from an initial 9 billion ringgit, even as the order was reduced from six ships to five. Read more: Boustead Signs $2.4B Supplementary Deal for Five LCS Vessel
Earnings Call Insights: EPAM Systems (EPAM) Q1 2026 Management View "We delivered a solid first quarter with revenue growth at high end of our outlook range, year-over-year improvement in our adjusted profitability and gross margins and strong adjusted earnings per share." (President, CEO & Director Balazs Fejes) "Our full pure AI revenues exceeded $125 million in Q1, up nearly 20% sequentially fr...
Earnings Call Insights: EPAM Systems (EPAM) Q1 2026 Management View "We delivered a solid first quarter with revenue growth at high end of our outlook range, year-over-year improvement in our adjusted profitability and gross margins and strong adjusted earnings per share." (President, CEO & Director Balazs Fejes) "Our full pure AI revenues exceeded $125 million in Q1, up nearly 20% sequentially from Q4" and "This momentum gives us a strong line of sight to our $600 million target for the full year." (President, CEO & Director Fejes) "We also just announced a strategic multiyear applied AI partnership with Anthropic" and, as part of the buildout, EPAM is "building a dedicated practice for more than 10,000 cloud-certified architects, including a specialized cadre of 250 forward-deployed engineering Black Belts." (President, CEO & Director Fejes) "We are particularly seeing underperformance in North America, and this is contributing to lower visibility in the second half" and "While Q1 was not impacted, we are expecting some impact in Q2." (President, CEO & Director Fejes) "In the first quarter, EPAM generated revenue of $1.4 billion" and "non-GAAP diluted EPS was $2.86." (Senior VP, CFO & Treasurer Jason Peterson) Outlook "We are lowering our full year revenue growth outlook" and "Revenue growth will now be in the range of 4% to 6.5%." (Senior VP, CFO & Treasurer Peterson) "For earnings per share, we expect that GAAP diluted EPS will now be in the range of $8.29 to $8.59 for the full year. And non-GAAP diluted EPS will now be in the range of $12.98 to $13.28 for the full year." (Senior VP, CFO & Treasurer Peterson) "We expect revenue to be in the range of $1.4 billion to $1.415 billion" for Q2, with "GAAP diluted EPS" of "$1.79 to $1.87" and "non-GAAP diluted EPS" of "$3.10 to $3.18" for the quarter. (Senior VP, CFO & Treasurer Peterson) Compared with the prior quarter’s full-year framework, management moved from "Revenue growth" of "4.5% to 7.5%" to "4% to 6.5%," whi...
Earnings Call Insights: News Corporation (NWSA) Q3 fiscal 2026 Management view "News Corp has again delivered resounding results this quarter, indeed marking the 12th straight quarter of profitability growth on a continuing operations basis," said "CEO & Director Robert Thomson," highlighting "total revenue rose 9% to $2.2 billion" and "total segment EBITDA increased...18% to $343 million," alongs...
Earnings Call Insights: News Corporation (NWSA) Q3 fiscal 2026 Management view "News Corp has again delivered resounding results this quarter, indeed marking the 12th straight quarter of profitability growth on a continuing operations basis," said "CEO & Director Robert Thomson," highlighting "total revenue rose 9% to $2.2 billion" and "total segment EBITDA increased...18% to $343 million," alongside "continued to execute our enhanced buyback program at an accelerated rate" because "the current share price does not reflect the intrinsic value of the company or its prospects." "We are an AI inputs company," Thomson said, adding, "that fact was reflected in our recent deal with Meta, which complements our partnership with OpenAI" and that the company is "negotiating several further deals" that "should have a positive impact on our revenue and profitability." He also said, "We also expect to receive our fair share of the proceeds of the $1.5 billion settlement with Anthropic starting later this calendar year." "Our third quarter results demonstrate the continued strength and resilience of our portfolio," said "Chief Financial Officer Lavanya Chandrashekar," adding, "In the third quarter, we repurchased $193 million in shares, up from $172 million in the second quarter, bringing fiscal year-to-date repurchases to $459 million." Chandrashekar described pricing and mix actions at Dow Jones, including: "we are actively working to optimize yield, including raising the full price rate for the Wall Street Journal digital subscription to $44.99 for new customers," and said, "we expect further improvements in the fourth quarter" for digital direct subscription ARPU. Outlook Chandrashekar said, "we remain confident in our strategy, underpinned by recurring revenues and expect to report strong results in the fourth quarter," while adding, "we are closely monitoring events in the Middle East." By segment, Chandrashekar said, "At Dow Jones, we expect continued strong revenue perfor...
Earnings Call Insights: Dropbox (DBX) Q1 2026 Management View "We delivered a strong start to the year, exceeding the high end of our guidance across revenue and operating margin with year-over-year revenue growth of 2%, excluding FormSwift, and unlevered free cash flow margin of 38%." (Co-Founder, Interim President, CEO & Chairman Andrew Houston) "Within individuals, retention remains an importan...
Earnings Call Insights: Dropbox (DBX) Q1 2026 Management View "We delivered a strong start to the year, exceeding the high end of our guidance across revenue and operating margin with year-over-year revenue growth of 2%, excluding FormSwift, and unlevered free cash flow margin of 38%." (Co-Founder, Interim President, CEO & Chairman Andrew Houston) "Within individuals, retention remains an important near-term revenue lever" and "these efforts drove our mobile churn rate down mid-single-digit percentage points"; the company also said targeted storage promotions drove a "50% improvement in conversion" for basic users near storage limits. (CEO Houston) "In Q1, that included continued progress on pricing and packaging simplification, a more unified checkout experience, credit card trials and onboarding and activation improvements." (CEO Houston) "In Q1, we expanded the rollout of Dash in Dropbox and plan to significantly expand access to our base throughout the remainder of 2026." (CEO Houston) "We're also increasingly excited by the signal we're seeing in our emerging data security solution, which we call Dropbox Protect." (CEO Houston) "Q1 was a strong quarter with important proof points for the thesis I laid out on my first earnings call." (Chief Financial Officer Ross Tennenbaum) Outlook "For the second quarter of 2026, we expect total revenue to be in the range of $624 million to $627 million." (CFO Tennenbaum) "For the full year 2026, we are raising our total revenue guidance by $12 million from a prior range of $2.485 billion to $2.5 billion to a revised range of $2.497 billion to $2.512 billion." (CFO Tennenbaum) "We are also raising our unlevered free cash flow guidance, which we now expect to be at or above $1.055 billion." (CFO Tennenbaum) "As a result, we now expect paying user trends for the full year to be modestly better than our prior year and to be slightly positive overall." (CFO Tennenbaum) "For ARPU, we expect modest sequential declines throughout the...
Firn/iStock via Getty Images Overview When I previously covered the TriplePoint Venture Growth BDC ( TPVG ), I issued a hold rating due to the improved earnings but remaining risks. Since then, the share price has fallen by roughly 15%, and the total return remains in the negative territory. I wanted to revisit TPVG to assess its overall value proposition, dividend sustainability, and outlook thro...
Firn/iStock via Getty Images Overview When I previously covered the TriplePoint Venture Growth BDC ( TPVG ), I issued a hold rating due to the improved earnings but remaining risks. Since then, the share price has fallen by roughly 15%, and the total return remains in the negative territory. I wanted to revisit TPVG to assess its overall value proposition, dividend sustainability, and outlook through the rest of 2026. BDCs continue to face headwinds related to high-interest rates, but TPVG may be positioned to navigate these challenges. Furthermore, TVPG recently released an updated earnings report, which prompted me to revisit its performance and outlook. Looking at the performance over the last twelve months, we can see that TPVG's share price has declined by more than 4.1%. However, this sort of pullback was common across the rest of the BDC sector. When including all distributions that were paid out to investors, the total return jumps up above 8.5% for the same time frame. TPVG now offers investors a starting dividend yield of about 16.4%. After assessing the latest earnings report, it is clear that net investment income continues to support these payouts. Although the coverage is thin, I believe that TPVG may continue to sustain its current payouts through the remainder of the year. Data by YCharts TPVG trades at one of the deepest discounts to NAV valuations over the last five years. While this may be an attractive opportunity to accumulate shares, there are still some challenges that can disrupt TPVG's recovery. For instance, the high-interest-rate environment has made it difficult for management to find new investment opportunities to grow the portfolio's base earnings. As sales and prepayments outpace new investment activity, we may see net investment income levels slowly decline unless improvements are made. Q1 Earnings & Software Risk According to the latest portfolio overview , TPVG now has total investments at a fair value of $785.6M. Since TPVG's succ...
Sentiment is warming among some Southeast Asian members towards easing Myanmar’s isolation five years after a coup, with diplomats signalling a possible opening to bring the crisis-torn nation back into the fold. Southeast Asian foreign ministers have agreed to a virtual meeting with their Myanmar counterpart, according to Asean’s secretary general on Thursday. In an interview during the Associati...
Sentiment is warming among some Southeast Asian members towards easing Myanmar’s isolation five years after a coup, with diplomats signalling a possible opening to bring the crisis-torn nation back into the fold. Southeast Asian foreign ministers have agreed to a virtual meeting with their Myanmar counterpart, according to Asean’s secretary general on Thursday. In an interview during the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in the Philippines on Thursday, Kao Kim Hourn said Myanmar had...