Tag Archives: googl

Google Worries Mount Over EU Antitrust Fine, Oracle Case Outcome

The European Commission may hit Alphabet ‘s ( GOOGL ) Google with a $3.4 billion fine as early as June on grounds that the U.S. Internet giant favors its own shopping service in Internet searches. The European Union’s biggest antitrust fine to date was $1.45 billion, against chipmaker Intel ( INTC ) in 2009. The EU in 2013 also fined Microsoft ( MSFT ) $730 million for failing to respect an antitrust settlement with regulators. The most Google could be fined would be 10% of annual revenue under EU law, which would be roughly double the $3.4 billion fine. Google posted revenue near $75 billion in 2015 and reported $75.3 billion in cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities in its Q1 earnings release. The Sunday Telegraph first reported the antitrust fine. Google has not commented. The EU’s European Commission (EC) regulators in recent years have investigated other U.S. companies — including Amazon.com ( AMZN ), Facebook ( FB ) and Apple ( AAPL ) — over antitrust and privacy issues. If the EU fines Google, it would put U.S. regulators in the spotlight. The Federal Trade Commission in 2013 ended an investigation into whether Google abused its dominance in the Internet search market without bringing charges. The EU has opened up a separate probe involving Google’s Android smartphone software. Meanwhile, a copyright infringement case involving Oracle ( ORCL ) and Google is heading into its second week. Oracle claims Google violated its copyright on parts of the Java programming language when it created the Android mobile operating system, now used in mobile phones worldwide. Oracle is seeking $8.8 billion in damages. “If the EC does issue the ruling, Google is required to comply with the nondiscrimination ruling even while pursuing a possible court appeal, which could take three to five years,” said Paul Gallant, an analyst at Guggenheim Partners, in a research report. “This is not well understood by investors. “In addition, if Google refuses to comply — or if its revisions are deemed inadequate — it can be subject to an ongoing noncompliance fine  of up to 5% of its global annual revenues, pro-rated daily.” Alphabet stock was flat in early trading, near 724. Alphabet stock broke out of a cup-with-handle base at a 777.41 buy point on April 14, but it is now near the 7% to 8% decline where selling shares is recommended.

Why You Should Be Taking Profits On Tesla Supplier Nvidia’s Stock

Tesla ( TSLA ) chip supplier Nvidia ( NVDA ) is flying to a new all-time high in the stock market today on the heels of its estimate-beating quarterly report late Thursday. The marker of graphics chips for the auto and gaming markets said Q1 EPS jumped 38% while sales climbed 13%. Its guidance also was well above forecasts. Nvidia received several upgrades and price target hikes from analysts after the report. Shares gapped up 13.9% in giant volume, hitting a fresh high and clearing the 20% profit-taking zone. Nvidia initially cleared a cup-with-handle buy point of 33.16 about a month ago, and briefly pulled back to find support at the 50-day line ahead of the report. Meanwhile, Tesla is trading at two-month lows, about 27% below its 52-week high. Shares were up 0.8% intraday Friday. The stock got knocked from recent highs as analysts felt Tesla’s 2018 production target was too lofty. But Evercore defended the luxury electric carmaker Thursday, saying the production target is achievable. And Tesla partner Mobileye ( MBLY ), which makes advanced driver-assistance systems, said Thursday it has made deals with two unnamed automakers to create fully autonomous cars by 2019. Aside from Tesla, General Motors ( GM ), Ford ( F ) and Alphabet ( GOOGL )-owned Google are also working on self-driving technology. Mobileye breached its 50-day line last week after the company’s quarterly earnings report, though it beat views. The stock is looking to retake that level in Friday’s session, rising 2%. Shares are now about 42% below their high reached last August.

Cisco At Risk As Workloads Shift To Public Cloud, Amazon: JPMorgan

Corporate America may need fatter communications pipes for cloud computing, but the trend toward lower-cost hardware in data centers — including networking gear — doesn’t bode well for Cisco Systems ( CSCO ), says a JPMorgan report. Despite the rise of Amazon.com’s ( AMZN ) Web Services unit and Microsoft ’s ( MSFT ) Azure, money spent on public cloud computing services will account for only 7% of the $215 billion global data center market in 2016, JPMorgan analyst Rod Hall said in a recent note to clients. Hall forecasts that from 2016 to 2020, traditional data center infrastructure spending will fall at a 2% rate annually. The bigger problem for legacy information technology suppliers is that computer workloads are moving at a faster rate to infrastructure-as-a-service, or IaaS, providers, he says. Amazon Web Services is the biggest IaaS provider, through which customers rent computer servers and data storage systems via the Internet. Microsoft is No. 2, with Alphabet ’s ( GOOGL ) Google third. According to a JPMorgan survey of chief information officers, more than 40% of workloads could shift to the public cloud in five years. “A near-tripling of public cloud workloads represents a monumental architectural shift, which shows no signs of abating and is likely to create a major ripple effect across the entire technology landscape,” wrote Hall. “(We) continue to believe it represents material earnings risk for companies like Cisco.” Hall added: “Though companies like Cisco focus on the increased bandwidth required for big data they miss the fact that this inevitably drives companies to want to deploy commodity (data center) solutions faster in our opinion.” Cisco reports fiscal third-quarter earnings on May 18 after the market close.