Category: 3. Business

Before she joined Logitech two years ago, chief executive Hanneke Faber submitted herself to a boot camp: 48 hours of computer gaming, coached by her 20-something son in Detroit. “He gave me a test afterwards,” says Faber, “which I passed.”

Gamers are core customers of the Swiss technology hardware group. Its gaming brand, Logitech G, which has its own website, sells G Hub software and high-specification hardware, including specialised headsets, keyboards and a bewildering array of mice — the product the company is still best known for.

Founded in 1981 and headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, with offices and innovation centres from San Jose, in Silicon Valley, to Shanghai, Logitech has always aimed to “provide the connection between the human and the compute”, Faber says.

That now means catching the “huge tailwind” of artificial intelligence, as big technology companies start to look for hardware to support their latest products. This year, for example, the group launched an AI-enabled stylus for 3D drawing in physical space using Apple’s Vision Pro headsets. Faber, 56, describes Logitech as “the eyes, the ears and the hands of AI”, just as its mobile keyboards help users connect to tablets and smartphones, and the mouse still links brain and cursor.

“The mouse built this house” is a mantra at Logitech. Faber carries seven in her backpack and extols the recently launched MX Master 4, a programmable mouse that has attracted admiring reviews across the technology community. Click-happy users can tailor its functions with as many as 72 different shortcuts. It is one reason Logitech employs more software than hardware engineers and a source of astonishment for those desk drones who think of the mouse as a dumb “peripheral”.

Faber herself never uses the P-word. She points out that if you are a “software designer who needs to do 1,000 lines of code in three minutes” or “an Excel jockey” or financial analyst, a highly sophisticated mouse is indispensable and can, Logitech claims, make you up to 33 per cent faster.

A former Dutch champion high-diver who studied journalism on a sports scholarship in the US, Faber had no hesitation about applying for the job of chief executive. She had spent her career until then in fast-moving consumer goods and retail, first at Procter & Gamble, then Dutch retailer Ahold. For six years before joining Logitech she held senior positions at multinational Unilever, overseeing food brands such as Hellmann’s and Knorr.

She has a practised answer to the question of what, if anything, those jobs taught her about running a technology company: “Yes, two years ago I was selling mayonnaise. But you need to really understand that user of the mayonnaise and deliver great superior products for her. And that is the same with Logitech,” she says. At Ahold, she was responsible for ecommerce, while Unilever’s nutrition operation was 40 per cent business-to-business. Increasing Logitech’s B2B offering, by selling, for instance, more systems to enhance corporate video calling, is a big part of her strategy.

When she joined in December 2023, the company was coming down from a pandemic-era boom, which had supercharged demand for its video-collaboration tools and gaming accessories. “All of a sudden everyone was video conferencing, was gaming like there was no tomorrow. So it was a bit of a sugar high. The couple of years after Covid were not easy for Logitech and for the industry.” Pre-tax profit, which peaked at $1.15bn in the year to March 2021, was still on the decline. Logitech was also facing pressure from co-founder Daniel Borel, who owns a small stake and wanted to oust the company’s then chair, Wendy Becker. 

In trying to set a new course, Faber put her journalism training to use as she met managers and staff. “Why are you doing that? What are you doing? Where are we doing it? Who’s doing it? All of those questions are important in business as well.” 

Faber cut the number of her direct reports and drew up a working strategy, which, using start-up jargon, she described as a “minimum viable product”. “We did have to move fast because there was no formal strategy, the business had been in decline for about two years. We had an interim CEO [from June to December 2023] so there was some uncertainty.” In her first week, she gathered the leadership team and they drafted a statement on where and how to act, and some financial goals. Faber took this one-pager out to Logitech’s 7,400 staff, to “get the wisdom of the crowd”, before agreeing it with the board and shareholders. She claims the strategy “hasn’t materially changed since then”. 

But the ex-diver’s entry was far from splashless. In an interview for The Verge’s Decoder podcast in July 2024 she chatted freely about the idea of a subscription-based “forever mouse”. The concept had emerged from internal brainstorming about the future of consumer electronics, based on the group’s deeply held commitment to “design for sustainability”, but the idea and her comparison of the device with a Rolex watch attracted ridicule. Logitech had to issue a statement that there was no plan for such a product. A few weeks later, Borel went public with a letter to shareholders criticising succession planning failures and a “toxic culture that [had] become ingrained”. “It must be hard [for founders] because . . . it is their baby,” says Faber. “It truly is like a child . . . When your child leaves the house, you’re not not going to care about your child.”

Becker stepped down this year and Faber has largely repaired relations with Borel. The day after this interview, she was set to meet him to mark the 44th anniversary of the company, and she hopes the co-founders will be part of 50th anniversary celebrations in 2031. “He’s a super-smart guy and he’s got all this experience,” she says, “so we would be crazy not to listen to him.” Contacted separately, Borel says Faber is a “good person” and that the pair now have a “positive and warm relationship”. He continues to push her to maintain the urgency and depth of research spending needed to keep up in a rapidly evolving sector. 

Faber does appear to have steadied Logitech and restarted its growth. The shares, which traded at around SFr75 (about $90) when she joined are now worth nearer SFr90. She repeats several times her strategic goal to “play offence”, despite the volatile global environment. She expects to build on Logitech’s advantages, which include a strong balance sheet, a strong brand, which she is unifying around the Logitech name, and diversified manufacturing. Before the pandemic, Logitech built nearly all of its products in Chinese factories. Donald Trump’s tariffs accelerated plans to diversify its supply chain and, by the end of the year, Faber expects fewer than 10 per cent of products going into the US will come from China. At the same time, Logitech continues to sell into the important and highly competitive Chinese market, where its Swissness provides cover against any animus towards US companies.

As for the device with which the company is most closely associated, Faber is used to reading premature obituaries. Logitech is not dependent only on mice, she points out. “But I wouldn’t write the mouse off either.”

The EU has only paid out a fraction of the money it says it has committed for green technologies, as companies spend up to 3,000 hours and an average €85,000 to access funds from a flagship programme.

Of €7.1bn awarded from the bloc’s Innovation Fund since it was established in 2021, only 4.7 per cent has been paid out to companies because of the red tape required to access the money, according to European Commission figures.

The application process is also extremely lengthy and bureaucratic. In an internal presentation this month, seen by the Financial Times, the commission said that 77 per cent of those seeking funding had to subcontract parts of the application process to consultants because of the “high burden”.

Average administrative costs were €85,000 per application, it said, even higher than the average €32,000 spent to access the EU’s research grant scheme, Horizon Europe.

Less than 20 per cent of applications to the Innovation Fund are successful, according to the presentation. Of the projects that had been awarded grants, only 6 per cent were operational, while 15 to 20 per cent face delays.

The hold-ups in disbursing the funds are the latest example of how bureaucracy is stifling the EU’s competitiveness. In a major report last year, the former European Central Bank governor Mario Draghi said that administrative burdens were one of the main reasons for Europe’s “static industrial structure with few new companies rising up to disrupt existing industries or develop new growth engines”.

The Innovation Fund, which uses revenues generated from the bloc’s emissions trading system, is one of the world’s largest financing programmes “for the demonstration of innovative low-carbon technologies”, the commission claims.

It was touted as one of the main funding platforms to help the bloc compete with the US after former president Joe Biden announced $369bn of funding and tax credits for green technologies through the Inflation Reduction Act.

Victor van Hoorn, director of trade body Cleantech for Europe, said some businesses have reported spending 3,000 hours on applications to the Innovation Fund — if carried out by one person alone this would be equivalent to more than a year and a half based on the EU’s 36-hour average working week.

“The biggest challenge [we hear] is the amount of resources, the amount of documentation and all of that for a frankly very low success rate,” said van Hoorn.

Eoin Condren, executive director for corporate development at cement company Ecocem, said for its last application to the fund, it had an entire team dedicated to it for five months “costing hundreds of thousands of euros”.

“Large companies can absorb that, but smaller firms developing breakthrough technologies can’t,” he added.

Condren also noted that much of the money went to “big umbrella technologies like [carbon capture and storage] and green hydrogen . . . yet these large, often lossmaking projects are notoriously hard to finance, causing long delays in actually deploying funds”.

An EU official said the low payment rate reflected “the normal or expected implementation milestones for Innovation Fund projects”, adding that “first-of-a-kind projects generally also need more time to reach financial close, be built and enter into operation compared to, for example, research projects”.

“While the application process is demanding, it is also an opportunity to improve the project and the effort is commensurate with the size of the support that is offered,” the official added.

Another issue with the fund is that market conditions in Europe make it difficult even for companies that receive grants to establish themselves and turn a profit.

Vianode, a company making low-carbon synthetic graphite for electric vehicle batteries, was awarded a €90mn grant in 2023 but decided not to go through with its European facility because of the flood of cheap Chinese graphite into the market. It instead set up in Canada, where it secured an offtake agreement with General Motors.

“In the end it comes down to what price you can compete for and with the Chinese dominance, the European market is very, very challenging for us now. It’s different in North America: there the battery producers have an incentive to choose non-Chinese,” said Andreas Forfang, vice-president for sustainability and public affairs at Vianode.

Leon de Graaf of the Brussels-based consultancy Sustainable Public Affairs, said the Innovation Fund “clearly serves a purpose”. Its application rounds were often several times subscribed, he said, adding that “the way the money is currently given is not fit for purpose”.

The commission has estimated that about €40bn could flow from the ETS into the Innovation Fund by 2030.

But van Hoorn said the small proportion that had so far been paid out showed that “most money is just sitting there due to complex milestones” resulting in a “huge opportunity cost” for the EU.

HONG KONG — China’s factory activity contracted for the eighth straight month in November, according to an official survey on Sunday, underscoring challenges for the country’s economy despite the U.S.-China trade truce.

The official manufacturing purchasing managers index rose slightly to 49.2 in November from 49 in October, China’s National Bureau of Statistics said.

The PMI is measured on a scale between 0 and 100, with a reading below 50 indicating contraction. The contraction was in line with analyst expectations.

A U.S. tariff cut earlier this month likely would mean that Chinese exports could gain competitiveness in the U.S. market, but it may be too early to say whether exports have regained momentum following the trade truce.

U.S. President Donald Trump said the U.S. would cut its tariffs on Chinese goods after meeting Chinese leader Xi Jinping in South Korea on Oct. 30, raising some optimism over Chinese exports and manufacturing.

A prolonged slump in China’s property market and falling home prices are still hurting consumer confidence, and real estate investments have been down. Intense price competition domestically in many sectors including the auto industry have also put pressure on many businesses.

More government policy support is required to help boost the economy, economists said.

But “policymakers appear to be delaying further policy support,” Lynn Song, chief economist for Greater China at ING bank, wrote in a note earlier this month.

While Chinese authorities previously rolled out measures such as trade-in subsidies for home appliances and electric vehicles, some of these subsidies are set to be phased out, and sales and demand are likely to drop, analysts said.

The fading boost from the consumer goods trade-in policies may be weighing on domestic demand for manufactured goods and “signals on domestic demand have been mixed,” said Zichun Huang, China economist at Capital Economics, last week.

Chinese officials have set a target of around 5% economic growth for the whole of 2025. The economy expanded 4.8% in the July-September quarter.

“This year’s growth target is likely to require minimal additional support to be reached,” Song wrote.

Story Continues

• Keppel REIT recently issued S$100 million in subordinated perpetual securities under its multicurrency debt programme, having received approval-in-principle for listing on the Singapore Exchange.

• This move is set to provide Keppel REIT with greater financial flexibility and supports its plans for future portfolio growth.

• We will assess how the increased capital flexibility from this perpetual securities issuance could shift Keppel REIT’s investment narrative.

Uncover the next big thing with financially sound penny stocks that balance risk and reward.

To be a shareholder in Keppel REIT, you need confidence in the continued strong demand for premium Grade A office space in Singapore and regional gateway cities, as well as the trust’s ability to manage sector and geographic concentration risks. The recent S$100 million perpetual securities issuance boosts Keppel REIT’s capital flexibility, but does not materially change the main short-term catalyst of rental growth in key markets or the cyclical risks tied to office occupancy and portfolio concentration.

Among recent developments, the acquisition of a 75% interest in Top Ryde City Shopping Centre in Sydney stands out. This move is relevant as it increases portfolio diversification beyond the office sector and into retail, potentially balancing the risks posed by Keppel REIT’s office-heavy exposure while positioning the trust to benefit from stable, non-discretionary retail income streams.

Yet, while recent expansion points to greater diversification, investors should still keep an eye on the persistent risks from concentrated exposure to Singapore’s office market if…

Read the full narrative on Keppel REIT (it’s free!)

Keppel REIT’s narrative projects SGD319.1 million in revenue and SGD188.0 million in earnings by 2028. This requires a 6.4% annual revenue decline and an earnings increase of about 19% from today’s earnings of SGD157.8 million.

Uncover how Keppel REIT’s forecasts yield a SGD1.06 fair value, in line with its current price.

Simply Wall St Community members provided 2 fair value estimates for Keppel REIT, ranging from S$1.06 to S$1.72 per unit. Ongoing concerns about sector-specific downturns and portfolio concentration continue to shape differing outlooks on future performance, explore these varied perspectives to better understand your options.

Explore 2 other fair value estimates on Keppel REIT – why the stock might be worth just SGD1.06!

Disagree with existing narratives? Create your own in under 3 minutes – extraordinary investment returns rarely come from following the herd.

Early movers are already taking notice. See the stocks they’re targeting before they’ve flown the coop:

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

Companies discussed in this article include K71U.SI.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

• Thinking about investing in NuScale Power? You might be wondering whether the recent ups and downs in the share price have created a new value opportunity, or if the risk profile has just shifted.

• NuScale’s stock has moved a lot lately, climbing 7.5% over the past week, but still down 52.7% across the last month and 32.5% over the last year. This reflects a volatile period, despite a notable 12.9% gain year to date.

• News of new project partnerships, as well as ongoing discussions about U.S. energy policy and small modular reactor adoption, have been fueling trading sentiment recently. Investors are weighing both the growth potential of NuScale’s nuclear technology and the challenges facing the broader clean energy sector.

• With a valuation score of 1 out of 6, there is a lot to uncover about how NuScale Power stacks up on different valuation metrics. Stay tuned as we break those down and reveal a smarter way to interpret valuation at the end.

NuScale Power scores just 1/6 on our valuation checks. See what other red flags we found in the full valuation breakdown.

A Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model estimates a company’s intrinsic value by forecasting its future cash flows and discounting them back to today. This approach attempts to answer what NuScale Power is fundamentally worth based on current and expected financial performance.

Currently, NuScale Power’s latest twelve-month Free Cash Flow (FCF) sits at a negative $284.0 million, and analysts expect the company to remain cash flow negative for the next several years. According to projections, NuScale’s FCF is only expected to turn positive by 2029, reaching $27.4 million, with continued growth beyond that point driven by anticipated deployment of its modular nuclear technology. Notably, the longer-term FCF forecasts, extending out to 2035, are largely extrapolated from analyst consensus.

Plugging these estimates into the DCF model yields a “fair value” of $3.20 per share. Compared to the current market price, this implies the stock is 525% above its calculated intrinsic value, suggesting significant overvaluation at present.

The DCF model, therefore, paints a challenging picture for value seekers. NuScale’s growth narrative is not yet reflected in its cash flows, and the stock trades with a large premium to its estimated worth.

Result: OVERVALUED

Our Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) analysis suggests NuScale Power may be overvalued by 525.0%. Discover 917 undervalued stocks or create your own screener to find better value opportunities.

Head to the Valuation section of our Company Report for more details on how we arrive at this Fair Value for NuScale Power.

The Price-to-Book (P/B) ratio is a widely used valuation metric, especially for companies where traditional earnings or cash flow metrics may not yet reflect future potential. This often includes innovative but unprofitable businesses like NuScale Power. The P/B ratio captures the relationship between a company’s market value and its net assets, making it relevant when investor focus is on the value of assets and future growth prospects rather than current profits.

Growth expectations and risks both play a crucial role in determining what an appropriate or “fair” P/B ratio should be. High growth prospects can justify a premium, while greater risk or asset uncertainty typically means a lower fair multiple. For NuScale Power, the current P/B sits at 6.72x, which is significantly above the electrical industry average of 2.38x and the peer group average of 18.32x. This signals that the market expects substantial future value creation from NuScale’s assets compared to most competitors.

Simply Wall St’s proprietary “Fair Ratio” is designed to refine this comparison. Unlike raw peer or industry averages, the Fair Ratio blends factors like NuScale’s earnings growth outlook, profit margins, market cap, sector trends, and risk profile. This offers a more tailored assessment of what multiple is justifiable for the company now, factoring in its distinct position and prospects in the market.

Comparing NuScale Power’s current P/B of 6.72x to its Fair Ratio, the difference is meaningful. This suggests the stock is OVERVALUED on a price-to-book basis at the moment and may not yet offer an attractive entry point for value-seeking investors.

Result: OVERVALUED

PB ratios tell one story, but what if the real opportunity lies elsewhere? Discover 1439 companies where insiders are betting big on explosive growth.

Earlier we mentioned that there is an even better way to understand valuation, so let’s introduce you to Narratives, a dynamic, story-driven approach to investing used by millions of investors on Simply Wall St’s Community page.

A Narrative is your personal way of connecting the company’s story and your perspective to informed numbers. You explain what you believe will drive NuScale Power’s future, estimate upcoming revenues, earnings, and margins, and see how that translates to a fair value for the stock.

With Narratives, you can easily compare your fair value estimate to NuScale’s current price, helping decide if now is the right time to buy or sell based on your outlook rather than just traditional metrics.

What makes Narratives especially powerful is that they update automatically when new information comes in, such as earnings results or major news, so your view stays current without extra work on your part.

For example, some NuScale Power Narratives are much more bullish, forecasting a fair value as high as $40.50 per share based on rapid deployment and major utility deals, while others are more cautious, seeing risks and setting fair values as low as $17.00 per share. This shows how quickly perspectives and valuations can change as the story unfolds.

Do you think there’s more to the story for NuScale Power? Head over to our Community to see what others are saying!

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

Companies discussed in this article include SMR.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

Benzinga and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some items through the links below.

Brazil’s central bank just tightened the screws on cryptocurrency trading with new regulations that could reshape how millions of Latin Americans use digital assets—particularly stablecoins that have become a popular workaround for traditional banking systems.

The long-awaited rules, announced on Nov. 11, will extend existing anti-money laundering and terrorism financing regulations to virtual-asset service providers starting in February. For a country where crypto adoption has exploded in recent years, this is the most significant regulatory shift since Brazil approved its cryptocurrency legal framework in 2022.

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The timing isn’t coincidental. Brazilian Central Bank Governor Gabriel Galipolo has raised concerns about the growing use of stablecoins—digital currencies pegged to real-world assets like the U.S. dollar—that are often associated with illicit activity

“New rules will reduce the scope for scams, fraud, and the use of virtual asset markets for money laundering,” central bank Director of Regulation Gilneu Vivan said at a press conference, Reuters reported.

Here’s what makes stablecoins particularly tricky from a regulatory standpoint: they’re less volatile than cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, making them more useful for payments than investments. Many users have gravitated toward them specifically to bypass more heavily supervised and taxed traditional payment systems—which is exactly what policymakers want to prevent.

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The updated regulations will treat stablecoin transactions similarly to traditional currency exchanges. Buying, selling or swapping virtual assets tied to government-issued currencies will fall under foreign exchange rules, according to Reuters. Cross-border payments using digital assets—including card purchases and other electronic payment methods—will receive the same regulatory treatment.

This isn’t just semantic hairsplitting. By reclassifying these transactions as foreign exchange operations, Brazil’s central bank is bringing them under the same regulatory umbrella as traditional currency exchanges—complete with customer protection requirements, transparency standards, and compliance obligations.

The new framework will require virtual-asset service providers to meet standards around corporate oversight, security protocols, internal monitoring systems, and mandatory disclosures to regulators, according to Reuters. Authorization processes will now cover foreign-exchange and securities brokers, distributors, and virtual-asset service providers.

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Brazil’s moves matter beyond its borders. As Latin America’s largest economy, regulatory decisions made in Brasilia often influence policy discussions throughout the region. The country held four public consultations before finalizing these rules, suggesting authorities were trying to strike a balance between innovation and oversight.

The central bank’s statement emphasized that the framework includes customer protection requirements and transparency standards that previously didn’t apply to virtual-asset service providers. For legitimate crypto users, these protections could actually increase confidence in the ecosystem by weeding out bad actors.

But for those who turned to stablecoins specifically to avoid traditional banking oversight, February marks the end of that regulatory arbitrage. The new rules are a clear signal that Brazilian authorities view unregulated crypto activity as a systemic risk worth addressing—even if it means slowing down an industry that has seen explosive growth.

The question now is whether other Latin American countries follow Brazil’s lead in closing what has become a significant regulatory gap in the global financial system.

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This article Brazil Just Closed A Major Crypto Loophole—And Stablecoin Users Should Pay Attention originally appeared on Benzinga.com