Select a category

The chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, has said some youths who trade in cryptocurrencies do not know that they are being used to fund t£rrorism in Nigeria.

Speaking at an event on Wednesday, the EFCC chair said some of the people who receive money to trade in cryptocurrencies do not know that their financiers are sponsors of t£rrorism.

He added that some of the 1,146 bank accounts recently frozen by the anti-graft agency were conduits for t£rrorism funding.

According to him, “Some of you are aware of our activities in the area of investigating virtual currency trading and the likes of cryptocurrencies.

They are potential platforms to fund t£rrorism. A lot of us don’t understand that. Some of our discoveries during investigation of some of these platforms were mind boggling.

We thought Binance was a major one. Yes, it was. We are prosecuting them. But there are other platforms we have discovered.

They used some of these young men. Some of them don’t know that the people who gave them money to trade are people who fund t£rrorism.”

Continue reading on Instablog

Costco Wholesale Corp. (COST) over four decades has grown into a major warehouse retailer in the U.S. and abroad by offering low prices on large packages of name-brand products. It sells groceries, appliances, electronics, apparel and other items. The company opened its first Costco warehouse under co-founders Jim Sinegal and Jeff Brotman in 1983 in Seattle, eventually merging with Price Club 10 years later. After a short period operating as PriceCostco, the company returned to the name Costco in 1997. It has expanded dramatically since then. Costco has over 127 million members who purchase long-term memberships to gain access to roughly 860 Costco warehouse stores in the U.S., Asia, Europe, and Latin America, and to make online purchases.

In the trailing 12-month period to May 2024, Costco generated operating income of $8.5 billion on revenue of $248.8 billion. The company has a market capitalization of $349 billion.

The top individual insider shareholders of Costco are Craig Jelinek, Charles Munger, and Patrick Callans, and the top institutional shareholders are Vanguard Group Inc., BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp.

"Insider" refers to people in senior management positions and members of the board of directors, as well as people or entities that own more than 10% of the company's stock. In this context, it has nothing to do with insider trading.

The shares owned by individual insider shareholders are those that are held through direct ownership. Shares mentioned in this section do not include shares held indirectly nor shares accessible through stock options. Company insiders must file an SEC Form 4 every time they buy or sell an amount of the company's stock that is deemed to be material.

Craig Jelinek owns 391,535 shares of Costco, or about 0.09% of all outstanding shares. Jelinek stepped down as CEO in January 2024 and stayed in an advisory role until the Spring. Jelinek has been a director and president of Costco since 2010, and CEO since 2012. During Jelinek's nine years at the helm, Costco has achieved steady growth, including expanding its operations into China. Costco opened its first store in China in 2019 in Shanghai. Jelinek previously held executive positions at Costco in operations and merchandising starting 2004. Jelinek's early career was in warehouse operations after joining Costco in 1984.

Charles Munger owned 187,180 shares of Costco, or about 0.04% of all outstanding shares. Munger was an independent director of the company since 1997. He was also vice chairman of the board of directors of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.B), and chairman of the board of directors of Daily Journal Corporation. He passed away in November 2023.

Patrick Callans owns 62,895 shares of Costco, or roughly 0.01% of all outstanding shares. Callans is executive vice president of Administration for Costco, a position he has held since January 2019. Prior to that appointment, Callans was senior vice president of Human Resources and Risk Management. He first joined Costco as corporate counsel in 1994.

According to Whale Wisdom, nearly 2,300 13F filers held Costco stock as of the end of Q2 2021. About 99 of them included Costco in their top 10 holdings. Institutional shareholders own about 72.30% of outstanding Costco shares.

Vanguard Group owns 40.83 million shares of Costco, representing 9.21% of total shares outstanding, as of May 2024. The company is primarily a mutual fund and ETF management company with about $7.8 trillion in global assets under management (AUM), as of September 30, 2023. The Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO) is one of the company's largest exchange-traded funds (ETFs) with about $1.1 trillion in AUM. Costco comprises 0.76% of VOO's holding, as of May 2024.

BlackRock owns 32.35 million shares of Costco, representing 7.29% of total shares outstanding, as of May 2024. The company is primarily a mutual fund and ETF management company with approximately $10 trillion in AUM. The iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV) is one of BlackRock's largest ETFs with approximately $451 billion in AUM. Costco comprises 0.78% of IVV's holdings.

State Street owns 18.7 million shares of Costco, representing 4.21% of total shares outstanding, as of May 2024. The company is primarily a manager of mutual funds, ETFs and other assets with approximately $4.34 trillion in AUM. The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) is one of State Street's largest ETFs with approximately $511 billion in AUM. Costco comprises 0.77% of SPY's holdings.

Read more on Investopedia

Walmart (WMT) shares are rising after a first-quarter earnings beat; Meta Platforms (META) is the subject of an EU child safety probe; Chubb (CB) shares are surging after the insurer was revealed to be the mystery stock Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) (BRK.B) had begun building a position in last year; Microsoft (MSFT) is reportedly asking hundreds of employees in its China-based cloud computing and artificial intelligence (AI) operations to consider transferring outside the country as tensions rachet up between Washington and Beijing over sensitive technologies; and Deere & Co. (DE) shares are tumbling after once again lowering its profit outlook for the year. Dow futures are near the 40000 threshold after markets closed at record highs Wednesday as signs of moderating inflation boosted investor bets that the Federal Reserve may cut interest rates. Here’s what investors need to know today.

Walmart (WMT) shares are up 5% about 90 minutes before the opening bell after the company reported higher-than-forecast top- and bottom-line results for its fiscal 2025 first quarter on the back of rising e-commerce sales and “upper-income" customers. The retail giant posted revenue of $161.5 billion, above the $159.5 billion average estimate compiled by Visible Alpha, while earnings per share (EPS) of 63 cents beat expectations of 51 cents. Walmart said it expects net sales for the current quarter to increase by 3.5% to 4.5% and sees full-year net sales growth at the “high-end or slightly above" its previous guidance of 3.0% to 4.0%.

Meta Platforms (META) was hit by another regulatory probe Thursday, with the European Union (EU) saying it has opened formal proceedings to assess whether the social media giant had breached its online content law over child safety risks. The European Commission, the EU’s executive body, said in a statement that it is investigating whether the company’s Facebook and Instagram platforms and algorithms “may stimulate behavioural addictions in children, as well as create so-called ‘rabbit-hole effects,’" and was "also concerned about age-assurance and verification methods." Meta stock was down less than 1% in premarket trading.

Chubb (CB) shares are surging nearly 8% in premarket trading after a regulatory filing revealed that Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) (BRK.B) has taken a sizable stake in the Zurich-based company, adding to the investment firm’s portfolio of insurers. Berkshire’s stake of nearly 26 million shares in Chubb, one of the world’s largest publicly traded property-casualty insurers, had a market value of around $6.7 billion as of March 31, making it the conglomerate’s ninth-largest holding. Berkshire owns GEICO and National Indemnity among insurance companies, which fit the legendary investor’s “buy and hold” philosophy because they provide a steady source of capital that can be deployed into long-term investments.

Microsoft (MSFT) reportedly is asking hundreds of employees in its China-based cloud computing and artificial intelligence (AI) operations to consider transferring outside the country as the Biden administration toughens controls on Beijing’s access to cutting-edge American technologyThe company is offering around 700 to 800 people—mostly engineers with Chinese nationality—the opportunity to transfer to countries including the U.S., Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, said. Microsoft shares were up less than 1% in premarket trading.

Shares of Deere & Co. (DE) are down more than 5% in premarket trading after the manufacturer of farm and construction machinery reported declining quarterly results and lowered its full-year profit guidance amid “challenging market conditions.” The company reported a 12% year-over-year slump in its fiscal second-quarter revenue to $15.24 billion and a 17% fall in net income to $2.37 billion. The maker of tractors and excavators now anticipates fiscal 2024 net income of around $7.0 billion, down from the previous range of $7.5-7.75 billion, itself a forecast that had been cut as recently as February.

Read more on Investopedia

A Nigerian political aspirant, Kene Nnadi is lucky to have survived death after he was shot several times and allegedly denied medical services.

The news was shared on X by a close friend of the victim where he revealed that hospitals refused to treat him without a police report.

According to his tweet, his friend had narrowly escaped death after he was attacked and shot several times.

After several back and forths, a hospital agreed to attend to him after which he was flown out of the country to London.

Continue reading on Instablog

A yet-to-be-identified bike rider has disappeared with three siblings in Abia State.

It was gathered that the commercial motorcyclist abd¥cted the three young brothers on their home from school on May 10, 2024 in Amaoba Ime Oboro Community in Ikwuano LGA of the state.

The children, eight-year-old Gideon Osinachi, six-year-old Divine Osinachi, and four-year-old Israel Osinachi, reportedly boarded a motorcycle with a commercial cyclist, only to disappear without a trace.

According to their mother, Glory Osinachi, “It happened on Friday at about 4pm while returning from my mother-in-law’s house.”

Gideon is a primary two pupils, while Divine and Israel are both in Nursery 3 and Nursery 1 respectively.

Meanwhile, confirming the incident on Thursday, May 16, the state Police Public Relations Officer PPRO Moureen Chinaka told Vanguard that investigation into the incident had commenced.

“The matter was reported at the police Divisional Headquarters covering that Area, and investigating is on going. However, she was asked to get the picture of her children which she is yet to comply with”, the PPRO said.

Continue reading on Instablog