Financial Times Europe - 21.02.2020

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Briefing

i BS appoints ING boss as new chiefU

UBShasappointedINGbossRalphHamersasits

nextchiefexecutive,inadecisionthatpromotesthe

Dutchmanintooneofthemostpowerfulrolesin

globalfinance.— PAGE 11; LEX, PAGE 10

i loomberg campaign off to shaky startB

MichaelBloomberg’scampaignteamtriedtoputa

positivespinonthebillionaire’sdebutDemocratic

debateperformanceandeaseconcernsoverthe

viabilityofhiscandidacy.— REPORT & ED LUCE, PAGE 2

i aris Saint-Germain president tackledP

Swissprosecutorshavecharged

thepresidentofFrance’sParis

Saint-Germainfootballclubin

connectionwithbriberyaimed

atsecuringTVbroadcastrights

fortheWorldCup.— PAGE 4

i uarantined millions hit ‘download’Q

Thetensofmillionsofpeopleconfinedtotheir

homesbyChina’scoronavirusoutbreakareboosting

the$150bnvideogamessectorastheycontributeto

recorddownloadsofgamesandotherapps.— PAGE 11

i ussia accused of Georgia cyber attackR

GeorgiaandwesternallieshaveaccusedRussiaof

cyberattacksonthecountry’sinfrastructure;the

attacksinOctoberhit15,000websitesofGeorgia’s

government,courts,mediaandbusinesses.— PAGE 4

i urkish soldiers killed in Idlib air strikeT

TwoTurkishsoldierswerekilledinIdlibasthe

Syrianprovincewashitbyclashesbetween

Turkish-ledforcesandRussian-backedSyrian

regimetroops.— PAGE 3; EDITORIAL COMMENT, PAGE 8

i ar-right blamed for Frankfurt killingsF

Germanauthoritiessaidthegunmansuspectedof

shootingdead10peoplenearFrankfurtwasafar-

rightextremist.Officialsconfirmedthatnineofthe

deadwerefromimmigrantcommunities.— PAGE 4

Datawatch

Up, up and away

Ever-rising stocks are defying all

precedents— GILLIAN TETT, PAGE 9

FRIDAY21 FEBRUARY 2020 WORLD BUSINESS NEWSPAPER EUROPE

World Markets

STOCK MARKETS

Feb 20 prev %chg

S&P 500 3357.67 3386.15 -0.

Nasdaq Composite 9694.99 9817.18 -1.

Dow Jones Ind 29078.24 29348.03 -0.

FTSEurofirst 300 1676.90 1690.83 -0.

Euro Stoxx 50 3836.57 3865.18 -0.

FTSE 100 7436.64 7457.02 -0.

FTSE All-Share 4150.19 4158.30 -0.

CAC 40 6062.30 6111.24 -0.

Xetra Dax 13664.00 13789.00 -0.

Nikkei 23479.15 23400.70 0.

Hang Seng 27609.16 27655.81 -0.

MSCI World $ 2431.22 2421.47 0.

MSCI EM $ 1103.69 1095.66 0.

MSCI ACWI $ 579.87 577.32 0.

CURRENCIES

Feb 20 prev

$ per € 1.080 1.

$ per £ 1.288 1.

£ per € 0.839 0.

¥ per $ 112.090 110.

¥ per £ 144.366 143.

SFr per € 1.061 1.

€ per $ 0.926 0.

Feb 20 prev

£ per $ 0.776 0.

€ per £ 1.192 1.

¥ per € 121.096 119.

£ index 81.201 81.

SFr per £ 1.265 1.

COMMODITIES

Feb 20 prev %chg

Oil WTI $ 53.89 53.49 0.

Oil Brent $ 59.40 59.12 0.

Gold $ 1604.20 1589.85 0.

INTEREST RATES

price yield chg

US Gov 10 yr 1.52 -0.

UK Gov 10 yr 0.60 -0.

Ger Gov 10 yr -0.45 -0.

Jpn Gov 10 yr -0.04 0.

US Gov 30 yr 115.39 1.96 -0.

Ger Gov 2 yr 105.74 -0.66 -0.

price prev chg

Fed Funds Eff 1.55 1.55 0.

US 3m Bills 1.58 1.58 0.

Euro Libor 3m -0.43 -0.43 0.

UK 3m 0.75 0.76 -0.

Prices are latest for edition Data provided by Morningstar

M A D H U M I TA M U R G I A —LONDON

Artificial intelligence has been used to

discover antibiotics effective against

untreatable diseases,signalling a sig-

nificant newtool n the global fighti

against drug resistance.

In a paper publishedyesterday in the

journal Cell, researchers at the Massa-

chusetts Institute of Technology

reported the discovery of halicin, a

potent antibiotic that wascapable of

killing35powerfulbacteria.

Among the pathogens targeted were

Clostridium difficile, tuberculosis and

Acinetobacter baumannii, anessen-

tially untreatable infection oftenafflict-

ing US veterans that enters wounds and

frequentlycausesdeath.

“We are facing a global crisis, due to

increased emergence of resistant bacte-

rial pathogens that are rendering our

current antibiotic arsenal ineffective,”

said James J Collins, the biological engi-

neeratMITwholedthework.

“Ifwedon’taddressthecrisisby2050,

annual deaths due to antibiotic-resist-

ant infections will grow to 10m,higher

thanthedeathrateduetocancer.”

The new antibiotic was discovered

using a deep-learning algorithm devel-

oped by computer scientist Regina Bar-

zilay. It was trained to analyse the struc-

ture of 2,500 molecules, including cur-

rent antibiotics and other natural com-

pounds such as glucose, to determine

theiranti-bacterialpotency.

The algorithm then scanned librarya

of 100m molecules to predict how effec-

tive each would be against specific path-

ogens. It wasprimed to seek out

molecules that looked physically

different from existing antibiotics, to

avoid perpetuating the problem of

resistance among the newly discovered

compounds.

“There is still a question of whether

machine-learning tools are really doing

something intelligent in healthcare, and

how we can develop them to be work-

horses in the pharmaceuticals indus-

try,” Ms Barzilay said. “This shows how

faryoucanadaptthistool.”

Despite the scientific promise of mol-

ecules such as halicin, and eight others

discovered by the MIT lab,market

forces emain ar hurdle to theirclinical

rollout.

However,theuseofmachine-learning

to accelerate drug discovery could bring

down the cost offuture antibiotics,

while targeting untreatable diseases

might open up lucrative new markets.

“We could dramatically reduce the cost

required to get through clinical trials,”

MrCollinssaid.

AI takes medical leap with discovery of

antibiotic to fight untreatable diseases

© THE FINANCIAL TIMES LTD 2020

No: 40,329★

Printed in London, Liverpool, Glasgow, Dublin,
Frankfurt, Milan, Madrid, New York, Chicago, San
Francisco, Orlando, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore,
Seoul, Dubai, Doha

Report iPAGE 3; Opinion iPAGES 9 & 10

Chinese banks cut lending

rate to prop up economy

Austria €3.90 Malta €3.
Bahrain Din1.8 Morocco Dh
Belgium €3.90 Netherlands €3.
Bulgaria Lev7.50 Norway NKr
Croatia Kn29 Oman OR1.
Cyprus €3.70 Pakistan Rupee
Czech Rep Kc105 Poland Zl 20
Denmark DKr38 Portugal €3.
Egypt E£45 Qatar QR
Finland €4.70 Romania Ron
France €3.90 Russia €5.
Germany €3.90 Serbia NewD
Gibraltar £2.90 Slovak Rep €3.
Greece €3.70 Slovenia €3.
Hungary Ft1200 Spain €3.
India Rup220 Sweden SKr
Italy €3.70 Switzerland SFr6.
Latvia €6.99 Tunisia Din7.
Lithuania €4.30 Turkey TL
Luxembourg €3.90 UAE Dh20.
North Macedonia Den

Britain’s coal

production per

capita outstripped

that of the global

average at the

start of the 20th

century. Britain

produces just a

fraction of that

amount now, while

China and the US

continue to rely on

coal as a major

source of energy.

Cutting back

Coal production per capita (MWh)

Source: Our World in Data















   

China

India

UK

US

World

Early warning

Why Sweden has reversed course

on negative rates— BIG READ, PAGE 7

Collision course

In Sanders v Bloomberg it is the

Democrats who lose— ED LUCE, PAGE 2

L AU R A N O O N A N — NEW YORK

Morgan Stanley as become the latesth
Wall Street bank to turn to Main Street
for growth, adding millions of stock
trading millennials to its customer base
with the $13bn acquisition of online
tradingplatformETrade.
The deal, the largest by a global bank
since the financial crisis and the second
biggest ever by Morgan Stanley, comes
as rival Goldman Sachs chases US con-
sumers with its mass market wealth
managementbusinessandonlinebank.
It also comes at a time of consolida-
tion in the US wealth management mar-
ket, most notably November’s$26bn
merger etween ETrade’s rivals Charlesb
Schwab and TD Ameritrade,prompted
by a relentless decline in fees from stock

trading. “This was our preferred part-

ner, always,”James Gorman, chief exec-

utive of Morgan Stanley, told the Finan-

cialTimes.

ETrade has more than 5.2m clients

with assets totalling about $360bn,

whom Morgan Stanley describedas a

“pipeline of emerging wealth”. Morgan

Stanley’s wealth management business

— formed through decades of acquisi-

tions, including a $13.5bn deal to buy

Smith Barney in 2009 — manages about

$2.7tnofassetsfor3mclients.

Morgan Stanley projected that, after

the deal, it would make 57 per cent of its

pre-tax profits from wealth manage-

ment and investment management —

businesses that, since the financial cri-

sis, investors have valued more highly

than investment banking. Analysts and

investors have beencalling for consoli-

dation in the financial sector so that

institutions can achieve economies of

scaleanddiversify.

However, Mr Gorman insisted that

the deal was “not about being bigger, it’s

about strategy”. The Morgan Stanley

chief alsorejected suggestions that the

dealwasareactiontotheSchwabAmer-

itrade merger. “I first called and spoke

to ETrade in 2002 when I was at Merrill

Lynch,”hesaid.

MorganStanleysaidtheall-sharedeal

would deliver $400m of cost savings

within three years through efficiencies,

includingsomejobcuts.

The deal would also cut the bank’s

funding costs by $150bn within two

years, thanks to the $57bn of low inter-

est rate deposits from ETrade custom-

ers, and take the Wall Street lender into

retail banking through the platform’s

onlineaccounts.

Jon Pruzan, Morgan Stanley chief

financial officer, said the deal would

“modestly” hurt earnings per share in

2021, before breaking even in 2022 and

improvingearningsin2023.

Under the terms of the deal, investors

will receive 1.0432 Morgan Stanley

sharesforeachthattheyowninETrade.

ETrade surged 24 per cent in mid-

morning trading in New York, while

MorganStanley,fellalmost4percent.

The deal is subject to regulatory

approval but Mr Gorman said the deal

was “not something we would have put

tobigchance”.

Additional reporting by Eric Platt in New York

Lex age 10p

Morgan Stanley joins rush into

retail with $13bn ETrade swoop

3 Brokerage seen as wealth ‘pipeline’ 3 Platform brings 5.2m clients 3 Consolidation steps up

Stone decision

ail sentenceJ

for Trump ally

Roger Stone, former adviser to Donald
Trump, arrives at court in Washington
yesterday, where he was sentenced to
40 months in jail following his convic-
tion last year of lying to Congress,
obstruction and witness tampering to
protectthepresident.
The sentence was handed down by
Judge Amy Berman Jackson, the target
of repeated attacks by Mr Trump. Two
weeks ago, William Barr, Mr Trump’s
attorney-general, sparked controversy
in the case when he reversed a recom-
mendation by career prosecutors that
MrStoneserveuptonineyearsinjail.
JudgeJacksonsaidthesentencewould
not take effect until she had ruled on a
motionbyMrStoneforanewtrial.
Full story page 2
MarkWilson/Getty Images

The Wall Street

lender says the

all-share deal

will result in

some job cuts

while delivering

$400m in

cost savings