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Why It Pays to Start Companies in Recessions

Could a recession be the best time to launch a tech startup?

A recent study suggests that is the case. The authors found that tech startups that began operations during the 2007-09 recession—and received their first patent in that time—tended to last longer than tech startups founded a few years before or after. And those recession-era companies also tended to be more innovative than the rest.

“The effect of macroeconomic trends is not always intuitive,” says Daniel Bias , an assistant professor of finance at Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management, who co-wrote the paper with Alexander Ljungqvist, Stefan Persson Family Chair in Entrepreneurial Finance at the Stockholm School of Economics.

Drawing on data from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the authors examined a sample of 6,946 tech startups that launched and received their first patent approval between 2002 and 2012.

One group—about 5,734 companies—launched and got their patent outside of the 2007-09 recession. Of those, about 70% made it to their seventh year. But the startups that launched and got their first patent during the recession—about 1,212 companies—were 12% more likely to be in business in their seventh year.

These recession-era firms were also more likely to file a novel and influential patent after their first one. (That is, a patent the researchers determined was dissimilar to patents in the same niche that came before it, but similar to ones that came after it.)

So, why did these recession-era firms outperform their peers? Labor markets played a big role.

A widespread lack of available jobs meant that the startups were able to land more productive and innovative employees, especially in their research and development groups, and then hold on to them. More important, the tight labor markets also meant that the founding inventors—the people named on the very first patent—were more likely to stick around rather than try for opportunities elsewhere.

For startups started during the 2007-09 recession, founding inventors were 25 percentage points less likely to leave their company within the first three years. On average, about 43% of founding inventors in the entire sample left their startup within the first three years.

“Our study really highlights the importance of labor retention for young innovative startups. Retaining founding inventors cannot only help them survive, but also thrive,” Bias says.

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Original ‘Harry Potter’ Illustration Could Fetch US$600,000, the Priciest Item Ever Sold From the Hit Series

An original watercolour illustration for the cover of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, 1997 — the first book in J.K. Rowling’s hit series—could sell for US$600,000 at a Sotheby’s auction this summer.

The illustration is headlining a June 26 sale in New York that will also feature big-ticket items from the collection of the late Dr. Rodney P. Swantko, a surgeon and collector from Indiana, including manuscripts by poet Edgar Allan Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes books

The Harry Potter illustration, which introduced the young wizard character to the world, is expected to sell for between US$400,000 to US$600,000, which would make it the highest-priced item ever sold related to the Harry Potter world. This is the second time the illustration has been sold, however—it was on the auction block at Sotheby’s in London in 2001, where it achieved £85,750 (US$107,316).

The artist of the illustration, Thomas Taylor, was 23 years old at the time and a graduate student working at a children’s bookshop. According to Sotheby’s, Taylor took a “professional commission from an unknown author to visualise a unique wizarding world,” Sotheby’s said in a news release. He depicted Harry Potter boarding the train to Hogwarts on platform9 ¾ platform, and the illustration became the “universal image” of the Harry Potter series, Sotheby’s said.

“It is exciting to see the painting that marks the very start of my career, decades later and as bright as ever! It takes me back to the experience of reading Harry Potter for the first time—one of the first people in the world to do so—and the process of creating what is now an iconic image,” Taylor said in the release.

Meanwhile, to commemorate the 175th anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe’s For Annie , 1849, Sotheby’s recently reunited the autographed manuscript of the poem with the author’s home, Poe Cottage, in the Bronx.

The cottage is where the author lived with his wife, Virginia, and mother-in-law, Maria Clemm, from 1846 until he died in 1849. The manuscript, also from the Swantko collection, will remain at the home until it is offered at auction at Sotheby’s on June 26 with an estimate between US$400,000 and US$600,000.

The autographed manuscript will remain at Poe Cottage until it is offered at auction at Sotheby’s on June 26.
Matthew Borowick for Sotheby’s

Poe Cottage, preserved and overseen by the Bronx County Historical Society, is home to many of the author’s famous works, including Eureka , 1948, and Annabel Lee , 1927.

“To reunite the For Annie manuscript with the Poe Cottage nearly two centuries after it was first composed brought to life literary history for a truly special and unique occasion,” Richard Austin , Sotheby’s Global Head of Books & Manuscripts, said in a news release.

For Annie was one of Poe’s most important compositions, and was addressed to Nancy “Annie” L. Richmond, one of the several women Poe pursued after his wife Viriginia’s death from tuberculosis in 1847.

In a letter to Richmond herself, Poe proclaimed For Annie was his best work: “I think the lines For Annie much the best I have ever written.”

The poem was composed in 1849, only months before Poe’s death, Sotheby’s said in the piece, Poe highlights the romantic comfort he feels from a woman named Annie while simultaneously grappling with the darkness of death, with lines like “And the fever called ‘living’ is conquered at last.”

Poe Cottage, preserved and overseen by the Bronx County Historical Society, is home to many of the author’s famous works, including Eureka, 1948, and Annabel Lee,, 1927.
Matthew Borowick for Sotheby’s

In the margins of the manuscript are the original handwritten instructions by Nathaniel P. Willis, co-editor of the New York Home Journal, where Poe published other poems such as The Raven and submitted For Annie on April 20, 1849.

Willis added Poe’s name in the top right and instructions about printing and presenting the poem on the side. The poem was also published in the Boston Weekly that same month.

Another piece of literary history included in the Swantko sale could surpass US$1 million. Conan Doyle’s autographed manuscript of the Sherlock Holmes tale The Sign of Four , 1889, is estimated to achieve between US$800,000 and US$1.2 million.

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The Exodus of China’s Wealthy to Japan

TOKYO—Last year, China native Tomo Hayashi, the owner of a metals-trading firm, moved to Tokyo. He quickly adopted a Japanese name, spent the equivalent of about $650,000 on a luxury waterfront condo and, in March, brought his family to join him.

The 45-year-old, whose two boys just started in a Japanese elementary school, is one of the many wealthy Chinese driving a boom in high-end Tokyo properties and reshaping the city.

Frustrations with Beijing’s autocratic political system, which flared during abrupt pandemic-era lockdowns and have only grown since then, have helped drive the wave, according to real-estate agents and others watching the exodus.  China’s economic slowdown and its struggling stock market are also motivating wealthy people to leave the country, they say.

Hayashi, who like many Chinese buyers avoids discussing politics back home, said the move to Tokyo was a challenge. “But we like Japan—food, culture, education and safety,” he said.

Japan isn’t the only haven for Chinese people seeking a Plan B. The U.S., Canada and Singapore are among the countries drawing Chinese migrants, while Hong Kong residents often head to the U.K.

But Japanese cities that are just a few hours’ flight from China are a leading choice for better-off Chinese people. Japan’s real-estate prices are low for foreigners thanks to the weak yen and it is fairly easy for them to purchase property. And the Japanese writing system uses Chinese characters in part, so new arrivals can more easily find their way around.

A report last June by Henley & Partners that tracks worldwide migration trends estimated that a net total of 13,500 high-net-worth Chinese people would migrate overseas during the year, making China the biggest worldwide loser in that category.

Japan had about 822,000 Chinese residents as of the end of last year, up 60,000 from the previous year in the biggest jump in recent years.

Tokyo real-estate broker Osamu Orihara, a naturalised Japanese citizen who was born in China, said his revenue has tripled or quadrupled compared with 2019 before the pandemic, driven in large part by Chinese buyers.

“What is different from the past is there are more who want to get a long-term visa,” Orihara said.

About one-third of the condos on the floor of the 48-story building where Hayashi lives are owned by individuals with Chinese names or companies whose representatives have Chinese names, according to real-estate records. People in the neighbourhood next to Tokyo Bay, a forest of high-rise condominiums, say the typical building has a quarter or more Chinese residents.

Hayashi said a Chinese friend recommended the building. He described the price for the 650-square-foot, two-bedroom unit as reasonable compared with Hong Kong, where he briefly lived after leaving his hometown of Shenzhen, China, and he said the value has already gone up by some 10% to 15%.

The average price for new apartments in central Tokyo was up nearly 40% last year to the equivalent of about $740,000, according to industry figures. The rise was influenced by a flood of new properties appealing to affluent Chinese buyers who are concerned about a steep slump in their own market, market watchers say.

Brokers said Chinese buyers were also eager to buy resort properties. On the northern island of Hokkaido, a town named Furano that is near ski slopes saw residential land prices rise 28% last year, the fastest rate nationwide. Hideyuki Ishii, a local broker, said wealthy Chinese from the mainland, Hong Kong and Singapore were looking for vacation homes.

“A red tsunami is coming with the Chinese flag in tow,” he said.

Chinese people who want to move to Japan and buy an apartment or house generally face two challenges: getting their money into Japan and getting a visa.

China restricts how much its residents can take out of the country, but many Chinese buyers own companies with international operations or have overseas investments. Orihara, the broker, said his clients usually have a bank account in Hong Kong or Singapore from which they can wire money.

One exception, he said, was a client who bought a $190,000 property and mobilized friends and relatives to carry cash little by little over a few months.

As for the visa, people who invest the equivalent of at least $32,000 in a Japanese business that has a permanent office and two or more employees can get a business-management visa.

Other Chinese obtain a visa for what Japan describes as high-level specialists in business, technology or academia. The number of Chinese with the technology version—software engineers and the like—rose 30% between 2019 and 2023 to more than 10,000. Holders can apply for permanent residency in Japan in as little as one year under a point system that favours those with high salaries and advanced degrees.

Tokyo visa consultant Wang Yun, who is originally from China, said most of his clients were Chinese, often business owners or corporate executives in their late 30s to 50s from big cities such as Shanghai or Beijing.

Once settled, many Chinese opt to use a Japanese name, including on legal records in Japan. Some turn to Japanese readings of their name’s Chinese characters, while others pick an entirely new name.

In addition to convenience when dealing with Japanese people, using a Japanese name allows people of Chinese origin to keep a lower profile back home, where they typically still have family. That may be helpful because Chinese authorities tend to frown on the trend of people moving out with their assets.

Popular Chinese social-media platforms such as Weibo , Little Red Book and WeChat buzz with talk of purchasing real estate in Japan. There is some censorship: Citing government regulations, Weibo blocks searches using a hashtag that translates as “Chinese investors are flooding into Tokyo to buy houses,” though users can search for that subject without the hashtag symbol.

Satoyoshi Mizugami, another broker in Tokyo with roots in China, said he hoped to triple his staff to 300 people in five years to handle all the new business from Chinese buyers. A new office building is under construction to accommodate them, he said.

One of Mizugami’s clients is a 42-year-old Chinese man who was educated in the U.K. and started a restaurant business in China and the U.S. He had been living in China since the pandemic and, when he decided to leave, chose Japan because he thought the business environment was better than that of the U.S. Last year, he bought an apartment in central Tokyo, using the money from selling his U.S. business.

This buyer said he was opening a food-trading business in Japan and applying for a visa to move to Japan with his Chinese-American wife and their 4-year-old son.

On a recent morning in Tokyo, Hayashi, the buyer of the waterfront condominium, was busy helping his boys, 9 and 7, learn Japanese and English online and watching them play outside. His wife had briefly returned to China to see their 15-year-old daughter, who is staying to finish high school there.

Hayashi said he intended to stick with Japan for the long haul. He said one attraction was the high level of medical care, which he expects would be valuable when he gets older. He was careful to note that he has been paying Japanese taxes since last year. As a holder of a high-level specialist visa, he said “I’d like to get permanent residency in four or five years.”

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Sydney Mansion Aims to Be the First Australian Home to Sell for More Than A$200 Million

A Sydney waterfront mansion that has just hit the market could set a countrywide price record as the first home to sell for A$200 million (US$129.77 million).

Located in the affluent suburb of Point Piper, the sprawling home sits on a lot that’s equivalent to “four normal housing blocks” and features 98 meters (321.5 feet) of water frontage along the harbour, according to an announcement on Wednesday from Ken Jacobs, director of Australia Pacific of Forbes Global Properties, who has the listing in association with real estate agent Brad Pillinger.

“The estate is Australia’s most iconic residence and ranks amongst the best in the world, combining both privacy and space, exuding elegance and comfort, while featuring gun-barrel views of the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge,” Jacobs said in a statement.

The residence is expected to sell for A$200 million or more, Pillinger added. “There is no comparable property in Australia.”

The home, named Wingadal, as it’s located on Wingadal Place, was built for Aussie Home Loans founder John Symond, who purchased the property in 1999. It took eight years to complete the mansion, which was designed by architect Alec Tzannes, according to the listing agency.

“Wingadal is a highlight of my career in residential design and architecture,” Tzannes said. “The timeless design on the Point Piper peninsula offers a unique appreciation of Sydney Harbour from a variety of angles, rotating around an axis that lines up perfectly with the Sydney Harbour Bridge.”

The colossal home has enough internal space to entertain up to 500 people, and underground parking provides space for 20 cars, plus eight more can fit inside the garage.

The four-level home has four bedrooms as well as a two-bedroom apartment. There’s also a 2,500-bottle wine cellar, a home theater that seats 22, two commercial kitchens and a swimming pool.

“Wingadal has been a special home for my family over the past two decades, and now I’m looking forward to spending more time traveling overseas,” Symond said in a statement. “While being an exceptional family home, we have also enjoyed hosting many important events for charities and other worthwhile causes.”

This is not the first time Symond has tried to sell his waterfront estate. In 2016, he listed the home in hopes of selling it for at least A$100 million, which would’ve been a price record for the country at that time Mansion Global reported . The current benchmark was set in 2022, when a baronial-style estate, also in Point Piper, sold for A$130 million, according to The Sydney Morning Herald .

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Worried About a Stock-Market Correction? Here’s How to Lock in Recent Gains

S&P show trades falling

The past five years have been good to stock-market investors. The S&P 500 index has climbed an annualised 12% during that period, outstripping the 9% annualised gain over the past 40 years. This year alone the index is up 6.9% as of April 26, tacking on to the 24% gain in 2023.

But signs are emerging that the stock market could be due for a breather. As of April 25, the S&P 500 went 133 trading days without a decline of at least 10%, according to PNC Institutional Asset Management. To be sure, that’s still short of the 172-day average since 1928. But the S&P 500 has jumped 24% in the past six months (about 180 days), which buttresses arguments for a correction.

What’s more, the multiyear ascent has arguably sent stocks to overvalued levels. The S&P 500’s forward price-to-earnings ratio—a gauge of market valuation based on earnings estimates for the next 12 months—registered 20 as of April 26, exceeding the five-year average of 19.1 and the 10-year average of 17.8, according to FactSet.

“A correction is certainly possible,” says Jack Ablin , chief investment officer at wealth-management firm Cresset Capital, pointing to the high valuations and the prospect that rate cuts will come later than expected thanks to inflation that has been higher than expected.

Given the danger of a stock-market correction, commonly defined as a 10% to 20% drop, how can investors guard the profits they have made in recent years?

Wait and see

Assuming you have a well-diversified portfolio and aren’t counting on the money from your stocks to finance an imminent expense, financial advisers say the best strategy is to hang tight.

Corrections generally don’t stick around long. Since 1985, declines between 10% and 20% for the S&P 500 have lasted only 97 days on average—three-plus months—according to a CFRA analysis of S&P data.

It then has taken the market an additional 101 days on average to recover the ground lost during the correction. So in about six months, investors tend to be back where they were before the correction.

“If there’s a shallow correction of 5% to 10%, we recommend riding it out,” says Karim Ahamed , an investment adviser at wealth-management firm Cerity Partners. “Eventually the market recovers. The idea of selling out and climbing back in is difficult to achieve. You’re more likely to stay on the sidelines with your losses crystallising.”

The S&P 500 did fall more than 5% in recent weeks, from March 28 to April 19.

Sell losers

Some people, though, simply find it impossible to do nothing if they fear a correction is looming. At the least, they want to protect the gains they have earned so far. What’s the most prudent way for them to reduce their market exposure?

Keep in mind that most actions you can take to guard your stock profits carry a cost. The easiest method, selling stocks, subjects you to capital-gains taxes unless you are selling from a tax-advantaged retirement account. That tax rate varies according to your income, but will likely be 15%.

One way to limit the burden is through tax-loss harvesting, says Amanda Agati , chief investment officer of PNC’s asset-management group. That is when you sell stocks at a loss, lowering your net capital gain. If you have any dogs in your portfolio—stocks with poor fundamentals—you can unload those.

If you do sell stocks, you could put the proceeds into a money-market fund for now, financial pros say. Many such funds yield 5% or more, far higher than rates over the past 15 years. Or if you want to increase the safety of your overall portfolio, you could put the money into safe government bonds. Three-year Treasury notes yield around 4.75%.

Play defence

If you are going to unload stocks, but don’t want to sell right away, you can put in a stop-limit sell order through your brokerage. That order can automatically sell your shares if they slide to a level you designate (they can go below it, too), protecting you from big drops.

Say you bought 100 shares of Tesla at $140, and they are now trading at $165. If you don’t want your profit to disappear in a downturn, you could enter a stop-limit sell order with your brokerage at $150 for some or all of your shares. Those shares can be sold if the price reaches $150, securing some of the gains.

You also might shift your holdings more toward defensive stocks, such as utilities and consumer-staple companies, which generally outperform during market downturns, says Michael Sheldon , executive director of wealth-management firm RDM Financial Group.

PNC’s Agati suggests an emphasis on quality stocks, those with high recurring revenues, strong and dependable profit margins, high cash flow and low debt. These stocks—such as AutoZone and Visa , she says—have lagged behind the leaders of the market’s surge over the past year.

Consider options

Advisers also suggest looking at “put” options to protect your stock gains. Puts give you the right but not the obligation to sell a security at a preset price by a preset deadline.

Note that we’re talking about a risk-reduction approach here, not the kind of risk-taking—to try to amplify returns— that has been rampant in the options market. The simplest strategy could be to purchase a put option on a market-index exchange-traded fund, such as one based on the S&P 500. You could buy puts on individual stocks rather than an index ETF, but that may get expensive and complicated as each option carries a purchase premium.

Here’s how the ETF strategy would work: First, buy an option that would let you sell the ETF at a price below the current one, protecting you from declines beneath that level. You wouldn’t have to sell the ETF, and you wouldn’t even have to own it. As the S&P 500 falls, the put option gains in value, and you can sell it.

Say on April 16 you wanted to protect 100 shares of SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) from a decline of more than 10%. With the ETF trading at $505 a share, you could buy an option that covers 100 shares for $1,050, or $10.50 a share. You’re paying a premium equal to 2% of your position.

The option’s expiration date is December, and its strike price is $455 a share, or 10% below the current value. The strike price is the price at which you could exercise the option. But generally you sell the option rather than exercising it, so you don’t have to dump any shares, especially if you don’t own them.

If the market doesn’t go down 10% by December, you let the option expire worthless, and you’re out the $1,050 you paid for it. If the market drops more than 10%, you can sell your option at a profit whenever you want until December.

While it might be more lucrative to sell it early, Ablin recommends holding until expiration if you’re using the option to protect your portfolio. “Think of it like homeowner insurance,” he says. “You pay a premium, like a deductible for insurance, and your coverage runs for a term.”

Keeping the option until expiration extends your coverage for the longest possible period.

By using options, you don’t have to sell any of your stocks, which are typically the best asset to generate strong long-term returns. “If you have the wherewithal to hold the S&P 500 for 10 years, your odds of making money are over 90%,” Ablin says.

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Less Is More: The Case for ‘Slow Productivity’ at Work

You’re oh so busy. You’re on Slack and email and back-to-back Zoom calls , sometimes all at once . Are you actually getting real work done?

Cal Newport doesn’t think so.

“It’s like, wait a second, none of this mattered,” says the Georgetown University computer science professor and crusader for focus in a distracted age.

Newport, 41, says we can accomplish more by shedding the overload. He calls his solution “slow productivity”—and has a book by the same name —a way for high achievers to say yes to fewer things, do them better and even slack off in strategic doses. Top-notch quality is the goal, and frenetic activity the enemy.

This, he told me, is the thing that can save our jobs from AI and layoffs, and even make shareholders happy.

I had questions. Can we really be less is more at work, or have we grown addicted to constantly crossing endless tasks off our to-do lists? What will our bosses think?

After all, so many of us yearn for a burnout cure-all that will preserve our high-achiever status, and this isn’t the first you-can-have-it-all proposition we’ve heard. Champions of the four-day workweek promise we can ditch an entire workday just by working smarter. Remote-work die-hards swear it’s a win for employers and employees. Few dreams are more seductive than bidding goodbye to hustle culture, while still reaping the benefits of said hustle.

Newport acknowledges that saying no to preserve our productivity can be a delicate act. He knows that entrepreneurs have more flexibility, but says those of us who answer to managers can carve this out too. We might even find we have more power and value to our employers.

“You should take that value out for a little bit of a spin,” he suggests. He offers some pointers.

Less is more

The way we work now is a “serious economic drag,” Newport says. Knowledge workers have devolved into a form of productivity that’s more about the vibes—stressed!—than actually making money for the company. Data from Microsoft finds that lots of us spend the equivalent of two workdays a week on meetings and email alone.

One mistake we make, Newport says, is taking on too many projects, then getting bogged down in the administrative overload—talking about the work, coordinating with others—that each requires. Work becomes a string of planning meetings, waiting on someone from another department to give us a go-ahead.

Newport recommends giving priority to a couple projects, then bumping the others to a waiting list in order of importance. Make that list public, say, in a Google doc you share with bosses and colleagues.

“When workloads are obfuscated behind black boxes, it’s just people throwing stuff at each other, it’s very dangerous to say no,” Newport says.

If someone comes to you with more work, have them consider where it should go on your list, Newport says.

When you do say yes, double the estimated timelines you set to complete a project. That’s how long it’ll take to do it well, he says. And try what he calls a “one for you, one for me strategy.” Every time you book an hour-long meeting, block an hour for independent work on your calendar.

Be the one to trust

It’s a foreign and bracing approach for those of us who reflexively say yes to work requests. Newport’s philosophy requires transparency and confidence. Instead of “let me see how fast I can turn that around!”, try, “This request will take six hours. I’ll have that time in three weeks.”

This could be heresy at some companies. The trick is in the delivery, he says. Never make it seem like work tasks are a burden you shouldn’t have to face. Instead, stress that you’re trying to be as effective as you can for the team and the company. Be positive, and deliver on the timelines you promise. You’ll be seen as someone who’s organized and on top of your game.

We think bosses want someone who’s always accessible—fast to respond, fast to jump into action, Newport says. But what bosses really want is to know that a project they hand you will get done.

Bite-size shirking

Quiet quitting permanently is a bad idea, Newport says, but a little bit is good.

Don’t feel guilty, he adds. You’re working under a new, better system. We weren’t meant to work all out , every day, without seasonal shifts and pauses.

Pick a time—say, the month of July—to slow down. Don’t volunteer for extra work. Don’t offer Mondays as a possibility for meetings. Take on an easier project for cover.

He also recommends taking yourself out to a monthly movie during the workday. Say it’s a personal appointment, and enjoy the sense of control and creativity it brings.

You don’t have to nail a manifesto to the wall, he adds, or try to change the whole company culture. Instead, quietly carve out change for yourself.

Coming into your power

The catch: You have to be really good at the part of your job that matters. And you have to get big stuff done. Remember, this is about being a happier high performer, not slacking.

“There’s no hiding,” Newport says.

I suspect this terrifies a lot of people. They’ve gotten good at being always on and typing up yet another meeting agenda. Tackling a major project or goal is often harder, and comes without a guarantee that you’re going to nail it.

Scary or not, real work is becoming imperative. AI is coming for the rote parts of our jobs. Leaders are sussing out the “nonsense” projects and roles in their ranks as they cut jobs, Newport says. No boss wants to be left with a team of people who are aces at responding to emails.

Mastering a valuable skill puts you in control. Newport writes of people who leave corporate America behind and move where they want , working remotely as contractors, charging wild fees for fewer hours of work. The more you shed the work that doesn’t matter, and spend that time getting better at the stuff that does, the more leeway you’ll get.

“The marketplace doesn’t care about your personal interest in slowing down,” Newport writes. “If you want more control over your schedule, you need something to offer in return.”

Figure that puzzle out, and you might just be able to have it all—high achievement, and your sanity.

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Picasso Painting of Muse Dora Maar Comes to Auction for the First Time

A portrait by Pablo Picasso of his lover and muse Dora Maar will be sold at auction for the first time at a Phillips evening sale in May in New York and is estimated to realize as much as US$18 million.

Buste de femme au chapeau, 1939, depicts Maar, whom Picasso met in 1935 and remained with for a decade. Buste de femme remained in Picasso’s personal collection until he died in 1973, when Galerie Beyeler in Switzerland took ownership of the piece and kept it  alongside other works from the artist’s Femmes au chapeau series, according to Phillips.

The piece has been in the same collection for the last 30 years, according to Jean-Paul Engelen, president, Americas, and worldwide co-head of modern and contemporary art for Phillips.

According to Phillips, the painting, only 24 inches by 15 inches, employs techniques from Cubism, and contains elements familiar to Picasso’s paintings of Marr, “including his distinctive rendering of her eyes, strong line of her nose, and radical combinations of frontal and profile views.”

Untitled (ELMAR), 1982, by Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Phillips

Phillips’ modern and contemporary evening sale on May 14 will also include three previously announced works by Jean-Michel Basquiat, including a large painting from the early 1980s, Untitled (ELMAR) , 1982, that could sell for more than US$60 million.  

Barclay L. Hendricks’ 1977 work, Vendetta.
Phillips

Also in the sale is Barclay L. Hendricks’ 1977 work, Vendetta, with an estimate between US$2.5 million and US$3.5 million. The painting was featured in the artist’s first career retrospective, and toured across the U.S. from 2008 to 2009. Hendricks’ works rarely come to auction, and Engelen expects increased interest given a recent exhibition of the artist’s works at the Frick Collection in New York.

A 1978 Donald Judd “stacks” sculpture set in stainless steel and yellow fluorescent Plexiglas.
Phillips

Lastly, two sculpture “stacks” from Donald Judd will be sold. A 1978 set in stainless steel and yellow fluorescent Plexiglas, described as a “signature” piece by the artist completed when he was near the top of his career, is estimated to sell for between US$5.5 million and US$7.5 million. The second is a 1994 six-part set composed of Cor-ten steel and black Plexiglas finished just before the artist’s death early that year. It carries an estimate of US$2 million to US$3 million.

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Packard Foundation Pledges $480 Million to Ocean Conservation Over the Next Five Years

Over the next five years, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation will be committing US$480 million to an initiative dedicated to ocean conservation.

The foundation made the announcement on April 17 during the closing ceremony of the ninth Our Ocean Conference, held in Athens, Greece.

“Ocean science and conservation are core to the Packard Foundation’s DNA,” wrote Meg Caldwell, interim vice president of environment and science, in an email. “The next phase of the Packard Foundation’s commitment to ocean health, the 10-year (2023-33) Ocean Initiative, aims to protect and restore ocean ecosystems for people and nature, now and in the future.”

The support from the funding will be focused in four countries, Chile, China, the U.S., and Indonesia, which were selected because of their “biological significance, human dependence on ocean ecosystems, and opportunities to affect positive changes,” Caldwell says.

The foundation’s ocean initiative will specifically address three primary threats: climate change, unsustainable overfishing, and habitat loss. These issues not only harm ocean ecosystems, but also the countless people who rely on the ocean for “their livelihoods, nutrition, and cultural heritage, disproportionately impacting Indigenous peoples and coastal communities,” Caldwell says.

Caldwell emphasises the need to include these groups of people in the conversations and actions regarding ocean conservation.

“Weak governance and seafood supply chains that put profit ahead of people compound these threats, allowing human rights abuses and inequities to persist,” she says.

The foundation plans to address these threats by funding work within three systems: civil society, to strengthen “the engagement of ocean-reliant communities” to create more inclusive solutions; seafood supply chains, to end illegal fishing, overfishing, and human rights abuses; and governance, to enact reform that will protect both the ocean and the reliant communities.

The Packard Foundation is also a part of the Ocean Resilience and Climate Alliance, which is a philanthropic initiative working to address the climate crisis and its damage to the ocean. ORCA’s mission is “to provide a surge of more than US$250 million dollars in grants over four years to catalyze work across a handful of immediate ocean-climate priorities,” according to their website.

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Anglo American Rejects $39 Billion BHP Bid, Setting Up Likely Bidding War

LONDON— Anglo American on Friday rejected a $39 billion takeover proposal from rival BHP, saying the bid “significantly undervalues” the company and setting the stage for a potential bidding war.

London-listed Anglo American said the unsolicited proposal, which was made earlier this month and which became public this week, features an unattractive structure that is too uncertain and complex .

Anglo American Chairman Stuart Chambers said the company stands to benefit from its portfolio of assets, including copper, that are likely to experience growth from trends around the energy transition. BHP’s bid, Chambers said, is opportunistic and dilutive for shareholders.

BHP’s all-share offer valued Anglo American at about $38.8 billion, and would have been contingent upon Anglo American spinning off shareholdings in two South African-listed units. The proposal represented a premium of about 31%, not including the South African-listed units, based on Tuesday’s closing prices.

Some analysts had predicted Anglo would find the bid too low and are expecting BHP to return with another. BHP has until May 22 to make a firm offer, though the deadline can be extended. Industry participants expect other large miners to also take a run at Anglo, whose share price has dropped since 2022 as lower commodity prices have ripped through the industry.

A tie-up between BHP and Anglo American, which would be the largest mining deal on record, would illustrate the growing importance of copper, a metal essential to clean-energy products , to a sector that has long relied on Chinese industrialisation to boost profits.

Copper represents some 30% of Anglo American’s output, while BHP counts a majority stake in Chile’s Escondida, the world’s biggest copper mine, among its assets. BHP bought Australian copper-and-gold miner Oz Minerals for $6.34 billion in May last year, representing its biggest acquisition since 2011.

Copper prices are up some 15% so far this year, reflecting expectations that demand for the metal will rise as the world decarbonises and supply will be constrained. Electric vehicles and wind farms use copper in much greater quantities than gasoline-powered cars and coal-fired power stations.

Anglo American has been reviewing its assets in recent months, and has held early conversations with potential buyers for its storied De Beers diamond unit, which it values at more than $7 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

Activist firm Elliott Investment Management holds a stake in Anglo American worth roughly $1 billion, accumulated over several months and before BHP’s move on the miner, according to a person familiar with the matter. The firm is widely known for its campaigns to push companies for change to boost their stock prices. Its view of the Anglo American holding couldn’t be learned.

That said, a jump in Anglo American’s share price following BHP’s takeover offer indicates Elliott has already profited from its holding, potentially reducing any incentive for it to take any action until the outcome of BHP’s bid becomes clearer.

Anglo’s stock on Friday traded above the implied value of BHP’s offer, indicating the market expects a higher bid to emerge.

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Tesla Stock Rose Again. Three Reasons for the Jump.

Tesla stock surged again on Thursday, bringing the two-day gain to more than $28 a share, up 17.4%.

Shares closed at $170.18, up 5%, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite fell 0.5% and 0.6%, respectively.

First quarter earnings are still at work. Tesla stock rose 11.8% on Wednesday after first-quarter results reported Tuesday evening weren’t great, but were good enough. Tesla earned 45 cents a share, down from 85 cents a year earlier, but given Telsa’s disappointing 387,000 units delivered in the first quarter, investors feared a worse outcome.

More important than the bottom line earnings, Telsa said it was accelerating the development of its l ower-priced vehicle that was originally slated for late 2025. A new vehicle will help get Tesla’s growth rate up.

A second reason for the big stock gain is Contemporatry Amperex Technology Co. , which is better known as CATL.

It’s the world’s largest EV battery maker and unveiled a battery at the Beijing Auto show on Thursday that can get up to 375 miles of range with a 10-minute charge and go more than 600 miles on one charge.

The cost of the battery has to be right, but those specs are impressive and alleviate a lot of range and charging anxiety.

Tesla buys batteries from CATL.

Another reason for the Thursday is the stock charts. Tesla stock was badly beaten up coming into earnings and has some room to run before hitting resistance around $175. “Many eyes are on that [level] I’m sure,” says CappThesis founder Frank Cappelleri .

He isn’t making a fundamental call on Tesla stock. Cappelleri is a market technician who looks at stock charts to get a sense of where shares of any company can go over the short and medium terms.

Support and resistance represent levels where investors, and traders, have bought and sold shares in the past.

Tesla stock is down 32% year to date after the epic two-day run.