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Stephen Dacus: Convenience Store Prince?

Based off the FT articles: Keohane, D. (2025). Seven & i set to list North American 7-Eleven store business . Financial Times.  https://www.ft.com/content/aa51ddce-3930-49ae-9f99-e6e629ada7ec And Keohane, D. & Dempsey, H. (2025)  The US CEO thrust into Japan’s biggest takeover battle . Financial Times.  https://www.ft.com/content/e20b33db-e4de-435a-b24a-b1b817ef7fe7 Block 3 Word Count - 753 Who is Stephen Dacus and What's Going On? Stephen Dacus is the newly appointed CEO of Seven & i Holdings, Japanese parent company of popular convenience store 7-Eleven with 13,145 stores in the US and Canada. Facing a $47bn takeover bid from Canada’s Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT), the retailer has turned to Stephen Dacus to fend off ACT’s advances and prove the company can thrive independently. Dacus has a great task in front of him. ACT’s ¥2,700 ($18.56)/share bid overshadows the current ¥2,150 ($14.87) price. Investors, fatigued by years of sluggish reform...
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Are Japan's GX Bonds Good Enough For Driving Sustainability?

This blog is based off of the articles:  Mundy, S. (2024). Unloved transition bonds are big in Japan. The Financial Times.  https://www.ft.com/content/ea9c24cc-be8c-4f01-bb59-e80c3c6e4b5d And Yoshida, K. & Temple-West, P. (2025).  Investors risk overlooking Japan’s green investment opportunities . The Financial Times.  https://www.ft.com/content/3cd9e83f-166f-49c7-8a97-aa6d09504471 Block 2 Word Count - 763 What Are GX Bonds? In February of 2024, the Japanese government started issuing Japan Climate Transition bonds (referred to as GX bonds), with the goal of supporting their Green Transformation (GX). Exploring this topic, this blog will be based off Financial Times articles written by Mundy (2024) and Yoshida & Temple-West (2025).  The GX is Japan's initiative to: "[Transform] the entire economic and social system from an economy, society, and industrial structure dependent on fossil fuels to “structures driven by clean energy” – the aim of the initiat...
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Big Tech to Spend 320 billion USD on AI in 2025

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Inspired by: Morris, S. & Uddin, R. (2025). Big Tech lines up over $300bn in AI spending for 2025 . Financial Times.  https://www.ft.com/content/634b7ec5-10c3-44d3-ae49-2a5b9ad566fa Block 1 Word Count - 769 Big Tech to Spend 320 billion USD on AI in 2025    Spending from the "Magnificent Seven" dwarves that of the rest of the stock market, and is increasing with Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Alphabet forecasting to spend upwards of a combined $320 billion on artificial intelligence (AI) in 2025. From revolutionizing cloud computing to enhancing productivity tools and transforming advertising, AI has potential to unlock new revenue streams and drive efficiency. While large investments into AI are framed as essential for securing long-term competitive advantages, they have sparked questioning from investors. Are these expansive capital expenditures a path to shareholder value creation, or do they risk destroying value in pursuit of an uncertain future?   ...
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