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While not official, the symbol XBT has become the generally accepted symbol to represent Bitcoin in the context of other currencies. To be more accurate, XBT is the unofficial currency code for Bitcoin, just as USD is the code for the U.S. dollar and EUR represents the euro. The preceding "X" denotes that Bitcoin is an... |
BTC is more of an abbreviation than a stock symbol. It sprung up because the Bitcoin sign, a capital "B" with a short horizontal line across the vertical stroke (Ƀ), requires a trip to the Symbol menu. But it's commonly used in the Bitcoin community. BTC is also the symbol you need to look up the Bitcoin price in vario... |
In May the New York Stock Exchange launched its NYSE Bitcoin Index with the symbol NYXBT to track the price of the digital currency. It's currently based on just one source, the Coinbase Exchange. NYSE publishes it once a day, within two hours of 4 p.m. in the UK. It's pretty new, so it's not on every financial news si... |
Marching to the beat of its own drummer, the website StockTwits adopted $BCOIN to represent the digital currency. Because StockTwits links to Twitter, the symbol will turn up there as well. |
I"am currently searching for the bitcoin index symbol HUC, so far no luck! |
Thanks for reading Money Morning. The symbol HUC is not actually a Bitcoin symbol, although it is the symbol for another cryptocurrency called Huntercoin. You can find the symbols – as well as the latest prices – of hundreds of cryptocurrencies, including Huntercoin, at CoinMarketCap.com. |
Will a revised corporate structure like Alphabet with its Chinese walls protect Google from regulators? Expect further break-ups of Google core services as EU fines and pressure come to bear, DMI co-founder Ian Dodson tells Siliconrepublic.com. |
At the forefront of digital marketing in Ireland for the last 10 years, Dodson co-founded the Digital Marketing Institute (DMI), which has developed a global certification standard in digital marketing education. The number of countries that DMI now has a presence in has grown 135pc in the last year, from 32 to 70, and... |
The DMI this week signed its first education partner in the Irish market, IBAT College in Dublin. |
Earlier this week an internet storm was unleashed when Google co-founder Larry Page revealed that Google was now going to be a subsidiary of a new holding company called Alphabet. |
“Alphabet/Google, like all publicly-traded companies, is a slave to shareholder value. Shareholders are not just interested in how you make your money but where you’re spending it. |
“In the last five years Google has bought or built 35 companies in fields as far flung as solar-powered drones, life sciences studying longevity, autonomous cars, thermostats and smoke alarms — an eclectic group of businesses that have used cash from the core Google business to stay afloat. |
Dodson believes the Alphabet move is really about protecting shareholder value ahead of a raft of antitrust and anti-competition lawsuits that will be leveled at Google in the years ahead. |
Google headhunted Ruth Porat from Morgan Stanley earlier this year to act as their new CFO. Porat was Obama’s first choice in 2013 for Treasury Secretary and was a principal adviser to the US government on the Freddie Mac/Fannie Mae mortgage debacle. She has spent her entire career on Wall Street and knows what investo... |
“She is also a heavy hitter in government regulation and Google hired her fully aware that they will be spending more and more time in the coming years dealing with antitrust and anti-competition violations. |
But will a revised corporate structure like Alphabet with its Chinese walls protect Google from regulators? |
Dodson believes the appointment of Sundar Pichai as CEO of Google is an effort by Alphabet to stem the flow of high-level defections, such as Marissa Mayer to Yahoo. |
“Sundar Pichai has been a target of several other Silicon Valley companies, the most recent rumoured to be Twitter, and Page and Bryn needed to relinquish the reigns a little more to provide a career path for their top people. Promoting the talent that they’ve been building internally also provides the marketplace with... |
Outside of Google, Dodson notes a recent study by Irish start-up PageFair and Adobe which suggested that close to US$300bn is being lost a year by online publishers through ad-blocking, mostly by millennials using ad-blocking software on browsers like Chrome and Firefox. |
He said the answer to the problem lies in why millennials are choosing to block ads. |
“A lot of internet advertising is irrelevant, intrusive or clogs up the performance of the browser and your device, or it offends on all counts. |
“We’ve all visited websites that have had distracting — rather than relevant and interesting — ads at eye level with the content we’re trying to read, or seen browsers become unresponsive and — particularly on mobile — crash when the ads are too heavy on the load. |
“This is particularly hard on tab surfers, who open a lot of tabs on a publication and then read through them. |
“With this as the experience, it’s natural that folks turn to blockers that not only cull the ads from their screens but also stop a lot of scripts firing in the background that are useful for analytics. |
“The consumer is simply reacting to the activities of the digital advertising world as a whole, and we’re going to need to respond with better ads that start to think about things like browser overhead and even battery drain on mobile devices. |
The rise of programmatic advertising, where brands and publishers will be able to automate the delivery of entire campaigns across digital, is a progressive move, and web publishers of all sizes could benefit, says Dodson. |
“In the UK, 45pc of display ads were programmatic last year; and the IAB reckons it’ll go as high as 80pc by 2018. It’s already more than half in the US. The reality is as it gets bigger it’ll become more democratised. As with anything, early adopters had to contend with new technology costs and a high barrier to entry... |
“There’s a lot of inventory out there, viewability of ads has been falling and as we see with ad blockers, users are getting ticked off. So anything that might enable us to target better and respond to them on the fly, across more than just the display medium I should add, will be a positive that all marketers will flo... |
I point out to Dodson that Facebook and Twitter are rapidly becoming the front pages of news for most consumers and soon Apple will be entering the fray with its news platform. What does this mean for news? |
“Facebook and Twitter are popular because they provide a consistency of product, but first it’s always worth noting that there are plenty of other — and many uninvented — mediums that people flock to and will flock to on the internet. So I don’t subscribe to the view completely that the internet will be these two or th... |
“Still, we do know that they’re influential and have captured a lot of time for users. But how then is optimising for Facebook so different to optimising for SEO? Google moved the dial on mobile friendliness significantly by just announcing an update to their algorithm earlier in the year. |
“Everyone was falling over themselves to do something they should have done anyway, because scary Google told them to. So, marketers and content producers and promoters need to think about and optimise for Facebook or Twitter. |
Last year, the DMI produced research that suggested Irish marketing talent is lacking in the digital area, with a shortage of skilled marketing executives hurting firms’ growth. Supply is still a problem, he admits. |
“Just look at the marked increase in digital marketing vacancies vs 12 months ago and the upward pressure on salaries coming from the recruitment agency surveys. It tells its own story: the economy is bouncing back, so we have lots of opportunities for digital marketers — great news. |
“But there’s too few of them, and too few specialised people in areas like data analytics and e-commerce. So headhunting is rife, tenures are short and people are hopping around for better deals. That’s good for them, but bad for our competitiveness and bad for the firms trying to get value from their digital teams thr... |
“We need more supply, and I’d urge anyone tangentially near the digital space — in traditional marketing for example, or coming up through college in that direction — to take a look at the vacancies that are there and ask, what do I need to do to get the skills and experience listed? |
“It’s not like flying an airplane, becoming a digital marketer doesn’t require tens of thousands of euro and full-time investment to convert yourself into someone who can take a job in the space and get on the ladder,” he concluded. |
FOR A man who taught many of his students to look at the stars, it seemed entirely appropriate for Elton John's Rocket Man to being a celebration of Allan Cameron's life. |
The well-known Maclean High school science teacher died last week aged 81 years. |
At a celebration of his life held today it seemed that no matter how many stories you knew about Mr Cameron, as he was known to his students, there were many, many more. |
Across the gathered crowd, which filled both levels of the Anglican church in Maclean to capacity, all ages gathered to pay tribute to a man who stood out from the crowd. |
Many took their chance to stand out, paying tribute to Allan's unique dress sense, ranging from hats, loud shirts and many with a handkerchief tied over their head. |
"Because of dad I'm wearing this outrageous outfit," daughter Sue-Ann said with a loud pineapple patterned shirt and handkerchief over her hair. "And I don't care." |
"I've learned (from Allan) that an ordinary life can be lived extraordinarily, and that remarkable people are everywhere." |
Teacher Wayne Rice paid tribute to his long-time science colleague, remembering him as a man who was the first to volunteer to help with anything to do with the school, and a mentor for staff and students alike. |
His career spanned such time at Maclean High school, that he worked alongside many students he taught at the school in later years, and went on to teach their children, one who paid tribute via text message to the inspiration he provided her. |
A believer in discipline - "you'll meet worse bastards than me boy!" one of his many one-liners recollected, his teaching and manner with all instilled a love of science in them, and showed a passion to get through to all of his students regardless of their ability. |
To finish the service, the aisles of the church lined with Maclean High School banners, the Maclean High school song proudly sung by the congregation. |
He was carried out by members of his family and driven away to applause of a guard of honour, recognition of an ordinary man who made an extraordinary impact on his community. |
Universal Orlando Resort announced the Roman gladiator games-themed Nightingales: Blood Pit as its first original haunted house that will appear in this year’s Halloween Horror Nights. |
“Guests will be transported to ancient Rome where they must escape the gladiator arena as the bloodthirsty nightingales begin to feed on the dead and dying. But with nothing to protect them, will they make it out alive or become part of history?” Universal said in a press release Friday. |
The nightingales, the namesake of the house, are described as “a grisly race of creatures,” according to Universal. |
HHN, which features 10 haunted houses, five scare zones and live entertainment, runs on select nights from Sept. 6 to Nov. 2. Tickets are already on sale. |
Last month, Universal announced the “Stranger Things” haunted house will return again this year. |
Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg said he “made some great progress” with President-elect Donald Trump on lowering the $4 billion price tag for the new Air Force One presidential aircraft fleet and the potential sale of Boeing fighter aircraft. |
Muilenburg said his meeting with Trump on Tuesday was an "excellent conversation" which could lead to a deal "in the very near term." |
"We made some great progress on simplifying requirements for Air Force One, streamlining the process, streamlining certification by using commercial practices," Muilenburg told reporters after the meeting. "That's going to lead to substantial cost reductions." |
Regarding fighter jets the Boeing boss said, "we were able to talk about options for the country and capabilities that will, again, provide the best capability and its's done affordably." |
The meeting comes a month after Trump’s criticism of the cost of building the new Air Force One fleet by Boeing. The President-elect has been pressuring defense companies on prices through Twitter posts and meetings. On December 6, he tweeted a $4 billion contract for Air Force One was too expensive and should be cance... |
Trump has also asked the company to price a contract for Boeing's F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet to compete with Lockheed Martin's F-35 fighter, a project notoriously over budget. |
The F-35s, are used by both the Marine Corps and the Air Force currently cost the government an estimated $379 billion and ultimately is due to cost around $1.5 trillion, making it the most expensive weapons system in US history. |
According to Roger Carr, chairman of subcontractor BAE Systems, Trump has asked Lockheed Martin to reduce the fighter jet program costs by at least 10 percent. |
The Boeing CEO has not provided any other details on his meeting with the president-elect but praised his approach to negotiations, saying “Trump is doing a great job of engaging business." |
"If you want manufacturing jobs, aerospace is the place to invest," Muilenburg said. "We're proud to take on that mission, and I think Mr. Trump's engagement with industry is going to help us grow manufacturing jobs in this country." |
Regarding public university education — contrary to ivory tower elitist claims, I think California’s public universities have a very strong public responsibility ethos. |
I certainly felt that as a student many years ago. That it was a privilege to have a higher education, that part of that accomplishment was giving back some of the knowledge gained to the greater community of which the students are a part. Faculty is available to answer queries from any citizen wherever they may live o... |
Disparaging higher education is a tired red herring in California. Not to forget that universities have a 1,000-year tradition in western culture. Bah humbug to the naysayers. |
There’s a new best country in the world to retire, according to the experts at International Living (IL), an authority on global retirement and relocation opportunities. In its Annual Global Retirement Index, Mexico — one of the most popular countries among U.S. expats — has edged out last year’s No. 1, Panama. |
But truth be told, Mexico (which was ranked No. 3 in 2016), Panama and Ecuador are within a hair of each other in the new International Living rankings. “There’s just a tenth of a percentage point difference in their total rankings,” said Dan Prescher, an International Living senior editor who lives with is wife Suzan ... |
If you’re intrigued because you’re considering joining the expat community, you’re in good company. |
Six of IL’s Top 10 places in this year’s ranking are nearby, in Latin America — either in North America (No. 1 Mexico), Central America (No. 2 Panama, No. 4 Costa Rica and No. 8 Nicaragua) or South America (No. 3 Ecuador and No. 5 Colombia). Just three are in Europe (No. 7 Spain, No. 9 Portugal and a new addition to th... |
Incidentally, communities in Mexico, Colombia, Spain, Nicaragua and Portugal are also in the just-released Top 10 Best Places to Live Overseas in 2017 from Live and Invest Overseas. |
Most of International Living Top 10 countries this year “have been heavyweight contenders in our Index for some time,” said Eoin Bassett, IL’s editorial director, who is based in No. 21 Ireland. This year, IL turned its sights on 24 countries, adding Bolivia to its list (No. 18, by the way). |
Expats in Mexico told IL that they live well there on as little as $1,200 a month. “My rent is $575 a month for a two-bedroom apartment with a great modern bathroom and nice kitchen,” San Francisco native turned Puerto Vallarta resident Jack Bramy told International Living. |
To compile its 2017 ranking, International Living’s editors, correspondents, contributors and contacts around the world crunched data and personal insights for 10 categories (from Cost of Living to Visas & Residence to Fitting In to Climate). |
Cost of living is a major retirement concern for Americans, according to a recent Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies survey of U.S. workers. Respondents told Transamerica that an affordable cost of living was their most important criteria for where to live in retirement. |
So what else made these 10 countries so great this year? |
Mexico was best among International Living's Top 10 for Entertainment & Amenities, but also had impressive scores in every other category. |
Runner-up Panama received IL’s best scores for Benefits & Discounts and Visas & Residence. “Panama changed its visa situation a little and it’s now incredibly easy to get a residency visa,” said Prescher. |
Ecuador had top scores for Buying and Renting (tied with Nicaragua) and for Climate. “Ecuador has always been one of the most affordable places for real estate in Central America and the strong dollar did nothing but improve that,” said Prescher. And don’t get the ex-Nebraskan started on the unbeatable weather in his n... |
Costa Rica led the Top 10 for Healthy Lifestyle (tied with Nicaragua); Malaysia for both Fitting In (“it’s a nexus for world cultures,” said Prescher) and Health Care (it’s a popular medical tourism destination); Spain for Infrastructure (great mass transit and Internet) and Nicaragua for Buying & Renting, Cost of Livi... |
Even the International Living folks don’t think you should move to a foreign country for retirement just because it scores well in their (or anyone else’s) ranking, though. Before relocating, said Prescher, “profile yourself ruthlessly about what you really want in a place. Find out what you can and can’t live without.... |
I’d add one giant caveat about the International Living rankings: The political and economic climate in the U.S. in 2017 could change considerably, which could, in turn, affect the lure of some countries as retirement havens. |
The following are the Top 10 countries to retire abroad in 2017, according to International Living (IL), an authority on global retirement and relocation opportunities. The ranking comes from IL’s Annual Global Retirement Index, sizing up 24 countries in 10 categories from Cost of Living to Climate. |
Mexico knocked off last year’s No. 1 Panama because you can live well there for under $1,200 a month, it’s close to the United States, the locals are friendly, English is widely spoken in popular retiree spots, the expat community is large (more than 1 million Americans live there), health care is affordable and high q... |
International Living editors describe their second-best place in the world to retire as “modern, comfortable and tolerant.” Panama’s also extremely convenient for Americans. Better still, says IL, Panamanians usually treat foreigners like VIPs. |
Ecuador has been at or near the top of International Living’s annual best places to retire index for years. A few reasons: excellent weather (you can choose almost any climate you like by moving up or down in altitude); affordable health care and real estate and an assortment of retiree benefits. |
“Fitting in once you arrive is remarkably easy,” said IL Senior Editor Dan Prescher, who has lived in Ecuador with his wife for years. |
International Living says Costa Rica has been hosting retirees and other expats for more than 30 years. It’s a safe, stable, laidback Central American country that has highly-rated health care and is known for welcoming foreigners. |
On the northern tip of South America (a three-hour flight from Florida), Colombia touches the Pacific and the Caribbean and features three ranges of the Andes Mountains. |
While you can pay about $1,250 a month to rent a three-bedroom high-rise Medellin apartment, International Living says there are also places there for $500 a month. |
This Asian country is known, International Living says for its “878 idyllic islands, stunning beaches and untouched rainforests.” It’s a multicultural place that’s home to a mixture of Malay, Chinese, Indian, Europeans and Americans. |
The highest-ranking European country on International Living’s 2017 list, Spain features a low cost of living, a relaxed lifestyle, plenty of beaches and a warm climate along its coasts. |
Small one- and two-bedroom apartments rent for as little as $500 a month and can be bought for $70,000 and up, says International Living. |
And Spain’s largest, cosmopolitan cities — Madrid and Barcelona — are much less expensive than London or Paris. |
International Living is impressed by how much Nicaragua has changed in recent years — for the better. “Everywhere you look, there is progress, and the expat lifestyle gets easier and easier every year,” says IL’s editors. A few notable features: Great health care, low stress and an ability to live here for $1,500 a mon... |
You’ll also sometimes feel like you’re back home, since Nicaragua has stores such as Walmart and Pricesmart, selling everything from flat screen TVs to washing machines. |
Spain’s neighbor to the west, Portugal attracts retirees due to its low cost of living, mild climate, Atlantic Ocean beaches and the fact that many locals speak English. But International Living says the country’s lifestyle is, in many ways, classic Mediterranean. |
The Lisbon area is a favorite with expats, say IL editors. So is the nation’s second largest city, Porto — best for those who prefer cool weather. |
The Algarve region, which frequently appears on Best Places to Retire lists, is known for its golf courses, beaches and British expats. |
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