Archives par mot-clé : advertising

Broadcom offers $105 billion for Qualcomm in landmark deal

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Broadcom offered about $105 billion for Qualcomm, kicking off an ambitious attempt at the largest technology takeover ever in a deal that would rock the electronics industry.

Broadcom made an offer of $70 a share in cash and stock for Qualcomm, a 28 percent premium for the world’s largest maker of mobile phone chips as of the stock’s closing price on Nov. 2, before Bloomberg first reported talks of a deal. The proposed transaction is valued at approximately $130 billion on a pro forma basis, including $25 billion of net debt.

Buying Qualcomm would make Broadcom the third-largest chipmaker, behind Intel and Samsung Electronics. The combined business would instantly become the default provider of a set of components needed to build each of the more than a billion smartphones sold every year. The deal would dwarf Dell Inc.’s $67 billion acquisition of EMC in 2015 — then the biggest in the technology industry.

« This complementary transaction will position the combined company as a global communications leader with an impressive portfolio of technologies and products, » Hock Tan, president and chief executive officer of Broadcom, said in a statement Monday. « We would not make this offer if we were not confident that our common global customers would embrace the proposed combination. »

4 Ways to Start Using Video Content in Your Marketing Strategy

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Read any article about marketing and content from the past few years, and you’ll see people advocating for video as though it’s a two-for-one ROI machine. But if you dive into video without understanding how it earned its throne, you’ll only leave frustrated.

Video gained its popularity by earning more and costing less. As trends in technology have evolved, video has become less expensive to create. At the same time, promotion and tracking tools have made major strides, making it easier for marketers to turn cheaper content into more successful collateral.

Successfully integrating video into your marketing strategy requires more than a budget shift. Before you drop everything and start filming, outline a strategy to get the most from your visual content.

Walk before you run to make thoughtful video content

Just as your bottle of cleaning solution recommends testing a small area first, your video strategy shouldn’t debut as your top investment without careful preparation. Although search engines and social media trends are rewarding video more than ever and pushing marketers toward the platform, a deliberate approach will beat a rash one every time.

Unless your content is well-designed, brand-friendly, and part of a larger message, its effect will be limited. When that happens, video marketing can’t deliver on its promises of high ROI, leaving you and your team to wonder whether video is really as valuable as everyone says.

Don’t get caught up in the crowd of subpar video content. Set up your videos to succeed by following these four steps to align them with your current strategy:

1. Update your documented marketing strategy.

We Went to Animoto’s Social Video Marketing Summit 2017 and Found Out How to Go Viral

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On Monday, Animoto, the cloud-based video creation service taking the marketing world by storm, was kind enough to invite us to their office in lower Manhattan for their  Social Video Marketing Summit 2017. Featuring speakers such as Gary Vaynerchuk, Sue Bryce, and Buffer’s Brian Peters, this two-hour summit covered all your most pressing video marketing questions.

From left to right: Susan Bryce, Jason Hsiao, and Brian Peters

(For those of you not lucky enough to receive an invite, a stream of the entire event can be found here.)

And for those of you without the attention span to watch the whole thing, here’s a recap of each speaker’s main points, along with the time at which they enter.

Gary Vee (8:38) –

“This is actually happening”

With his typical flair, Gary got the Summit started, making clear to each and every attendee just how important video is, and will continue to be. He reminded us that, whether we like it not, the digital age is happening, enveloping each and every one of us. Likening it to the introduction of the first printing press, he made it clear that if you want to “win” –defined as “emerging in the consciousness of someone you want to talk to”–you have to learn how to go viral.

“The remote control of our lives”

A few years back, Gary recalled, he realized that the mobile phone was going to drive much more of our decision making than we would ever be conscious of. Thus, he labelled it–while pulling out and pointing to his own iPhone–the “remote control of our lives.” With that in mind, he became determined to understand what works and what doesn’t in the virtual sphere.

Where once content was created “in a silo,” only to be shown to the public as a finished product, Gary believes current content creators need to take seriously the “science behind the art.” That means finding out–through trial-and-error, data collection, observation and the like–what the people want. The market, he says “is always right, not you.”

“I wasn’t shocked by anything”

Despite his penchant for public speaking, Gary claims, he’s a listener more than anything. This is what allowed him to dominate digitally by finding out what the people want by listening to what they said. He didn’t want to be a content creator, for instance, and never imagined himself as such. Nevertheless, he has “to play on other people’s terms,” leading him to where he is now. This is the mark of his famous 51/49 breakdown: give 51% to the other, and make the best of the 49% you get for yourself. Even though he was forced into a role he never imagined for himself, Gary is happy as ever, as he declared later in his talk when discussing his absence of regrets.

“Empathy. Gratitude. Patience.“

Asked for his keys to success, Gary provided the above^.

Empathy is what allows you to listen to others genuinely. Instead of simply waiting for keywords, or things that relate to you, a true empath will be able to hear others for how they want to be heard, allowing that person to gain actual information regarding what others want.

Gratitude is part of self-understanding, and, as Gary insists, you have “know who you are” before you can be successful in anything. Having gratitude is the ability to look at yourself honestly, being grateful for your gifts and fortunate circumstances and able to accept those things you may lack. Gary’s own example: a 4-times NYT Bestseller, he can’t even put a sentence together. “Tripling down” on his strengths, however, allowed him the opportunity to afford to hire a ghostwriter who could do that for him.

Patience is necessary because, as fast as the digital ecosystem evolves, success does not always come so quickly. It is only through constant failure, reevaluation, and iteration that one reaches the point at which they create something worthwhile.

 

Brian Peters (36:12) –

“Puppies pull heartstrings. Heartstrings create brand loyalty.”

Brian, Digital Marketing Strategist at Buffer, focused his talk on the “power of emotion.” There’s a reason, he said, that puppies are “the epitome of social media.” If you want to get noticed, you have to convey emotion in you content. So how do we do that?

“Let the data drive your decisions”

Just like Gary Vee, Brian stressed that in order to find out what your would-be customers are looking for, you need to listen to them. While for Gary this meant active listening with his ear, for Brian this means reviewing the data. No matter how “stupid” a particular strategy may seem to you, that won’t stop it from being a hit; instead of going off instinct, its important that marketers begin to go off of facts.

Just a couple examples he provided:

  • 92% of people access Facebook only on mobile
  • 55% of people watch videos online every day
  • Square videos, as opposed to the traditional 16×9, generate 70% more engagement and 33% less costs-per-click
  • The optimal timing for a video is 60-90 seconds, while for a Facebook Live stream it is 18-20 minutes
  • For more facts, watch the stream

“Test, iterate, improve“

While Buffer now produces almost solely successful content, it wasn’t always that way. Just like Gary’s plea for patience, Brian assures us that even the most skilled video marketers bombed at one point or another. Even some of what we may think to be our brightest ideas will ultimately turn out to receive ten views or less. The only way to get better? Do. After doing, review the data, alter your method, and make something slightly better. Do this a hundred times and all the sudden you’ve elevated yourself from an eye-roll to viral.

 

Sally Sargood (1:08:06) –

Animoto‘s own Business Video Specialist, Sally gave us a tour of all that Animoto can do for your business. Have zero clue how to make a video? Have no fear, Animoto is here. I recommend watching this part, as her step-by-step breakdown makes clear the ease with which Animoto will allow you to create professional-level video content with little to no prior experience.

Whether its their pre-designed templates, an easy-to-use homepage, or their always-on-call customer service, Sally made it clear to the audience that Animoto is the answer to any and every question they would have following a conference which urged them to market with video. She also announced the release of Animoto’s holiday-themed playbook, which can be found here. Exciting stuff.

 

Sue Bryce (1:24:22) –

“What do I say?”

If you’re going to market yourself on video, photographer/educator/ entrepreneur Sue Bryce told, you’re going to have to identify what it is you’re selling.

Over and again, she hears from creators who are skeptical of going in front of the camera that they “don’t know what to say.” She herself was once a victim of this mindset. However, she reminds us that it’s not that we don’t have anything to say, but rather often we don’t know how to say it.

For her, the key to finding out how to communicate what it is you want to get across is to become more clear on what exactly it is you’re selling. For example, Sue, a portrait photographer, wasn’t selling photographers, she was selling “the experience of beauty,” as her friend once told her. Once she understood this, it became much easier for her to speak about her product: because she was selling a feeling rather than simply a photo, she had a unique angle to take in her pitch to clients.

“You need me”

However, not any old pitch will work. If you want a client to bite, you need to convince them that more than wanting you, they need you. How?

1. Identify a problem, desire, or need

2. Solve that problem, quell that desire, or satisfy that need and then..

3. They can’t live with you!

And along the way, always remember: “You’re not selling yourself. You’re presenting yourself but you’re selling the knowledge and experience which you can give.” 

“Work on your look”

This doesn’t mean you have to be the prettiest, or most stylish. It means you have to present yourself consciously. Don’t allow any old piece of clothing define you. When you’re going in front of a camera, make sure that what you are wearing and how you are styled reflects on you in the way you want it to. Be quirky, be fun, or be cold, just do you.

Wrap-up 

The clear takeaway from this event is the importance of reaching out to customer and learning what they want. Whether this is through listening, data collection, or the holding of focus groups, each speaker made it clear that the key to their success was by looking outward, not in.

Remember, going viral is about other people, and although we’d like to think it is based totally upon some intrinsic artistic or marketing merit, it is more likely the result of carefully studying of how others have gone viral. Through finding the keys to successful campaigns, coupled with constant efforts and revamp, anyone can become a successful video creator.

Millions of Leaked Files Shine Light on Where the Elite Hide Their Money

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The Paradise Papers

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The offices of Appleby, an offshore law firm, in Hamilton, Bermuda. The company is at the center of leaked documents being called the Paradise Papers.CreditMeredith Andrews for The New York Times

By Michael Forsythe

Nov. 5, 2017

It’s called the Paradise Papers: the latest in a series of leaks made public by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists shedding light on the trillions of dollars that move through offshore tax havens.

The core of the leak, totaling more than 13.4 million documents, focuses on the Bermudan law firm Appleby, a 119-year old company that caters to blue chip corporations and very wealthy people. Appleby helps clients reduce their tax burden; obscure their ownership of assets like companies, private aircraft, real estate and yachts; and set up huge offshore trusts that in some cases hold billions of dollars.

The New York Times is part of the group of more than 380 journalists from over 90 media organizations in 67 countries that have spent months examining the latest set of documents.

As with the Panama Papers, the Paradise Papers leak came through a duo of reporters at the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and was then shared with I.C.I.J., a Washington-based group that won the Pulitzer Prize for reporting on the millions of records of a Panamanian law firm. The release of that trove of documents led to the resignation of one prime minister last year and to the unmasking of the wealth of people close to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

The predominantly elite clients of Appleby contrast with those of Mossack Fonseca — the company whose leaked records became the Panama Papers — which appeared to be less discriminating in the business it took on. Much of the material makes for dull reading: Spreadsheets, prospectuses and billing statements abound. But amid these are documents that help reveal how multinational companies avoid taxes and how the superrich hide their wealth. The records date back to 1950 and up to 2016.

Appleby has offices in tax havens around the world. In addition to its Bermudan headquarters, it works out of places like the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands in the Caribbean; the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey off Britain; Mauritius and the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean; and Hong Kong and Shanghai.

Americans — companies and people — dominate the list of clients. Past disclosures, such as the 2013 “Offshore Leaks” from two offshore incorporators in Singapore and the British Virgin Islands, the 2015 “Swiss Leaks” from a private Swiss bank owned by the British bank HSBC and another leak in 2016 from the Bahamas were dominated by clients not from the United States.

The documents come not only from Appleby, but also from the Singaporean company Asiaciti Trust and official business registries in places such as Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, Lebanon and Malta.

Setting up companies offshore is generally legal, and corporations routinely do so to facilitate cross-border transactions such as mergers and acquisitions. Appleby, in a public statement on Oct. 24, after inquiries from I.C.I.J., said that it was “subject to frequent regulatory checks” in “highly regulated jurisdictions.”

“Appleby has thoroughly and vigorously investigated the allegations and we are satisfied that there is no evidence of any wrongdoing, either on the part of ourselves or our clients,” the company said.

But with this latest leak, some wealthy individuals and multinational corporations may think twice about using offshore ownership structures, said Jack Blum, a lawyer who worked for decades on congressional committees investigating money transfers overseas.

“The danger of being found out has increased exponentially,” Mr. Blum said in an interview. “If I were a rich guy looking to hide money offshore so that the tax man won’t get me, my nightmare would be to put it in the hands of somebody whose documents leak.”

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Saudi Crown Prince’s Mass Purge Upends a Longstanding System

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In the same stroke, the crown prince has cowed businessmen and royals across the kingdom by taking down the undisputed giant of Saudi finance. And over the last several weeks he has ordered enough high-profile arrests of intellectuals and clerics to frighten the remainder of the academic and religious establishment into acceding to his will as well.

Apolitical scholars who used to speak freely in cafes now look nervously over their shoulders, as Crown Prince Mohammed has achieved a degree of dominance that no ruler has attained for generations.

“It is the coup de grâce of the old system,” said Chas W. Freeman, a former United States ambassador. “Gone. All power has now been concentrated in the hands of Mohammad bin Salman.”

Why the crown prince acted now — whether to eliminate future opposition or perhaps to crush some threat he saw brewing — was not immediately clear.

At 32 years old, he had little experience in government before his father, King Salman, 81, ascended to the throne in 2015, and the prince has demonstrated little patience for the previously staid pace of change in the kingdom.

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal in Riyadh in 2014. He is best known for his investments in brand-name Western companies.


Pool photo by Fayez Nudeldine

He has led Saudi Arabia into a protracted military conflict in Yemen and a bitter feud with its Persian Gulf neighbor Qatar. He has taken on a business elite accustomed to state subsidies and profligacy by laying out radical plans to remake the Saudi economy, lessen its dependence on oil and rely instead on foreign investment. And he has squared off against conservatives in the religious establishment with symbolic steps to loosen strict moral codes, including a pending end to the longstanding ban on women driving.

Crown Prince Mohammed’s haste, however, may now come at a price, because the lack of transparency or due process surrounding the anticorruption crackdown is sure to unnerve the same private investors he hopes to attract — including through a planned stock offering of the huge state oil company, Aramco.

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Saudi Arabian businessmen and royals anxious about the crown prince’s plans were quietly moving assets out of the country even before the arrests.

“Some of these are businessmen with international status, and if they are caught in this web then it could happen to anyone,” said James M. Dorsey, who studies Saudi Arabia at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. “How is that going to inspire confidence and attract foreign investment?”

The Saudi Arabian news media, however, celebrated the arrests as a long-awaited cleanup, appealing to populist resentment of self-enrichment enjoyed by the sprawling royal family and its closest allies.

Almost everyone in the capital, Riyadh, and other big cities like Jeddah has heard stories about princes absconding with vast sums that had been allocated for a public project.

The arrests are “a frontal assault on some members of the royal family and the impunity with which they have operated in the past,” said Bernard Haykel, a professor at Princeton University who studies Saudi Arabia.

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“It was something that had to be done,” he said, even though the absence of a judicial process “sends a chill down the spine of foreign investors.”

President Trump on Sunday appeared to give a tacit endorsement of the arrests in a phone call with King Salman. A White House summary of the call contained no references to the arrests, and said Mr. Trump had praised Crown Prince Mohammed for other matters.

Three White House advisers, including the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, returned just days ago from the latest in at least three high-level Trump administration visits to Saudi Arabia this year.

Nearly 24 hours after the arrests were announced, no Saudi authority or spokesman had identified those arrested or the charges against them.

Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, right, in Riyadh in 2014. He was removed from his post as chief of a major security service over the weekend just hours before the arrests.


Fayez Nureldine/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The Saudi-owned satellite network Al Arabiya reported only that a large number of arrests, including 11 princes, had been ordered by an “anticorruption committee” that just hours earlier had been formed under the direction of Crown Prince Mohammed. A royal decree granted the committee powers to detain individuals or seize assets without any trial, process or disclosure.

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A list of those arrested began circulating over social media shortly after midnight Sunday, and by Sunday evening senior government officials were reposting the list. News organization around the region were reporting its contents without contradiction by either the Saudi government or individuals.

In the case of the most politically potent of the detainees, the former security chief Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, the Saudi government appeared on Sunday to have started a social media campaign seeking to make him the new face of public corruption.

Analysts said the list appeared to reflect individuals with a reputation for self-enrichment and those representing rival power centers within the kingdom. Others included the power broker who once ran the royal court under King Abdullah, and the owner of one of the biggest private media companies in the region.

But another was a top aide to Crown Prince Mohammed himself — Adel Fakeih — who had been considered a driving force behind the ambitious program of economic reform, leaving analysts puzzled about the motives.

In what appeared to be an unrelated episode, a helicopter carrying another Saudi royal, Prince Mansur bin Muqrin, the deputy governor of Asir Province, which borders Yemen, was killed on Sunday along with a number of other officials when their helicopter crashed. Al Arabiya, which reported the crash in a brief dispatch, did not identify the cause.

The history of the house of Saud was sometimes punctuated by violent intrafamily strife in the decades before the founding of the modern dynasty, in 1932. Since then, the family has maintained its unity in part by spreading its top government roles and vast oil wealth among different branches of the sprawling clan. Most important was the division of the three main security services, which constitute the hard power on the ground.

King Salman, however, quickly named his favorite son, Mohammed, as his defense minister, chief of the royal court, a top economic adviser and deputy crown prince. Then, this June, the king removed his nephew, Mohammed bin Nayef, from his position as crown prince and his powerful role of interior minister in charge of the internal security forces, secret police and counterterrorism operations. Evidently anxious to forestall resistance, the king also placed the demoted nephew under house arrest. A campaign of leaks spread rumors that he had become addicted to painkillers and other drugs.

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It was unclear why the crackdown targeted Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who is best known for his past and present investments in brand-name Western companies including Twitter, News Corporation, Apple and the Four Seasons. Prince Alwaleed has been a vocal supporter of the crown prince’s plans to attract outside investors to Saudi Arabia. But when a committee of 34 senior family members — known as the allegiance council — approved Prince Mohammed’s elevation to crown prince, one of the three dissenters was from Prince Alwaleed’s branch of the family, the Talals, according to people familiar with the voting.

Michael Stephens, who studies Saudi Arabia at the Royal United Services Institute in London, recalled the bloody purges other leaders in the region have sometimes used to eliminate rivals. What Crown Prince Mohammed was doing, Mr. Stephens said, “is a more genteel way of making sure there are no challenges to your power.”

Time will tell, Mr. Stephens said, whether the arrests signal a slide into despotism or “whether we will look back and say Mohammed bin Salman is the one guy who saw the wall coming and managed to hurdle it.”

Reporting was contributed by Declan Walsh from Cairo, Neil MacFarquhar from Moscow, Nicholas Kulish from New York, Eric Schmitt from Washington and Mark Landler from Tokyo.


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Police arrest neighbor after Rand Paul is assaulted at Kentucky home

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Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is recovering after being assaulted at his Kentucky home Friday, joining a growing list of lawmakers who have been injured or threatened with violence this year.

Paul, a second-term senator, suffered a minor injury when he was assaulted at his Warren County, Ky., home Friday afternoon. Kelsey Cooper, Paul’s ­Kentucky-based communications director, said in a statement Saturday that the senator “was blindsided and the victim of an assault. The assailant was arrested, and it is now a matter for the police.”

It was unclear whether politics was a motivation for the attack, according to a senior aide to the senator, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the aide was not authorized to speak about the incident.

Kentucky State Police charged 59-year-old Rene Boucher with fourth-degree assault with a minor injury. He is being held at Warren County jail on $5,000 bond, state police said.

Boucher is an anesthesiologist and the inventor of the Therm-a-Vest, a cloth vest partially filled with rice and secured with Velcro straps that is designed to help with back pain, according to the Bowling Green Daily News.

Troopers responded to Paul’s residence at 3:21 p.m. Friday after reports of an assault. Upon arrival, troops determined that Boucher “had intentionally assaulted Paul, causing a minor injury,” state police said.

Robert Porter, who has known the senator and his family for more than 20 years, said he went to see his friend Saturday evening. He would not specify where or how the senator was injured but said Paul “didn’t get any severe injuries to his face.”

“He’s in some pain, but he’s going to be fine,” Porter said, adding that Paul’s return to Washington will be a “game-time decision” but that Paul is planning to return to work at some point in the coming days.

Paul and Boucher live in the same gated community along Rivergreen Lane in Bowling Green, Ky., according to Porter and another person close to Paul who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of respect for the senator.

Porter said Paul was mowing his lawn and wearing ear plugs Friday afternoon just before the alleged assault. Shortly after stepping off the riding mower to do something in the yard, Paul “got blindsided. He didn’t hear him or see his neighbor come over,” Porter said.

“He hadn’t really talked to his neighbor in years,” Porter said, noting that there is a large amount of land between their adjoining homes, so the lack of interaction would not be surprising to locals.

Porter said he was unaware of any previous incidents between Paul and his neighbor.

Porter said that he and Paul and their spouses raised their kids together. He also traveled with the senator to Guatemala in 2014 as part of a missionary trip to provide free eye care to hundreds of impoverished patients.

Paul, 54, has served in the Senate since 2011. He is an ophthalmologist who has practiced in Bowling Green, Ky., where he moved with his wife in 1993.

He ran unsuccessfully for president in 2016, focusing the closing months of his bid on attacking then-candidate Donald Trump and his readiness for office.

In recent months, he was a lead opponent of Republican attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

But more recently, Paul has emerged as a leading defender of Trump’s policies and has golfed with the president at Trump’s Virginia golf course.

Porter said he didn’t know whether Paul and Boucher had ever worked together at local medical facilities.

A Facebook page purportedly used by Boucher says he is a former U.S. Army pain management specialist and graduated from the College of Osteopathic Medicine in Des Moines in 1984. The page also includes links to articles or memes critical of Trump and a news article about a Montana Republican congressional candidate who attacked a reporter the day before winning his seat.

The page was overrun late Saturday by other Facebook users criticizing Boucher for his alleged assault on Paul.

While it is unclear whether the attack was politically motivated, an unprecedented wave of threats against House and Senate lawmakers this year has prompted congressional security officials to review and follow up on thousands of threatening messages to members of both parties.

The threats turned to violence this summer when House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) was shot and nearly killed by a gunman who showed up at a congressional baseball practice in Alexandria, Va.

More recently, Rep. Frederica S. Wilson (D-Fla.) skipped several days of votes after threats were made against her after she sparred with Trump over the treatment of the widow of a soldier killed in Niger.

In addition to Scalise, Paul and Wilson, Rep. Al Green (D-Tex.) has faced threats since suggesting that Trump should face impeachment. And several GOP lawmakers, including Sens. Jeff Flake (Ariz.) and Marco Rubio (Fla.), have faced threats. Rubio, another failed 2016 presidential candidate, was spotted in July walking around the U.S. Capitol with three U.S. Capitol Police officers wearing suits and ties.

Brian Fung and David Weigel contributed to this report.

Read more at PowerPost

Arriving in Japan, Trump projects confidence, says he’ll probably meet Putin during Asia trip

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President Trump waves to U.S. military personnel after giving an address at Yokota Air Base in Fussa, Tokyo Prefecture, Japan on Nov. 5. Trump arrived in the outskirts of Tokyo on the first leg of his 12-day Asian tour, during which he will attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Vietnam. (Kimimasa Mayama/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)

TOKYO — President Trump donned a military-style bomber jacket shortly after arriving in Japan on Sunday and projected confidence that the United States will confront threats in Asia, telling hundreds of U.S. troops that they will have the resources « to fight, to overpower and to always, always, always win. »

Trump’s tough talk in a speech to U.S. and Japanese military personnel at Yokota Air Base, shortly after Air Force One touched down here, aimed to set a tone for his five-nation tour during which the president said he is likely to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a regional summit in Vietnam later this week.

The president told reporters during his flight that he wants « Putin’s help on North Korea, » as his administration attempts to consolidate support for its strategy to pressure Pyongyang over its nuclear weapons program.

“History has proven over and over that the road of the tyrant is a steady march towards poverty, suffering and servitude, » Trump told the troops, perhaps referring obliquely to North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, whose name he did not mention. Noting that he has proposed a bigger military budget, Trump surveyed the troops in an air base hangar and declared: « We’ve got a lot of stuff coming; use it well. »

The boisterous scene, during which the troops cheered and chanted « U.S.A.! » was probably closely watched in capitals across Northeast Asia, where governments from Seoul to Beijing are looking for signals of how Trump will address the threat on his first trip to the region. The president’s heightened rhetoric aimed at the North and the Kim regime has set the region on edge over concerns that increasing tensions could result in a military confrontation.

[Trump heads to Asia where concerns are growing over possible war with North Korea]

On the plane, Trump told reporters that he plans to decide “very soon” whether to re-label North Korea a state sponsor of terror. The North spent 10 years on that list before being removed in 2008 by the George W. Bush administration for meeting nuclear inspection requirements. Pyongyang later violated the agreement.

But Trump also offered encouragement for North Korean citizens, calling them “great people.”

“They’re industrious, they’re warm, much warmer than the world really knows and understands,” he told reporters on the plane. “They’re great people and I hope it all works out for everybody. And it would be a wonderful thing if it could work for those great people, and for everybody.”

And he seemed unconcerned about the prospect that North Korea might use his trip to the region to demonstrate its military might by firing a missile. “We’ll soon find out,” he said. “Good luck!”

After speaking at the air base, Trump was scheduled to spend the day with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, including nine holes of golf and a dinner. At the golf course, the two signed white baseball caps with the embroidered words: « Donald and Shinzo Make Alliance Even Greater. » On Monday, the two will hold formal bilateral meetings.

The golf outing aimed to recreate the bond the two men forged during Abe’s visit in February to Trump’s Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago, where they played a round. It was while the two leaders dined together that evening that Kim launched a missile test, prompting an angry condemnation from both men at a joint statement to reporters in Florida.

Trump, who had spent Saturday night in Honolulu and toured Pearl Harbor, seemed in buoyant spirits  Sunday. He wore an unbuttoned, open-collared white shirt with no tie to chat with the press on Air Force One, and he enthusiastically donned the brown leather bomber jacket presented to him by Air Force officers at Yokota. « I like this better, » he joked, after replacing his navy blue suit coat.

[Four reasons Trump’s Asia trip is so important]

Trump confirmed that he expects to meet with Putin on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Da Nang, Vietnam, later in the trip. The meeting would come as special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia has heated up. Last week, Mueller indicted three people in Trump’s orbit — two senior campaign aides and one lower-level, unpaid volunteer — as part of his ongoing investigation.

But the president, who has often expressed admiration for authoritarian leaders, has remained reluctant to criticize Putin.

The president also promised that trade will also be a key focus of his trip, with China — a frequent target of his trade-related ire — looming largest on the economic front. Chinese President Xi Jinping consolidated power last month at the 19th Communist Party Congress, and Trump is preparing to face a newly emboldened Xi on his home turf.

“I think we’re going in with tremendous strength, » Trump said. When a reporter asked him about Xi’s elevated position, the president cut off the questioner, saying, “Excuse me, so am I.”

He then rattled off a laundry list of highlights of U.S. power, including the surging stock market, low unemployment and success in combating the Islamic State in the Middle East.

“I think he’s viewing us as very, very strong, and also very friendly,” Trump said. “But we have to do better with trade with China because it’s a one-way street right now and it has been for many years. And we will. But the reason our stock market is so successful is because of me. I’ve always been great with money, I’ve always been great with jobs, that’s what I do.”

[Trump arrives in Hawaii ahead of his five-country tour of Asia]

Trump noted that he will spend the first anniversary of Election Day 2016 in China, and facetiously invited his traveling press corps to join him in the festivities. “Can you believe it is almost exactly one year? We’re going to be in China — together,” he said. “We’ll have to celebrate together, Nov. 8. I hope we’ll all celebrate together. In fact, I was going to have a big celebration party, and then I said, ‘Well.’ But we’ll celebrate together.”

Asked about a new book about former presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, in which they sharply criticize Trump, the president showed uncharacteristic restraint.

“The Bushes? I’ll comment after we come back,” he said. “I don’t need headlines. I don’t want to make their book successful.”

Saudi Arabia Arrests 11 Princes, Including Billionaire Alwaleed bin Talal

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The king had decreed the creation of a powerful new anti-corruption committee, headed by the crown prince, only hours before the committee ordered the arrests.

Al Arabiya said that the anticorruption committee has the right to investigate, arrest, ban from travel, or freeze the assets of anyone it deems corrupt.

The Ritz Carlton hotel in Riyadh, the de facto royal hotel, was evacuated on Saturday, stirring rumors that it would be used to house detained royals. The airport for private planes was closed, arousing speculation that the crown prince was seeking to block rich businessmen from fleeing before more arrests.

Prince Alwaleed was giving interviews to the Western news media as recently as late last month about subjects like so-called crypto currencies and Saudi Arabia’s plans for a public offering of shares in its state oil company, Aramco.

He has also recently sparred publicly with President Donald J. Trump. The prince was part of a group of investors who bought control of the Plaza Hotel in New York from Mr. Trump, and he also bought an expensive yacht from him as well. But in a twitter message in 2015 the prince called Mr. Trump “a disgrace not only to the GOP but to all America.”

Mr. Trump fired back, also on Twitter, that “Dopey Prince @Alwaleed_Talal wants to control our U.S. politicians with daddy’s money.”

As president, Mr. Trump has developed a warm, mutually supportive relationship with the ascendant crown prince, who has rocketed from near obscurity in recent years to taking control of the country’s most important functions.

At 32, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is already the dominant voice in Saudi military, foreign, economic and social policies.


Fayez Nureldine/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

But his swift rise has also divided Saudis. Many applaud his vision, crediting him with addressing the economic problems facing the kingdom and laying out a plan to move beyond its dependence on oil.

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Others see him as brash, power-hungry and inexperienced, and they resent him for bypassing his elder relatives and concentrating so much power in one branch of the family.

At least three senior White House officials, including the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, were reportedly in Saudi Arabia last month for meetings that were undisclosed at the time.

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Before sparring with Mr. Trump, Prince Alwaleed was publicly rebuffed by Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who rejected his $10 million donation for the victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York because the prince had also criticized American foreign policy.

As powerful as the billionaire is, he is something of an outsider within the royal family — not a dissident, but an unusually outspoken figure on a variety of issues. He openly supported women driving long before the kingdom said it would grant them the right to do so, and he has long employed women in his orbit.

In 2015 he pledged to donate his fortune of $32 billion to charity after his death. It was unclear Saturday whether Saudi Arabia’s corruption committee might seek to confiscate any of his assets.

Saudi Arabia is an executive monarchy without a written Constitution or independent government institutions like a Parliament or courts, so accusations of corruption are difficult to evaluate. The boundaries between the public funds and the wealth of the royal family are murky at best, and corruption, as other countries would describe it, is believed to be widespread.

The arrests came a few hours after the king replaced the minister in charge of the Saudi national guard, Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, who controlled the last of the three Saudi armed forces not yet considered to be under control of the crown prince.

The king named Crown Prince Mohammed the minister of defense in 2015. Earlier this year, the king removed Prince Mohammed bin Nayef as head of the interior ministry, placing him under house arrest and extending the crown prince’s influence over the interior ministry’s troops, which act as a second armed force.

Rumors have swirled since then that King Salman and his favorite son would soon move against Prince Mutaib, commander of the third armed force and himself a former contender for the crown.


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