On Tuesday, the creator of the Fortnite game won its San Francisco-based trial against Google.

The lawsuit, filed three years ago, claimed that Google sought to stifle competition by imposing up to 30% fees on app developers.

It also accused Google of engaging in an illegal practice by linking its Play Store and billing service. This meant that in order for a developer’s app to appear in the Play Store, they needed to use both.

The penalty will decided next year.

Alphabet, the owner of Google, saw its shares drop 1.20% in premarket trading on Tuesday. Epic Games is privately held, although Chinese tech giant Tencent has a 40% stake.

On their website, Epic Games commented on the legal victor, saying that it was proof that “Google’s app store practices are illegal, and they abuse their monopoly to extract exorbitant fees, stifle competition, and reduce innovation.”.

The rare loss for a major US tech company in a US court marks a setback, as recent rulings have generally favoured big tech, dismissing allegations of misusing market dominance or operating illegal monopolies.

Google is currently also facing legal challenges in a federal court in Washington, where officials from the Justice Department allege that the company engaged in illegal practices to maintain the dominance of its globally leading search engine.

The case is related to Google’s substantial revenue-sharing agreements, where Apple receives a significant portion of the ad revenue generated by Google as the default search engine on Apple devices.

Tekcapital shares ticked higher on Tuesday after announcing their portfolio company Innovative Eyewear will launch Nautica branded ChatGPT-enabled Smart Eyewear in January.

The launch of Nautica-licensed smart eyewear is one of three licensing agreements with leading global lifestyle brands, including Reebok and Eddie Bauer.

Nautica will launch a line of smart eyewear with eight styles of sunglasses, two of which will also come with blue-light filtering lenses for indoor use.

All of the frames will be compatible with prescription lenses.

The collection marks Nautica’s first “Global Fit” frame designed for consumers with lower nose bridges, allowing for expanded availability in more regions.

Additional features include Bluetooth 5.2 for high-fidelity audio, up to 12 hours of music playback per charge, packaging made from 99% post-consumer recycled materials, patent-pending auto-adjusting hinges, and branded accessories such as a power brick, cleaning cloth and sail logo slipcase.

“Smart eyewear was once firmly in the remit of early adopters and tech enthusiasts alone. We are changing that forever by producing smart eyewear that is not only a functional Bluetooth accessory, but a fun and trendy fashion statement,” said Harrison Gross, CEO of Innovative Eyewear Inc.

“Combining our technology with the popular and storied Nautica brand is sure to delight consumers worldwide, and further advance our mission to make the future of eyewear smart. We look forward to launching the line via our optical store partners in January, as well as on Nautica.com soon after.”

Tekcapital has a 40% stake in NASDAQ-listed Innovative Eyewear.

Tekcapital shares were 5.1% higher, trading at 7.88p at the time of writing.

Rolls Royce shares gained on Monday after the engineering firm enjoyed another broker price target increase.

Analysts at Deutsche Bank increased their price target to 400p from 310p and currently have a ‘buy’ rating on the stock.

The Rolls Royce share price was up 2.5% on Monday, trading at 296p. Shares in the jet engine maker are the FTSE 100’s best-performing of 2023 so far, gaining a whopping 218%.

Rolls Royce has left every other FTSE 100 stock in the dust, with the second-highest share, Marks and Spencer, gaining only 110%. The FTSE 100 index is up less than 1% year-to-date.

Today’s price target increase follows JP Morgan’s upgrading of Rolls Royce to ‘overweight’ from ‘neutral’ last week. JP Morgan also has a 400p price target.

Rolls Royce recently outlined a medium-term strategy to boost operating profits to £2.5bn-£2.8bn and free cashflow to £2.8bn-£3.1bn.

DG Innovate shares rocketed higher on Monday after the junior batteries and electric motor company said it had hired ex-Tesla executives and raised £2.4m via a convertible note issue.

The company is developing two core technologies: the Enhanced Drive Technology (EDT) electric motors and Enhanced Battery Technology (EBT) sodium-ion electric vehicle batteries.

DG Innovate is among numerous companies exploring the viability of sodium-ion batteries in electric vehicles, including AIM-listed AMTE Power and privately held Northvolt.

The addition of three ex-Tesla executives to the board has sparked a wave of speculation as to what the future holds for the company, especially after one of the incoming directors, Christian Eidem, took a 29% take in the company. The executives have extensive experience at the forefront of electric vehicle innovation, and their appointment is a major vote of confidence in DG Innovate’s technology.

“The new executive management team, with their world-class track record in the electric vehicle and mobility sector, recognise the significant commercial potential in DG Innovate’s technology and the wider opportunity to use DG Innovate as a platform to build a larger company focused on the sector,” said Nick Tulloch, Chairman of DG Innovate.

DG Innovate shares were up 160% to 0.11p at the time of writing.

“Most people will have never heard of DG Innovate yet the stock was certainly shouting from the rooftop as the market opened. Initially surging by 180% in value, this tiny company delivered the type of news that sends small cap investors into a frenzy,” said AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould.

“The research and development company looking to develop next-generation batteries and electric motors has appointed three executive directors, all of whom used to work for Tesla.

“Inevitably, when you see a small business appoint ‘heavyweight’ individuals there is speculation it will lead to a takeover by one of their contacts. The fact they’re linked to Tesla is the cherry on top as it implies to investors that this little-known company could eventually be gobbled up by the electric car giant. This is pure speculation but that’s how many investors operate.

“In such situations, investors look for a strong narrative around a stock and get carried away. Stirring the pot was an equity research group saying the shares could ‘5-10 bag into New Year’, namely increase by five to 10 times in value. That comment doesn’t appear to be based on any concrete analysis.

Mould continued to detail the use of the proceeds from the convertible note raise and suggested the company could raise further funds to facilitate its strategy.

“More noteworthy is that DG Innovate has raised £2.4 million – more than half the company’s value as of last Friday. This money will be used to advance existing projects; however, the new directors have already indicated they will use DG Innovate as a roll-up vehicle for acquisitions in the electric mobility and energy storage space. That implies we could see a succession of fundraises in 2024,” Russ Mould said.

The FTSE 100 slipped on Monday as worrying Chinese economic data hit mining companies ahead of a series of interest rate decisions.

London’s leading index was down 0.5% to 7,516 at the time of writing and was underperforming major European indices. The DAX was flat, and the CAC 40 gained 0.3%.

“The FTSE 100 started the week on the back foot, dragged lower by the mining sector as figures from China over the weekend showed the economy swung deeper into deflation,” said AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould.

“An indicator of depressed domestic demand and a very different story to the inflationary pressures faced in the rest of the world, the data inevitably hit the miners given the world’s second-largest economy is such a rapacious consumer of commodities.

A deflationary environment in China will damage the FTSE 100 with a strong weighting to commodity companies. This was evident on Monday with losses in diversified miners Rio Tinto and Glencore. Rio Tinto slipped 1.5%, while Glencore fell 3.2%. Anglo American rose 1.3% after a plummeting last week.

Pure-play copper miner Antofagasta bucked the trend and rose 2% on Monday. Antofagasta is the second-best-performing FTSE 100 stock of December so far. InterContinental Hotels is the best performing, gaining 12%.

Centrica was the top faller on Monday as utility companies dipped.

The interest rate-sensitive banking and housebuilding sectors were weaker as traders trimmed positions ahead of central bank action this week.

Central bank action

Markets are preparing for a bumper week of central bank action. According to Bloomberg, central banks representing 60% of the world’s economy will decide on interest rates this week.

This includes the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve, and the European Central Bank.

Although these major central are set to issue decisions on interest rates, all are expected to keep rates on hold. Investors will pour over the accompanying commentary for hints of where rates will go in early 2024.

These comments and projections have the power to move markets significantly before Christmas.

A narrative has been established around interest rate cuts in Q1; should we learn of anything to the contrary, one would expect negativity in stocks. If hopes of rate cuts are fuelled by central bank rhetoric, we could well be on for a Santa’s rally.