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• Each year, JPMorgan makes an annual tongue-in-cheek list of bond market awards.
• The bank named Jay Powell the central banker the year while giving Janet Yellen the lifetime achievement award.
• Check out all of the awards below.

JPMorgan makes an annual tongue-in-cheek list of bond market awards. Here it is for 2017...

Bond of the Year – Veolia 0% due 11/20. It’s not that a BBB-rated French company was able to borrow at ZERO percent, it’s that they actually charged lenders a premium for the privilege of holding their debt: 100.078 on the reoffer, or a negative yield to maturity of -0.03%! Either lending in the public markets isn’t what it used to be or we’ll look back on this as another symptom of over-exuberant monetary policy distortion. My only question is, if they had over EUR 1B in interest, why did they only issue EUR 0.5B?!? For those wondering, I am happy to report that we passed on the new issue.

Central Banker of the Year– Jerome “Jay” Powell. Honestly, I love the choice. He’s a very balanced blend of real markets experience and official institutions ideology. He’s willing to challenge the consensus views at times, but once a decision is made, he has a history of getting behind it and making it work. But how on earth did he do it?!? He was on no-one’s list at mid-year, yet effortlessly took down Cohn, Yellen, Taylor and Warsh. We should keep a very close eye on him – he’s politically more astute than he gets credit for. Now, Jay…just painlessly ‘normalize’ and deregulate so that you get re-nominated next year!

Lifetime Achievement Award– Janet Yellen. She’s done it! She’s the first Fed chair in about 40 years without a recession on their watch. She also started the normalization process with both rates and the balance sheet…while keeping the economy rolling ahead and the capital markets humming. I hope we continue to hear her policy musings in the future…she’s one cool lady!

Currency of the Year– Mexican Peso. Wait a minute…wasn’t that currency supposed to be dead and buried with a new US president and administration hell-bent on ‘America first’ and protectionist policies? It’s a powerful reminder that a currency can get oversold and that there are two sides to the trade. Congrats to Banxico for stepping in to support their currency with a powerful policy response and to the investors that happily went along for the ride.

Comeback Player of the Year– Developed Market Government Bonds. I know I’m a bond manager but, frankly, I’m getting a little tired of this. Wasn’t this supposed to be the year that we saw central banks tighten monetary policy, stimulus from DC and government bond yields reset at higher levels? The global economy is just fine and inflation is OK – sure, we’d like a bit more of both – but where is the need for these emergency central bank policies that are keeping real yields at zero? While it is true that the yield of the entire US Treasury market is up about 25 bps this year, longer maturity yields are actually down and the Treasury index has generated a positive total return of over 2% so far in 2017. It’s time for central banks to take the punch bowl away and let bond yields find their own level without the distortion and price-insensitive buying they have created.

Unsung Hero – The Yield Curve. So important, but so misunderstood. If it weren’t for a flattening yield curve, bond market returns would look poor if not negative. In some respects, it was just BAU: the Fed raises rates and the curve flattens around where investors play ‘guess the terminal Fed funds rate’. This time around, moderate inflation expectations and the ongoing torrent of cash exported from overseas into the US market also weighed on the long end of the US yield curve. It has since created some anxiety in the markets as flattening yield curves are the traditional precursor to recession. We’re not worried. For the time being its pretty normal and we’ll see what happens to the curve when the Fed and ECB dial down the size and growth in the balance sheets. What WOULD worry us is an inverted yield curve.

BTW: the runner up in this category was European bank capital notes. Good yield, tidier loan books and onerous regulation designed to prevent another crisis – what’s not to like?

Villain in a Leading Role – Bitcoin. I confess that I was getting worried about a month ago. Every asset class and asset was so well behaved, I wasn’t sure we would even have the award this year. And then it happened – like a holiday miracle – Bitcoin went vertical. We know the unprecedented amount of money printing has created significant asset price inflation – but where was the bubble? We always have one at this stage in the cycle which needs bursting. One of the great definitions of an asset bubble is that you can graph the price of the asset on a logarithmic chart, and if there is upward curvature in the line – BUBBLE! Well, here it is. I’m not going to waste my time explaining the sound concepts of ‘store of value’, ‘blockchain’ or ‘digital currency’. They will all make more sense to me once a central bank administers them. But moves of 10-20% in a day reek of monetary excess and mania.

Rookie of the Year – Cross Currency Swap Basis. Who knew that this little known domain of currency and bond geeks would emerge into the spotlight as the prerequisite for understanding 2017 capital market flows? In short, the pools of capital resident outside the US are finding their way into US assets, and are then hedged back to their home currency. The calculation on the cost of the currency hedge is based off of the differential in short term interest rates and helps to quantify the yield and/or return potential of the investment. For the bond market, shape of the yield curve in the US and the home market are important, for other asset classes, not so much. Anyway, when the cross currency swap improves, foreign flows accelerate into the US; when it declines, flows tail off. Fed normalization is going to make this a heck of a lot more fun in 2018!

Runners up – Corporate bonds and municipals. Just grinding appreciation all year…every back up was met with buying…BORING. Tax reform ought to impact these sectors next year as both the amount and type of issuance should change along with the base of potential buyers.

Most Valuable Player – QE. I really wanted ‘volatility’ (the absence of it) to be the MVP, but I just couldn’t do it. We knew that the vast pool of money printed via QE was sloshing around the markets and depressing volatility while inflating prices. There was no point fighting it, and we along with other investors made money by just going with it. Sure the macro economy was fine…sure corporate fundamentals were improving…sure central banks were being patient in withdrawing accommodation. But how to explain the rich valuations across markets? The benign backdrop simply created the cover for the vast pools of liquidity to flow into markets. This time next year it will be different. The global Central Banks’ aggregate balance sheet will shift from expansion to contraction. Then we will see if investors had been picking up nickels in front of a steamroller since Q1 2016!

SEE ALSO: The definitive guide to buying your own bitcoin

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• The Federal Communications Commission voted to repeal net neutrality rules on Thursday.
• Many of the major telecom companies were down after the vote.

The Federal Communications Commission, chaired by Ajit Pai, voted to reclassify the internet as a Class I utility, turning over so-called net neutrality regulations put in place in 2015.

After the vote on Thursday, blocking, throttling and paid prioritization by internet service providers will no longer be prohibited. Pai and his fellow Republican commission members have said reversing the rules will return the telecom industry to a period of light-touch regulation that will spur growth and investment in the sector.

The new rules are not set to go into effect for 60 days, in which critics are sure to file lawsuits to stop the rules from going into place. To no avail, the two Democratic commissioners, as well as many members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, asked Pai and his commission to delay Thursday's vote.

Many of the largest internet providers in America started the day down in anticipation of the FCC's vote, and all but Comcast ended the trading session lower than their open. The S&P 500 started the day in positive territory but ended the day down 0.39%.

Here's how the major internet providers ended the day after the vote:

• Verizon (VZ) -1.04% at $52.34
• AT&T (T) -0.79% at $37.74
• T-Mobile (TMUS) -1.27% at $62.56
• Sprint (S) -1.05% at $5.63
• Comcast (CMCSA) +1.40% at $39.12
• Charter (CHTR) -0.10% at $328.68
• CenturyLink (CTL) -1.67% at $16.47
• Telus (TU) -0.74% at $37.62
• Time Warner (TWX) -0.46% at $89.65

Read more about the net neutrality vote, and what it means for you, here.

SEE ALSO: The FCC is expected to repeal net neutrality on Thursday — here's what that means for you

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NOW WATCH: One type of ETF is taking over the market

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• Ripple's XRP overtook bitcoin cash to become the third most valuable cryptocurrency on Thursday.
• Bitcoin cash is falling on Friday after dropping a spot on the most valuable cryptocurrencies list.
• Ripple also fell slightly on Friday.
• Check out the live price of the top cryptocurrencies here.

Bitcoin cash is down 9.83% in the 24 hours after losing its spot as the third most valuable cryptocurrency by market cap. 

On Thursday, Ripple's XRP currency jumped about 78% to a market cap of $320.29 billion, overtaking bitcoin cash as the third largest digital currency. XRP is trading down 6.69% on Friday, according to data from Markets Insider. 

Bitcoin cash was created earlier this year when it split from bitcoin. Some bitcoin miners were unhappy with the direction of the cryptocurrency and decided to clone bitcoin's payments history and begin going in their own direction. Since the split, bitcoin cash has struggled to keep pace with its namesake, but is still up 534%.

Bitcoin and ethereum hold the top two spots in terms of cryptocurrency market cap, with the former's commanding more than $300 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.com. There are currently 24 cryptos with a market cap larger than $1 billion.

Bitcoin cash is up 48.97% over the past seven days, currently trading at $1,763 a coin.

Read more about bitcoin futures here.

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SEE ALSO: Bitcoin pops to new all-time high

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• CSX shares fell on Friday after the company announced CEO Hunter Harrison has taken medical leave. 
• The company has appointed James Foote, its chief operating officer, as acting CEO. 
• CSX hired Harrison in March to help turnaround the company, and concerns had been raised about his health.

Shares of the railroad-provider CSX Corporation tumbled in trading on Friday after the company announced that its CEO has taken medical leave. 

Hunter Harrison experienced "unexpected complications from a recent illness," CSX said in a statement late-Thursday without specifying the condition.

CSX shares were down 7.5% to $53.03 at 10:32 a.m. ET. They've gained nearly 48% this year. 

The company has appointed James Foote, its chief operating officer, as the acting CEO. "Hunter is a good friend and has been a colleague of mine for many years," Foote said. "He is an icon in the industry and we pray for his speedy recovery."

CSX named Harrison as CEO in March after activist investor Mantle Ridge bought a nearly 5% stake in the company and pressed for his hiring. Harrison was brought on board after helping to turn around Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railway. 

Harrison occasionally uses an oxygen tank and concerns had been raised about his health, according to Reuters. The 73-year-old executive maintained that he was fit enough to turnaround another railroad company. 

Earlier this week, Reuters also reported that the US Government Accountability Office is starting to investigate the safety of CSX's longer freight trains that were designed to boost profits. 

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• The boutique investment bank Centerview Partners is having a monster year.
• It has advised on some of the biggest deals in 2017, including the $69 billion CVS-Aetna merger and Disney's $66 billion buyout of 21st Century Fox's film and TV assets.
• With 37 senior bankers on staff, the small firm is projected to pull in as much as $13.5 million a partner.

In the first two weeks of December, two industry-shaking transactions hit the wire: CVS Healthcare announced a deal to acquire Aetna for $69 billion, and Disney agreed to buy $66 billion worth of 21st Century Fox's assets, including debt.

The boutique investment bank Centerview Partners advised on both megadeals, setting itself up for a major payday if the combined $135 billion in deals close and launching it to 10th place on Wall Street's mergers-and-acquisitions league tables.

The December deal frenzy caps a stellar year for the firm. Since August, it has advised on five announced transactions worth over $10 billion, including Gilead's $12 billion takeout of Kite Pharma, Vantiv's $10 billion buyout of Worldpay, and the $18 billion sale of Toshiba's memory-chip unit to a group of buyers led by Bain Capital.

Centerview has now leapfrogged Evercore, a fellow independent, on the M&A league tables, with $213 billion in announced deals to its name and an average deal size of $11.2 billion, according to Bloomberg data.

On a per-banker basis, few banks are having a better year than Centerview, founded in 2006 by Blair Effron, a former UBS stalwart, and Robert Pruzan, the former Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein star.

The firm has just 37 partners yet routinely battles for high-profile assignments with Wall Street's bulge-bracket banks. By comparison, Citigroup promoted more than 30 new managing directors in its corporate and investment bank this week alone, and in November Goldman Sachs promoted 101 new investment-banking MDs.

Centerview is projected to earn $400 million to $500 million this year from advising on M&A deals, according to Jeffrey Nassof, the director of the consulting firm Freeman & Co.

That works out to as much as $13.5 million in revenue per partner.

And that figure doesn't include fees from the CVS-Aetna or the Disney-Fox deal, according to Nassof, as roughly 90% are paid out when a deal closes. Those could bring in as much as $70 million in fee revenue for the bank.

Centerview has more than 10 deals valued at over $1 billion that have been announced but not closed heading into 2018, meaning the plucky boutique is tracking to have a very rich 2018 as well.

SEE ALSO: We asked 2 of Citigroup's top executives what they look for when hiring senior investment bankers

NOW READ: The looming threat from supercorporations like Amazon is helping spur a new wave of megadeals

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Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman talks to Business Insider senior political editor Josh Barro about bitcoin. Krugman says the price of bitcoin is helped by the fact that no one understands it and people are caught up in the mystique of this new technology. Following is a transcript of the video. 

Josh Barro: Finally, I want to ask you about Bitcoin. Does the runup in bitcoin prices make any sense to you?

Paul Krugman: No.

Barro:  What's going on here?

Krugman: Bitcoin, nobody understands it. Which is for the time being a positive. It comes with this —

Barro: A positive for the prices?

Krugman: For the price of it. It's got this mystique about it, because it's some fancy technological thing that nobody really understands. There's been no demonstration yet that it actually is helpful in conducting economic transactions. There's no anchor for its value. You know, unlike pieces of paper with dead presidents on them, those are anchored by the fact that you can use them to pay taxes. There's not anchor for bitcoin. But bitcoin has developed this mystique. The price is going up, partly, it's tied up with Libertarian stuff ... I'm told that there are apocalyptic, the-end-is-coming guys who are accumulating bitcoin because once we turn into a Mad Max wasteland, having a digitally distributed – nevermind. So … I think it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense. And the psychology of it is clearly — if you're using the shoeshine boy test, my barber asked me about bitcoin. The feeling that people are caught up in something that they really don't understand, is overwhelming.

Barro: So you think this is an obvious bubble?

Krugman: It's the most — if this isn't … this is even more obvious, I think, than the housing bubble was. And that one was, I thought, tremendously obvious.

Barro: So sometimes a bubble can be obvious and yet can persist for a long time. And in fact you can – I mean, you know, I've been saying that Canadian housing is in a bubble for years, and it keeps going up. And so, I mean, the nice thing about calling a bubble is that you can always — if it doesn't burst, you can always say well it's just going to burst later. But I guess the question is how long can something like this go on with bitcoin?

Krugman: Well, the thing about bitcoin is there isn't actually a whole lot of stuff… there's not — in a way the fact that it's completely untethered to anything real means that it doesn't fall until it … it can just hang there in mid-air for a long, long time. There's no obvious real — it's not like, you know, the housing crisis. If housing prices are unrealistic, then more housing gets built and you can see it. Bitcoin — the cost of producing of new bitcoins has gone crazily high. So that's not going to happen. So we're waiting for a Wylie Coyote moment. You know, the cartoon physics, he runs off the edge of a cliff and it's only when he looks down and realizes there's nothing under him and he goes ... So we're waiting for that sort of thing to happen. And that can go on for a long time. You know, a bubble is a natural Ponzi scheme, that's how Bob Shiller puts it. That it's — as long as it's going on everybody who bought in keeps making money and it looks good, and the fact that in the end somebody's going to be left holding the bag. Everybody assumes it's not going to be them.

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• Tech has outpaced the broader market by a wide margin in 2017.
• But it wasn't all smooth sailing, as many of the largest companies faced public and regulatory scrutiny along with company-level issues.
• Mark Mahaney, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, told Markets Insider that he sees little risk to the future growth of the largest tech companies.

Tech has been the fastest-growing sector this year, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 nearly doubling the gains of the S&P 500.

But tech has made its share of negative headlines this year. Facebook and Google have been facing investigations over their roles in allowing foreign influence in the 2016 presidential elections. Additionally, Apple has seen highly mixed results to its newest editions of the iPhone.

As the EU cracks down on tax evasion and anticompetitive practices by tech companies in its member states, American lawmakers have started to ponder regulating or even breaking up some of the big tech companies.

As the capabilities of AI programs skyrocket, and tech companies successfully automate more human jobs, anxiety over the future of work in the US seems to grow with the market cap of many of the tech giants.

But is it all doom and gloom for some of the world's largest companies?

With 2018 fast approaching, Markets Insider sat down RBC's Mark Mahaney to find out what could be in store for the tech sector next year.

Mahaney is one of the most widely respected analysts in the tech space and is rated in the top five analysts by Bloomberg for 14 of the 25 stocks he covers.

Following is transcript of a phone interview with Mahaney. It has been edited for clarity.

Seth Archer: Going into 2018, what are you looking out for, what gets you excited, and what are you worried about?

Mark Mahaney: Three things have remained constant about the large-cap internet stocks, at least the high-quality ones. One of these facts is that revenue growth is extraordinarily consistent. The expression we use is 'insanely consistent' in our last earnings preview.

Google, Amazon, Facebook, Netflix — all four of the FANGs— have had almost the exact same growth rate in '17, '16 and '15. Facebook has faded a little bit, but it's faded from, like, 60 down to high 40. I've been struck by how consistent the growth rates have been.

I've also been struck by how consistent the aggressive investment has been by these companies. All these companies have been spending aggressively on new areas of growth: whether it's Netflix spending more money on original content and expanding internationally, whether its Amazon spending more money on buying Whole Foods and on distribution centers for its retail business and data centers for its cloud business, whether it's Facebook investing aggressively into artificial intelligence and machine learning and into video content.

And Google is still aggressively investing in cloud — also into its projects like autonomous vehicles. The investment outlook remains aggressive for all four of those companies, and the revenue growth has remained very consistent.

And the third thing that is constant is really the multiples. The valuations on these names are very similar to where they were two years ago. The multiples have either held or have come down. It’s interesting: They've had three years in a row of dramatic market outperformance. It's not been due to a multiple rerating. That would typically be it, you'd expect. It's been entirely been due to earnings growth. The stocks have gone up because the earnings have gone up, and the earnings have gone up because the revenue growth has been consistent.

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So those are the three constants. As I think about '18, I don't see a reason why the fundamental trends behind the leading internet platforms, so I call them "PEFANG": Priceline, Expedia, FANG. I don't think there is any reason — except for the online travel names — I don't think there is any reason to expect a change, either a material change in their revenue growth or in their aggressive investment outlook.

And the multiples. It’s sort of interesting. I feel less conviction about the multiples than I do about the fundamentals of the company. Because I feel like the fundamentals are extremely intact, and since multiples have been very consistent the last three years, I don't know why they wouldn't be this year.

But as a stock picker, I would worry about if there's a rotation out of growth into value. Then, clearly, no matter how high quality they are, the internet names would underperform if there's a material rotation out of growth into value.

Archer: So you are worried about multiples going down, not them going higher right?

Mahaney: Yeah, I guess that's right. I don't think that given where the multiples are, I don't know that there's room for a lot of correction in the multiples. But I could see the multiples go down by a couple of points on each of the names as a part of the trade rotation out of growth and into value. That's a risk that I would think about.

I think the high-quality internet names, they probably face portfolio risk. I don't foresee any particular macro risk and I don't see any particular fundamentals risk. You know, famous last words — but they've been very consistent the last three years.

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Archer: You mentioned government regulations. Does that come to a head in 2018, and how does that affect earnings?

Mahaney: I don't know if it comes to a head, but there's no doubt that there is greater regulatory scrutiny of these names. OK, maybe not Netflix — but Google, Amazon and Facebook. There's no doubt that there's greater public and regulatory scrutiny now than there was 12 and 24 months ago.

And it's not only that, but there's been actual, regulatory action taken against Google in the EU. And there are two more investigations that the EU is undergoing. I'm skeptical that the regulatory public scrutiny will lead to either a material change in their revenue growth outlooks or in their cost structures. But the latter is a possibility. It's possible that they are going to have to spend more money to comply with regulations. Whether that's data-privacy regulations like those that are going to be imposed by the EU in 2018, that could lead to a rise in their cost structure. I don't think it would be material, but it's possible.

Facebook — one of the reasons they are going to be accelerating their expense growth in '18 is the need to spend more on security because of the Russian hacking of the US elections. So that's an odd expense. I don't know if that really falls under scrutiny, except that it was public scrutiny that made Facebook get more aggressive about it. I guess that's probably the biggest variable I can think of. Does regulatory and public scrutiny cause their operating costs to rise more aggressively than they would otherwise? That, to me, is one of the most interesting changes.

A couple of other trends I find interesting in the group are the increasing focus on AI and machine learning. It's very hard to see that impact from a financial perspective; it's hard to find their line in the P&L that says this is artificial intelligence, but it's in there in terms of the expenses. And it should be in there in the form of more relevant and more effective services. I guess that's point one.

The stocks have gone up because the earnings have gone up, and the earnings have gone up because the revenue growth has been consistent.

Point two is, I'm very intrigued by what I call the "voiceification" of the internet. It's not only in emerging markets. I'm not certain on this, that voice is much more of a user interface, an application-interaction method than in the developing markets. And more and more of the growth of the internet is in developing markets.

In the US, that will essentially carry the internet, or bring the internet into the car and the kitchen. I'm thinking about Alexa devices, Google Home devices, the HomePod, by Apple, whenever that comes out. So I think about that. It's not the most important platform shift of the last five years or next five years.

It's still going to be smartphones. But voiceification could also move the needle — not exactly as smartphones did, but it will move the needle.

Archer: And does AI move that needle? You said it's hard to see.

Mahaney: Yes, it must. It's one of those "submarine trends." It's impacting the tides, but it’s below the surface, so it's very hard to see it.

Read more about how tech is in the crosshairs of regulators here.

SEE ALSO: RBC: Google is in the ‘crosshairs’ of antitrust regulators — and should be kicked out of FANG

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NOW WATCH: One market expert says the financial system could collapse at any moment

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• Some have argued that the boost Nvidia has seen from cryptocurrency mining is over, but one analyst thinks differently.
• Alt-coins have been exploding in value and could provide another big boost to Nvidia's bottom line.
• Watch Nvidia's stock price move in real time here.

Some analysts have already called for the end of the crypto boom for Nvidia, but Mitch Steves, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, thinks differently.

"While the Ethereum market opportunity could fade, we are confident the market will be open (at minimum)," Steves said.

Steves argues that the bigger cryptocurrencies — bitcoin and ethereum— aren't likely to add to Nvidia's bottom line in the coming year, but almost every other one can.

Cryptocurrency miners were born alongside bitcoin in 2009, and soon figured out that the type of math required to mine the digital coins was made faster by introducing graphics cards initially used to improve video game graphics. Nvidia, as well as rival AMD, has profited massively from the trend.

But, as the number of miners increased and the process of mining got harder, it lessened the impact of buying a graphics chip. Now, there are specially designed mining rigs that maximize the ratio of power consumption to processing power, as the cost of electricity can easily outweigh the benefits of inefficient mining.

Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency as measured by market cap, is still mostly profitable to mine with a graphics processing unit (GPU), but will soon move to a "proof of stake" system for payment verification. This will greatly diminish the impact a GPU will have on the mining process. Ethereum payment verification will soon happen via a sort of voting system rather than a race to find the answer to a complicated math problem, which is the current verification method.

It's because of this change that analysts had previously called for the end of the cryptocurrency golden days for chip makers. But, cryptocurrencies not named bitcoin or ethereum have been skyrocketing in recent weeks. Litecoin’s record week keeps going, and ripple just surpassed litecoin to become the fourth-largest crypto by market cap.

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Prices are likely moving higher in many of the alternative currencies because of a large number of new players in the industry, Steves said. Cboe started offering the first future contracts for bitcoin on Sunday, and CME is soon to follow.

Iterations of bitcoin's technology that are faster, more liquid and less volatile are being tried out on the smaller cryptocurrencies, Steves said, which could also lead to a boost in confidence in all cryptos.

"On a near-term basis we think it is quite difficult to make price statements, which is why we are flagging the move now in the case that it sustains," Steves wrote in a note to clients on Wednesday. "Longer term, we think crypto currencies are here to stay and will likely become a large market."

Steves sees a long-term value of $10 trillion for the cryptocurrency market, which currently sits around the $500 billion mark.

In the even longer term, the decentralized technology that drives all the cryptos could leak into other areas of the computing world and drive an increase in demand for chips from Nvidia and AMD.

Steves rates Nvidia an outperform and has a price target of $250, which is 31% higher than its current share price.

Read more about litecoin's record-setting week here.

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SEE ALSO: Ripple overtakes litecoin as the 4th largest cryptocurrency

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NOW WATCH: One market expert says the financial system could collapse at any moment

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• Republicans have reached a preliminary agreement on their tax bill, meaning the US tax code could soon be overhauled.
• The tax bill would limit the property tax deduction to $10,000 a year; currently, homeowners can deduct their property tax in full.
• We compiled a list of the places where homeowners and prospective homebuyers are likely to be hit hardest if the tax bill is enacted.

House and Senate Republicans on Wednesday came to a preliminary agreement on their final tax bill.

The bill could affect current and future homeowners in a few different ways, including by capping the deduction for state and local property taxes at $10,000. Under the current tax system, there is no cap on the amount of property taxes a homeowner can deduct.

As part of its latest housing report, Trulia identified the top metro areas in the US with the greatest share of homeowners who pay $10,000 or more in property taxes annually. It's these places where homeowners and prospective homebuyers are likely to be hit hardest if the tax bill is enacted.

New Yorkers would be hit especially hard. In each of three New York area metros — New York City, Newark, Long Island — more than one out of every five households pay at least $10,000 annually in property taxes.

For each metro, Trulia also calculated the effective property tax rate paid by homeowners in 2016, according to data from the American Community Survey. Business Insider used that rate to estimate the minimum home value at which the annual property tax bill would be at least $10,000.

Here are the 11 worst places to buy a home if the GOP tax bill passes — with the largest share of homeowners who pay more than $10,000 in property taxes.

SEE ALSO: America's future depends on the death of the single-family home

DON'T MISS: Here's what Trump's tax plan means for people making between $300,000 and $10 million a year

11. Houston, Texas

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Effective property tax rate for 2016: 1.7%

Household property tax bills above $10,000: 10.2%

Home value at which property tax bill exceeds $10,000: $583,371

10. Cambridge, Massachusetts

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Effective property tax rate for 2016: 1.2%

Household property tax bills above $10,000: 10.8%

Home value at which property tax bill exceeds $10,000: $866,626

9. Austin, Texas

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Effective property tax rate for 2016: 1.6%

Household property tax bills above $10,000: 11.4%

Home value at which property tax bill exceeds $10,000: $619,641

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• Tulipmania gripped the Netherlands in the 1600s as the price of tulip bulbs skyrocketed.
• Bitcoin has been compared to tulipmania.
• When the tulip bubble collapsed, much of the Dutch economy was unaffected, which is likely the case if bitcoin ever collapses, according to Capital Economics.
• Watch the price of bitcoin move in real time on Markets Insider.

Tulipmania is a famous period in the 1600s when the Netherlands was enraptured by tulip bulbs, sending their prices sky high before collapsing in a spectacular fashion. Recently, people have been comparing bitcoin to that period in history because of the cryptocurrency's meteoric rise, and the two have a lot more in common than you might think.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said that bitcoin's is "worse than tulip bulbs," and added it's a fraud that would eventually blow up. Since those comments in mid-September, the price of bitcoin has spiked 268%. While Tulip bulbs rose as much as 1,100% in one month at the peak of their mania, its easy to see the similarities between the two.

But the comparisons don't stop there.

"Like bitcoin, tulips became popular "because of their strangeness and rarity" and because they were new, having arrived from the Ottoman Empire in the late 16th century," Andrew Kenningham, chief global economist at Capital Economics, wrote in a note to clients.

In addition to the novelty of the two, tulipmania and bitcoin were only enjoyed by a select portion of the population. Tulips, while talked about by much of the nation's population, were primarily traded among the elites and aristocrats who could afford the flower's high prices. Bitcoin gained notoriety on the backs of early adopters and enthusiasts, and its high volatility and climbing price have kept many people at bay. 

With the recent media hype, more people are trading bitcoin than ever before, evidenced by the record-high traffic at a number of the exchanges. Still a relatively small amount of the population is involved, making bitcoin more like the tulip bubble than the housing crisis of 2007 or tech bubble of 2000.

If the bitcoin "bubble" ever bursts, it would likely be equivalent to the stock market falling just 0.6%, according to Kenningham. Bitcoin is still a relatively small asset, with a market cap of about $240 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.com. Meanwhile, the companies in the S&P 500 represent more than $24.8 trillion combined, according to data from Bloomberg.

While a stock market plunge would be devastating, the fallout from a bitcoin crash would likely be limited. Those who are personally invested in the cryptocurrency would feel the pain, but financial institutions and 401(k) plans would likely shrug off any decline in bitcoin's value, Kenningham says.

After the price of Tulip bulbs collapsed, specialty commissions were formed to help sort out the financial mess, but the Netherlands, where a majority of the trading was happening, continued to prosper. The system built up around tulips was shuttered, but the majority of the country's financial system continued humming along.

"There is no correlation between the prices of bitcoin and other risky assets, so a fall in its price should not affect wider financial conditions," Kenningham said.  

Read more about bitcoin, and the technology powering it, here.

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SEE ALSO: Here's everything you need to know about blockchains, the ground-breaking tech that could be as disruptive as the internet

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Business Insider's Henry Blodget and Sara Silverstein discuss the argument that we're nearing "peak media" in the US. According to a recent study, the average US adult spends 12 hours a day consuming tech and media, and Blodget says that's been driven by the rise of the internet. He doesn't see the amount of time used to consume media increasing meaningfully going forward.

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Clik here to view.Welcome to Finance Insider, Business Insider's summary of the top stories of the past 24 hours. Sign up here to get the best of Business Insider delivered direct to your inbox.

Republicans are expected to release the final version of their massive tax bill on Friday, setting up a frantic stretch to pass the plan through Congress next week.

The bill will be a compromise between the House and Senate versions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, assembled by Republican members mostly from both chambers' tax-writing committees. The text of the legislation will be released around 5:30 p.m. ET, House Ways and Means Committee Chair Kevin Brady said. Here's what to expect. 

In related news, JPMorgan's quant guru says traders are waiting for tax cuts to unleash more stock market gains.

The repercussions of Disney's industry changing deal to buy $66 billion worth of 21st Century Fox's assets are still emerging. Here's our latest:

• Disney just put a big question mark over Hulu's future
• Rupert Murdoch laid out his vision of TV's future after the Disney-Fox deal, and it raises a lot of questions
• Rupert Murdoch called allegations of sexual misconduct at Fox News "largely political"
• Centerview Partners has crushed 2017 — and its investment bankers are going to make a fortune in 2018 as well

Elsewhere in deal news, a photo from the CEO of Goldman Sachs is fueling Twitter takeover chatter.

Tech executives from Sheryl Sandberg to Microsoft's Brad Smith spoke out Thursday to decry the Federal Communications Commission's vote to kill net neutrality. The move by the FCC eliminates rules designed to stop broadband providers like Comcast and Verizon from charging customers more for access to certain sites, blocking or slowing down competitors' content, and charging for internet "fast lanes."

Here's how some of the top tech companies and industry executives reacted to Thursday's vote.

Lastly, Tesla is opening a new showroom in one of NYC's trendiest neighborhoods — take a look inside.

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• Facebook has acknowledged that too much social media can be damaging to people's mental health.
• The company is coming under increasing scrutiny about its impact on society.
• A former Facebook exec recently said social networks are "destroying how society works."

Facebook acknowledged on Friday that too much social media can be bad for you, a remarkable admission as the 2-billion member online service battles mounting criticism about its impact on society.

In a blog post published on Friday, Facebook addressed a "hard question": "Is spending time on social media bad for us?" In it, the social networking firm cites academic research indicating that in certain instances using Facebook can have a negative effect on people's moods, and that heavier users of the site can have worse mental health.

"Researchers hypothesize that reading about others online might lead to negative social comparison," wrote Facebook director of researcher David Finsberg and research scientist Moira Burke, "and perhaps even more so than offline, since people’s posts are often more curated and flattering."

Facebook also cited research showing the positive impact of social media. "In sum, our research and other academic literature suggests that it’s about how you use social media that matters when it comes to your well-being."

The post by Facebook underscores the thorny situation facing the company, which has built a $28 billion business on an advertising model that relies on people spending as much time on its site as possible. Globally, the average user spent 50 minutes every day using Facebook's various suite of apps, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in April 2016.

The fact that Facebook is even talking about this is a big deal

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Clik here to view.That Facebook felt it necessary to publish a blog post like this is testament to how public perception of it and other major tech companies is shifting.

Historically well-regarded, Facebook has recently come under intense scrutiny over its role spreading propaganda and disinformation in the 2016 US presidential election, and critics — including former company executives — have attacked it over its broader impact on society.

In November, Sean Parker — the first president of Facebook — launched an extraordinary attack on the company he helped build, accusing it of exploiting human "vulnerability" and remarking: "God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains."

And former executive Chamath Palihapitiya said social networks are "destroying how society works" — though he has since said he wasn't trying to single out Facebook, and he views the company as a "force for good."

Facebook's blog post can be read as a veiled response to these attacks — an attempt to get out ahead on the issues, and to be seen to be taking criticism seriously. 

'The internet takes people away from social engagement in person'

In the post, Facebook openly acknowledges that research shows that social media can have a damaging impact on people. Here's a key section (emphasis added):

"In general, when people spend a lot of time passively consuming information — reading but not interacting with people — they report feeling worse afterward. In one experiment, University of Michigan students randomly assigned to read Facebook for 10 minutes were in a worse mood at the end of the day than students assigned to post or talk to friends on Facebook. A study from UC San Diego and Yale found that people who clicked on about four times as many links as the average person, or who liked twice as many posts, reported worse mental health than average in a survey. Though the causes aren’t clear, researchers hypothesize that reading about others online might lead to negative social comparison— and perhaps even more so than offline, since people’s posts are often more curated and flattering. Another theory is that the internet takes people away from social engagement in person."

But Facebook also counters this with evidence that engaging with others online "is linked to improvements in well-being," and that Facebook can have other positive impacts.

The company also details efforts it's taking to make "Facebook more about social interaction and less about spending time." These include changes to the news feed to demote what Facebook considers "low-quality content," letting users "snooze" their friends so they don't appear in their News Feed, tools to help manage the content they see from ex-partners, and suicide prevention tools.

"We don’t have all the answers, but given the prominent role social media now plays in many people’s lives, we want to help elevate the conversation," the blog post concludes. "In the years ahead we’ll be doing more to dig into these questions, share our findings and improve our products. At the end of the day, we’re committed to bringing people together and supporting well-being through meaningful interactions on Facebook."

SEE ALSO: Former Facebook exec: I take back what I said about Facebook 'destroying how society works' — kinda

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• Morgan Stanley analysts Adam Jonas expects Tesla to deliver 8,000 Model 3s in the first quarter of 2018 and raise that 46,000 by the end of the year.
• No other automaker has so many people scrutinizing its ability to do something as fundamental as build cars.
• Delivery-fixated observers could miss some bigger questions about whether the Model 3 can be profitable.

On balance, Tesla is closing out 2017 in defiantly counterintuitive fashion. The company is losing more money than ever and struggling to deliver its Model 3 sedan in volume, but the stock is still up a whopping 59% year to date.

Much of the upward move on Tesla's market cap in 2017 can be chalked up to elevated expectations for the Model 3. And as Tesla fails to get the cars into owner hands on schedule, everybody on Wall Street, in Silicon Valley, and in all lands in between has fixated on how many Model 3s will actually hit the streets in 2018.

In a research note published Friday, Morgan Stanley analysts Adam Jonas predicts that Tesla will delivery a pretty unimpressive 8,000 Model 3s total in the first quarter in 2018, but he raises that to 46,000 by the fourth quarter. That would translate into Tesla's best-ever year, assuming 100,000 or so Model S and Model X deliveries, but it would still fall well short of CEO Elon Musk's own goal of 500,000 for 2018.

Elsewhere, speculation is rampant about Tesla's impending surge of Model 3 deliveries, with completed cars waiting at delivery centers and Tesla's online configuration tool opening up to new owners who have placed pre-orders.

Tesla has turned the auto-industry expectations upside down, and not in a good way

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I've covered the auto industry for a long time, and I've never seen anything even remotely like this. It's almost as if Tesla has been playing baseball for 14 years and suddenly figured out how to hit the ball past the infield. Countless Tesla pundits are now trying to figure out if the company can hit .400 in 2018.

Nowhere else in the industry would this happen. For example, General Motors announced its Model 3 competitor, the Chevy Bolt, in 2015 and had the car rolling off the assembly line by late 2016. GM just sold 3,000 Bolts in November. Nobody is sussing out how many Bolts GM will sell in 2018; it could be 3,000 a month, or it could be more, depending on how much demand the carmaker sees. If it thinks it can sell 10,000 a month, it will simply ... build 10,000 a month.

This is what we often worry about with the auto industry — that carmakers will overproduce. We worry because carmakers can easily overproduce. Tesla has something north of 400,000 pre-orders for the Model 3, and if Jonas' numbers are good, it will end 2018 with 300,000 of them unfulfilled (he's estimating about 50,000 Model 3 deliveries in Q2 and Q3). If another automaker found itself in that position, it would be an absolute catastrophe.

A glaring and baffling weakness at making cars

But it wouldn't happen because if a GM or Toyota had 400,000 pre-orders for anything on the books, those cars would be getting built and built fast. It's a given. Nobody thinks about a major modern automaker's ability to handle something as fundamental as building cars.

Tesla's manufacturing weakness is glaring and baffling, and that's why Tesla watchers are spending so much time drilling down on Model 3 production. What we really should be witnessing is Tesla building the Model 3 at something resembling GM's Bolt pace, then crunching the numbers on whether Tesla is actually making money on the car or just seeing the Model 3 elevate its top line and its cash flow. 

Ideally, even if Tesla sorts out something that everybody else has already sorted out, we'll continue to look at actual market dynamics of the Model 3. But I suspect that instead, Tesla will get a bump in confidence as it masters the base hit, even as the traditional auto industry continues to drive home the runs.

SEE ALSO: FOLLOW US on Facebook for more car and transportation content!

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• Ripple's XRP cryptocurrency has more than tripled in one week. 
• The company hired a Facebook communications manager to keep up with demand. 

Ripple, the company behind the third-largest cryptocurrency, has hired Tom Channick to serve as its head of communications. Channick, who will start January 2, previously served as a corporate communications manager for Facebook's advertising and business integrity unit. 

"I am honored to join Ripple, and very much look forward to working with the global team to continue to build the internet of value,” Channick told Markets Insider in an email. “Developing technology that lets people and businesses move money as fast as information is incredibly important, and I'm excited to help Ripple achieve that goal."

The move comes the same week that Ripple's cryptocurrency, XRP, more than tripled in price, from $0.253 to $0.775 per token, and overtook bitcoin cash as the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization. It trails only bitcoin and ethereum by that measure. 

Ripple, which was founded as Ripple Labs in 2012, is based in San Francisco. The firm is using blockchain technology to speed up global payments and transfers, most of which currently use an outdated network called Swift, which can take days to send money. 

Those payments are facilitates through its cryptocurrency called XRP, which saw major gains this week thanks to newly announced partnerships and tests with major banks and financial firms. 

In 2015, Channick was named to Business Insider's 50 best public-relations people in the tech industry for his work with the advertising software company Sharethrough. Before that he worked for the agencies WE communications and WCG.

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SEE ALSO: Ripple's XRP overtakes bitcoin cash as third largest cryptocurrency

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NOW WATCH: Here's what bitcoin futures could mean for the price of bitcoin

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• Amazon and Walmart competed more fiercely in 2017 than ever before.
• It has quickly become the biggest feud in retail — and possibly all of business.
• With all of the new features that have been unveiled, consumers are the clear winners.

No feud in business was more solidified in 2017 than the one between Amazon and Walmart.

Walmart has quickly moved into Amazon's turf, eating away at online market share with a revamped Walmart.com. It now has an expanded online assortment and features that make shopping more convenient, like free two-day shipping with every purchase. It has seen a 60% increase in online sales this year, with no sign that it's slowing down.

Amazon's Whole Foods purchase and subsequent price cuts signaled it was moving in on Walmart's specialty of low-priced grocery. Though Whole Foods' 350-plus stores pale in comparison with Walmart's thousands of stores, the brick-and-mortar locations can serve as leverage in Amazon's quest to become a true omnichannel retailer.

It's a clash of the titans unlike anything we've seen in retail for years. Amazon's dominance online is well-documented, and Walmart's fleet of stores and hundreds of billions in sales is a matter of record. As each move in on the other's territory, we've seen some moves this year that appear to be direct responses to the other.

Walmart's partnership with Google and its voice-shopping platform is a direct response to the ubiquity of Amazon's Alexa. Amazon's lower free shipping threshold of $25 was put into place just a short while after Walmart instituted its free two-day shipping offer with every $35 purchase.

It's also gotten a little bit personal. Walmart made a point of putting the thousandth location for its click-and-pick grocery service in the new market of Seattle, squarely in Amazon territory. That also put it directly in competition with Amazon's grocery pickup service that opened this year, but only in two locations — both in Seattle.

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They both also now have in-home delivery, with Walmart striking first but Amazon striking more broadly.

With these two giants duking it out, there's a already a clear winner: the consumer. There's never been a more exciting time to buy things in America. That's why we're calling Walmart vs. Amazon the biggest retail feud of 2017.

SEE ALSO: Amazon dominated online shopping in 2017 — and it wasn't even close

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• Sen. Marco Rubio said on Friday that he would vote for the GOP tax bill, reversing course from a day earlier.
• Sen. Bob Corker, the only Republican to vote against the Senate's version of the bill, also said on Friday that he would support the final legislation.
• They appear to have cleared the way for the bill's passage early next week.

Republicans appear to have wrapped up the votes they need to pass their final tax bill after a pair of GOP senators — Marco Rubio and Bob Corker — reversed course on Friday and said they would support the legislation.

The bill, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, was finalized this week by a conference committee made up mostly of members of the House and Senate committees that wrote the versions that those chambers passed.

Corker, the only Republican to vote against the Senate's version earlier this month, said in a statement that the final bill was not perfect but would do enough to help the economy to get his vote.

"In the end, after 11 years in the Senate, I know every bill we consider is imperfect and the question becomes is our country better off with or without this piece of legislation," Corker said. "I think we are better off with it. I realize this is a bet on our country's enterprising spirit, and that is a bet I am willing to make."

Corker called President Donald Trump to tell him about his decision.

"The president greatly appreciates Senator Corker's phone call and pledge to support tax cuts," the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said.

Corker had been concerned about the nearly $1.5 trillion in debt the bill is projected to add over the next 10 years.

Rubio said earlier Friday that he would vote for the final tax bill, roughly one day after threatening to vote against it if the child tax credit were not made more generous.

The bill proposes expanding the child tax credit to $2,000 per dependent from the current $1,000.

But it had called for capping the amount of the credit that was refundable — and thus available to low-income workers who don't have a tax burden — at $1,100.

After Rubio's threat, the tax-bill writers upped the amount to $1,400 — apparently enough to satisfy him.

"For far too long, Washington has ignored and left behind the American working class," Rubio tweeted Friday. "Increasing the refundability of the Child Tax Credit from 55% to 70% is a solid step toward broader reforms which are both Pro-Growth and Pro-Worker."

Rubio's and Corker's support is a huge win for Republican leaders, who cannot afford to lose more than two GOP senators for the bill to pass.

With the pair's support, the bill is likely to pass when it comes to the floor for a vote, expected early next week.

SEE ALSO: Republicans are about to release their final tax bill — here's what to expect

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US stocks surged to new record highs amid investor expectations that the final version of the GOP tax bill will be released on Friday evening.

The S&P 500 soared 0.9%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 0.6% and the more tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 index climbed 1.2%.

First up, the scoreboard:

• Dow: 24,651.74, +143.08, (+0.58%)
• S&P 500: 2,675.81, +23.80, (+0.90%)
• Nasdaq: 6,936.58, +80.06, (+1.17%)
• US 10-year yield: 2.36%, +0.009
• WTI crude oil: $57.35, +$0.31, +0.54%

1. JPMorgan's quant guru says traders are waiting for tax cuts to unleash more stock market gains. Marko Kolanovic, the firm's global head of quantitative and derivatives strategy, says a successful Republican tax overhaul will give equities a huge shot in the arm in 2018.

2. A photo from the CEO of Goldman Sachs is fueling Twitter takeover chatter. The company's stock surged as much as 7.3% on Thursday, closing at its highest level in 14 months, amid speculation that Twitter and Goldman are re-engaging in discussions around a sale to Disney.

3. Oracle tops Wall Street targets — but shares sink more than 4%. The company reported strong quarterly earnings after the closing bell on Thursday afternoon, beating revenue and profit estimates.

4. Bitcoin pops to new all-time high. The red-hot cryptocurrency reached a new record versus the dollar, and has been steadily recovering ground after falling as low as $13,000 on Sunday.

5. Facebook admits that social media can be bad for you. In a blog post published on Friday, Facebook addressed a "hard question": "Is spending time on social media bad for us?"

ADDITIONALLY:

Corker and Rubio reverse course, and the GOP tax bill now looks like a slam dunk to pass

Walmart and Amazon's long-simmering feud exploded in 2017 — and it's redefining retail

Ripple hires Facebook communications manager after its cryptocurrency triples in a week

Wall Street is obsessed with Tesla Model 3 production — but investors may be missing something more important

There's a lot to learn about bitcoin from looking at the tulip bulb bubble

TOP TECH ANALYST: Only one thing could stop the FANGs from skyrocketing in 2018

SEE ALSO: JPMorgan's quant guru says traders are waiting for tax cuts to unleash more stock market gains

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NOW WATCH: One market expert says the financial system could collapse at any moment

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• Republicans on Friday released the final text of the compromise version of their massive tax bill.
• The compromise bill, crafted by GOP members of the congressional tax committees, features a few changes from the House and Senate versions.
• Republicans leaders want to vote on the bill as early as Tuesday.

Republicans released the final version of their massive tax bill on Friday, setting up a frantic stretch to pass the plan through Congress next week.

The bill is a compromise between the House and Senate versions and assembled by Republican members mostly from the committees that wrote them.

The legislation would make sweeping changes to the corporate and individual tax systems. Here are some ways the bill differs from the House and Senate versions:

• It would give corporations a slightly less generous tax cut. The corporate rate would be slashed to 21% from the current 35%. The House and Senate versions had proposed 20%.
• It would increase the refundability of the child tax credit. The bill would increase the child tax credit to $2,000 from the current $1,000, like the Senate version — but the level to which the credit would be refundable would increase to $1,400 from the Senate's proposed $1,100. That change is aimed at Sen. Marco Rubio, who on Thursday threatened to vote against the bill if the credit were not made more generous.
• It would lower the top marginal tax rate. It would be 37% instead of the current 39.6%. That's more generous than the 38% proposed in the Senate version.
• It would adjust the individual tax brackets.
  • 10%: $0 to $9,525 of taxable income for an individual; $0 to $19,050 for married joint filers
  • 12%: $9,526 to $38,700 individual; $19,051 to $77,400 joint
  • 22%: $38,701 to $82,500 individual; $77,401 to $165,000 joint
  • 24%: $82,501 to $157,500 individual; $165,001 to $315,000 joint
  • 32%: $157,501 to $200,000 individual; $315,001 to $400,000 joint
  • 35%: $200,001 to $500,000 individual; $400,001 to $600,000 joint
  • 37%: over $500,000 individual; over $600,000 joint
• It would allow people to count income or sales tax toward the state and local tax deduction. The House and Senate versions proposed people be able to deduct up to $10,000 in state property taxes from their federal tax bill. The compromise bill would allow people to deduct up to $10,000 in a combination of state and local property, income, and sales tax. It's unclear whether that figure is the same for joint and individual filers.
• It would give pass-through businesses a deduction. Pass-through businesses like limited liability corporations in which the owner books the profits as income would be allowed to deduct 20% of their earnings — like the Senate version, but down from its proposed 23% deduction. The benefit would also phase out starting at $315,000 for couples, down from $500,000 in the Senate version.
• It would double the threshold to qualify for the estate tax. It's currently $5.6 million. But the increase would expire, along with all the individual tax changes, in 2026. Many Republicans wanted to do away with the tax entirely.
• It would not repeal the Johnson amendment. That prevents nonprofit organizations from donating directly to political campaigns, and the House and Senate versions called for repealing it. Critics had argued that would allow nonprofits to become de facto tax-exempt political organizations.
• It would lower the threshold for the medical expense deduction for two years. The House version called for repealing the deduction, which allows people with medical expenses above 10% of their income to deduct costs beyond that. The compromise bill lowers that level to 7.5%. Sen. Susan Collins requested this change.

Republican leaders have said they plan to hold a vote on the compromise bill early next week, with a goal of President Donald Trump signing it by Wednesday.

Despite concerns from some senators, it appears Republican leadership has secured enough votes to pass the bill.

After initially withholding their support, Sens. Marco Rubio and Bob Corker said on Friday that they would vote for the bill. Corker was the only Republican to vote against the Senate version of the legislation.

SEE ALSO: Marco Rubio threatens to vote against the GOP tax bill unless leaders meet demands

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• Dan Sundheim, the former chief investment officer at Viking Global, is launching a new fund in 2018.
• It's still early days, but hedge fund insiders say the fund launch could be one of the biggest in recent history.

Dan Sundheim, the former chief investment officer at Viking Global Investors, is expected to launch a hedge fund next year. And we keep hearing the fund launch is going to be one of the biggest in recent history. 

It has previously been reported that the fund, a long-short equity fund called D1 Capital, could raise more than $1 billion when it launches next year. But according to multiple people in the hedge fund world that Business Insider spoke with, the fund could raise multiple billions, with one person putting the figure at $4 billion to $5 billion on day one. 

Hedge-fund investors and others familiar with the launch told Business Insider they expect Sundheim to raise multiple billions of dollars, with the lowest estimate $2 billion. The fund is expected to include a significant amount of Sundheim's personal capital, some of the people said.

That range of $2 billion to $5 billion would make it one of the biggest fund launches next year, and comes at a time when most launches struggle to raise more than $1 billion.

To be clear, the fund isn't yet formally being marketed, according to people familiar with the matter. The situation is fluid and could change, said one of the people, asking not to be identified discussing private matters.

Jonathan Gasthalter, a spokesman for Sundheim, declined to comment.

But there's reason to believe the fund could be one of the biggest in recent memory. Sundheim is said to have had a strong track record at Viking, and his new fund is expected to attract money from previous Viking investors. Earlier this year, Viking said it would return about $8 billion in assets to clients.

The start-up has hired Eton Park CFO Tony Fox alongside Michael Lean, the former head of equity research at Hong Kong-based investment group CLSA, HFM Week reported. D1 Capital has also rented out a 32,300 square-foot office at 9 West 57th Street with a 15-year lease, according to a press release.

Other highly anticipated launches for next year include Steve Cohen's Stamford Harbor, which is targeting close to $2 billion, and former Millennium bond chief Michael Gelband's fund. Ex-GLG and Moore manager Greg Coffey is also prepping a fund.

DON'T MISS: What it takes to launch a hedge fund right now, according to the Wall Street pros who know

SEE ALSO: Greg Coffey, a hedge fund star who retired at 41, is eyeing a comeback

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