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Good morning from the Financial Times.

Today is Wednesday, February 2nd, and this is your FT News Briefing.

Businesses in Myanmar defied government warnings and joined a nationwide protest yesterday.

Google served up a strong fourth quarter with a stock split on the side,

plus plant-based meats were all the rage, but last year, the novelty wore off.

Personally, I think it's really down to taste.

I've tried a lot of things out in the market and I've been disappointed.

The FT's Emico Terizono explains why sales have gone from Red Hot to Room Tamp.

A Mark Filipino, and here's the news you need to start your day.

Google's parent company Alphabet beat Wall Street's revenue expectations by a cool $3 billion

last quarter. Alphabet reported earnings yesterday. It saw a bit of a slowdown from quarter to quarter,

but still posted a 32% increase in revenue over the year.

But the big news is that Alphabet announced a 20-for-one stock split,

so every share will turn into 20 shares, but the price will reflect the split so that the company's

market capitalization will stay the same. It is only Alphabet's second stock split in the

18 years since the company went public. The move still needs to be approved at Alphabet's

annual meeting in July. The company's share price shot up more than 8% in after-hours trading

on the announcement. Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of the military coup in Myanmar,

despite threats from the Huta businesses shut down and marked the day by joining a nationwide

silent strike. Here's the FT's John Reed. Some smaller businesses did keep their doors open

...