Bloomberg Estee Lauder Cos.’s online sales and China push are helping maintain its growth streak. The New York-based seller of Clinique and Aveda products saw sales surge across most of its brands in the latest quarter, with skin care, makeup and fragrances all posting double-digit gains. Revenue advanced on a regional level too, led by a 33 percent climb in …

Bloomberg As short sellers swoop on Marks & Spencer Group Plc, value investors are pinning their hopes on a man with a history of turning around struggling businesses. Archie Norman, 63, a former lawmaker who joined the iconic British retailer as chairman in September, is credited with leading the Asda supermarket chain from near bankruptcy in the early 1990s to …

Bloomberg For almost a decade, investors have waited patiently for any hint of inflation in the US economy, a sign the recovery can sustain itself without emergency stimulus from the Federal Reserve. Now they’re getting it, and many are shocked at the reaction. It landed with the worst stock market plunge since January 2016. A stronger-than-expected employment report with signs …

Reuters Middle Eastern stock markets sank on Sunday in response to the tumble on Wall Street on February 2, after US data showed the strongest annual wage growth since 2009 and raised the risk of more interest rate hikes than expected this year. The Saudi index dropped 0.6 percent with falling shares outnumbering gainers by 105 to 74. Saudi Arabian …

Bloomberg Crude production by OPEC and its main ally Russia held steady last month as increases in Saudi Arabia and Iran offset the ongoing deterioration of Venezuela’s oil industry. Output from the 14 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries rose just 20,000 barrels a day to 32.4 million a day in January, according to a Bloomberg News survey …

Bloomberg Iran can swiftly increase production of crude if OPEC decides to scrap limits on global output when the group meets next in June, Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said. The Persian Gulf nation can raise daily production by at least 100,000 barrels within “five or six days” if the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries decides that crude prices are …

BEIRUT / Reuters Lebanon has signed its first deal to buy electricity from private companies, the energy minister said, in a model which took years to hammer out and opens the country up to more international investment. Lebanon has been short of electricity since its 1975-90 civil war. Households experience at least three-hour outages each day. Those who can afford …

Bloomberg France’s nuclear giant has a plan to survive the wave of renewable energy that’s sweeping aside old-fashioned utilities across Europe. First it needs to disprove the conventional wisdom about how reactors work. Electricite de France SA says its fleet of nuclear reactors aren’t just able to provide a steady stream of power, they’re flexible enough to complement a large …

Bloomberg The biggest independent refiners in the US are lining their pockets with billions of dollars in tax reform windfalls just in time to invest in equipment that meets ever-tightening domestic and global environmental rules, making the “liquid freedom” they export cleaner than ever. “The reduction in the corporate tax rate is a catalyst for incremental investment in the business,” …

Bloomberg European Central Bank Executive Board member Benoit Coeure urged European governments to push ahead with plans to strengthen monetary union to avoid stretching his institution’s mandate in the next crisis. “Without further reforms, the next crisis may well force the ECB to test the limits of its mandate,” he said in a speech near Ljubljana, Slovenia. “To assume that …