Bloomberg The battle for control of Akzo Nobel NV escalated after Elliott Advisors called for the chairman’s ouster, drawing a fiery retort from the Dutch paint maker suggesting the activist shareholder is working with PPG Industries Inc. on its $24 billion takeover offer. The removal of Chairman Antony Burgmans would be irresponsible and damaging, and Elliott’s move for a ...

  Bloomberg Britain’s major banks are making it tougher for consumers to get unsecured credit, which may slow the pace of lending that the Bank of England has identified as a risk to financial stability. In its Credit Conditions survey, the BOE said its measure of the availability of unsecured credit fell to minus 6.6 in the first quarter, to ...

  Bloomberg The view from the biggest coal plant in the US West is spectacular: red rock buttes and wide desert vistas that change color with the movement of the sun. Set against this backdrop, the station’s towering smoke stacks seem to disrupt the serenity of the landscape, its three concrete pillars spewing a perpetual stream of heat and gas. ...

  RAS AL KHAIMAH / Emirates Business Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority (RAKTDA), which develops the emirate’s tourism infrastructure and initiates its domestic and overseas promotions, conducted a media and trade roadshow in India this week to outline its 2017 strategy for the Indian market. Visitors from India to the emirate in Q1 2017 grew 35 percent, while the ...

  SHARJAH / Emirates Business Sharjah Business Women Council (SBWC) will hold two workshops that will offer participants a glimpse into the art of photography and videography, as well as table setting, and how women can turn those skills into a business. The first workshop, which will take place on April 16-18 between 10am to 2pm at the Sharjah Art ...

  DUBAI / WAM The role of commercial arbitration in settlement of disputes and in ensuring an investment-friendly environment was the main topic of discussion at a meeting held by the Dubai International Arbitration Centre (DIAC), with a high-ranking Chinese delegation. The meeting touched on ways of exchanging expertise in areas of arbitration, being an ideal alternative to litigation in resolving ...

  ABU DHABI / WAM Abu Dhabi University, ADU, announced on Thursday its plans to open a new campus in Dubai offering master’s degree programmes in law, business and engineering. The announcement was made during ADU’s participation at Gulf Education & Training Exhibition, GETEX, the leading student recruitment event that’s currently underway in Dubai. The university’s expansion drive is aligned with ...

  DUBAI / Reuters Profit taking dragged most stock markets in the Middle East lower on Thursday, erasing most of the previous session’s gains as some of the optimism generated by generally positive first quarter results faded. Saudi Arabia’s index retreated 0.3 percent, after rising 0.9 percent on Wednesday when Saudi British Bank reported an earnings beat and banking shares ...

  Bloomberg US stocks opened lower as the dollar stabilized from earlier losses as markets digested comments from US President Donald Trump on Wednesday denouncing the greenback’s strength and championing lower interest rates. Banking stocks led a European decline. The S&P 500 Index opened down 0.25 percent at 2,339.09 Thursday, while the Dow Jones Industrial average fell 0.24 percent to ...

  Bloomberg The spectacular failure of what was once the world’s biggest renewable-energy company has turned into a smorgasbord of wind and solar farms being gobbled up by infrastructure investors, clean-power developers and even a vegan soccer team. Since filing the largest US bankruptcy of 2016, SunEdison Inc. has hosted the biggest-ever sale of renewables assets. It’s shed at least ...