International News

  Bloomberg UK manufacturing and construction unexpectedly shrank in February, adding to signs that the economy lost momentum in the first quarter. Factory output fell 0.1 percent from January, the Office for National Statistics said. Total industrial production declined 0.7 percent as unseasonably warm weather reduced demand for energy. Construction dropped 1.7 percent, the most in almost a year. While ...

  Bloomberg The prospect of a trade war between China and the US elicits frequent warnings of the risk to the global economy. India sees it somewhat differently. Senior officials in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party say India stands to benefit from the tensions. President Xi Jinping will need India’s huge market as President Donald Trump threatens punitive measures against ...

  Bloomberg Toshiba Corp. has narrowed the number of bidders for its semiconductor business from about 10 interested parties to a smaller group that includes Taiwan’s Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and Korea’s SK Hynix Inc., according to people familiar with the matter. The other remaining contenders include private equity firm Silver Lake Management and chipmaker Broadcom, which are collaborating ...

  Bloomberg The US dairy industry is appealing to President Donald Trump for help after Canadian companies halted some imports, exacerbating a glut of milk on the American side of the border and forcing one of the country’s biggest butter producers to scrap supply contracts with farmers. Some US dairy companies say that in the past week, they’ve lost all ...

  Bloomberg Twitter Inc. is dropping its free-speech lawsuit against the Trump administration over the government’s effort to unmask users critical of the president’s policies. Twitter said in a court filing, a day after it filed the case, that the US had withdrawn its summons to learn the identity of one of the so-called ALT handles purported to be the ...

  Bloomberg China’s evolving means of selling government debt is masking the true extent of the government’s planned borrowing levels. The official budget deficit target is 3 percent of economic output, but that doesn’t include all government debt. One category falling outside of the forecast is off-book bonds — or special bonds as they’re known in China — whose sales ...

  Bloomberg There are signs Britain is getting tougher on financiers just as it needs to attract them. Tax officials are pursuing probes into the residency status of HSBC Holdings Plc Chief Executive Officer Stuart Gulliver and Chi-X Global Inc. Chairman-Emeritus Anthony Mackay, as the government clamps down on people — oftentimes bankers — who work in the UK but ...

  Bloomberg German factory orders rebounded from their steepest decline in eight years in a sign the recovery in Europe’s largest economy remains intact. Orders, adjusted for seasonal swings and inflation, rose 3.4 percent in February, after slumping a revised 6.8 percent in January, data from the Economy Ministry in Berlin showed on Thursday. The typically volatile reading compares with ...

  Bloomberg WPP Plc fell the most in a month after one of the advertising company’s biggest clients, consumer-product giant Unilever, said it would cut back on its marketing spending, fueling concerns about a broader ad-industry slowdown. Unilever, which sells Dove soap and Hellmann’s mayonnaise, will produce 30 percent fewer ads as part of a cost-cutting drive, Chief Financial Officer ...

  Bloomberg Monsanto Co., the world’s largest seed company, reported record fiscal second-quarter earnings amid signs that US farmers are preparing to sow record acreage with soybeans this year. Profit excluding one-time items was $3.19 a share in the three months through February, St. Louis-based Monsanto said in a statement, beating the highest of 16 analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg. ...