International News

Tokyo / Reuters Influential members of Japan’s top economic advisory panel recommended the government take additional measures to boost consumer spending as a looming recession forces Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to roll out more pro-growth policies. The four private-sector members of the Council for Economic and Fiscal Policy (CEFP) also urged the government to accelerate its plans to raise the ...

Mumbai / Bloomberg Xiaomi Corp. is leading a $25-million investment in India’s Hungama Digital Media Entertainment, an online provider of music and videos, as it seeks to lure more customers in the world’s fastest-growing smartphone market. “India is a fast-growing, strategic geography for us and it’s about time we established our services offerings here,” said Hugo Barra, Xiaomi’s vice president ...

New Delhi / Bloomberg Apple Inc.’s latest attempt to crack the Indian smartphone market — by selling used phones — is meeting a wall of resistance. The iPhone maker is seeking permission to become the first company allowed to import and sell used phones into the country, its second attempt in as many years. This time, the stakes are higher ...

Tokyo / Bloomberg Sharp Corp.’s shares rose after President Kozo Takahashi and Foxconn Technology Group’s Chairman Terry Gou formally signed a rescue deal over the weekend that gives the electronics maker a chance to recover from a long slump. The stock climbed 4 percent to close at 130 yen in Tokyo on Monday, while the Nikkei 225 Index was mostly ...

Sydney / Bloomberg Optus, Australia’s second-biggest mobile-phone carrier, plans to cut as many as 480 jobs as it revamps its consumer and enterprise divisions and seeks sustainable growth. The unit of Singapore Telecommunications Ltd. notified affected employees today, with some likely to be offered alternative positions within the company, said a Singtel official who asked not to be identified per ...

Bloomberg Greece could again face the threat of being pushed into default and out of the euro area if its current bailout review drags on into June and July, according to European officials monitoring the slow progress of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s negotiations with creditors. Greece still hasn’t cut a deal on pensions, tax administration or its fiscal gap, and ...

Bloomberg Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane said there are limits to how much the central bank can restrain the housing market and prevent a price spiral. “There are things we can do at the bank and others can do at the Treasury to damp down demand a bit,” Haldane said at an Open University event in London on ...

Bloomberg Jobless claims in Spain fell more than anticipated in March, even as the political impasse continues with lawmakers struggling to form a government following an inconclusive vote. New data on Monday showed the number of people registered as unemployed decreased by more than 58,200 people from February, adding to two months of falling unemployment. The decline was greater than ...

Bloomberg Euro-area unemployment retreated in February to the lowest since 2011, continuing its slow decline as the economy grows at a modest pace. The rate fell to 10.3 percent from 10.4 percent in January, the European Union’s statistics office Eurostat in Luxembourg said on Monday. That matched the median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg survey, though the January number ...

Bloomberg Airbus Group SE, which relies on British facilities to design and build the wings for its commercial aircraft, told its 15,000 workers there that it “strongly” supports the U.K. remaining in the European Union and that an exit wouldn’t be helpful to its operations. “Our business model is entirely based on our ability to move products, people and ideas ...