International News

Bloomberg Cafes bustled with customers, parks teemed with sunbathers, and the first Apple store to reopen outside China had lines snaking out the door as many South Koreans — almost all wearing masks — emerged from months of self-isolation. The scene in Seoul on a picture-perfect weekend contrasted sharply with other nations where major cities look like ghost towns as ...

Bloomberg India recorded its largest daily spike in coronavirus cases, adding 1,400 new infections to its tally of more than 16,000 amid a nationwide lockdown that’s about to enter its fourth week. The South Asian nation’s cases have been surging over the last week as it gradually scales up its testing capacity. Confirmed infections are up 78% to 16,365 on ...

Bloomberg Just weeks after a surging dollar was causing havoc in world financial markets, President Donald Trump has decided that a muscular US currency is a good thing after all. “The dollar is very strong,” he told a press conference. “And dollars — strong dollars are overall very good.” The comment marked a U-turn from the president’s rhetoric for much ...

Bloomberg IWG Plc is considering selling and leasing back offices to raise as much as 250 million pounds ($312 million) to help it weather the coronovirus pandemic, the Sunday Times reported. The firm, which owns the Regus and Spaces brands, plans to sell and then lease back more than 10 UK buildings, the newspaper said. Small business tenants of Regus ...

Bloomberg Mexico’s economic contraction may be deeper than expected, according to Scotiabank. The bank now estimates Mexico’s gross domestic product (GDP) to drop 8.4% in 2020, more than the 5.77% contraction it predicted on March 20, due to the increasingly adverse economic indicators, Economia Hoy newspaper reported. The forecast was adjusted due to the lack of an effective policy response ...

Bloomberg Man Group Plc is facing a rise in withdrawals after being hit by $10.7 billion of losses last quarter amid unprecedented volatility in global markets. The investment firm pulled in net new cash and some of its hedge fund strategies made money, but it wasn’t enough to compensate for the drop in performance. Assets under management declined to $104.2 ...

Bloomberg Uber Technologies says a guilty plea by its former star engineer is proof that he’s a liar — and supports its decision to make Anthony Levandowski alone shoulder a $180 million legal award Google won against him. The ride-hailing company, which recruited Levandowski in 2016 from Alphabet Inc.’s self-driving car program, ended up firing him after the companies became ...

Bloomberg With coronavirus pandemic driving up demand for protective gear, profiteers and unscrupulous middlemen have taken advantage. Now, one of the biggest manufacturers of the products is fighting back. 3M Co. , the maker of the coveted N95 mask that drew criticism from President Donald Trump over their availability, has filed four lawsuits in the past week against alleged price-gougers ...

Bloomberg Indonesians have been asked to cancel various gatherings that have been a common tradition during the Ramadan festive season as the number of daily coronavirus cases spiked by the most since the country reported its first case. The world’s fourth most populous nation reported 407 new infections on April 17, taking the total confirmed case count close to 6,000, ...

Bloomberg The coronavirus pushed China’s economy into its first contraction in decades in the first quarter, with the spread of the disease around the world now leaving the nation reliant on fragile local demand to spur a recovery. Gross domestic product shrank 6.8% from a year ago, the worst performance since at least 1992 when official releases of quarterly GDP ...