International News

Bloomberg Dropbox Inc Chief Executive Officer Drew Houston is joining Facebook Inc’s board. Houston, who co-founded file-sharing software company Dropbox in 2007, is a friend of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Houston has in the past turned to Zuckerberg for help running his own company. “He’s given me a lot of advice on company scaling,” Houston told Bloomberg’s Emily Chang in ...

Bloomberg The world’s biggest trading bloc shouldn’t rush into more ambitious climate targets this decade without assessing how lower emissions could impact the economy, according to a top European Union (EU) lawmaker. With the EU preparing to forge its flagship Green Deal into law later this month, European People’s Party Parliamentarian Peter Liese said his party wants to see how ...

Bloomberg Indian PM Narendra Modi’s government plans to allow foreign investors greater access to short-term and long-term government securities in a bid to tap money being poured into passive funds operated by firms such as BlackRock Inc. Certain categories of sovereign bonds will be fully opened to non-resident investors, apart from being available to domestic investors, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman ...

Bloomberg China said the US “inappropriately overreacted” to the deadly virus that originated there and hasn’t provided much help to counter the outbreak, disputing the Trump administration’s claim that it offered assistance. “The US government hasn’t provided any substantial assistance to us, but it was the first to evacuate personnel from its consulate in Wuhan, the first to suggest partial ...

Bloomberg Toyota Motor Corp’s luxury Lexus brand posted a double-digit sales gain last year, taking its 30th anniversary in stride as strength in China and Europe offset stalled demand in North America. The brand, which debuted in 1989, grew 10% to 765,330 vehicles worldwide, Toyota said in a statement on Monday, powered by strong sales of its UX subcompact crossover ...

Bloomberg India is gearing up for what could potentially be a slew of mega initial public offerings. PM Narendra Modi’s government surprised investors on February 1 by saying it will sell part of its stake in state-run behemoth Life Insurance Corp of India to meet its record asset-sale target. The jumbo sale could fetch the government between 850 billion rupees ...

Bloomberg Asian manufacturing gauges stumbled in January, suggesting the US-China trade agreement failed to spur sentiment for an industry now bracing for supply-chain disruptions and a blow to demand from the spread of the coronavirus. South Korea’s purchasing manager index — often viewed as a key barometer of global demand — fell to 49.8 from 50.1 in December. Malaysia’s reading ...

Bloomberg The hits just keep coming for Hong Kong. In 2019, there was the escalating US-China trade war, which squeezed exports. Then came violent protests beginning mid-year, with street-fighting between police and protesters driving away tourists and shoppers, hurting the services industries, and tipping the economy into its first contraction in a decade. Now, with advance figures on Monday confirming ...

Bloomberg The Brexit battle between the UK and the European Union (EU) resumed as British leader Boris Johnson clashed with the bloc’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier at the start of 11 months of talks on a future trade deal. The pound fell. Barnier said in Brussels that a “highly ambitious” trade deal is on offer for the UK — but ...

Bloomberg Facebook Inc agreed to pay $550 million to resolve claims it collected user biometric data without consent in one of the largest consumer privacy settlements in US history. The accord, which requires a judge’s approval, will avert a trial that may have exposed the social networking company to billions of dollars in damages. Facebook fought unsuccessfully to persuade the ...