International News

Bloomberg Allianz SE agreed to pay 667 million euros ($738 million) for the general-insurance assets of SulAmerica, a deal that will make the German firm Brazil’s second-largest provider of motor insurance. Europe’s largest insurer will combine the new assets with its existing Brazilian subsidiary to create a business with 1.5 billion euros of gross written premiums, according to a company ...

Bloomberg Tesla Inc. agreed to buy batteries from South Korea’s LG Chem Ltd. to be used in electric vehicles produced out in China, according to people familiar with the matter. Batteries made by LG Chem will be used initially in Model 3 cars manufactured in the plant near Shanghai, Tesla’s first outside of the US. LG Chem batteries will also ...

Bloomberg The German Chancellery now also expects Europe’s largest economy to slip into a mild recession in the third quarter, news magazine Der Spiegel reports. Gross domestic product contracted by 0.1% in the second quarter, and Angela Merkel’s economic advisers expect a similar result in the period between July and September. Economists at the German central bank had been making ...

Bloomberg The UK announced a $370 million investment aimed to spur the development of greener flights for people and goods. The government will put 125 million pounds into the initiative, which will to supplement 175 million pounds from industry, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office said in a statement late Friday. The intention is to support new technologies including freight-carrying drones, ...

Bloomberg The world’s largest cities need to invest billions of additional dollars into their infrastructure in order to secure citizen data, new research suggests. Of the roughly $135 billion expected to be spent globally on cybersecurity for critical city infrastructure in 2024, 44% will be split across data protection provisions for energy, health care, public security, transport, water and waste ...

Bloomberg JSR Corp., one of the Japanese materials makers hit by government restrictions on exports to South Korea, has received a permit to resume shipments, according to a person familiar with the matter. The Tokyo-based maker of photo-resist, a light-sensitive liquid used by semiconductor manufacturers to imprint circuits on silicon wafers, was granted the license on Monday, the person said, ...

Bloomberg India’s jobs scene — with unemployment at a 45-year high — is looking gloomy with hiring activity slowing across most sectors. Banks, insurers, auto makers and logistics and infrastructure companies are among those hiring at a slower pace, according to the study by Care Ratings Ltd. that relied on annual reports for the year ended March from nearly 1,000 ...

Bloomberg The number of South Koreans visiting Japan dropped 7.6% in July, underscoring the toll a trade spat is taking on commerce in both countries. The decline in South Korean tourists dented an otherwise positive result, with total number of visitors to Japan climbing 5.6% from a year earlier, according to Japan National Tourism Organisation. The result was boosted by ...

Bloomberg Global markets have become so synchronised that money managers risk losing on every front, according to Hiromichi Mizuno, chief investment officer of the world’s largest pension fund. Japan’s $1.5 trillion Government Pension Investment Fund lost money in equities, fixed-income and currency positions in the last three months of 2018, Mizuno pointed out in Sacramento, California. “Conventional wisdom of portfolio ...

Bloomberg China is cracking down on banks and brokers that it suspects of inflating bond trading volumes in an effort to win more business, according to traders familiar with the matter. A subsidiary of the central bank is monitoring large transactions on the X-Bond system for signs of abnormal trading, the two traders said, asking not to be named as ...