International News

Bloomberg BT Group Plc’s restructuring is starting to bite, with workers accusing the British telecom company of betrayal as it cuts thousands of jobs and sweeps away layers of management. Chief Executive Officer Gavin Patterson began to overhaul the world’s oldest phone company in June, under pressure to revive profits and a moribund share price. The changes involve 13,000 layoffs ...

Bloomberg US companies are evading President Donald Trump’s goods tariffs by partly moving production abroad, shielding China for now from the effects of an escalating trade dispute, according to research by UBS Group AG. “If US companies move a stage of their manufacturing overseas (to a country other than China), the trade tax is avoided,” Paul Donovan, chief economist at ...

Bloomberg German economic growth was the weakest in almost four years in November as both services and manufacturing cooled. The composite Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for Europe’s largest economy dropped to 52.2 in November from 53.4 last month, according to a flash reading released by IHS Markit. The result, below all estimates in a Bloomberg survey of economists, pushed the euro ...

Bloomberg Preliminary figures compiled by Venezuela’s central bank indicate that the crisis-wracked nation’s economy contracted 16.6 percent in 2017, according to two people with direct knowledge of the estimates. For the first time since 2016, the bank is preparing a raft of macroeconomic indicators for International Monetary Fund (IMF) to avoid sanctions including a possible expulsion from lender. Bank technicians ...

Bloomberg Tensions between Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA over the future of their car-making partnership have exploded into the open as the downfall of Chairman Carlos Ghosn roils the automotive industry and his top lieutenant, Hiroto Saikawa, moves to consolidate power in his absence. The two companies, which are connected via a complex structure of cross-shareholdings and joint manufacturing, ...

Bloomberg PT Tokopedia, Indonesia’s largest online marketplace, is raising $1 billion from existing investors including SoftBank, people familiar with the matter said. The e-commerce operator is valued at about $7 billion after the round, the people said, asking not to be identified as the details are private. That would make it the most valuable startup in Indonesia, according to the ...

Bloomberg A drop in South Korean exports to China and another weak figure for semiconductor shipments add to concerns over the strength of global trade amid the economic conflict between Washington and Beijing. Preliminary trade data for the first 20 days of November showed a 4.3 percent slip in exports to China, the first fall outside holiday-affected months since late ...

Bloomberg Sea Ltd., operator of Southeast Asia’s biggest gaming platform, reported a wider third-quarter loss on rising investments at e-commerce unit Shopee. Net loss increased to $218 million in the three months ended on September 30 from $132.8 million a year earlier, the company said. Total revenue rose to $204.9 million from $94.1 million. Sea has been struggling to keep ...

Bloomberg China’s plan to judge each of its 1.3 billion people based on their social behaviour is moving a step closer to reality, with Beijing set to adopt a lifelong points program by 2021 that assigns personalised ratings for each resident. The capital city will pool data from several departments to reward and punish some 22 million citizens based on ...

Bloomberg Three years ago, artificial intelligence company DeepMind embarked on a landmark effort to transform health care in the UK. Now plans by owner Alphabet Inc to wrap the partnership into its Google search engine business are tripping alarm bells about privacy. Data protection advocates cried foul when the company reversed course on a pledge to keep DeepMind Health, which ...