International News

Bloomberg Tencent Holdings Ltd. is working with the Chinese government to create an electronic pass system that smooths travel between Hong Kong, Macau and the southern province of Guangdong. The unusual proposal would see multiple travel documents linked to Tencent’s WeChat app to streamline border crossings, the Shenzhen, Guangdong-based company said in a statement. With the ‘E-card’ ID system, users ...

Bloomberg Companies facing the potential threat of tariffs and other trade barriers after Brexit are stepping up contingency planning, with some retailers creating new sites in continental Europe to avoid snags. US pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. is planning for the possibility of a temporary supply blackout when the UK leaves the European Union and may stockpile as much as ...

Bloomberg HP Inc., the world’s largest personal-computer maker, increased its planned job cuts to 4,500 to 5,000 employees by the end of fiscal 2019, or as many as 1,000 more than the company had estimated as part of a reorganisation unveiled almost two years ago. The company will incur pretax restructuring charges of about $700 million for the job cuts, ...

Bloomberg California and the auto industry mostly agree that the state should maintain a role in setting vehicle emissions standards despite Trump admin- istration efforts to curb its authority, according to the head of the California Air Resources Board. “We are now, I think it is fair to say, in a confusing situation,” Mary Nichols said at the Edison Electric ...

Bloomberg A unit of Imerys SA agreed to settle claims by 22 women that talc it supplied to Johnson & Johnson for baby powder was tainted with asbestos and caused their cancers. The Paris-based minerals company’s unit didn’t acknowledge that the talc was tainted or dangerous. The terms of the settlement are closely guarded and won’t be made public. But ...

Bloomberg US job growth in May vaulted payroll gains above 1 million in 2018, reaching the milestone a month earlier than in the past two years. Whether the labor market can maintain such a breakneck pace amid a diminishing pool of skilled workers is another question. Employers added 223,000 jobs last month, more than forecast and bringing payroll gains for ...

Bloomberg India’s Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. is bunching the 477 billion rupees ($7.1 billion) of its cash reserves in short and long-tenure securities to balance its need for easy liquidity with safety as it looks to make significant payouts to shareholders each year. Asia’s largest software services provider invested about 53 percent of its reserves in government securities as of ...

Bloomberg Singapore-based Internet provider MyRepublic Group Ltd. is weighing an initial public offering in Hong Kong as early as December 2019 to fund expansion of its cloud-based broadband and mobile platform. The company has raised $150 million in capital, including a $60 million injection from Singapore family office Kamet Capital Partners and CLSA Ltd.’s asset management arm, according to CEO ...

Bloomberg Sharp Corp., controlled by Foxconn Technology Group, plans to buy Toshiba Corp.’s personal-computer business as its Taiwanese parent seeks to expand beyond contract manufacturing and build a brand of its own. Toshiba is selling 80 percent of the unit for 4 billion yen ($36 million) and the two companies aim to complete the sale by October 1, they said ...

Bloomberg China is expanding efforts to keep its most promising companies from going public in Hong Kong or the US, with officials studying a new trading venue in Shanghai that would have lower thresholds for biotechnology and high-tech firms, people with knowledge of the matter said. Government entities including the China Securities Regulatory Commission and Ministry of Science and Technology ...