News

  LONDON / AP Britain is leaving the European Union’s single market but wants a “frictionless” new trade relationship with the bloc, the government said in the most detailed account yet of its EU exit plans. In a bid to ease uncertainty around the UK’s exit from the European Union — and appease opposition demands for greater clarity — the ...

  Bloomberg OPEC cut output by 840,000 barrels a day last month, but has more work to do to fully comply with last year’s historic production deal. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries pumped 32.3 million barrels a day in January, according to a Bloomberg News survey of analysts, oil companies and ship-tracking data. The 10 members of the group ...

  Bloomberg The oil industry’s struggle through the worst slump in a generation showed signs of easing, with Royal Dutch Shell Plc managing to reduce its record debt for the first time since the downturn began. Rising oil prices and billions in cost cuts allowed Europe’s largest energy company and fellow giant Exxon Mobil Corp. to generate enough cash to ...

Bloomberg The exchange that’s home to Brent crude futures hired a consultant to discuss with traders, banks and other market participants measures to revamp how North Sea oil prices are calculated. Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) hired Energex Partners, founded by former Morgan Stanley oil traders, to discuss potential changes to the multi-layered North Sea market that includes both physical and ...

  ANKARA / Reuters Turkey’s growth will be below potential in 2016 and this year, the International Monetary Fund said, citing political uncertainty, strained relations with Europe and insecurity at home and in the region. The IMF said growth in 2016 would be 2.7 percent, below the government’s official 3.2 percent forecast, rising to just 2.9 percent in 2017, below ...

  Bloomberg Screams alerted Dadasaheb Vidhate to the fire trapping three of his children in the family’s thatched-roof hut in rural India. “Neighbors rushed to help douse the fire, but we couldn’t save anyone,” Vidhate, 45, said of the blaze four years ago, which he blames on an overturned kerosene lamp. “My children were burned alive before my eyes.” With ...

  Bloomberg India plans to allow non-state mining companies to mine and sell coal for the first time in more than four decades, federal coal secretary Susheel Kumar said. The nation’s coal ministry will auction four mines to both state-run and private companies during the year starting April 1, Kumar told reporters in New Delhi. The winning bidders will have ...

  JOHANNESBURG / AP Wildlife traffickers in a major African park have been offering rewards for a full lion carcass, raising concerns that poachers are increasingly targeting a vulnerable species because of demand in some Asian countries for lion bones used in traditional medicine. The report from Mozambique’s Niassa National Reserve comes amid debate about whether the legal, annual export ...

  Bloomberg To Nguyen Tan Phong, a farmer in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, the foreign-owned paper mill built upriver from his catfish ponds was an ecological disaster waiting to happen. Phong feared a repeat of last year’s toxic spill from a steel plant owned by Taiwan’s Formosa Plastics Corp. that devastated central coast fishing communities and cut annual economic growth by ...

  Bloomberg Chinese-owned Key Safety Systems Inc. has emerged as the leading bidder for Takata Corp., the embattled air-bag maker that’s seeking a buyer after causing the biggest safety recall in automotive history. An external committee appointed to spearhead Takata’s restructuring recommends Key Safety, the Tokyo-based supplier said in a statement, adding that no final decision has been made. Key ...