News

  Tokyo / Bloomberg Suzuki Motor Corp.’s minicar sales fell 18 percent in Japan this month, after the automaker disclosed using improper methods to test the fuel economy of more than 2.1 million vehicles. Dealers heard both encouragement and criticism from customers after Suzuki said May 19 that it didn’t use a test method required by Japanese law, Chairman Osamu ...

  Yangon / AFP Myanmar’s growth rate, once one of the world’s most impressive, has dipped following heavy floods and an investment slowdown sparked by uncertainty over its political transition, the World Bank (WB) said on Tuesday. A civilian government led by veteran democracy campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi took power in March after clinching a clear majority in elections late ...

  Beijing / Bloomberg China’s jobs market, which has weathered the economy’s slowdown so far this year, faces fresh challenges as the government plans to shut inefficient companies, according to a top official at the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. The nation created 4.43 million new jobs in the first four months of the year, hitting 44 percent ...

  Bloomberg Euro-area consumer prices failed to increase for a fourth consecutive month, highlighting policy makers’ struggle to stoke inflation despite multiple rounds of stimulus. Prices fell 0.1 percent in May from a year earlier, the European Union’s statistics office in Luxembourg said on Tuesday. That’s in line with the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists and follows ...

  Bloomberg The pound weakened amid signs that support for the campaign for Britain to leave the European Union had increased. Sterling fell against most of its major peers as Bookmaker William Hill Plc said 85 percent of all EU referendum bets taken over Monday’s public holiday in the U.K. were in favor of Britain exiting the bloc, and that ...

  Bloomberg Profit at Volkswagen AG’s namesake brand crumbled 86 percent in the first quarter, highlighting the challenge the carmaker faces in emerging from the nearly nine-month-old emissions cheating scandal. Operating profit at the VW nameplate dropped to 73 million euros ($81 million) from 514 million euros last year, Europe’s biggest carmaker said in a statement. That gave the marque ...

  Bloomberg Italy’s unemployment rate rose more than estimated in April amid weakening business and household expectations for recovery in the euro region’s third-biggest economy. Consumer prices on an annual basis fell for a fourth month in a row in May. The jobless rate rose to 11.7 percent from a revised 11.5 percent in March, national statistics agency Istat said ...

Frankfurt / AFP Unemployment in Germany fell to its lowest level since East and West Germany reunited after the fall of the Berlin Wall, as Europe’s top economy continues to recover, data showed on Tuesday. The unemployment rate — which measures the jobless total against the working population as a whole — fell to 6.1 percent in May from 6.2 ...

  Bloomberg As OPEC ministers gather in Vienna, they may notice more sport utility vehicles on the streets of the Austrian capital than on previous visits. Last year, SUVs outsold any other type of passenger vehicle in Europe for the first time, according to auto industry consultants JATO Dynamics. The trend has continued in 2016, with demand for SUVs such ...

  Bloomberg Treasuries have lost their edge over stocks as the U.S. economy expands enough to push the Federal Reserve toward raising interest rates. U.S. government securities stagnated for a second month in May, leaving them little changed for the second quarter. The S&P 500 Index of shares has returned 2.3 percent since the end of March, based on data ...