Regional News

Bloomberg Barry Sternlicht’s Starwood Property Trust Inc. agreed to buy a General Electric Co. energy-finance business for $2.56 billion to expand beyond real estate holdings. The acquisition includes a roughly $2.1 billion portfolio of 51 loans backed by assets such as pipelines, power plants and wind farms, as well as $400 million of unfunded commitments, Starwood and GE said in ...

Bloomberg A clean-power company owned by billionaire Richard Branson’s Virgin Group has taken over a Caribbean solar farm that was damaged last year by Hurricane Maria. Virgin’s BMR Energy unit, which develops, owns and operates clean-energy projects in the Caribbean and Latin America, plans to restore the 4-megawatt farm in St. Croix, the US Virgin Islands, and take over a ...

Bloomberg Saudi Arabia’s second-quarter budget revenue increased 67 percent from the year-earlier period as higher oil prices helped boost income, the country’s Finance Ministry said in a statement. Revenue climbed to 273.6 billion riyals ($73 billion), boosted by an 82 percent increase in oil revenue, the ministry said on Wednesday. Non-oil revenue rose 42 percent to 89.4 billion riyals, while ...

Bloomberg Snap Inc. shares fell the most in about two months after the company reported its first-ever drop in daily active users. But revenue gains in the second quarter proved that the company is making headway in the mobile-advertising market dominated by Facebook Inc. and Google. The declining user numbers at Snapchat, attributed to an unpopular app redesign, worried analysts ...

Bloomberg After decades of difficulties in Nigeria over crude theft, pollution and oil-related corruption, Royal Dutch Shell Plc still feels optimistic a fossil fuel can improve life in the country. The Anglo-Dutch oil major is seeking to develop Nigeria’s domestic energy market around natural gas. It’s plentiful, harder to steal, better for the environment and can underpin a robust industrial ...

Bloomberg Sempra Energy Chief Executive Officer Jeff Martin said he’s holding “constructive” talks with activist investors pressing for the company to shed assets and shake up its board. But Elliott Management Corp. and investor partner Bluescape Resources have been frustrated by the pace of the discussions and had hoped for a settlement before Sempra’s second-quarter earnings report, according to people ...

RIYADH / WAM The Government of Jeddah has combined its ancient heritage and its modern advancements through its public and private museums, the Corniche, the historic Jeddah wall, its entertainment and sporting locations, and especially its diving facilities. The Khuzam Palace Museum, part of the King Abdul Aziz Palace, is one of the city’s most important museums because of its ...

Bloomberg China’s GCL-Poly Energy Holdings Ltd. sank to the lowest level in more than nine years as a deal for the company to sell a controlling stake in its polysilicon unit worth $1.9 billion to Shanghai Electric Group Co. fell apart. Shares of GCL-Poly in Hong Kong fell 7.6 percent to close at HK$0.61, the lowest since March 2009, paring ...

Bloomberg The Trump administration will consider partial exemptions from oil sanctions against Iran for some countries as a first wave of non-oil penalties against the Islamic Republic snap back into effect on Tuesday, US officials said. President Donald Trump is still willing to meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani at any time, without preconditions, as the US ramps up economic ...

Bloomberg The Trump administration’s plan to relax fuel-economy and vehicle pollution standards could be a boon to US oil producers who’ve quietly lobbied for the measure. The proposal would translate into an additional 500,000 barrels of US oil demand per day by the early 2030s, about 2 to 3 percent of projected consumption, according to government calculations. “It’s a increase ...