Opinion

Round and round the DuPont merry-go-round of financial engineering we go. The chemicals giant agreed on Sunday to sell its nutrition and biosciences division to International Flavours & Fragrances Inc. via a tax-friendly Reverse Morris Trust transaction that values the business at about $26 billion. DuPont de Nemours Inc. will receive a one-time $7.3 billion cash payment and its shareholders ...

There are times, including in armed conflict, when adversaries see it in their own interests to opt for a truce and sell it to the outside world as a steppingstone to a comprehensive peace. But both sides know it will be only a prelude to renewed tensions down the road. This could well be the best way to think of ...

How do you unscramble an egg called Tata Sons? The second law of thermodynamics says orderly things gradually turn more chaotic, and there’s no going back, no separating yolks from whites. But the appeals judge of India’s corporate law arbiter thinks he can reverse time. Or so it would appear from his order declaring that Cyrus Mistry, deposed three years ...

It can always get worse for FedEx Corp. Back in June, I wrote that the parcel-delivery company had managed to fall out of a basement window when it issued fiscal 2020 guidance that fell well short of already depressed expectations. Two guidance cuts later, it seems we’ve sunk below the foundation and are in the dirt with the worms. The ...

China has made developing its own chip industry a matter of patriotic pride. It helps that “China chip” and “China heart” sound the same in the local language. The strain of this 1.7 trillion yuan ($243 billion) endeavour may be too much for the debt-clogged arteries of its municipal governments, though. Over the past decade, Beijing hasn’t hesitated to deploy ...

The financial markets had a rude awakening on Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s first day back at the office. Instead of using his new parliamentary majority to push for an ambitious trading relationship with Europe post-Brexit, Johnson doubled down on his election pledge to rush ahead and complete trade talks next year, suggesting there will be either a bare-bones deal or ...

The days of a strong dollar look as if they’re coming to an end — and not a moment too soon. If the dollar does weaken, we may finally see the kind of durable and robust growth that the US has only had in fits and starts since the financial crisis ended. Let’s tick off a few of the events ...

The clock is ticking for Frederic Oudea. After more than 11 years running Societe Generale SA, the French bank is searching for an eventual successor. A new leader may bring a change of course, but undoing the lender’s strategic missteps will require some fancy footwork. SocGen wants a replacement to succeed the 56-year-old Frenchman once his term expires in three ...

Anil Ambani, the younger brother of Asia’s richest man, faces a $680 million legal test to answer one and only one question: Just what did he know about what his employees were doing on his behalf? Other Indian tycoons will take an abiding interest in his defense. The $680 million is the amount Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd. ...

India has exploded into protests against a citizenship law that explicitly discriminates against its 200 million-strong Muslim population. Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government has responded with police firing on demonstrators and assaults on university campuses. The global wildfire of street protests, from Sudan to Chile, Lebanon to Hong Kong, has finally reached the country whose 1.3 billion population is mostly ...