Opinion

Antibiotics might be the most important medicines we have. They treat everything from dirty cuts to rapidly mutating superbugs that make a stay at a hospital an increasingly scary proposition. With new strains of drug-resistant and potentially deadly bacteria continuing to emerge, it’s essential from a public-health perspective that the antibiotic pipeline remains robust. But instead, big pharmaceutical companies are ...

A tiny subsection in the UK takeover code has shot from the margins to the center. The Takeover Panel prompted more controversy over an arcane rule and its application to the battle for Sky Plc. The rule book’s so-called chain principle determines what happens if a bidder takes control of a publicly traded company by buying a firm that owns ...

Corporations are easy to hate. They are big, they are impersonal, and they operate by profit-driven rules that can sometimes seem cruel. When corporations are accused of wrongdoing by a community led by a plucky plaintiffs lawyer, there is a natural tendency to believe the latter over the former. Chevron Corp, which is ranked 13th on the Fortune 500 and ...

It’s a mystery. The US economy seems strong. Since the nadir of the Great Recession, employers have added about 19 million workers. The unemployment rate is 4 percent, near the lowest level since 2000. By standard economic theory, the strong demand for labour should be pushing up wages. But that isn’t happening. Wage gains of 2.7 percent roughly match inflation. ...

In the seven months since Bitcoin’s price peaked, it has fallen by about two-thirds. But it’s still almost three times more valuable than it was a year ago: So what does the future hold for the world’s first and still most famous cryptocurrency? I see three basic scenarios: No. 1. Bitcoin Triumph: Bitcoin replaces the dollar (and probably other fiat ...

From China, without love. The stampede of unicorns is losing fans. Xiaomi Corp fell as much as 6 percent in its debut in Hong Kong, while most of last year’s hottest listings, from ZhongAn Online P&C Insurance Co to Ping An Healthcare & Technology Co, are trading below their IPO prices. Yet it seems nothing will stop the unicorns. In ...

Theresa May’s government has presented its eagerly awaited proposal on the future relationship between Britain and the EU after Brexit. One area that merits careful scrutiny concerns the City of London and financial services, given their weight on the country’s economy and central position in global markets. After the Chequers agreement, it became clear that the UK would want to ...

New tariffs on Chinese imports went into effect only on July 6, so it is too early to say how the trade war is going and which country, if any, will win it. Even the most die-hard free trader should admit that in theory it is possible that the threat of tariffs can induce other countries to make concessions that ...

US President Donald Trump exulted this week over Pfizer Inc’s decision to delay planned drug price increases a day after he attacked the company on Twitter. He should take a look at China, where President Xi Jinping has done much better. Over the past two weeks, the US pharmaceutical giant quietly cut the prices of more than a dozen of ...

Can’t code, or speak Bahasa? Didn’t go to school with a CEO’s son or daughter? A robot will take your trading seat. Read on if you want to save your job. The threat from automation is in the flows part of banks’ global markets business, the most important chunk of the biggest division of investment banking. Investment banks garner 70 ...