Opinion

If Unilever NV picks Rotterdam over London as its new headquarters, Britain will need to ask itself why. One reason might be that the UK’s corporate culture puts shareholders first—and this money-grabbing ethos is behind the times. Theresa May’s government is braced for the Anglo-Dutch consumer group to leave London, the Financial Times reported. Unilever started reviewing its dual-headed structure ...

For all the talk of the costs that “Brexit” will impose on Britain, the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union will not be painless for the rest of the bloc either. One immediate problem will be how to fill the gap in the EU budget resulting from Britain’s departure. The UK is a net contributor to the EU budget. Even ...

Uttar Pradesh, (UP) India’s largest state, is also its greatest challenge. It has about as many people as Brazil but, according to Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, suffers from development indicators more similar to sub-Saharan Africa than anywhere else in Asia. Anyone who wants India to live up to its potential has to figure out how to fix UP. And that ...

When the China Insurance Regulatory Commission announced last week that it was seizing Anbang Insurance Group Co., the only surprise was that it took so long. Last year, the company was told to sell its overseas assets, its founder was placed behind bars, and banks were ordered to stop offering its products. So what, if anything, does this latest incident ...

Stocks have been on a wild ride, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropping 10.4 percent from its peak on January 26 to the February 8 trough, before recovering about half those losses. Usually, big declines foreshadow Federal Reserve-induced recessions. Late in a business cycle, the central bank worries about economic overheating and jacks up interest rates to crushing levels. ...

A recent report by Goldman Sachs’ global research team highlights a new study showing that large, dominant superstar companies are paying lower wages and earning higher profits. I’ve flagged that research myself, but when Goldman says it’s worried, you know things have really gotten serious. American industry is increasingly dominated by a shrinking handful of giant companies. Why is Goldman ...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitions to turn his country into a powerhouse of high-tech manufacturing via the ‘Make In India’ campaign just received one hell of a boost. Toyota Motor Corp.’s Lexus is considering assembling its ES brand in the nation to take advantage of lower import tariffs on auto parts, the Asahi newspaper reported, citing an unidentified official. To ...

Barclays Plc CEO Jes Staley reckons he will keep his side of the bargain he struck with shareholders back in 2016. Back then, he cut the dividend to give him more space to speed up his overhaul of the bank. A bet on that effort paying off still needs a fair amount of faith. On February 22, Barclays reported a ...

The Trump administration’s latest strike on the Affordable Care Act is to expand the availability of so-called short-term health insurance. Don’t be misled by the seeming modesty of this idea. It’s an impressive combination of bad policy and bad faith. First, these aren’t short-term plans at all. They’d provide coverage for up to a year, much longer than required for ...

New York City has added an estimated 488,478 housing units since 1991. For a city that has added 1.1 million jobs over that same period, that’s not great, but it’s not terrible, either. Where things get complicated — and in some ways less encouraging — is in exactly what kind of housing it has added. These numbers are from the ...