Opinion

  Safran SA launched a weak counter-attack against hedge fund TCI Fund Management Ltd.’s opposition to its proposed 9.7 billion euro ($10.3 billion) takeover of Zodiac Aerospace. The French jet engine maker is still short on strategic and financial justifications for the deal. Nor has it addressed the strong common-sense argument for giving shareholders a simple vote on the whole ...

  Every time a government sets out to abolish something people like, the well-liked thing moves to where it can’t be stopped. This has happened with prohibition, gambling, the war on drugs and digital piracy. Now it’s happening in China, where the government has been trying to crack down on bitcoin. As part of an effort to control capital outflows, ...

  Financial markets have been sending an interesting message about President Trump and Russia. After Trump’s election, investors seemed to be betting that sanctions against Moscow would soon be eased. But this confidence collapsed in late January, and Russian stocks plummeted. The numbers tell the story: From Nov. 7, the day before the election, to Jan. 27, the MICEX index ...

  The European Central Bank (ECB) just can’t get a break. After many years of unconventional monetary measures that have drawn lots of political criticism and attacks and forced it to intervene uncomfortably in the functioning and pricing of financial markets, it was hoping that a pickup in euro-zone economic activity would allow it to declare victory and gradually normalize ...

  Nearly a decade after a devastating financial crisis, the U.S. remains poorly prepared for a repeat. So it’s unsettling that Daniel Tarullo, the Federal Reserve official who has done the most to make the country’s banks stronger, plans to step down — and all the more important that President Donald Trump find a worthy replacement. The 2008 crisis exposed ...

  US Vice President Mike Pence told Republican Jewish Coalition that Washington is assessing whether to move American embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Trump on the campaign trail had pledged to move the embassy, although he’s softened his stance since taking office in January. Pence assured the influential Jewish group that he alongwith President Trump will work ...

  The legal battle that’s starting between Waymo, the self-driving car spin-off of Google’s former “moonshot” unit, and ride-hailing giant Uber appears to be all about trade secrets and patents. But there is a bigger issue behind it: Silicon Valley ethics and employee loyalty. The Waymo lawsuit contends that a former employee, Anthony Levandowski, downloaded 9.7 gigabytes of sensitive data ...

  No one should be surprised about job cuts at Jasper Infotech Pvt’s Snapdeal. The Indian media have chronicled the struggles facing the country’s e-commerce industry, including executive departures and lower equity valuations, and I foreshadowed trouble back in July in looking at rescinded job offers for college students. Shining a light on these valuation hiccups and stumbles is important ...

  A big day is coming for the faithful followers of the Oracle of Omaha. Warren Buffett’s annual letter is due out, and he’s expected to take up the long-simmering debate about active versus passive investing. Buffett has a somewhat complicated relationship with that debate. On the one hand, he is the most famous — and arguably the most successful ...

  Some American disasters come as bolts from the blue — the stock market crash of October 1929, Pearl Harbor, the designated hitter, 9/11. Others are predictable because they arise from arithmetic that is neither hidden nor arcane. Now comes the tsunami of pension problems that will wash over many cities and states. Dallas has the fastest-growing economy of America’s ...