Christine Lagarde is famous for her lively and engaging speaking style. But when she holds her first press conference as president of the European Central Bank, she would be wise to play it safe. It takes time to build a reputation as a central banker who can speak clearly and then deliver on her promises. A wrong foot could make ...

Along with never invading Russia or getting into a Twitter argument, we can add another golden rule — this one specifically for US oil majors: Never buy a shale-gas business. Chevron Corp.’s $10-11 billion impairment relates mostly to the Appalachian gas assets it picked up in 2011’s $4.9 billion acquisition of Atlas Energy Inc. Back then, the Permian basin was ...

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and his colleagues sent a message with their final interest-rate decision of 2019: Don’t expect us to be subject to the whims of America’s ever-shifting trade policy in the year ahead. The Federal Open Market Committee, in its first unanimous decision since May, kept its benchmark lending rate unchanged in a range of 1.5% to ...