Bloomberg A Hermes handbag fetched a record price for a Sotheby’s auction, latest evidence that rare luxury items are increasingly seen as stores of value by investors and wealthy buyers. The Himalaya Retourne Kelly 25 bag sold for €352,800 ($346,802) in a Paris auction, Sotheby’s said. The crocodile-skin handbag in mother-of-pearl white, reminiscent of a snowy mountain landscape, sold ...

  Bloomberg The crash in the value of sterling has put Rolex and other luxury watches at discounts of as much as 19% for US visitors lucky enough to get their hands on the coveted timepieces. Promised policy changes by the new UK government including a plan to reintroduce Value Added Tax rebates on goods bought by tourists could even ...

Bloomberg Vladimir Putin vowed his annexation of four occupied regions in Ukraine is irreversible, as the Russian president formalized Europe’s biggest land grab since World War II and accused the West of trying to subjugate his country. “They will become our citizens forever,” he told officials in a Kremlin ceremony Friday before he and Moscow-installed leaders signed annexation documents. He ...