The world’s largest electric-vehicle (EV) battery maker is getting bigger. Whether it can maintain its global reign will come down to Beijing’s tolerance of a private enterprise’s monopoly in a key industrial sector. China’s Contemporary Amperex Technology Co (CATL) announced it was investing 24 billion yuan ($3.77 billion) to expand its battery production capacity in Sichuan province, maintaining its ...

Environment, social and governance investing is all the rage, but most all investment goes into the “E” and, to a lesser extent, the “G” and not the “S.” We neglect social-welfare investment at grave risk and for no good reason. But there is a way to quickly change this by making ESG meaningful for an urgent social good: speeding treatment ...

  It’s private equity (PE) to the rescue. French big-box retailer Auchan couldn’t quite make a good enough offer to buy peer Carrefour SA when it tried a takeover last year. Now buyout firms may be on hand to juice up the bid. Securing a deal would involve the buyers making compromises. A willingness to do so suggests some desperation ...