Bloomberg Amazon.com Inc.’s relaunch of its online payments business in 2013 was greeted with scepticism. PayPal Holdings Inc. had a huge head start and credit card companies like Visa Inc. already had products that made buying something on the Web as easy as swiping a card. It seemed doubtful digital shop owners would want to team up with Amazon and ...

Bloomberg Singapore home prices dropped for a tenth quarter, posting the longest losing streak in almost two decades, as tighter mortgage curbs cooled demand in Asia’s second-most expensive housing market. An index tracking private residential prices fell 0.7 percent in the three months ended March 31 from the previous quarter, matching the longest series of losses since 1998, according to ...

Bloomberg GFH Financial Group ( GFH ), a prominent regional financial group, announced that it has signed an agreement with Palace Revive Developments Limited worth £100 million to be a key partner in the prestigious No. 1 Palace Street development in central London, a project being developed by Northacre, the leading British developer. Under the agreement, GFH will become a ...

Dubai / Emirates Business Hilton Hotels & Resorts opened Hilton Alexandria King’s Ranchon Friday. The hotel marks Hilton Worldwide’s 18th in Egypt, showcasing the company’s commitment to expanding its operations and further strengthening its presence in the country. “As we continue to spearhead the hospitality industry in Egypt and around the world, we’re proud to expand our world-class offerings,” said ...

Bloomberg Mort Zuckerman, who co-founded Boston Properties Inc. in 1970 and has been its chairman since 1997, will leave the company’s board next month following its annual election of trustees. Zuckerman, 78, won’t seek re-election at the company’s annual meeting, Boston Properties, the biggest U.S. office real estate investment trust, said. In honor of his “long and dedicated service,” Zuckerman ...

Reuters Anbang Insurance Group Co’s unexpected withdrawal this week of its $14 billion offer to buy Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc is a wider blow to the unprecedented drive by Chinese companies to acquire North American and European assets. Fresh disclosures by Starwood on Friday showed how Anbang’s hard-charging Chairman Wu Xiaohui backed out of the deal even after ...

Shanghai / AFP China Construction Bank (CCB), the country’s second-largest lender, reported flat growth in net profit in 2015, as bad loans jumped with economic growth slowing. The bank’s net profit edged up 0.14 percent year-on-year to 228.15 billion yuan ($35 billion) in last year, slowing from a 6.1 percent annual increase in 2014, according to a statement that was ...

WARSAW / Reuters Poland’s Alior Bank has agreed to buy Bank BPH from General Electric for 1.225 billion zloty ($329 million) and said it will look to make another acquisition this year after moving into the country’s top 10. Shares in the lender, which has a market capitalisation of 4.67 billion zlotys, jumped by up to 5.7 percent, with investors ...

Bloomberg Banco Santander SA intends to close about 450 branches in Spain this year, more than one in 10, as the lender steers customers into digital banking to cut costs and bolster profitability. “Spain’s financial sector is facing a period of major change,” Country Head Rami Aboukhair told employees in an internal memo announcing the closures. “The current economic context, ...

Nicosia / AFP Bank of Cyprus, the bailed-out eurozone country’s largest lender, has announced plans to list its shares on the London Stock Exchange and to delist from the Athens market. The move reflects the bank’s ambitions of raising its “visibility and share liquidity” on a major European exchange, BoC said in a statement. The announcement came on the same ...