Having bestowed the presidency on a candidate who described their country as a “hellhole” besieged by multitudes trying to get into it, Americans need an antidote for social hypochondria. Fortunately, one has arrived from Don Boudreaux, an economist at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center and proprietor of the indispensable blog Cafe Hayek. He has good news: You are as …

  The benefits of OPEC’s agreement to cut output have proved elusive. With less than three weeks to go before the group’s next meeting, something is very, very wrong as far as oil producers are concerned. And they have no easy solution to put it right. The oil price is not far off where it was in November, before OPEC …

  Beji Sasaki, a maverick businessman who first challenged Tokyo’s status quo four decades ago, says his bidding war with the $13 billion computer giant Fujitsu Ltd. is just the start of his plan to use takeovers to change Japan Inc. Sasaki, a 61-year-old entrepreneur, fashion designer and supermarathon runner, says he’s setting up a fund backed by Taiwanese money …

  Bloomberg China is considering plans to create three power giants through mergers of eight coal-fired and nuclear generators with combined assets of almost 5.9 trillion yuan ($855 billion), according to people with knowl-edge of the plan. The proposal, which is only one option being considered as the government of President Xi Jinping seeks to restructure the state-run power sector, …

  Bloomberg Garena has rebranded as Sea Ltd. after Southeast Asia’s most valuable startup secured $550 million in funds to step up a battle with Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba and other players in Indonesia. The eight-year-old startup backed by Tencent Holdings Ltd. landed a clutch of new investors in its latest funding round, including some of the region’s wealthiest families. …

  Bloomberg How much pain can China’s leaders stomach? It’s becoming a key question for investors as the government’s clampdown on financial leverage ripples through markets. The tightening campaign has erased at least $453 billion from the value of Chinese stocks and bonds since mid-April, spurred $21 billion of canceled debt sales and compelled the People’s Bank of China to …

  Bloomberg KKR & Co. is in talks with Toshiba Corp. about a preemptive bid for the Japanese company’s memory chips business that would accelerate completion of a sale and end negotiations with other potential acquirers, according to people familiar with the matter. Toshiba is in favor of the proposal from KKR and Innovation Network Corp. of Japan because it …

  Bloomberg China’s overseas shipments held up in April amid recovering global demand and as the threat of a trade war with the US dissipated. Exports rose 8 percent in dollar terms from a year earlier, less than the 11.3 percent increase economists projected in Bloomberg survey Imports increased 11.9 percent, compared with an estimate for 18 percent growth. Trade …

  Bloomberg Akzo Nobel NV rejected PPG Industries Inc.’s third takeover bid in favor of its own breakup strategy, raising the prospect that the US rival will go hostile with its $29.5 billion offer for the Dutch coating and chemical company. After taking two weeks to evaluate the bid, Akzo Nobel repeated that the proposal is flawed and riddled with …

  Bloomberg Coach Inc. agreed to buy handbag maker Kate Spade & Co. for $2.4 billion following months of talks, helping the luxury brand cope with an industry racked by deep discounting and sluggish demand. The $18.50-a-share transaction represents a premium to Kate Spade’s price when deal speculation first surfaced in December, but it’s well below the amount investors were …