The golden age of Australian economic growth may have passed. Continuing a run of over 25 years, the expansion most likely clocked another quarter of gains in gross domestic product in the three months to June 30. But that run looks tired, and the weight of many challenges has accumulated. The most significant are two related shifts. The first is ...

“Burst week” has quickly established itself as a highlight of the Tesla calendar. It’s like Thanksgiving, except it happens once every three months and everyone works twice as hard. Tesla Inc. on Monday morning announced the number everyone’s been waiting for: In the last seven days of June, the electric vehicle maker churned out 5,031 Model 3s, finally delivering on ...

The European Commission’s proposal to ban plastic straws, plates, cutlery and drink stirrers, and slash the consumption of many other single-use products, is more than just a nice, novel idea. It’s a step urgently needed from every country — as plastic trash pours into the oceans at the rate of almost 9 million tons a year. The flood of trash ...

When is a loosening of foreign investment rules not really a loosening of foreign investment rules? When China’s doing it in the face of a brewing trade war. The country’s latest so-called “negative list” issued last week, which comprises a group of industries where foreign businesses are either prohibited from investing or restricted to joint ventures with a degree of ...

In the battle for the first company to reach and sustain $1 trillion in stock market value, don’t count out a come-from-behind victory. Apple Inc. has had a lock on its spot as the world’s most valuable public company by stock value for several years, and we’ve been waiting for it to crest the $1 trillion market cap milestone. The ...

Urban transportation is undergoing a revolution. Offerings such as Uber and Lyft, as well as car- and bike-sharing services are widely believed to reduce congestion and generally make urban dwellers more mobile; driverless cars are expected to provide further benefits. Yet the notion that these innovations always make things better is far from a given: The new services are a ...

Bloomberg US stocks rose with European shares on Tuesday after China said it won’t use the yuan as a weapon in any trade dispute. Oil briefly rose above $75 a barrel for the first time since November 2014. All major US benchmarks were higher, paced by strength in energy, on lighter than normal volume heading into the US. Telecom companies ...

Bloomberg Crude soared above $75 a barrel in New York for the first time since 2014 on signs global supply outages outweigh OPEC’s pledged production rise. Futures in New York jumped as much as 1.7 percent. Even as US President Donald Trump — facing sky-high retail gasoline prices ahead of midterm elections — urges to boost output more than it ...

Bloomberg Two top Chinese central bank officials vowed to keep the yuan stable on Tuesday, stoking speculation that policy makers are prepared to take tougher actions to arrest the plunge in the currency. Using standard language to describe the stance on the currency, People’s Bank of China Governor Yi Gang said China will “keep the yuan exchange rate basically stable ...

Bloomberg The South African Reserve Bank has written to the National Credit Regulator requesting a probe into loan- origination fees charged by Capitec Bank Holdings Ltd., according to a person familiar with the matter. The referral came after the issue was raised in a report by short-seller Viceroy Research in January, said the person, asking not to be identified because ...