Bloomberg The gloom is clearing over Ukraine’s beleaguered consumers. Faced with a war on the border with Russia and a devaluation that sent inflation shooting past 60 percent, crumbling domestic demand kept the economy shrinking for eight straight quarters on an annual basis. A spending revival helped reverse the slump in the first three months of the year, according ...

  London / AFP French oil and gas company Total officially launched a project off Britain’s remote Shetland Islands on Monday, hailed by London as a “vote of confidence” in the flagging Scottish North Sea oil and gas industry. The Laggan-Tormore fields are located 600 metres (1,970 feet) under water off Britain’s northernmost outpost. They began production on February 7 ...

  Bloomberg Royal Philips NV is seeking to raise as much as €970 million ($1.1 billion) from the initial public offering of a 25 percent stake in its lighting unit in Amsterdam after a private sale process didn’t result in a deal. Philips is planning to sell 37.5 million shares at a range of between €18.50 and €22.50 per share, ...

  Bloomberg Russian assets, which are among the most volatile in the world, are bringing hedge fund managers the best returns in emerging markets. Funds with a geographical focus on the country have gained an average 29 percent since the start of 2015, more than any others geared toward major developing nations, according to industry tracker eVestment. That’s 8 times ...

  Bloomberg Oil climbed to a six-month high as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said the market moved into a deficit earlier than expected due to disruptions in Nigeria and higher demand. Futures rose as much as 2.1 percent in New York. The shift to a supply deficit this month happened one quarter earlier than forecast, Goldman Sachs said in a ...

  Bloomberg Konecranes Oyj shares soared after the crane maker agreed to buy a lifting-gear business from Terex Corp. for about $1.3 billion, abandoning a full merger plan and paving the way for China’s Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science & Technology Co. to buy the rest of the U.S. company. Konecranes will pay $820 million in cash and 19.6 million shares ...

  Bloomberg Brazil’s state-controlled oil company Petrobras is advancing asset sales to reduce the biggest debt load in the oil industry after three quarters of straight losses. Brazil’s deepest recession in a century is curbing lucrative fuel imports and eroding profit at Rio de Janeiro-based Petroleo Brasileiro SA. The company’s net loss was 1.25 billion reais ($360 million), or 10 ...

  Bloomberg Safra Catz emerged as the highest-paid U.S. female executive in fiscal 2015 when she became co-chief executive officer of Oracle Corp. Catz was awarded a $56.9 million pay package last year, placing her first among women on the Bloomberg Pay Index, a ranking of the 200 best-paid executives at companies that trade on U.S. exchanges. Her pay included ...

  Foreign governments can’t be sued in U.S. courts. Foreign companies can. What happens when China’s state-owned companies claim to be part of the government? Nobody knows because the law is confusing, but some U.S. courts are taking the Chinese claim seriously. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act isn’t well drawn to address the complex situation of Chinese companies and their ...

  When signs of world economic crisis began to show up, China was an exemplary business hub for western investors, especially from the US. Now, there seems to be a sort of role reversal as Chinese investors are flocking to the US, Canada and Australia, to buy properties. Chinese investors may be seeking to move money abroad amid abysmal look ...