One way to gauge just how transitory the current supply-chain challenges are is to look at the degree to which companies are spending to add more capacity. The third-quarter industrial earnings season kicks off next week with factory-floor distributor Fastenal Co. The theme will undoubtedly be logistical logjams and parts shortages, which have become materially worse since the last time ...

I have met Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg only once and it did not go well. It was at a dinner in July 2017, in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s presidential election victory, and controversy was raging about Facebook’s political role. I had the temerity to warn him that he increasingly resembled a cross between John D Rockefeller and William ...

Stuart Woolf, a large almond and tomato producer, recently bulldozed 400 acres of almond orchards in central California — about 50,000 trees that under normal conditions would have produced $2.5 million of nuts every year for another decade. It’s a fraction of the 25,000 acres his family farms, but razing the land was a necessary triage — “Like cutting off ...

There’s plenty of symbolism to Russian editor Dmitry Muratov’s (shared) Nobel Peace Prize. The media outlet he edits, Novaya Gazeta, started, in a way, with another Nobel — Mikhail Gorbachev’s: He spent part of his 1990 Peace Prize to buy computers for the Novaya start-up in 1993. The award also comes almost exactly 15 years after Novaya journalist Anna Politkovskaya ...

Bloomberg French grocer Auchan made a recent approach to acquire rival Carrefour SA for about $19 billion but talks to create the country’s market leader stalled over the terms, according to people familiar with the matter. Auchan had approached Carrefour about a combination that would have seen Auchan, which is owned by the Mulliez family, hold a majority stake in ...

Bloomberg Walmart Inc said “the overwhelming majority” of employees required to get Covid-19 vaccines have received the shots. A “very small percentage” of the US headquarters and regional staff covered by the company mandate are partially inoculated or haven’t gotten the shots, Walmart said in an email without providing specific numbers. Employees who aren’t fully vaccinated can complete the process ...

Bloomberg Southwest Airlines Co pilots asked a court to temporarily block the company from carrying out federally mandated coronavirus vaccinations until an existing lawsuit over alleged US labour law violations is resolved. The Southwest Airlines Pilots Association’s (SWAPA) filing also asked for an immediate hearing on the request before a federal court in Dallas, claiming the carrier has continued to ...

Bloomberg Hong Kong said its coronavirus policy will become increasingly tethered to China’s, as the financial hub recorded its first local Covid-19 case since mid-August, raising the specter of an outbreak in one of the world’s densest cities. An airport worker has been infected, officials said at a briefing. His close contacts and some 400 people in his residential neighbourhood ...

Bloomberg The number of empty storefronts is surging in midtown Manhattan, where an absence of tourists and office workers has hammered the retail industry during the pandemic. Nearly 30% of 311 storefronts were vacant in the retail corridors near Grand Central and Midtown East as of the end of September, roughly double the historical rate, according to a report from ...

Bloomberg Levi Strauss & Co’s strong quarter is sending a clear message to the rest of the apparel industry: There’s value in spreading out manufacturing. Chief Executive Officer Chip Bergh said the denim maker sources less than 4% of its goods from Vietnam — which has faced factory shutdowns recent due to Covid-19 outbreaks — and tries not to have ...