Bloomberg Century 21 Stores, an iconic New York off-price department store chain, filed for bankruptcy with plans to shut down, becoming the latest victim of the retail industry carnage that’s accelerated during the pandemic. Nearly 1,400 jobs are at risk. The retailer will hold going out of business sales at its 13 stores in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and ...

Bloomberg JC Penney Co sales plunged 45% in the second quarter as the department-store chain entered bankruptcy and struggled with an accelerated shift away from physical stores and the Covid-19 outbreak. Net sales fell to $1.39 billion in the period ended on August 1 from $2.51 billion a year earlier, the company reported in a regulatory filing. The retailer’s lenders ...

Bloomberg The UK’s fluctuating quarantine restrictions are again leading to punishing airfares for vacationers forced to rush home on short notice. Travellers scrambling to return from Portugal before a rule requiring self-isolation kicks in on Saturday faced paying more than $640 for a one-way ticket, based on fares from both British Airways Plc and Jet2holidays Ltd. Airlines have been vocal ...

Bloomberg Boeing Co’s grounded 737 Max jetliner completed a round of test flights with European air-safety regulators, taking another step towards a return to the skies. The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) will now evaluate data from the trips, it said in a statement. The agency, based in Cologne, Germany, performed the flights from Vancouver, near Boeing’s Seattle-area operations, ...

Bloomberg The Philippines has eased distancing rules in public transport, allowing trains and planes to have more passengers amid the region’s worst coronavirus outbreak, the Department of Transportation said. The agency and economic managers’ proposal to increase public transport ridership and accommodate more people going back to work was approved by the government’s coronavirus task force, Transport Secretary Arthur Tugade ...

Bloomberg Afghanistan’s government and Taliban leaders began historic peace talks on Saturday in a bid to end two decades of war, in a meeting that was fraught with tension over what the insurgent group will demand in return for laying down its arms. Meeting in an enormous hotel conference room in Doha, Qatar, the two sides promised to negotiate in ...

Bloomberg The US is “deeply concerned” about 12 Hong Kong pro-democratic activists held in mainland China who have been denied access to lawyers of their choice, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The activists were arrested two weeks ago off the coast of Hong Kong by Guangdong Maritime Police. Local authorities haven’t provided information on their welfare or charges ...

Bloomberg India and China pledged to de-escalate tensions along their disputed Himalayan border after their foreign ministers met Thursday for the first time since May when the stand-off began. Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, agreed that “the current situation in the border area is not in the interests of both sides,” according to a joint ...

Bloomberg Yoshihide Suga, the front-runner to become Japan’s next premier, emphasized the importance of the nation’s alliance with the US for the country’s foreign policy. “With the US-Japan alliance at the foundation, it is important for Japan to get along with other Asian nations,” Suga said in a debate in Tokyo on Saturday at the Japan National Press Club. While ...

Bloomberg Australian raids on Chinese journalists living in that country were “imperious” and “utterly appalling,” and are damaging relations between the two nations, China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency said. Australian authorities confiscated computers and phones in raids on four Chinese journalists’ homes, including that of a Xinhua employee, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said. The operation was conducted by ...