Bloomberg Ikea is in talks about returning aid granted by nine countries to subsidise furloughs triggered by the coronavirus pandemic because its business is recovering faster than expected, the Financial Times reported. The global furniture retailer is negotiating with Belgium, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Spain and the US, retail operations manager Tolga Oncu at Ingka Group, ...

Bloomberg Deutsche Lufthansa AG issued a plea to investors to turn up and vote for a $10 billion bailout package or risk tipping Europe’s largest airline into insolvency. The carrier said it expects attendance at its June 25 shareholder meeting to fall below 50% of votes, meaning two-thirds of stockholders would need to vote in favor if the bailout package. ...

Bloomberg Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed India will defend its sovereignty in his first public statement since deadly clashes along its contested border with China resulted in the deaths of 20 Indian troops and an unknown number of Chinese casualties. “India wants peace,” Modi said in a televised address on Wednesday. “But when provoked India will and is capable ...

Bloomberg South Korea warned North Korea against further provocations, after Kim Jong-un’s regime pledged to dismantle the last remnants of President Moon Jae-in’s legacy of rapprochement and move troops into disarmed border areas. Moon’s office urged North Korea to tread carefully after the country reduced to rubble a $15 million liaison office set up north of the border in 2018 ...

Bloomberg European Union diplomats are furious that President Donald Trump shut them out of talks between Serbia and Kosovo, fearing not only that EU interests will be sidelined but that the two countries’ long-term interests will suffer. Three officials familiar with the behind-the-scenes maneuvering in the Balkans said the transatlantic snub ignores years of EU efforts at reconciliation between the ...

Bloomberg Hong Kong, already grappling with tightened policing to rein in widespread protests that followed last year’s proposed extradition bill, is now bracing for the prospect of stricter digital controls — ones that would curtail free speech, communications and the ability to organise and turn the city of 7 million into a surveillance state that more closely resembles China. In ...

Bloomberg Mexico plans to keep migrant workers from travelling to Canada amid a wave of coronavirus outbreaks on farms, threatening a labour squeeze in the northern nation’s fruit and vegetable industry as harvests start to ramp up. There will be a “temporary pause” on migrant workers travelling to Canada while protocols and sanitary situations are reviewed, Daniel Millan, a spokesman ...

Bloomberg Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cabinet signed off on plans to raise another 62.5 billion euros ($70 billion) in debt to finance the country’s largest stimulus program in recent history. The proposal has yet to be approved by parliament and would increase net borrowing to 218 billion euros this year. In March the Bundestag, or lower house, had already authorised a ...

Bloomberg European car sales showed first signs of a tepid recovery in May as showrooms reopened after a two-month shutdown because of the coronavirus. New auto registrations across the region fell 57% year-over-year, the European Automobile Manufacturers Association said. While that’s the worst May since the group started tracking the data in 1990, it’s an improvement over the 78% plunge ...

Bloomberg UK inflation slowed to just a quarter of the Bank of England’s (BOE) target in May, boosting the case for policy makers to add to their stimulus plan at their meeting this week. Consumer prices increased just 0.5% from a year earlier, the weakest since 2016, amid falling prices of auto fuel and recreational goods. The core rate, which ...