Frankfurt am Main / AFP Lending to households and companies picked up in November in the eurozone, the European Central Bank said on Thursday, signalling that its efforts to encourage spending and investment are gaining traction. Loans to households in the single currency area grew by 1.9 percent year-on-year, compared to 1.8 percent a month earlier, the bank said. …

  DUBAI / Reuters Saudi Arabian commercial bank deposits rose to their highest level this year in November, a sign that a liquidity crunch due to low oil prices is easing as the government liquidates foreign assets to pay its bills, official data showed on Wednesday. Bank deposits climbed to 1.624 trillion riyals ($433 billion) from 1.610 trillion riyals in …

  DUBAI / Reuters National Bank of Oman (NBO) said on Thursday it had received a letter from Treasure Fleet International proposing to buy a stake in Oman’s third biggest lender. NBO will review the proposal; no legally binding commitments have been made and any deal would be subject to approval by shareholders and regulators, it said in a bourse …

  Bloomberg The dollar dropped to a two-week low against the yen as traders pushed it through stops in thin trading amid a slide in Treasury yields. The greenback weakened against all its major peers on Thursday, with leveraged funds shorting the dollar against the yen as the currency pair continued a pull back from a 10-month high. Bloomberg’s dollar …

  Bloomberg Investors may grow increasingly skeptical of the European Central Bank meeting its inflation target, with a host of factors — some beyond the control of President Mario Draghi — exposing the limitations of policy makers’ toolkit. The monetary authority’s efforts to bring inflation close to 2 percent “without undue delay” are being curbed by judicial hurdles to changing …

  Kaiserslautern / DPA When Professor Sabine Hoffmann invites you to sit down, there’s a surprise in store: the individualized office chairs she’s helping to develop can ventilate you from below. At the push of a button, their little built-in fans can blow air on the back or bottom. Men in particular like this feature, she says, as it helps …

  Relaxnews Twitter began streaming 360-degree video, allowing users to interact and get behind the scenes of live broadcasts. “Starting today, you can check out live, interactive 360 videos from interesting broadcasters and explore what’s happening with them,” Twitter’s Alessandro Sabatelli said in a blog post. “You’ll be able to get an inside look with well-known personalities and go behind …

  Relaxnews 2017 will be marked by Nokia’s grand return to the smartphone market. According to DigiTimes, Finnish company HMD Global, which is now in charge of mobile devices for the brand, is preparing to launch half a dozen models. In December 2016, HMD launched a basic phone for emerging markets, the Nokia 150, which has all the trappings of …

  Bloomberg Here are the requirements that every good pair of travel headphones needs to meet: They must be small enough to fit in a carry-on, they must drown out ambient airplane noise (and crying babies), the batteries must last long enough for a trans-ocean flight, and they must have killer sound. Achieving all that is easier said than done. …

    Emirates Business To advance the essential functions of its home appliances, LG Electr- onics (LG) is set to deliver an unparalleled level of performance and convenience into the home with Deep Learning technology to be unveiled at CES® 2017. LG Deep Learning allows home appliances to better understand its users, making lives simpler and more enjoyable. Using smart …