Bloomberg Indians increase purchases of refrigerators and TV sets around election time as the government puts more money in the hands of voters, which stands to benefit some of the world’s most profitable consumer finance companies. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is following his predecessor in boosting spending before polls due early 2019, a practice that has sparked surges in stocks ...

Bloomberg It’s the $85 billion question that could hold the key to how mega deals are made for years to come. When US District Judge Richard Leon hands down his decision on AT&T Inc.’s proposed takeover of Time Warner Inc. next week, the likes of Comcast Corp., Verizon Communications Inc., Cigna Corp. and CVS Health Corp. will be watching keenly. ...

Bloomberg Fortive Corp. will buy Johnson & Johnson’s medical sterilisation unit for $2.7 billion, adding a range of new products to the company that was spun off from medical and industrial parts giant Danaher Corp. in 2016. J&J’s Advanced Sterilisation Products business had sales of about $775 million last year, Fortive said in a statement announcing the transaction. For J&J, ...

Bloomberg Verizon Communications Inc. named Hans Vestberg as its next chief executive officer, picking a leader who plans to stay the course even as all three of the company’s major wireless rivals are pursuing megadeals. The move will take effect Aug. 1, ending months of speculation over who takes over at the largest US wireless carrier in the midst of ...

Bloomberg Euro-area exports fell for the first time in five years at the start of 2018, dragging on economic growth, which slowed sharply in the period. Updated first-quarter GDP data showed that government spending stagnated in the three months through March, while exports fell 0.4 percent and net trade proved a drag. The economy expanded 0.4 percent, down from 0.7 ...

Bloomberg Daimler AG could split its truck unit and passenger-car business into separate companies, but it’s not a necessity and won’t happen unless stockholders want it to. “It’s not so much an issue of management, it’s more of the shareholders, what they want to do,” Martin Daum, Chief Executive Officer of Daimler’s truck unit, said in an interview at the ...

Bloomberg Israeli troops killed four Palestinians along the Gaza Strip border on June 08 as the Hamas group that rules the coastal strip struggled to revive a flagging protest campaign. About 10,000 people protested at five spots along the border, sending flaming kites and airborne pipe bombs into Israel and hurling rocks and grenades, the Israeli army said. At least ...

Bloomberg President Donald Trump said Russia should be allowed back into the G-8 bloc, lobbing another point of friction into an-already fraught summit with allies in Canada. “Russia should be in this meeting,” Trump told reporters in Washington as he left the White House to fly to Canada. “Whether you like it or not, and it may not be politically ...

Bloomberg US Special Counsel Robert Mueller strengthened his case against Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort with new charges filed on June 08. He also stoked intrigue by adding a new name to his indictment against Manafort — a longtime Manafort associate who prosecutors have said has ties to Russian intelligence. The superseding indictment Mueller’s team filed in Washington ...

Bloomberg If Singapore’s reputation for tight security was one reason the real Kim Jong-un agreed to hold his summit with Donald Trump in the city-state, the fake Kim Jong-un now knows why. A Hong Kong-based entertainer who impersonates the North Korean leader said he was detained at Changi Airport after returning to Singapore ahead of the summit on Tuesday. The ...