Bloomberg Britons’ confidence in the housing market stayed near a three-year low in March as sentiment toward the economic outlook soured, according to Halifax. An index of home-value expectations climbed to 44 from 42 in October, when Brexit pushed it down by a record to its lowest level since June 2013, the lender said. Fifty-eight percent of respondents predict ...

  Bloomberg Sales of previously owned US homes rose more than forecast in March to the fastest pace in a decade, signaling sustained momentum in the housing market despite higher prices and scarce supply, a report from the National Association of Realtors showed. Contract closings jumped 4.4 percent to a 5.71 million annual rate (forecast was 5.60 million), the highest ...

  Bloomberg After almost three years of booming health-care dealmaking in the US, 2017 is off to a slow start. Pharmaceutical and biotech acquisitions totaled $44 billion last quarter, down 13 percent from a year earlier, and 35 percent below the first quarter of 2015, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. And exchange-traded funds, a good indicator of investors’ appetite ...

  Bloomberg Central and eastern Europe has long been considered a relatively cheap manufacturing hub to make sophisticated products like cars and electronics goods at a fraction of what it would cost in the West. Accelerating salary growth may now be changing that perception. Average nominal wages rose 10.7 percent in Hungary in February from a year ago, the most ...

  Bloomberg Euro-area economic momentum accelerated to its fastest pace in six years, with France unexpectedly outperforming Germany in a strong start to the second quarter that suggests the recovery is broadening. France’s composite Purchasing Managers’ Index unexpectedly advanced to a six-year high of 57.4 in April, putting it above Germany’s for the first time since 2012, according IHS Markit ...

  Bloomberg Waymo says it’s uncovered new evidence that Uber Technologies Inc. took and copied its trade secrets and urged a judge to bar the head of the ride-hailing company’s driverless car program from continuing to work on the project. Alphabet Inc.’s Waymo made the request as a federal judge weighs whether to issue a court order that may impede ...

  Bloomberg Play, Poland’s fastest growing mobile provider, may soon announce an initial public offering that would give it a multibillion-dollar valuation. The Warsaw-based company, which already serves about 14 million customers, is reviewing options to generate further growth, according to a filing on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange Friday. One option is an IPO, the company said in the filing. ...

  If I were teaching a college-level course on political economy, my midterm exam would ask students to spot the errors in an op-ed with the headline, “Do You Want Reagan’s Economy or Obama’s?” Why? Because this particular article, by former Republican Senator Phil Gramm and Michael Solon, a GOP policy adviser, provides a perfect opportunity to show how partisan ...

  It’s not often that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warns of a risk to global financial stability at its spring meeting in Washington, and almost immediately evidence jumps out of a bank earnings report in Mumbai. That’s what happened on Wednesday. The IMF released analysis showing an alarming buildup of vulnerable corporate debt — the kind where operating profit ...

  In the 21st century, human misery has become something of a growth industry. Conflicts have driven the number of displaced people to an all-time high; last December, the United Nations launched a record appeal for humanitarian aid; three months later, citing impending famines in several African countries, it said the world faced the “largest humanitarian crisis” since the UN’s ...