Bloomberg The pace of North Sea oil-field shutdowns is picking up as the impact of the market slump is compounded by the uncertain investment environment created by Brexit. Projected spending on decommissioning in the British sector in the decade to 2024 has risen to 16.9 billion pounds ($22.4 billion), according to Oil & Gas U.K., an industry group. That’s ...

  Bloomberg The International Monetary Fund scrapped its forecast for a pickup in global growth this year, citing Britain’s vote to leave the European Union, and warned the damage could worsen if confidence falters among investors and companies. The IMF sees global gross domestic product rising 3.1 percent this year, down from April’s 3.2 percent projection and equal to growth ...

  Bloomberg Monsanto Co., the world’s largest seed company, said Bayer AG’s latest $55 billion takeover offer is “financially inadequate” and doesn’t ensure a deal would be completed. Monsanto also said in a statement on Tuesday that it’s still open to further “constructive conversations” with the German company and other parties about a deal. Bayer said on Thursday it upped ...

  Bloomberg Volvo AB cut its outlook for the North American truck market for the third time this year after stagnant freight volumes and excess inventory drove orders in the region down by nearly one-third in the second quarter. Truck orders in North America fell 29 percent, and manufacturers as a whole will probably sell about 240,000 vehicles there this ...

  Bloomberg If there’s one industry where all of Brazil’s political and economic upheavals come together, it’s shipbuilding. A Rio de Janeiro shipyard, where suspended president Dilma Rousseff once promised to employ an army of welders, electricians and engineers to make offshore oil platforms, is all but shut. Every other day, 50 workers on average hand in their helmets and ...

  Bloomberg UnitedHealth Group Inc., the largest U.S. health insurer, reported second-quarter profit that beat analysts’ estimates, driven by growth at its Optum technology and consulting unit. Optum, whose businesses range from data analysis to running clinics, has accounted for an increasing chunk of UnitedHealth’s profit. That helped cushion an additional $200 million loss from sales of Affordable Care Act ...

  Kiev / AFP Ukraine said on Tuesday seven of its soldiers had been killed and 14 wounded in “very heated” fighting that marked the bloodiest clashes with pro-Russian separatists in two months. The announcement — the highest daily death toll since Ukraine reported seven of its soldiers dying on May 24 — follows a flurry of talks between world ...

  London, United Kingdom / AFP US Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday became the first senior foreign official to meet British Prime Minister Theresa May since she took office after the Brexit referendum. Kerry visited May at her Downing Street office on the last day of a five-stop tour of European capitals, ahead of talks with the British, ...

  Paris / AFP French lawmakers, prompted by the Bastille Day massacre in Nice, were on Tuesday to debate extending the country’s state of emergency for a fourth time amid mounting criticism of the government’s response to extremist attacks. President Francois Hollande had announced last Thursday that he planned to lift the measures on July 26. But within hours, he ...

  Cleveland / AFP Donald Trump faced an embarrassing plagiarism scandal on Tuesday that tarnished his wife Melania’s prime-time speech to a Republican National Convention already roiled by an opening day rank-and-file revolt. It was a rough start to the four-day political jamboree, which was designed to crown Trump as the presidential nominee and catapult the party toward November’s elections. ...