May, 2020

• 23 May

  Electric cars are about to start rolling out of the Arizona desert

  

  Bloomberg On the outskirts of a small town less than 50 miles southeast of Phoenix, a 720,000 square foot electric vehicle factory is arising in the desert. If all goes as planned, a luxurious new battery-electric sedan will roll off its production line by year’s end. Lucid Motors, a US startup, is building the factory and slated to start manufacturing …

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• 23 May

  Facebook plans to push remote hiring

  Bloomberg Facebook Inc. plans to hire more remote workers in areas where the company doesn’t have an office, and let some current employees work from home permanently if they’d like to. Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said the firm plans to “aggressively open up remote hiring” starting immediately with the US, particularly for engineering talent. Based on internal employee surveys, …

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• 21 May

  China sets 1.4trn plan to overtake US in tech

  

  Bloomberg Beijing is accelerating its bid for global leadership in key technologies, planning to pump more than a trillion dollars into the economy through the rollout of everything from wireless networks to artificial intelligence. In the masterplan backed by President Xi Jinping himself, China will invest an estimated $1.4 trillion over six years to 2025, calling on urban governments and …

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• 21 May

  AstraZeneca gets deals for potential Covid-19 vaccine

  LONDON / WAM Biopharmaceutical company, AstraZeneca, said on Thursday it had received the first agreements to supply at least 400 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine it is developing with the University of Oxford, reported Reuters. The British drugmaker said it has a total capacity sourced for one billion doses through 2020 and into 2021, and continues to increase capacity …

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• 21 May

  Oil gains for a 6th session as US stockpiles decline

  

  Bloomberg Oil was headed for its longest run of daily gains since February 2019 after a drop in US crude stockpiles added to signs that the market is starting to balance. West Texas Intermediate futures rose for a sixth day in New York to near $34 a barrel. American inventories fell for a second week, and there was a record …

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• 21 May

  Total’s Mozambique LNG to sign $15b financing in June

  

  Bloomberg A Total SA-led liquefied natural gas project in Mozambique will receive commitments for about $15 billion of financing at a signing scheduled in June, marking rare progress for such a project as companies scrutinise costs. The first and most significant phase of the financing commitment for the LNG project — which will be Africa’s biggest private investment yet — …

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• 21 May

  UK grid struggles as renewables overtake fossil fuels, says study

  

  Bloomberg The UK transmission network is under pressure as it grapples with a flood of green power and lower demand, according to new research published on Thursday. Intermittent renewables supplied more than 40% of electricity during first quarter of 2020, overtaking fossil fuels for the first time, according to the Electric Insights report, commissioned by Drax Group Plc and researched …

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• 21 May

  India’s oil demand stays weak as its economy falters amid virus lockdown

  

  Bloomberg It’s going to take months for oil demand in the world’s third biggest market to get back to pre-virus levels as India faces its deepest recession ever in the wake of its near two-month lockdown. Once the engine of global oil demand growth, India’s fuel consumption collapsed by as much as 70% at one stage last month as it …

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• 21 May

  Texas sees power demand rebound as lockdowns ease

  Bloomberg Texas has started seeing a slight increase in power use this week in one of the first signs that electricity demand is bouncing back in the US as lockdowns ease. While power use in the Lone Star state is still depressed, the state’s main grid operator noticed a slight improvement in electricity use during early morning hours, according to …

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• 21 May

  Mitsui mulls stake sale in Indonesia’s Paiton Energy

  

  Bloomberg Japanese trading house Mitsui & Co is considering a sale of its majority stake in PT Paiton Energy, one of Indonesia’s biggest independent power producers, people with knowledge of the matter said. Mitsui is working with an adviser on a potential divestment of its 45.5% stake in the power producer, said the people, who asked not to be identified …

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