October, 2019

• 13 October

  Fake news pushes Indian firms to authorities

  

  Bloomberg Indian companies struggling to tackle false information and speculation doing the rounds on WhatsApp and other social media sites are finally seeking help from the authorities. Yes Bank Ltd this month registered a police complaint against what it said was “fake news” about its financial health “to create panic and fear in the mind of its depositors.” Piramal Enterprises ...

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• 13 October

  Brexit cloud hangs over energy supplies from Dublin to Belfast

  

  Bloomberg The Irish border issue isn’t the only Brexit-induced headache the island is facing. How to keep the lights on in the long term is also far from resolved. Weeks before the UK is due to leave the European Union, questions remain over trading agreements and Ireland’s 12-year-old single electricity market, known as the SEM. While nobody thinks there will ...

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• 13 October

  UK’s Royal Mail faces threat of Christmas strike

  

  Bloomberg Royal Mail Plc faces the prospect of Christmas chaos, with letter and package deliveries grinding to a halt, should its workers agree this week to strike, the Sunday Times reported. About 110,000 Communication Workers Union (CWU) members have been balloted and the results on Tuesday are expected to lead to a mass strike over pay, conditions and employment terms, ...

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• 13 October

  UK’s favourite pizza set to survive debt restructuring

  

  Bloomberg Twitter users following the #savepizzaexpress hashtag will probably get what they want, at least in part. Creditors to troubled casual-dining group PizzaExpress Ltd, which has around $1.4 billion of debts, expect to see much of their money returned and the brand survive, according to analyst Helen Rodriguez at CreditSights in London. “There’s a brand and a business for PizzaExpress, ...

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• 13 October

  No exceptions for UK-EU trade in hard Brexit: WTO

  Bloomberg In the event of a no-deal Brexit there will be no special rules for trade between the UK and the European Union, the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) director-general Roberto Azevedo said in an interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. A trade without customs duties would only be possible, if customs would be removed for all other trading partners, too, he ...

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• 13 October

  NYC cabbies say ‘no-cost’ bailout would avoid financial ruin

  

  Bloomberg Bill de Blasio campaigned for New York mayor — and for president — vowing to help low-income workers and the least fortunate. But financially desperate taxi drivers, devastated by competition from Uber Technologies and similar companies, say he has abandoned them. The 22,000-member Taxi Workers Alliance says it has a plan at almost no net expense to the city: ...

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• 13 October

  US-China trade war truce is needed for global growth

  

  As the global economy shows signs of stuttering, the race is on to find the right policy response. In Europe, many central bankers are asking politicians in countries such as Germany to unleash a fiscal stimulus to complement their recent monetary push. In the US, President Donald Trump is lambasting the Federal Reserve for failing to cut rates fast enough, ...

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• 13 October

  Facebook can fight lies in political ads

  

  All over the world, truth is in trouble. What are we going to do about that? Unfortunately, Facebook’s new policy on political advertisements is a step in the wrong direction. By exempting “politicians” from its third-party fact-checking program, designed to reduce the spread of lies and falsehoods in ads, the company is essentially throwing up its hands. With some urgency, ...

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• 13 October

  Hong Kong left exposed by HKEX surrender on LSE

  That was quick. Workers in Hong Kong’s finance industry returned to the office after a long weekend of violent protests to find that their stock exchange has decided not to pursue a takeover bid for its London counterpart. The limp end to its month-long courtship has left Charles Li, chief executive officer of Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd., looking ...

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• 13 October

  The Fed can’t fight this kind of inflation

  The Federal Reserve held a “listening session” in Washington, not for members of Congress but for representatives from the community. It was a worthwhile exercise and is an admirable program, but as it turns out their main concerns are beyond the Fed’s ability to address. Representatives of traditionally price-conscious groups such as retirees and small-business owners reported that they were ...

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