February, 2019

• 16 February

  Russian holds US investor Calvey in jail for 2 months

  Bloomberg A Russian court ruled that Michael Calvey, the founder of private-equity firm Baring Vostok Capital Partners and one of the country’s longest-standing American investors, should be held in custody for nearly two months in an embezzlement case. Calvey will be held through April 13, the judge said. Calvey’s lawyer said the investor maintains his innocence and will appeal. Calvey ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  With $25bn in company stakes to manage, Austria gets tough

  

  Bloomberg Sebastian Kurz is getting tough on how the country’s family silver is managed. The Austrian Chancellor’s government put a new team in charge of the more than 22 billion euros worth of company stakes held by the state, giving marching orders that for the first time in decades include a license to buy. The more active role that Kurz ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Trump’s wall ‘emergency’ faces first legal challenge

  

  Bloomberg A nonprofit sued to block President Donald Trump from diverting funds from the federal budget to spend about $8 billion on his promised border wall, hours after he declared a national emergency. Public Citizen, a consumer rights think tank, filed the complaint on behalf of a nature preserve and three landowners in southern Texas who’ve been told the government ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Brazil now treads softly on Venezuela

  

  Bloomberg Brazil was among the first countries to recognize US-backed National Assembly President Juan Guaido as Venezuela’s rightful leader but it’s unlikely to add much more pressure to help oust Nicolas Maduro. President Jair Bolsonaro is no fan of Maduro, yet he’s been constrained by economic interests, a long-held Brazilian tradition of non-intervention in other countries, and a dash of ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Libya vote by year-end ‘true possibility’

  

  Bloomberg Libya should be ready to hold elections this year, with rival factions on track to hold a national reconciliation conference by the end of March, the United Nations envoy to the oil-rich but chaotic north African state said. “End of the year is a true possibility” for holding parliamentary and presidential elections, UN envoy Ghassan Salame said in an ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Pro-Brexit ministers could live with ‘limit on backstop’

  Bloomberg Pro-Brexit members of Theresa May’s Cabinet would be willing keep Britain tied to the European Union’s customs regime for as long as five years in an effort to break the deadlock in divorce talks, people familiar with the matter said. The prime minister is trying to renegotiate the so-called backstop guarantee for avoiding a hard border with Ireland because ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Nigeria’s postponement throws election into disarray

  

  Bloomberg The last-minute delay of Nigeria’s general elections by a week carries dangers for both President Muhammadu Buhari and his main opponent, Atiku Abubakar. While the electoral commission said the postponement just over five hours before polls were due to open Saturday was for logistical reasons, it reinforces opposition criticisms that state institutions under Buhari aren’t independent and are incompetent. ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Redefining the commuter car

  

  Bloomberg It’s all-electric like a Tesla. It’s priced like a Ford Fiesta. It’s one of the oddest-looking vehicles you’ve ever seen — and it may just redefine the commuter car. As General Motors Co. prepares to shut the plant near Toronto that got car-making started in Canada more than a century ago, a new model is taking shape in a ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Robot scratches tip of Fukushima’s 600-ton melted fuel conundrum

  

  Bloomberg Japan reached the latest hard-fought step in the 40-year, $194 billion cleanup of the 2011 Fukushima meltdown: A robot successfully touched some of the melted fuel sitting inside one of its three wrecked reactors. Japan has decided to remove and dispose of the melted nuclear fuel inside of the Fukushima plant, rather than entombing the site as was done ...

  Read More »
• 16 February

  Angry Birds maker plans to sell control of Hatch unit

  

  Bloomberg Rovio Entertainment Oyj, maker of the Angry Birds mobile games, fell after it reported declining profitability, and warned investors of lower profits for the first half of the year. The company is prepared to cede control of subsidiary Hatch Entertainment, the cloud-based gaming service it currently owns 80 percent of, to less than 50 percent. Without Hatch, the Finnish ...

  Read More »