March, 2017

• 4 March

  Bigger data isn’t always better data

  

    When making a decision such as whether to hire, insure or lend to someone, is more data better? Actually, when it comes to fairness, the opposite is often true. Consider a recent Harvard Business Review experiment, which involved sending 316 fake applications to the largest U.S. law firms. All the applicants were among the top 1 percent of students ...

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• 4 March

  Why are Beijing’s taxi drivers freezing?

  

    Beijing had the best of intentions when it started to promote all-electric taxis in 2011. Not only would the green cars reduce the city’s choking pollution, but they’d highlight its commitment to becoming a center of innovation. There was just one problem: cold weather. Electric cars lose their charge quickly when temperatures drop, reducing their range, utility and — ...

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• 4 March

  Europe’s appetite for gas keeps getting bigger

  

    Bloomberg Europe’s appetite for natural gas is leading to a growth “renaissance” as its stores of the fuel languish at the lowest levels since 2013, according to Gazprom PJSC. Europe’s appetite for natural gas will probably meet or even exceed last year’s growth as the region needs to replenish its lowest gas storage levels since 2013, according to Gazprom ...

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• 4 March

  Crude rises from three-week low

  

    Bloomberg Oil rose from a three-week low amid reports that the Benghazi Defense Brigades forces captured Libya’s biggest oil port. Futures advanced 1.4 percent in New York after three days of declines. Benghazi Defense Brigades forces captured Es Sider as fighting escalated, according to two people with knowledge of the matter who asked not to be identified because they ...

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• 4 March

  Vitol to offer 4mn barrels of stored oil as glut ebbs

  

    Bloomberg Vitol Group BV is offering to sell Nigerian crude oil from a storage terminal in South Africa, five traders familiar with the matter said, in what may be a signal that the global supply glut is beginning to ease. The world’s biggest oil merchant has been offering 4 million barrels of Nigeria’s Qua Iboe for delivery to Europe ...

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• 4 March

  Nigeria wants Shell to open major pipeline but attack feared

  

    JOHANNESBURG / AP Nigeria wants Royal Dutch Shell to reopen one of its main pipelines but the oil multinational is resisting, analysts say, for fear it could once again be bombed by militants. The Trans Forcados Pipeline, the main feed to the 400,000-barrel-a-day Forcados export terminal, has been shut for all but three weeks of the past year, Lagos-based ...

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• 4 March

  China defense budget to rise by 7 percent in 2017

  

    BEIJING / AP China will raise its defense budget by about 7 percent this year, a government spokeswoman said Saturday, continuing a trend of lowered growth amid a slowing economy despite regional tensions over the South China Sea and other issues. Total defense spending would account for about 1.3 percent of projected gross domestic project in 2017, said Fu ...

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• 4 March

  World’s biggest pension fund posts record $92bn gain

  

    Bloomberg The world’s biggest pension fund posted the biggest quarterly gain in its history as Japanese stocks surged and a plunge in the yen boosted overseas investments after Donald Trump’s election victory. The Government Pension Investment Fund returned 8 percent, or 10.5 trillion yen ($92 billion), in the three months ended December 31, increasing assets to 144.8 trillion yen, ...

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• 4 March

  PropertyGuru to turn profitable this year after expansion spurt

  

    Bloomberg PropertyGuru Pte, the top Southeast Asian real estate website backed by TPG Capital, expects to become profitable this year as it digests a clutch of acquisitions and rides growth in markets such as Indonesia and Vietnam. “We have hyper-growth, our revenues are growing over 30 percent,” Chief Executive Officer Hari Krishnan, 39, said in an interview in Singapore. ...

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• 4 March

  Services PMI adds to signs India rebounding from cash clampdown

  

    Bloomberg A private survey signaled the first expansion in four months for India’s key service sector, adding to signs the economy is bouncing back from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s shock clampdown on cash late last year. The Nikkei India Services Purchasing Managers’ Index inched up to 50.3 in February, a report showed Friday, from 48.7 in January and November’s ...

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