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The fight between Apple and the U.S. government comes down to a technical enigma wrapped in layers of emotional debate. On the surface, people seem to be drawn to opposing sides depending on feelings: fear of terrorism, or suspicion of government, distrust of corporations. But the crux of the disagreement comes down to a technical question, not a gut feeling: ...

Kazakhstan’s first McDonald’s will open March 8 in Astana. The world’s largest fast food chain has been operating in Russia since 1990 and last year opened its 500th store in that country (there are now 545)–while also, for the first time in Russia, permanently closing a store. Moving into the Kazakh market, per Reuters’ report, took more than a decade ...

China is facing an uphill battle on two fronts. At home, government prestige is waning as the economy falters with Chinese people sending their money abroad as the stock market stumbles amid a slowing economy and a deteriorating currency. And as the bad economic news continues to drip out of China so do the dispatches about its military maneuvers in ...

Bloomberg Citigroup Inc. was sued for fraud by investors and creditors of a bankrupt Mexican oil services firm over claims they were harmed by a loan scheme that also led the bank to cut 2013 profit by $235 million and fire at least a dozen people. Citigroup’s loans led to the 2014 collapse of the Mexican firm, Oceanografia SA, and ...

ZURICH / Bloomberg The Swiss National Bank could lower the amount of bank reserves that are exempt from its negative interest rate if it needs to ease policy further, the central bank’s president said. “So far we do not plan any change, but of course the exemption threshold is a possible policy instrument,” SNB President Thomas Jordan said in an ...

Beijing / Bloomberg Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is seeking a loan of as much as $4 billion from at least eight banks, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The banks are expected to begin marketing a $3 billion loan to other lenders, with the intention of increasing the size depending on demand, the people said. The loan would ...

WARSAW / Bloomberg Dropping valuations aren’t enough to convince Eastern Europe’s third-largest lender Erste Group Bank AG to buy assets in Poland, the region’s biggest market, amid growing political uncertainty in Warsaw. Consolidation among Polish banks has been slowed by uncertainty stemming from the government’s plan to convert $44 billion in foreign currency-denominated loans, a proposal called “pure evil” by ...

JEDDAH / Emirates Business Arqaam Capital, the specialist emerging markets Investment Bank, said in a strategy note issued ahead of Jeddah Economic Forum to be held on March 1-3 that Saudi Arabia’s plans to implement wide-ranging institutional changes to put its fiscal policy on a sustainable footing would give an unprecedented impetus to public-privatepartnerships’(PPPs) in the country. History suggests that ...

BLOOMBERG NorthStar Realty Finance Corp., a U.S. mortgage real estate investment trust, hired a division of UBS Group AG to advise on a potential recombination with NorthStar Asset Management Group Inc., the company from which it was spun off in 2014. The REIT’s board formed a special committee that will be composed of independent directors who aren’t also on the ...

Doha / Emirates Business Tightening its grip on engineering consultancies, the government has cancelled the licences of at least nine errant firms and detected 87 violations this year. The punished firms include A grade consultancies. There are still some consultancies with engineers not registered with authorities. A committee at the Ministry of Municipality and Environment licenses engineers and engineering consultancies. ...