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Bloomberg Walmart Inc. plans to place its giant brick-and-mortar stores at the center of its strategy to take on its web-based retail rival Amazon.com Inc., Dow Jones reported. Walmart President and CEO Doug McMillon, outlining the plans at a strategy meeting, pitched a vision where the company’s stores and its retail shopping model is the base of an expanding array …

Bloomberg United Airlines Holdings Inc. has given up on flying the Boeing Co. 737 Max until June, two months longer than rival US carriers, as the regulatory fate of the grounded aircraft remains unclear. The Max will be removed from its schedule until June 4, the Chicago-based carrier said. American Airlines Group Inc. and Southwest Airlines Co., the other US …

Bloomberg A pilot on a jet carrying Amazon.com Inc. packages that crashed near Houston in February had a record of repeatedly flunking flight tests and may have become disoriented in clouds, according to newly released documents. The pilot mistakenly thought the plane’s nose was pointed too high and jerked the jet down so steeply that the Boeing Co. 767 dove …

Bloomberg H/2 Capital Partners scrapped an auction for J.C. Penney Inc.’s term loan held by the hedge fund after a weak reception from potential buyers, according to people with knowledge of the situation. Bids for H/2’s sale of about half J.C. Penney’s $1.7 billion term loan didn’t meet the seller’s minimum price. The hedge fund will continue to own its …

Bloomberg Shares in Saudi Aramco dropped for a second day in a row a week after its record initial public offering, pushing its market value just below $2 trillion, the level sought by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Shares ended 2.8% lower at 36.70 riyals in Riyadh, giving the company a total value of $1.96 trillion. The stock was included …

Bloomberg China’s government-bond investors will soon be looking for reassurance from the central bank that there’s plenty of cash in the financial system. The country will see a “liquidity hole” of 2.8 trillion yuan ($400 billion) in January, in large part because people across the nation will withdraw cash for the Lunar New Year holiday, according to Guotai Junan Securities …

Bloomberg The European Central Bank’s (ECB) Single Supervisory Mechanism will likely lift the ceiling on Greek banks’ holdings of the country’s sovereign bonds, people familiar with the situation said. The supervisory ceiling set in 2015 is expected to be lifted in February, according to the people, who asked not to be named discussing ongoing deliberations. European and national authorities warned …

Bloomberg The Bank of Thailand held its benchmark interest rate steady at an all-time low and cut its forecasts for economic growth, saying it was gauging whether further efforts were needed to restrain the local currency. The central bank kept its policy rate at 1.25% on Wednesday in a unanimous decision. All 23 economists in a Bloomberg survey predicted a …

Bloomberg Togo and the World Bank have agreed a $150 million loan to refinance its more expensive debt after the global lender failed to guarantee the initial 300 million euros that the country is seeking. “Due to the refusal of the new board of the World Bank to guarantee the syndicated loans,” Togo has held discussions on a cheaper loan,” …

Bloomberg Traders have ramped up bets for the Bank of England (BOE) to lower interest rates at the end of 2020 after Prime Minister Boris Johnson reignited fears of a no-deal Brexit. Money markets see an 80% probability of the central bank cutting by 25 basis points in December 2020, up from about 30%. While Johnson’s victory last week fueled …