Bloomberg Walt Disney Co.’s $71 billion deal with 21st Century Fox Inc. won the endorsement of influential proxy advisers Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. and Glass Lewis & Co., giving the entertainment giant another edge over rival suitor Comcast Corp. Both firms recommended that Fox shareholders vote in favor of the transaction during a July 27 investor meeting, with Glass Lewis ...
Read More »Microsoft urges lawmakers to regulate face-recognition tech
Bloomberg Microsoft Corp., which has come under fire for a US government contract that was said to involve facial recognition software, said it will more carefully consider contracts in this area and urged lawmakers to regulate the use of such artificial intelligence to prevent abuse. The company, one of the key makers of software capable of recognizing individual faces, said ...
Read More »Facebook hires AI chip head from Google
Bloomberg Facebook Inc. has sent another signal that it’s serious about building its own semiconductors, joining Apple Inc., Alphabet Inc.’s Google, and Amazon.com Inc. in trying to make its own custom chips. The social-networking giant this month hired Shahriar Rabii to be a vice president and its head of silicon. Rabii previously worked at Google, where he helped lead the ...
Read More »France woos UK finance as sector reels from Brexit paper
Bloomberg France is on a charm offensive. While the UK’s financial-services industry reels from the Prime Minister’s latest Brexit proposal, politicians across the Channel are stepping up their campaign to show firms they have other options. On a two-day visit to the UK, French Deputy Finance Minister Delphine Geny-Stephann met banks, asset managers, private equity and fintech firms in an ...
Read More »159 killed, hundreds injured as IS bomb hits Pakistan election rally
Bloomberg An IS suicide bomber killed at least 159 people in Pakistan on July 13 in one of the country’s worst attacks in living memory ahead of a tense July 25 national election. The blast also injured 200 others at an election rally in northwestern Mastung in the restive province of Balochistan, Ali Ahmed, a rescue worker in Mastung told ...
Read More »Israel-Gaza border violence flares with airstrikes
Bloomberg Violence flared along the volatile Israel-Gaza Strip border on Saturday, with the Israeli air force striking sites inside the Hamas-ruled enclave including two tunnels designed for attacks, and Palestinian militants firing volleys of mortars and rockets. No serious casualties were reported on either side. The military said it struck overnight in response to arson attacks from Gaza and assaults ...
Read More »Trump pressed to confront Putin after Mueller’s indictments
Bloomberg Whatever Donald Trump had hoped to get out of his summit with Vladimir Putin, Robert Mueller changed the game. The US president’s goals for the meeting had always been unclear. But now Trump is under pressure — including from several members of Congress from his own party — to finally confront Putin once and for all over trying to ...
Read More »Reunited immigrant families face difficult choice
Bloomberg Escaping gruesome violence at the hands of police and gangs in Honduras, a mother and her daughter arrived in the US on June 8 near McAllen, Texas, and turned themselves in to federal agents. They were then separated and held in custody 1,555 miles apart, according to court filings. The 12-year-old daughter is now among a couple thousand migrant ...
Read More »â€˜Privatisation champion’ quits Brazil’s vote race
Bloomberg The Brazilian presidential candidate with the most enthusiasm for privatising state assets quit the race, saying he had fulfilled his duty as a citizen. Flavio Rocha, the former chief executive officer of retail giant Riachuelo and candidate for the Brazilian Republican Party, had about one percent of vote intentions. “I am convinced that I helped inspire†entrepreneurs or those ...
Read More »Why aren’t wages rising?
It’s a mystery. The US economy seems strong. Since the nadir of the Great Recession, employers have added about 19 million workers. The unemployment rate is 4 percent, near the lowest level since 2000. By standard economic theory, the strong demand for labour should be pushing up wages. But that isn’t happening. Wage gains of 2.7 percent roughly match inflation. ...
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