Bloomberg Societe Generale SA, France’s second-largest bank, reported second-quarter profit that beat analyst estimates, capping a string of positive results for the country’s lenders. Net income rose 8 percent to 1.46 billion euros ($1.6 billion) from a year ago, the Paris-based bank said in a statement. That beat the 1.36 billion-euro average estimate of six analysts compiled by Bloomberg. ...
Read More »Southwest Airlines board says CEO not ‘leaving’
Bloomberg Southwest Airlines Co.’s board made no bones about its response to the labor groups that called for the ouster of two top executives: They’re not going anywhere. After the carrier’s four largest unions earlier this week called for Chief Executive Officer Gary Kelly and Chief Operating Officer Mike Van de Ven to step down, directors fired back in ...
Read More »Wal-Mart’s deal for Jet.com to hinge on ‘keeping its founder’
Bloomberg Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and e-commerce startup Jet.com Inc. are trying to close a $3 billion acquisition as soon as Monday that will require Jet founder Marc Lore to head the retailer’s online division for several years, according to people familiar with the matter. Lore would stay in that role for longer than the two-plus years he spent at ...
Read More »â€˜Pride of Africa’ tries to stop a long fall amid loss
Nairobi / AFP When Kenya Airways published the country’s worst-ever corporate results last month, the scale of the loss revealed the effects of several disastrous decisions that the national carrier is struggling to reverse. The airline’s “Pride of Africa” slogan rang uncomfortably hollow when the 26.22- billion-shilling ($259-million) loss was announced, driven by higher borrowing costs and unfavourable exchange ...
Read More »Boomers’ retirement plan is millennials paying rent
Bloomberg Pete Pollinger and his wife, Julie, are relocating from Boca Raton to Melbourne, a city of about 70,000 on Florida’s Space Coast, named for its proximity to NASA rocket sites at Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center. They weren’t just hunting for a place to live. As they get ready to move this year, they’re also looking ...
Read More »Evergrande invests $1.4bn in competitor China Vanke
Bloomberg Evergrande Real Estate Group Ltd., controlled by billionaire Chairman Hui Ka Yan, paid 9.1 billion yuan ($1.4 billion) for a 4.68 percent stake in China Vanke Co., the competitor embroiled in an ownership tussle with a key shareholder. The Guangzhou-based developer bought Vanke’s Shenzhen-traded shares through a unit, it said in a filing to Hong Kong’s stock exchange ...
Read More »Manhattan luxury-condo glut ends rush for land deals
Bloomberg New York’s condo slowdown is upending the market for one of the most coveted assets in tightly packed Manhattan: land. Sales of parcels for development are plummeting as builders, seeing signs that a once-hot property market is cooling, offer prices that sellers won’t agree to. Just 48 land deals were completed in the first half of 2016, compared ...
Read More »Amazon unveils cargo plane as it expands delivery network
SEATTLE / AP Seattle-based Amazon is unveiling its first branded cargo plane, one of 40 jetliners that will make up the e-commerce giant’s own air transportation network as it takes more control of its delivery process. The latest push to speed delivery of its products comes as the company ships an increasing number of packages worldwide. Amazon’s parcel volume ...
Read More »US parents to spend $18.5 billion on back-to-school tech
Relaxnews According to the Consumer Technology Association’s ‘The Role of Consumer Tech in Back-to-School Shopping’ study, devices from portable hard disks to laptops are moving further up the average family’s shopping list. In all, 59% of parents hitting physical or online stores to equip their children for the first term of the new school year are looking for technology ...
Read More »Now, grab what you see on your video screen
Bloomberg Forget 3D, soon you could be able to reach out and grab the things you see on the screen. Researchers from the US state of Massachusetts’ MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) say that they’ve developed a way of being able to “touch” objects that appear on the screen. Called Interactive Dynamic Video (IDV), what makes ...
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