Generali, Italy’s largest insurer, has bought voting rights amounting to 3.01 per cent in Intesa Sanpaolo in a defensive move designed to block a mooted takeover bid by the country’s largest bank. The move came after shares in the insurer rose nearly 4 per cent on Monday following a report in Turin-based newspaper La Stampa suggesting Intesa was considering a takeover bid in tandem with Germany’s Allianz. […]
LONDON Britain’s Guardian newspaper is considering becoming a tabloid and outsourcing printing to a rival such as Rupert Murdoch’s News UK as one of a series of options to cut costs, sources told Reuters. Publisher Guardian Media Group (GMG) said last year it needed to make savings of 20 percent to stem underlying losses that widened to 62.6 million pounds ($78 million) for the year to April […]
Credit: Lancaster University The popular Pattern Lock system used to secure millions of Android phones can be cracked within just five attempts – and more complicated patterns are the easiest to crack, security experts reveal. Pattern Lock is a security measure that protects devices, such as mobile phones or tablets, and which is preferred by many to PIN codes or text passwords. It is used by around […]
President Donald Trump addresses business and trade issues on Monday. Highlights of the day follow: BUSINESS Trump meets with a dozen prominent American manufacturers at the White House, promising to cut regulations and corporate taxes but warning them of penalties if they move production outside the country. TRADE Trump could sign an executive order on Monday intended to renegotiate the free trade agreement between the United States, […]
Doha Bank, Qatar’s fifth-largest lender by assets, reported a 84.8 percent decline in fourth-quarter net profit on Sunday, according to Reuters calculations, missing analyst expectations. The bank earned a net profit of 35 million riyals ($9.61 million) in the three months to Dec. 31 against 231.4 million riyals in the same period of the previous year, Reuters calculations showed, using financial statements in lieu of a quarterly […]
23 January 2017 Aluminium Bahrain B.S.C. (Alba), the Bahrain-based international aluminium smelter, was the proud winner of the 2017 Occupational Excellence Achievement Award and the 2017 Significant Improvement Award by the National Safety Council (NSC) – USA. These wins endorse the Company’s long-standing commitment to Safety as well as its efforts in creating a safe working environment for its employees and contractors alike. The NSC Occupational Excellence […]
German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung on Monday tweeted documents to ‘help’ Pakistanis form their own opinion on the role of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s daughter in Panamagate. “For those in Pakistan who doubt the role of the prime minister’s daughter Mariam Safdar in Panama Papers – some of the documents. Judge yourself,” Süddeutsche Zeitung tweeted, along with attachments purporting to show her involvement with Minerva Financial Services. Maryam […]
By Jean Paul Arouff | PORT LOUIS PORT LOUIS The son of the outgoing Mauritius prime minister was appointed as the new premier on Monday, prompting accusations of nepotism and calls for a referendum from opponents. Anerood Jugnauth, 86, who has been in his post since 2014, the latest of several terms at the helm, announced on Saturday he would step down in favour of his son […]
A billionaire Chinese hedge fund manager has been jailed for five-and-a-half years for market manipulation in one of the country’s highest-profile financial crimes prosecutions since a market rout in 2015. Xu Xiang, an investment guru who used to be compared with Carl Icahn, led a loose-knit group of hedge fund managers from the port city of Ningbo known as the “Limit-up Kamikaze Squad” because of their penchant for […]
Abu Dhabi’s government merged two of its top investment funds on Saturday to strengthen their financial clout in an era of low oil prices, creating a company with assets totalling about $125 billion. The new fund, Mubadala Investment Co, was formed by merging Mubadala Development Co and International Petroleum Investment Co, which own corporate stakes in the energy industry and other sectors across the world. The new […]
H.E Bin Shafar: “Empower boosted cooperation with many international energy companies at the summit” Abu Dhabi, UAE, 22 January 2017 Emirates Central Cooling Systems Corporation (EMPOWER), the world’s largest district cooling service provider, successfully concluded its participation in the 10th World Future Energy Summit (WFES), as part of Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week 2017, which was held from 16th to 19th January at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre Empower team […]
PayTM, the Alibaba-backed Indian smartphone payments platform, plans to enter the asset management market a month before it begins banking operations in the country. The group, which has attracted more than 170m users since it started seven years ago, told the FT that its aggressive strategy to disrupt traditional finance will soon extend to loans, wealth management and mutual fund products. The move could give PayTM an even […]
‘Remote working’ and ‘working from home’ is becoming more and more common with workforces. Businesses of the future must adapt in order to cope with the increasing complexities with our work life blend. The 9-5 work day, long considered the norm, is becoming further detached from workers’ personal commitments, and daily life. Working schedules have got to adapt around this change in the way workers manage their […]
SINGAPORE — With salary disputes forming a significant proportion of cases it saw last year, the labour movement’s Centre for Domestic Employees (CDE) will push for electronic payments for all foreign domestic workers here, centre chairman Yeo Guat Kwang said yesterday. “Today, it’s still not standardised,” Mr Yeo said at an event at the Singapore Flyer to mark the CDE’s first anniversary and to thank 50 of […]
Sorry, Faraday Future fans. Tesla Motors has officially ended Faraday Future‘s celebration, and the FF91’s dream of racing past the Model S isn’t happening. The Model S P100D’s Ludicrous+ Easter Egg was included in the vehicle’s Over-the-Air software update on Jan. 12. Tech Times reported that some owners and speed enthusiasts have powered up with the Ludicrous+ Easter Egg. YouTube user Tesla Racing Channel has just validated the possibility that […]
By Carmel Crimmins and Pamela Barbaglia | DAVOS, Switzerland DAVOS, Switzerland U.S. bankers, buoyed by a resurgence in profits, are advising their counterparts in Europe to think positively about the new administration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. But many Europeans still need convincing. At the annual gathering of the world’s political and business elites in the Swiss resort of Davos, U.S. financiers told investors and overseas’ rivals […]
Britain’s security co-operation with EU countries will be on the table as part of the Brexit negotiations, Theresa May has said as she prepares to become the first world leader to meet new US president Donald Trump. The prime minister plans to discuss British-US co-operation on terrorism and Nato at the meeting in Washington on Friday, the prime minister said on Sunday — and sent a signal […]
In Bollywood circles, Hrithik Roshan’s new movie, Kaabil, has been described as a “comeback”. The 43-year-old heart-throb is one of the most recognisable stars in Hindi cinema, but following 2014’s widely panned action comedy Bang Bang!, and the financial flop of last year’s Mohenjo Daro, the consensus is that the star of superhero franchise Krrish needs a critical and commercial success to get his career back on […]
The world’s largest pension fund, Japan’s GPIF, is under intensifying pressure to draw a “line in the sand” on corporate governance standards in the country as other investors rail against a controversial takeover deal. The imbroglio centres around Panasonic’s proposed purchase of PanaHome. Investors say it represents one of the sternest tests to date of Japan’s stewardship and governance codes, guidelines introduced in 2014 as part of the “Abenomics” drive to […]
Good morning. Here’s our morning roundup of all the media news you need to know. Want to get this briefing in your inbox every morning? Subscribe here. The aura of numbers-crunching superstar Nate Silver was diminished by Donald Trump’s victory. He was seen as among the many missing the boat. Old media chortled at stumbling by a paragon of big data. Now comes Silver’s pre-inaugural revenge. He […]
TAIPEI Thousands of military personnel, teachers, police and civil servants protested a plan to reform Taiwan’s pension system outside of the Presidential Office in Taipei on Sunday, as a national conference to discuss reform was held in the Office. Vice President Chen Chien-jen announced a pension reform plan this week for teachers, civil servants and non-government employees which would delay a default in payments to retirees by […]
Kuwait is well positioned to mitigate the impact of lower oil prices on the economy despite a deterioration in the country’s fiscal position, according to the International Monetary Fund. It said in a new report that Kuwait’s nonhydrocarbon growth has moderated from 5 percent in 2014 to about 3.25 percent last year as a result of the drop in oil prices. However, large financial buffers and low […]
Yep, that’s a Samsung Galaxy phone. (Image: file photo via Twitter) Donald Trump’s phone was a national security risk. Now he has a new one. With just days before his inauguration, the president-elect was handed a new locked-down device, just like his predecessor. Per a note in The New York Times, Trump has traded in his Android phone for “a secure, encrypted device approved by the Secret […]
Helena Grech from Strasbourg Wednesday, 18 January 2017, 13:08 Last update: about 2 days ago Nationalist Party and European People’s Party MEP David Casa professed that he is “embarrassed” of his government over its role and handling of the Panama Papers scandal. His comments were made during a plenary session following the Prime Minister’s address at the European […]
