Paul Polman thought it was just going to be an informal catch-up. But it quickly became clear that Alexandre Behring, chairman of Kraft Heinz, had something very specific on his mind when he visited Unilever’s art deco headquarters in London last month. Had Mr Polman, chief executive of Unilever since 2009, ever considered a collaboration with Kraft Heinz, Mr Behring wanted to know. Mr Polman took this […]
Oil company Saudi Aramco [IPO-ARMO.SE] has selected JPMorgan Chase & Co, Morgan Stanley, and HSBC Holdings Plc as lead underwriters for its planned initial public share offering, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter. The listing of Aramco is expected to be the world’s biggest initial public offering and could raise up to $100 billion. The IPO is the centerpiece of […]
Whatever route the government chooses for Brexit it will need to cooperate with other countries, especially our EU neighbours, to combat tax avoidance, tax evasion and money laundering. Yet the signs are not very good as the government seems to have chosen non-cooperation. It has snubbed the EU inquiry into the Panama Papers. Last year, a leak of 11.5m documents and 2.6 terabytes of information from the […]
At least 180 Chinese listed companies will be forced to cancel or scale back planned rights offerings worth $97bn in response to regulations that target excessive fundraising used for dubious acquisitions and financial speculation. The rules come as Chinese regulators are increasingly concerned about the trend of “exit the real, enter the fake” — a phrase used to denote companies abandoning real economic activity in favour of […]
By Sumeet Chatterjee and Lawrence White | HONG KONG/LONDON HONG KONG/LONDON HSBC Holdings (HSBA.L) reported a 62 percent slump in annual pre-tax profit that fell way short of analysts’ estimates as the British bank took hefty writedowns from restructuring and pointed to brakes on revenue growth. HSBC shares slid more than 6 percent after the company reported revenues fell by a fifth from 2015, underscoring the challenge […]
Success for banks selling large blocks of stock in the European market this year points to a supportive environment for new listings in the months ahead, bankers say. There have been 70 such accelerated offerings so far this year according to Dealogic, worth €11.3bn, more than double the €5.5bn sold in the same period a year ago when anxiety about the state of China’s economy prompted much […]
The UAE awarded 4.5 billion dirhams ($1.2 billion) in military procurement deals on Sunday, part of a total of 20 billion dirhams worth of purchases it expects to make at an arms fair this week, a spokesman for the expo said. The deals awarded to local and international companies on Sunday included a 2 billion dirham award to the UAE’s NIMR Automotive, part of Tawazun Holdings, for […]
Since Ancient times, Visual Capitalist’s Jeff Desjardins explains, gold has served a very unique function in society. Gold is extremely rare, impossible to create out of “thin air”, easily identifiable, malleable, and it does not tarnish. By nature of these properties, gold has been highly valued throughout history for every tiny ounce of weight. That’s why it’s been used by people for centuries as a monetary metal, […]
China ended a six-month streak disposing of its US Treasury holdings in December, adding to its position for the first time since last May as the country’s central bank seeks to manage capital flight. The country, which ceded its status as the world’s largest owner of haven Treasuries in October to Japan, added $9.1bn of US sovereign debt to its reserves in the final month of 2016, […]
By Alex Dobuzinskis | LOS ANGELES LOS ANGELES Robert Durst, the real estate scion tied to several slayings explored in HBO’s series “The Jinx,” returned to a Los Angeles courtroom on Wednesday to face a prosecution witness whose identity was being kept secret until taking the stand. Durst, 73, is charged with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a writer and longtime confidante of his, Susan […]
Muscat, 15 February 2017 Dentons advised Al Anwar Holdings SAOG on the sale of 20.35% of its shareholding in Falcon Insurance Company SAOC (FIC) for a consideration of OMR 1.876 per share to Arabia Insurance Company S.A.L’s (AIC) affiliates, namely Arabia S.A.L. and Lawrence Investment LLC (Under Formation). The transaction also involved a simultaneous acquisition of the business, assets and liabilities of AIC’s Oman branch by FIC, […]
Joo Kim Tiah, the son of one of Malaysia’s wealthiest tycoons, sat on stage in the summer of 2013 as his new business partner announced their plans for a C$360m luxury condominium-hotel project on Vancouver’s most prestigious downtown thoroughfare. With characteristic salesmanship, Donald Trump bragged that the 63-storey glass tower on West Georgia Street would be “one of the great buildings, not only in Canada and the […]
After two days of questioning, Ramon Fonseca Mora and Jurgen Mossack were detained by prosecutors in Panama on 9 February. The pair have been denied bail as they have been deemed flight risks. They are being held as part of a probe into corruption and bribery allegations involving Brazilian construction group Odebrecht, which has admitted paying $1bn (£800m, €943m) in bribes to obtain contracts in 12 […]
KOTA KINABALU: Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd said today it would extend the fullest cooperation to the police in their investigation into the death of a North Korean man at the KL International Airport 2 on Monday. MAHB chairman Tan Sri Wan Abdul Aziz Wan Abdullah said it included providing the footage of the CCTV cameras at the airport to assist the probe. “They (police) are still investigating […]
Last Updated On 15 February,2017 10:08 am A five member larger bench headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa is hearing the case. ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – The Supreme Court (SC) has resumed hearing of Panama case today (Wednesday) after a break of two weeks. A five member larger bench headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa is hearing the case. Salman Akram Raja, the counsel of Hussain Nawaz […]
As central bankers seek to wean markets off quantitative easing and exit the dangerous experiment of negative rates, they increasingly fret about the resilience of credit markets. How worried should they be? The US Treasury’s Office for Financial Research, the European Central Bank and the Bank of England have all issued warnings in their financial stability reports voicing concern over whether we might see fire sales that […]
SoftBank’s billionaire founder Masayoshi Son, who has boasted of creating the “Berkshire Hathaway of tech”, has thrown himself into the world of private equity and hedge funds with a $3.3bn acquisition of US alternative asset manager Fortress Investment Group. The deal, which follows the Japanese group’s traditional focus on telecoms and internet, comes just as SoftBank is emerging as one of the world’s largest investors with the […]
By Manolo Serapio Jr | SANTA CRUZ, Philippines SANTA CRUZ, Philippines His brother kept telling him that the mine would reopen and he would be hired again: but when Winston Ordonez didn’t get a call from a mining firm, he took a laptop charger cable, tied it around his neck and hanged himself in his kitchen. Ordonez worked at the nickel mine operated by Eramen Minerals Inc […]
A striking feature of global financial markets since the crises of 2007 and 2008 has been the high propensity of many wealthy private investors to sit out all the turmoil, holding cash in bank accounts rather than in riskier assets. Might that be about to change? The word among bankers in conservative Switzerland — the world’s largest centre for cross-border private wealth management — is that it […]
|By Matein Khalid| The US Dollar Index has now fallen 3.5% since it peaked on January 3. Donald Trump and his White House aides broke the 20 year taboo against speaking out against the “strong dollar” policy platitudes. The Federal Reserve did not raise interest rates and signaled no rate hike is imminent at the March FOMC. It is significant that the US dollar has fallen against […]
A bench led by Justice Dipak Misra was asked to direct the CBI to lodge FIRs and conduct probe into the alleged offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act and Prevention of Money Laundering Act. (PTI) The Supreme Court today will hear the plea seeking a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the Panama papers expose case, in which many Indian industrialists and celebrities have been […]
The latest retailer to join the “anti-Trump resistance“, is also the one which despite being closest to death managed to crush short sellers on Friday after its stock soared on the announcement of yet another hail ymary restructuring: according to Reuters, Sears and Kmart are discontinuing online sales of 31 Trump Home items. An obvious publicity stunt meant to distract the public’s attention from the company’s chronic […]
Major U.S. retailers Sears and Kmart this week removed 31 Trump Home items from their online product offerings to focus on more profitable items, a spokesman said on Saturday. The decision follows retailer Nordstrom Inc’s announcement this week it had decided to stop carrying Ivanka Trump’s apparel because of declining sales, prompting President Donald Trump to take to Twitter to defend his daughter. White House spokesman Sean […]
Qatar Petroleum is the hidden giant of the global energy industry, overshadowed by its neighbor Saudi Aramco. Yet, the country’s colossal natural gas resources allow the state-run company to pump more oil and gas than Rosneft PJSC or Exxon Mobil Corp. After almost two decades of breakneck growth, the company needs to change tack. QP plans to expand abroad as domestic crude output declines and the government […]
