Category Archives: Business

Goldman Sachs reaches $2.9bn deal to settle US-led 1MDB inquiry

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Bank’s Malaysia division agrees to plead guilty to violating foreign bribery laws

Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay $2.9bn (£2.2bn) to settle a US-led investigation into its role in the 1MDB corruption scandal.

The settlement is expected to draw a line under a years-long saga that has cast a shadow over one of the most recognisable names on Wall Street. Goldman Sachs’ Malaysia division also agreed to plead guilty to violating foreign bribery laws linked to the alleged looting of the country’s sovereign wealth fund, 1MDB.

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Room for improvement with test and trace, says Patrick Vallance – video

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Sir Patrick Vallance said there was ‘room for improvement’ with test and trace in the UK as only about two-thirds of the close contacts reached are done so within 48 hours of the case entering the system, according to performance figures released on Thursday.

Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak presented a new package of government support grants during a televised briefing and also discussed vaccines and local restrictions

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Australian politics live: five Melbourne suburbs on Covid alert as Victoria and NSW premiers still under pressure

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A school student in Melbourne’s north tested positive to coronavirus, putting the suburbs of Dallas, Roxburgh Park, Broadmeadows, Preston and West Heidelberg on high alert. Follow live

Australia Post is up in the communications estimates committee hearing - that starts at 9

NSW has reported just one locally acquired case - another six are in hotel quarantine.

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Airbus to operate drones searching for migrants crossing the Mediterranean

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European aerospace giant and two Israeli arms firms win EU contracts totalling €100m

Airbus and two Israeli arms companies will be paid €100m (£91m) to operate unmanned drones to spot refugees and migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean sea to Europe, according to EU contracts.

Drone operations over the Mediterranean will start next year, after testing carried out on the Greek island of Crete.

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EU seeks Amazon protections pledge from Bolsonaro in push to ratify trade deal

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Brazilian president’s stance on deforestation remains stumbling block for South America agreement

Brussels is in talks with Brazil’s far-right nationalist president, Jair Bolsonaro, over commitments on the future of the Amazon as it seeks to persuade Emmanuel Macron and other EU leaders and parliaments to ratify the trade deal the bloc has negotiated with South America.

The ratification of the draft trade agreement between the EU and the “Mercosur” or Southern Common Market free-trade zone – which spans Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina – has been in doubt almost since it was announced last June.

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US justice department sues Google over accusation of illegal monopoly

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Lawsuit accuse tech company of abusing its position to dominate search and search advertising

The US justice department filed a lawsuit against Google on Tuesday, accusing the tech company of abusing its position to maintain an illegal monopoly over search and search advertising.

“Two decades ago, Google became the darling of Silicon Valley as a scrappy startup with an innovative way to search the emerging internet. That Google is long gone,” the suit alleged.

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A decade in the building, Madrid’s showpiece hotel has everything … except guests

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Spain’s tourist sector – including the new Four Seasons hotel – is bearing the brunt of Covid, with the capital’s occupancy rates at 15%

Madrid’s first new grand hotel in almost half a century has more than enough to recommend it to even the most discerning and demanding of visitors.

As well as a presidential suite for VIPs and their bodyguards, there is a spa, a handy branch of Hermès, and a restaurant by the three Michelin-starred chef Dani García, whose rooftop terrace appears to float high above the busy streets of the city centre.

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Can the centre hold? Germany looks to its Covid-stricken high streets

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Minister battles to rescue retailers amid fears for 50,000 shops and hundreds of thousands of jobs

The stakes for Germany’s high streets could not be greater when the economics minister, Peter Altmaier, summons trade representatives across the country this month for a series of crisis workshops to discuss how to save them from collapse.

In Germany, as elsewhere across Europe and beyond, the coronavirus pandemic has blown a huge hole in street retail – accelerating the decline in footfall precipitated by the rise of online shopping.

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China’s economy was first in to Covid crisis – and is first out

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Beijing was fast to respond and increased public investment; it has not faced a second wave

By its own standards, China’s economy is having a bad year. After four decades of stellar growth, the east Asian country will barely expand at all in 2020.

But just about every country – big or small – has faced a hit from the Covid-19 pandemic, and China has suffered less than most. Whereas most western industrialised nations are still struggling to get back to where they were before the virus struck, Beijing has reported that there was year-on-year growth in the third quarter.

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Global shares rise on US stimulus and vaccine hopes, China data – business live

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Shoppers numbers across the UK fell 3.1% last week from the week before, as the new Covid-19 restrictions took their toll. The latest numbers from retail consultants Springboard show larger cities continue to be hit hardest, with footfall in regional cities down 5.7% compared with declines of 2.1% in market towns and 1.2% in coastal towns.

The 10pm curfew meant that high street footfall post 6pm fell 4.5% – nearly double the drop seen during the day, between 9am and 6pm, of 2.4%.

The additional Covid tiered restrictions had an immediate impact on footfall in retail destinations last week with an across the board week on week decline; the fourth consecutive drop and also greater than that in previous weeks.

US stock futures are pointing to a higher open on Wall Street later, with the Dow Jones seen opening 0.8% higher, the Nasdaq up 1.2% and the S&P 500 0.9% ahead.

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Revealed: Sheikh Khalifa’s £5bn London property empire

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Documents reveal UAE president owns multibillion-pound property portfolio spanning London’s most expensive neighbourhoods

The row of 1960s-built houses with untidy gardens on a quiet cul-de-sac near Richmond upon Thames appears to have little in common with Ecuador’s red-brick embassy in Knightsbridge, where Julian Assange spent seven years in hiding, just across the road from Harrods.

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Digital ‘health passport’ trials under way to aid reopening of borders

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CommonPass aims to create common standard proving a traveller is Covid-free or vaccinated

A new digital “health passport” is to be piloted by a small number of passengers flying from the UK to the US for the first time next week under plans for a global framework for Covid-safe air travel.

The CommonPass system, backed by the World Economic Forum (WEF), is designed to create a common international standard for passengers to demonstrate they do not have coronavirus.

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Battle over EU ban on ‘veggie burger’ label reaches key vote

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Farmers and meat lobbyists accuse plant-based food producers of ‘cultural hijacking’

The terms “veggie burger” and “veggie sausage” could be banned under proposals being voted on by the European parliament next week. Also banned would be terms such as “yoghurt-style” and “cheese-like” for plant-based alternatives to dairy products.

Sales of these products are growing fast but farming and meat lobbyists say the terms mislead people and amount to a “cultural hijacking” of the meat industry. Opponents, backed by major food companies including Unilever and Nestle, say the claims of consumer confusion are ridiculous. They say a ban would also contradict the EU’s drive to help consumers choose more sustainable food and cut climate-heating emissions.

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Proof is in the pudding: M&S and Waitrose win Christmas food test

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Tasters compile league table of items such as turkey, gravy and yule logs from 52 UK stockists

Marks & Spencer and Waitrose have swept the board in an independent taste test of this year’s Christmas food and drink, both clinching first place in three categories of the UK’s festive favourites.

M&S was awarded top spot for its Christmas pudding, gravy and frozen turkey in the annual exercise by the Good Housekeeping Institute, while its rival, Waitrose, triumphed in the Christmas cake, champagne and yule log listings and was also rated for a vegan centrepiece.

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We can’t ignore JCB role in West Bank outrages | Letters

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Charities such as the NSPCC should not accept money from the machinery firm, writes Annie O’Gara, while Nick Georges has witnessed the use of JCB equipment in the destruction of Palestinian infrastructure

JCB is rightly under close scrutiny (JCB challenged over machinery used to demolish Palestinian homes, 12 October).

You highlight JCB’s donations to the Conservative party. But JCB also donates to a leading children’s charity, the NSPCC, effectively sanitising the company’s reputation.

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Covid Crimestoppers hotline launches to catch business loan fraudsters

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Public asked to leave anonymous tips about emergency loan and grant scheme fraud

The UK government has launched a Covid fraud hotline, after being criticised for failing to act on warnings about risks linked to emergency business loans.

The hotline, run by Crimestoppers, allows the public to leave anonymous tips about suspected fraud linked to the government’s emergency Covid-19 loan and grant schemes for UK businesses. That could include identity theft to obtain loans, false grant claims and the use of so-called mule bank accounts to cover the tracks of money launderers.

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IMF estimates global Covid cost at $28tn in lost output

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World economic outlook says 2020 impact is less than thought but there will be deep scars

The International Monetary Fund has scaled back its estimate of the hit to the global economy from Covid-19 this year but warned that the final bill for the pandemic would total $28tn (£21.5tn) in lost output.

Gita Gopinath, the IMF’s economic counsellor, described coronavirus as the worst crisis since the Great Depression, and said the pandemic would leave deep and enduring scars caused by job losses, weaker investment and children being deprived of education.

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Stop CO2 emissions bouncing back after Covid plunge, says IEA

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Governments are not doing enough to prevent rapid rebound, says agency’s report

The coronavirus pandemic is expected to cause a record 7% decline in global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions in 2020, but governments are not doing enough to prevent a rapid rebound, according to an influential report.

Carbon dioxide emissions from energy use are expected to fall to 33.4 gigatonnes in 2020, the lowest level since 2011 and the biggest year on year fall since 1900 when records began, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in its annual world energy outlook.

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Johnson & Johnson pauses Covid vaccine trial over participant’s ‘unexplained illness’

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Company is unclear about whether patient was receiving vaccine or placebo in 60,000-patient study

Johnson & Johnson has paused its Covid-19 vaccine trial due to an “unexplained illness” in a participant, the company confirmed.

The pharmaceutical giant was unclear if the patient was administered a placebo or the experimental vaccine, and it’s not remarkable for studies as large as the one Johnson & Johnson are conducting – involving 60,000 patients – to be temporarily paused.

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