Hui Ka Yan also forfeits all his personal property and the company he set up is given hefty fines
The founder of Evergrande, one of China’s largest property developers, has been sentenced to life in prison and had all of his personal property confiscated.
Hui Ka Yan, 67 and once named by Forbes as China’s richest man, with a net worth of $42.5bn (£31.2bn) in 2017, pleaded guilty in April to eight charges.
Continue reading...PM wants to reduce department’s stranglehold on public purse and bring long-term thinking to economic policy
Andy Burnham is far from the first prime minister to dream of taming the power of the mighty Treasury.
Boris Johnson all but forced the resignation of Sajid Javid by handpicking his team; Margaret Thatcher favoured her economic adviser Alan Walters over Nigel Lawson, prompting the latter’s furious resignation; and Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s power struggle was the stuff of Whitehall legend.
Continue reading...Owner of firm behind ‘Temu Range Rover’ will open facility in Bedfordshire in autumn
The Chinese carmaker behind the irreverently nicknamed “Temu Range Rover” is plotting further UK expansion with a major research and development centre in England.
Chery, which makes the Jaecoo and Omoda car brands, said the launch of a new R&D site was “the next step in our long-term plan” for Britain as it also moves towards manufacturing its cars in the UK.
Continue reading...PM’s plan to shield households from more pressure risks being overwhelmed by wider price rises
July’s increase in inflation, to 2.9%, is likely to be the first of several, underlining the challenge facing Andy Burnham in shielding consumers from a fresh cost of living squeeze this autumn.
Rising energy bills, as an increase in Ofgem’s quarterly price cap came into force, were the main driver of the jump in inflation, from 2.6% in June. That was partly offset by cheaper fuel prices – the knock-on effect of hostilities easing in the Middle East, after Donald Trump hailed his “memorandum of understanding” with Iran in June.
Continue reading...Food Foundation sounds alarm over supply risks and price shocks as about 40% of Britain’s food is imported
The UK is vulnerable to food price shocks because of its dependence on imports of fruit and vegetable from countries even more exposed to the climate crisis, researchers say.
Much of Britain has sweltered under a record five heatwaves this year and endured drought and wildfires, with the hot, dry conditions damaging crops and reducing yields of domestic produce.
Continue reading...Government assessment warns of supply shock that could leave homes and businesses without gas within a decade
Great Britain risks running out of gas in the 2030s despite its growing clean energy sources, unless ministers take “unprecedented” action to guard against a future supply shock, according to an official assessment.
The government is considering plans to provide direct financial support to safeguard the country’s ageing gas infrastructure after a consultation found that a “high stress scenario” could mean homes and businesses run out within the next decade.
Continue reading...Vegetable and grain growers call for urgent action, warning of ‘catastrophic’ harvests due to continent-wide drought
Successive intense heatwaves and an increasingly severe, continent-wide drought have left many of Europe’s farmers in an “unprecedented” crisis, with vegetable and grain growers in particular warning of “catastrophic” harvests.
French vegetable production is down by “a very significant extent” compared with previous years, French growers have said, with shortfalls put at 25% for courgettes, 35% for lettuces, 40% for peas, 60% for broccoli and 50% to 100% for artichokes.
Continue reading...Vegetable and grain growers call for urgent action, warning of ‘catastrophic’ harvests due to continent-wide drought
Successive intense heatwaves and an increasingly severe, continent-wide drought have left many of Europe’s farmers in an “unprecedented” crisis, with vegetable and grain growers in particular warning of “catastrophic” harvests.
French vegetable production is down by “a very significant extent” compared with previous years, French growers have said, with shortfalls put at 25% for courgettes, 35% for lettuces, 40% for peas, 60% for broccoli and 50% to 100% for artichokes.
Continue reading...Fierce competition in some areas of London means landlord purchasers are making successful lowball offers
The average price of a home coming up for sale in Britain’s richest borough has dropped by almost £100,000 in a month as fierce competition among sellers in many areas prompts some to slash their price expectations, data shows.
The property website Rightmove said that for Britain as a whole, average newly listed asking prices for homes had fallen by 2% over the past month, the largest August price drop in eight years.
Continue reading...Legislation for plan passed parliament earlier this year and is set to commence in NSW from November. Follow live updates
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Pauline Hanson says she is opposed to a major gun buyback being announced by Anthony Albanese and the NSW premier, Chris Minns, in Sydney shortly.
Legislation for the plan passed parliament earlier this year, part of the response to the Bondi beach terror attack. It will be run in two phases, with the cost split 50:50 between the federal and NSW governments.
A different gun is for a different purpose, and you have to understand guns. I’ve got my own gun license, so I understand these people.
Continue reading...Move will be one of first large-scale foreign investments in country since US ousted leader Nicolás Maduro in January
BP has answered Donald Trump’s call for oil companies to help rebuild Venezuela’s fossil fuel industry with new plans to develop a large offshore gasfield.
BP will partner with two oil firms with close links to the Trump administration to develop the second phase of the Loran gasfield, in one of the first large-scale foreign investments in Venezuela since the US ousted its leader Nicolás Maduro in January.
Continue reading...Fan blade broke off shortly after takeoff on 10 July flight from Greece to Germany, preliminary findings show
Broken engine parts were responsible for shattering a window on a Ryanair plane, causing a passenger to be partly sucked out mid-flight in July, US investigators have said.
A preliminary report by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) found an engine fan blade broke off shortly after takeoff on the 10 July flight from Greece to Germany shattering the window and damaging the fuselage.
Continue reading...Randall Lane left his job last month after accepting money from founder of firm that does business with magazine
The top editor of Forbes left his job last month and was reportedly dismissed for accepting $6m from the founder of a firm that does business with the magazine.
The New York Times reported this week that Randall Lane was paid by RJ Shook, whose company, Shook Research, worked with Forbes since 2016 to publish rankings of wealth advisers. The payment was made after Shook sold a majority stake in the company to a private equity firm a year ago.
Continue reading...Several firms promised to disrupt the consumer credit market by offering consumers their purchases instantly and the bill later. Did it work?
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Afterpay has never turned a profit in Australia. Last month, it spent millions to take over a Sydney Olympic Park arena.
The company says Afterpay Arena will be the first venue where Australians can “buy now, pay later” for their event tickets, merchandise, dinner and even alcohol.
Continue reading...Incheon airport had 38.39m international passengers in first half of 2026, as traffic diverted from Middle East hubs
South Korea’s Incheon airport has become the world’s busiest airport for international passengers, in part owing to disruption in the Middle East caused by the Iran war.
The airport, South Korea’s main gateway, about 30 miles (48km) west of Seoul, handled 38.39 million international passengers in the first half of 2026, according to preliminary figures compiled by the Airports Council International (ACI), the global trade body for airports.
Continue reading...GDP expanded by 0.4% in three months to June, down from 0.6% in the first quarter, says ONS
Economic growth slowed in the second quarter of the year, as the disruption unleashed by the Iran war began to take its toll, official figures show.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said GDP expanded by 0.4% in the three months to June, down from 0.6% in the first quarter, in line with City economists’ expectations.
Continue reading...Rio Tinto makes power supply deal with federal and NSW government to cut emissions and decarbonise, preventing potential closure
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Resources giant Rio Tinto says Australia’s largest aluminium smelter will run entirely on renewable energy by 2033 after it struck a $2.5bn subsidy deal with the federal and New South Wales governments to prevent a potential closure.
The deal – announced by Anthony Albanese and the NSW premier, Chris Minns, at the Tomago smelter near Newcastle on Thursday – is for a 10-year below-market power supply guarantee that begins after the facility’s existing coal-focused electricity contract with AGL ends in December 2028.
Continue reading...Female staff alleged company failed to maintain safe workplace, after allegations of sexual assault against pilot
The Canadian airline WestJet has agreed to pay C$4.5m (£2.4m) to settle a decade-long sexual harassment class action lawsuit levelled by its female flight attendants, who alleged the company failed to maintain a safe workplace.
The suit followed allegations by Mandalena Lewis, a former flight attendant, that a pilot had sexually assaulted her and a colleague, but that WestJet kept the pilot flying, thereby putting other employees at risk.
Continue reading...Geopolitics and cost of living crisis have cost Europe’s largest travel company €60m so far
Holidaymakers are waiting until the last minute to book their trips because of the continuing uncertainty caused by the war in Iran and the cost of living crisis, according to Tui, Europe’s largest travel company, which said the war had cost it €60m (£51m) so far.
In the weeks after the outbreak of the war at the end of February, Tui recorded a temporary drop-off in customers wanting to travel to Cyprus or Turkey, in what the company called a “volatile market”.
Continue reading...Verdant thinktank says cost could top £25bn a year by 2030 and calls for maximum temperature for working and urban redesign to cool down cities
Repeated debilitating heatwaves this summer are likely to have cost the UK economy more than £4bn in lost economic output by the end of July, new analysis shows.
Green thinktank Verdant had suggested June’s unseasonally hot weather had an economic cost of £2.36bn. Updating its assessment to include last month’s high temperatures, it finds a £4.4bn hit to output.
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