Intel Corp.'s chief executive and other board members met with Biden administration officials last month and held a rooftop reception near the White House to push a multibillion-dollar chip-investment plan, according to people familiar with the event.
The gathering was only one stop for Pat Gelsinger, the Intel boss, in what has become a global tour to get facetime with government leaders-many worried about their countries' access to chips at an unprecedented time of shortage.
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Faurecia Offers to Buy Hella for About $8 Bln
Faurecia SE has launched a tender offer to acquire all shares in Hella GmbH & Co. KGaA in a deal that values Hella at about 6.8 billion euros ($8.02 billion), the companies said.
Faurecia's offer is to acquire all Hella shares at a price of EUR60 apiece as part of a total consideration of EUR60.96 a share including an expected dividend, it said Saturday.
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Ultra Electronics Agrees to GBP2.57 Bln Takeover by Advent's Cobham
Ultra Electronics Holdings PLC said Monday that it has agreed to a 2.57 billion-pound ($3.56 billion) takeover by Cobham Ultra Acquisitions Ltd., as first announced last month.
Accepting shareholders of the British defense-equipment provider will get GBP35.00 for each share held and also keep the interim dividend of 16.2 pence per share.
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After Bankruptcy, Shale Pioneer Chesapeake Touts Natural Gas Again
Chesapeake Energy Corp., a fracking pioneer, is once again betting big on natural gas after recently emerging from bankruptcy, agreeing last week to buy another gas company to position itself to sell the commodity in Europe and Asia.
Chesapeake, co-founded by the late shale trailblazer Aubrey McClendon, agreed to buy Vine Energy Inc., a gas producer in northwestern Louisiana, in a stock and cash deal valued at about $1.1 billion. The transaction comes six months after Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake emerged from chapter 11 bankruptcy, in which it cut about $7 billion in debt.
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Carvana's Success Rides on Used-Car Loans
Online used-car dealer Carvana Co., known for its vehicle vending-machine towers, has a secret sauce to its business success: a way of handling car loans that turbocharges revenue.
The company has become a market darling during the pandemic, benefiting from huge demand and high prices for used vehicles. Its stock has skyrocketed more than 1000% since the depth of the Covid-19-related selloff in March 2020 and is now valued at more than Ford Motor Co. at about $63 billion.
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Huawei Accused in Suit of Installing Data 'Back Door' in Pakistan Project
A long-running dispute between Huawei Technologies Co. and a small U.S.-based contractor has escalated to U.S. federal court, with the contractor alleging Huawei stole its technology and pressured it to build a "back door" into a sensitive law-enforcement project in Pakistan.
The contractor, Buena Park, Calif.-based Business Efficiency Solutions LLC, or BES, says in a lawsuit filed Wednesday in California district court that Huawei required it to set up a system in China that gives Huawei access to sensitive information about citizens and government officials from a safe-cities surveillance project in Pakistan's second-largest city of Lahore.
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Who Controls 'Cruise' Name? GM and Ford Battle It Out
A dispute between General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co. over the name of their hands-free driving offerings has escalated into an unusual legal spat between corporate arch rivals.
Last month, GM sued Ford over the name of Ford's assisted-driving system, BlueCruise, which is scheduled to be released later this year. GM said the name is "confusingly similar" to GM's own system, Super Cruise, as well as that of its driverless-car division, San Francisco-based Cruise. In the lawsuit, GM called its competitor's naming choice "a brazen attempt to trade on their goodwill."
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Fed Officials Weigh Ending Asset Purchases by Mid-2022
Federal Reserve officials are nearing agreement to begin scaling back their easy money policies in about three months if the economic recovery continues, with some pushing to end their asset-purchase program by the middle of next year.
In recent interviews and public statements, several have advocated for this timetable, which would enable them to raise interest rates sooner than currently anticipated if the economy makes rapid progress toward their goals.
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China's Economic Recovery Is Losing Steam
BEIJING-China's economy slowed more than expected in July as extreme weather and the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus swept across the country, adding more strains to a recovery that was already plateauing more than a year after the pandemic first exploded.
Monthly indicators of industrial, consumption and investment activity all showed growth retreating more quickly than expected-and decelerating from June's yearly growth rates-according to data released Monday by China's National Bureau of Statistics.
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Japan's Economy Expanded Slightly in Second Quarter
TOKYO-Japan's economy grew slightly in the second quarter of 2021 thanks to increasing global demand and better-than-expected private spending, but a resurgence of Covid-19 infections may limit further recovery.
The world's third-largest economy has struggled this year to recover from last year's Covid-19 downturn, while other advanced nations, including the U.S., have recorded solid rebounds. The U.S. economy has already recovered its pre-pandemic size.
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Nancy Pelosi Looks at Advancing Infrastructure and Budget Framework Simultaneously
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) on Sunday asked a top committee to look at moving forward on a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill along with the $3.5 trillion budget framework in an effort to balance the demands of her party's ideological factions.
The request came after nine centrist House members said Thursday they "will not consider voting for a budget resolution until" the House approves the infrastructure bill.
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China's Corporate Crackdown Adds to Junk-Bond Distress
The latest Chinese market to buckle under pressure from Beijing's wide-ranging corporate crackdown: junk bonds.
Companies from China make up the bulk of Asia's roughly $300 billion high-yield dollar bond market, thanks to a surge in borrowing by the country's heavily indebted property developers. But the investor optimism that drove that borrowing has collapsed.
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Small Traders Pile Back Into Cryptocurrencies
Small investors are piling back into the cryptocurrency market, helping drive prices higher even as traders face uncertainty over proposed tax regulations in Washington.
Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, ether, dogecoin and other altcoins have rebounded in recent weeks from their midyear pullback, returning to levels not seen in months. Bitcoin on Friday traded at $47,544, its highest close since May 15, giving it a 64% gain for the year. Rival currency ether is up 344% for the year, while dogecoin-the joke cryptocurrency beloved by retail investors-traded at 28 cents, up more than 5,500% for the year.
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Oil Giants Turn to Startups for Low-Carbon Energy Ideas
Some of the world's biggest oil companies are turning to startups to help plot their future.
Energy giants including BP PLC and Royal Dutch Shell PLC are bolstering their venture capital arms-increasing budgets, hiring more staff and doing more deals-seeking out new low-carbon technologies to help future-proof their profits.
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As Electric Air Taxis Land on Stock Markets, Investors Need a Flight Guide
A few years ago most investors had never even heard of "air taxis." Now they need to decide whether to board early movers with a high-altitude but low-definition view of the potential market, or else wait for the technology to land somewhere more specific.
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New Covid-19 Hospitalizations for 30- to 39-Year-Olds at Record Rate
Hospitalizations of Covid-19 patients in their 30s have hit a new record, U.S. government data show, a sign of the toll that the highly contagious Delta variant is taking among the unvaccinated.
Thirty-somethings, who are in prime ages for work and parenting, had largely avoided hospital stays for Covid-19 during earlier phases of the pandemic because of their relative good health.
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Severe Drought Could Threaten Power Supply in West for Years to Come
As drought persists across more than 95% of the American West, water elevation at the Hoover Dam has sunk to record-low levels, endangering a source of hydroelectric power for an estimated 1.3 million people across California, Nevada and Arizona.
The water level at Lake Mead, the Colorado River reservoir serving the Hoover Dam, fell to 1,068 ft. in July, the lowest level since the lake was first filled following the dam's construction in the 1930s. This month, the federal government is expected to declare a water shortage on the Colorado River for the first time, triggering cutbacks in water allocations to surrounding states from the river.
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Malaysian PM Resigns Amid Covid-19 Crisis
Malaysia's prime minister and cabinet resigned Monday after 18 months in power, injecting new political uncertainty into the Southeast Asian nation as it struggles with a nationwide lockdown amid record cases of Covid-19.
Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, speaking in a televised national address, cited the loss of support among lawmakers for his decision to step down two years ahead of schedule.
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Afghanistan Government Collapses as Taliban Take Kabul
KABUL-Taliban fighters on Sunday took over the Afghan capital and President Ashraf Ghani fled abroad, leaving the government in collapse, as a U.S.-led military operation began to airlift Western diplomats, civilians and Afghans likely to be targeted by the country's new rulers.
(MORE TO FOLLOW) Dow Jones Newswires
08-16-21 0559ET
