World Economy

  •  Apple Inc. is working on an electric vehicle, according to people familiar with the matter, showing the consumer-electronics giant is open to stepping outside its lucrative focus on mobile…

  • Venezuelans puzzled over the impact of a complicated currency devaluation and fretted that dire product shortages in the OPEC nation’s recession-hit economy would not go away, VoA reported.…

  • The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is expanding a crackdown on a little-known program to dole out visas to wealthy foreigners in exchange for investments that generate jobs, Bloomberg…

  • China’s growth in broad money supply slumped to its lowest on record in January even as new yuan loans hit a 5-1/2-year high, boosting bets that Beijing may further loosen monetary policy to avert…

  • Early each year, Tucson becomes a mecca for many of the world’s leading collectors and dealers of minerals and gems, a Bloomberg report says. For several weeks leading up to the Tucson Gem &…

  • The United States has eased restrictions on imports of goods and services from private Cuban entrepreneurs as part of Washington’s rapprochement with Havana after more than half a century of…

  • The rating agency Fitch downgraded Ukraine’s foreign currency denominated sovereign debt on Friday from CCC to CC, citing a probable default and deteriorating creditworthiness, the…

  • Food security has become a key issue of the UN climate negotiations this week in Geneva as a number of countries and observers raised concerns that recent advances in Lima are in jeopardy.

  • Almost 91 domestic credit institutions have been incorporated into the new Russian financial system, the analogous of SWIFT, an international banking network.

  • The German electronics firm Siemens announced it was slashing 7,800 jobs globally. Most of the job losses will occur among white collar administrative workers, while 1,200 positions in the company…

  • The board of Aer Lingus strengthened its support for British Airways-owner IAG’s takeover approach, saying that after talks with the airline, the deal made compelling commercial sense, RTE News…

  • Canadian factory sales rose faster than economists predicted in December as gains in motor vehicles and machinery more than made up for lower crude oil prices. Sales climbed 1.7% to C$52.4b ($41.…

  • Air France’s low-cost carrier Transavia has ordered 20 Boeing 737-800 jets, a deal worth up to $1.8b at current list prices, the airline announced Thursday, Ultrasurf reported. The deal includes “…

  • Cyprus’s recession deepened in the fourth quarter of 2014 as gross domestic product shrank by 0.7% from the previous three-month period, official data showed Friday.

  • While the EU has been historically dependent on Russian oil and gas supplies, this dependence has proved to be a two-way street, with Russia dependent on European goods and technology. This trade…

  • Spain’s economy grew at its fastest pace since before its near seven-year downturn in the fourth quarter of last year. Its economy was boosted by tumbling energy costs which also prompted the…

  • Despite its vast oil wealth, the World Bank said it expects the economy of the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq to shrink because of regional crises.

  • The eurozone’s gross domestic product (GDP) expanded more than expected in the fourth quarter of 2014, boosted by an acceleration in Germany’s growth.

  • As a subsidiary of the world’s second-largest coal producing company, China’s Shuohuang Railway needed the largest locomotives possible to carry coal the length of its 594-kilometer railroad.

  • US consumer spending barely rose in January as households cut back on purchases of a range of goods, suggesting the economy started the first quarter on a softer note, Reuters reported.…

  • Deutsche Bank AG’s Japan units were sued by a Japanese school operator for 9b yen ($76m) in compensation for losses on derivative transactions, Bloomberg reported. Nanzan School Corp.

  • Turkey, which had been experiencing unprecedented economic growth since 2003, has started sending out ominous signals in the past year, with investor confidence shaken and the lira plunging to a…

  • German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said a compromise is possible in the stand-off with Greece over its bailout terms.

    But Merkel told reporters as she arrived for a conference with other…

  • When the Group of 20 finance ministers this week urged the Federal Reserve to “minimize negative spillovers” from potential interest-rate increases, they omitted a key figure: $9 trillion.

  • Cities in the Persian Gulf region have been named among the least sustainable in the world in a new global index.

    Three cities – Doha, Jeddah and Riyadh – languish in the bottom 10…