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Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd said on Tuesday that it expects to nearly double its transaction volumes by 2020, signalling it still expects rampant growth as Executive Chairman Jack Ma pledged to intensify a crackdown on fake goods. 
 
At an investor conference at its headquarters in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, Alibaba said it expects to record 6 trillion yuan ($912 billion) in gross merchandise volume (GMV) in fiscal 2020, nearly double 3.09 trillion yuan in fiscal 2016. 
 
Echoing that growth, Ma said Alibaba expects to have 2 billion consumers on its books by 2036, up from 423 million active buyers in 2016. 
 
Addressing concerns about the company&#39;s efforts to remove counterfeit products from its online platforms, Ma said Alibaba will do &quot;anything to stop the fake products&quot;. The company has been dogged for years by accusations that its shopping platforms were conduits for counterfeiters. 
 
&quot;I promise you guys that counterfeits, fake products, and intellectual property theft - we are more and more confident than ever that we can solve the problem,&quot; he said.

Executive Chairman Jack Ma was even more hopeful long term, stating they'd have 2 billion annual consumers by 2036

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd said on Tuesday that it expects to nearly double its transaction volumes by 2020, signalling it still expects rampant growth as Executive Chairman Jack Ma pledged to intensify a crackdown on fake goods. At an investor conference at its headquarters in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, Alibaba said it expects to record 6 trillion yuan ($912 billion) in gross merchandise volume (GMV) in fiscal 2020, nearly double 3.09 trillion yuan in fiscal 2016. Echoing that growth, Ma said Alibaba expects to have 2 billion consumers on its books by 2036, up from 423 million active buyers in 2016. Addressing concerns about the company's efforts to remove counterfeit products from its online platforms, Ma said Alibaba will do "anything to stop the fake products". The company has been dogged for years by accusations that its shopping platforms were conduits for counterfeiters. "I promise you guys that counterfeits, fake products, and intellectual property theft - we are more and more confident than ever that we can solve the problem," he said.

Alibaba expects to record $912 billion by 2020, even amid concerns it sells counterfeit products

South Korea&#39;s Lotte Group said prosecutors are conducting additional raids on 10&nbsp;units including Lotte Chemical, heaping further pressure on the sprawling beer-to-petrochemicals conglomerate. 
 
Lotte Chemical, Lotte Confectionery Co Ltd&nbsp;and unlisted Lotte Engineering and Construction were among the firms raided, a spokesman for the country&#39;s fifth-largest conglomerate said. 
 
A Lotte Chilsung Beverage Co Ltd spokesman also said the firm was being raided. 
 
The new raids follow raids on Friday on the offices of Lotte Group and several Lotte companies including unlisted Hotel Lotte. 
 
People familiar with the matter have said the Friday raids, which involved about 200 prosecutors and investigators, were part of an investigation into a possible slush fund. 
 
The Seoul Central Prosecutors&#39; Office could not be immediately reached for comment. 
 
The investigators&#39; probe has already led to the cancellation of an up to $4.5 billion initial public offering for Hotel Lotte. Lotte Chemical, the conglomerate&#39;s biggest listed unit, has also bowed out of bidding for US-based Axiall Corp&nbsp;in the wake of raids.

South Korean conglomerate, Lotte Group, has been raided, leading to a cancellation of $4.5 billion initial public offering for Hotel Lotte

South Korea's Lotte Group said prosecutors are conducting additional raids on 10 units including Lotte Chemical, heaping further pressure on the sprawling beer-to-petrochemicals conglomerate. Lotte Chemical, Lotte Confectionery Co Ltd and unlisted Lotte Engineering and Construction were among the firms raided, a spokesman for the country's fifth-largest conglomerate said. A Lotte Chilsung Beverage Co Ltd spokesman also said the firm was being raided. The new raids follow raids on Friday on the offices of Lotte Group and several Lotte companies including unlisted Hotel Lotte. People familiar with the matter have said the Friday raids, which involved about 200 prosecutors and investigators, were part of an investigation into a possible slush fund. The Seoul Central Prosecutors' Office could not be immediately reached for comment. The investigators' probe has already led to the cancellation of an up to $4.5 billion initial public offering for Hotel Lotte. Lotte Chemical, the conglomerate's biggest listed unit, has also bowed out of bidding for US-based Axiall Corp in the wake of raids.

South Korea prosecutors raid Lotte Group firms

<div style="text-align: justify;">Brazilian iron ore miner Vale SA&nbsp;said on Monday that a 20 billion-Reais ($5.7 billion) civil lawsuit seeking environmental and property damages for last year&#39;s deadly Samarco mine disaster has been dismissed. 
 
The mine is operated by Samarco Minera??o SA, a joint venture between Vale and the world&#39;s largest mining company, BHP Billiton Ltd. Vale said the judge did not rule on the merits of the case. 
 
A tailing&nbsp;dam burst at the mine in November and unleashed 60 million cubic meters of mud and mine waste that devastated a village, killed at least 13 people and polluted a major river valley. 
 
The National Humanitarian Society (Sohumana) filed the lawsuit before a federal judge in Rio de Janeiro in December. 
 
Brazil&#39;s federal and state governments also threatened to sue Samarco and its owners for 20 billion Reais in compensation for the disaster and a settlement was reached in March to cover the damages. 
 
Under the agreement, Samarco, BHP and Vale will pay the 20 billion Reais over 15 years to cover and repair damages. Vale, however, has outlined it expects to pay less than that due to the way the deal is structured, calculating future payments depending on how much work remains to be done. 
 
The settlement was approved by a Brazilian judge in May, which potentially reduced the threat of a separate $44 billion lawsuit filed by federal prosecutors in the states of Minas Gerais, where the mine is located, and neighbouring Esp?rito Santo, who based their claim on the clean-up costs of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. 
(Reuters)</div>

A lawsuit filed by National Humanitarian Society against Samarco about a mining disaster that killed 13 people has been shot down

Brazilian iron ore miner Vale SA said on Monday that a 20 billion-Reais ($5.7 billion) civil lawsuit seeking environmental and property damages for last year's deadly Samarco mine disaster has been dismissed. The mine is operated by Samarco Minera??o SA, a joint venture between Vale and the world's largest mining company, BHP Billiton Ltd. Vale said the judge did not rule on the merits of the case. A tailing dam burst at the mine in November and unleashed 60 million cubic meters of mud and mine waste that devastated a village, killed at least 13 people and polluted a major river valley. The National Humanitarian Society (Sohumana) filed the lawsuit before a federal judge in Rio de Janeiro in December. Brazil's federal and state governments also threatened to sue Samarco and its owners for 20 billion Reais in compensation for the disaster and a settlement was reached in March to cover the damages. Under the agreement, Samarco, BHP and Vale will pay the 20 billion Reais over 15 years to cover and repair damages. Vale, however, has outlined it expects to pay less than that due to the way the deal is structured, calculating future payments depending on how much work remains to be done. The settlement was approved by a Brazilian judge in May, which potentially reduced the threat of a separate $44 billion lawsuit filed by federal prosecutors in the states of Minas Gerais, where the mine is located, and neighbouring Esp?rito Santo, who based their claim on the clean-up costs of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. (Reuters)

Brazil judge rejects $5.7-billion civil suit against mining company

The oil market is now in balance thanks to unplanned outages and robust demand, particularly from emerging economies, but this equilibrium will tilt into surplus again early next year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said today. 
 
The agency said in its monthly report that demand growth in 2017 is likely to reach 1.3 million barrels per day (bpd), the same level at which it estimates growth for this year, having revised up its May 2016 forecast of 1.2 million bpd. 
 
&quot;Again, on the planning assumption that OPEC oil production grows modestly in 2017, we expect to see global oil stocks build slightly in the first half of 2017 before falling slightly more in the second half of 2017. For the year as a whole, there will be a very small stock draw of 0.1 million bpd,&quot; &nbsp; said&nbsp;the IEA. 
 
&quot;At halfway in 2016, the oil market looks to be balancing; but we must not forget that there are large volumes of shut-in production, mainly in Nigeria and Libya, that could return to the market, and the strong start for oil demand growth seen this year might not be maintained,&quot; said&nbsp;the Paris-based agency . 
 
Most of the anticipated demand growth this year and in 2017 is expected to come from nations that are not part of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the agency said. 
 
&quot;We must stress that this is our first look at 2017 and the huge number of moving parts will see us amend our numbers accordingly. However ... the direction of travel seems to be clear,&quot; said&nbsp;the IEA. 
 
The IEA&#39;s latest demand estimate for the first three months of this year shows global oil deliveries rising by 1.6 million bpd to 95.2 million bpd, with nine out of every 10 extra barrels going to a non-OECD economy. 
 
On the supply side, the IEA said output fell by 590,000 bpd year-on-year to 95.4 million bpd in May, the first major decline since the start of 2013, as spending cuts and outages reduced non-OPEC production by 1.3 million bpd from a year earlier. 
 
Having fallen by 900,000 bpd in 2016, non-OPEC supply growth is expected to rise by 200,000 bpd in 2017, lifting output to 57 million bpd, the IEA said. 
 
Crude output from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries fell by 100,000 bpd in May to 32.61 million bpd, after a spate of attacks on oil infrastructure in Nigeria offset higher output from the Middle East. Production was still 500,000 bpd higher than in May last year. 
 
&quot;Iran has clearly emerged as OPEC&#39;s fastest source of supply growth this year, with an anticipated annual gain of nearly 700,000 bpd,&quot; the IEA said. 
 
The only other substantial increase from OPEC in 2017 could be from Nigeria, should security issues in the Niger Delta be resolved. 
(Reuters)

Large volumes of shut-in production from Nigeria and Libya can return to the market and that may change oil demand growth

The oil market is now in balance thanks to unplanned outages and robust demand, particularly from emerging economies, but this equilibrium will tilt into surplus again early next year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said today. The agency said in its monthly report that demand growth in 2017 is likely to reach 1.3 million barrels per day (bpd), the same level at which it estimates growth for this year, having revised up its May 2016 forecast of 1.2 million bpd. "Again, on the planning assumption that OPEC oil production grows modestly in 2017, we expect to see global oil stocks build slightly in the first half of 2017 before falling slightly more in the second half of 2017. For the year as a whole, there will be a very small stock draw of 0.1 million bpd," said the IEA. "At halfway in 2016, the oil market looks to be balancing; but we must not forget that there are large volumes of shut-in production, mainly in Nigeria and Libya, that could return to the market, and the strong start for oil demand growth seen this year might not be maintained," said the Paris-based agency . Most of the anticipated demand growth this year and in 2017 is expected to come from nations that are not part of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the agency said. "We must stress that this is our first look at 2017 and the huge number of moving parts will see us amend our numbers accordingly. However ... the direction of travel seems to be clear," said the IEA. The IEA's latest demand estimate for the first three months of this year shows global oil deliveries rising by 1.6 million bpd to 95.2 million bpd, with nine out of every 10 extra barrels going to a non-OECD economy. On the supply side, the IEA said output fell by 590,000 bpd year-on-year to 95.4 million bpd in May, the first major decline since the start of 2013, as spending cuts and outages reduced non-OPEC production by 1.3 million bpd from a year earlier. Having fallen by 900,000 bpd in 2016, non-OPEC supply growth is expected to rise by 200,000 bpd in 2017, lifting output to 57 million bpd, the IEA said. Crude output from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries fell by 100,000 bpd in May to 32.61 million bpd, after a spate of attacks on oil infrastructure in Nigeria offset higher output from the Middle East. Production was still 500,000 bpd higher than in May last year. "Iran has clearly emerged as OPEC's fastest source of supply growth this year, with an anticipated annual gain of nearly 700,000 bpd," the IEA said. The only other substantial increase from OPEC in 2017 could be from Nigeria, should security issues in the Niger Delta be resolved. (Reuters)

IEA sees oil market balance in 2016, surplus to re-emerge next year

<div style="text-align: justify;">Renewable energy sources such as wind and solar will attract two-thirds of all investment in power-generating plants between 2016 and 2040 in spite of persistently cheap coal and gas prices, a new report has found. 
 
The forecast by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the energy research unit of information company Bloomberg, expects some $7.8 trillion to be invested globally in renewables over the period, compared with $1.2 trillion for new coal plants - largely in India and other Asian emerging markets. 
 
Gas will attract a relatively small $892 billion, the report&nbsp;said, despite a projected glut of the fuel leading to lower power generating costs. 
 
&quot;One conclusion that may surprise is that our forecast shows no golden age for gas, except in North America,&quot; according to report co-author Elena Giannakopoulou. 
 
&quot;As a global generation source, gas will be overtaken by renewables in 2027. It will be 2037 before renewables overtake coal,&quot; Giannakopoulou said. 
 
While good news for helping decarbonise the world&#39;s electricity system, it is still not enough to meet the United Nations target to limit global warming below 2&ordm;C. 
 
Another $5.3 trillion in zero-carbon power investment by 2040 is needed to prevent carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere rising above the limit of 450 parts per million, the report says. 
 
Rising coal use in India and emerging Asia will push global carbon emissions five per cent above 2015 levels by 2040, to 700 megatonnes, it said. 
 
In China, weaker growth and a rebalancing of the economy away from heavy industry, as well as more renewables, will mean emissions peak by as early as 2025. 
 
For Europe renewables will dominate with a 70 per cent share in the continent&#39;s power mix by 2040, while the United States&#39; share will jump from 14 per cent last year to 44 per cent. 
 
A breakdown of renewable investments shows that of the $7.8 trillion overall, onshore and offshore wind accounts for $3.1 trillion, with solar taking $3.4 trillion and hydro-electric $911 billion.</div>

Bloomberg New Energy Finance foresees an investment worth $7.8 trillion in power-generating plants between 2016 and 2040

Renewable energy sources such as wind and solar will attract two-thirds of all investment in power-generating plants between 2016 and 2040 in spite of persistently cheap coal and gas prices, a new report has found. The forecast by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the energy research unit of information company Bloomberg, expects some $7.8 trillion to be invested globally in renewables over the period, compared with $1.2 trillion for new coal plants - largely in India and other Asian emerging markets. Gas will attract a relatively small $892 billion, the report said, despite a projected glut of the fuel leading to lower power generating costs. "One conclusion that may surprise is that our forecast shows no golden age for gas, except in North America," according to report co-author Elena Giannakopoulou. "As a global generation source, gas will be overtaken by renewables in 2027. It will be 2037 before renewables overtake coal," Giannakopoulou said. While good news for helping decarbonise the world's electricity system, it is still not enough to meet the United Nations target to limit global warming below 2ºC. Another $5.3 trillion in zero-carbon power investment by 2040 is needed to prevent carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere rising above the limit of 450 parts per million, the report says. Rising coal use in India and emerging Asia will push global carbon emissions five per cent above 2015 levels by 2040, to 700 megatonnes, it said. In China, weaker growth and a rebalancing of the economy away from heavy industry, as well as more renewables, will mean emissions peak by as early as 2025. For Europe renewables will dominate with a 70 per cent share in the continent's power mix by 2040, while the United States' share will jump from 14 per cent last year to 44 per cent. A breakdown of renewable investments shows that of the $7.8 trillion overall, onshore and offshore wind accounts for $3.1 trillion, with solar taking $3.4 trillion and hydro-electric $911 billion.

Renewable energy to attract two-thirds of power plant investments

<div style="text-align: justify;">Fears that&nbsp;Britain is on the verge of voting to leave the European Union next week, spread through global financial markets today, sending Asian and European shares sharply lower and the pound to an eight-week low. 
 
With the world economy looking shaky, and surprisingly weak, jobs figures last month suggesting even the United States is not ready for higher interest rates, concerns over the economic fallout of a Brexit have lurked in the background for weeks. 
 
They were at the heart on Monday of the biggest falls for Asian stock markets in four months, and a one&nbsp;per cent drop in European share prices, after a new poll late on Friday gave the &quot;Leave&quot; camp a 10 point lead. 
 
Money markets have now abandoned expectations, high just weeks ago, that the US&nbsp;Federal Reserve could raise official borrowing costs on Wednesday. Instead, the worry is that it could use language that quells expectations of a move this year at all. 
 
&quot;We&#39;re in uncharted territory in front of the Brexit vote, and then there&#39;s also the Fed this week. So the wall of worry is quite high at the moment,&quot; said Zeg Choudhry, managing director at LONTRAD.&nbsp;&quot;All the banks are a little bit lower, and they&#39;re the ones which are likely to get hit. For the next two weeks, you&#39;ve got to be slightly mad if you&#39;ve not got your money in defensive stocks.&quot; 
 
The news out of China, global investors&#39; other big concern this year, was also poor, with data showing investment growth cooling. Stock markets in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Shanghai all fell by around three&nbsp;per cent. 
 
By comparison, the moves in Europe, where investors have been preparing for the British vote for months, were more subdued. Britain&#39;s FTSE 100 fell one&nbsp;per cent, Germany&#39;s DAX 0.9 per cent, and France&#39;s CAC 40 by 0.8 per cent. 
 
On currency markets, sterling fell another half a per cent against the Dollar after sinking by as much as 3 full cents in value on Friday. The biggest beneficiary of the global moves, however, was the Yen, traditionally investors&#39; first choice in times of financial and economic stress. 
 
Further gains for the Japanese currency, which broke past long-term resistance around 106.50 Yen per Dollar and is up 14 per cent this year, puts more pressure on the Bank of Japan to act against the currency&#39;s strength this week. 
 
&quot;While the pound is the worst-performing G10 currency versus the Dollar this year, the Yen is by far the best,&quot; said Derek Halpenny, European Head of Global Markets Research at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in London. 
 
&quot;The continued surge of the Yen will lift expectations that the BOJ may surprise the markets and announce some additional monetary easing.&quot; 
 
The grim mood was visible on commodities markets, where crude oil futures added to Friday&#39;s three&nbsp;per cent drop after data showed the US&nbsp;oil drilling rig count rose for the second week in row. 
 
Gold, another perceived safe haven, hit four-week highs above $1,280 an ounce. (Reuters)</div>

Asian stock markets experience biggest drop in 4 months and European share prices fall by one per cent due to Britain's unassertive decision

Fears that Britain is on the verge of voting to leave the European Union next week, spread through global financial markets today, sending Asian and European shares sharply lower and the pound to an eight-week low. With the world economy looking shaky, and surprisingly weak, jobs figures last month suggesting even the United States is not ready for higher interest rates, concerns over the economic fallout of a Brexit have lurked in the background for weeks. They were at the heart on Monday of the biggest falls for Asian stock markets in four months, and a one per cent drop in European share prices, after a new poll late on Friday gave the "Leave" camp a 10 point lead. Money markets have now abandoned expectations, high just weeks ago, that the US Federal Reserve could raise official borrowing costs on Wednesday. Instead, the worry is that it could use language that quells expectations of a move this year at all. "We're in uncharted territory in front of the Brexit vote, and then there's also the Fed this week. So the wall of worry is quite high at the moment," said Zeg Choudhry, managing director at LONTRAD. "All the banks are a little bit lower, and they're the ones which are likely to get hit. For the next two weeks, you've got to be slightly mad if you've not got your money in defensive stocks." The news out of China, global investors' other big concern this year, was also poor, with data showing investment growth cooling. Stock markets in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Shanghai all fell by around three per cent. By comparison, the moves in Europe, where investors have been preparing for the British vote for months, were more subdued. Britain's FTSE 100 fell one per cent, Germany's DAX 0.9 per cent, and France's CAC 40 by 0.8 per cent. On currency markets, sterling fell another half a per cent against the Dollar after sinking by as much as 3 full cents in value on Friday. The biggest beneficiary of the global moves, however, was the Yen, traditionally investors' first choice in times of financial and economic stress. Further gains for the Japanese currency, which broke past long-term resistance around 106.50 Yen per Dollar and is up 14 per cent this year, puts more pressure on the Bank of Japan to act against the currency's strength this week. "While the pound is the worst-performing G10 currency versus the Dollar this year, the Yen is by far the best," said Derek Halpenny, European Head of Global Markets Research at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in London. "The continued surge of the Yen will lift expectations that the BOJ may surprise the markets and announce some additional monetary easing." The grim mood was visible on commodities markets, where crude oil futures added to Friday's three per cent drop after data showed the US oil drilling rig count rose for the second week in row. Gold, another perceived safe haven, hit four-week highs above $1,280 an ounce. (Reuters)

Brexit fear factor sends global stocks spinning

Liquor Baron Vijay Mallya commented that&nbsp;Indian authorities trying to recover about $1.4 billion from his collapsed Kingfisher Airlines had no legitimate reason&nbsp;for confiscating certain assets in a money laundering case.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) tweeted on Saturday that it had &quot;attached&quot; properties worth 14.11 billion Indian rupees ($210.78 million) in the case involving a loan from state-owned IDBI Bank to Kingfisher to buy properties abroad.

The assets were purchased several years before Kingfisher was launched, Mallya said in a statement to the media on Sunday.

&quot;There is no rationale nor any legal basis for the series of actions initiated by the ED which is now making it more difficult to raise resources to pay the banks,&quot; Mallya said.

The ED says Mallya&#39;s United Breweries Group used 4.3 billion rupees of Kingfisher bank loans to buy property overseas.

Mallya&#39;s statement said Kingfisher had provided evidence that the funds were used for legitimate business purposes.

Creditors, led by State Bank of India, have rejected an offer of partial repayment by Mallya, who had given a personal guarantee for the Kingfisher loan. They want the former billionaire, who is living in Britain, to attend a hearing in India&#39;s Supreme Court.

The foreign ministry in April revoked a diplomatic passport that he carried as a member of parliament&#39;s upper house. A judge in Mumbai has non-bailable warrant for his arrest.&nbsp;(Reuters) 
&nbsp;

Tycoon says assets were bought before his now-bankrupt airline was launched

Liquor Baron Vijay Mallya commented that Indian authorities trying to recover about $1.4 billion from his collapsed Kingfisher Airlines had no legitimate reason for confiscating certain assets in a money laundering case. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) tweeted on Saturday that it had "attached" properties worth 14.11 billion Indian rupees ($210.78 million) in the case involving a loan from state-owned IDBI Bank to Kingfisher to buy properties abroad. The assets were purchased several years before Kingfisher was launched, Mallya said in a statement to the media on Sunday. "There is no rationale nor any legal basis for the series of actions initiated by the ED which is now making it more difficult to raise resources to pay the banks," Mallya said. The ED says Mallya's United Breweries Group used 4.3 billion rupees of Kingfisher bank loans to buy property overseas. Mallya's statement said Kingfisher had provided evidence that the funds were used for legitimate business purposes. Creditors, led by State Bank of India, have rejected an offer of partial repayment by Mallya, who had given a personal guarantee for the Kingfisher loan. They want the former billionaire, who is living in Britain, to attend a hearing in India's Supreme Court. The foreign ministry in April revoked a diplomatic passport that he carried as a member of parliament's upper house. A judge in Mumbai has non-bailable warrant for his arrest. (Reuters)

Mallya: No legitimate basis for authorities to confiscate my assets

Chinese taxi-hailing app&nbsp;Didi Chuxing&nbsp;received an investment of about $600 million from China Life Insurance Co Ltd.

The latest fund-raising comes with China&#39;s top ride-hailing company locked in a struggle to fend off its global rival&#39;s - Uber&nbsp;-&nbsp;march into China. Uber raised $3.5 billion from Saudi Arabia&#39;s sovereign wealth fund in new resources earlier this month.

The investment by China Life - the largest insurer in the Asia-Pacific region by market value - included equity of $300 million and a long-term borrowing commitment of $305 million, the company&#39;s&nbsp;said in a statement.

&quot;The two parties will also collaborate on investment opportunities in mobile transportation and related sectors in China and beyond,&quot; the statement said.

Apple invested $1 billion in May in Didi, a move that Apple chief executive Tim Cook said would help his company better understand the critical Chinese market.

Didi and Uber have spent heavily to subsidise fares to gain market share in China, raising speculation in local media that they might ultimately join forces. Didi itself teamed up with a former local rival last year.

Prior to the China Life investment, the company had raised about $6.3 billion including funding rounds before and after it became a merged company, according to research firm CB Insights.

Didi, which completes more than 11 million rides a day, is&nbsp;working towards initial public offering in the United States that would likely take place in 2018.

Chinese mobile taxi-booking app, Didi Chuxing, raised a $600-million funding which includes equity and long-term borrowings

Chinese taxi-hailing app Didi Chuxing received an investment of about $600 million from China Life Insurance Co Ltd. The latest fund-raising comes with China's top ride-hailing company locked in a struggle to fend off its global rival's - Uber - march into China. Uber raised $3.5 billion from Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund in new resources earlier this month. The investment by China Life - the largest insurer in the Asia-Pacific region by market value - included equity of $300 million and a long-term borrowing commitment of $305 million, the company's said in a statement. "The two parties will also collaborate on investment opportunities in mobile transportation and related sectors in China and beyond," the statement said. Apple invested $1 billion in May in Didi, a move that Apple chief executive Tim Cook said would help his company better understand the critical Chinese market. Didi and Uber have spent heavily to subsidise fares to gain market share in China, raising speculation in local media that they might ultimately join forces. Didi itself teamed up with a former local rival last year. Prior to the China Life investment, the company had raised about $6.3 billion including funding rounds before and after it became a merged company, according to research firm CB Insights. Didi, which completes more than 11 million rides a day, is working towards initial public offering in the United States that would likely take place in 2018.

China's Didi Chuxing raises $600 million from China Life Insurance

Gawker Media LLC, an online publishing pioneer, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and put itself up for sale on Friday. The decision came after a $140 million court judgment against it in a lawsuit brought by former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan over a sex tape. 
 
The move followed revelations that Hogan&#39;s lawsuit, along with several others against Gawker, were being bankrolled by billionaire investor Peter Thiel, an early backer of Facebook and a co-founder of PayPal. 
 
Thiel&#39;s involvement, which stemmed from his ire over Gawker&#39;s writings about him and his friends in Silicon Valley, raised alarm bells in U.S. media circles over the prospect of wealthy individuals using the courts to muzzle the press. 
 
Gawker vowed to continue operating its seven websites during the bankruptcy process. Media company Ziff Davis LLC has entered an agreement to buy Gawker&#39;s assets for a little less than $100 million, according to people familiar with the matter, but that may be only the initial bid in a court-supervised auction likely to take place at the end of July. 
 
&quot;Even with his billions, Thiel will not silence our writers,&quot; Gawker founder and Chief Executive Nick Denton said on Twitter. &quot;Our sites will thrive &mdash; under new ownership &mdash; and we&#39;ll win in court.&quot; 
 
Hogan&#39;s lawsuit accused Gawker, Denton, and former Gawker editor AJ Daulerio of violating his privacy by publishing a one minute, 41-second edited video clip featuring Hogan having sex with the wife of his then-best friend. 
 
In March, a six-person jury awarded $60 million to Hogan for emotional distress and $55 million for economic damages. The jury then added another $25 million in punitive damages. 
 
Gawker has vowed to appeal the verdict, and legal experts believe the company has a good chance of eventually having the award thrown out or reduced. But at a post-trial hearing in St. Petersburg, Florida on Friday, Gawker said it had just $5.3 million in cash on hand and faced massive legal bills. 
 
The judge agreed to postpone payment of the $140 million judgment while Gawker pursued its appeal, but required the defendants to put up their shares of the company as collateral to be held by Hogan&#39;s lawyers. 
 
Gawker objected to having Hogan, whose real name is Terry Bollea, hold the collateral and proposed a different arrangement, which the judge rejected. The company then filed for bankruptcy. 
 
Gawker filed a separate lawsuit in bankruptcy court on Friday asking the judge to extend the bankruptcy court protections to Denton, Daulerio and other former and current Gawker employees. 
 
The lawsuit states that Denton could be forced to file for personal bankruptcy if the lawsuits against him personally are allowed to proceed. 
 
Denton owns about 30 per cent of Gawker, according to the lawsuit. The company posted revenues of $49.9 million in 2015, according to the documents, and has grown at a compound annual rate of 24 per cent over the past three years. 
 
Gawker and Denton were influential forces in the development of online media, developing a direct, conversational style that dispensed with many journalistic conventions and was widely imitated. Its eagerness to dish obscene gossip was often condemned, but it was also one of the few early digital publishers to build a profitable independent business. 
 
Along with its flagship Gawker site, Gawker Media also publishes consumer websites Gizmodo, Lifehacker, Kotaku, Jalopnik, Deadspin, and Jezebel. 
 
Denton said in a prepared statement that he was &quot;encouraged&quot; by the agreement from Ziff Davis, which itself has a long and rocky history. Once a powerful technology trade publisher, the company went through bankruptcy of its own in 2008. 
 
&quot;There&#39;s a tremendous fit between the two organizations, from brands to audience to monetization,&quot; said a spokesman for Ziff Davis. &quot;We look forward to the possibility of adding these great brands -- and the talented people who support them -- to the Ziff Davis family.&quot; 
 
It was not clear on Friday what other bidders might emerge. Univision, which is expanding aggressively in digital media, had previously been cited as a possible suitor. 
 
A spokesman for Peter Thiel declined to comment on Gawker&#39;s bankruptcy filing. 
&nbsp;

Hogan's lawsuit accused Gawker of violating his privacy by publishing an edited video of him having sex with his then-best friend's wife

Gawker Media LLC, an online publishing pioneer, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and put itself up for sale on Friday. The decision came after a $140 million court judgment against it in a lawsuit brought by former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan over a sex tape. The move followed revelations that Hogan's lawsuit, along with several others against Gawker, were being bankrolled by billionaire investor Peter Thiel, an early backer of Facebook and a co-founder of PayPal. Thiel's involvement, which stemmed from his ire over Gawker's writings about him and his friends in Silicon Valley, raised alarm bells in U.S. media circles over the prospect of wealthy individuals using the courts to muzzle the press. Gawker vowed to continue operating its seven websites during the bankruptcy process. Media company Ziff Davis LLC has entered an agreement to buy Gawker's assets for a little less than $100 million, according to people familiar with the matter, but that may be only the initial bid in a court-supervised auction likely to take place at the end of July. "Even with his billions, Thiel will not silence our writers," Gawker founder and Chief Executive Nick Denton said on Twitter. "Our sites will thrive — under new ownership — and we'll win in court." Hogan's lawsuit accused Gawker, Denton, and former Gawker editor AJ Daulerio of violating his privacy by publishing a one minute, 41-second edited video clip featuring Hogan having sex with the wife of his then-best friend. In March, a six-person jury awarded $60 million to Hogan for emotional distress and $55 million for economic damages. The jury then added another $25 million in punitive damages. Gawker has vowed to appeal the verdict, and legal experts believe the company has a good chance of eventually having the award thrown out or reduced. But at a post-trial hearing in St. Petersburg, Florida on Friday, Gawker said it had just $5.3 million in cash on hand and faced massive legal bills. The judge agreed to postpone payment of the $140 million judgment while Gawker pursued its appeal, but required the defendants to put up their shares of the company as collateral to be held by Hogan's lawyers. Gawker objected to having Hogan, whose real name is Terry Bollea, hold the collateral and proposed a different arrangement, which the judge rejected. The company then filed for bankruptcy. Gawker filed a separate lawsuit in bankruptcy court on Friday asking the judge to extend the bankruptcy court protections to Denton, Daulerio and other former and current Gawker employees. The lawsuit states that Denton could be forced to file for personal bankruptcy if the lawsuits against him personally are allowed to proceed. Denton owns about 30 per cent of Gawker, according to the lawsuit. The company posted revenues of $49.9 million in 2015, according to the documents, and has grown at a compound annual rate of 24 per cent over the past three years. Gawker and Denton were influential forces in the development of online media, developing a direct, conversational style that dispensed with many journalistic conventions and was widely imitated. Its eagerness to dish obscene gossip was often condemned, but it was also one of the few early digital publishers to build a profitable independent business. Along with its flagship Gawker site, Gawker Media also publishes consumer websites Gizmodo, Lifehacker, Kotaku, Jalopnik, Deadspin, and Jezebel. Denton said in a prepared statement that he was "encouraged" by the agreement from Ziff Davis, which itself has a long and rocky history. Once a powerful technology trade publisher, the company went through bankruptcy of its own in 2008. "There's a tremendous fit between the two organizations, from brands to audience to monetization," said a spokesman for Ziff Davis. "We look forward to the possibility of adding these great brands -- and the talented people who support them -- to the Ziff Davis family." It was not clear on Friday what other bidders might emerge. Univision, which is expanding aggressively in digital media, had previously been cited as a possible suitor. A spokesman for Peter Thiel declined to comment on Gawker's bankruptcy filing.

Gawker Media files for bankruptcy after losing Hulk Hogan sex tape lawsuit

It is a sign of caution that spreads through the global economic outlook when four of the world&#39;s top central banks, all due to meet within days of each other, are almost unanimously expected to make no change to their extraordinary stimulus programs.

While the US&nbsp;Federal Reserve, Bank of England, Swiss National Bank and the Bank of Japan are all dealing with varying amounts or shortages of inflation, none are expected to act ahead of one of the biggest risk events of 2016.

Britain&#39;s referendum on whether to remain in or leave the European Union has been creeping from the back to the front of investors&#39; minds. During the last full week of campaigning before the June 23 vote, it may dominate most discussion.

Janet Yellen&#39;s Fed has spent most of the past month or so dropping hints that a summer rate hike was on the way. However, disappointing May hiring data and a UK vote that is too close in the polls to have confidence in the outcome have toned down her message, making a rate rise on June 15 now highly unlikely.

That leaves financial markets stuck in a holding pattern with renewed fears about global growth pushing against safety nets that central banks have built up over the years, according to Valentin Marinov, head of G10 FX strategy at CA-CIB.

So a packed week of data releases for the world&#39;s largest economy, including retail sales, housing starts, building permits as well as inflation, will at best be able to help build the case for a Fed rise as soon as July, rather than September.

&quot;Weak labour market data have messed up the carefully-prepared script for the Fed&#39;s next rate move. An interest rate rise at the meeting next week is off the table,&quot; wrote Christoph Balz, economist at Commerzbank, in a note.

&quot;However ... the U.S. labour market recovery is not over yet and a rate hike at the meeting in July is therefore still on the agenda.&quot;

A recent Reuters poll showed four-fifth&nbsp;of a sample of 90 economists expect a rate rise in either July or September, with most leaning toward the latter month, and with many saying a hiring rebound could seal an earlier move.

June jobs data won&#39;t be released until early July. But for the most part, the economy has been performing well: an analysis of key economic releases since the last Fed meeting shows 70 per cent have come in at or above Reuters poll forecasts.

US&nbsp;retail sales may stage a milder 0.4 per cent rise on the month after a 1.3 per cent surge in April, while housing starts and permits will be watched closely after a blowout month in April for pending and new home sales.

Core consumer price inflation is likely to remain on a relatively steady course a few ticks above 2 per cent.

In Britain, where not a soul expects the Bank of England to change policy just ahead of the EU referendum but instead focus on contingency planning and market liquidity in the event of a vote to leave, price pressures are weaker.

Headline inflation, which the BoE targets, is forecast to rise to 0.4 per cent, with core inflation at 1.3 per cent. The UK jobless rate is forecast to hold steady at 5.1 per cent, close to what many would call full employment.&nbsp;

But with a slowdown this year in the UK economy which a majority of analysts attribute to jitters ahead of the referendum, talk about interest rates has shifted from the next rate rise to whether they will need to be cut.

In Japan, the dearth of inflation is much more severe, much as it has been for the better part of two decades and there is little hope for a revival any time soon.

So while the Fed is forecast to take a pass in June and possibly lift its federal funds rate gingerly in July, the Bank of Japan is forecast to take a pass on June 16 and do the opposite in July by piling on more stimulus.

Much of it will depend on the Yen exchange rate, which appears now to be out of the BOJ&#39;s control, having surged earlier this year when it surprised the markets by introducing by a narrow majority a negative deposit rate policy.

In Zurich, the SNB is also expected to leave its negative key rate unchanged at a midpoint of -0.75 per cent, according to a Reuters poll. There may be some signs of inflation turning but again, what the Swiss Franc does will matter a lot and what drives it is not completely within the SNB&#39;s control.

United States, England, Switzerland and Japan

It is a sign of caution that spreads through the global economic outlook when four of the world's top central banks, all due to meet within days of each other, are almost unanimously expected to make no change to their extraordinary stimulus programs. While the US Federal Reserve, Bank of England, Swiss National Bank and the Bank of Japan are all dealing with varying amounts or shortages of inflation, none are expected to act ahead of one of the biggest risk events of 2016. Britain's referendum on whether to remain in or leave the European Union has been creeping from the back to the front of investors' minds. During the last full week of campaigning before the June 23 vote, it may dominate most discussion. Janet Yellen's Fed has spent most of the past month or so dropping hints that a summer rate hike was on the way. However, disappointing May hiring data and a UK vote that is too close in the polls to have confidence in the outcome have toned down her message, making a rate rise on June 15 now highly unlikely. That leaves financial markets stuck in a holding pattern with renewed fears about global growth pushing against safety nets that central banks have built up over the years, according to Valentin Marinov, head of G10 FX strategy at CA-CIB. So a packed week of data releases for the world's largest economy, including retail sales, housing starts, building permits as well as inflation, will at best be able to help build the case for a Fed rise as soon as July, rather than September. "Weak labour market data have messed up the carefully-prepared script for the Fed's next rate move. An interest rate rise at the meeting next week is off the table," wrote Christoph Balz, economist at Commerzbank, in a note. "However ... the U.S. labour market recovery is not over yet and a rate hike at the meeting in July is therefore still on the agenda." A recent Reuters poll showed four-fifth of a sample of 90 economists expect a rate rise in either July or September, with most leaning toward the latter month, and with many saying a hiring rebound could seal an earlier move. June jobs data won't be released until early July. But for the most part, the economy has been performing well: an analysis of key economic releases since the last Fed meeting shows 70 per cent have come in at or above Reuters poll forecasts. US retail sales may stage a milder 0.4 per cent rise on the month after a 1.3 per cent surge in April, while housing starts and permits will be watched closely after a blowout month in April for pending and new home sales. Core consumer price inflation is likely to remain on a relatively steady course a few ticks above 2 per cent. In Britain, where not a soul expects the Bank of England to change policy just ahead of the EU referendum but instead focus on contingency planning and market liquidity in the event of a vote to leave, price pressures are weaker. Headline inflation, which the BoE targets, is forecast to rise to 0.4 per cent, with core inflation at 1.3 per cent. The UK jobless rate is forecast to hold steady at 5.1 per cent, close to what many would call full employment. But with a slowdown this year in the UK economy which a majority of analysts attribute to jitters ahead of the referendum, talk about interest rates has shifted from the next rate rise to whether they will need to be cut. In Japan, the dearth of inflation is much more severe, much as it has been for the better part of two decades and there is little hope for a revival any time soon. So while the Fed is forecast to take a pass in June and possibly lift its federal funds rate gingerly in July, the Bank of Japan is forecast to take a pass on June 16 and do the opposite in July by piling on more stimulus. Much of it will depend on the Yen exchange rate, which appears now to be out of the BOJ's control, having surged earlier this year when it surprised the markets by introducing by a narrow majority a negative deposit rate policy. In Zurich, the SNB is also expected to leave its negative key rate unchanged at a midpoint of -0.75 per cent, according to a Reuters poll. There may be some signs of inflation turning but again, what the Swiss Franc does will matter a lot and what drives it is not completely within the SNB's control.

Caution pervades at four of world's top central banks

Japanese messaging app operator Line Corporation&nbsp;plans to list shares worth as much as $1.05 billion in Tokyo and New York next month&nbsp;in what would be Japan&#39;s biggest initial public offering (IPO) this year.

The Tokyo-based firm&nbsp;will sell 13 million new shares in Japan and 22 million shares overseas for an indicative price of 2,800 Yen each.

That will value the entire company at 588 billion Yen ($5.5 billion).

Line is currently 100 per cent owned by South Korea&#39;s largest web portal operator, Naver Corp, which may offer as many as 5.25 million existing shares in the event of excessive demand.

Altogether, as many as 40.25 million shares will be sold, valuing the IPO at as much as 112.7 billion Yen.

Line said it plans to use the proceeds for strategic investments, including global mergers and acquisitions, and to repay debt.

Line launched its messaging app in 2011 under the name NHN Japan as a communication tool prompted by the chaotic aftermath of a devastating earthquake and tsunami in March that year. It rebranded to Line in 2013.

Its IPO would be the largest in Japan since the $12 billion partial privatisation of Japan Post and its bank and insurance divisions in November.

Line has hired Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Nomura to manage the IPO.

The South-Korean owned company's move will be Japan's largest IPO this year

Japanese messaging app operator Line Corporation plans to list shares worth as much as $1.05 billion in Tokyo and New York next month in what would be Japan's biggest initial public offering (IPO) this year. The Tokyo-based firm will sell 13 million new shares in Japan and 22 million shares overseas for an indicative price of 2,800 Yen each. That will value the entire company at 588 billion Yen ($5.5 billion). Line is currently 100 per cent owned by South Korea's largest web portal operator, Naver Corp, which may offer as many as 5.25 million existing shares in the event of excessive demand. Altogether, as many as 40.25 million shares will be sold, valuing the IPO at as much as 112.7 billion Yen. Line said it plans to use the proceeds for strategic investments, including global mergers and acquisitions, and to repay debt. Line launched its messaging app in 2011 under the name NHN Japan as a communication tool prompted by the chaotic aftermath of a devastating earthquake and tsunami in March that year. It rebranded to Line in 2013. Its IPO would be the largest in Japan since the $12 billion partial privatisation of Japan Post and its bank and insurance divisions in November. Line has hired Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Nomura to manage the IPO.

Japanese messaging app Line to list shares for $1.05 billion

<div style="text-align: justify;">India&#39;s industrial output&nbsp;fell in April, facing its first contraction in three months, dragged down by a sharp plunge in production of capital goods and a contraction in consumer wares. 
 
Production at factories, mines and utilities shrank 0.8 per cent from a year earlier, government data revealed. Capital goods output plunged about 25 per cent on year in April. The sector, a proxy for capital investments, has been falling since October.&nbsp;Consumer goods were not spared,&nbsp;hit by a 9.7 per cent annual contraction in production of non-durables items. 
 
The fall comes unexpected if compared with a 0.5 per cent annual rise predicted by economists surveyed by Reuters and a revised 0.3 per cent year-on-year growth in March. 
 
Industrial output figures have paled in significance since last year&nbsp;when New Delhi revamped the method it uses to calculate gross domestic product. 
 
The new method takes into account gross value addition in goods and services, a departure from the old practice that factored in volume-based indicators such as industrial output. 
 
That helps to explain why India&#39;s economy grew 7.6 per cent from a year earlier in the fiscal year to end-March despite the sluggish pace of expansion in industrial production&nbsp;which posted annual growth of 2.4 per cent in 2015/16. 
 
The federal statistics office plans to revise and rebase the industrial production index in the next six months to better capture the changes taking place in the economy.</div>

The fall is unexpected as economists had predicted a 0.5% rise

India's industrial output fell in April, facing its first contraction in three months, dragged down by a sharp plunge in production of capital goods and a contraction in consumer wares. Production at factories, mines and utilities shrank 0.8 per cent from a year earlier, government data revealed. Capital goods output plunged about 25 per cent on year in April. The sector, a proxy for capital investments, has been falling since October. Consumer goods were not spared, hit by a 9.7 per cent annual contraction in production of non-durables items. The fall comes unexpected if compared with a 0.5 per cent annual rise predicted by economists surveyed by Reuters and a revised 0.3 per cent year-on-year growth in March. Industrial output figures have paled in significance since last year when New Delhi revamped the method it uses to calculate gross domestic product. The new method takes into account gross value addition in goods and services, a departure from the old practice that factored in volume-based indicators such as industrial output. That helps to explain why India's economy grew 7.6 per cent from a year earlier in the fiscal year to end-March despite the sluggish pace of expansion in industrial production which posted annual growth of 2.4 per cent in 2015/16. The federal statistics office plans to revise and rebase the industrial production index in the next six months to better capture the changes taking place in the economy.

India's industrial output shrinks

<div style="text-align: justify;">Germany&#39;s Daimler&nbsp;will lift the curtain on its much-awaited long-distance electric car at the Paris Motor Show in October&nbsp;as the automaker gears up to compete with Tesla Motors&#39;&nbsp;Model X SUV. 
 
The company will display a prototype of an electric-powered Mercedes car with a 500-kilometre&nbsp;range, said chief development officer Thomas Weber. 
 
&quot;The structure is ready, the teams are working and the initial results from road tests are coming in quick succession,&quot; he&nbsp;said. 
 
Weber did not specify how soon the car would hit the road, but said it would be sometime this decade.&nbsp;Weber also said Daimler would launch its fourth-generation electric Smart car at the end of the year in both two and four-seater variants. 
 
Daimler and other European rivals are stepping up investments in electric vehicles in order to meet new EU pollution targets and catch up with US&nbsp;battery-car specialist Tesla. The German government has also announced subsidies for buyers of electric and other less polluting cars. 
 
German competitors&nbsp;Audi and Porsche have already unveiled long-distance electric prototypes&nbsp;and&nbsp;BMW is also working on one. 
 
Daimler currently offers two fully electric cars under its Smart and B-class models and a host of plug-in hybrids&nbsp;powered by a combined battery and combustion engine. Further hybrid models are in the pipeline. 
 
The company is aiming to sell more than 100,000 electric cars a year by the end of the decade, Weber said. 
 
Daimler has also been working on fuel cell powered cars&nbsp;which run on electricity generated by hydrogen. It initially planned to launch such a vehicle in 2014, but had to postpone, due to&nbsp;pricing issues. 
 
The fuel cell operated SUV GLC, likely to compete with Toyota&#39;s Mirai, is now expected to enter production next year.</div>

German company, Dailmer, will display a prototype of an electric-powered Mercedes with a 500-kilometre range

Germany's Daimler will lift the curtain on its much-awaited long-distance electric car at the Paris Motor Show in October as the automaker gears up to compete with Tesla Motors' Model X SUV. The company will display a prototype of an electric-powered Mercedes car with a 500-kilometre range, said chief development officer Thomas Weber. "The structure is ready, the teams are working and the initial results from road tests are coming in quick succession," he said. Weber did not specify how soon the car would hit the road, but said it would be sometime this decade. Weber also said Daimler would launch its fourth-generation electric Smart car at the end of the year in both two and four-seater variants. Daimler and other European rivals are stepping up investments in electric vehicles in order to meet new EU pollution targets and catch up with US battery-car specialist Tesla. The German government has also announced subsidies for buyers of electric and other less polluting cars. German competitors Audi and Porsche have already unveiled long-distance electric prototypes and BMW is also working on one. Daimler currently offers two fully electric cars under its Smart and B-class models and a host of plug-in hybrids powered by a combined battery and combustion engine. Further hybrid models are in the pipeline. The company is aiming to sell more than 100,000 electric cars a year by the end of the decade, Weber said. Daimler has also been working on fuel cell powered cars which run on electricity generated by hydrogen. It initially planned to launch such a vehicle in 2014, but had to postpone, due to pricing issues. The fuel cell operated SUV GLC, likely to compete with Toyota's Mirai, is now expected to enter production next year.

Daimler to unveil long-distance electric car in October

THIS IMAGE NEEDS TO BE CHANGED. 
 
Sumner Redstone&#39;s National Amusements Inc is consulting investment bankers about strategic options for Viacom Inc&#39;s Paramount Pictures, including a possible stake sale, sources&nbsp;said.

National Amusements, which controls 80 per cent of the voting shares of Viacom, is also keen to extract more value from the film studio&#39;s real estate holdings in Los Angeles.

It is unclear what other scenarios National Amusements is considering. The fact that it is entertaining options for Paramount is significant because it could mean that a deal for the movie studio could happen even without Viacom chief executive Philippe Dauman leading the process.

Redstone&nbsp;is considering removing Dauman and members of the board. Representatives for National Amusement and Viacom declined to comment.

The sale of&nbsp;interest in Paramount has been an issue of contention in the battle for control of 93-year-old Redstone&#39;s $40 billion media empire, which includes Viacom and CBS Corporation.

Redstone said in a statement last month he believes keeping 100 per cent of the film unit is in the best interest of Viacom but could be swayed by a plan that convinces him otherwise.

National Amusements said&nbsp;it &quot;is not opposed to a transaction that would unlock value at Paramount&quot;. But it amended Viacom&#39;s bylaws to create hurdles for Dauman to sell a stake in the studio unless he obtained the approval of the entire board of the media company. 
 
Dauman is&nbsp;pushing ahead with plans to sell a 49 per cent stake in Paramount, and he is&nbsp;also looking to unlock the value of the film studio&#39;s real estate holdings, he said at an investor meeting.

Last month, Redstone removed Dauman and Viacom board member George Abrams from the seven-person trust that will determine the fate of Viacom and CBS after Redstone dies or is incapacitated. Part of the reason that he made the move was over concerns about the Paramount sale, a representative for Redstone has said.

Dauman and Abrams have filed a lawsuit opposing Redstone&#39;s removal of them from the trust and the National Amusement Inc&#39;s&nbsp;board. A Massachusetts judge is deciding whether to move up that trial from October.

National Amusements, which controls 80 per cent of the voting shares of Viacom, is interested in the film studio's real estate holdings

THIS IMAGE NEEDS TO BE CHANGED. Sumner Redstone's National Amusements Inc is consulting investment bankers about strategic options for Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures, including a possible stake sale, sources said. National Amusements, which controls 80 per cent of the voting shares of Viacom, is also keen to extract more value from the film studio's real estate holdings in Los Angeles. It is unclear what other scenarios National Amusements is considering. The fact that it is entertaining options for Paramount is significant because it could mean that a deal for the movie studio could happen even without Viacom chief executive Philippe Dauman leading the process. Redstone is considering removing Dauman and members of the board. Representatives for National Amusement and Viacom declined to comment. The sale of interest in Paramount has been an issue of contention in the battle for control of 93-year-old Redstone's $40 billion media empire, which includes Viacom and CBS Corporation. Redstone said in a statement last month he believes keeping 100 per cent of the film unit is in the best interest of Viacom but could be swayed by a plan that convinces him otherwise. National Amusements said it "is not opposed to a transaction that would unlock value at Paramount". But it amended Viacom's bylaws to create hurdles for Dauman to sell a stake in the studio unless he obtained the approval of the entire board of the media company. Dauman is pushing ahead with plans to sell a 49 per cent stake in Paramount, and he is also looking to unlock the value of the film studio's real estate holdings, he said at an investor meeting. Last month, Redstone removed Dauman and Viacom board member George Abrams from the seven-person trust that will determine the fate of Viacom and CBS after Redstone dies or is incapacitated. Part of the reason that he made the move was over concerns about the Paramount sale, a representative for Redstone has said. Dauman and Abrams have filed a lawsuit opposing Redstone's removal of them from the trust and the National Amusement Inc's board. A Massachusetts judge is deciding whether to move up that trial from October.

National Amusements in talks to buy Paramount Pictures

Amazon&nbsp;is preparing to launch a standalone music streaming subscription service, placing it squarely in competition with rival offerings from Apple&nbsp;and Spotify, according to sources.

The service will be offered at $9.99 per month, in line with major rivals, and it will offer a competitive catalogue of songs. Amazon&nbsp;is finalising licenses with labels for the service, which likely will be launched in late summer or early fall.

Amazon, which offers a free music streaming&nbsp;service with a limited catalogue to subscribers of its Prime shipping and video service, did not comment on the matter.

Although it will be a late entrant to the crowded streaming space, Amazon believes a comprehensive music service is important to its bid to be a one-stop shop for content and goods.

The new music offering also is intended to increase the appeal of the Amazon Echo, its home speaker, which searches the Internet and orders products from the retailer with voice commands.

&ldquo;A music service will further increase the daily interactions between Amazon and its customer base,&rdquo; said former music executive Jay Samit when told about the company&#39;s plan.

The new Amazon effort will compete directly with Apple Music and Spotify, which boast more than 30 million songs. Apple launched its service last year in one of the highest profile signs that listeners wanted subscription services, rather than paying for individual songs or albums.

The service also will diversify Amazon&#39;s subscription offerings and be another step away from a single, annual subscription. Amazon recently began allowing Prime subscribers&nbsp;to pay monthly.

Silicon Valley titans such as Apple and Alphabet Inc&#39;s&nbsp;Google have muscled into music streaming in recent years, aiming to weave themselves more tightly into their customers&rsquo; daily routines and drive device sales.

Amazon similarly hopes its new service&rsquo;s tight integration with the Echo will help it stand out and reinforce the speaker&rsquo;s appeal.

Released broadly last year, the Echo has become a surprise hit that rival Google is now seeking to emulate with a speaker of its own.

The move suggests that Amazon will increasingly offer basic media options through Prime while selling additional subscriptions for consumers who want to go deeper. The company recently launched a standalone video service.

The new music service is unlikely to steal many customers from Spotify, but it could pose a threat to other players, said David Pakman, a partner at Venrock who headed early Apple music efforts, when informed of the move.

Palman believes the Amazon service is inevitable and said that it&nbsp;&ldquo;might take a little oxygen out of Apple&rsquo;s potential pool of paying users&rdquo;.

Amazon's music streaming service will be offered at $9.99 per month, and will offer a competitive catalogue of songs

Amazon is preparing to launch a standalone music streaming subscription service, placing it squarely in competition with rival offerings from Apple and Spotify, according to sources. The service will be offered at $9.99 per month, in line with major rivals, and it will offer a competitive catalogue of songs. Amazon is finalising licenses with labels for the service, which likely will be launched in late summer or early fall. Amazon, which offers a free music streaming service with a limited catalogue to subscribers of its Prime shipping and video service, did not comment on the matter. Although it will be a late entrant to the crowded streaming space, Amazon believes a comprehensive music service is important to its bid to be a one-stop shop for content and goods. The new music offering also is intended to increase the appeal of the Amazon Echo, its home speaker, which searches the Internet and orders products from the retailer with voice commands. “A music service will further increase the daily interactions between Amazon and its customer base,” said former music executive Jay Samit when told about the company's plan. The new Amazon effort will compete directly with Apple Music and Spotify, which boast more than 30 million songs. Apple launched its service last year in one of the highest profile signs that listeners wanted subscription services, rather than paying for individual songs or albums. The service also will diversify Amazon's subscription offerings and be another step away from a single, annual subscription. Amazon recently began allowing Prime subscribers to pay monthly. Silicon Valley titans such as Apple and Alphabet Inc's Google have muscled into music streaming in recent years, aiming to weave themselves more tightly into their customers’ daily routines and drive device sales. Amazon similarly hopes its new service’s tight integration with the Echo will help it stand out and reinforce the speaker’s appeal. Released broadly last year, the Echo has become a surprise hit that rival Google is now seeking to emulate with a speaker of its own. The move suggests that Amazon will increasingly offer basic media options through Prime while selling additional subscriptions for consumers who want to go deeper. The company recently launched a standalone video service. The new music service is unlikely to steal many customers from Spotify, but it could pose a threat to other players, said David Pakman, a partner at Venrock who headed early Apple music efforts, when informed of the move. Palman believes the Amazon service is inevitable and said that it “might take a little oxygen out of Apple’s potential pool of paying users”.

Amazon to launch music streaming service

&nbsp;Advertising agencies are for the first time turning to Instagram more frequently than Twitter for social media ad campaigns, a survey released Thursday showed, a further indication of weakness in an ad sales operation that has been one of the few bright spots for Twitter.

The survey, from a unit of Comcast called Strata, came the same week Twitter Inc said its head of product, who took over the team in September, was leaving. The research firm eMarketer said earlier this month that Snapchat was on pace to surpass Twitter in the US&nbsp;active users, highlighting the threat Twitter faces from faster-growing competitors.

Amid Twitter&#39;s ongoing struggles with stagnant user growth, management turmoil and a tumbling stock price, the advertising operations under chief operating office Adam Bain had been a relative oasis of stability. Bain, who joined the company in 2010, helped build Twitter from scratch to more than $1 billion revenue in just over three years.

But cracks in the ad business began to emerge in the company&#39;s first-quarter earnings report, in which it missed its numbers due to weaker-than-expected spending by big advertisers and provided a weak revenue forecast. The stock has fallen 15 per cent since the April earnings announcement and closed Wednesday at $14.60 - far below its $26 IPO price in November of 2013.

The Strata survey asked 83 advertising agencies which social platform their clients preferred for social media campaigns. Sixty three&nbsp;per cent of advertisers said they were most likely to use photo-sharing app Instagram, compared with 56 per cent who said they would use social network Twitter. Facebook dominated, with 96 per cent of advertisers saying they were likely to use it.

Twitter rejected the survey results, pointing to a 2015 study by Advertiser Perceptions that showed 37 per cent of advertisers intended to buy ads on Twitter, compared with 28 per cent on Instagram, which is owned by Facebook. The same study showed that 46 per cent were considering buying ads on Twitter compared with 41 per cent on Instagram.

&quot;The data presented in this survey couldn&#39;t be farther from the truth,&quot; a Twitter spokesperson said. &quot;We have close relationships with our agency clients and continue to hear that Twitter offers the most powerful creative canvas.&quot;

Still, the survey shows the growing power of Instagram, which has the benefit of using Facebook&#39;s advertising technology and has been rolling out features that make it more useful for sharing news and activity updates that are the bread and butter of Twitter. Instagram has more than 200,000 advertisers compared with Twitter&#39;s 130,000.

&quot;We&#39;re seeing almost all of our clients shifting if not all of their budgets, then most of their budgets from Twitter to Instagram,&quot; said Chris Gilbert, senior social strategist at digital agency Kettle, which works mostly with fashion brands. &quot;Marketers typically want to be where the audience is.&quot;

Some ad agencies said their clients are shifting more of their budgets to Instagram because it has more users - more than 400 million compared with 310 million on Twitter - and because Facebook&#39;s ad technology allows them to target highly specific audiences.

&quot;We&#39;ve had more emphasis on Instagram for the last year,&quot; said Jason Peterson, chief creative officer at ad agency Havas Worldwide North America.

Instagram declined to comment on the Strata survey.

Sixty three per cent of advertisers chose Instagram, compared to 56% who chose Twitter

Advertising agencies are for the first time turning to Instagram more frequently than Twitter for social media ad campaigns, a survey released Thursday showed, a further indication of weakness in an ad sales operation that has been one of the few bright spots for Twitter. The survey, from a unit of Comcast called Strata, came the same week Twitter Inc said its head of product, who took over the team in September, was leaving. The research firm eMarketer said earlier this month that Snapchat was on pace to surpass Twitter in the US active users, highlighting the threat Twitter faces from faster-growing competitors. Amid Twitter's ongoing struggles with stagnant user growth, management turmoil and a tumbling stock price, the advertising operations under chief operating office Adam Bain had been a relative oasis of stability. Bain, who joined the company in 2010, helped build Twitter from scratch to more than $1 billion revenue in just over three years. But cracks in the ad business began to emerge in the company's first-quarter earnings report, in which it missed its numbers due to weaker-than-expected spending by big advertisers and provided a weak revenue forecast. The stock has fallen 15 per cent since the April earnings announcement and closed Wednesday at $14.60 - far below its $26 IPO price in November of 2013. The Strata survey asked 83 advertising agencies which social platform their clients preferred for social media campaigns. Sixty three per cent of advertisers said they were most likely to use photo-sharing app Instagram, compared with 56 per cent who said they would use social network Twitter. Facebook dominated, with 96 per cent of advertisers saying they were likely to use it. Twitter rejected the survey results, pointing to a 2015 study by Advertiser Perceptions that showed 37 per cent of advertisers intended to buy ads on Twitter, compared with 28 per cent on Instagram, which is owned by Facebook. The same study showed that 46 per cent were considering buying ads on Twitter compared with 41 per cent on Instagram. "The data presented in this survey couldn't be farther from the truth," a Twitter spokesperson said. "We have close relationships with our agency clients and continue to hear that Twitter offers the most powerful creative canvas." Still, the survey shows the growing power of Instagram, which has the benefit of using Facebook's advertising technology and has been rolling out features that make it more useful for sharing news and activity updates that are the bread and butter of Twitter. Instagram has more than 200,000 advertisers compared with Twitter's 130,000. "We're seeing almost all of our clients shifting if not all of their budgets, then most of their budgets from Twitter to Instagram," said Chris Gilbert, senior social strategist at digital agency Kettle, which works mostly with fashion brands. "Marketers typically want to be where the audience is." Some ad agencies said their clients are shifting more of their budgets to Instagram because it has more users - more than 400 million compared with 310 million on Twitter - and because Facebook's ad technology allows them to target highly specific audiences. "We've had more emphasis on Instagram for the last year," said Jason Peterson, chief creative officer at ad agency Havas Worldwide North America. Instagram declined to comment on the Strata survey.

Instagram attracting more advertising than Twitter: Survey

One of the largest Indian information technology companies, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), has become the third conglomerate to invest large cash holdings in government bonds, a trend that could boost the young debt market but also stir volatility. 
 
TCS ploughed $3 billion into the market from January to March, its annual balance sheet showed last month, shifting funds that totalled 80 per cent of its surplus cash position. Previously the company had largely invested in mutual funds. 
 
TCS is the third company to have meaningful investment in government securities after Reliance Industries and construction firm Larsen &amp; Toubro, which traders say, is diversifying a $665-billion market dominated by banks and could portend a new investment trend for the country&#39;s conglomerates. 
 
&quot;I expect more cash-rich companies to invest in government bonds as these are more liquid and carry a much better credit risk,&quot; said Anindya Das Gupta, head of local markets trading at Barclays in India. 
 
However, this trend could create new risks, namely the volatility that a conglomerate selling a large amount of government bonds at once could create. 
 
When contacted by Reuters, TCS declined comment. 
 
While many banks have larger holdings, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) regulates both banks and the bond market and thus can ensure that banks sell their holdings in a way that does not disrupt the market. The central bank has no sway over conglomerates as it does not regulate them. 
 
The RBI is happy for the investor base in government bonds to diversify, a senior policymaker said, and will monitor the market for any instances of manipulation or volatility tied to these investments. 
 
&quot;There is nothing as of now which raises any alarm from such large purchases but we will monitor these entities closely as they are not 
the regular investors in this market,&quot; said the policymaker, who declined to be identified as he is not authorised to speak to the media. 
 
Indian companies could become bigger players in the government securities market as they confront the problem of what to do with growing cash stockpiles. 
 
The country&#39;s top six cash-rich companies have amassed around 1.7 trillion rupees ($25.5 billion) worth of cash holdings, according to Reuters calculations, at a time when private capital spending is weak and bad loans are on the rise. 
 
As with TCS, most companies put their money in mutual funds, corporate bonds and bank deposits, which are losing their appeal versus government bonds in terms of both returns and safety. 
 
Investing via mutual funds entails an average fee of about 100 basis points of assets under management, according to debt fund 
managers and bankers. 
 
One-year bank deposits, at the country&#39;s largest lender State Bank of India which holds the largest amount of corporate deposits, yields 7.25-7.50 percent compared with nearly 7.5 percent for benchmark 10-year governments bonds. 
 
Das Gupta of Barclays said the narrower spread between bank deposits and 10-year bonds could be one reason companies buy &quot;liquid and safe&quot; government bonds. 
 
&quot;On a risk-adjusted basis, the total return from a sovereign security has been much better than any other asset class like fixed deposits, mutual funds,&quot; said Ashish Vaidya, executive director and head of trading at DBS Bank in Mumbai. 
 
Government bonds have rallied in the past year as the RBI has cut interest rates by 150 basis points to a five-year low of 6.50 per cent. 
 
Further gains, however, may now be capped given that the RBI is expected to cut the repo rate only once more this year and inflationary risks have risen. 
 
Reliance Industries, India&#39;s biggest energy firm, has outstanding government bond investments worth 79.21 billion rupees ($1.19 billion) as of March 2015, according to its 2014/15 annual report. 
 
Larsen &amp; Toubro held 14.7 billion rupees ($220 million) of government bonds as of March 2015. It has yet to publish its annual report for 2015/16. 
&nbsp;

Buying of the bonds by companies -- which was earlier dominated by banks -- will diversify $665 bn govt debt market

One of the largest Indian information technology companies, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), has become the third conglomerate to invest large cash holdings in government bonds, a trend that could boost the young debt market but also stir volatility. TCS ploughed $3 billion into the market from January to March, its annual balance sheet showed last month, shifting funds that totalled 80 per cent of its surplus cash position. Previously the company had largely invested in mutual funds. TCS is the third company to have meaningful investment in government securities after Reliance Industries and construction firm Larsen & Toubro, which traders say, is diversifying a $665-billion market dominated by banks and could portend a new investment trend for the country's conglomerates. "I expect more cash-rich companies to invest in government bonds as these are more liquid and carry a much better credit risk," said Anindya Das Gupta, head of local markets trading at Barclays in India. However, this trend could create new risks, namely the volatility that a conglomerate selling a large amount of government bonds at once could create. When contacted by Reuters, TCS declined comment. While many banks have larger holdings, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) regulates both banks and the bond market and thus can ensure that banks sell their holdings in a way that does not disrupt the market. The central bank has no sway over conglomerates as it does not regulate them. The RBI is happy for the investor base in government bonds to diversify, a senior policymaker said, and will monitor the market for any instances of manipulation or volatility tied to these investments. "There is nothing as of now which raises any alarm from such large purchases but we will monitor these entities closely as they are not the regular investors in this market," said the policymaker, who declined to be identified as he is not authorised to speak to the media. Indian companies could become bigger players in the government securities market as they confront the problem of what to do with growing cash stockpiles. The country's top six cash-rich companies have amassed around 1.7 trillion rupees ($25.5 billion) worth of cash holdings, according to Reuters calculations, at a time when private capital spending is weak and bad loans are on the rise. As with TCS, most companies put their money in mutual funds, corporate bonds and bank deposits, which are losing their appeal versus government bonds in terms of both returns and safety. Investing via mutual funds entails an average fee of about 100 basis points of assets under management, according to debt fund managers and bankers. One-year bank deposits, at the country's largest lender State Bank of India which holds the largest amount of corporate deposits, yields 7.25-7.50 percent compared with nearly 7.5 percent for benchmark 10-year governments bonds. Das Gupta of Barclays said the narrower spread between bank deposits and 10-year bonds could be one reason companies buy "liquid and safe" government bonds. "On a risk-adjusted basis, the total return from a sovereign security has been much better than any other asset class like fixed deposits, mutual funds," said Ashish Vaidya, executive director and head of trading at DBS Bank in Mumbai. Government bonds have rallied in the past year as the RBI has cut interest rates by 150 basis points to a five-year low of 6.50 per cent. Further gains, however, may now be capped given that the RBI is expected to cut the repo rate only once more this year and inflationary risks have risen. Reliance Industries, India's biggest energy firm, has outstanding government bond investments worth 79.21 billion rupees ($1.19 billion) as of March 2015, according to its 2014/15 annual report. Larsen & Toubro held 14.7 billion rupees ($220 million) of government bonds as of March 2015. It has yet to publish its annual report for 2015/16.

India's cash-rich firms may deepen govt bond market but spur volatility

Chinese e-commerce firm Alibaba Group Holding Ltd&#39;s affiliate Ant Financial has bought a fifth of financial data provider Shanghai Suntime Information Technology for around $35 million, a source with direct knowledge of the deal said. 
 
&quot;The acquisition will provide Ant Financial with good financial products so that it can attract more clients,&quot; the source told Reuters on Friday. 
 
Ant Financial Services Group, valued at close to $60 billion, offers services like online payment, wealth management products and insurance. Its core Alipay online payment business was founded in 2004. 
 
The Alibaba affiliate closed a $4.5 billion funding round in April. 
 
Ant Financial and Shanghai Suntime, which was founded in 2003, were not immediately available for comment on Friday, a public holiday in China. The source was not authorized to speak to media and therefore declined to be identified.

Ant Financial Services Group, valued at close to $60 billion, offers services like online payment, wealth management products and insurance

Chinese e-commerce firm Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's affiliate Ant Financial has bought a fifth of financial data provider Shanghai Suntime Information Technology for around $35 million, a source with direct knowledge of the deal said. "The acquisition will provide Ant Financial with good financial products so that it can attract more clients," the source told Reuters on Friday. Ant Financial Services Group, valued at close to $60 billion, offers services like online payment, wealth management products and insurance. Its core Alipay online payment business was founded in 2004. The Alibaba affiliate closed a $4.5 billion funding round in April. Ant Financial and Shanghai Suntime, which was founded in 2003, were not immediately available for comment on Friday, a public holiday in China. The source was not authorized to speak to media and therefore declined to be identified.

Alibaba's Ant Financial buys 20 percent of data firm for $35 million - source

Many online lenders have failed to detect the &ldquo;stacking&rdquo; of multiple loans by borrowers who slip through their automated underwriting systems, lending company executives and investors told Reuters. 
 
The practice is proliferating in the sector - led by LendingClub, OnDeck and Prosper Marketplace, US based lending companies - because of many lenders&rsquo; hurried, algorithmic underwriting, use of &ldquo;soft&rdquo; credit inquiries, and patchy reporting of the resulting loans to credit bureaus, according to online lending and consumer credit experts. 
 
Such loopholes, they said, can result in multiple lenders making loans to the same borrowers, often within a short period, without the full picture of their rising obligations and deteriorating ability to pay. 
 
Stacking is &ldquo;causing problems with the whole industry,&quot; said Brian Biglin, chief risk officer of LoanDepot, a five-year-old mortgage lender that last year started making personal loans online. 
 
New revelations of loose lending could make it harder for the troubled sector to win back trust from investors who are already concerned about slipshod underwriting and rising default risk. The marketplace lending industry - which last year hit $18 billion in annual loan originations - has seen plummeting share prices and the retreat of some major backers, including BlackRock and Citigroup. 
 
Industry leaders LendingClub and Avant said they are aware of stacking and its dangers, but they downplayed the risks and did not provide examples of specific actions taken to prevent the practice. OnDeck and Prosper said they have launched efforts to detect and guard against stacking. 
 
&ldquo;We have established proprietary algorithms,&quot; said Prosper spokeswoman Sarah Cain. 
 
Some higher-risk lenders allow and promote stacking as debt consolidation, but most lenders consider it a threat, particularly when not disclosed. 
 
Edward Hanson, the owner of Ella&rsquo;s Wood Fire Pizza, said he started stacking loans about five years ago to sustain his business. 
 
&quot;You take out another one to help you pay for the first,&quot; Hanson said. 
 
Hanson, 55, said he already had loans from a variety of online lenders when he received offers from online business lenders OnDeck and Kabbage, which approved his application. 
 
OnDeck knew Hanson had at least one other loan when he applied in August of 2014, and required that the existing debt be paid off as a condition of the new loan, said company spokesman Jim Larkin. 
 
When Hanson came back a year later, OnDeck declined his application because Hanson had stacked loans during the course of repayment, Larkin said. 
 
Kabbage declined to comment on Hanson&#39;s loans and did not respond to questions about its stacking policies. 
 
Hanson now pays nearly 40 per cent interest on his latest loan, from yet another lender. 
 
&quot;I pretty much feel trapped,&quot; he said. 
 
Nervous Investors 
 
Institutional investors have lately grown wary of marketplace lenders after initially hailing them as disruptors of banks and credit card companies. Wall Street money is crucial for most online lenders, who need it to fund their loans. 
 
Citigroup ended its partnership with Prosper earlier this year. The bank had repackaged about $1.5 billion of Prosper&#39;s loans into securities since the partnership began less than a year ago. 
 
Investor sentiment was hammered again last month by a scandal at industry leader LendingClub. The company knowingly sold $22 million in loans that did not meet the agreed specifications of one investment bank, Jefferies, and falsified the applications of $3 million of those loans. 
 
LendingClub is under investigation by the US Department of Justice, the company said last month, and a number of its large investors have halted investments in the wake of its chief executive&#39;s resignation. The New York Department of Financial Services also has said it will launch a probe into online lenders. 
 
Now concerns about stacking are adding to the industry&rsquo;s woes. One investment firm that was considering buying equity in a marketplace lender described stacking as a sector &quot;blind spot.&rdquo; The firm declined to be named. 
 
Bill Kassul, a partner in Ranger Capital Group - which has about $300 million invested in marketplace lending and business lending - said stacking has become a concern in the last two years and poses a &ldquo;big risk&rdquo; to investors. 
 
Blue Elephant Capital Management stopped buying loans from Prosper for several months recently over concerns about weak underwriting and profitability. Marketplace lenders need to slow their lending processes and improve sharing of credit information, said Brian Weinstein, chief investment officer at Blue Elephant. 
 
Stacking was &ldquo;one of the reasons why we think we saw credit deteriorate last summer when we stopped our marketplace lending program,&rdquo; Weinstein said. 
 
Blue Elephant last month announced plans to resume buying Prosper loans, in part because the company is charging higher interest rates. 
 
&ldquo;Soft&rdquo; Credit Check 
 
In their haste to give applicants quick loan decisions - sometimes within 24 hours - some marketplace lenders do not conduct thorough credit checks, known as &quot;hard inquiries,&quot; according to industry executives. 
 
Such checks create an updated log of credit and loan applications, and they can lower a borrower&#39;s credit score. Soft inquiries don&rsquo;t require the borrower&rsquo;s consent and don&#39;t usually show up on credit reports. 
 
OnDeck said it runs only soft checks. LendingClub and Prosper said they initially run soft checks but run hard checks later in the process, just before funding loans. 
 
Running hard checks only at the last minute, however, can also leave other lenders in the dark, said Gilles Gade, president and CEO of Cross River Bank, which invests in many online lending platforms. At that point, the borrower may have already obtained other loans, he said, because hard checks can take about 30 days to show up on a credit report. 
 
Another problem: Loans that never show up on credit reports at all, because of uneven reporting by online lenders. 
 
&ldquo;Not all lenders in our industry report to bureaus,&quot; said Leslie Payne, a spokeswoman for LendUp, which makes high-interest installment loans. In a February blog post, Experian, the credit bureau, said a &ldquo;significant number&rdquo; of marketplace lenders do not report their loans. 
 
Prosper, Avant and LendingClub told Reuters that they report their loans to all three major credit bureaus at least monthly. OnDeck said it reports to several leading commercial credit bureaus, including Experian and PayNet.&nbsp; 
 
Many lenders said they also pull data from other sources, including paystubs, tax documents and accounting software for businesses to size up a borrower&#39;s ability to pay. 
 
LoanDepot said it has taken several steps to mitigate the risks of stacking, including requiring months of bank statements for its borrowers and building custom algorithms to flag potential stacking activity. 
 
When The Music Stops 
 
Most online lenders focus on either business or consumer lending. Those lending to small businesses may face greater risk from stacking, in part because of a separate class of high-risk, high-interest business lenders that actively promotes the practice. 
 
Merchant cash advance lenders make loans based mainly on a business&rsquo;s expected revenue rather than its credit record or existing debts. They often scour databases of business loans &ndash; such as those by OnDeck or Kabbage &ndash; and use them as marketing leads to find new borrowers, online lending executives and investors said. 
 
OnDeck has made efforts to educate customers to stay away from lenders offering stacked loans, said chief operating officer James Hobson. It has also started monitoring borrowers more frequently and joined the Small Business Finance Exchange, an effort to share lending data to guard against stacking. 
 
After OnDeck turned down the second application from Hanson, the pizzeria owner, he turned to World Business Lenders, a small business lender founded in 2011. He now pays 39 percent interest. 
 
Hanson would not detail his balance or his payments, but said he put up his house as collateral. The company said Hanson&rsquo;s latest loan reduced his payments from 44 percent of his business&rsquo;s revenue to 12 percent by offering a longer term. 
 
Some small business owners will keep borrowing as long as lenders grant approvals, taking one loan after another, said chief executive Doug Naidus. But at some point, he cautioned, the principal needs to get paid back. 
 
&quot;The fifth stack pays the fourth stack, and the sixth stack pays the fifth stack,&quot; Naidus said. &quot;But when the music stops, everybody&#39;s got to find a chair.&quot;

Soft credit enquiries, hurried algorithmic underwriting have led to multiple companies making simultaneous loans to the same borrowers

Many online lenders have failed to detect the “stacking” of multiple loans by borrowers who slip through their automated underwriting systems, lending company executives and investors told Reuters. The practice is proliferating in the sector - led by LendingClub, OnDeck and Prosper Marketplace, US based lending companies - because of many lenders’ hurried, algorithmic underwriting, use of “soft” credit inquiries, and patchy reporting of the resulting loans to credit bureaus, according to online lending and consumer credit experts. Such loopholes, they said, can result in multiple lenders making loans to the same borrowers, often within a short period, without the full picture of their rising obligations and deteriorating ability to pay. Stacking is “causing problems with the whole industry," said Brian Biglin, chief risk officer of LoanDepot, a five-year-old mortgage lender that last year started making personal loans online. New revelations of loose lending could make it harder for the troubled sector to win back trust from investors who are already concerned about slipshod underwriting and rising default risk. The marketplace lending industry - which last year hit $18 billion in annual loan originations - has seen plummeting share prices and the retreat of some major backers, including BlackRock and Citigroup. Industry leaders LendingClub and Avant said they are aware of stacking and its dangers, but they downplayed the risks and did not provide examples of specific actions taken to prevent the practice. OnDeck and Prosper said they have launched efforts to detect and guard against stacking. “We have established proprietary algorithms," said Prosper spokeswoman Sarah Cain. Some higher-risk lenders allow and promote stacking as debt consolidation, but most lenders consider it a threat, particularly when not disclosed. Edward Hanson, the owner of Ella’s Wood Fire Pizza, said he started stacking loans about five years ago to sustain his business. "You take out another one to help you pay for the first," Hanson said. Hanson, 55, said he already had loans from a variety of online lenders when he received offers from online business lenders OnDeck and Kabbage, which approved his application. OnDeck knew Hanson had at least one other loan when he applied in August of 2014, and required that the existing debt be paid off as a condition of the new loan, said company spokesman Jim Larkin. When Hanson came back a year later, OnDeck declined his application because Hanson had stacked loans during the course of repayment, Larkin said. Kabbage declined to comment on Hanson's loans and did not respond to questions about its stacking policies. Hanson now pays nearly 40 per cent interest on his latest loan, from yet another lender. "I pretty much feel trapped," he said. Nervous Investors Institutional investors have lately grown wary of marketplace lenders after initially hailing them as disruptors of banks and credit card companies. Wall Street money is crucial for most online lenders, who need it to fund their loans. Citigroup ended its partnership with Prosper earlier this year. The bank had repackaged about $1.5 billion of Prosper's loans into securities since the partnership began less than a year ago. Investor sentiment was hammered again last month by a scandal at industry leader LendingClub. The company knowingly sold $22 million in loans that did not meet the agreed specifications of one investment bank, Jefferies, and falsified the applications of $3 million of those loans. LendingClub is under investigation by the US Department of Justice, the company said last month, and a number of its large investors have halted investments in the wake of its chief executive's resignation. The New York Department of Financial Services also has said it will launch a probe into online lenders. Now concerns about stacking are adding to the industry’s woes. One investment firm that was considering buying equity in a marketplace lender described stacking as a sector "blind spot.” The firm declined to be named. Bill Kassul, a partner in Ranger Capital Group - which has about $300 million invested in marketplace lending and business lending - said stacking has become a concern in the last two years and poses a “big risk” to investors. Blue Elephant Capital Management stopped buying loans from Prosper for several months recently over concerns about weak underwriting and profitability. Marketplace lenders need to slow their lending processes and improve sharing of credit information, said Brian Weinstein, chief investment officer at Blue Elephant. Stacking was “one of the reasons why we think we saw credit deteriorate last summer when we stopped our marketplace lending program,” Weinstein said. Blue Elephant last month announced plans to resume buying Prosper loans, in part because the company is charging higher interest rates. “Soft” Credit Check In their haste to give applicants quick loan decisions - sometimes within 24 hours - some marketplace lenders do not conduct thorough credit checks, known as "hard inquiries," according to industry executives. Such checks create an updated log of credit and loan applications, and they can lower a borrower's credit score. Soft inquiries don’t require the borrower’s consent and don't usually show up on credit reports. OnDeck said it runs only soft checks. LendingClub and Prosper said they initially run soft checks but run hard checks later in the process, just before funding loans. Running hard checks only at the last minute, however, can also leave other lenders in the dark, said Gilles Gade, president and CEO of Cross River Bank, which invests in many online lending platforms. At that point, the borrower may have already obtained other loans, he said, because hard checks can take about 30 days to show up on a credit report. Another problem: Loans that never show up on credit reports at all, because of uneven reporting by online lenders. “Not all lenders in our industry report to bureaus," said Leslie Payne, a spokeswoman for LendUp, which makes high-interest installment loans. In a February blog post, Experian, the credit bureau, said a “significant number” of marketplace lenders do not report their loans. Prosper, Avant and LendingClub told Reuters that they report their loans to all three major credit bureaus at least monthly. OnDeck said it reports to several leading commercial credit bureaus, including Experian and PayNet. Many lenders said they also pull data from other sources, including paystubs, tax documents and accounting software for businesses to size up a borrower's ability to pay. LoanDepot said it has taken several steps to mitigate the risks of stacking, including requiring months of bank statements for its borrowers and building custom algorithms to flag potential stacking activity. When The Music Stops Most online lenders focus on either business or consumer lending. Those lending to small businesses may face greater risk from stacking, in part because of a separate class of high-risk, high-interest business lenders that actively promotes the practice. Merchant cash advance lenders make loans based mainly on a business’s expected revenue rather than its credit record or existing debts. They often scour databases of business loans – such as those by OnDeck or Kabbage – and use them as marketing leads to find new borrowers, online lending executives and investors said. OnDeck has made efforts to educate customers to stay away from lenders offering stacked loans, said chief operating officer James Hobson. It has also started monitoring borrowers more frequently and joined the Small Business Finance Exchange, an effort to share lending data to guard against stacking. After OnDeck turned down the second application from Hanson, the pizzeria owner, he turned to World Business Lenders, a small business lender founded in 2011. He now pays 39 percent interest. Hanson would not detail his balance or his payments, but said he put up his house as collateral. The company said Hanson’s latest loan reduced his payments from 44 percent of his business’s revenue to 12 percent by offering a longer term. Some small business owners will keep borrowing as long as lenders grant approvals, taking one loan after another, said chief executive Doug Naidus. But at some point, he cautioned, the principal needs to get paid back. "The fifth stack pays the fourth stack, and the sixth stack pays the fifth stack," Naidus said. "But when the music stops, everybody's got to find a chair."

Latest threat to online lenders - the 'stacking' of multiple loans

Two Israeli citizens pleaded not guilty for&nbsp;orchestrating a massive computer hacking and fraud scheme that included an attack against JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co and generated hundreds of millions of dollars of illegal profit on&nbsp;Thursday.

Gery Shalon, 32, and Ziv Orenstein, 41, entered their pleas in Manhattan federal court before US&nbsp;Magistrate Judge Nathaniel Fox. They were extradited from Israel this week.

Shalon, Orenstein and a third defendant, Joshua Samuel Aaron, all from Israel, were charged in November in a 23-count indictment with alleged crimes targeting 12 companies, including nine financial services companies and media outlets such as The Wall Street Journal.

Aaron has not been arrested by US&nbsp;authorities, prosecutors said, and his whereabouts were not immediately clear.&nbsp;The scheme dated back to 2007 and compromised more than 100 million people&#39;s personal information.

The alleged enterprise included pumping up stock prices with sham promotional emails, running online casinos, operating an illegal bitcoin exchange and laundering money through at least 75 shell companies and accounts around the world.

It involved a massive attack on JP Morgan affecting 83 million customers, the largest theft of customer data from a US&nbsp;financial institution, authorities said.

A separate indictment unveiled in Atlanta against Shalon, Aaron and an unnamed defendant said the brokerages E*Trade Financial Corp and Scotttrade Inc were also targets, and personal information of more than 10 million customers was compromised.

The counts in the New York charge&nbsp;include counts of computer hacking, securities and wire fraud, identity theft, illegal internet gambling and conspiring to commit money laundering, carrying possible prison sentences ranging from two to 20 years. Not all counts were brought against all defendants.

Israeli citizens accused of heavy data security frauds against JP Morgan and Scott trade Inc among others have registered a plea in New York

Two Israeli citizens pleaded not guilty for orchestrating a massive computer hacking and fraud scheme that included an attack against JPMorgan Chase & Co and generated hundreds of millions of dollars of illegal profit on Thursday. Gery Shalon, 32, and Ziv Orenstein, 41, entered their pleas in Manhattan federal court before US Magistrate Judge Nathaniel Fox. They were extradited from Israel this week. Shalon, Orenstein and a third defendant, Joshua Samuel Aaron, all from Israel, were charged in November in a 23-count indictment with alleged crimes targeting 12 companies, including nine financial services companies and media outlets such as The Wall Street Journal. Aaron has not been arrested by US authorities, prosecutors said, and his whereabouts were not immediately clear. The scheme dated back to 2007 and compromised more than 100 million people's personal information. The alleged enterprise included pumping up stock prices with sham promotional emails, running online casinos, operating an illegal bitcoin exchange and laundering money through at least 75 shell companies and accounts around the world. It involved a massive attack on JP Morgan affecting 83 million customers, the largest theft of customer data from a US financial institution, authorities said. A separate indictment unveiled in Atlanta against Shalon, Aaron and an unnamed defendant said the brokerages E*Trade Financial Corp and Scotttrade Inc were also targets, and personal information of more than 10 million customers was compromised. The counts in the New York charge include counts of computer hacking, securities and wire fraud, identity theft, illegal internet gambling and conspiring to commit money laundering, carrying possible prison sentences ranging from two to 20 years. Not all counts were brought against all defendants.

Two charged in massive cyberfraud against JPMorgan plead not guilty

Asian stocks declined on Thursday, led by sliding Japanese equities, while a weaker Dollar lifted&nbsp;commodities such as gold and crude oil.

Spreadbetters expected a lower open for Britain&#39;s Financial Times Stock Exchange(FTSE), Germany&#39;s DAX and France&#39;s CAC with a stronger Euro seen weighing on European shares.

The New Zealand Dollar soared to a one-year high after the nation&#39;s central bank kept interest rates steady as expected, even as some in the market had wagered on a cut.

Morgan Stanley Capital International&#39;s (MSCI)&nbsp;broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was down 0.2 per cent after rising by as much as 0.3 per cent earlier to a six-week high.

Nikkei pulled back 1.3 per cent, hurt by a stronger Yen. Financial markets in Hong Kong and China were closed for holidays.

South Korea&#39;s Kospi lost 0.3 per cent. The index briefly rose to a 2016 high after the Bank of Korea (BOK) unexpectedly cut its policy rate to a record low 1.25 per cent amid weak inflation and stagnant exports. The BOK may also be looking to cushion the economy as the government drives a major overhaul of the struggling shipping and shipbuilding industries that could see large job losses.

&quot;Many expected the US&nbsp;Federal Reserve to hike rates in June or July but after the May (US) jobs data a June hike now seems impossible. The BOK probably thought taking action before the Fed&#39;s rate hike would be safer,&quot; said Lee Sur-bee, fixed income analyst at Samsung Securities.

On Wall Street, Dow gained 0.4 per cent overnight, rising above 18,000 for the first time since April as a weaker dollar lifted some commodity-related shares.

The greenback slipped 0.4 per cent to 106.58 Yen, nearing a one-month low of 106.35 hit on Monday in the wake of the jobs report.

Euro rose to a one-month peak of $1.1416, with the latest uptick coming after the European Central Bank began buying corporate debt for its bond purchase program in a bid to boost the euro zone economy.

The New Zealand dollar was the region&#39;s outperformer, rallying about 1.7 per cent to a one-year high of $0.7148 after the Reserve Bank of New Zealand held interest rates steady while retaining an easing bias.

Kiwi surged as not all in the market had expected the central bank to stand pat.

&quot;We were surprised, we were calling for a rate cut. We still see one so the next opportunity is August. A key reason for that is persistent strength in the exchange rate,&quot; said Jane Turner, senior economist at ASB Bank.

&quot;The Reserve Bank is relying on a lower New Zealand Dollar to achieve their inflation target and based on where the exchange rate is now, they&#39;re not going to achieve that without cutting the cash rate further.&quot;

In commodities, US&nbsp;crude oil extended overnight gains to reach an 11-month high of $51.67 a barrel. In addition to a weaker Dollar, supply worries caused by a sabotage of oil facilities in major producer Nigeria has boosted oil.

Brent crude rose as high as $52.86 a barrel, highest since October 2015.

Spot gold advanced to a three-week high of $1,266.01 an ounce, while aluminium climbed to a one-month high of $1,614.50 a tonne. Copper also inched higher.

Asian stocks fall due to decreasing Japanese equities while New Zealand Dollar outperformed with a hike of 1.7 per cent.

Asian stocks declined on Thursday, led by sliding Japanese equities, while a weaker Dollar lifted commodities such as gold and crude oil. Spreadbetters expected a lower open for Britain's Financial Times Stock Exchange(FTSE), Germany's DAX and France's CAC with a stronger Euro seen weighing on European shares. The New Zealand Dollar soared to a one-year high after the nation's central bank kept interest rates steady as expected, even as some in the market had wagered on a cut. Morgan Stanley Capital International's (MSCI) broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was down 0.2 per cent after rising by as much as 0.3 per cent earlier to a six-week high. Nikkei pulled back 1.3 per cent, hurt by a stronger Yen. Financial markets in Hong Kong and China were closed for holidays. South Korea's Kospi lost 0.3 per cent. The index briefly rose to a 2016 high after the Bank of Korea (BOK) unexpectedly cut its policy rate to a record low 1.25 per cent amid weak inflation and stagnant exports. The BOK may also be looking to cushion the economy as the government drives a major overhaul of the struggling shipping and shipbuilding industries that could see large job losses. "Many expected the US Federal Reserve to hike rates in June or July but after the May (US) jobs data a June hike now seems impossible. The BOK probably thought taking action before the Fed's rate hike would be safer," said Lee Sur-bee, fixed income analyst at Samsung Securities. On Wall Street, Dow gained 0.4 per cent overnight, rising above 18,000 for the first time since April as a weaker dollar lifted some commodity-related shares. The greenback slipped 0.4 per cent to 106.58 Yen, nearing a one-month low of 106.35 hit on Monday in the wake of the jobs report. Euro rose to a one-month peak of $1.1416, with the latest uptick coming after the European Central Bank began buying corporate debt for its bond purchase program in a bid to boost the euro zone economy. The New Zealand dollar was the region's outperformer, rallying about 1.7 per cent to a one-year high of $0.7148 after the Reserve Bank of New Zealand held interest rates steady while retaining an easing bias. Kiwi surged as not all in the market had expected the central bank to stand pat. "We were surprised, we were calling for a rate cut. We still see one so the next opportunity is August. A key reason for that is persistent strength in the exchange rate," said Jane Turner, senior economist at ASB Bank. "The Reserve Bank is relying on a lower New Zealand Dollar to achieve their inflation target and based on where the exchange rate is now, they're not going to achieve that without cutting the cash rate further." In commodities, US crude oil extended overnight gains to reach an 11-month high of $51.67 a barrel. In addition to a weaker Dollar, supply worries caused by a sabotage of oil facilities in major producer Nigeria has boosted oil. Brent crude rose as high as $52.86 a barrel, highest since October 2015. Spot gold advanced to a three-week high of $1,266.01 an ounce, while aluminium climbed to a one-month high of $1,614.50 a tonne. Copper also inched higher.

Japan assists lowering Asian stocks, New Zealand Dollar soars high

Tesla Motors Inc.&nbsp;may source batteries from Samsung SDI Co Ltd.&nbsp;for its energy systems in homes, companies and utilities, rather than for its electric cars, the US&nbsp;company&#39;s chief executive Elon Musk&nbsp;said on Wednesday.

Shares of Samsung SDI, an affiliate of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, rebounded three&nbsp;per cent early Thursday.

The stock had fallen eight&nbsp;per cent on Wednesday after Elon Musk tweeted that Tesla was working exclusively with longtime partner Panasonic Corporation&nbsp;to supply batteries for its upcoming Model 3, the company&#39;s first mass-market car. Panasonic shares rallied nearly four&nbsp;per cent on Wednesday after his comments.

Asked in a tweet whether Samsung batteries might be used in Tesla Energy, Musk&nbsp;responded, &quot;yes.&quot;

The company launched Tesla Energy storage systems last year to expand its&nbsp;business&nbsp;beyond electric vehicles into supplying energy for homes and&nbsp;businesses.

Samsung SDI spokesperson&nbsp;declined to comment.

Reuters reported on Tuesday&nbsp;that Samsung SDI was making progress in talks with Tesla to supply batteries for the Model 3, as well as Tesla&#39;s energy storage products.

Reuters&#39;&nbsp;source said Tesla planned to initially use Panasonic as the sole supplier for Model 3 and might add Samsung SDI if and when Tesla&#39;s battery plant is unable to meet demand.

Tesla has taken 373,000 orders for the Model 3, which has a starting price of $35,000, about half the price of&nbsp;its luxury Model S liftback sedan. It has said it would begin customer deliveries in late 2017.

Citing &quot;tremendous demand,&quot; Musk said in April that Tesla planned to boost total vehicle production to 500,000 in 2018, two years ahead of its original target. Suppliers have said the goal would be difficult to achieve.

Panasonic said last month it was ready, if necessary, to speed up its investment in Tesla&#39;s $5 billion Gigafactory battery plant to meet demand for the Model 3.

The Japanese company plans to contribute $1.6 billion to the plant in phases over the next few years.

Tesla CEO confirmed in a tweet query that Samsung batteries might be used in Tesla energy

Tesla Motors Inc. may source batteries from Samsung SDI Co Ltd. for its energy systems in homes, companies and utilities, rather than for its electric cars, the US company's chief executive Elon Musk said on Wednesday. Shares of Samsung SDI, an affiliate of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, rebounded three per cent early Thursday. The stock had fallen eight per cent on Wednesday after Elon Musk tweeted that Tesla was working exclusively with longtime partner Panasonic Corporation to supply batteries for its upcoming Model 3, the company's first mass-market car. Panasonic shares rallied nearly four per cent on Wednesday after his comments. Asked in a tweet whether Samsung batteries might be used in Tesla Energy, Musk responded, "yes." The company launched Tesla Energy storage systems last year to expand its business beyond electric vehicles into supplying energy for homes and businesses. Samsung SDI spokesperson declined to comment. Reuters reported on Tuesday that Samsung SDI was making progress in talks with Tesla to supply batteries for the Model 3, as well as Tesla's energy storage products. Reuters' source said Tesla planned to initially use Panasonic as the sole supplier for Model 3 and might add Samsung SDI if and when Tesla's battery plant is unable to meet demand. Tesla has taken 373,000 orders for the Model 3, which has a starting price of $35,000, about half the price of its luxury Model S liftback sedan. It has said it would begin customer deliveries in late 2017. Citing "tremendous demand," Musk said in April that Tesla planned to boost total vehicle production to 500,000 in 2018, two years ahead of its original target. Suppliers have said the goal would be difficult to achieve. Panasonic said last month it was ready, if necessary, to speed up its investment in Tesla's $5 billion Gigafactory battery plant to meet demand for the Model 3. The Japanese company plans to contribute $1.6 billion to the plant in phases over the next few years.

Tesla CEO may source Samsung battery for energy storage products

Apple Inc announced a series of long-awaited enhancements to its App Store on Wednesday, but the new features may not ease concerns of developers and analysts who say that the App Store model - and the very idea of the single-purpose app - has seen its best days. 
 
The revamped App Store will let developers advertise their wares in search results and give developers a bigger cut of revenues on subscription apps, while Apple said it has already dramatically sped up its app-approval process. 
The goal is to sustain the virtuous cycle at the heart of the hugely lucrative iPhone&nbsp;business. Software developers make apps for the iPhone because its customers are willing to pay, and those customers, in turn, pay a premium for the device because it has the best apps. 
 
The store is now more strategically important than ever for Apple as sales of the iPhone begin to level off and the company looks to software and services to fill the gap. Apple CEO Tim Cook said during&nbsp;a recent conference call&nbsp;that App Store revenues were up 35 per cent over last year. 
 
But the store is also a victim of its own success. Eight years after its launch, it is packed with more than 1.9 million apps, according to analytics firm App Annie, making it almost impossible for developers to find an audience - and increasingly difficult for customers to find what they need, as some 14,000 new apps arrive in the store each week. 
 
&quot;The app space has grown out of control,&quot; said Vint Cerf, one of the inventors of the internet and now a vice president at Alphabet Inc&#39;s Google, who was speaking at a San Francisco conference on the future of the web on Wednesday. &quot;We need to move away from having an individual app for every individual thing you want to do.&quot; 
 
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE 
Some users are moving away from apps toward messaging services such as Slack and Facebook Inc&#39;s Messenger, which are branching out into areas like shopping and document storage. 
 
Meanwhile, rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) could lead to a world where people navigate their phones through voice-controlled digital assistants such as Apple&#39;s Siri, rather than opening individual apps. 
 
To be sure, chat and AI are in their infancy, and their appeal to the masses remains uncertain. But if they take off, they could erase the edge Apple enjoys by virtue of its strong app ecosystem and tip the scales toward Google, which is widely considered to have the lead in AI. 
 
&quot;The current dynamic is very favorable to Apple, and this is a suggestion that we might shift to a different dynamic where Google would have a very strong advantage,&quot; said Benedict Evans, a partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. 
 
&quot;No matter what you do to an app store, you always have that underlying problem: It&#39;s a list of a million things,&quot; Evans&nbsp;added. 
 
Apple may yet find ways to wield AI to reinforce the App Store. The company has already woven more intelligence into its operating system, which now prompts iPhone users to open certain apps during the day based on their habits. 
 
DEVELOPER GRIPES 
On a more basic level, the changes announced this week address some of the loudest complaints from developers, who say it is virtually impossible to stand out in an app landscape dominated by hit games, big media companies and internet giants such as Facebook and Google. 
 
Statistics from Sensor Tower, an app analytics firm, show a stark and widening divide between top earners and low performers in the App Store. 
 
The top one&nbsp;per cent of app publishers raked in about 94 per cent of the store&#39;s estimated $1.43 billion net revenue in the first quarter of 2016. The gulf has expanded rapidly since July 2012, the first month for which Sensor Tower has data, when the top one&nbsp;per cent netted about 80 per cent of the revenue in the store, according to data provided to Reuters. The figures cover paid apps and apps that include in-app purchases. 
 
Some developers who carved out a niche early say they doubt success would come so easily today. 
 
&quot;Now the challenge for developers is, if there&#39;s an app for everything, how will you create an app people will use?&quot; said Lucas Buick, who founded Hipstamatic, a photography app that was an early hit in the App Store. 
 
TOO LATE? 
David Barnard, founder of Contrast, an app development company, applauded the new focus on subscriptions, which he said would encourage developers to invest in their apps. But getting attention in the store remains a challenge. 
 
&quot;It&#39;s not like they fixed everything in one fell swoop,&quot; Barnard said. 
 
Pete Zed, a 33-year-old Oakland, California developer, thought he had a hit on his hands when reminder app Bump was featured by Apple in January 2015, inspiring thousands of users to install the programme. But as soon as the promotion ended, downloads dropped. Zed discontinued the service this year. 
 
Some developers are banking on the next wave of user interfaces. 
 
In 2014, developer Eswar Priyadarshan founded Tasteful, which aims to guide users with various diets to healthy restaurant dishes through its app. Tasteful&#39;s audience, though loyal, is too niche to vault it up the App Store charts, Priyadarshan said. 
 
In a bid to lessen his dependence on the App Store, he recently made Tasteful available on chat platforms such as Messenger and Slack. 
 
&quot;It has been difficult to get the kind of growth we need to sustain an app&nbsp;business,&quot; Priyadarshan said. 
 
Analyst Bob O&#39;Donnell of TECHnalysis Research said he doubted the changes will do much to move the needle for small developers. 
 
&quot;At the end of the day I&rsquo;m not sure how much real-world impact it&rsquo;s going to end up having for a lot of these apps,&quot; he said. 
&nbsp;

It already has 1.9 million apps, making it impossible for app builders to find an audience and customers to find what they want

Apple Inc announced a series of long-awaited enhancements to its App Store on Wednesday, but the new features may not ease concerns of developers and analysts who say that the App Store model - and the very idea of the single-purpose app - has seen its best days. The revamped App Store will let developers advertise their wares in search results and give developers a bigger cut of revenues on subscription apps, while Apple said it has already dramatically sped up its app-approval process. The goal is to sustain the virtuous cycle at the heart of the hugely lucrative iPhone business. Software developers make apps for the iPhone because its customers are willing to pay, and those customers, in turn, pay a premium for the device because it has the best apps. The store is now more strategically important than ever for Apple as sales of the iPhone begin to level off and the company looks to software and services to fill the gap. Apple CEO Tim Cook said during a recent conference call that App Store revenues were up 35 per cent over last year. But the store is also a victim of its own success. Eight years after its launch, it is packed with more than 1.9 million apps, according to analytics firm App Annie, making it almost impossible for developers to find an audience - and increasingly difficult for customers to find what they need, as some 14,000 new apps arrive in the store each week. "The app space has grown out of control," said Vint Cerf, one of the inventors of the internet and now a vice president at Alphabet Inc's Google, who was speaking at a San Francisco conference on the future of the web on Wednesday. "We need to move away from having an individual app for every individual thing you want to do." ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Some users are moving away from apps toward messaging services such as Slack and Facebook Inc's Messenger, which are branching out into areas like shopping and document storage. Meanwhile, rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) could lead to a world where people navigate their phones through voice-controlled digital assistants such as Apple's Siri, rather than opening individual apps. To be sure, chat and AI are in their infancy, and their appeal to the masses remains uncertain. But if they take off, they could erase the edge Apple enjoys by virtue of its strong app ecosystem and tip the scales toward Google, which is widely considered to have the lead in AI. "The current dynamic is very favorable to Apple, and this is a suggestion that we might shift to a different dynamic where Google would have a very strong advantage," said Benedict Evans, a partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. "No matter what you do to an app store, you always have that underlying problem: It's a list of a million things," Evans added. Apple may yet find ways to wield AI to reinforce the App Store. The company has already woven more intelligence into its operating system, which now prompts iPhone users to open certain apps during the day based on their habits. DEVELOPER GRIPES On a more basic level, the changes announced this week address some of the loudest complaints from developers, who say it is virtually impossible to stand out in an app landscape dominated by hit games, big media companies and internet giants such as Facebook and Google. Statistics from Sensor Tower, an app analytics firm, show a stark and widening divide between top earners and low performers in the App Store. The top one per cent of app publishers raked in about 94 per cent of the store's estimated $1.43 billion net revenue in the first quarter of 2016. The gulf has expanded rapidly since July 2012, the first month for which Sensor Tower has data, when the top one per cent netted about 80 per cent of the revenue in the store, according to data provided to Reuters. The figures cover paid apps and apps that include in-app purchases. Some developers who carved out a niche early say they doubt success would come so easily today. "Now the challenge for developers is, if there's an app for everything, how will you create an app people will use?" said Lucas Buick, who founded Hipstamatic, a photography app that was an early hit in the App Store. TOO LATE? David Barnard, founder of Contrast, an app development company, applauded the new focus on subscriptions, which he said would encourage developers to invest in their apps. But getting attention in the store remains a challenge. "It's not like they fixed everything in one fell swoop," Barnard said. Pete Zed, a 33-year-old Oakland, California developer, thought he had a hit on his hands when reminder app Bump was featured by Apple in January 2015, inspiring thousands of users to install the programme. But as soon as the promotion ended, downloads dropped. Zed discontinued the service this year. Some developers are banking on the next wave of user interfaces. In 2014, developer Eswar Priyadarshan founded Tasteful, which aims to guide users with various diets to healthy restaurant dishes through its app. Tasteful's audience, though loyal, is too niche to vault it up the App Store charts, Priyadarshan said. In a bid to lessen his dependence on the App Store, he recently made Tasteful available on chat platforms such as Messenger and Slack. "It has been difficult to get the kind of growth we need to sustain an app business," Priyadarshan said. Analyst Bob O'Donnell of TECHnalysis Research said he doubted the changes will do much to move the needle for small developers. "At the end of the day I’m not sure how much real-world impact it’s going to end up having for a lot of these apps," he said.

Revamped Apple App Store may not win over developers

BASF, a multi-national chemicals manufacturing corporation,&nbsp;based in Germany,&nbsp;said its business model was not affected by rival Bayer&#39;s plans to buy Monsanto. So far it has stood on the sidelines of a consolidation wave among&nbsp;global&nbsp;seeds and pesticides groups.

&quot;We are not backed into a corner by what is happening in the&nbsp;market,&quot; the group&#39;s deputy chief executive Martin Brudermueller said at a press conference to present BASF&#39;s research and development efforts.

He added that BASF&#39;s crop chemicals business was highly profitable and innovative and also &quot;not quite small&quot;.

BASF has so far focused on crop chemicals, unlike major rivals who are combining or are planning to combine seeds and chemicals businesses, also among the main motives for Bayer to seek a tie-up with Monsanto.

Bayer, one of the largest pesticides maker, last month launched a $62-billion takeover proposal for Monsanto, the&nbsp;market&nbsp;leader in seeds.&nbsp;Monsanto&nbsp;rejected the offer as too low but said it was ready to negotiate.

BASF, one of the world's largest chemical producers, shrugs off competitor's step to take over Monsanto

BASF, a multi-national chemicals manufacturing corporation, based in Germany, said its business model was not affected by rival Bayer's plans to buy Monsanto. So far it has stood on the sidelines of a consolidation wave among global seeds and pesticides groups. "We are not backed into a corner by what is happening in the market," the group's deputy chief executive Martin Brudermueller said at a press conference to present BASF's research and development efforts. He added that BASF's crop chemicals business was highly profitable and innovative and also "not quite small". BASF has so far focused on crop chemicals, unlike major rivals who are combining or are planning to combine seeds and chemicals businesses, also among the main motives for Bayer to seek a tie-up with Monsanto. Bayer, one of the largest pesticides maker, last month launched a $62-billion takeover proposal for Monsanto, the market leader in seeds. Monsanto rejected the offer as too low but said it was ready to negotiate.

Bayer's swoop on Monsanto doesn't worry BASF

The who&#39;s who of America Inc, including e-commerce giant Amazon&#39;s Jeff Bezos, PepsiCo&#39;s Indra Nooyi, Boeing&#39;s Mark Allen and Lockheed Martin&#39;s Marillyn Hewson, attended the roundtable held at Central Green Room Gallery of Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium. 
 
Bezos announced that his company will invest an additional $3 billion in India, Amazon&#39;s fastest growing region. This will boost Amazon&#39;s committed investment in India to over $5 billion. 
 
Foreign ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup said in a tweet that Modi invited the US business leaders &quot;to work more closely with India and in India&quot;. 
 
The Prime Minister also &quot;outlined strengths of Indian economy and its talented workforce,&quot; Swarup posted on Twitter. 
 
US Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker and several top Indian business leaders were also present at the meeting. 
 
Earlier in the day, Modi held a closed-door meeting with Obama during which they discussed significant issues of bilateral interests. 
 
Prior to the US, the Indian prime minister visited Afghanistan, Qatar and Switzerland on his five-nation tour aimed at expanding India&#39;s trade, energy and security cooperation. He will end his tour in Mexico.

Amazon's founder and CEO Jeff Bezos announced that the e-commerce giant will invest an additional $3 billion in India

The who's who of America Inc, including e-commerce giant Amazon's Jeff Bezos, PepsiCo's Indra Nooyi, Boeing's Mark Allen and Lockheed Martin's Marillyn Hewson, attended the roundtable held at Central Green Room Gallery of Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium. Bezos announced that his company will invest an additional $3 billion in India, Amazon's fastest growing region. This will boost Amazon's committed investment in India to over $5 billion. Foreign ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup said in a tweet that Modi invited the US business leaders "to work more closely with India and in India". The Prime Minister also "outlined strengths of Indian economy and its talented workforce," Swarup posted on Twitter. US Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker and several top Indian business leaders were also present at the meeting. Earlier in the day, Modi held a closed-door meeting with Obama during which they discussed significant issues of bilateral interests. Prior to the US, the Indian prime minister visited Afghanistan, Qatar and Switzerland on his five-nation tour aimed at expanding India's trade, energy and security cooperation. He will end his tour in Mexico.

Indian PM Modi meets top US CEOs in Washington

<div>Ralph Lauren is cutting about 1,000 jobs and closing 50 stores as part of a sweeping plan to lower costs and revive sales growth at the luxury&nbsp;fashion&nbsp;brand.</div>

<div>Shares of Ralph Lauren, which also forecast declines in full-year and first-quarter revenue, fell as much as 10.4 per cent to $86.32 in early trading on Tuesday. 
 
&quot;It&#39;s been a long time coming. Ralph Lauren is a behemoth, it&#39;s a very successful brand. It&#39;s an iconic brand. However, it need changes to adjust to the times,&quot; said&nbsp;Mary Epner, a retail analyst.</div>

<div>The jobs being eliminated represent about 8 per cent of the company&#39;s full-time jobs, spokesman Ryan Lally told Reuters. 
 
Ralph Lauren, like some other luxury brands, has been struggling amid sluggish spending on luxury apparel and accessories. The company&#39;s margins have taken a knock as department stores discount heavily to get rid of excess inventory. Moreover, the company&#39;s lower-end Polo and Lauren brands are facing competition from retailers such as H&amp;M and Inditex&#39;s Zara, which are known for their shorter production times.</div>

<div>Ralph Lauren said on Tuesday it would try to reduce the time taken to get new products to shelves to nine months from fifteen. The company brought in Stefan Larsson as chief executive late last year in the hope that he would replicate his success of reviving sales at Gap Old Navy, where he cut down production times and focused on offering trendy clothes at low prices.</div>

<div>&quot;I believe that he (Larsson)&nbsp;can be a positive influence. I&#39;ve hear great things about him. He is making fast changes, which is really impressive in a company like Ralph Lauren. And, listen, he knows how to do this. They need changes in their infrastructure. They need changes in their supply chain, and lead times, and delivery times. And he knows how to do this very quickly,&quot; Epner said.</div>

<div>Larsson has also worked with H&amp;M for about 15 years, where he helped grow the company&#39;s sales to $17 billion from $3 billion and introduced partnerships with luxury brands such as Versace and Karl Lagerfeld.</div>

<div>The company will focus on its luxury Ralph Lauren line and the lower-end Polo and Lauren brands, Larsson said in the company&#39;s first investor day call on Tuesday. The company&#39;s sales have fallen in every quarter in fiscal 2016, leading to a full-year sales decline of nearly three per cent. Ralph Lauren said it expects net revenue for the current fiscal year to fall in the low-double digit percentage range, hurt partly by store closures, pullback in inventory receipts and weak traffic.</div>

<div>The company said it expects to record restructuring charges of up to $400 million and an inventory reduction-related charge of up to $150 million, mostly in the current fiscal year. The restructuring measures are expected to result in annualized savings of about $180 to&nbsp;$220 million.</div>

<div>The company had about 493 directly operated retail stores and employed about 26,000 people, roughly 15,000 of who work full time as of April 2. Shares of the retailer had recouped losses and were trading down 4.8 pct at $91.96. Up to Monday&#39;s close of $96.33, the stock had fallen nearly 14 per cent this year.</div>

In an attempt to lower costs, about 8 per cent of the company's full-time jobs are being eliminated

Ralph Lauren is cutting about 1,000 jobs and closing 50 stores as part of a sweeping plan to lower costs and revive sales growth at the luxury fashion brand. Shares of Ralph Lauren, which also forecast declines in full-year and first-quarter revenue, fell as much as 10.4 per cent to $86.32 in early trading on Tuesday. "It's been a long time coming. Ralph Lauren is a behemoth, it's a very successful brand. It's an iconic brand. However, it need changes to adjust to the times," said Mary Epner, a retail analyst. The jobs being eliminated represent about 8 per cent of the company's full-time jobs, spokesman Ryan Lally told Reuters. Ralph Lauren, like some other luxury brands, has been struggling amid sluggish spending on luxury apparel and accessories. The company's margins have taken a knock as department stores discount heavily to get rid of excess inventory. Moreover, the company's lower-end Polo and Lauren brands are facing competition from retailers such as H&M and Inditex's Zara, which are known for their shorter production times. Ralph Lauren said on Tuesday it would try to reduce the time taken to get new products to shelves to nine months from fifteen. The company brought in Stefan Larsson as chief executive late last year in the hope that he would replicate his success of reviving sales at Gap Old Navy, where he cut down production times and focused on offering trendy clothes at low prices. "I believe that he (Larsson) can be a positive influence. I've hear great things about him. He is making fast changes, which is really impressive in a company like Ralph Lauren. And, listen, he knows how to do this. They need changes in their infrastructure. They need changes in their supply chain, and lead times, and delivery times. And he knows how to do this very quickly," Epner said. Larsson has also worked with H&M for about 15 years, where he helped grow the company's sales to $17 billion from $3 billion and introduced partnerships with luxury brands such as Versace and Karl Lagerfeld. The company will focus on its luxury Ralph Lauren line and the lower-end Polo and Lauren brands, Larsson said in the company's first investor day call on Tuesday. The company's sales have fallen in every quarter in fiscal 2016, leading to a full-year sales decline of nearly three per cent. Ralph Lauren said it expects net revenue for the current fiscal year to fall in the low-double digit percentage range, hurt partly by store closures, pullback in inventory receipts and weak traffic. The company said it expects to record restructuring charges of up to $400 million and an inventory reduction-related charge of up to $150 million, mostly in the current fiscal year. The restructuring measures are expected to result in annualized savings of about $180 to $220 million. The company had about 493 directly operated retail stores and employed about 26,000 people, roughly 15,000 of who work full time as of April 2. Shares of the retailer had recouped losses and were trading down 4.8 pct at $91.96. Up to Monday's close of $96.33, the stock had fallen nearly 14 per cent this year.

Ralph Lauren to cut about 1,000 jobs and shut shops