Britain’s GDP fell 0.1 per cent in August from the previous month – the first drop since April – after an upwardly revised 0.4 per cent rise in July, official data showed. The figures put the economy on track for a modest expansion in the third quarter, after a surprise contraction in the second quarter.
Meanwhile, homeowners are increasingly shunning the property market because of heightened uncertainty about Britain's future, research has found.
The number of new homes coming to the market slumped to a three-year low in September while buyer demand also fell, a poll by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors found.
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Apple on Wednesday removed an app that enabled protesters in Hong Kong to track police, a day after facing intense criticism from Chinese state media for it, plunging the technology giant deeper into the increasingly politicised atmosphere in China.
Apple said it was removing the app, called HKmap.live, from its iPhone App Store just days after approving it because authorities in Hong Kong said protesters were using it to attack police there.
A day earlier, People’s Daily, the flagship newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, published an editorial that accused Apple of aiding “rioters” in Hong Kong. “Letting poisonous software have its way is a betrayal of the Chinese people’s feelings,” said the article, which was written under a pseudonym, “Calming the Waves.”
Apple gives in to China's demand to pull Hong Kong app that lets protesters track police
'Poisonous' app aiding 'rioters', claims an editorial in People's Daily, the Communist Party's newspaperChinese oil refiner issues $140m 'green' bond to fund new fossil fuel plant
Oil refiner Jiangsu Eastern Shenghong has just issued a 'green' bond worth 1 billion yuan (£115m) to finance the production of an oil refinery.
The plant will process 16 million tonnes of crude to feed a new petrochemical plant, Chinese official outlet People's Daily said.
Its the latest Chinese firm to take advantage of laughably lax rules around what constitutes a green investment.
Classifying a project as environmentally friendly allows companies to access money from funds that have excluded unsustainable industries from their portfolios.
The hard-wearing polymer note, which will be issued from 20 February 2020, has two windows and a two-colour foil. This design, used for the first time, makes the note very difficult to counterfeit, the central bank said on Thursday.
Bank of England reveals its 'most secure' note yet
Innovative design makes new note very difficult to counterfeit, central bank saysBut the atmosphere surrounding the talks was soured by the US Commerce Department's decision on Monday to blacklist 28 Chinese public security bureaus, technology and surveillance firms, citing human rights violations of Muslim minority groups in China's Xinjiang province. A day later, the US State Department imposed visa restrictions on Chinese officials related to the Xinjiang issue.
If negotiations break down again, by 15 December, nearly all Chinese goods imports into the United States - more than $500bn (£400bn) - could be subject to punitive tariffs in the dispute that erupted during Trump's time in office.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in Sydney, Australia, on Thursday that the tariffs were working, forcing Beijing to pay attention to US concerns about its trade practices.
"We do not love tariffs, in fact we would prefer not to use them, but after years of discussions and no action, tariffs are finally forcing China to pay attention to our concerns," Ross said.
Alongside music, film, books and fashion merchandise, the store will offer a specially-designed performance space, inviting both local artists and international musicians to perform in-store.The store’s Friday launch will see a performance by Liam Payne, with chart topper James Arthur set to perform on Saturday.
Brexit and global economy hurt Hargreaves Lansdown
Hargreaves Lansdown says it was hit by "weak investor sentiment" in the past three months due to fears about Brexit and the future of the global economy.
Sentiment will no doubt also have been damaged by the fiasco that saw almost 300,000 of Hargreaves’ customers and £1.6bn of their assets trapped in Neil Woodford’s struggling investment fund.
Despite the debacle, Hargreaves hailed a "solid start" to the financial year.
The fund supermarket reported a 6 per cent rise in net revenue to £128.1m for the three months to 30 September. New business also increased, up to £1.7bn from £1.3bn.
These latest figures show minimal growth overall but no-one in the industry will be getting too excited.
The trends show that the industry is experiencing a mixed profile of monthly growth, with falls in March, April and June largely offset by increases in May, July and August. There was also a month-on-month decrease in new work of 0.2% in August.
This fall in new work reflects the industry being at a crossroads as the Brexit situation remains unclear, with the longer-term picture one of investor restraint and a weakness in the housing market translating into a fall in the numbers of homes.
After an $8bn verdict against Johnson & Johnson, here’s why America’s runaway juries might be a good thing
Such punitive damages are designed to punish corporate wrongdoing. Those with bad products need to be encouraged to think twice before marketing them to the public, writes James Moore- Return £123 million to former and existing customers.
- Pay a fine of £3 million on top - in recognition of the serious and significant breaches of its licence conditions and statutory duties
"The fall in GDP in August was due to a 0.7% m/m drop in manufacturing output.
The main contributor to gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the three months to August 2019 was the services sector, which grew by 0.4%. This was driven by widespread strength across the services industries in June and July, following a period of largely flat growth in the previous three months.Meanwhile, the production sector fell by 0.4% in the same period, while construction output grew by 0.1%.
