general news

Shrinking flows of Russian natural gas to Europe have triggered a global race among U.S. allies to secure American gas exports, testing the country’s ability to meet fast-growing demand.Russia throttled deliveries of natural gas to Europe after the continent adopted a flurry of sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine. That change has left Europe scrambling to secure alternatives, especially from the U.S. The continent’s liquefied natural gas, or LNG, imports from the U.S. more than doubled between March and June from the…

Russia’s central bank Friday lowered its key interest rate below its prewar level, and said it expects the economy to contract less sharply than it did when Western sanctions were first imposed in response to the invasion of Ukraine. The Bank of Russia lowered its key rate to 8% from 9.5%, the level it stood at before the late-February invasion of the country’s southern neighbor. The central bank’s first move as sanctions were rolled out and the ruble slumped was to more than double the…

Shares of Twitter fell 2% to $38.72 in premarket trading. Twitter’s results Friday follow rival social-media company Snap Inc. SNAP -32.60% posting its weakest-ever quarterly sales growth because of “increasing competition for advertising dollars that are now growing more slowly.” Twitter, in its news release, cited “advertising industry headwinds associated with the macroenvironment as well as uncertainty related to the pending acquisition of Twitter.” The company won’t…

Workers at HSBC HSBC 1.26% Holdings PLC’s Chinese securities subsidiary have formed a unit that represents the Communist Party, in the latest instance of the party establishing a presence inside a foreign company.As few as three workers have formed a party branch at HSBC Qianhai Securities, a Shenzhen-based investment bank owned by HSBC, people familiar with the matter said. London-based HSBC owns 90% of the company after increasing its stake this spring. HSBC said the…

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is digging in against protesters who this week shut down most operations at the Port of Oakland, saying truckers “should focus on supporting this transition” to a new employment law, even as shippers warned the impasse was hurting their businesses.Mr. Newsom’s administration indicated Thursday it wouldn’t bow to the protesters’ demands to pause the implementation of the new state law, known as AB5, that will make it harder for tens of thousands of independent…

Mattel Inc.’s MAT 2.81% second-quarter sales rose 20%, signaling continued strong demand for toys even as inflation eats away at household budgets. The growth was led by Hot Wheels, with gross billings—a metric that reflects sales to retailers before adjustments—up 26% globally, and Fisher-Price and Thomas & Friends up 21%. Action figures tied to recent movies such as the Toy Story spinoff “Lightyear” also did well. Barbie, the toy…

SEOUL— Samsung Electronics Co. has floated the prospect of investing nearly $200 billion for 11 new chip-making plants in Texas over the next two decades, a mega splurge that if executed would dramatically boost its semiconductor foothold in the U.S.The South Korean tech giant’s proposed spending was divulged in recent filings submitted to the Texas Comptroller’s office and made public Wednesday. One likely motivation is a year-end expiration of a Texas state incentive program offering…

Freight railroad companies averted a labor strike with an intervention from President Biden, but tensions between rank-and-file workers and their employers continue to simmer.Containers are piling up at terminals across the country, exacerbating delays and frustrating customers. Railroad executives cite the tight labor market, saying they haven’t been able to hire and retain enough workers despite offering incentives such as higher sign-on bonuses. Existing rail employees say they are overworked and waiting for wage…

New applications for unemployment benefits climbed again last week, reaching their highest point since late last year in a sign the tight labor market is slowly loosening. Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, rose to a seasonally adjusted 251,000 in the week ended July 16 from 244,000 the week before, the Labor Department said Thursday. Last week’s claims were above the 2019 prepandemic weekly average of 218,000, when the labor market was also strong, and at their highest since…

Roche RHHBY -1.38% Holding AG Chief Executive Severin Schwan is to step down in March, following a 15-year tenure marked by the marriage of the Swiss healthcare giant and California’s Genentech, the blockbuster success of three cancer drugs and the challenge of replacing them when lower-cost competition arrived.Mr. Schwan also presided over setbacks in his long run at the top of the company. Genentech lost a rare challenge to U.S.…