BANGKOK/HONG KONG U.S. fund giant BlackRock Inc (BLK.N) has won a special new licence that will allow it to raise funds in China directly for the first time, a senior executive told Reuters, paving the way for the world’s largest money manager to expand in the... More »
MELBOURNE Australian tennis officials want to clear the air with Bernard Tomic and reinstate the country’s estranged number one into the Davis Cup team for the semi-final against Britain. The controversial world number 29 was booted off the team before the qua... More »
SEOUL South Korean tycoon Chung Mong-joon, one of the most influential figures in Asian soccer, said on Tuesday that leaving Sepp Blatter at the helm of FIFA until a new president is elected shows those in power at the scandal-hit governing body “have yet to c... More »
SYDNEY Masters and U.S. Open champion Jordan Spieth will return to Sydney in late November to defend his Australian Open title, organizers said on Tuesday. The 21-year-old American won the Stonehaven Cup by six shots last year and with his recent run of form i... More »
LONDON British publisher Pearson (PSON.L) is exploring the sale of its Financial Times newspaper after receiving interest from potential buyers, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter. Pearson was sounding out possible bidders for... More »
SAN FRANCISCO/LONDON Scientists are about to embark on the biggest search yet for alien life, sweeping the skies for signals of civilizations beyond our solar system with $100 million from a Russian billionaire and the backing of physicist Stephen Hawking. Whe... More »
LONDON Buckingham Palace scolded Rupert Murdoch’s top-selling Sun tabloid on Saturday for publishing a previously unknown film from 1933 that appears to show Britain’s Queen Elizabeth performing a Nazi salute as a young girl. The black-and-white film from the ... More »
LOS ANGELES From his classic 1967 Los Angeles pool scene “A Bigger Splash” to his interpretations of Yorkshire forests, British artist David Hockney has always injected the world around him with a vibrant palette, most recently in a study of perspectives. “Dav... More »
LONDON Britain’s newly elected Conservative government signalled on Thursday it would cut back the BBC, the opening salvo in a battle over the future of the world’s biggest public service broadcaster. Any attempt to change the 92-year-old broadcaster provokes ... More »
LONDON Britain’s telecoms regulator is seriously considering a break up of dominant provider BT, after rivals accused it of abusing its market position and failing to invest in the broadband networks they rely on. Ofcom floated the idea of a forced separation ... More »
LONDON A quarter of dogs competing in the world’s biggest dog show are overweight, scientists said on Monday. An analysis of canines at Britain’s Crufts show – held annually since the reign of Queen Victoria – found 74 percent were in ideal condition but 26 pe... More »
VIENNA A senior Iranian negotiator voiced hope on Monday that a nuclear deal with six major powers would be completed but cautioned that there was work to be done and he could not promise the talks would finish by Tuesday night, Iranian media reported. “I cann... More »
TORONTO Canada’s Jennifer Abel and Mexico’s Ivan Garcia won gold medals in their diving events at the Pan American Games on Sunday to earn automatic qualifying spots for the 2016 Rio Olympics. Abel, who won a bronze medal at the 2012 London Olympics, led the w... More »
LONDON Britain’s government will ask the BBC’s competitors to scrutinize the broadcaster’s remit and scale, the government said on Sunday, after years of controversy over how it has been funded. The BBC [TBBC.UL], the world’s largest broadcaster, has long been... More »
PARIS An attempt by Airbus to make history by crossing the English Channel in an electric plane ended in wounded pride on Friday after a French pilot claimed to have beaten it by hours. In a further twist, a Slovenian businessman said he might have beaten both... More »
TORONTO BlackBerry Ltd (BB.TO), which has been coy about its ambitions to make a mainstream Android smartphone, fueled more speculation about its plans this week when it scooped up two Android-related domain names. Several blog posts in the last two days have ... More »
MILAN British mobile phone giant Vodafone has reached an agreement with Mediaset to offer pay-TV content of the Italian broadcaster to its customers in the southern European country, the two companies said in a joint statement on Thursday. The offer, which bun... More »
LONDON Andy Murray goes to the dogs, or more precisely the puppies, in a video released on Tuesday which shows him playing at Wimbledon with five cocker spaniels being trained to become sniffer dogs. The six-week-old puppies are being raised by the Metropolita... More »
SYDNEY Nick Kyrgios has accused Olympic great Dawn Fraser of being a “blatant racist” after she said tennis players should “go back to where their parents came from” if they did not set a better example to Australian youth. The former champion swimmer, after i... More »
ATHENS Euclid Tsakalotos, the mild-tempered professor who was appointed as Greece’s new finance minister on Monday, is a clear change in style from his combative predecessor Yanis Varoufakis. The 55-year-old Tsakalotos studied at prestigious private London sch... More »
MONTREUX, Switzerland Pop star Lady Gaga and crooner Tony Bennett brought a mix of Cole Porter, Duke Ellington, Frank Sinatra and even Edith Piaf to a sell-out crowd spanning generations at the Montreux Jazz Festival on Monday night. Legendary producer Quincy ... More »
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A new app designed to educate young people about female genital mutilation (FGM) was launched in Britain on Tuesday amid a government crackdown on people who take girls abroad to undergo the practice during the summer holi... More »
MUNICH/FRANKFURT German broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1 and German publishing house Axel Springer have reignited talks for a merger, seeking to consolidate their push into digital media, two sources familiar with the matter said on Monday. Axel Springer, the publis... More »
WASHINGTON AstraZeneca LP has agreed to pay $46.5 million and Cephalon Inc [TEVAE.UL] $7.5 million to resolve allegations that the two drug companies underpaid rebates owed under the Medicaid program, the U.S. Justice Department said on Monday. (Reporting by E... More »
LONDON After three hours and two minutes of combat, Novak Djokovic and Kevin Anderson were forced off court in the twilight with their last 16 clash tantalizingly poised at two sets all and their Wimbledon audience begging for more. The match was halted as dus... More »
LONDON It was a case of 7-7-7 for Roger Federer at Wimbledon on Monday as he fired down seven aces, won seven games on the trot and sat through a seven-minute injury timeout in an otherwise serene 6-2 6-2 6-3 win over Roberto Bautista Agut. The Spaniard became... More »
LONDON Holder and top seed Novak Djokovic suffered an almighty scare against South African giant Kevin Anderson before bad light halted play with the score tied at two sets all in their fourth round match at Wimbledon on Monday. The world number one lost the f... More »
LONDON Unbeaten British boxer Tyson Fury will get a shot at the world heavyweight title in October after agreeing terms for a meeting with champion Wladimir Klitschko. The 39-year-old Ukrainian’s WBA, WBO, IBF and IBO crowns will be on the line when the pair m... More »
CHICAGO The Grateful Dead gave what they say will be their last group performance on Sunday, playing to some 70,000 singing, dancing and tearful fans in Chicago’s Soldier Field. The four surviving members of the band ended their 50-year-run this weekend with t... More »
ZURICH Tunisia has filed an objection to HSBC’s agreement to pay 40 million Swiss francs ($43 million) to settle a money laundering investigation at its Swiss private bank, a lawyer representing the North African country said on Monday. After four months of in... More »
LONDON The sun was out for double-Grammy-award-winning U.S. rapper Kendrick Lamar this weekend as he performed an energetic set of his hits to an enraptured young North London crowd. On stage at the Wireless festival on Saturday, less than a week after winnin... More »
ZURICH Tunisia has filed an objection to HSBC’s agreement to pay 40 million Swiss francs ($42.5 million) to settle a money laundering investigation at its Swiss private bank, Swiss newspaper SonntagsZeitung reported on Sunday. After four months of inquiries Ge... More »
LONDON British finance minister George Osborne plans to launch a 650 million pound raid on the BBC to help cover the country’s benefits bill, forcing the corporation to meet the cost of free television licences for the over-75s, the Sunday Times said. It quote... More »
LONDON A restored World War Two Spitfire which was shot down over northern France in 1940 is expected to raise about $3 million for charity when it goes up for auction in London next week. The wreckage of the Vickers Supermarine Spitfire Mk.1A was recovered in... More »
SAO PAULO Swiss lender UBS AG made a whistleblower deal with Brazilian authorities investigating the suspected rigging of Brazil’s currency market and will receive no punishment in the case, a local newspaper reported on Friday. The investigation, which involv... More »
LONDON The British Broadcasting Corporation will cut more than 1,000 jobs to cover a 150-million-pound gap in license fee income next financial year as millions of viewers turn off their televisions and watch programs on tablets and mobile phones. The BBC, the... More »
TOKYO Oil futures hovered below three-week lows on Tuesday as investors waited for developments in Greece following a bank shutdown, keeping them away from riskier assets and putting Brent crude on course for a second month of declines. Brent crude futures wer... More »
DUBAI Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, departed Tehran for Vienna with nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi and Hossein Fereydoon, a brother and close aide to President Hassan Rouhani, for nuclear talks, state news agency IRNA reported on Tuesday. Zari... More »
WASHINGTON More than half a billion years ago, a peculiar little creature with rows of spikes on its back and delicate, feather-like front limbs to strain bits of food from the water thrived in the primordial seas of what is now China. Scientists on Monday ann... More »
BRUSSELS The European Union reached a preliminary deal on Tuesday to scrap mobile roaming charges across the 28-country bloc by June 2017 as part of an overhaul of the continent’s telecoms market to boost growth and innovation. “Under the agreement, roaming su... More »
PARIS Chris Froome struggled for form, then crashed but the Briton looks ready just in time to compete for a second Tour de France title although micro managers Team Sky will struggle to control the race like they usually do. Froome, who claimed the 2013 Tour ... More »
PARIS Hot prospects Warren Barguil and Simon Yates have been tipped to win the Tour de France one day, yet neither is riding for a team from their home country as they learn the ropes abroad. France’s Barguil, 23, is with Dutch team Giant-Alpecin while Briton ... More »
LONDON Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams made strong cases for the less is more approach to Wimbledon build-ups with resounding victories at a sunny All England Club on Monday. Defending men’s champion Djokovic, who has been training in the south of France ra... More »
NEW YORK Aerialists descend in a giant chandelier and lift a guest back up with them, a showgirl leads an audience member back in time to a 1920s Parisian nightclub and actors single out guests for a mysterious experience yet to come. Immersive theater product... More »
CANNES (This version of the story corrects figures on Publicis contract wins, paragraph 13) The reluctance of big companies to spend at a time of lacklustre global growth and fewer major sporting events this year are dampening demand for advertising, said the ... More »
LONDON Harry Potter, the world’s most famous boy wizard, is set to make his debut on the London stage next year in a new play called the Cursed Child which has been created in collaboration with author J.K. Rowling. Rowling said on her Twitter feed that the ne... More »
FRANKFURT German media group ProSiebenSat.1 has agreed to buy 80 percent of German energy price comparison site Verivox from Oakley Capital for 170 million euros ($190 million). The price tag for Verivox, ProSieben’s largest digital acquisition so far, could r... More »
LONDON Scientists have identified a key gene used by poppies to make morphine, paving the way for better methods of producing the medically important drug, potentially without the need for cultivating poppy fields. The latest finding follows recent success in ... More »
LONDON Italian luxury car maker Maserati is showcasing its hand-crafted Quattroporte S in an unlikely setting: at the Masterpiece London art and antiques fair, which opened on Thursday in a plush tent on the grounds of Chelsea’s Royal Hospital. Featuring among... More »
WASHINGTON It was a creature so strange that experts literally could not make heads nor tails of it. But scientists said on Wednesday a new analysis of fossils of Hallucigenia, so named for its fantastical appearance, has given them for the first time a comple... More »
LONDON A Gustav Klimt portrait of a young woman that had been the subject of an ownership dispute fetched the highest price of 24.8 million pounds ($39.1 million) in an auction at Sotheby’s in London on Wednesday evening. Sales at the auction topped 178.6 mill... More »
LONDON Christie’s kept the international art auction caravan rolling with an impressionist and modern art sale that brought in $113 million on Tuesday. A Claude Monet study of mauve irises swaying against a pale blue sky in his Giverny garden was the star lot ... More »
TOKYO Still dealing with the huge clean up after the Fukushima crisis and debating its future use of atomic energy, Japan now faces another nuclear conundrum – what to do with 16 tonnes of its plutonium sitting in France after being reprocessed there. The ques... More »
SINGAPORE/SYDNEY The dollar hit a one-month low on Thursday, staying on the defensive after the head of the Federal Reserve disappointed some who had hoped for a clearer signal on when the central bank will lift interest rates. Instead, Fed Chair Janet Yellen ... More »
MONTREAL England and France qualified in style for the last 16 of the women’s World Cup on Wednesday, with the tournament looking as though it will be dominated by a strong contingent of European sides. On the evidence of the first round the winner could well ... More »
LONDON At a pub in rural England, Alan “Nasty” Nash is exercising his toes before he gets into the fighting ring. Draped in a Union Jack flag, the competitor is preparing for the most brutal of bouts to retain his title — World Toe Wrestling Champion. Beside h... More »
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla Europe’s Airbus Group will design and build about 900 satellites for privately owned OneWeb Ltd, which plans to offer high-speed, space-based Internet access to billions of people worldwide, company officials said on Monday. About 700 of th... More »
LONDON/NEW YORK The Glazers are unlikely to ever be liked, let alone loved, by fans of Manchester United. The fiercely private American family that bought the famous English soccer club 10 years ago has been widely depicted by the team’s fans and the British m... More »
LONDON/SYDNEY One has been closely involved with the family business from his early 20s and is driven to succeed. The other had to be lured back from a decade’s hiatus from the company and has operated at the edges of the empire. Now James and Lachlan Murdoch,... More »
PRISTINA Dresses and skirts donated by Cherie Blair and Rita Ora were among 5,000 pegged to washing lines in a Kosovo stadium on Friday in an art installation drawing attention to the stigma suffered by victims of wartime sexual violence. While there are no pr... More »
MADRID Britain’s Virgin Group is looking to potentially buy Spanish budget mobile operator Yoigo from Sweden’s TeliaSonera (TLSN.ST), El Economista newspaper reported on Friday, citing sources with knowledge of the situation. Virgin, run by billionaire entrepr... More »
LONDON Britain’s economic growth rate was stronger than previously estimated last year and in early 2015, the country’s statistics office said as it announced revisions to the way it measures the construction sector. Gross domestic product would rise by 3.1 pe... More »
LONDON Sherlock Holmes hits British cinemas this week but not quite as many might imagine the legendary sleuth. “Lord of the Rings” and “X-Men” star Ian McKellen portrays him as an elderly beekeeper, who at 93 has long retired from solving cases. Living in an ... More »
HAY-ON-WYE, Wales It’s a shard, a smeuse, a smout, and for some creatures it’s a perfect place to squiggle. Each of the nouns means, more or less, a gap in a hedge in various dialects of English, while to squiggle is to wriggle through a hedge in the county of... More »
KRUEN, Germany British Prime Minister David Cameron sought to quell fresh signs of rebellion in his Conservative Party over Europe, warning ministers they will have to back his European Union strategy or leave his government. Speaking on the sidelines of a mee... More »
FRANKFURT Germany’s largest lender Deutsche Bank purged its leadership on Sunday, appointing Briton John Cryan as chief executive to replace Anshu Jain just two weeks after Jain was given more power to reorganize the bank. Deutsche Bank has struggled to restor... More »
BERLIN As Greece stumbles towards bankruptcy, a Eurosceptic party bent on breaking up the euro zone should be enjoying its golden hour- but instead the Alternative for Germany (AfD) is mired in such bitter personal feuding it teeters on the verge of collapse i... More »
LONDON The BBC apologized on Wednesday after a journalist erroneously posted a Twitter message saying Britain’s Queen Elizabeth had been taken to hospital after falling ill. The 89-year-old monarch, who will become the country’s longest serving sovereign in Se... More »
TOKYO The dollar ascended to a new 12-1/2-year peak against the yen on Tuesday, while Asian shares fell for a second day as the stronger greenback pressured commodity prices. But financial spreadbetters predicted a brighter day in Europe, with Britain’s FTSE 1... More »
NEW YORK E.L. James, author of the hugely successful “Fifty Shades of Grey” erotic novels, has written a new entry in the series that takes the point of view of its male character, Christian Grey, publisher Vintage Books said on Monday. The book, titled “Grey,... More »
TOKYO Asian shares edged higher on Monday but gains were capped by concerns that market volatility may intensify as the U.S. central bank prepares to raise interest rates for the first time in six years. U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen indicated on Fri... More »
ATHENS Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis on Sunday admitted he had recorded a euro zone finance ministers meeting and criticized media for reporting “lies and innuendos” on what transpired at that April 24 Eurogroup gathering. The outspoken minister told... More »
LONDON One hallowed feature of Britain’s finances is a tax break for individuals called “non-domiciled status.” The break, which is more than 200 years old, is designed to attract foreign investors by allowing them to keep wealth they make abroad out of the re... More »
LONDON Just three years after the extraordinary discovery of King Richard III under a car park, researchers think another medieval English monarch might be found buried beneath a parking lot and are hoping to find him. Philippa Langley, the inspiration behind ... More »
DOHA A BBC television team was arrested in Qatar and held for two nights in prison while reporting on living conditions for migrant laborers working on the 2022 World Cup, the broadcaster said on Monday. The Gulf state had organized a press tour in early May f... More »
HONG KONG As China’s economy slows and Beijing becomes more relaxed about letting its companies fail, a rising number of foreign bondholders risk being caught up in the country’s unpredictable court system. Last month, solar producer Baoding Tianwei Baobian El... More »
LONDON Britain wants to reach a new settlement with the European Union as fast as possible, Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said, the Financial Times reported on Friday. Prime Minister David Cameron, who won an outright majority in a general election last wee... More »
CANNES, France Director George Miller has come close to confirming there could be more to come in his “Mad Max” franchise, saying he has additional storylines kicking around in his head after completing “Mad Max: Fury Road”. Asked if the expected huge U.S. ope... More »
TOKYO A Japanese city will press ahead to get the U.N. World Heritage to register letters by World War Two kamikaze suicide pilots alongside documents including the diaries of Anne Frank and the Magna Carta. The Wednesday announcement by Kampei Shimoide, mayor... More »
LONDON Prime Minister David Cameron will hold a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union earlier than the end of 2017 if he can and wants EU treaty change as part of a renegotiation of ties, his spokesman said on Tuesday. “If we can do it earli... More »
CANBERRA Australia on Tuesday proposed new legislation to tighten tax loopholes that the conservative government says have allowed around 30 of the world’s largest multinational companies to avoid paying taxes. Under the proposals, released as part of Australi... More »
MADRID Spain’s Defence Minister Pedro Morenes said on Tuesday that flight permission for Airbus (AIR.PA) A-400M planes currently in production in Spain has been temporarily withdrawn until the reasons for Saturday’s fatal crash were determined. “It’s obvious t... More »
LONDON The BBC faces renewed funding concerns following the appointment of John Whittingdale as British culture secretary, though there remains little chance of a major overhaul of the public broadcaster. Whittingdale, a critic of the corporation’s license fee... More »
LONDON With optimism building that the United States is already recovering smartly from another horrible start to the year, focus will shift this week to reports that may show the euro zone is finally shaking off half a decade of torpor. The 19-member currency... More »
NEW YORK A U.S. jury cleared HBO of libel claims on Friday in a lawsuit brought against the Time Warner Inc subsidiary by a British sporting goods company over a report linking it to child labor in India. Mitre Sports International, a unit of the Pentland Grou... More »
LONDON Following a recent sell-off in German bunds, pension fund managers are resisting making any major changes to their exposure to European government debt, confident that demand from the European Central Bank (ECB) will stabilize markets. Around a third of... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Patients with type-2 diabetes who are overweight but not obese outlive diabetics of normal weight, scientists reported on Monday, in another example of the “obesity paradox.” Although public health officials issue dire warnings about the c... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – British band Blur hit the top of the UK album chart on Sunday with “The Magic Whip”, the group’s first number one album in 12 years, the Official Charts Company said. Nearly 24 years since their debut album, Blur saw off Taylor Swift’s “1989... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – A company owned by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has almost doubled its political donations in the UK over the past four years, records of electoral donations show. Bloomberg Tradebook, a British-registered financial markets broke... More »
