Our Business News

NEW YORK China’s largest maker of auto parts won an auction for A123 Systems Inc , a bankrupt maker of batteries for electric cars that was funded partly with U.S. government money, A123 confirmed in a statement Sunday. Wanxiang Group Corp’s bid of $ 256.6 million topped a joint bid from Johnson Controls Inc of Milwaukee and Japan’s NEC Corp <6701.T> for the maker of lithium-ion batteries. The sale did not include A123′s Michigan-based government business that works with the U.S. Defense Department, which was instead sold to Navitas Systems for $ 2.25 million, A123 said. Wanxiang’s winning bid came [...]

PARIS Shares in EADS rose on Monday as European nations raced towards a deal aimed at overhauling a convoluted shareholder structure at Europe’s largest aerospace group. The Airbus parent company said it was in talks on the company’s ownership with France, German and Spain, confirming press reports. People familiar with the matter said the talks involved a sweeping re-arrangement of government stakes, coupled with a staged exit of its industrial partners, reducing big shareholder blocks below 30 percent instead of more than 50 percent. “The company is participating actively in such discussions … with the objective to preserve and enhance [...]

SAN FRANCISCO Zynga Inc. confirmed on Tuesday afternoon that it is closing one studio and laying off about 5% of its total workforce in a cost-cutting move. In an e-mail to Zynga employees, CEO Mark Pincus said the company was closing its Boston studio and “proposing closures of the Zynga Japan and UK studios,” along with cuts to its studio in Austin, Texas. The move was somewhat expected, as Zynga had said it would reduce its costs in an earnings pre-announcement on Oct. 4, in which the company cited underperformance of some of its social and mobile games. On Tuesday, [...]

Providence Equity Partners said on Friday it had sold its 10 percent stake in online video site Hulu. The private equity firm’s press release followed media reports in the last two weeks that the sale would take place. Providence sold its stake for around $ 200 million, doubling its initial investment, according to a source familiar with the matter who requested anonymity because of lack of authorization to speak to the press. Providence’s exit leaves Hulu in the hands of Walt Disney Co, News Corp and Comcast Cable’s NBC Universal. “Providence has been an ideal partner over the past five [...]

SHANGHAI ZTE Corp, China’s second largest telecom equipment maker, said on Tuesday that Cisco Systems has terminated its agreement with the company, confirming an earlier Reuters report. ZTE said in a statement filed on the Shenzhen stock exchange that the U.S. company had terminated the agreement involving equipment sales in July, but added that the move will have little impact on its business. On Monday, sources told Reuters that Cisco has ended a longstanding sales partnership with ZTE after an internal investigation into allegations that the Chinese telecommunications equipment maker sold Cisco networking gear to Iran. (Reporting by Kazunori Takada; Editing by Anne Marie Roantree)

FLORANGE ArcelorMittal told unions it will permanently close two mothballed furnaces in northeastern France, enraging workers who blocked access to the steel plant and management offices at the site on Monday. In a blunt response to the Socialist government’s demand last week that it restart or sell the furnaces, ArcelorMittal said it would give the state a two-month window to try to find a buyer before it shuts down the site. “After four years of economic difficulties, we cannot hope for any return in the short term to pre-crisis activity levels,” ArcelorMittal, the world’s biggest steelmaker, said. It said the [...]

SAN FRANCISCO Nokia Corp. saw its U.S.-listed shares jump more than 6% to $ 3.11 on Friday morning. Prior to the opening bell, the company issued a statement regarding a video used in its marketing materials for the soon-to-be launched Lumia 920 Windows-based smartphone. The video in question was intended to demonstrate the optical image stabilization technology of the phone’s camera, though several bloggers noted that it apparently had been shot with a standard video camera. Nokia said last week that it was conducting an investigation into the matter. “Today, we concluded the internal investigation, and our findings confirm that [...]

FRANKFURT Germany’s Bundesbank confirmed that its president, Jens Weidmann, voted against the bond-buying proposal unveiled Thursday by European Central Bank President Mario Draghi. A spokesman said Weidmann opposed the measures, which he viewed as “too close” to central-bank financing of government deficits “with a printing press.” Draghi, in a news conference, said there was one dissenting vote on the program, but didn’t identify who cast it. Weidmann’s opposition to the plan, however, was no secret. The Bundesbank chief last month made a similar complaint to a German news magazine and warned that central-bank bond purchases could prove to be “addictive.”

LONDON State-controlled Royal Bank of Scotland confirmed on Friday it has dismissed a number of employees for misconduct as a result of its investigations into the Libor interest rate rigging scandal and, along with other banks, is still under investigation by regulators. “The Libor situation is on our agenda and is a stark reminder of the damage that individual wrongdoing and inadequate systems and controls can have in terms of financial and reputational impact,” Chief Executive Stephen Hester said in reporting first-half results. RBS said it was co-operating with investigations by governments and regulators into its submissions and procedures around [...]

THIS TOWN – Much some-more traders have been means to have hazard as good as reduction have been customarily couples a worldwide slowdown, in line with a Economic establishment per U . s Merrill Lynch Market investigate per Pay for Executives per Thinking about reception introduced The following thursday. Typically a inspect per 214 institutional traders reveals a internet 3% forecast vaticinate boundless predict a worldwide altogether manage to buy really will repairs over a following fifteen months, towards 27% inside December, a largest one-month encouragement inside of a general suffer deliberation which Could presumably a year only gone. Chance cravings is in addition approach up. [...]