 | | | | LONDON (Reuters) - Last October, at the height of a political crisis in Iraq's Kurdistan region, a letter arrived at the Iraqi oil ministry in Baghdad from Igor Sechin, head of Kremlin oil major Rosneft . | | | | | | (Reuters) - Wall Street slid on Thursday morning, weighed down by a broad-based slump in technology stocks from Apple to chipmakers as well as a tumble in consumer staples such as Procter & Gamble. | | | | | | BEIJING (Reuters) - China is looking to accelerate plans to develop its domestic semiconductor market amid a fierce trade stand-off with the United States and a U.S. ban on sales to Chinese phone maker ZTE that has underscored the country's reliance on imported chips. | | | | | | STOCKHOLM/LONDON (Reuters) - Investors are warming to beleaguered mobile network makers Ericsson and Nokia as they begin to recover ahead of a once-a-decade uplift from a new business cycle and an unexpected boost from a U.S. ban on exports to low-cost Chinese rival ZTE. | | | | | | SEOUL (Reuters) - Wage talks between General Motors' South Korean unit and its labor union ended without an agreement on Thursday, a day before the deadline the company had set for filing for bankruptcy. | | | | | | HONG KONG (Reuters) - A U.S. ban on sales of American components to ZTE Corp has unleashed a patriotic backlash in China's cyberspace, highlighting the growing tension between the world's two largest economies. | | | | | | (Reuters) - The world's largest consumer goods maker Procter & Gamble Co narrowly beat quarterly earnings expectations on Thursday, saying shrinking retailer inventories and higher commodities and transportation costs squeezed margins. | | | | | | (Reuters) - Procter & Gamble Co (P&G) has agreed to acquire Merck KGaA's consumer health unit for 3.4 billion euros ($4.2 billion), giving it vitamin brands such as Seven Seas and greater exposure to Latin American and Asian markets. | | | | | | NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) - Drugmaker Shire has rejected a third takeover bid worth nearly $63 billion from Japan's Takeda Pharmaceutical , although talks are continuing, while sources said Allergan was also in competing negotiations. | | | | | | SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A venture capital firm aiming to bring more U.S. startups to Russia has raised a $200 million fund, hoping to use the fresh pool of money to help Silicon Valley companies deliver their services to Russia's biggest corporations and its millions of internet-connected consumers. | | | | | |
