COMPANIES

Wall Street is losing patience over Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg's enormous and experimental bets on his metaverse project that helped drive up the company's overall costs by a fifth in the third quarter.

Musk, the world's richest man, has reportedly been lining up financing since a judge paused litigation on October 6.

German carmaker Mercedes-Benz is expected to sell its Russian assets to a local investor, the Russian ministry of industry and trade said Wednesday, becoming the latest automaker to exit since Moscow sent troops to Ukraine.

South Korean flat-screen maker LG Display Co Ltd posted its second consecutive quarterly loss and cut its investment budget, as soaring inflation and a gloomy economic outlook dealt a further blow to demand for TVs and smartphones.

Adidas AG terminated its partnership with rapper and fashion designer Ye on Tuesday after he made a series of antisemitic remarks, a move that knocked the musician off the Forbes list of the world's billionaires.

Alphabet said it made a profit of $14 billion in the third quarter on ad revenue that grew just 6 percent to $69 billion when compared with the same period of last year.

Toyota is considering a reboot of its electric-car strategy to better compete in a booming market it has been slow to enter, and has halted some work on existing EV projects, four people with knowledge of the still-developing plans said.

Philips to cut 4,000 jobs as recall losses deepen

South Korea's parliament saw heated debate on Friday over proposed legislation to make global content providers such as Netflix and Alphabet's Google pay South Korean network fees.

Shares of Meta Platforms, Google-owner Alphabet and other companies that sell digital ads dropped late on Thursday after Snapchat owner Snap Inc blamed inflation for its slowest revenue growth since going public five years ago.

Marlboro maker Philip Morris International Inc on Thursday raised its buyout offer for Swedish Match AB in a last-ditch effort to get shareholder support for its $16 billion move into the fast-growing market for alternatives to cigarettes.

Amazon.com Inc is launching a home insurance portal in Britain and has signed up three big-name insurers as it pushes further into financial services across the globe.

Musk added that he believes Twitter has potential to be worth "an order of magnitude" more than it is now.

United Airlines Holdings on Tuesday forecast a profit for the current quarter well above Wall Street estimates after reporting higher-than-expected third-quarter earnings due to a robust rebound in travel demand.

British company owners are pulling investments as a crisis triggered in Westminster pushes up borrowing costs and hits confidence in an economy once seen by businesses as a haven of stability.

BP will pay $3.3 billion in cash plus around $800 million in debt, while the purchase remains subject to regulatory and Archaea shareholder approvals.

Qantas Airways Ltd will return to a profit in the first half for the first time since the pandemic began as demand rebounds and it focuses on ensuring reliable operations and sweetens its wages offer to employees, its chief executive said.

Volkswagen is looking at automating 20-30% of production at its upcoming Trinity plant near its Wolfsburg headquarters, the plant's chief production officer said on Tuesday.

Only three companies out of 20 have published objectives for employee mental health management, a study from British charity investment manager CCLA revealed on Monday, despite "clear evidence" that such targets can save money.

Amazon.com Inc said on Monday it will invest more than 1 billion euros ($974.8 million) over the next five years in electric vans, trucks and low-emission package hubs across Europe, accelerating its drive to achieve net-zero carbon.

Elon Musk's $44 billion Twitter takeover saga comes with all the drama necessary to be immortalised in case studies for future captains of industry, as the tycoon's on-off pursuit of the social media platform and unique management style make for a union like no other.

British companies are the most downbeat about the outlook for their profits since the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic in late 2020 despite widespread plans to raise prices, a major survey showed on Thursday, adding to signs of gloom about the economy.

Toyota Motor Corp said it would restart production of its first electric vehicle, the bZ4X, on Thursday after fixing potential safety problems that had halted sales of the new battery-powered model for more than three months.

Tesco, Britain's biggest retailer, forecast full-year profit at the lower end of its previous guidance, blaming uncertainty over how consumer spending will evolve amid a worsening cost-of-living squeeze.

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's third-quarter profit could tumble 25%, the first year-on-year decline in nearly three years, as an economic downturn saps demand for electronic devices and the chips that power them.

Amazon.com Inc is investing in outside venture capital funds for the first time, saying on Wednesday it planned to hand $150 million to firms that are backing underrepresented founders.

Twitter Inc's stock surged on Tuesday after billionaire Elon Musk proposed to go ahead with his takeover of the social media platform at $54.20 per share.

A former Tesla senior executive and chief operating officer at ride hailing company Lyft is joining General Motors board of directors.

Ben van Beurden, who leaves Shell at the end of this year, was addressing the Energy Intelligence Forum industry gathering.