Page 11 - The Economist

The Economist December 9th 2017 The world this week 11

Business employee to be sentenced in Eurogroup. MrCenteno is the The Irish government opened
first head ofthe policymaking
an account into which Apple
America overthe scandal.
body forthe euro zone’s can start paying€13bn
In a deal with the potential to Ping An, a bigChinese insurer, finance ministries to come ($15.4bn) in unpaid taxes. Last
reshape America’s health-care lifted its stake in HSBC to 5%, from a country that was bailed yearthe European Commis-
industry, CVS Health formally describingit as a purely out duringthe debt crisis. His sion ruled that Ireland was
offered $69bn forAetna. CVS is financial investment. The bank biggest tasknext yearwill be owed the sum, afterfinding
America’s largest chain of makes most ofits profit in Asia. steeringdiscussions overdebt that taxadvantages offered to
pharmacies and also the coun- Its new chairman, MarkTucker, reliefforGreece at the end of Apple broke laws on state aid.
try’s biggest pharmacy-benefit used to run a rival insurance its bail-out programme. Ireland was taken to court for
manager, negotiatingon be- company to PingAn in Asia. failingto recoverthe money,
halfofcompanies and insurers Gone shopping at Christmas which will sit in the account
with pharmaceutical firms to Hammerson, a property until an appeal against the
lowertheircosts. Aetna Brent crude-oil price developerresponsible for ruling, lodged by Apple and
provides health insurance. $ per barrel some ofBritain’s best-known Ireland, has been resolved.
OPEC cuts production shoppingcentres, including
UnitedHealth, America’s 80 Brent Cross in London and the Planning for your retirement?
biggest insurer, said it was 60 Bullringin Birmingham, spent Areport from the OECD placed
buyingDaVita Medical for 40 £3.4bn ($4.6bn) to buy Intu, Britain at the bottom ofthe
$4.9bn. UnitedHealth will gain which operates Lakeside in heap forpension provisions.
a further300 clinics in a deal 20 Essexand otherarcades. The Foraverage earners, the future
that steps up its drive to 2015 16 17 0 deal creates Britain’s biggest net-replacement rate for
administermedical services property firm. incomes is 63% across the
directly. Source: Thomson Reuters OECD, but forBritain it is just
Saudi Arabia’senergy minister Deutsche Bank reportedly 29%. Germans can expect
Nestlé agreed to buy Atrium said he expects that OPEC’s received a subpoena from pensions worth halftheir
Innovations, a makerofvita- cuts to oil output will stay in Robert Mueller, the special pre-retirement salary on aver-
mins, for$2.3bn. It is a confi- place until the end of2018. He counsel in America investigat- age and the French almost
dent move by the Swiss group was speakinga few days after a ingalleged links between three-quarters. Average earn-
into consumerhealth care, a meetingbetween OPEC and Donald Trump’s campaign ers in the Netherlands do the
business it is pivotingtowards Russia, where it was agreed to and Russia, to hand over best in the EU, with a net-
as sales ofits better-known extend curbs on production, documents related to its replacement rate ofover100%,
food brands stagnate. but to review the situation in dealings with people and but Turkey comes out on top in
June. Oil prices have risen this entities associated with Mr the survey at102%. Forlow
Tech titans tit-for-tat year; Brent crude traded con- Trump. The bankdid not com- earners (those on halfthe
Asquabble between two of sistently above $60 a barrel ment directly about the news average wage), Britain does
America’s tech giants was seen throughout November. but said it tookits “legal obliga- slightly better, movingabove
as a possible harbingerof tions seriously and remains Chile, Poland and Mexico.
biggerdisputes to come. Goo- Portugal’s finance minister, committed to co-operating
gle said it would blockaccess Mário Centeno, was chosen to with authorised investigations Other economic data and news
to its YouTube site across some be the next president ofthe into this matter”. can be found on pages 88-89
ofAmazon’s devices in retalia-
tion forAmazon not selling
Google’s smartspeakeror
Chromecast, Google’s internet-
streamingplug-in forTVs, on
its website. Amazon retorted
that Google was “settinga
disappointingprecedent”.

Broadcom went hostile in its
$130bn proposal to take over
Qualcomm, nominatinga
slate of11new directors to the
board ofits largerchipmaking
rival. Qualcomm has so far
refused to countenance
Broadcom’s offer.
The managerin charge of
Volkswagen’s engineering
office in America was sen-
tenced to seven years in prison
forhis part in coveringup the
carmaker’s deception in emis-
sions tests. OliverSchmidt
pleaded guilty in August to the
charge. He is the second VW