Business

By Seham El Oraby CAIRO, Dec 14 –  Growing lettuce in the desert is not most people’s idea of how to make a success of farming, but Amr Bassiouny believes he is on to something. The 30-year-old chief executive of Egyptian Hydrofarms says he is growing salad greens at his farm on the outskirts of

LONDON, Dec 14 – Brexit could hit trade relations between Britain and the U.S, with nearly 40 percent of American firms considering moving their British office to the EU and two-thirds saying the vote is impacting investment choices, according to a survey. Food and beverage, life sciences and financial services firms were most likely to

By Stephen Jewkes, Gianluca Semeraro and Pamela Barbaglia MILAN/LONDON, Dec 13 – Italy’s largest bank, UniCredit, plans to raise 13 billion euros ($13.8 billion) in the country’s biggest-ever share issue to shore up its balance sheet and shield itself from a broader banking crisis. The plans announced on Tuesday, which also include 14,000 job cuts,

Dec 13  – China’s Sinopec Corp is weighing a takeover of Gulf Keystone Petroleum , an oil company operating in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. Gulf Keystone shares were up 13.5 percent at 144.43 pence at 1041 GMT. Sinopec, Asia’s largest refiner, is working with advisers and has made an approach

By Tom Finn DOHA, Dec 13  – The head of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund has told U.S. officials it will invest $10 billion in infrastructure projects inside the United States, sources said, in an apparent boost to the economic plans of president-elect Donald Trump. Sheikh Abdullah bin Mohamed bin Saud al-Thani, chief executive of the

By Bozorgmehr Sharafedin BEIRUT, Dec 13 – European planemaker Airbus and Iran Air will finalise a deal to buy aircraft in two weeks, the head of Iran’s flag carrier said on Tuesday, adding Airbus has agreed to provide financing for 17 planes. Uncertainty over financing of the deal and political opposition in the United States

By Daren Butler and Nevzat Devranoglu ISTANBUL/ANKARA, Dec 12 – On paper at least, 79 million Turks got a near 20 percent boost to their average standard of living on Monday when the government rejigged GDP calculations, a change unlikely to stem frustration about an economy now in contraction. Turkey, which restated its gross domestic

By Tim Hepher and Sami Aboudi PARIS/DUBAI, Dec 11 – Iran signed a $16.6 billion deal for 80 Boeing passenger jets on Sunday and was said to be close to another for dozens of Airbus planes to complete what would be the biggest package of firm contracts with Western companies since Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution.

By Vladimir Soldatkin, Rania El Gamal and Alex Lawler VIENNA, Dec 10  – OPEC and non-OPEC producers on Saturday reached their first deal since 2001 to curtail oil output jointly and ease a global glut after more than two years of low prices that overstretched many budgets and spurred unrest in some countries. With the

By Rania El Gamal, Alex Lawler and Vladimir Soldatkin VIENNA, Dec 9 – Saudi Arabia has told its U.S. and European customers it will reduce oil deliveries from January, as Russia said it was confident non-OPEC producers would fully join OPEC’s output limits on Saturday in the first such move since 2001. Saudi Arabia told