UK services sector stagnates in June - BBC News

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It looks as though Britain's economy shrank in the second quarter with news that the services economy barely grew in June against a backdrop of worries over Brexit.

Carefully watched data from IHS Markit/CIPS, who survey purchasing managers, say their index fell to 50.2 in June, below the 51 that had been expected, which would have seen growth remain flat.

Equivalent surveys for manufacturing and construction published earlier this week showed that those sectors contracted in June, meaning Britain's economy overall probably shrank by 0.1% in the second quarter, according to IHS/CIPS.

"The latest downturn has followed a gradual deterioration in demand over the past year as Brexit-related uncertainty has increasingly exacerbated the impact of a broader global economic slowdown," Chris Williamson, chief business economist at IHS Markit, said.

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2019-07-03 11:15:20Z
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Christine Lagarde appointment risks making the ECB weaker - Financial News

Mario Draghi’s move to shape eurozone monetary policy beyond his retirement date — at least through 2020 — may prove to be the best decision he ever made as European Central Bank president.

His nominated successor, current International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Lagarde, would come to the job without any central banking experience, and by most accounts devoid of the character that allowed Draghi to utter his famous promise in 2012 to do “whatever it takes” to keep the monetary union together.

If in the next weeks European leaders confirm their choice to give Lagarde one of the world’s most important monetary policy jobs, they will increase fears that the eurozone will not be able to withstand the next serious financial shock, with the ECB crippled by the transformation of its ruling body into a bickering and ineffective mini-parliament.

The first reason is that the ECB would be headed by two personalities hailing from politics, without proper experience in central banking or a serious academic background: Lagarde is a former minister under French conservative presidents Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy, and ECB vice-president Luis de Guindos is an ex-conservative Spanish finance minister.

READ The exhausted ECB dove insists it can still fly

Lagarde, 63, is a lawyer by training, and served as a lacklustre finance minister under Sarkozy. She was later convicted of dereliction of duty by France’s highest court of justice for having overseen a misuse of public funds while serving in that post. That did not prevent her from being renewed in 2016 to the IMF post that Sarkozy had lobbied for and helped her get in 2011.

Although some European leaders salute her political acumen and capacity to muster compromises from diverging governments in difficult situations, Lagarde has never seemed interested by the fierce economic arguments that split governments throughout the eurozone crisis. She has no discernible firm views on economic or monetary policy, save for sticking to the consensus of the moment. At the IMF she has proved a good bureaucratic operator, and an articulate defender of the policies conceived by the international organisation’s staff.

That is precisely the problem she presents as ECB president-nominee. Draghi knew where he was going and did not hesitate to venture way beyond the consensus that his central banker colleagues had agreed on or discussed. He led the way. Lagarde’s tenure is more likely to be one where the ECB bureaucracy will lead, and the president follows after checking what other eurozone central bankers stand for.

READ Central banks must guard their fragile independence

More worryingly, Lagarde’s lack of convictions will weigh on the deliberations of the ECB’s governing council, the ruling body made up of the 19 national central bank governors and the six members of its executive board. The risk is that, instead of being dominated by a president deft at steering the debate their way, it will be turned into a deliberative assembly incapable of making the kind of swift decisions needed in times of crisis.

Markets will have some reasons to fear the appointment of an inexperienced ECB president just as the eurozone is heading towards a troubled economic future. Inflation expectations are at their lowest in years; the region’s economy could be hit by trade wars and the slowdown of emerging markets; and European governments are either reluctant or incapable of moving toward the type of fiscal stimulus Draghi has been advocating for months. Meanwhile, European leaders have all but given up on any pretence of reforming the eurozone, or strengthening their still-fragile banking union.

In choosing a consensus candidate who is unlikely to ruffle any feathers, European governments have at least made sure their influence will increase on the ECB’s policies. This is worrying for the central bank’s ultimate independence. But in the short term this should be an indication to markets that, beyond the next year or so, the ECB may no longer be the strong reliable institution they have learnt to respect.

To contact the author of this story with feedback or news, email Pierre Briançon

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2019-07-03 09:52:50Z
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Mom furious with United Airlines after boy is placed on wrong international flight: 'Cosmic failure' - Fox News

United Airlines has issued an apology after a 14-year-old boy was reportedly instructed to board the wrong international flight on Sunday.

Anton Berg, of North Carolina, was scheduled to fly from Raleigh to Stockholm, Sweden, via a stop at Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) in New Jersey.

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Once at EWR, however, Anton was ushered onto a Eurowings flight headed for Dusseldorf, Germany — rather than the Scandinavian Airlines partner flight he was booked on — despite his parents, Christer and Brenda Berg, paying United an additional $150 to escort the boy to the correct flight, WRAL reports.

Anton alerted his parents to the mix-up via text, but only after he was already on the plane, and began to realize he was on the wrong aircraft.

Brenda Berg claimed on Twitter that she was unable to reach United by phone, to notify them of the mix-up, so she began tweeting directly at the airline, begging for someone to confirm where her son was.

“He is an unaccompanied minor going to ARN. You probably put another kid in his place who is supposed to go to Germany. The ARN is due to take off any second. The Eurowings to DUS has stopped on the runway. Do something! - call me,” she pleaded, all while Anton was sitting on the tarmac.

CHRISSY TEIGEN FINDS TSA LOOPHOLE CONCERNING GRAVY

Brenda continued tweeting throughout the ordeal, claiming that no one from United had responding, or confirmed whether Anton was off the plane, for over an hour.

Anton eventually did return to the terminal in Newark, she said, though he was still unaccompanied.

Brenda was finally able to reach a representative, who said Anton was being rebooked on a different flight to Copenhagen. He arrived in Stockholm on Monday.

"When somebody says unaccompanied minor, wrong airplane, wrong country, everybody should’ve stepped up and done something," Brenda told WRAL, adding that the screw-up was a "cosmic failure" on United's part.

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Eurowings, meanwhile, said in a statement obtained by Fox News that Anton had “mistakenly received a boarding pass for the [Eurowings] flight,” which was boarding at a neighboring gate to the Scandinavian Airlines flight.

Eurowings said in a statement that he somehow "mistakenly received a boarding pass for the [Eurowings] flight" rather than the scheduled Scandinavian Airlines flight he was scheduled to board. (iStock)

“The boarding for both flights was handled by an external service provider who was in charge for both SAS and Eurowings,” the airline told Fox News. “The passenger mistakenly received a boarding pass for the EW flight to DUS instead of a boarding pass for the SAS flight to Stockholm.”

Eurowings added that the crew “reacted immediately and informed the captain” before the plane turned back for the gate at EWR, where Anton was handed off to Port Authority and Transportation Security Administration staff.

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United has also issued an apology for the incident.

“The safety and well-being of all of our customers is our top priority, and we have been in frequent contact with the young man’s family to confirm his safety and to apologize for this issue,” the airline wrote. “Once Eurowings recognized that he had boarded the wrong aircraft in Newark, the plane returned to the gate — before taking off. Our staff then assisted the young customer to ensure that he boarded the correct rebooked flight later that evening.

“We have confirmed that this young customer safely reached his destination.”

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2019-07-02 15:58:48Z
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Mom fumes as United puts her son on flight to wrong country - New York Post

A 14-year-old boy traveling alone from North Carolina to Sweden was put on the wrong plane during a transfer at Newark Airport, where he alerted the crew on the Germany-bound flight right before takeoff, according to reports.

The comedy of errors involving three airlines began when Anton boarded a United flight on Sunday with a codeshare ticket booked on Scandinavian carrier SAS, which does not have direct service from Raleigh to Stockholm, his mom, Brenda Berg, told Business Insider.

The boy was supposed to be put on an SAS flight to Sweden — but United placed him on a plane operated by German low-cost airline Eurowings bound for Düsseldorf, according to the news outlet.

SAS and Eurowings both operate those flights as codeshares with United.

“We booked him through SAS to visit his grandparents in Sweden,” Berg told USA Today in an email.

“SAS does not have an unaccompanied minor program for a 14-year-old,” she said. “We intentionally booked a long layover in a domestic location, so it would be easy.”

An unaccompanied minor attendant was supposed to take Anton to SAS Flight SK904 to Stockholm, she added.

“According to my son, the UM agent took him from the UM room at Newark to the Eurowings flight to Germany that he boarded,” Berg continued.

“The United agent handed my son’s paperwork to the agent at the gate, who immediately moved him onto the plane, apparently without looking at this UM paperwork.”

When Anton realized he was on the wrong plane, he “contacted a flight attendant, and the plane was turned around,” his mom said.

SAS agents quickly rebooked Anton, but he had to wait more than five hours for the next flight to Stockholm, she said.

A frantic Berg detailed the unfolding fiasco on Twitter.

“@United @SAS my son is in the wrong plane!!! EWR you put him on a plane to Germany!!!!” she wrote.

“They are booking him through Copenhagen. He will have 7hours of additinal (sic) travel. Still NO one has called from @united. I finally got through to a rep after 52 minutes and i am back on hold. Warning to everyone. Never trust @United with your children,” she said in another tweet before finally getting hold of a United manager.

“Ironically, @United if you hadn’t accompanied him, this would never have happened. He wouldn’t have counted on you to know what you were doing. #NeverUnitedAir,” she added.

United’s UM policy states that “this service is required for children ages 5-14 who are traveling alone.”

For $150 each way, the program includes a wristband for a child to wear and special bag tags so United employees can clearly identify them as being unaccompanied.

“Unaccompanied minors can only travel on nonstop United or United Express flights and United does not offer unaccompanied minor service connecting to or from other airlines’ flights,” according to the policy.

A United spokesman told Business Insider that a 14-year-old flying alone would normally not be allowed when an international flight is involved, but that because the ticket was sold by SAS, the check-in agent decided to allow Anton onto the connecting flight with the airport escort service.

The teen’s paperwork contained the correct flight information, but there was a gate change before he arrived at Newark for the connecting flight and the Eurowings plane was sitting at the gate at that point.

The United rep said the flight to Germany was awaiting one more passenger, whose name was similar to Anton’s, and the person escorting the boy assumed the passenger being called on the public address system was the boy.

“The safety and well-being of all of our customers is our top priority, and we have been in frequent contact with the young man’s family to confirm his safety and to apologize for this issue,” United said in a statement.

“Once Eurowings recognized he had boarded the wrong aircraft in Newark, the plane returned to the gate — before taking off. Our staff then assisted the young customer to ensure that he boarded the correct rebooked flight later that evening. We have confirmed that this young customer safely reached his destination.”

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2019-07-02 14:28:00Z
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Elizabeth Warren blasts former FDA commissioner for joining Pfizer's board - STAT

WASHINGTON — Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday called for Scott Gottlieb, who resigned as commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration in April, to leave Pfizer’s board of directors.

In a letter, the Massachusetts Democrat applauded Gottlieb’s tenure at FDA but suggested his decision to join the drug giant “smacks of corruption.”

Gottlieb’s decision to join a corporation he once regulated, Warren wrote, “makes the American people rightfully cynical and distrustful about whether high-level Trump Administration officials are working for them, or for their future corporate employers.”

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Warren is among the leading candidates for her party’s presidential nomination in 2020. Many of her legislative priorities in recent years have fallen under FDA’s purview, including an aggressive bill aimed at lowering drug prices and a $100 billion proposal to counter the opioid epidemic.

Gottlieb announced last week that he would join Pfizer’s board beginning June 27, sparking immediate criticism that the company would have unmatched sway with the agency that regulates it. The move also allowed critics of the Trump administration to pounce on the perceived hypocrisy of an official who touted his work to lower drug costs accepting a leadership position with the world’s largest pharmaceutical manufacturer.

Gottlieb’s move, however, is typical.

Every FDA commissioner over the past 38 years has joined the board of a pharmaceutical company after leaving the agency, with the exception of David Kessler, who served as commissioner from 1990 to 1997. Robert Califf and Peggy Hamburg, the commissioners who immediately preceded Gottlieb, took posts at Cytokinetics and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, respectively.

In a statement, Gottlieb said he respected Warren and would respond to her letter “promptly, directly, and privately.”

“While I was at FDA, I had a productive relationship with Sen. Warren, working together to advance shared public health goals,” he said.

Despite her criticism, Warren’s letter also touched on her broad approval for Gottlieb’s accomplishments at the agency — rare praise for a Trump administration official from a liberal Democrat and 2020 presidential candidate. 

“Unlike other administration officials who dedicated themselves to rolling back public health and consumer regulations, you often used your tenure to strengthen protections for Americans,” Warren wrote.

Warren, however, also wrote that Gottlieb is the second high-ranking federal official to leave government for industry in recent months. Warren also cited John Kelly, President Trump’s former chief of staff, who joined the board of a for-profit company operating a large detention center for migrant children in Florida.

Gottlieb also told STAT last week that he was “proud of the affiliation.”

“I’ve never been shy about my belief that America has the best biopharmaceutical sector in the world and this sector and its output of beneficial medicines is one of our great national achievements,” Gottlieb said in an email. “At the same time, I’m confident my record at FDA demonstrates I put the public health interest first and called balls and strikes based on the science and the public interest.”

In the letter, Warren also touted anti-corruption legislation that she said “would shut the revolving door and prohibit giant companies like Pfizer from wielding undue influence.”

That bill would prohibit many private companies from hiring or paying senior government officials in the four years following their departure.

Nicholas Florko contributed reporting. 

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2019-07-02 14:24:27Z
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Trader Joe's, Green Giant veggies recalled due to Listeria risk Trader Joe's, Green Giant veggies recalled due to Listeria risk - CNN

The vegetable products were voluntarily recalled by manufacturer Growers Express due to concerns about possible contamination with the bacteria Listeria monocytogenes, the FDA said in a Monday statement.

The packaged vegetables were produced at a factory in Biddeford, Maine, and were distributed to grocery stores across the United States, primarily in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Maine. The FDA issued a list of the stores and states affected.

Most of the potentially contaminated products have "Best if Used By" dates between June 26 and 29, 2019. No Green Giant frozen or canned vegetables are recalled.

"Listeria is an organism that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems," said the FDA.

Other short term symptoms include high fever, severe headaches, stiffness, nausea, abdominal pain and diarrhea, according to the FDA. Listeria infections can cause pregnant women to have miscarriages and stillbirths.

If you think your veggies might be recalled, or if you can't read the date on your packaged veggies, the FDA urges you to not consume them and to throw away the packages.

"The safety of our consumers is our first priority," said Tom Byrne, president of Growers Express in a statement.

"We self-reported the need for this recall to the US Food and Drug Administration and stopped production immediately after being notified of a single positive sample by the Massachusetts Department of Health."

Growers Express issued a full list of the products recalled. It includes:

• Green Giant Fresh Butternut Squash Cubes
• Green Giant Fresh Butternut Squash Noodles
• Green Giant Fresh Butternut Squash Diced
• Green Giant Fresh Cauliflower Crumbles Fried Rice Blend
• Green Giant Fresh Ramen Soup Bowl
• Green Giant Fresh Sweet Potato Cauliflower Crumbles
• Green Giant Fresh Zucchini Noodles
• Signature Farms Cauliflower Crumbles
• Trader Joe's Butternut Squash Spirals
• Trader Joe's Zucchini Spirals

Growers Express said it is sanitizing the factory and equipment involved and conducting additional safety tests. No other Growers Express products were involved in the recall.

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2019-07-02 13:22:00Z
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Budweiser IPO: AB InBev prepares its Asia business for biggest listing of the year - CNN

Budweiser Brewing Company APAC, the largest brewer in Asia by retail sales, plans to offer 1.63 billion shares for between 40 and 47 Hong Kong dollars ($5.13 to $6.02), according to a document setting out the terms of the IPO that was shared with CNN Business.

That would raise between $8.3 billion and $9.8 billion for the brewer of Bud Light, Beck's and Stella Artois. The biggest IPO of the year so far, by Uber (UBER) in May in New York, raised $8.1 billion.

The world's biggest brewer could use the funds to reduce its massive debt load. But AB InBev CEO Carlos Brito suggested in late June that listing in Asia could also lead to acquisitions in the region.

"The number one reason to do the listing is to have a platform in the region that is seen as closer to those markets and connected to what the region will do, since that's something that can be attractive to local groups," he told the Financial Times.

AB InBev became the world's largest brewer by borrowing money to fund a series of acquisitions. Its most recent mega purchase, of SABMiller, increased the company's debt to $102.5 billion in 2018.

The IPO could also help the company in China, the world's largest market for beer. AB InBev's sales in the country grew 8.3% last year, with its super premium brands performing especially well.

Institutional investors could submit orders starting on Tuesday, according to the IPO document. The IPO will be opened to retail investors on July 8, and the stock will list on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on July 19.

Budweiser APAC plans to sell 95% of the shares to international institutional investors. Only 5% will be set aside for retail investors, unless underwriters choose to release additional shares.

JPMorgan (JPM) and Morgan Stanley (MS) are joint sponsors on the deal, while Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAC) and Deutsche Bank (DB) are acting as joint global coordinators.

AB InBev declined to comment.

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2019-07-02 13:45:00Z
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