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[1/2] A Confederation of British Industry (CBI) logo is seen during their annual conference in London, Britain November 9, 2015. "While the CBI was not previously aware of the most serious allegations, it is vital that they are thoroughly investigated now and we are liaising closely with the police," CBI President Brian McBride said. Virgin Media O2 criticised how the CBI had dealt with the allegations. Aviva (AV.L) and two other insurers, Phoenix Group and Zurich Insurance Group (ZURN.S), also quit on Friday along with asset manager Schroders. Accountancy firm PWC suspended activity with the CBI, as has telecoms company BT Group, while bank Santander said it was reviewing its membership.

☆ UK inflation stays at 10% as bread rises at record clip. Here’s why it’s proving hard to beat
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Hanna Ziady | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

London CNN —UK inflation remained above 10% in March, far higher than in the United States and Europe, as bread prices rose at a record pace. Energy an ‘Achilles’ heel’The United Kingdom is a net importer of energy, unlike the United States. UK inflation to fall sharplyThe good news is that UK inflation is expected to fall rapidly through the remainder of the year, as lower wholesale gas prices feed through to household energy bills. From April, “UK inflation might start to drop faster than in Europe,” he said. But core inflation could take longer to fall in the United Kingdom, according to Gregory of Capital Economics.

☆ UK growth hinges on more than a new pension giant
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Francesco Guerrera | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

Politicians and financiers think a consolidation of the country’s pension funds would breathe new life into its stocks, startups and infrastructure. Meanwhile, there is no doubt that UK defined-benefit pension funds, company-sponsored plans that promise a specific payment upon retirement, have moved away from UK equities. The proposals also entail creating a 100 billion pound pension fund, modelled on the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, a retirement giant with $536 billion assets under management. Overall, some 19% of these funds’ assets are in UK stocks, according to the Pensions Policy Institute. If UK assets can yield the risk-adjusted returns offered by other assets, pension funds will join in too.

Last year, all of the record 15 shareholder proposals were rejected by investors' votes. Shareholder proposals across industries have increased since 2020, but support for them fell from 2021 to 2022, according to a PWC report. The report would detail the "impact of (Amazon's) policies, management, performance metrics, and targets," Tulipshare's proposal said. Tulipshare, which owns 13 shares or about $7,000 in Amazon stock, secured 44% of investors' votes in 2022. Amazon is recommending that shareholders reject Tulipshare's proposal, saying the company continually works to improve "safety processes, programs, and technology."

Companies Amazon.com Inc FollowNEW YORK, April 13 (Reuters) - E-retail giant Amazon (AMZN.O) is facing 18 shareholder proposals, beating its 2022 record of 15 proposals, as environmental, social and governance (ESG)-focused investors push for more changes in the company, according to Amazons' proxy statement released on Thursday. The number of shareholder proposals across industries has grown since 2020. Last year, all of the record 15 shareholder proposals were rejected by investors’ votes. Although Amazon has a record number of proposals on the ballot this year, this is not the most proposals that have been submitted by shareholders to the company. Amazon can challenge submissions with the Securities Exchange Commission or negotiate with investors to provide audits and reports outside of the annual shareholder meeting.

☆ UK economy flat in February as strikes and inflation bite — and the IMF delivers reality check
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Elliot Smith | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

LONDON — The U.K. economy flatlined in February as widespread industrial action and persistently high inflation stymied activity. Large-scale strike action has been carried out in recent months by teachers, doctors, civil servants and rail workers, among others — members of the sectors that were the largest contributors to the fall in February services output. The independent Office for Budget Responsibility no longer expects the U.K. economy to enter a technical recession in 2023 — defined as two consecutive quarters of contractions. "Industrial strike action was the primary root cause of stagnating growth in the U.K. over the month. Much of the population also remains mired in a cost-of-living crisis, as inflation continues to vastly outpace wage growth, exacerbating the threat of further industrial action.

☆ Factbox: Tesla sets stage for annual shareholder meeting
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

April 10 (Reuters) - Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) has put up five proposals for vote at its annual shareholder meeting on May 16, including the nomination of co-founder JB Straubel to the electric-vehicle maker's board. Tesla shareholders usually vote largely in line with board recommendations. FREQUENCY OF NON-BINDING VOTE ON EXECUTIVE COMPENSATIONTesla said shareholders will vote on how frequently they would prefer a non-binding, advisory vote on compensation for executive officers. Investors will choose between one, two and three-year intervals for the non-binding vote on executive compensation, the board said, adding that it recommends a three-year interval. The EV maker has urged shareholders to vote against the proposal, saying it "would cause unnecessary competitive harm".

☆ Tesla nominates ex-CTO JB Straubel to board of directors
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-07 | by ( Lora Kolodny | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

JB Straubel, Tesla Motors' former chief technical officer, speaks during a ribbon cutting for a new Supercharger station outside of the Tesla Factory on August 16, 2013 in Fremont, California. Tesla has nominated JB Straubel, the CEO and founder of e-waste recycler Redwood Materials, to its eight-member board of directors, according to an SEC filing out Thursday. Straubel is deemed a co-founder of Tesla due to his engineering and operations leadership at Tesla from early on. Mizuno was previously the chief investment officer Japan's government pension investment fund and has been a member of the Tesla board since April 2020. Besides Straubel, Tesla is nominating CEO Elon Musk and chair Robyn Denholm to be re-elected to the board of directors again.

☆ Unstable markets drag Canadian M&A, debt issuance to four-year low
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Maiya Keidan | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The collapse of regional banks Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in the U.S. tightened credit market making funding difficult for deals. As the banking crisis abate and many global central banks move to the sidelines to assess the impact of rapid interest rates hikes, bankers are, however, betting that appetite for dealmaking would return. Canadian M&A volumes totalled $34.7 billion in the first quarter, down 52.3% from a year ago, with dealmaking off to the worst start since the same period in 2020. Some market participants noted the second quarter is already off to a stronger start, with the mining sector gathering momentum. Abeed Ramji, head of Canadian Debt Capital Markets at TD, said the lack of issuance from banks impacted the corporate debt market, adding that global markets had become more expensive for financing.

Public Investment Fund LIV Golf Trump World Performance54 LIV Golfers PLUS 45 OTHERS CONSULTANTS LAWYERS McKinsey & Company PwC Public Investment Fund Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan White & Case M. Klein & Company Teneo Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Majed al-Sorour Newcastle United Aramco Golf Saudi Benjamin Quayle Yasir al-Rumayyan Ari Fleischer Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LIV Golf Performance54 Trump World Greg Norman Donald J. Trump Gary Davidson Jed Moore Eric Trump Jared Kushner LIV Golfers Cameron Smith Phil Mickelson Dustin Johnson PLUS 45 OTHERSLIV Golf has cleaved men’s professional golf like no other force since the 1960s. Some of the world’s top players, including Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson, have become the faces of LIV Golf. The Public Investment FundDiagram of the major figures in LIV Golf that are connected to Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. Public Investment Fund Jared Kushner’s firm accepted a $2 billion investment from the Public Investment Fund. LIV Golf Trump World Eric Trump Jared Kushner Donald J. Trump Public Investment Fund Jared Kushner’s firm accepted a $2 billion investment from the Public Investment Fund.

☆ Factbox: Economic reliance on China that EU wants to 'rebalance'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/2] European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen leaves after an EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, Belgium March 24, 2023. Von der Leyen said the bloc could not decouple from China, but needed to reduce risk and "rebalance" economic ties. China is the EU's third largest outside market for its cars, and some 15% of EU car exports head there. Chinese EV exports to the bloc shot up to 6.9 billion euros in 2022 from less than 800 million euros in 2020. CLEAN TECHThe EU imports 80% of its solar panels from China, importing 21 billion euros worth in 2022.

☆ Teen consumers are setting new trends — and spending more. A raft of Club names stand to gain
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( Zev Fima | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Piper Sandler on Tuesday released the results of its semi-annual survey on Gen-Z teenagers, with bullish implications for a slate of Club holdings. For its latest report, Piper Sandler surveyed 5,690 U.S. teens between Feb. 13 and March 21, with an average age of 16.2 years across 47 states. Haircare saw a marginal 1% year-over-year gain, but that's of little concern to us given Estee Lauder's minimal exposure to the haircare market, a dynamic highlighted by Piper Sandler. Internet On the ecommerce front, 57% of survey respondents cited Club name Amazon (AMZ) as their favorite online retailer. As Piper Sandler noted, these are encouraging results that highlight Meta's ongoing product-improvement initiatives.

With large language models like OpenAI's GPT-4 and Google's Bard quickly increasing their power and reach, vLex and Fastcase are betting their combined document library will be a rich training data set for legal AI products. "It will always make sense to train legal LLMs on legal data instead of the World Wide Web," Walters said. The merger creates a law library that is "the biggest legal data corpus ever assembled," the companies said. Other large law firms are using new products from companies like Casetext, a legal research company that last month released a new generative AI legal assistant product. Casey Flaherty of legal innovation collective LexFusion predicted the new vLex would be a "serious player" among legal information companies as AI progresses.

☆ High-profile tech leaders say AI is developing too fast and we should pause. Google's Bard says it's complicated.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-01 | by ( Josée Rose | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

A letter from tech heavyweights and researchers urging caution about AI should serve as a warning. To help address the fears, companies must set rules and be open how they use AI, execs told Insider. If you ask a group of high-profile tech leaders and researchers, they'll answer a firm "yes." That could involve companies coming up with standards and declaring how they are using or plan to use AI, business leaders told Insider. Bricker said business leaders need to work on improving the rules around AI systems and processes.

☆ Britain sets out next steps to green its financial system
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-30 | by ( Huw Jones | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Asset managers oversee assets worth 10 trillion pounds ($12.35 trillion), with nearly half having integrated ESG into the investment process, the paper said. "This will support the quality of standards, labels and disclosures used in the industry for green finance activity," the ministry said in a statement. "The government proposes that nuclear - as a key technology within our pathways to reach net zero - will be included within the UK’s Green Taxonomy, subject to consultation." In the fourth quarter, Britain will also consult on requirements for the largest companies to disclose their transition plans to net zero carbon emissions, if they have one, the ministry said. Brendan Curry, policy fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change, said the updated strategy has "failed to deliver" a clear roadmap for the annual investment needed for net zero.

☆ Corporate giants say anti-LGBT law would hurt Uganda's economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-29 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NAIROBI, March 29 (Reuters) - A coalition of international companies, including Google (GOOGL.O) and Microsoft (MSFT.O), on Wednesday denounced anti-LGBTQ legislation passed by Uganda's parliament last week, warning it would damage the East Africa country's economy. The Open for Business coalition said the legislation, which criminalises identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer, would curb investment flows and deter tourists. Open for Business said in a statement the new law would undermine companies' ability to recruit a diverse and talented workforce. "Either they violate the law in Uganda or they are going against international standards of corporate responsibility as well as human rights laws of the countries in which they are headquartered," she said. Among the coalition's members, Google, Mastercard (MA.N) Unilever (ULVR.L), Standard Chartered (STAN.L), PwC and Deloitte (DLTE.UL) have operations in Uganda.

☆ Layoffs destroy workers' trust, but there are ways employers can reduce the damage, a PwC survey shows
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Josée Rose | Tim Paradis | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A PwC survey identified steps employers can take to help restore trust amid layoffs. "Trust is built in hard times, not easy times," Wes Bricker, a vice chair and US trust solutions coleader at PwC, told Insider. Bank runs and waves of job cuts across industries, including tech, have left some leaders and rank-and-file workers feeling uneasy. Yet the gaps in trust revealed by the survey indicate that there's more work for business leaders to do. The recent challenges in some industries mean business leaders need to be straight with their employees, Bricker said, even when it's difficult.

☆ Teacher transitions from the classroom to a major accounting firm — and reminds others 'you haven't just taught'
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-25 | by ( Britney Nguyen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Michael Sanders taught US history at two different charter schools around the start of the pandemic. He talked to Insider about how he transitioned out of teaching to working at a Big Four firm. In 2019, he started teaching tenth grade US history at a charter school in Barnstable, Mass., which he enjoyed. The next school year, he moved to a larger charter school network in Austin, Texas, and taught AP US history to eleventh-graders. He still talks to some of his former students and teacher colleagues too.

☆ Want to start a side hustle and earn extra money? Here's how to launch a lucrative business and bring in six figures.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( Alexandra York | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Like many people during the pandemic, Davis reallocated the time she'd typically spent commuting home to building her side hustle. Davis' handbag company netted $14,000 in sales in its first four months in business, which Insider verified with documentation. Another entrepreneur, Lisa Andrea, regularly books $8,000 in revenue a month from her side hustle, The Financial Cookbook, which Insider also verified with documentation. Andrea started The Financial Cookbook, an online financial-coaching company, to earn extra income and try entrepreneurship part time before taking the plunge. Leveraging expertise, as Andrea did with financial coaching, is one way entrepreneurs can start a side hustle and balance risk versus reward.

☆ EY's 'paused' split dragged into $2.7 bln London lawsuit
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( Sam Tobin | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, March 20 (Reuters) - EY’s plans to split its auditing and consulting arms have been dragged into a $2.7 billion lawsuit brought in London by the administrators of troubled hospital operator NMC Health PLC over concerns EY would be unable to pay if it loses the case. "NMC will be aware from press coverage … that the potential separation under consideration is paused," the document said. However, EY – which denies any breach of duty to NMC – says it has already agreed to provide relevant information about the potential split to NMC. EY’s lawyer Thomas Plewman also said in court filings that, as the proposed separation has been paused, the application is "premature and unnecessary". Court filings for Monday’s hearing indicate that a trial of NMC’s lawsuit will not begin before October, 2024.

Despite SVB's demise knocking the value of banks globally, particularly European lender Credit Suisse, U.N. climate envoy Mark Carney said he, too, did not expect a "material" impact on climate tech funding. "At a minimum, this will likely drive continued tightening of investments and a push to have their portfolio companies cut (cash) burn," it said in a note. Mona Dajani, partner at law firm Shearman and Sterling, said most of her clean energy clients either banked with SVB or faced some other impact from its troubles. SVB "cultivated a reputation as being very friendly to clean energy... they were willing to underwrite more risk," she said. "Not all the companies are going to make it and now that’s happening to climate companies."

HONG KONG, March 16 (Reuters) - Officials from the U.S. audit watchdog will start a new round of inspections in Hong Kong on Chinese companies' auditors as soon as next week, sources said, as part of a deal with Beijing to prevent delistings of the firms from the New York bourse. That visit came after U.S. and China reached a landmark deal last August to settle a long-running dispute over auditing compliance of U.S.-listed Chinese firms. It also warned that any obstruction of inspection access could affect Chinese firms' listings in the U.S. A mainland branch under KPMG and a Hong Kong branch under PwC were picked by the PCAOB in last year's inspections, the PCAOB said earlier. Reporting by Xie Yu and Selena Li in Hong Kong, additional reporting by Chris Prentice in Washington; Editing by Sumeet Chatterjee and Sonali PaulOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Inside the opaque tech market where startup employees and early investors are trying to get rich now IPOs have collapsed and the VC party is over
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Callum Burroughs | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Startup employees and early investors tended to get rich at IPO or acquisition. That's the tough reality for startup employees and early investors as IPOs drop off and venture capital funding dries up. There's a glut of highly valued, late-stage private companies that should be debuting on stock exchanges in the next 12 to 36 months. Share options held by employees and investors can also come with an array of terms and conditions that make them harder to liquidate. "Investors are defending valuations that hurt employees – and companies long term – but help them raise their new funds.

☆ 4,000 legal professionals at one of the world's largest accounting firms are getting a chatbot to speed up their work
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Britney Nguyen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Accounting firm PwC is giving 4,000 of its lawyers access to an AI chatbot to help speed up work. The chatbots are being provided by AI startup Harvey which has a 12-month partnership with PwC. PwC said the chatbots will be used to help in areas like due diligence and contract analysis. The firm said AI won't be used to provide clients with legal advice, nor will it replace or substitute lawyers and professional legal services. PwC also plans to use Harvey to develop and train its own proprietary models to make products for the firm's use and for its Legal Business Solutions clients.

(Reuters) - PricewaterhouseCoopers said Wednesday that it will give 4,000 of its legal professionals access to an artificial intelligence platform, becoming the latest firm to introduce generative AI technology for legal work. Other companies, law firms and professional services firms have also started to experiment with generative AI technology. Global law firm Allen & Overy last month became the first major legal business to publicly partner with Harvey. Other legal technology companies are rushing to incorporate generative AI capabilities into products. Casetext, a legal research company, said Tuesday its recently-released AI legal assistant product is also built on OpenAI's latest model, GPT-4.

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