JP Morgan Chase & Co. gifts its shareholders a 42.9% hike in quarterly dividends. The investment bank’s Board of Directors announced new quarterly dividends of 80 cents per share (up from around 56 cents) that will be paid out on Oct 31.These have been approved by the Federal Reserve. JP Morgan's latest dividend increase follows its earlier 12% hike to 56 cents per share in September 2017. 

Nestle wants to sell its skin health unit, as the company wants to focus mainly on food, drinks and nutritional health.  The Swiss company’s skin health unit (which produces Cetaphil and Proactiv skin care brands and  Restylane wrinkle fillers) had sales of 2.7 billion Swiss francs ($2.8 billion) last year, which is around 3 percent of Nestle’s total sales.Also, Nestle agreed to sell its Gerber Life Insurance business for $1.55 billion, while a Reuters report suggested that it might be  bidding for GlaxoSmithKline’s Horlicks drink.

Comcast Corp. and 21st Century Fox Inc.’s  race to acquire Sky Plc.will be settled in a one-day auction to be held this Saturday. Fox and Comcast will place their respective bids for Europe’s pay-TV behemoth, starting at 5 p.m. on Sept. 21 in London in an auction conducted by Britain’s Takeover Panel.

The stock ended the day up +5%. The company - whose app offers consumer services including lunch reservations, buying movie tickets, booking vacations and hailing car rides -  raised $4.2 billion from its IPO, pricing its shares near the top of its target range.Thursday’s trade valued the company at about $50 billion. Formed in 2015 by the merger of two smaller companies Meituan and Dianping, the company is seen as a potential competitor to Chinese tech giant Alibaba and ride-hailing firm Didi Chuxing.

Alibaba CEO Jack Ma might have turned skeptical about his promise to create 1 million US jobs, as U.S.-China trade tensions keep escalating. Last year, Jack Ma was eager to help American small businesses to sell their products to Chinese customers via Alibaba’s platform – a move he expected would boost jobs in the U.S.But given the intensifying US.-China trade wars in recent times,  Ma seems unsure about following up on his earlier promise. "This promise was on the basis of friendly China-US cooperation and reasonable bilateral trade relations, but the current situation has already destroyed that basis," Ma said in an interview published late Wednesday by China's official news agency, Xinhua.

Auto parts supplier ZF Friedrichshafen AG is developing its own technology for self-driving vehicles. With an investment of 12 billion euros ($14 billion) over the next five years on autonomous vehicle technology, the German company’s project will include developing a battery-powered self-driving delivery van.Navigating city centers, identifying traffic lights and maintaining lanes even in absence of markings on street are some of the features of ZF’s  autonomous van, as mentioned by the company.

GitLab Inc. raised $100 million in financing from Alphabet' Inc.'s GV, Iconiq Capital and Khosla Ventures among other investors.The funding valued the open-source code-sharing & collaborating platform at just over $1 billion. GitLab is apparently gearing up to compete with GitHub, which was acquired by Microsoft in June.

PlayStation fans are in for nostalgia, as Sony plans to release a revamped version of its iconic PlayStation Classic on December 3. On Wednesday, Sony announced that the new version will be 45% smaller than the original, and will have 20 pre-loaded games, including "Final Fantasy VII," "Tekken 3" and "Wild Arms."The release is happening almost 25 years after the original version came out.  

The name is inspired by the animal’s daring nature, according to chief technology officer Jeff Zhang. In recent times, Alibaba CEO Jack Ma has hinted at the need to temper over-dependence on U.S. companies for chips and instead focus on building technologies domestically.His comments came around the time the US Commerce Department precluded American companies from selling parts to Chinese tech firm ZTE that relied on US chipmakers for smartphones and telecommunications equipment manufacturing.    

European Union antitrust regulators are looking into whether or not Amazon has milked smaller retailers’ data to boost its own sales. Such data might include information on consumer preferences, the kind of offers people are liking and other factors that incentivize people to buy things." The EU has, in recent times, been keeping tech companies on a tight leash over their use of data and their compliance with industry competition rules.

China will not devalue its currency to boost it export demand, according to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. "Persistent depreciation of the renminbi will only do more harm than good to our country," Li said said on Wednesday during a speech at a World Economic Forum event in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin.Since China imports much less from the U.S. compared to the other way round, speculations are rife as to whether or not China will manage to have enough measures to 'fight' back at U.S. tariffs. Since April, the yuan (or renminbi) has declined by around -9% against the U.S dollar, amidst U.S.-China trade wars.

In July, China’s ownership of U.S. Treasuries declined to a six month low. China’s holdings of U.S. bonds, bills and notes was $1.17 trillion in July – the lowest level since January.In the latest round of the 'battle',  the U.S. will impose fresh levies on an additional $200 billion of Chinese goods on September 24, to which China has responded with its plan to hit $60 billion of U.S. goods with tariffs. 

In less than three weeks of posting that tweet, Musk abandoned the plans and said that Tesla would remain a publicly traded company.But the latest news of the DOJ’s involvement potentially lends a more serious tone to the matter, since the Department’s investigations are often associated with possible criminal charges.

BMW said Tuesday that it plans to shutdown its Mini factory in England for a month of maintenance starting April 1, over Brexit-related concerns. The German multinational automaker is unsure about whether or not the UK would exit the European Union with a trade deal, and therefore wants to hold off production in its Oxford factory immediately after Brexit.   News of BMW’s decision comes just a day after Jaguar Land Rover announced that it will reduce the number of work days from five to three a week until Christmas for its 1,000 workers due to uncertainty over Brexit. 

Movie subscription service MoviePass’s parent company Helios and Matheson wants to offer its shareholders a reverse stock split, for a second time this year. In a reverse stock split, the issuing company reduces the number of outstanding shares without altering their total value (which means, price per share is raised by the firm).Executives at Helios and Matheson are seeking shareholder votes on a plan that would allow shareholders to trade in 500 shares for a single share worth 500-times as much. If approved, the reverse stock split could  increase Helios and Matheson stock price from less than 2 cents to as much as $10 — which would possibly be sufficient to allow the company to continue being listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. In July, the company executed a reverse stock split to boost its stock from 8 cents to $21; however, its market price dropped to less than a dollar within days. Nasdaq has warned Helios and Matheson that it could be re

Following reports of U.S. President Donald Trump’s fresh round of levies on Chinese goods, China has hit back with its own tariff list against U.S. goods. On Tuesday, the Chinese government announced that it will slap tariffs at rates of 5% or 10%(depending on the product) on US goods worth $60 billion, starting September 24. This comes shortly after a Wall Street Journal report mentioned that U.S. will impose tariffs on an additional $200 billion worth of Chinese goods.U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods will also commence on September 24.

That marks a whopping +48% increase since last year. Apple went ahead with $45 billion worth of buybacks during the first half of 2018, which is triple the amount its spent during the same time period last year.Other companies with substantial share repurchase increases includes Amgen, Cisco, AbbVie and Oracle (as mentioned in the Goldman Sachs report).  For the full year 2018, share buyback authorizations among all US companies will exceed $1 trillion for the first time ever (according to Goldman Sachs projections).

The carmaker said that reducing the number of work days from five to three would help avoid job cuts and allow operation through Christmas. The move is apparently a result of decreasing demand for diesel vehicles.Consumers’ concerns over Brexit uncertainties and regulatory stringency following Volkswagen’s emission scandal might have dampened their appetite for diesel cars. Jaguar Land Rover expressed in July its fears that if Brexit happened without the UK being able to maintain a smooth trading relationship with the European Union, the company would see its profits get reduced by more than £1.2 billion ($1.6 billion)  a year.

Coca-Cola might be interested in ‘taking’ marijuana. According to a report from BNN Bloomberg Television, Coca-Cola is in talks with Canadian marijuana producer Aurora Cannabis Inc. to develop beverages infused with CBD -- the non-psychoactive component in marijuana that treats pain without getting you high. Expressing his thoughts on  CBD’s use in drinks, Coca-Cola spokesman Kent Landers mentions in an emailed statement to Bloomberg New, ““We are closely watching the growth of non-psychoactive CBD as an ingredient in functional wellness beverages around the world,” and also said "The space is evolving quickly.For instance, Corona beer brewer Constellation Brands Inc.announced last month that it will invest $3.8 billion to increase its stake in Canadian marijuana producer Canopy Growth Corp.  Also, Guinness beer-maker Diageo PLC is in talks with at least three Canadian cannabis producers about a possible deal, BNN Bloomberg reported last month.

Moller-Maersk A/S’s customers will have to pay separately for fuel from 2020. Environmental regulations are expected to limit sulfur emissions, and that is likely to cause an upgrade to low-sulfur fuel in shipping and therefore higher fuel expenses – something that has apparently led to Maersk's decision to break out the fuel cost when charging its customers for delivering goods across thousands of miles of ocean.Moller-Maersk A/S's fuel cost projections and new billing strategy could potentially have implications for global trade, especially since about 90% of the trade moves by sea, involving goods such as oil, gas, coal and iron ore.