Canada spat pulls Russian lumber to U.S.
Russia has emerged as one of the winners from the trade dispute between Canada and the U.S. over lumber.
The U.S. is importing more softwood lumber from overseas after it placed tariffs on Canadian supplies, making them more expensive. Russian shipments are 42 percent higher so far in 2017, according to U.S. government data.
Russia accounts for a relatively small proportion of total imported lumber, while European countries such as Germany and Sweden are among the biggest suppliers to the U.S. But the shift in volumes illustrate how a political spat has quickly altered the flow of international trade.
"It seems to be that there's something illogical that we're not buying the lumber from our neighbors to the north, that we're buying it from the Russians," Jerry Howard, chief executive officer of the National Association of Home Builders, said in a telephone interview from Washington. "That's sort of the looking glass that we've gone through, and that's what the market is forcing us to do now."
The dispute has increased material costs for house builders in the U.S. by 20 percent, according to Howard.
-- Bloomberg News
16 billionaires have outer-space stakes
Think billionaires and outer space and three names quickly come to mind: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson.
It turns out, though, that they have plenty of company. There are 13 others among the world's 500 richest people who have an investment in a space enterprise, according to data compiled by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index and consulting firm Bryce Space and Technology. While technology tycoons dominate, the list also includes casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, who's backing a lunar mission, and Mexican retail and banking billionaire Ricardo Salinas, an investor in satellite network OneWeb.
All told, they have a net worth of $513 billion. Bezos, the world's second-richest man, is funding rocket company Blue Origin to the tune of $1 billion a year. Branson's Virgin Galactic has spent more than $600 million to help get commercial passenger flights into suborbital space by the end of 2018.
-- Bloomberg News
Herbalife in stock buyback; sale talks off
NEW YORK -- Herbalife said Monday that it had been in talks to be acquired and taken private but that those negotiations ended last week.
The nutritional supplement company said that in response to those talks, it is offering to buy $600 million worth of its shares from investors in an auction. Herbalife, which has its U.S. headquarters in Los Angeles, says that investors who sell their shares will get a contingent cash payment if the company is sold within two years. The maneuver, known as a modified Dutch auction, will pay shareholders between $60 per share and $68 per share. The offer ends next month.
Shares of Herbalife Ltd. jumped $6.09, or 9.8 percent, to close Monday at $68.04.
-- The Associated Press
Intel touts new chip PC as decade's leap
Intel, the biggest maker of semiconductors, said its new processors are going to deliver the biggest bump in performance that personal computer users have experienced in years.
The eighth generation of its Core line will provide as much as a 40 percent jump over its predecessor, according to the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company. That's a leap in performance that arguably happens only once in a decade, Intel said. New laptops built on the chips will come to market in September.
Intel, whose chips are the heart of more than 80 percent of the world's personal computers, has been remarkably successful in a market that's been declining since it peaked in 2011 and is now more than 100 million units smaller than it was. In the second quarter, Intel's personal computer chip unit posted a 12 percent increase in sales even as overall shipments of computers continued their slide.
Intel's strategy has been to persuade consumers that they need to buy up, even though they're not replacing their old PCs as often as they did.
-- Bloomberg News
UAE taxes tobacco, drinks to lift revenue
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- The United Arab Emirates has issued a new law that imposes taxes on tobacco products, energy drinks and soft drinks to boost revenue and help offset the impact of lower oil prices.
President of the UAE Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan approved the tax decree Monday. Abu Dhabi's The National news website reports that tobacco and energy drinks will be taxed at 100 percent and soft drinks at 50 percent.
The move follows Saudi Arabia's imposition of such taxes in June. The gradual introduction of the taxes is part of a regionwide effort in the Persian Gulf to diversify revenue streams away from oil.
Persistently lower oil revenues have forced oil exporting countries to consolidate spending, particularly in the Gulf where citizens have grown accustomed to generous perks and subsidies.
-- The Associated Press
Russian grain to top Soviet-era crop peak
A quarter-century after the collapse of the USSR, Russian farmers are finally poised to beat the record for grain production that the country set as a republic within the Soviet Union.
The harvest will total at least 144 million tons this year on bumper wheat and corn crops, said Vladimir Petrichenko, director general of Moscow-based consultant ProZerno. That would push production 2.6 percent above the previous all-time high in 1978, a year before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan under leader Leonid Brezhnev.
Farmers will gather more wheat and corn than ever before, while the barley crop will be the largest since 2008, ProZerno figures show.
Estimates for the crop have been rising as ample rains spurred growth in European parts of the country, contrasting with dry conditions that have hurt crops in the U.S. and Canada. The gains cement Russia's position as a top producer this year. It's expected to be the biggest wheat exporter in the 2017-18 season, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
-- Bloomberg News
Business on 08/22/2017