Author: News Room

China Vanke, one of China’s largest property developers, said on Monday that its top executives were stepping down and warned of a $6.2 billion loss for 2024, the latest sign that China’s grueling multiyear property downturn has not reached the bottom.In a filing in Hong Kong, Vanke said that its chairman, Yu Liang, would leave his post for “work adjustment reasons.” Zhu Jiusheng, the chief executive, would resign “due to health reasons,” the company said.The changes mark an effort by the local government to take greater control of the management of Vanke.Vanke’s new chairman will be Xin Jie, the head…

The latest guessing game in Washington is where former Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Douglas Emhoff, might go next. Half of that question has been answered.Starting Monday, Mr. Emhoff will become a partner at the corporate law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher, splitting his time between Los Angeles and New York. He will advise companies on crises including litigation and corporate investigations.Mr. Emhoff spent decades as a corporate lawyer before moving to Washington. He was a co-founder of a boutique law firm in 2000, which he sold to a rival, Venable, in 2006. He left Venable in 2017…

Good morning on this action-packed Monday. Mark this week on your “History of Artificial Intelligence Timeline”: The creation of DeepSeek, the Chinese A.I. sensation that we told you about last week, is shaking the technology industry to its core.The super-efficient, open-source software is raising questions about the valuations of tech giants, including the chip maker Nvidia, with their stocks getting crushed today. Has the entire industry been wildly overspending? It’s also raising profound questions about how China may have undercut America’s most critical economic advantage on A.I. by making its technology free. We have more on all of this below.Plus:…

Stock markets fell sharply on Monday, dragged down by fears that advances in artificial intelligence by Chinese upstarts could threaten the moneymaking power of American technology giants.The Chinese A.I. company DeepSeek has made waves by matching the capabilities of cutting-edge chatbots while using a fraction of the specialized computer chips that leading A.I. companies rely on. That has made investors rethink the large returns they are expecting on the heady valuations of chipmakers like Nvidia, whose equipment powers the most advanced A.I. systems, as well as the enormous investments that companies like Google, Meta and OpenAI are making to build…

Owners of electric cars in Vermont recently got a letter from the Department of Motor Vehicles with some bad news. Starting Jan. 1 they would have to pay $178 a year to register their cars, twice as much as owners of vehicles with internal combustion engines.In imposing the higher fee, Vermont became the latest state to make people pay a premium for driving electric. At least 39 states charge such annual fees, including $50 in Hawaii and $200 in Texas, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. That’s up from no states a few years ago.Now, as President Trump…

When a group of prominent Chinese doctors publicly raised worries last week about the quality of domestic drugs, China’s government sent officials to investigate.But now data about the drugs that appeared on a government website as recently as Friday is no longer publicly available. A social media post from a doctor who scrutinized the data has been taken down.The criticism in China over how the government buys drugs for its public health care system, which most people use, has ignited frustration over the most basic of concerns: the effectiveness of medicine.Two separate groups of medical experts and political advisers in…

Earlier this month, Drew Wallace started paying the cooks, bussers and the rest of the 20 or so employees of his restaurant the Bull and Beggar, in Asheville, N.C., for the first time since two feet of river water flooded its dining room in September.“It’s a really victorious feeling,” Mr. Wallace said, his feet planted on a floor that had recently been buried under several inches of fine brick-colored silt. He seemed a little surprised as the words came out of his mouth. “It’s strange to say, ‘I can’t wait for payroll to kick back in.’”Payroll is one of the…

ZK the Goat, a rising star in the world of social media, has recently made headlines with his decision to relocate to Dubai. Known for its luxury, innovation, and business-friendly environment, Dubai offers the perfect backdrop for ZK’s next chapter. With 1.3 million followers on TikTok, 858,000 subscribers on YouTube, and 485,000 followers on Instagram, ZK is not just an influencer but a global brand. His move to Dubai is a strategic one, aimed at expanding his reach and capitalizing on the city’s dynamic social media and business landscape. Dubai, often referred to as the “City of Gold,” is a…

Thanks to the continued advancements of communication and travel, the world is becoming smaller. Many are able to work from almost anywhere, and trips to distant places are no longer limited to the vacation seasons like winter and summer. Unfortunately, despite this supposedly highly convenient era of digital solutions, frequent travelers continue to face a myriad of financial challenges. Issues like high transaction fees, unfavorable currency exchange rates, and the inability to use debit or credit cards in foreign countries are common problems. Luckily, there are now the likes of Black Banx, a digital banking powerhouse that has emerged…

Last month, Black Banx announced a remarkable financial performance for the first quarter of year, achieving record-breaking profits and setting a new benchmark for the company. Under the leadership of German billionaire Michael Gastauer, Black Banx reported a profit before tax of $639 million. This impressive figure reflects a series of innovative strategies that have revitalized the company’s revenue streams including fixed fees. The first quarter results were significantly bolstered by higher revenues, which reached $1.6 billion. A key driver of this increase was the implementation of fixed monthly account maintenance fees for the company’s 45 million customers. This…