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Deutsche Bank has started cutting jobs in London as part of a plan to reduce its global workforce by 18,000 to try to revive its ailing fortunes. The jobs being cut makeup 20% of Deutsche’s global workforce and will hit its investment bank hard. The chief executive, Christian Sewing, promised “tough cutbacks” to the investment bank in May as part of €1bn (£880m) of cost reductions – the latest round in a series of cuts.
Apple has joined a growing chorus of firms urging the Trump administration to drop a plan for more US tariffs on Chinese goods. The US has said it may impose duties on $300bn (£236.1bn) worth of Chinese products if the two sides can’t reach a trade deal. In a letter, Apple “urged” the White House to drop the tariff plan. The tech giant said the duties would “tilt the playing field” to its global rivals.
Adidas has been unsuccessful in an attempt to expand its trademark three-stripe design in the EU after a court ruled it was not “distinctive” enough. The three-stripe logo was first registered by Adidas’s founder, Adi Dassler, on a football boot on 18 August 1949, but the court said it was not sufficient to identify the products as originating from the brand. The ruling is part of a long-running dispute between the German sportswear manufacturer and the Belgian company Shoe Branding Europe.
Uber said Thursday it lost more than $1 billion in the first three months of 2019, in the latest sign that the company has a long and uncertain road ahead to profitability. The ride-hailing company lost $1.01 billion in the first quarter, compared to a rare profit of $3.75 billion in the same period a year ago, which was fueled by its decision to cede two of its operations abroad to rivals. For the better part of a decade, Uber raised unprecedented sums of capital from venture capitalists, celebrities and Saudi Arabia to bulldoze into markets around the world.
Uber priced its IPO at $45 per share Thursday, at the low end of its stated range. At the IPO price of $45 per share, the company will be valued on a non-diluted basis at about $75.46 billion, which will put the stock’s market cap right around the size of Caterpillar’s and make it one of the most valuable companies ever to go public. In 2018, Uber’s revenue reached $11.3 billion for the year, up 43% from 2017, while reporting adjusted losses of $1.8 billion, an improvement over losses of $2.6 billion in 2017, according to its IPO filing. The company has never turned a profit.
In the strongest market debut so far this year, Beyond Meat shares surged 163% Thursday, giving the maker of plant-based meat substitutes a market value of $3.77 billion. On Wednesday night, Beyond priced its initial public offering at $25 per share, for an implied market value of $1.46 billion. Beyond’s meat alternatives, which range from fake ground beef to burger patties, are designed to more closely mimic the texture and taste of traditional meat.
Apple and Qualcomm have settled their royalty dispute, the companies announced in a press release. The settlement includes a payment from Apple to Qualcomm as well as a chipset supply agreement, suggesting that Apple will buy Qualcomm chips for future iPhones. Qualcomm stock rose more than 20% after the news broke, boosting its market cap by about $14.5 billion to more than $84 billion.
Uber released its long-awaited IPO prospectus. The company will list on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “UBER.” The filing comes about two weeks after rival Lyft debuted on the public markets. The two ride-hailing companies had been racing toward the public markets practically in tandem, though Uber’s offering is likely to be significantly larger, and one of the largest offerings this year. The company was previously reported to be seeking a valuation of up to $120 billion.
Tokyo prosecutors arrested Nissan’s former chairman Carlos Ghosn on Thursday for a fourth time, on fresh allegations that cut short his brief time outside detention. The prosecutors defended the move, saying the latest allegations are a new case requiring precautions to prevent Ghosn from destroying evidence. They allege $5 million in funds sent by a Nissan subsidiary to an overseas dealership were diverted to a company controlled by Ghosn. He had been released on bail just a month earlier.
The fast-food company said Monday that it’s testing a soy-based meat patty, dubbed the “Impossible Whopper,” in 59 restaurants in the St. Louis metropolitan area. Burger King is developing the meatless patty with Impossible Foods, a California-based producer of plant-based substitutes whose meatless burgers are served by chains Red Robin and White Castle, along with more than 5,000 restaurants nationwide. The company, founded in 2011 by Stanford biochemistry professor Patrick Brown, uses “heme,” an iron-rich molecule in animal protein, to mimic the flavor of meat.