Category: Business / Finance

BARS and pubs have not usually been the non-drinker’s friend. Knocking back pint after pint of juice or fizzy drink quickly gets boring. But beverage manufacturers are now showing more sympathy for their plight. Many companies regard non-alcoholic drinks as the “biggest opportunity in the market”, says Frank Lampen, who runs Distill Ventures, which helps small producers with investment and advice, and is backed by Diageo, a British drinks giant.

One of the fund’s recent investments, for example, is in Seedlip, a British firm that makes distilled, non-alcoholic “spirits” flavoured with botanicals, and which last year launched in America. Low-alcohol beer, once maligned for its paucity of flavour, is also in fashion. Technological advances mean alcohol can be filtered out of the beer without ruining its taste; other breweries use “lazy” yeast, which produces less alcohol to start with. Over the past couple of years, non-alcoholic craft breweries, such as Nirvana Brewery in London, or…

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Ever since February 2016, when David Cameron, the British prime minister, called a referendum on the UKleaving the EU, the debate has been clouded by catchphrases, similes and confusing metaphors. If you haven’t followed the debate religiously, or you are unfamiliar with British idioms, these may be mysterious. So as the negotiations reach a critical stage, here is your cut-out-and-keep guide to some of the most notable.

Project Fear

This was how the Leave campaign dubbed the economic forecasts made by the Treasury and bodies like the OECD and IMF about the potential adverse impact of a Brexit vote. George Osborne, the chancellor, certainly went over the top with his threats of a “punishment Budget” after a Leave vote. So far, the UK has not fallen into recession, a fact that Brexiters cite when pooh-poohing negative forecasts of the longer-term impact. But the UK’s…

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The same can be said for the economy. The average business cycle since the Second World War has lasted around six years. By that standard the current expansion is elderly, at…

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The same can be said for the economy. The average business cycle since the Second World War has lasted around six years. By that standard the current expansion is elderly, at…

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“INNOCENT if rich, guilty if poor” is a well-known adage in South Korea. It has been trending anew on social media since February 5th, when Lee Jae-yong, the vice-chairman of Samsung Electronics, was released from prison. The 49-year-old heir to South Korea’s biggest chaebol, or family-run conglomerate, had been found guilty of bribing a former president, Park Geun-hye, and her confidante, Choi Soon-sil. But Mr Lee’s initial five-year prison sentence was cut in half and suspended by an appeals court, allowing him to walk free after 353 days in jail. Other executives were also released on suspended sentences.

The ruling largely upheld Mr Lee’s insistence that he had been coerced by Ms Park into handing over the bribe. Prosecutors had charged him with paying 43bn won ($38m), which included buying horses for Ms Choi’s daughter and various donations to her sports foundations. In the end, only use of the horses was recognised as bribery, slashing the sum to 3.6bn won. Although Mr Lee…

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IN 1996 Alan Greenspan began asking why the flashy information technology spreading across America seemed not to be lifting productivity. He was not the first to wonder. A decade earlier Robert Solow, a Nobel prizewinner, famously remarked that computers were everywhere but in the statistics. But Mr Greenspan was uniquely positioned, as the chairman of the Federal Reserve, to experiment on the American economy. As the unemployment rate dropped to levels that might normally trigger a phalanx of interest-rate rises, Mr Greenspan’s Fed moved cautiously, betting that efficiencies from new IT would keep price pressures in check. The result was the longest period of rapid growth since the early 1960s. Despite his success, few central bankers seem eager to repeat the experiment and many remain blinkered to issues other than inflation and employment. That is unfortunate. A little faith in technology could go a long way.

Central bankers are not known to be a visionary bunch. Turning new ideas into more…

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LUANN STOTTLEMYER has had diabetes for 23 years, but it was only in 2016 that her doctor prescribed a treatment that changed her life. It has allowed her to bring her blood-sugar levels under control and lose weight. Yet this miracle of modern science is not a new pill. It is a smartphone app called BlueStar.

The program is one of a growing number of apps that America’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved to treat everything from diabetes to substance abuse. The FDA has encouraged firms to join a scheme that aims to streamline the regulatory process for such treatments. There are many candidates: at least 150 firms globally are developing some form of “digital therapeutic” (“digiceutical” in the lingo), says Mark Sluijs, who advises Merck, a big American drugmaker.

Unlike other sorts of digital health apps, digiceuticals have been tested for efficacy, approved by regulatory agencies such as the FDA and are prescribed by a doctor. Most gather data, either by asking patients for information or by using sensors,…

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EVEN in a business where the house always wins, Steve Wynn is used to winning more than anyone else. The casinos that the billionaire has built, from The Mirage and Bellagio to Wynn Macau and Wynn Palace, helped transform Las Vegas and Macau from seedy gambling joints into luxury high-roller destinations. His fiercest rivals heaped praise on him as a visionary and perfectionist. His company, Wynn Resorts, enjoyed a “Wynn premium” from analysts and investors.

Now he could lose control of his empire. On January 26th the Wall Street Journal published an investigation detailing numerous allegations that would amount to a decades-long pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr Wynn. The board of Wynn Resorts has announced an inquiry by a special committee into the reports, the veracity of which Mr Wynn denies.

He has resigned as finance chairman of the Republican National Committee. Gaming commissioners in Nevada, Macau and…

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