■FINANCE
RBS near deal to sell assets
Bailed out lender Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is close to sealing a deal to sell its assets in China, India and Malaysia to Standard Chartered, a report said yesterday. The Guardian said the £200 million (US$328 million) deal between RBS, now government-controlled, and emerging market British specialist Standard Chartered was imminent. “Standard Chartered is currently the frontrunner in this auction,” an unnamed source was quoted as saying, adding that HSBC was “still hovering in the background.”
■MINING
Rio Tinto, BHP mull deal
Mining giants Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton are considering merging their Canadian diamond operations as the former bitter rivals look for savings through increased cooperation, a report said yesterday. Both firms had sent employees to Canada to examine a C$1 billion (US$850 million) merger of their diamond mines, which sit alongside each other in the Northwest Territories, the Australian newspaper reported. They already jointly own the Escondida copper mine in Chile and earlier this year announced plans for a massive iron ore joint venture in Western Australia expected to save the firms at least US$10 billion. The Australian said the plan being considered in Canada involved combining operations at BHP’s Ekati and Rio’s Diavik mines.
■INTERNET
Spotify offers application
Spotify, the Swedish music streaming Web site, yesterday announced the launch of its software on Apple’s iPhone. The software application is available to download for free from the AppStore, Apple’s online shop, for customers that subscribe to its premium service, the Swedish company said in the statement. Music fans can sign up for the company’s ad-supported free service or a premium service with no commercials that costs 9.99 euros (US$14.33) a month. Users can search for new tunes and then stream them directly on their handsets. Playlists can even be saved for use when there is poor mobile reception. The service, launched last year, is seen as a potential rival to iTunes because of its free library of millions of songs.
■STEEL
Severstal posts loss
Russia’s largest steelmaker, Severstal, posted a US$290 million loss in the second quarter this year, compared with a US$1.5 billion profit a year earlier, as the steel market remained vulnerable to flagging demand in the global economy. The loss was less than the US$654 million that Severstal incurred in the first quarter. Sales in April to June were US$2.8 billion, a marginal improvement against the previous quarter. The steelmaker said in a statement that it does not propose a dividend payment for the quarter or expect one for the full year.
■INTERNET
Google bows to publishers
Google will make concessions to European publishers and authors in an attempt to stem rising anger over its move to digitize and sell millions of books online, a report said yesterday. The company has agreed to have two non-US representatives on the board of a body that will administer a US legal settlement over the controversial online project, the Financial Times said. The newspaper cited a letter sent to 16 EU publishers’ representatives at the weekend. The letter said Google also promises to consult European publishers before cataloguing some European works in its digital library.
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