the bottomline

MADISON:

The Wisconsin Senate was poised to approve nearly $3 billion in cash payments for Taiwanbased Foxconn Technology Group on Tuesday, an unprecedented incentive package for the electronics company to locate a flat-screen factory in the state.

The proposed subsidy would be the largest ever from a US state to a foreign company and 10 times bigger than anything Wisconsin has extended to a private business. It would take at least 25 years for Wisconsin to see a return on its investment, the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau estimated.

Foxconn would receive $2.85 billion in cash payments over 15 years if it invests $10 billion in the state and employs 13,000 people. It could also qualify for $150 million in sales tax exemptions for construction equipment. (AP)

WASHINGTON:

The General Motors unit developing autonomous vehicles said Monday it has begun rolling out the first “mass producible” self-driving cars that could be available once regulations allow.

“This isn’t just a concept design — it has airbags, crumple zones, and comfortable seats,” said Kyle Vogt, who heads Cruise Automation,a technology startup acquired by GM in 2016.

Vogt said in a blog post on Medium that the cars are being made “in a high-volume assembly plant” capable of producing hundreds of thousands of vehicles per year. (AFP)

NEW HAVEN:

Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc has announced that it is relocating its headquarters from New Haven, Connecticut to Boston.

In what it calls a plan to “re-align the global organization with its refocused corporate strategy,” the company also announced Tuesday it is cutting 20 percent of its workforce.

The company said about 400 jobs will move to Boston by the middle of next year. The company will maintain a research and development center in New Haven with about 450 employees. (AP)

LOS ANGELES:

Google has hired a number of key Skype engineers following Microsoft’s decision to close its office in Sweden’s capital Stockholm, Variety has learned. The new hires are likely going to help Google with its real-time communication services, which includes its corporate Meet video-conferencing service as well as its Duo video chat app.

Google didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The exact number of hires is unknown, but apparently in the double digits. A source with knowledge of the move told Variety that Google interviewed the majority of engineers at the location, and that almost everyone who ended up getting a job offer accepted it. (RTRS)

NEW YORK:

The Justice Department brought civil fraud charges Monday against a former Deutsche Bank executive over alleged misrepresentations on more than $1 billion in mortgage-backed securities sold ahead of the 2008 financial crisis.

US prosecutors are seeking an unspecified civil penalty from Paul Mangione, former Deutsche Bank head of sub-prime trading, charging that he misrepresented the quality of loans backing a pair of securities worth a total of $1.4 billion.

Mangione “falsely represented” that Deutsche Bank had strict underwriting guidelines and a strict monitoring process for the securities, US officials said. Pension plans, financial institutions and religious organizations suffered “significant” losses as a result. (AFP)

BERLIN:

Bankrupt German airline Air Berlin says its existence is threatened by an apparent wildcat strike, after 200 pilots called in sick at short notice Tuesday.

The ailing carrier was forced to cancel more than 100 flights including trans-Atlantic connections, causing chaos at several German airports.

The airline’s chief executive, Thomas Winkelmann, accused pilots of “playing with fire” as the canceled flights would cost the company several million euros (dollars), making it less attractive to potential buyers.

German media reported that the airline is in a dispute with pilots about the transfer of staff to a new owner. (AP)

LONDON:

The British government will refer Twenty-First Century Fox Inc.’s bid for satellite broadcaster Sky to the country’s competition regulator for further examination, in a blow to Rupert Murdoch’s takeover plans.

Culture Secretary Karen Bradley told lawmakers Tuesday that she intended to refer the takeover to the Competition and Markets Authority because of concerns that the deal might concentrate too much power in one company’s hands. Murdoch already owns British newspapers including the Sun and The Times of London.

And she said she was also “minded” to refer it out of concerns about broadcasting standards. Bradley said there is a risk, “which is not purely fanciful,” that the merger would not be in the public interest. (AP)

LONDON:

Glencore’s move last week to sell most of its stake in Russian oil major Rosneft to Chinese conglomerate CEFC is eliciting admiration from the Swiss oil trader’s rivals — and relief from its bankers.

To rivals, it appears to be a clever deal by Glencore’s boss Ivan Glasenberg, who had initially invested 300 million euros of Glencore’s money in a deal worth 10.2 billion.

On paper, after nine months he shows a small loss: Glencore retains a 0.5 percent equity stake in Rosneft, now worth around 250 million euros. But crucially, traders expect Glencore to hold on to the most valuable benefit of the deal: an agreement to let his firm sell hundreds of millions of barrels of Russian oil to global markets over five years. (RTRS)

NICOSIA:

Cyprus said on Tuesday that an exploratory drill by ItalianFrench venture Eni-Total in waters off the Mediterranean island had failed to find enough natural gas to exploit.

The discovery of a gas field off Cyprus’s southeast coast in 2011 raised the country’s hopes of becoming a regional energy player, but it must find more reserves to make a planned onshore terminal financially viable.

Energy Minister George Lakkotrypis said data from the Eni-Total venture’s exploration drilling in a different block had confirmed the existence of a natural gas reservoir within the country’s exclusive economic zone. (AFP)