#7. Corporate refugees to choose the Netherlands

The Netherlands seems to be a popular destination for corporate refugees. About 250 companies are in talks with the country’s Foreign Investment Agency to potentially relocate their activities to the Netherlands, Bloomberg reports.

The candidates would join 42 other companies that moved last year and 18 others that already relocated to the Netherlands in 2017.


#6. Fitbit moves into the corporate market

Fitbit’s new fitness tracker is available only to corporate employees and health insurance members, TechCrunch reports. It makes sense for the company to move in this direction since the consumer market is very competitive with Apple dominating on the high end of the spectrum and companies such as Xiaomi and Huami offering trackers for as little as $30.

Fitbit’s share price went up to $6.48 on Friday following this news, still down a lot from its listing price of $20 in 2015.


#5. No-deal Brexit chances rising

The Brexit saga continues. On Sunday, the head of business lobby group the Confederation of British Industry said that the chances of Britain leaving the EU next month without a deal have increased since the country has now entered a so-called emergency zone, Reuters reports.

According to CBI director Carolyn Fairbairn, the prospects of a no-deal currently feel much higher. A (never-ending) story that’s without a doubt to be continued next week…


#4. Bond King Bill Gross retires

Mr. Gross, co-founder of investment firm Pimco in 1971 and known by many as ‘the Bond King’ is going into retirement, the New York Times reports. During his time at Pimco, Bill Gross controlled more bond money than anyone else in the world. He also advised the US Treasury during the financial crisis.


#3. Germany severely restricts Facebook’s user data merger

Speaking of a saga that continues… There was another episode in the Facebook saga this week. Germany’s competition authority has ordered the social media giant to severely restrict the data it collates on users, Forbes reports.

In a move that could threaten Facebook’s business model, the German Bundeskartellamt says that Facebook has to stop combining user data from separate apps such as WhatsApp, Instagram, and third-party websites without obtaining explicit user consent first, according to the same Forbes article.


#2. Spain’s economic experiment

Spain is embarking on a major economic experiment. The country’s Socialist government is giving a 22% boost to the minimum wage, saying the jump will lead to more spending and hiring, hence propelling Spain’s expansion, Bloomberg reports.

The increase already came into effect at the beginning of the year and impacts about 8% of Spain’s workforce (1.2 million employees). Critics fear that thousands of jobs will be destroyed because of this jump in the minimum wage since companies can’t afford the extra costs. 


#1. Catalytic converters being targeted by thieves

Palladium prices are soaring and this is pushing a rather special type of thieves to hunt down catalytic converters.

These exhaust-control devices can be found in most cars and they contain the silvery-white precious metal, whose prices have gone up more than 50% since mid-August, the Wall Street Journal reports. As such, palladium is now more expensive than gold.  


There you have it, the sixth week of 2019 all captured in Tweets. As always, we’ll continue to track Twitter and bring you the top financial micro-messages from the web. See you back here next Friday.

Source: www.scoopnest.com.