North America:

  • Microsoft will have invested $80 billion in AI infrastructure by the end of 2025.
  • Paychex is negotiating to buy Paycor, according to Bloomberg.
  • General Motors, Ford and Toyota saw sales growth in the US in 2024.
  • Shares in Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp (Freddie Mac) and Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) soared 30% after the federal agencies unveiled a framework for their “orderly” exit from government conservatorship.
  • Getty Images is considering merging with Shutterstock, according to Bloomberg.
  • Walt Disney is reportedly close to merging Hulu and its live TV service with FuboTV, aiming to integrate their online live TV offerings into a sports-centric streaming platform.
  • In December, Spain's service sector saw its fastest expansion since April due to a surge in new business and recovery post-flooding, while the HCOB Eurozone Composite PMI Output Index increased, and S&P Global completed the acquisition of ProntoNLP.
  • Alibaba International's AI-powered search engine Accio has reached 500,000 SME users, while Alibaba Cloud has partnered with 01.AI and RayNeo to enhance AI models and support AR glasses products with large language models.
  • United States Steel and Nippon Steel have filed federal lawsuits challenging President Biden's order blocking their proposed business deal.
  • Perpetua Resources has been approved by the U.S. Forest Service to develop the Stibnite gold-antimony project in Idaho, following an eight-year review, while maintaining its stock rating and price target as per National Bank of Canada.
  • Uber Technologies has accelerated its stock buyback plan by signing an agreement to repurchase $1.5 billion of its shares from Bank of America.
  • KKR has taken legal action against Bain Capital, urging Fuji Soft to file an injunction over allegations of breaching a non-disclosure agreement and misusing confidential information in a takeover bid.

Europe and Asia:

  • UBS has appointed an independent ombudsman to investigate Nazi-linked accounts at Credit Suisse.
  • Galp Energia is investigating an anonymous complaint about an alleged personal relationship between CEO Filipe Silva and a company executive, the business website ECO reported on Saturday.
  • Eni restarts drilling for a gas project off the coast of Egypt.
  • Rheinmetall sets up a joint venture in Lithuania to build a munitions factory.
  • Volkswagen and Xpeng strengthen their collaboration by working together to develop ultra-fast charging networks for electric vehicles in China.
  • Moody's upgraded Unipol's credit rating from Ba1 to Baa3.
  • Nippon Steel considers legal action against White House veto of United States Steel takeover.
  • Insignia Financial receives a $1.8 billion takeover offer from CC Capital Partners.
  • Foxconn,Apple's largest iPhone assembler, reported record Q4 sales, up 15.2%.