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The Morning Ledger: SEC Calls for Better Controls as Cyber Scams Climb |
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The SEC report said nine companies wired nearly $100 million to hackers who impersonated corporate executives or vendors. PHOTO: ANDREW HARNIK/ASSOCIATED PRESS
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Good day. Public companies that are easy targets of cyber scams could be in violation of accounting rules that call for firms to safeguard assets, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday.
Probing scams: The SEC said in an investigative report that nine public companies wired nearly $100 million to hackers who impersonated corporate executives or vendors using emails. One company made 14 wire payments to a hacker, resulting in more than $45 million in losses, the SEC said. The agency declined to punish the companies, which weren’t identified.
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Growing problem: The type of scam the companies faced, known as business email compromises, has been responsible for more than $5 billion in losses since 2013 and ranked last year as the top cause of estimated losses linked to any cybercrime, the SEC said, citing data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Human error: SEC officials underscored that many of the scams the companies faced weren’t technologically sophisticated but preyed on “weaknesses in policies and procedures and human vulnerabilities,” according to the report.
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Abbott Laboratories, Kaiser Aluminum Corp., Steel Dynamics Inc. and United Rentals Inc. are among the companies scheduled to report earnings today.
The U.S. Federal Reserve releases minutes from its Sept. 25-26 meeting in which the central bank raised short-term interest rates by a quarter percentage point.
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Germany’s Merck to Centralize R&D Spending for Chemicals Business |
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A logo of drugs and chemicals group Merck is pictured in Darmstadt, Germany. PHOTO: RALPH ORLOWSKI/REUTERS
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German pharmaceuticals group Merck KGaA will begin making more research and development spending decisions centrally for a unit that is experiencing declining sales, in an effort to get products to market faster, CFO Journal's Nina Trentmann reports.
The change comes as Merck’s performance materials business battles increased price pressure from Chinese competitors and volume growth is declining, Chief Financial Officer Marcus Kuhnert said Tuesday in an interview with CFO Journal. Sales in that unit fell 4.2% in the second quarter, compared with a 3.2% decline in the prior-year quarter.
The company plans to bring more products to market within one to three years, compared with five years or more in the past, Mr. Kuhnert said. “That means that we are shifting resources...to projects which...deliver economic impact in a much shorter period of time,” he said.
Centrally managing capital allocation for research and development in the performance materials unit will help Merck to prioritize certain projects and better link different stages of the development process, Mr. Kuhnert said.
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Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has said the company is aiming for an IPO in the second half of 2019. PHOTO: JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES
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Uber Technologies Inc. recently received proposals from Wall Street banks valuing the ride-hailing company at as much as $120 billion in an initial public offering that could take place early next year, according to people familiar with the matter.
Facebook Inc. knew of problems with how it measured viewership of video ads on its platform for more than a year before it disclosed them in 2016, according to a complaint filed Tuesday.
A federal judge approved settlements between Elon Musk, Tesla Inc. and securities regulators over the chief executive’s August tweet saying he had secured funding to take the auto maker private.
Alphabet Inc.’s Google said Tuesday that it will start charging device manufacturers license fees to pre-install Google apps on devices running the company’s Android operating system in Europe.
Netflix Inc. exceeded expectations for adding new subscribers during the third quarter, reporting strong user growth in international markets as it continues to invest heavily in its global programming offerings.
Investors pulled cash from BlackRock Inc. for the first time in three years, the latest sign of investor unease about the direction of global markets.
Walmart Inc. lowered its profit targets in the wake of its largest-ever acquisition, the $16 billion deal for Indian e-commerce company Flipkart, but said sales growth will continue next year.
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The New York Stock Exchange and other major markets sell lucrative data to Wall Street banks and traders. PHOTO: WANG YING/XINHUA/ZUMA PRESS
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The SEC ruled against the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq Inc. in a 12-year legal dispute over market-data fees.
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Danske Bank AS said Wednesday that its search for a new chief executive will continue, after the Danish Financial Services Authority said the bank’s proposed candidate lacked experience, Bloomberg reports.
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Japan’s Fujifilm Holdings Corp. has won an appeal in its legal battles with Xerox Corp. as a New York court overturned preliminary injunctions that had blocked the planned merger of the two companies, reports Reuters.
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A group of nine international insurance associations is calling for changes and a two-year delay to an overhaul in accounting rules aimed at increasing transparency about how they generate profits. The standard, IFRS 17, is set to come into force in January 2021, Ms. Trentmann writes.
"We strongly believe a two-year delay in the effective date of the standard is required," the bodies said in an open letter sent to the Chairman of the International Accounting Standards Board, Hans Hoogervorst.
Delaying the effective date of the standard would not result in insurers stopping or slowing their implementation projects, but give them more time to prepare their businesses, the letter said. Insurers expect to spend hundreds of millions on getting their businesses IFRS 17-compliant.
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President Trump said inflation rates remain low while contending the Fed was raising interest rates too fast. PHOTO: MANDEL NGAN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
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President Trump reiterated his complaints that the Federal Reserve is raising short-term interest rates too fast, calling the U.S. central bank “my biggest threat.”
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The U.S. is back on top as the most competitive country in the world, regaining the No. 1 spot for the first time since 2008 in an index produced by the World Economic Forum, which said the country could still do better on social issues.
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Silicon Valley faces a potentially unsettling fact in light of the recent backlash against Saudi Arabia: The kingdom is the largest single funding source for U.S. startups.
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American employers had more than seven million unfilled jobs for the first time on record this summer, reflecting a historically tight labor market that is causing some businesses to struggle to find workers.
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U.S. manufacturers increased their capacity for the 16th straight month in September, fresh evidence that a strengthening economy is helping to propel a U.S. industrial rebound.
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Ubisoft Entertainment SA, a French videogame company, named Frederick Duguet finance chief, effective Jan. 1, 2019. Mr. Duguet succeeds Alain Martinez, who plans to retire at the end of 2018.
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Mr. Duguet joined Ubisoft in 2009 following stints at L’Oréal SA and Procter & Gamble Co. He is currently the company's chief financial planning officer. Any changes to his compensation have yet to be released.
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