Good morning. Johnson & Johnson has tentatively agreed to pay about $700 million to settle an investigation brought by more than 40 states into the marketing of its talcum-based baby powder, a J&J executive said.

The agreement in principle with attorney general offices in most U.S. states is an “important step” for the company, based in New Brunswick, N.J., as it tries to “reasonably put the matter behind us,” J&J Chief Financial Officer Joseph Wolk said in an interview Tuesday.

• Outstanding injury claims: The proposed settlement with states would only address a small portion of the litigation over the safety and marketing of J&J’s talcum powders. It doesn’t resolve the personal-injury lawsuits filed by more than 52,000 plaintiffs in various U.S. courts against J&J, alleging that use of the powders, primarily Johnson’s Baby Powder, caused cancer.
   
• Billions more? J&J likely will have to spend billions more dollars to resolve the broader litigation. J&J is pursuing the consensual resolution of the personal-injury claims through a bankruptcy plan, and analysts have estimated the ultimate settlement cost could range from $10 billion to $15 billion.
   
• No more talc: J&J no longer sells talc-based baby powder. J&J separated its consumer-health business into a stand-alone company that sells a cornstarch-based version of Johnson’s Baby Powder.

Amazon fined in France over alleged employee surveillance.

France’s privacy watchdog fined Amazon.com’s local warehouse management business, saying the company had put in place an “excessively intrusive” system to keep track of staff performance.

The country’s data-protection regulator, the CNIL, announced Tuesday that it had fined Amazon France Logistique 32 million euros ($34.8 million) in late December, saying the business was collecting data from scanners used to process packages to gauge employee productivity and downtime.

U.S. toughens Russia export controls.

The U.S. further expanded its export controls targeting Russia and Belarus in response to Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine.

The Commerce Department on Tuesday announced restrictions on the export of 95 types of items, including chemicals, lubricants and metals. The department also expanded its restrictions on the export of aircraft, spacecraft and their parts.

The move aims to restrict Russia’s access to inputs for its defense industrial base, Commerce said. The U.S. has targeted Belarus because of its complicity in the invasion, the department said.

• The European Union launched an in-depth investigation into Deutsche Lufthansa’s acquisition of a minority stake in ITA Airways, the Italian carrier formerly known as Alitalia, saying the deal could stifle competition.
   
• Apple is planning to add new fees and restrictions when it begins allowing third-party software downloads outside its App Store in response to a new European law intended to tear down its closed iPhone app ecosystem.
   
• A Canadian judge ruled Tuesday that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau violated the country’s constitution when he invoked extraordinary powers in 2022 to end a protest against Covid-19 vaccine mandates. The government pressed banks under the emergency powers into freezing protesters' accounts, using tools normally applied to combat financial crime.
   
• In a new report, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority said 70% of crypto advertisements and other communications it reviewed may violate rules that require fair, balanced and truthful communications with the public.

Spread of militants, coups draws U.S. attention to West Africa.

Top U.S. diplomats, worried about Islamist insurgencies spreading through western Africa, are urging stable countries on the region’s coast to insulate themselves by improving government services and addressing divisive grievances before it is too late.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Ivory Coast this week, touting a $300 million American program to help shore up governments along Africa’s Atlantic Coast, including those in Benin, Ghana, Guinea and Togo. In Ivory Coast, the world’s largest cocoa producer and one of Africa’s fastest-growing economies, Blinken announced $45 million in funding to help sound the alarm and warn the region about militant activity and recruitment.

Global supply chains are in flux.

Companies face a range of global supply-chain headaches, even as pressures stemming from the pandemic have eased. Disruptions from wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, and risks from U.S.-China tensions, are top concerns, Citi said in a new report on supply-chain financing.

Jane Fraser, Citi's chief executive, said geopolitical and macroeconomic shocks had upended the earlier emphasis on sourcing and moving products globally as efficiently as possible.

• China’s central bank announced new steps to boost bank lending to households and businesses, an early move in what is expected to be a broad but restrained campaign by authorities to prop up growth this year after a lackluster 2023.
   
• Officials of Palestinian militant group Hamas have told international mediators that they are open to discussing a deal to release some of the kidnapped Israelis they are holding hostage in exchange for a significant pause in fighting, Egyptian officials said Tuesday.
   
• Higher prices for household items aren’t the turnoff that they used to be. Procter & Gamble said that while pricing is largely fueling sales growth, shoppers stepped up the volume of items purchased across several categories. Some measures of U.S. consumer sentiment are showing improvement.
   
• From fuel and groceries to hotels and airline tickets, consumers are putting more purchases on credit cards—and taking longer to pay them off.

• The labor union that defeated Amazon is fighting for survival.
   
• Sanofi plans to buy assets from biopharmaceutical company Inhibrx in a deal worth up to $2.2 billion.
   
• Turkey’s parliament approved Sweden’s entrance to NATO, removing one of the last remaining obstacles to a historic expansion of the alliance in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
   
• Southwest Airlines flight attendants on Tuesday voted to authorize a strike against the airline, their union said.
   
• The S&P 500 set a third consecutive record Tuesday.

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