Latest Developments

Europe
BBC Business

Graduate job vacancies drop by almost 50% in a year

The number of graduate jobs has fallen almost in half in the past year, according to new figures, as employers cut entry-level roles in favour of AI and battle rising costs. Jobs website Adzuna said it had just 8,383 graduate vacancies listed in July, down from 15,397 at the same point last year. Adzuna also found competition among job seekers across all levels is rising, with an average of 2.14 job seekers per vacancy in July, up from 1.93 a year earlier. Businesses have said employer national insurance and minimum wage hikes have made hiring more expensive, particularly for junior staff. The number of graduate vacancies listed hit its lowest level since Adzuna started recording such data in 2016. The firm pointed to a peak for graduate roles in 2017, when it had more than 55,800 listed on its website. That is more than six times the number of roles listed on the site in July. Andrew Hunter, the co-founder of Adzuna, said the figures show "employers still haven't found a reason to open up hiring" for recent graduates. Official figures show the UK's youth unemployment rate - which covers 16-to-24-year-olds - was 16.2% in the three months to March 2026. The number of young people not in education, employment or training (Neet) is now over one million. Young people have told BBC News previously they have applied for hundreds of jobs before even receiving a response. They also expressed frustration at the growing number of employers using AI to screen applications. Former government minister Alan Milburn is leading a major review of the youth unemployment crisis. He has previously said the number of entry-level jobs is shrinking, as is the number of part-time jobs traditionally filled by teenagers and students. The Adzuna data also showed vacancies for jobs in travel, teaching and construction rose in recent weeks. But sectors including healthcare, nursing, hospitality and logistics posted fewer vacancies.

Graduate job vacancies drop by almost 50% in a year
Europe
BBC Business

'What you see is what you pay' - why some US restaurants are banning tips

Wine waiter Caroline Kraetzer earns $40 (£30) an hour, double what most service staff in San Francisco are paid but then it costs a lot to eat at her restaurant. At a set price of $140 (£100) per person, La Cigale is one of a small number of restaurants charging higher prices so it can pay high salaries - and it doesn't allow tips. It tells customers: "What you see is what you pay. We do not accept tips, your kind words and return visits will suffice." Kraetzer says it is good to no longer be "reliant on the generosity of strangers to pay the bills". While waiting staff at other restaurants can make a lot of money from tips, she says "you're often there two hours before service, and again when you're closing after the guests have left, so you are making minimum wage during that time". On the other side of the US, Rachel Miller, chef and owner of Nightshade Noodle Bar in the town Lynn, Massachusetts, moved to a tip-free model five years ago when they reopened after the Covid-19 pandemic. "The people breaking their backs and minds in the kitchen - often the least visible and the least celebrated - were taking home a fraction of what the front staff made on tips for the same hours," she says. Miller says she found it "deeply unsettling" to see higher tips going to white male staff and lower tips to everyone else. "Tipping lets guests, consciously or not, pay people differently based on gender, race, or sexuality and I was not willing to let that decide my team's income." To pay the staff higher wages, Miller also increased prices at the French-Vietnamese restaurant. Its tasting menus now start from $102 (£75) for seven courses before 18:00, and $126 (£92) for nine courses. "Our prices are higher than a comparable restaurant's because they carry the full cost of paying people properly," says Miller. "That is the trade, and I stand behind it." Yet not every restaurant that has switched to a tipless model has made a success of it, as sometimes customers don't appreciate the higher menu prices.

'What you see is what you pay' - why some US restaurants are banning tips
Europe
BBC Business

New 10p coin enters circulation - will you spot one?

Something new might appear in your change when you pay in cash from now on: a 10p coin featuring the portrait of King Charles and the world's largest grouse. Sufficient demand for the coins mean newly-minted 10p pieces are entering circulation for the first time for about four years, this time with a new design. The Royal Mint says shoppers and collectors should discover the coins, which were minted and dated in 2023 and 2026, across the country. The reverse side of the coin depicts an image of the capercaillie which is found in a small part of Scotland and threatened with extinction. The redesigned suite of coins to celebrate the King's love of the natural world were unveiled in October 2023 by The Royal Mint. The tails side of every newly-minted coin from the 1p to the £2 now features the country's flora and fauna - from bees to an oak tree leaf. Coins in circulation in the UK carrying the portrait of King Charles have so far been limited to the 5p, 50p and £1. Old coins with the image of the late Queen Elizabeth II can still be used, so the new coins are only struck in response to demand. That is why, with 1.4 billion 10p coins in circulation, there has been no need for the new 10p to be released until now by The Royal Mint. Now. 600,000 of these coins, dated 2023, and 6.5 million dated 2026 have been released to banks and post offices nationwide. However, King Charles III coins still only represent about 1% of the 24.1 billion coins in circulation across the UK, making any new ones highly sought after by seasoned numismatists and new coin collectors. The capercaillie design on the tails side of the coin is based on an illustration by the artist Mike Langman who previously worked for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB). His illustrations are seen across the charity's nature reserves.

New 10p coin enters circulation - will you spot one?
North America
CNBC Finance

New York unseats San Francisco as the top market for tech talent, CBRE reports

It should come as no surprise that the number of artificial intelligence-specific tech workers is growing rapidly, and the effect of this growth on regional office markets is substantial. For the first time, New York's office market is home to the most tech workers, thanks in large part to AI, according to a new report from CBRE. New York's 394,300 tech talent jobs edged out the San Francisco Bay Area's 375,730 jobs, CBRE found. The report analyzes tech-specific workers in 75 metropolitan markets in the U.S. and Canada. It's the first time New York has taken the lead in the 13 years of this analysis. "The story there is that there's been cuts in the Bay Area, so the tech industry has contracted the size of the tech talent workforce, and the finance sector [in New York] has hired a lot of tech talent and a lot of AI workers," said Colin Yasukochi, executive director of CBRE's Tech Insights Center in San Francisco. For both the U.S. and Canada, AI tech roles grew by 45% in the past year, with San Francisco and New York each adding more than 20,000 AI-specific jobs since mid-2025, according to CBRE. As of June, there were 751,000 AI-related workers across the two countries, the report found. Those include both new jobs and conversions from existing jobs. AI-related roles now account for nearly one-third of all tech-talent job listings in the U.S., per the findings. By market, 37% of AI jobs in the U.S. are in the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, Seattle and Washington. While New York leads in overall tech talent, San Francisco still leads in AI, specifically. In Canada, there is greater concentration of AI employment, with 60% of those jobs based in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. Office leasing is rising accordingly in those markets where AI workers are most in demand. CNBC's Property Play with Diana Olick covers new and evolving opportunities for the real estate investor, delivered weekly to your inbox. In San Francisco, AI companies made up 58% of all leasing in the first half of this year and have accounted for 30% of leasing activity, totaling about 10 million square feet, since 2023, according to CBRE. While overall tech drove the Bay Area's office market over the past few decades, the pandemic pushed many of those workers to remote jobs. AI, however, has a more office-centric culture and is now fueling the market's recovery. "It's more of the sort of startup innovation culture that we've seen, where people are in the office [a] minimum of four, but usually like five or six days a week," said Yasukochi. "Through this whole innovation process, being together and working in person is just much more efficient and innovative."

New York unseats San Francisco as the top market for tech talent, CBRE reports
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

Markets set for cautious start; MSCI rejig, HDFC Bank in focus

Financial Analysts and Day Traders Working on a Computers with Multi-Monitor Workstations with Real-Time Stocks, Commodities and Exchange Market Charts. Team of Brokers at Work in Agency. istock photo for BL | Photo Credit: iStockphoto Indian shares were set for a muted open on Monday, with investors bracing for potential volatility from MSCI’s index rejig under the new closing auction system, while an escalation in the Iran war and HDFC Bank’s CEO resignation could also weigh on sentiment. GIFT Nifty futures were at 24,222.5 points as of 8:11 am IST, indicating a muted start for the Nifty 50. The benchmark index closed at 24,175.65 on Friday and posted its third straight weekly decline. MSCI’s quarterly index changes will be implemented at Monday’s close and take effect on September 1. As part of its August review, the index provider added four Indian stocks to its widely tracked Global Standard index and removed three. This would be the first MSCI rebalancing under India’s new closing auction system, which has led to sharp swings in benchmark indexes, especially on monthly derivatives expiry days. “With these (passive fund) flows executed around the closing auction, the final half-hour could see outsized moves in affected stocks and the broader index, potentially making the closing print less representative of underlying market sentiment,” said Hariselvan Radhakrishnan, founder and CEO of HST Wealth. Meanwhile, global sentiment soured after US forces struck two Iranian launchers, marking the first known American strikes on Iran since late July. Brent crude futures jumped about 2.5 per cent to $90 per barrel, while Asian markets were down 0.7 per cent. Among stocks, the focus will be on HDFC Bank. India’s largest private lender said on Saturday that its Chief Executive Sashidhar Jagdishan will not seek reappointment when his term ends in October. The bank is likely to name Deputy Managing Director Kaizad Bharucha as one of two options for its next CEO, Reuters reported, citing two people familiar with the matter. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

Markets set for cautious start; MSCI rejig, HDFC Bank in focus
North America
CNBC Finance

California AG tells CNBC that settling Paramount-WBD lawsuit would require 'robust structural remedies'

California Attorney General Rob Bonta told CNBC's David Faber on Thursday that the group of states suing to block Paramount Skydance's proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery would require "robust structural remedies" to reach a settlement in the antitrust case. "[Paramount] wanted to talk about everything except for what this case is about. They want to talk about the streaming market, which we don't allege in our complaint. They want to talk about CNN, which is not a focus of our complaint. They want to talk about the foreign regulators. We want to talk about the three markets that we set forth in our complaint, where we think there's antitrust violation," Bonta said. Bonta and 11 other state attorneys general filed a lawsuit in July seeking to block the merger. The group of suing states also includes Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Washington. In the suit, the group focuses on the size of the combined company and how it would control nearly one-third of films and nearly a third of basic cable TV programming. Paramount, which initially sought to close the deal by Sept. 30, agreed to delay the proposed acquisition of WBD to as late as June 2027. A trial will be heard on the matter in March. There has been widespread speculation about whether Paramount and the states will hold settlement talks to bypass the March trial. "I will say that coming to the table has always been on the table. And if [CEO David] Ellison and Paramount want to come to the table in good faith and talk, we want to talk, too. We're happy to have that conversation," Bonta said. "We do prefer to resolve cases in the boardroom instead of the courtroom, but for now we're bringing our case, and, you know, I hope they can focus on the actual allegations we make in our complaint." If the two companies were to combine, it would unite the famed movie studios Warner Bros. and Paramount, as well as a massive portfolio of TV networks including Paramount's broadcast network CBS and pay TV channels such as its MTV and BET with WBD's CNN, Discovery and others. It would also bring together streaming platforms Paramount+ and HBO Max. "Whether the market is shrinking or growing is really irrelevant," Bonta said Thursday in response to the argument that the pay TV subscriber base has been decreasing due to the rise of streaming. Bonta said a combined Paramount-WBD would create a "presumptively illegal market concentration" in the film and TV markets the group of attorneys general identified in the lawsuit. "We are the ones who've looked at this from a straight-up law and facts perspective in the American economy under American law under Clayton Act Section 7, which applies here as antitrust law," Bonta said. "[The law has] been on the books for over a century. And it's just a straight up, meat-and-potatoes, black-and-white, bread-and-butter, antitrust case." The Clayton Antitrust Act is the more-than-100-year-old law that prohibits anticompetitive mergers and acquisitions. Paramount has previously called the states' lawsuit a "misrepresentation of competition in the entertainment industry today," and said it plans to "vigorously defend the transaction and demonstrate that this challenge is inconsistent with sound competition and policy and the competitive realities of the media marketplace."

California AG tells CNBC that settling Paramount-WBD lawsuit would require 'robust structural remedies'
Europe
BBC Business

Review launched into how pub and hotel business rates calculated

Image source, Getty ImagesByNick EdserBusiness reporterPublished4 hours agoA review is being launched into the way business rates are calculated for pubs and hotels in England and Wales, and could lead to a reform of the system. The Treasury says business rates expert Jerry Schurder will lead the review into rate valuations and report back in March 2027, with the government calling for the views of landlords, hoteliers and business owners to feed in to the process. Last month, Andy Burnham announced a 20% cut in business rates for pubs, social clubs and live music venues in England, to come into effect in April. Pub groups have argued they face disproportionately higher rates bills, but other businesses have called for a wider reform of the rates system. According to the British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA), 161 pubs closed in the first three months of this year across England, Scotland and Wales, equating to the loss of around 2,400 jobs. Rising business rates are cited as one issue facing the sector, although there have also been complaints that increases in National Insurance and the minimum wage have made staff costs more expensive. James Murray, financial secretary to the Treasury, said the new review would look at "a rethink of valuations - so that we can build a fairer system for the future". Emma McClarkin, chief executive of the BBPA, said: "For years pubs have paid a disproportionately higher business rates bill which has ground down their ability to keep the doors open, so this review is sorely needed and hugely welcome." The BBPA says pubs are valued differently for rates than retail venues. Instead of being based just on floor area, they are judged by a measure called Fair Maintainable Trade - which means when a pub's turnover increases, so does its rates bill. Schurder is a former business rates policy lead at advisory firm Newmark UK, and his review will feed into the next rates revaluation in 2029. His appointment was welcomed by Craig Beaumont of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) who said he would bring "crucial heavyweight business rates expertise into the Treasury". However, Beaumont said the government needed to address the wider business rates system and exempt more smaller firms by increasing the rates relief threshold for small businesses.

Review launched into how pub and hotel business rates calculated
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

MSCI rejig drives volumes in Indian stocks amid closing auction swings

A quarterly MSCI rebalancing, seen as the first major stress test for India's new stock closing pricing system, drove about $4.1 billion ‌of trades on the National Stock Exchange during the closing auction window on Monday. The exchange said the turnover was nearly 40 ‌times the average since the new closing auction was introduced earlier this ‌month ⁠and represented 21% of cash-market volume, reflecting greater adoption after ⁠initial hiccups. The closing auction is a roughly 20-minute auction during which buy and sell orders are matched to determine a stock's official closing price. Similar mechanisms are used in other global ​and Asian markets, including China, ‌Taiwan, Hong Kong and South Korea. An MSCI index rejig, which takes effect on September 1, spurred the higher interest in the auction, with the stock-specific flows triggering sharp price swings, traders said. MSCI added four Indian companies: ‌Laurus Labs, Lenskart, Adani Energy Solutions and Groww to its global standard ​index, replacing Balkrishna Industries, SBI Cards, and Astral. The reshuffle also reduced the weight for billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries and ⁠increased the weight for Eternal. "Flows-driven moves were always expected," said Anand James, chief market strategist at Geojit Investments, adding that volatility was restricted to a few ‌stocks as is the case usually. Reliance, which had risen 0.6% ahead of the closing auction, saw its indicative prices falling 1.6% during the closing auction, before settling 0.8% lower. Eternal erased intraday losses of 3% at close. Adani Energy fell 10.4%. SBI Card rose 0.6% and Astral fell 0.7%. The new system currently applies only to stocks that have futures and options, leading to ‌muted moves in Lenskart and Groww. "MSCI-related flows are largely handled by foreign institutional investors familiar with ​closing auctions from other global markets, helping limit benchmark swings," said Tejas Shah, head of trading at Equirus Securities. Since its ⁠introduction, the new closing auction has led to sharp swings, particularly on days ⁠when derivative contracts expire.

MSCI rejig drives volumes in Indian stocks amid closing auction swings
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

India's Fly91 close to ordering at least 20 ATR turboprops, sources say

The government has ​sought to bring dozens of ⁠smaller cities into the air network ‌through a subsidised regional connectivity scheme. | Photo Credit: HANDOUT Indian ​regional airline Fly91 is ‌close to placing ​an order ⁠for at least 20 turboprop aircraft from Franco-Italian ‌planemaker ATR as it looks ‌to expand ‌its ⁠fleet, three ⁠sources familiar with the matter said. The deal would ​be a ‌significant bet on India's growing regional aviation market, where ‌the government has ​sought to bring dozens of ⁠smaller cities into the air network ‌through a subsidised regional connectivity scheme, but several regional carriers have struggled to build ‌sustainable businesses. A spokesperson ​for ATR declined to comment. ⁠Fly91 did not immediately ⁠respond to a request for ‌comment. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

India's Fly91 close to ordering at least 20 ATR turboprops, sources say