The Business Live page will be back from Monday at 0600.
Enjoy the weekend
The Business Live page will be back from Monday at 0600.
Enjoy the weekend
The London share market ended on a flat note with the FTSE 100 up just 0.1% at 7,264.56 points. It had been at 7,275 at its best point. Nerves over what President Trump might do in Syria unsettled global markets.
The pound rose to a two-month high of $1.4257, up 0.13%. It was flat against the euro.
James Kettle is a bug hunter - not of the insect kind, but of software.
He scans through pages of code looking for mistakes - weaknesses that criminals could exploit to break into a company's network and steal data.
He's now one of the top-earning bug finders on HackerOne, a service that matches hackers with companies and governments looking for experts to test their software.
These elite ethical or "white hat" hackers can earn more than $350,000 (£250,000) a year. Bug bounty programmes award hackers an average of $50,000 a month, with some paying out $1,000,000 a year in total, say industry insiders.
In his first TV interview with foreign media, Cheng Wei tells the BBC's Karishma Vaswani about his plans to take Didi Chuxing global.
The senior executive in charge of sustainability at one of the world's shipping behemoths, John Koreneup from Maersk, told the BBC earlier it is even changing the paint on its cargo carrying ships to become more fuel efficient.
The government has published the analysis that led housing minister Dominic Raab to say that immigration had raised house prices by 20% over 25 years.
Is he right? He might be, but there is a strong argument that the housing market is too complicated to assign price changes to particular factors.
We should also be cautious because it is a 10-year-old model and we have seen an unprecedented decade of low interest rates since then.
It is reasonable to expect an increase in households nationally to increase the demand for housing, but assigning precise-looking figures to that overlooks the complexity of the market.
It's been a good day for the pound, with sterling flirting with the $1.43 level at one point against the US currency - a value it hasn't reached since January.
However, the pound "lost some of its swagger" this afternoon as it fell back, said Conner Campbell, financial analyst at Spreadex.
Despite this, he says. it's still a pretty impressive performance from the currency.
"Sterling looks set to close the week above $1.425 and €1.155, so the currency can’t really complain.
"It will want to be in the best position it can heading into next week, given that the impending UK jobs, inflation and retail sales data may all be impacted by March’s ‘Beast from the East’."
If you're thinking of heading down the local garden centre this weekend you're likely to be welcomed with open arms
The UK's garden centres are suffering after the country's spate of bad weather, with sales at their worst levels in at least five years.
So far this year, average underlying sales are down 15% to 20%, with the early Easter proving a washout, says the Garden Centre Association.
Now the horticulture industry is hoping for brighter late spring weather.
"It's literally in the lap of the gods," said the association's chief executive, Iain Wylie.
Despite reporting better-than-expected first-quarter results, shares in JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo have all fallen in early trade.
The main share indexes have also lost much of their early gains, with the Dow Jones and S&P 500 both up by just 0.1% while the Nasdaq has slipped 0.1%.
A businessman fighting for the "right to be forgotten" has won a High Court action against Google.
The man, who has not been named due to reporting restrictions surrounding the case, wanted search results about a past crime he had committed removed from the search engine.
The judge, Mr Justice Mark Warby, ruled in his favour on Friday.
But he rejected a separate claim made by another businessman who had committed a more serious crime.
UK fashion house Burberry has appointed the current chairman of Tate & Lyle, Gerry Murphy, as its new chairman.
Mr Murphy will take up the role after the company's annual shareholder meeting on 12 July, replacing Sir John Peace who has been in the role for 16 years.
The move completes a changes in leadership at the Burberry brand, which is famed for its camel, red and black check pattern. Last year, Marco Gobbetti replaced Christopher Bailey as chief executive.
"Burberry is a unique British brand that I have admired for a long time and I am looking forward to working with Marco Gobbetti and the board to guide the company through its next phase of growth," Mr Murphy said.
Stocks on Wall Street have opened higher.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average opened up 118.62 points, or 0.5%, at 24,601.67.
The wider S&P 500 index rose 21.80 points, or 0.8%, to 2,663.99 while the tech-heavy Nasdaq index climbed 31.55 points, or 0.4%, to 7,171.80.
A village pub will get a £740,000 cash boost from the National Lottery to turn it into a community hub.
The money has been awarded to a community group in Banton, near Kilsyth, for a major renovation of the Swan Inn.
Investment comes after the People United for Banton (PUB) campaign bought the closure-threatened bar in 2017.
Catherine Moneypenny, Secretary of PUB, said the Swan Inn could be "the community hub we all want and need".
Jaguar Land Rover says it will not be renewing the contracts of 1,000 temporary workers in Solihull.
The company blamed the "continuing headwinds impacting the car industry" for the move.
It said it was continuing to recruit large numbers of engineers and apprentices and it remained "committed" to its UK plants.
JLR has seen its sales suffer so far in 2018 - Jaguar sales were down 26% for the three months ended 31 March, compared with the same period in the previous years, and Land Rover sales were down 20%.
The industry as a whole is down 12%, and diesel registrations overall have plunged, down a third compared the same period in 2017.
Wells Fargo has reported mixed results, with pre-tax profits falling 9% to $7.7bn, compared with the same period in the previous year.
Meanwhile its net income grew 5% year-on-year to $5.9bn.
The bank is still waiting to hear how much the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will fine it for auto insurance and mortgage lending abuses, which could be as much as $1bn.
“I’m confident that our outstanding team will continue to transform Wells Fargo into a better, stronger company; however, we recognise that it will take time to put all of our challenges behind us," said Wells Fargo's chief executive Tim Sloan.
"During the first quarter our team members continued to focus on our vision of satisfying our customers’ financial needs and helping them succeed financially. We also made progress on our priority of rebuilding trust with our customers, team members, communities, regulators, and shareholders."
Citigroup has reported first quarter net income of $4.6bn up 13% on the same period last year.
It was boosted by strength at its consumer banking business and its division which provides banking services to big companies and governments.
BBC tech correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones alerts us to a spat between the Economist and Tesla owner, Elon Musk.
This from the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau.
The year has got off to a "good start" for US banking giant JP Morgan Chase.
Net income was $8.7bn up 35% on the same quarter of last year. Sales were up 10% at $28.5bn.
The bank said higher interest rates and rising loan growth were behind the improvement.
Away from loans, the bank also saw lower costs at its card business, higher income from its auto leases and higher management fees in wealth management.
“2018 is off to a good start with our businesses performing well across the board," said chief executive Jamie Dimon.
"We have been outpacing the industry on consumer deposit growth while attracting significant net new money and growing client investment assets 13%.
"Card sales and merchant processing volume both grew double digits, reflecting our investments in new products and innovation focused on our customers' needs.”
Shares in Sage Group are still down almost 10%, although off the lowest levels of the day.
Investors dumped shares after the company said it would not meet its full-year sales target.
Sage supplies software for accounting, payroll and human resources to millions of small businesses.
So what should we make of the warning?
"Sage is perceived to be one of the reliable performers on the stock market, so a slip up has been punished quite brutally," said Laith Khalaf, Senior Analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.
"Particularly concerning in today’s statement was the big drop in recurring revenue growth, which is one of the key attractions of the stock for shareholders. It’s important to recognise revenues are still growing at Sage, but today investors will be adjusting the slope of their future projections, and that has consequences for the share price," he said.
Russia may block the supply of titanium to Boeing, according to Russian news agency Ria.
The Russian parliament is considering a set of measures in retaliation to US sanctions.
Titanium is an important component in Boeing planes - it makes up 14% of the airframe of the 787 Dreamliner - and Boeing imports large amounts of the metal.
Russian firm VSMPO-Avisma is the world's largest titanium producer, and it is currently in a 50/50 joint venture with Boeing based in the Urals, Russia.
Thousands of fans of the Arctic Monkeys have taken to Twitter to complain that tickets to their new concerts sold out in just one minute.
Tickets were released at 9am BST, but all 10 dates sold out immediately. Four more gigs were added at 10.30am BST, but many fans have still failed to get them.
Some users are now trying to sell off tickets they bought by mistake over the social network, provoking the ire of upset fans who feel deprived of a chance to go to the gigs.
Gaming is a massive industry worth around £1.2 billion to the UK economy and employs about 33,600 people in the UK.
It's a high-skilled industry that the UK is particularly good at says gaming presenter Elle Osili-Wood, but the day after the BAFTA Game awards she tells BBC Breakfast it's undervalued compared to the other creative industries.
Michael Hewson, the chief market analyst at CMC Markets, is a little bemused by the appointment of David Schwimmer as chief executive of the London Stock Exchange.
"It seems an odd choice to go for an investment banker with little experience in equities though at least he and Rolet have both worked for Goldman Sachs.
"He wasn’t even in the frame when the position became available at the end of last year.
"I’m sure he will be a good appointment given his experience at Goldman Sachs but why he won’t be joining until 1st August also seems rather odd.
Sainsbury's has recalled jars of sliced beetroot following concerns there could be small pieces of glass inside.
The supermarket said that, as a precautionary measure, customers who have bought the 340g jar of its own-brand beetroot, item code 7860491, should not eat it.
The jars have a best before date of August 2019 and a batch code L318N 1737.
Customers should return the jars to their nearest Sainsbury’s store where they will receive a full refund, the supermarket said.
A Russian court has ordered all access to the encrypted messenger app Telegram be blocked in the country, according to state news agency TASS.
Last week, Russia's communications watchdog filed a lawsuit to limit access to the service, after Telegram refused requests from the Russian government to let it view users' secret messages.
The pound is slightly higher against the dollar, climbing 0.32% to $1.4273. It's back above $1.425 for the first time since February.
Sterling has also edged higher against the euro, rising 0.18% to €1.1563.
"The pound has been able to take advantage of both the dollar’s ongoing uncertainty, and the euro’s weakened state post-dovish ECB (European Central Bank) meeting minutes," said Connor Campbell, Financial Analyst at SpreadEx.
BBC Radio 4
Last night at the Bafta Games Awards, accolades were given out to honour the best video games of the year.
One big winner was Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, a dark fantasy action-adventure game about a Celtic warrior's struggle with psychosis, which was developed with input from neuroscientists.
The game, which won five awards, was made by a small indie video game developer based in Cambridge called Ninja Theory.
"A few years ago the industry was really moving toward big budget games or mobile and free-to-play games, and the idea of doing a single-player story - it felt like we didn't have a place in the industry and it was very hard to raise money for anything we were doing," Hellblade's writer and director Tameem Antoniades told Today.
But he says the industry is slowly changing, and smaller firms have more opportunities.
"Games have always been a marriage of technical and art. It's always been a technical challenge, but what's changed is that the schools have become so good that small groups of people can do amazing things," he said.
"When you look at the Baftas, there's tiny teams up against teams of hundreds of people. The range of categories is now much more diverse."
China's trade surplus with the US expanded by 19.4% in the first quarter compared to a year earlier - to $58.25bn.
Official data released on Friday showed China's exports to the US rose 14.8% while imports from the US were up 8.9%.
The latest data comes amid an ongoing trade spat between the US and China which has sent shock waves through global markets in recent weeks.
US President Donald Trump is adamant that tariff threats will help address China's bilateral trade surplus with the US, and its policies around intellectual property.
China meanwhile has said it is not afraid of a trade war.
In monthly terms, China's overall exports fell 2.7% in March compared to a year before - surprising analysts who had forecast a rise of about 10% for the period.
Imports rose 14.4%, also giving analysts a bit of a shock. Expectations had been for a rise of just 10%.
The official numbers, calculated in dollar-denominated terms, leave China with a trade deficit for the period for the first time since February last year.
Sage Group is the big loser with a 19% fall, after its warning over falling sales.
IAG is the biggest winner with a 2.5% gain. Investors are no doubt mulling over the prospects of an IAG takeover bid for Norwegian.
On the FTSE 250, Hammerson is the biggest loser with a 12% decline.
In Japan, the benchmark Nikkei 225 finished the session up 0.55% to 21,778 points.
Stocks in Australia rose strongly on Friday morning but lost ground later on news that China had recorded a surprising trade deficit in March compared to a year earlier.
Sydney's benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index ended the day up 0.23% to 5,829.
In China, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was up 0.1% in afternoon trade, while the Shanghai Composite was down 0.67%.
Hammerson shares have fallen 12% after France's Klepierre abandoned an effort to buy the British property firm.
"The Board of Hammerson did not provide any meaningful engagement with respect to the increased proposal and, after careful consideration, Klepierre has concluded that it does not intend to make an offer for Hammerson," the French company said in a statement.
Hammerson owns 22 shopping centres in the UK, including the Bull Ring in Birmingham and Brent Cross in London.
Investors have reacted badly to that warning over slowing sales at Sage Group - shares have plunged almost 15%.
Business management software firm Sage has reported a 1.3% fall in sales for the six months ended 31 March, compared with the same period in the previous year.
The firm said this was due to a decline in recurring business from existing customers, and a decrease in price on new contract licence.
Sage said sales growth was below management's expectations, and as a result, it revised its sales forecast for sales growth down to 7% for the full year, down from 8%.
The London Stock Exchange has appointed David Schwimmer (no, not Ross from Friends) as chief executive.
Mr Schwimmer spent 20 years at Goldman Sachs where, most recently, he was Global Head of Market Structure and Global Head of Metals and Mining in Investment Banking.
You might remember that late last year the previous chief executive left amid boardroom acrimony.
One of the firm's biggest shareholders claimed that Xavier Rolet was forced out.
BBC Radio 4
The Today programme has interviewed Roberto Azevedo, director-general of the World Trade Organization, who says the trade tariffs row between the US and China is a cause for concern.
"I'm quite worried, but there are positive signs also. The fact that the two sides are talking to each other is helpful. In the WTO, they have been trying to address this situation with various departments, including dispute settlement," he told Today.
"This could lead to litigation, but this is still a more normal way of doing things."
BBC Radio 4
The world's biggest car maker Volkswagen has just appointed a new chief executive Herbet Diess (pictured).
The new boss will have to manage his firm's transition from traditional engines to electric vehicles.
"Diesel engines will still be good for big cars, especially SUVs, but VW has committed to an electric platform that will help them produce more than 2.5 million electric vehicles in a couple of years' time, and no one is more committed then them," Arndt Ellinghorst, an automotive analyst at Ever Core told Today.
"It's a myth that the tech world will take over the world of making cars. As we've seen with Tesla, it's very very difficult to make cars at scale.
"VW will partner with tech companies but traditional car makers will still be very relevant."
Rolls Royce says it is carrying out further inspections on its Trent 1000 engines.
Last month Rolls Royce said that problems with its Trent 1000 engine would cost £340m to sort out.
Turbine blades on the engine were wearing out more quickly than expected and there were also problems with the compressor.
Rolls said there will be "incremental" cash costs associated with those checks.
"We sincerely regret the disruption this will cause to our customers and our team of technical experts and service engineers is working around the clock to ensure we return them to full service as soon as possible. We will be working closely with Boeing and affected airlines to minimise disruption wherever possible," said Warren East, chief executive of Rolls-Royce.