Business & Markets

SYDNEY — Goodman Group and Digital Realty moved after Wednesday's close to buy up to 9.9% of Australian data-center operator NextDC. They offered A$9.50 a share, about A$715 million in total (roughly US$500 million). The price was a 45.5% premium to NextDC's A$6.53 close, and the shares rose more than 40% Thursday. The two buyers said they have no current plan for a full takeover bid but kept that option open. NextDC's board called the approach opportunistic. It came about two weeks after the company disclosed a power-supply delay at its M3 Melbourne facility, cut its fiscal 2027 outlook and paused new development and land purchases. JPMorgan is advising on the stake purchase. It is not yet clear how many shares were actually acquired.

FRANKFURT — German auto supplier Schaeffler said Tuesday it will eliminate 3,460 jobs and close five sites in Europe, four of them in Germany. The cuts, due by 2028, equal roughly 3% of its nearly 110,000 workers. About 2,660 of the jobs are in Germany. They come on top of 4,700 cuts announced in 2024. The company expects annual savings of about €300 million from 2030, with one-off costs of about €480 million, according to a trade report. Schaeffler cited weak demand for combustion-engine vehicles, a slower electric-mobility ramp-up, high German labor costs and competition from Chinese rivals. Its e-mobility division lost €571 million at the operating level in the first nine months. Shares fell a little over 2% after third-quarter core profit of €245 million, down 7.2%. The works council said the plan lacks a growth vision and asked for talks.

NEW YORK — Wall Street's Wednesday rally set the backdrop. The Dow gained more than 1,500 points, or 3%, its best day since April 2025, and the S&P 500 rose 1.6%. West Texas Intermediate crude fell more than 8% to $88.12 a barrel. In after-hours trading, AppLovin jumped almost 24% on better-than-expected results and guidance. Coherent gained 7% after beating profit and revenue estimates. Expedia fell more than 7% on a mixed outlook: it forecast fourth-quarter revenue of $3.69 billion to $3.75 billion, versus the $3.74 billion analysts expected on average. Snap shares dropped more than 10% after a third-quarter revenue miss. E.l.f. Beauty reported a 51% rise in sales and raised its full-year forecast. Airbnb and Akamai report Thursday afternoon.

Google can now show up to four Google Ads in an AI Mode response to a single query, Search Engine Roundtable reported on November 4. Search Engine Watch had relayed an example by November 2, in which four text ads from marketing-technology firms sat beneath one answer. Sightings of three ads were passed around on October 14. Google has not said how broadly the four-ad layout runs or whether it will last. The report follows Google's earnings-call remarks that AI Mode monetizes less than traditional search while ads in AI Overviews and AI Mode are scaled to more users, queries and markets. This is a new development on the earlier AI Mode ads story: the ad count per answer is now higher.

Google Search Console's performance report has been showing an unexplained jump in clicks for some sites over the past couple of days. It does not affect every site, and Search Engine Roundtable says it may be a bug. Separately, Google's Gary Illyes implied that click and query data are unlikely to be added to Search Console's AI performance report, according to the same outlet on November 2. Google has also revised its page-indexing help text. It now says that not indexing every page is common and does not necessarily signal a problem. Another Google statement says a site with only its homepage indexed may have a quality issue. Google has not confirmed a cause for the click anomaly.

WASHINGTON — Private employers added 86,000 jobs in October, ADP reported Wednesday. That matched the revised September figure and beat forecasts of about 69,000 to 75,000. Trade, transportation and utilities led with 39,000 jobs, while professional and business services lost 27,000. Base pay rose 3.2% from a year earlier, and job-changers saw 4.8%. The Labor Department's October payrolls report is due Friday. Forecasters quoted by outlets including U.S. News and Fox Business expect gains of about 60,000 to 75,000 and an unemployment rate of 4.2%. September payrolls rose only 29,000. Weekly jobless claims stood at 194,000 for the week ended Oct. 24, near the lowest level since July, according to the Labor Department. Economists told Morningstar that Friday's report is unlikely to change December expectations, with the Fed meeting Dec. 8-9 and futures pricing about a 79% chance of a quarter-point hike.

LONDON — The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee is due to announce its decision Thursday at noon London time. Economists polled by Reuters expect a 7-2 vote to lift Bank Rate to 4% from 3.75%. That would be the first increase since August 2023 and the first change since a cut last December. Mounting inflation pressure from the U.S.-Iran war is the driver. Financial markets price at least three more quarter-point rises next year, which would put UK rates above projected U.S. levels. At the September meeting the committee voted 6-3 to hold, with Megan Greene, Catherine Mann and Huw Pill favoring a rise to 4%. Governor Andrew Bailey and four other members said the case for a hike grew the longer energy prices stayed high. The decision comes with the Bank's quarterly Monetary Policy Report.

NEW YORK — Bond yields fell Wednesday as oil dropped and investors assessed Democratic control of Congress. CNBC reported the 10-year Treasury yield down more than 6 basis points at 4.884%, the 30-year at 5.273% and the 2-year at 4.573%. The dollar index fell to about 101.5, a one-month low, according to market data compiled by broker EBC. Gold rose past $4,000 an ounce. Schwab said hopes that a split government could restrain borrowing and spending helped gold and kept yields in check. Short-term rate expectations barely moved. The CME FedWatch tool put the chance of a December Fed hike at about 81%, a bit higher than earlier in the week. The Fed held its target range at 3.75% to 4.00% on Oct. 28, with two dissents in favor of a hike. Next week's inflation data and Friday's payrolls are the next checks.

WASHINGTON — Congress returns Nov. 9 with surface transportation funding unresolved. A stopgap measure extends Highway Trust Fund programs to Dec. 11. It left out the advance appropriations in the 2021 infrastructure law, so that money lapsed Oct. 1, according to Transport Topics. A report from Sen. Maria Cantwell's office, dated Oct. 27, estimates $10.8 billion in nationwide formula funding is at risk, including a full loss for the Bridge Formula Program. It also finds that discretionary programs such as Safe Streets and Roads for All and the Mega program would get no money. The American Public Transportation Association estimates a 20% cut to transit investment and an over-80% cut to passenger rail. Lawmakers have about five legislative weeks to pass a longer bill or approve another short-term extension. The Cantwell figures are a Democratic estimate.

WASHINGTON — The Energy Department's Office of Energy Dominance Financing announced Oct. 27 a conditional commitment of up to $5 billion to Constellation. The money would finance uprates and modernization at eight nuclear plants in Illinois, Maryland and Pennsylvania. Power Magazine puts the potential additional capacity at nearly 1.1 GW. DOE says the work would support power for more than 930,000 homes and over 10,000 jobs. The commitment is subject to technical, legal, environmental and financial conditions, and it includes an option to finance uprates at other Constellation sites. It advances a goal in a 2025 executive order of 5 GW of uprates at existing reactors. Utility Dive notes DOE also announced $5.1 billion in loans to Alliant Energy the same week. DOE had already committed up to $4.2 billion to Vistra for uprates.