Autos: Gm to Pay $900m to End Ignition Probe
General Motors agreed last week to pay $900 million to end the Justice Department’s criminal investigation into the automaker’s repeated failure to fix faulty ignition switches linked to at least 124 deaths, said Patricia Hurtado and David Welch in Bloomberg.com. The settlement is part of a deferred-prosecution agreement, which essentially puts GM on probation for three years, during which time the government will monitor some of the automaker’s safety policies. But to the frustration of some victims’ families, no GM employee has so far been charged.
Tech: Apple to release electric car in 2019
Apple “is accelerating efforts to build an electric car,” said Daisuke Wakabayashi in The Wall Street Journal. After studying the feasibility of an Apple-branded vehicle for the past year, the company has set an “ambitious” target release date of 2019. Leaders of the project, “codenamed Titan,” are tripling the size of the current 600-person team and recently met with government officials in California. The first Apple car is not expected to be driverless, but people familiar with Titan said “that capability is part of the product’s long-term plans.”
Economy: Fed holds interest rates steady
“Not yet,” said Paul Davidson in USA Today. That was the message last week from the Federal Reserve, which decided to maintain its unprecedented support for the U.S. recovery and keep its benchmark interest rate near zero, despite the improving job market. Though hiring is “solid,” the central bank said, inflation remains low, exports have fallen, and global economic weakness could drag down U.S. growth. Analysts still expect the Fed to announce a rate bump later this year, though the increase may be “even more gradual” than earlier signaled.
Banking: BofA lets Moynihan keep dual role
Bank of America shareholders voted this week to allow Brian Moynihan to keep both his CEO and chairman jobs, despite intense lobby ing efforts from some of the bank’s top investors, said Michael Cork ery in The New York Times. The vote had become “a flash point for shareholder activists” concerned about the bank’s governance practices, with some of the nation’s largest pension funds arguing that dividing the roles would provide more oversight at the bank. BofA shareholders had voted in 2009 to keep the jobs separate, but the bank’s board of directors “unilaterally overturned” that decision last year, handing Moynihan both jobs.
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