Corporate Social Responsibility

In potentially the biggest foreign corporate takeover ever by a German company, Bayer seeks to buy Monsanto for 62 billion. Werner Bauman gets into agribusiness.

Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s de facto leader and a Nobel Peace Prize winner, has a change of heart regarding US sanctions against her country. 

Mexico | Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim is advocating a massive shift to a three-day workweek, particularly for older employees. 

Highly compensated Israeli bank executives feel harried by a new law placing limits on their salaries.  

Panama
The country has been a stellar performer in Latin America, but now a worldwide scandal about its massive offshore financial industry is putting Panama’s economic growth at risk.

Management | Corporate Culture
Several recent financial and corruption scandals have forced multinationals to develop comprehensive corporate conduct and compliance programs.

Management | Corruption
At the anticorruption summit held in London last month, world leaders pledged to fight tax dodging, boost transparency and redouble efforts to confiscate and repatriate stolen assets to many of the world’s poorest countries.

Corporate leaders can be forgiven for not thinking too far ahead. The length of time that investors hold stock has fallen. Share-holders want fast rewards—and quick fixes when performance flags. Moreover, given the upheavals and macroeconomic uncertainties of the past decade, many CEOs and CFOs have been preoccupied with firefighting.

Corporate Charity | Trends
Billionaire philanthropy may be growing, but it is also giving rise to a new trend that could change the face of charitable giving.

Management | Corporate Governance
With the enactment of the Modern Slavery Act in October, the United Kingdom has made a new addition to the growing body of compliance regulations sprouting up globally.

Management | Corporate Boards
Led by investors such as Carl Icahn, Bill Ackman and Jeff Smith, and targeting companies from DuPont to PepsiCo, campaigns by activist investors have become a common occurrence in the United States in the past few decades.

Thomas Gass, assistant secretary-general for policy coordination and interagency affairs in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs at the United Nations, talked with Global Finance about the UN’s new Sustainable Development Goals and how the private sector can help.

Management | Auto Manufacturers
The Volkswagen emissions scandal, which saw the company fudge emissions tests to make its cars appear less polluting, has resulted in a new CEO appointment, the suspension of key executives and a proposed group restructure.

Islamic Finance | Bank Negara’s decision to halt issuing shariah-compliant bonds has left a big hole in the Islamic debt market. Filling the void will take time.

Newsmakers | United Nations
When the United Nations Global Compact was launched 15 years ago at the New York Stock Exchange, Lise Kingo was entrenched on the corporate responsibility frontline in Europe.
 

Winterkorn is forced to resign after it was revealed the company was guilty of manipulating diesel emission tests.

Annual Awards honoring the Best Islamic Financial Institutions in the world.

Global Salon | Global Finance sat down with Ommeed Sathe, vice president and head of impact investing at Newark, New Jersey-based insurer Prudential Financial, to discuss how corporate social responsibility and profitable investing can go hand in hand.

Special Report | Private Banking
Offshore banking, the booking and management of assets outside an individual’s country of domicile, has taken a beating since the financial crisis.

Q&A with Moataz Natafji, general manager, BLOM Development Bank, the Islamic subsidiary of BLOM Bank, Beirut, Lebanon