Binance will allow users in Syria to trade in cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin, on the platform after the US decision to lift sanctions on the country last month, the company said on Thursday. Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, said that Syrians will be granted full access to its offerings, which include more than 300 cryptocurrency tokens and stable coins. The group added that the Syrian pound could now be used to buy and sell cryptocurrencies on the exchange.
US President Donald Trump’s administration made a surprise announcement last month on lifting sanctions against Syria, where an Islamist-led government took power after overthrowing former leader Bashar al-Assad in December. Trump said he took the decision at the behest of Saudi Arabia, which was a leading advocate for removing the sanctions. Syria’s new leaders are aiming to make rapid progress in improving public services, including internet connectivity, in the country after 14 years of civil war and decades of Western sanctions. Reuters
BlackRock sets sights high
BlackRock said on Thursday it was aiming to grow its revenue to $35bn and more by 2030, as the asset management giant expands its foothold in private markets.
The New York-based firm, which reported revenue of $20bn for 2024, was to hold an investor day on Thursday that is expected to provide insight into the firm’s strategic priorities and its growing focus on private markets.
The world’s largest asset manager, overseeing $11.58-trillion at the end of the first quarter, last year expanded its presence in private markets through a series of acquisitions that BlackRock boss Larry Fink said were transformational for the New York-based firm.
BlackRock spent about $25bn in 2024 on infrastructure investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners and private credit business HPS Investment Partners. It also struck a $3.2bn deal to acquire UK data provider Preqin. That acquisition officially closed in March. BlackRock is also aiming to double its market cap to $280bn and targeting $400bn of cumulative fundraising in private markets by 2030, it said in an investor presentation on Thursday. Reuters
Gordon Brothers’ £80m turnaround plan
Investment firm Gordon Brothers has acquired Pepco Group’s struggling Poundland business for a nominal value and will invest up to £80m to help fuel its turnaround, the companies said on Thursday. Pepco has been weighing options for the more than 800-store British discount retailer since December, and last month warned that a potential sale would result in meagre proceeds as the business is struggling in “challenging trading conditions”.
The sale “marks an important milestone in our strategic plan to move away from FMCG and focus predominantly on Pepco, our higher margin clothing and general merchandise business,” Pepco Group CEO Stephan Borchert said in a statement.
Poundland has been a fixture on British high streets since its founding in 1990 and became a popular destination for value shopping, offering items ranging from cosmetics to food and home décor to stationery — all originally priced at one pound. Though it formally moved away from the one pound-only model in 2019, its revenue has struggled to pick up, with first-half sales slipping 7.3% and leading Pepco to book an impairment charge of €234m. Reuters
MD Knaap resigns after second mix-up
Australian fertility business Monash IVF said on Thursday that CEO and MD Michael Knaap has resigned, days after the company disclosed a second fertility clinic mix-up within two months. Shares of the company ended the session 9.1% higher, indicating the news helped alleviate investor concerns that had sent the stock plummeting 38% in the two months since the first mix-up was revealed after market hours on April 10.
The IVF provider’s finance chief, Malik Jainudeen, has taken over as acting CEO. The company, which has not yet disclosed the reason behind Knaap’s resignation, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Knaap had served as Monash’s CFO for more than three years before taking over as CEO in April 2019.
The second mix-up, reported a few days ago, raised concerns about an industry that did not have much active government attention until recently. In April, the fertility company confirmed a mix-up at its Brisbane clinic, where a patient unknowingly gave birth to another couple’s child after an embryo from a different patient was mistakenly transferred. Reuters
Air taxi partnership deal expanded
British electric-aircraft developer Vertical Aerospace said on Thursday it has expanded its partnership with helicopter ride operator Bristow Group as it aims to bring air taxi services into commercial operation. US-listed shares of Vertical were up 2.6% in premarket trade and Bristow was up 3%. Texas-based Bristow Group — which offers short-distance helicopter rides in several countries, including the UK and the US — has also ordered up to 50 of Vertical’s VX4 aircraft, with the option to purchase 50 more.
Air taxi start-ups are heavily investing to secure approvals and commercialise electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, to meet the growing demand for faster, more sustainable urban transportation amid a stringent regulatory environment.
The deal provides Vertical’s customers a scalable eVTOL platform, without the need to build operational infrastructure from scratch, the companies said. “We think eVTOL aircraft will be a 60% to 70% reduction in direct operating cost,” Chris Bradshaw, CEO of Bristow Group, said in an interview.
The partnership also includes access to certified aircraft, trained pilots, maintenance and insurance via Bristow, with both companies managing aircraft operations for Vertical’s customers. “This strategic partnership mirrors what already successfully works in aviation today,” said Vertical Aerospace CEO Stuart Simpson, adding that it will lower barriers to market entry and accelerate eVTOL service adoption worldwide Reuters
BioNTech to buy CureVac in $1.25bn deal
German biotech firm BioNTech has agreed to acquire domestic peer CureVac for about $1.25bn worth of BioNTech shares, it said on Thursday, to boost its work on new mRNA-based cancer treatments.
Under the agreed deal, which pairs two former rivals in the race to develop Covid-19 vaccines, each CureVac share will be exchanged for about $5.46 in BioNTech American depositary shares (ADS), BioNTech said.
The deal further underscores BioNTech’s costly long-term ambition to focus on new cancer treatments and show that its success as Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine partner, which left its balance sheet flush with billions of euros in cash, was not a fluke.
CureVac shareholders are expected to own 4%-6% of BioNTech after the deal closes, it said. Reuters
‘Europe needs small, affordable cars’
Turin — Europe needs small and affordable cars such as Japan’s so-called kei cars, Stellantis chair John Elkann said on Thursday, as high prices, which he blamed on regulation in the region, weigh on consumer demand.
Kei cars are urban vehicles traditionally sold in Japan with size and engine restrictions, enjoying lower tax and insurance costs. Elkann said the European equivalent could be called the “e car”.
“There’s no reason if Japan has a kei car, which is 40% of the market, Europe should not have an e car,” he said at an Automotive News Europe conference in the Italian city of Turin, the home of Fiat, now part of Stellantis.
Fiat has a tradition of making small, affordable cars, from the “Topolino” of pre-war years to the famous “600" and “500" of the 1950s and 1960s, which helped Italians to take to the roads and turned Fiat into a European giant. Reuters
Toyota chair re-elected amid buyout bid
Toyota City — Toyota Motor shareholders re-elected Akio Toyoda as chair on Thursday, highlighting support among mom-and-pop investors even as the Japanese automaker’s $33bn buyout of a group company draws criticism from overseas shareholders.
Toyoda, formerly CEO of the world’s top-selling automaker and grandson of its founder, was widely expected to be re-elected at Thursday’s AGM. For the first year in three, he was not opposed by either of the leading proxy advisory firms which had previously flagged governance concerns.
The breakdown of voting is yet to be released so it is unclear whether he secured more than last year’s 72%, the lowest on record for a Toyota director. The Nikkei newspaper reported, without citing its source, that Toyoda was estimated to have received at least 96%. Reuters
KPMG fined for Carr’s Group audit breach
The British accounting watchdog imposed a penalty of £1.25m on audit firm KPMG on Thursday as a result of an investigation into the financial audit of UK manufacturing firm Carr’s Group. KPMG and audit engagement partner Nick Plumb failed to ensure compliance with applicable independence requirements, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) said. “In this case, while the quality of the audit work performed by the two firms is not brought into question, the breaches were serious,” FRC deputy executive counsel Jamie Symington said in a statement published on its website. Reuters
Tesco sales rise as market share grows
Tesco, Britain’s biggest food retailer, said UK underlying sales growth picked up in its first quarter and it won market share from rivals but it left its profit guidance for the full-year unchanged. The group, whose share of Britain’s grocery market has grown this year to 28%, a level not seen since 2016, said its UK like-for-like sales rose 5.1% in the 13 weeks to May 24, having been up 4.3% in the previous quarter. Tesco said it still expected to report adjusted operating profit of between £2.7bn-£3bn in the year ending February 2026, down from the £3.13bn achieved in 2024/25. The group said in April it expected profit to fall in its 2025/26 year as it set aside cash to deal with a step up in the “competitive intensity” of the UK grocery market — a reference to a pledge of sustained price cuts from Asda, Britain’s third biggest supermarket group, which has been losing market share. “The market remains intensely competitive,” Tesco CEO Ken Murphy said on Thursday. Reuters
Banco BPM’s takeover appeal rejected
An Italian court on Thursday rejected an appeal by Banco BPM which had challenged the suspension of a takeover offer it faces by rival UniCredit, the court’s website showed.
UniCredit secured a one-month suspension of its offer for BPM by the country’s markets regulator after the bid ran into difficulties due to government-set conditions. UniCredit has challenged the conditions in court.
After the suspension, the offer is now due to end on July 23 instead of June 23, eight months after it was first announced. BPM had sought to have the suspension scrapped, saying it limited the bank’s decision-making abilities and damaged its shareholders.
Italian takeover rules hinder any actions by a bid’s target that could hamper the proposed takeover, unless shareholders clear those decisions first.Reuters
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