经济学人下载:一周商业要闻

The People’s Bank of China lifted restrictions on commercial interest rates, leaving lenders free to set the price of credit for the first time. By removing the floor on rates, previously set at 70% of the central bank’s benchmark interest rate, officials hope to increase competition among banks and spur lending to private companies.

中国人民银行全面放开贷款利率管制。首次允许金融机构自行设定贷款利率。取消金融机构贷款利率0.7倍下限，官方希望增加银行间的竞争力，刺激贷款流向私企。

The EU’s controversial Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive came into force. The AIFMD, which will be phased in over a year, aims to change the way hedge funds, buy-out firms and other alternative-investment companies in Europe deal with risk, market their funds and pay staff. The industry fears that the new rules will serve mainly to raise costs to investors. 

欧盟富有争议的另类投资基金经理指令生效。此指令会在一年多的时间里逐渐施行，目的在于改变对冲基金，收购公司和其他另类投资公司在欧洲风险管理，规范自己基金以及员工工资的方式。欧洲金融业害怕新规则会增加投资者的花费。

The Financial Stability Board, which co-ordinates financial regulation for the G20, named nine insurers, including Allianz, MetLife and Prudential, as “systemically important”. The designation, hitherto reserved for big banks, entails closer regulatory scrutiny and higher capital requirements. The insurers argue that lumping them with lenders is unfair because of their fundamentally different risk profiles. 

协调G20金融管理的金融稳定委员会指名包括安联，大都会人寿和保诚集团在内的9个保险公司具有系统重要性。这个称号，迄今为止只有银行有，现在则意味着监管更加严格，资金要求更高。保险公司辩解道，将他们同银行相提并论对他们不公平，因为他们本质上截然不同的风险形象。

The G20 endorsed a roadmap drawn up by the OECD, a rich-country club, for reforming the current patchwork of cross-border tax rules and treaties. Its 15 proposals should make it harder for companies to exploit the existing system’s many loopholes.

G20签署了一个经合组织规划的路线图，经合组织是一个富国俱乐部，该路线图是为了改革现有拼凑起来的边境税规则。该路线图的15项提议会使得公司钻现有制度的空子变得困难。

America’s Securities and Exchange Commission charged Steven Cohen in a probe centred on his hedge fund, SAC Capital. The SEC did not accuse Mr Cohen directly of insider trading, but filed a civil suit against him for failing “reasonably to supervise” two underlings, who now await criminal trial for it. SAC vowed to fight the charge.

美国证券交易委员会控告赛科资本的Steven Cohen，并对其对冲基金展开调查。证券交易委员会并没有直接起诉Mr Cohen内幕交易，而是因其没能有效监督两位即将面临牢狱之灾的下属而对其提起民事诉讼。赛克资本说要应对诉讼。

A federal appeals court upheld a verdict reached last year by a jury in Texas to invalidate two patents covering some of the internet’s basic interactive features. This put an end to a protracted legal battle which pitted a clutch of big web firms, including Amazon and Google, against the patents’ owner, Eolas Technologies, which was seeking damages of at least $600m.

联邦上诉法庭对去年德州一名法官对两个涉及互联网基础交互的专利侵权宣告无效的判决予以肯定。这宣告了陷入官司的包括亚马逊和谷歌在内的网络巨头们同原告，即专利的拥有者Eolas Technologies的纠纷结束。Eolas Technologies公司索要至少6亿美元的赔偿。

Yahoo said it will buy back 40m shares, valued at $1.2 billion, from Third Point, a hedge fund headed by Daniel Loeb. Shares in the internet giant have almost doubled in value since the activist investor helped to boot out Scott Thompson and install Marissa Mayer as boss a year ago. Third Point will keep a stake of less than 2% in Yahoo, worth around $500m, but Mr Loeb and two directors he nominated will leave the board.

雅虎宣告要从Daniel Loeb领导的对冲基金Third Point回购4000万股股票，价值12亿美元。自从一年前维权投资者帮着解雇掉Scott Thompson，任命Marissa Mayer当老板以来，雅虎这一网络巨头的股价已经翻了一番。Third Point将持有雅虎不到2%的股份，价值5亿美元左右，但是Mr Loeb和他任命的两个主管将离开董事会。

Michael Dell and Silver Lake Partners, a private-equity firm, raised their offer for the computer-maker Mr Dell founded by 10 cents, to $13.75 a share. A vote by Dell shareholders on whether to accept the buy-out bid, currently valued at $24.4 billion, was postponed for the second time.

迈克尔·戴尔和私募公司银湖资本向戴尔公司提出收购提案。该电脑公司由戴尔先生创立，股价从每股10分增加到了现在的每股13.75美元。戴尔股东关于此次收购的投票再次推迟，此次收购金额达244亿美元。

Apple made a profit of $6.9 billion in the second quarter, down from $8.8 billion last year but higher than many analysts had expected, thanks to soaring demand for iPhones. The gadget-maker shifted 31.2m smartphones in the three months to June, 5.2m more than a year ago. Sales of its tablet computers, though, were disappointing: only 14.6m iPads were sold between April and June, down from 17m last year. 

苹果第二季度利润达69亿美元，与去年同期的88亿美元相比有所下降，但高于很多分析师的预期。这得归功于iphone的强烈需求。该公司四到六月智能手机的销售量为3120万，比去年多520万。然而，其平板电脑的销售量则令人失望，同期只卖出了1460万台，相比去年的1700万有所下降。

EasyJet flew 16.4m passengers in the three months to June, up 2.6% on last year. The budget airline’s revenue grew by 10.5% in the second quarter, to ￡1.14 billion ($1.75 billion), as frugal consumers snapped up cheap holiday flights well in advance.

易捷航空二季度运送旅客达1640万人次，与去年同期相比增加了2.6%。由于节俭的旅客提前抢订假期机票，其二季度应收增加了10.5%，达到了11.4亿英镑，也就是17.5亿美元.

SAP announced that it will not replace Jim Hagemann Snabe, one of its two joint chief executives, when he moves to the supervisory board in May 2014. That will leave Bill McDermott, an American, alone at the helm of the German software giant.

SAP公司宣布在Jim Hagemann Snabe于2014年五月调任到监事会后，将不会有人接任其首席执行官的职务。这意味着美国人Bill McDermott将会自己掌控德国软件巨头。

Caterpillar’s second-quarter sales fell to $14.6 billion, from $17.3 billion a year earlier, and profits sank by 43%, to $960m. The world’s biggest maker of earth-moving equipment benefited from a decade of insatiable demand for diggers in places like China but feels the pinch as growth in emerging markets slows.

卡特皮勒二季度销售额从去年同期的173亿美元下降到了今年的146亿，利润也减少了43%，只有9.6亿美元。这个世界上最大的土方挖掘机械公司在受益于像中国这种地方对挖掘机的猛烈需求之后感到了新兴市场增长的放缓。

Bentley Motors announced that it would invest ￡800m ($1.2 billion) in its factory in Crewe. The high-end carmaker, based in Britain but owned by Germany’s Volkswagen, plans to expand the plant to build its first sport-utility vehicle, which it says will be the “most luxurious and most powerful”, and probably most expensive, in the world.

宾利汽车宣布将在其克鲁郡的工厂增加8亿英镑（12亿美元）的投资。这个高端汽车生产商位于英国，但是隶属于德国的大众，计划扩建工厂开发第一款SUV，这会是世界上最奢华动力最强劲，可能也是最贵的汽车。 

Mark Carney, the Bank of England’s Canadian governor, picked Jane Austen, the inventor of chick lit, as the next face to appear on the back of new ￡10 notes.

英格兰银行的加拿大主管Mark Carney选了小妞文学的创造者，简奥斯丁作为新的10英镑的背面图案。