Reuters
“At least 50 dead, more than 400 hurt in Las Vegas concert attack.”
Some 50 people died and more than 400 were hurt when a 64-year-old gunman with an arsenal of at least 10 rifles fired on a Las Vegas country music festival on Sunday, raining down bullets from a 32nd-floor window for several minutes before killing himself.
The death toll, which police emphasized was preliminary, would make the mass shooting the deadliest in U.S. history, eclipsing last year’s massacre of 49 people at an Orlando night club by a gunman who pledged allegiance to Islamic State militants.
Some 22,000 people were in the crowd when a man police identified as Stephen Paddock opened fire, sparking a panic in which some people trampled on others, as law enforcement officers scrambled to locate the gunman.
The shooting broke out on the final night of the three-day Route 91 Harvest festival, a sold-out event featuring top acts such as Eric Church, Sam Hunt and Jason Aldean.
The rampage was reminiscent of a mass shooting at a Paris rock concert in November 2015 that killed 89 people, part of a wave of coordinated attacks by Islamist militants that left 130 dead.
Bloomberg
“Spain Vows to Double Down on Catalonia Opposition.”
Spain’s government will consider using all means at its disposal to uphold the law in Catalonia, the justice minister said, praising the police for their “exemplary” action in defense of the constitution.
“We have always said that we would use all the force of the law and all the mechanisms that the constitution and laws grant to the government,” Rafael Catala told broadcaster TVE in an interview. While images of police violence provoked alarmed reactions from some European government officials, Catala praised the security force for their “measured” response.
Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy looks to be doubling down on his response to a still-escalating crisis after secessionist leaders in Barcelona signaled they may declare independence within days for the region that constitutes about a fifth of Spain’s economic output. Asked if he would consider activating a constitutional clause to suspend Catalonia’s regional autonomy, Catala said the government’s duty was to “fix problems” and ensure the rule of law prevails.
Spanish stocks, shares of Catalan lenders and the euro fell on Monday as the country was left reeling from the previous day’s turbulent events that saw thousands of police use force to obstruct voting in the referendum ruled illegal by the constitutional court in Madrid. The clashes left hundreds of people injured, according to the regional government.
Two million Catalans backed independence out of 2.3 million votes cast in total, government spokesman Jordi Turull said at a press conference in the early hours of Monday. Just over 5 million people were eligible to vote. Before the government crackdown began, separatist leaders said they would be comfortable declaring independence with about 1.8 million votes. The government disputes the result, saying there were no safeguards to prevent people voting more than once after it acted to take down online voting rolls.
Rajoy is wrestling with his country’s biggest constitutional crisis since Franco’s death in 1975. The political settlement gave regional administrations control of areas such as health, education and, in Catalonia’s case, the police, within a centralized system for collecting and distributing tax revenue. Many Catalans complain they get a raw deal from that system.
BBC News
“Monarch flights cancelled as airline ceases trading.”
Monarch Airlines has ceased trading and all its future flights and holidays have been cancelled, affecting hundreds of thousands of customers.
About 860,000 people have lost bookings and more than 30 planes will be sent by the Civil Aviation Authority to return 110,000 holidaymakers who are overseas. Monarch employs about 2,100 people and reported a £291m loss last year.
Terror attacks in Tunisia and Egypt, increased competition, and the weak pound have been blamed for its demise. Theresa May’s official spokesman said the prime minister «feels hugely sorry» for those affected by a «very distressing situation».
Monarch – the UK’s fifth biggest and the country’s largest ever to collapse – was placed in administration at 04:00 BST – a time when the airline had no planes in the air. Passengers were then sent text messages informing them flights had been cancelled – but some customers were already at airports.
Bloomberg
“Banks’ Brexit Moving Costs Are Seen Topping $500 Million Each.”
Banks poised to channel hundreds—if not thousands—of employees out of the U.K. expect their Brexit bills to reach $500 million or more, according to people with knowledge of firms’ contingency planning.
Costs are climbing in part as they find it more difficult than anticipated to persuade reluctant Londoners to move abroad and reckon with a shortage of experienced bankers in Dublin, Paris and Frankfurt, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing confidential matters.
Banks may have to resort to costly relocation packages that include housing, private school costs and other perks to get Londoners to go. Someone who earned 1 million pounds ($1.3 million) in the U.K. could easily cost 1.5 million pounds in Paris or Frankfurt, after offsetting any increases in income taxes and other expenses, Terry estimated.
Moving a few hundred people into new offices in the European Union by April 2019 may add up to $100 million in personnel expenses alone, leaving aside the legal, technology and capital outlays related to setting up the entity, said one of the people. While few banks have provided public estimates of their costs, HSBC Holdings Plc said in July it faces a bill of as much as $300 million to transfer 1,000 staff to Paris, where it already has a fully-licensed subsidiary.
With the U.K. and EU deadlocked in negotiations over their future trading relationship, financial-services firms have little choice but to start shifting bankers, compliance staff and IT workers to the bloc. EU regulators have made it clear they expect banks to establish full-scale operations staffed by significant numbers of senior employees, not brass-plate offices with people commuting from London.