Here are the business stories making the headlines across Aberdeen, Scotland and the UK this morning.
IFM Investors buys majority stake in £10bn ports operator ABP
A majority stake in Britain’s largest ports operator has been sold to an Australian infrastructure investment firm in a deal that values the company at about £10bn.
IFM Investors, headquartered in Melbourne, has combined the stakes of two Canadian pension funds — The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (Omers) and The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPP) — to give it a 63.9 per cent stake in Associated British Ports (ABP).
Kyle Mangini, global head of infrastructure at IFM Investors, said as an investor owned by Australian and UK pension funds, its investment in ABP “reflects our longstanding commitment to mobilising pension capital into UK infrastructure”.
Read The Times' article here.
Meta fined $25bn for 'lies' over user data privacy
Meta, the company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp has been hit with the largest ever fine against it for its business practices.
A judge in New Mexico on Wednesday ordered the company to pay $25bn (£18.6bn) following a two-week trial earlier this year that found it had spent years lying to the public about how it handled Facebook user data.
"The lies extend beyond Facebook's data practices as well," the judge said, adding they went to "the heart of Facebook's core business practices".
Read more from the BBC.
Aberdeen University staff to hold strike vote over job cuts
Aberdeen University staff are set to vote over whether they will go on strike in protest against proposals to slash more than 100 jobs.
Members of the University and College Union (UCU) are angry about the institution’s refusal to rule out compulsory redundancies.
They also feel university management has failed to properly consult them on what is happening.
Read more in The Press and Journal.
Elon Musk scales back Tesla spending plans
Tesla has dialled back its full-year spending plans despite Elon Musk’s vision to transform the electric vehicle-maker with innovations in autonomous vehicles, robotics and energy.
The company said it now expects capital expenditures of around $20bn in 2026, a reversal from earlier in the year when it raised its spending forecast to $25bn.
It comes as Tesla faces an uphill battle to achieve Musk’s vision of transforming Tesla from a car manufacturer into an AI and robotics company. An ambition that is also a catalyst for a potential merger between Tesla and SpaceX, Musk’s rockets, AI and satellites conglomerate.
Read the full story in The Times.
UK banks pay a record £48bn in taxes — more than all their rivals
Banks contributed almost £48bn in taxes to the Treasury this year — a record — and are paying far more in London than other financial centres, according to an industry association as it made a last-ditch attempt to avert a further increase in next week’s budget.
Taxes borne directly by lenders operating in Britain generated an estimated £25.7bn in receipts in the year to March, while they collected a further £22.1bn on behalf of the Exchequer in employment taxes and other levies, according to the latest annual analysis commissioned by UK Finance and undertaken by PwC.
It said the figures cemented the country’s position as imposing the biggest overall tax burden on banks compared with rival financial centres in the United States and Europe. A model lender based in London faces a total tax rate of 46.2% , compared with 27.9% in New York, 39.1% in Frankfurt and 29% in Dublin.
Read the full story in The Times.