Posts published in “Business & Markets”

In recent years, consumer product companies have consolidated, leaving just 10 of them owning the world’s most popular food brands, according to Oxfam. However, food and beverage isn’t the only hot industry for mergers and acquisitions today. Unlike the spotlight that we so often shine on what we eat, we tend to treat what we apply to our faces and skin with less scrutiny. Beauty oligopolies have been acquiring budding brands left and right, but they’ve taken new leadership roles lightly. Although companies can no longer afford to ignore corporate social responsibility, and transparency has been improving, the beauty industry’s rapid consolidation has largely been unchallenged and unsupervised by consumers.…

On Friday, September 29, the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) voted 6-3 to remove American International Group Inc.’s (AIG) designation as a systemically important financial institution (SIFI), determining that financial problems at AIG would not pose a threat to the financial security of the United States. Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and several of the FSOC’s  new regulators appointed by President Trump voted in favor of the change.

The decision gives AIG more freedom from previously instituted stringent capital restriction rules, in part, as a result of AIG’s collapse in 2007 and the federal government’s subsequent bailout.

“The Council has worked diligently to thoroughly reevaluate whether AIG poses a risk to financial stability,” Treasury Secretary Steven T.…