Charter Communications abuses customer rights, wins approval for big cable merger anyway and other top stories.

• Charter Communications abuses customer rights, wins approval for big cable merger anyway

  Government approval of a merger that creates the second-largest cable and Internet service behemoth in the country is a rich prize that shouldn't be handed out casually.So it's proper to ask why the Federal Communications Commission sat on its finding that Charter Communications flouted customer-service rules until Tuesday, the very day it also approved Charter's $78-billion merger with Time Warner Cable. And why the FCC slapped Charter's wrist with a laughable $640,000 penalty, and failed to e..

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• Humbled hedge fund managers acquiesce to clients at Vegas confab

  

  Thomson ReutersLeon G. Cooperman, CEO of Omega Advisors, Inc., speaks on a panel at the annual Skybridge Alternatives Conference (SALT) in Las Vegas By Lawrence Delevingne LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - Swaggering hedge fund managers, long known for ignoring client complaints during years of strong performance, are trying something new: listening. The shift was evident at the annual SkyBridge Alternatives Conference in Las Vegas this week, where a group of money managers humbled by losses or meager re..

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• US producer prices rise 0.2 per cent in April, first gain in 3 months; inflation still tame

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• PepsiCo Declines After Activist Trian Fund Eliminates Stake

  

  PepsiCo Inc. suffered its biggest intraday decline in more than two months after Nelson Peltz’s investment firm sold off its shares in the beverage-and-snack giant.Peltz’s company, Trian Fund Management LP, indicated in a filing on Friday that it no longer holds a stake in PepsiCo. Trian had held 18.3 million shares, or 1.3 percent of the company, as of the end of last year.Peltz had advocated for PepsiCo to break itself up, arguing that its snack and beverage businesses would be more valuable ..

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• US Retail Sales in April Grew at Best Pace in More Than a Year

  

  WASHINGTON—Sales at U.S. retailers and restaurants grew at the fastest pace in more than a year last month, a sign consumers stepped up spending after a slow start to 2016. Retail sales advanced 1.3% in April from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted $453.44 billion, the Commerce Department said Friday. It was the best monthly gain since...

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• Apple just gave us a $1 billion clue to its automotive aspirations

  

  Given the strength of car culture in America and the number of major, global automotive manufacturers based here, it's easy enough to assume that the US of A is the largest automotive market on planet Earth. But it isn't. That's China. In fact, Chinese auto sales have been driving circles around American figures for the past three years, a state of affairs made all the more impressive when you consider the Chinese automotive market was effectively nil just 15 years ago. This is why you're seein..

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• Retail Sales Data Tempers Some Negativity

  The major U.S. index futures are pointing to a nearly flat opening on Friday, with the negativity mitigated following the release of positive retail sales report for April. The data that pertains to the month of April should quell some anxiety triggered by weak earnings reported by some retailers for the first quarter, which encompasses the three month period ended March. Oil and the rest of the commodities are lower as the dollar grinds higher in the wake of the strong..

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• APNewsBreak: Anti-Counterfeiting Group Suspends Alibaba

  

  SHANGHAI — An anti-counterfeiting group said Friday it was suspending Alibaba's membership following an uproar by some companies that view the Chinese e-commerce giant as the world's largest marketplace for fakes.The International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition told members that it had failed to inform the board of directors about conflicts of interest involving the group's president, Robert Barchiesi.Earlier Friday, The Associated Press reported that Barchiesi had stock in Alibaba, had close t..

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• Pfizer Blocks the Use of Its Drugs in Executions

  

  Lawyers for condemned inmates have challenged the efforts of corrections officials to conceal how the drugs are obtained, saying this makes it impossible to know if they meet quality standards or might cause undue suffering.“States are shrouding in secrecy aspects of what should be the most transparent government activity,” said Ty Alper, associate director of the death penalty clinic at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law.Before Missouri put to death a prisoner on Wednesday, ..

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Traditional retailers stumble in their efforts to compete with Amazon .	Nissan to take key stake in scandal-hit Mitsubishi Motors, sources say .
Walker Wins First Nonpartisan Election to the W.Va. Supreme Court .	The creators of Siri just showed off their next AI assistant, Viv, and it's incredible .