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Stocks fell relatively flat Thursday, with the Dow down 0.03%, the S&P 500 up 0.06% and Nasdaq up 0.3%. …Stoxx Europe 600 was up 0.6% Thursday. …Oil fell 0.6% to $48.52 a barrel. …Gold was down 0.4%. … Late swings are the new normal for Chinese stocks. This week most of the Shanghai market’s jolts have come after 2 p.m., before its 3 p.m. close.
LinkedIn posts strong growth. LinkedIn reported a 33% revenue growth to $711.7 million in the second quarter, surpassing the expectation of $670 million to $675 million. Earnings were down $67.7 million, or 53 cents a share. Wall Street Journal
Amgen surpasses expectations. Biotech firm Amgen reported a 6.9% earnings growth for the second quarter, after improved sales and lower operating costs. The firm has upped its 2015 expectations, forecasting earnings of $9.55 to $9.80 and revenue of $21.1 billion to $21.4 billion. Wall Street Journal
NBCUniversal closes in on BuzzFeed. NBCUniversal is close to investing $250 million in BuzzFeed. NBCU is also looking to invest in Vox. NBCU CEO Steve Burke has been looking to digital outlets to tab millennial audiences that aren’t using NBC’s traditional TV networks. Re/Code
Warren Buffett: Feminist Icon? The latest issue of Bloomberg Businessweek features a flower-child Buffett, and his closet-feminism. The Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, named for Buffett’s late wife, gave away almost a half a billion dollars in 2013, mostly to reproductive health causes. Bloomberg
Obama wants insider trading reviewed. The Obama administration asked the Supreme Court to reinstate convictions against two hedge fund managers. Anthony Chiasson and Todd Newman were both convicted of securities fraud, but a federal appeals court ruled in their favor. The White House says the appeals court ruling will make it harder to prosecute insider trading. U.S. News
Women’s museum turns dark. A museum originally planned to be the first women’s museum in the U.K. was revealed to be a Jack the Ripper museum. The application and proposal for the museum described suffragettes and equal-pay campaigners, but the unveiling revealed something quite different. Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe, the man behind the project and former Google diversity chief, says they initially planned a museum about the social history of women, but a look at Jack the Ripper’s victims seemed more appealing. ArtNet
Israeli gay pride parade ends in chaos. The gay rights parade in Jerusalem ended when six marchers were stabbed. An ultra-Orthodox man named Yishai Shlissel has been detained by the police as the suspected stabber. Shlissel was released from prison three weeks ago after carrying out a similar attack at the same parade 10 years ago. Quartz
Royal Dutch Shell says profits drop 35%, plans 6,500 in layoffs, 6.9% of the workforce. The oil giant blamed lower oil prices, which averaged $53/barrel in the three months ended June 30 from $110 a year ago. The company said the layoffs are part of an effort to reduce costs by $4 billion. BBC
Deutsche Bank says it might not hit 2020 performance targets as legal costs eat into profits. In a blistering memo, the new CEO John Cryan declared “The status quo is not an option.” The bank has set aside 1.2 billion euros for fines and settlements. Second quarter pre-tax earnings fell to 1.34 billion euros from 1.36 billion a year earlier. Reuters
Baidu announces share buyback plan. To the tune of $1 billion over next 12 months, in a bid to recoup some of its Tuesday losses. Barron’s
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