Britain is on course for another trade showdown with President Trump after deciding to forge ahead with a special tax on Amazon, Google and other big technology companies (The Times £). The UK vowed to press ahead with its plans for a special tax on large technology companies on Thursday, hours after the US threatened to impose trade sanctions on France for similar action (The Financial Times £).

The news comes after President Donald Trump has ordered an investigation into France’s proposed tax on technology companies (Sky News). Meanwhile, France has hit back at a US investigation into a new French tax on major internet companies, saying threats were not the way allies should resolve disputes (The Guardian).

Reckitt Benckiser has agreed to pay up to $1.4bn to US authorities in the largest penalty linked to the country’s opioid crisis (The Financial Times £, The Telegraph, The Daily Mail, Sky News)

Senior executives of Reckitt Benckiser face pressure to return lucrative bonuses after it agreed to pay $1.4 billion to resolve long-running US investigations into the sales and marketing of a treatment for opioid addiction. (The Times £)

Will deal cure Reckitt of stubborn headache? Analysts said that the deal clears a big hurdle for Reckitt and Laxman Narasimhan, a Pepsico executive who was announced as its new boss a month ago. Crucially for Reckitt, the settlement protects the group’s participation in all US government programmes, preventing it from being cut off from lucrative contracts. (The Times £)

Alistair Osborne in The Times (£) writes: “it’s terribly nice of Mr Kapoor to pay up and save his successor, Laxman Narasimhan, the hassle of dealing with the DoJ… But there’s still something a bit off about a departing boss writing a big cheque to make a problem go away. Not least when the problem happened on his watch.”

The FT’s Lex colums writes: “The bill is huge, but takes a monkey off the back of the UK-listed group at a pivotal moment… It will clear the way for its ex-Pepsico CEO to push through plans to separate RB’s health business.” (The Financial Times £)

Marks and Spencer has lost its fourth clothing chief in a decade as the British retailer struggles to turn round the business and attract younger customers (The Financial Times £). The boss of Marks & Spencer’s struggling clothing business, Jill McDonald, has been ousted less than two years after joining the retailer (The Telegraph). M&S sacks fashion boss McDonald with CEO to lead turnaround as it moves to accelerate the recovery of its struggling clothing business (Sky News). The departure of Jill McDonald was confirmed on Thursday and followed recent criticism of the performance of the retailer’s clothing ranges by M&S’s overall boss, Steve Rowe (The Guardian). McDonald exits having served less than two years after failing to iron out stock issues (The Daily Mail). The former boss of Halfords had been parachuted into one of the trickiest jobs in retail with no fashion experience (The BBC)

The Guardian writes that McDonald had a strategy to take M&S back to its fashion roots, albeit one that would inevitably take time to deliver fruit. “It’s time that has just run out for McDonald – the question is now, how much time is left for M&S?” (The Guardian)

Colgate-Palmolive has reached an agreement to buy the Filorga Cosmétiques skincare business for €1.5bn, a sign the US consumer goods group is turning to deals to diversify its interests beyond toothpaste and soap. (The Financial Times £)

The Times’ Tempus column looks at Ocado, backing the shares as a long-term investment and writing: “In less than a year, fees from international deals start rolling in and the shares should keep going”. (The Times £)

KFC is to become the first UK fast food chain to sign up to new European welfare standards for farmed chickens, in an attempt to tackle growing concerns about inhumane conditions in the intensive and large-scale production of meat. (The Guardian)

Topics