our top story: 13 people have been killed in the spanish city of barcelona, after a van deliberately drove at speed into a crowd of pedestrians. so—called islamic state says it was behind the attack. the catalan authorities have declared three days of mourning. we say they stop a second attempted attack in cambrial, south of barcelona. and this video is trending on bbc.com. donald trump has denounced the removal of "beautiful" confederate statues from public spaces in the us. he's tweeted that us history and culture are being "ripped apart". his comments come after violent protests in charlottesville over the weekend. that's all from me for now. and the top story here in the uk: numbers of a—level students receiving the highest grades has risen for the first time in six years. exactly a quarter of them received

either an a star or an a grade, almost 3% up on last year. now on bbc news all the latest business news live from singapore. the world's largest personal computer maker lenovo faces a shrinking market and higher cost for parts. and as some of the world's biggest cruise ship causing super—sized environmental problems? —— are some of the. happy friday. good morning, world. glad you could join us. i'm rico hizon. the world's biggest computer lenovo is reporting tough times. the company returned a profit earlier this year, even though there was a drop in pc

shipments. the computer maker has been losing in its mobile division as well as rising component cost. lenovo‘s chief executive is hoping the chinese market will help the company maintain its leading decision. earlier i spoke to someone from tech 460 tv. the pc market right now is more than just pcs and la pto ps, we right now is more than just pcs and laptops, we are looking at new areas of virtual reality and even wearable tech. the pc market has seen a decline. the chief executive of lenovo said they are relying heavily on the chinese market, but now there is much more competition in the mainland. i would sort of agree and disagree with that. the chinese domestic market is still lenovo's

biggest. as you say competition is strong. on a global scale lenovo is still strong in that area. they are trading slightly behind hp. they are suffering in the pc market and also in the smartphone space. they are losing money there, especially some tough competition from the likes of huawei. how are they likely to turn around this business?” huawei. how are they likely to turn around this business? i wouldn't say it's a huge competition in a sense because even in china companies like huawei are very strong. but lenovo has do integrate pcs and smart phones so that they have a strong position for users in china. what about rising component prices? could

this put pressure on the bottomline going forward? this isn't unique to lenovo. overall a lot of pc makers are facing this. mainly because high—end devices use more expensive components. but if you look at mid—to low end devices, they should be able to compete very well. you mentioned they are expanding things like virtual reality. when will this reflect on revenues? are not sure right now but every year lenovo showcases this new technology. revenue wise they are still strong on the pc market but slowly they are looking at new devices. even laptops can be powerful enough to run virtual reality. the market awaits earnings of lenovo. in other news, alibaba had another

lacklustre quarter thanks to slow growth in their shopping business and cloud computing. the e—commerce giant posted a 56% jump and cloud computing. the e—commerce giant posted a 56%jump in and cloud computing. the e—commerce giant posted a 56% jump in revenues for the three months untiljune, which came in at 7.5 william dollars, blowing past market expectations. —— billion dollars. walmart has released higher full—year profits and sales figures for the past three months but it looks like investors aren't happy with the results. shares have fallen overnight. now, do you appreciate our life on the rolling deep? if so you may be one of the 25 million people who took a holiday onboard a cruise ship last year. industry major business and is growing rapidly. but as we report, the new generation of giant, floating hotels aren't welcome everywhere. they are floating cities. majestic

and luxurious. sailing serenely through the waters that surround some of the most beautiful places on earth. but when these vessels come close to land or interport not eve ryo ne close to land or interport not everyone is pleased to see them. for many people cruise is a great way to see the world, at least to find some better weather. but the industry has grown and so have the ships. some modern cruise liners can carry more than 5000 people that can cross ocea ns than 5000 people that can cross oceans at 30 mph. but critics say this comes with a hefty environmental cost and that could be leaving the industry in choppy waters. like other large ships, cruise liners and heavy marine fuels, tons of it every hour, and produce emissions that are sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and partick units, known to be harmful to human health. the problem with cruise liners is not only are the passengers exposed when on the ship but when the ship is important it keeps the engines

running because it needs to keep the systems running and that can result in some of the emissions being spread of the city, even when the ship isn't moving, and really we don't know what the effects of exposure over a lifetime of that is. in some port cities like venice, their effect on air quality is one reason the giant cruise ships are rapidly becoming unwelcome guest. yet cruise firms say they are working hard to clean up their act. we are very small part of a problem, but we are playing our part very actively to make sure that we do the best we possibly can to contribute toa best we possibly can to contribute to a improvement in those ports and cities. among the improvements on the way are high—tech exhaust filtering systems for existing vessels, while some new ships will be powered by liquid knighthood —— liquid nitro gas. there is a risk more and more cities could see the back of this queens of the seas.

turning to trade. the us and south korea will start talks on mending a trade agreement that president trump has called a horrible deal. south korea is the united states' sixth—largest goods trading partner. negotiations are scheduled to kick off next week. china's unicom says it will suspend trading until further notice, after the state owned communications group announced it would try to raise roughly 12 william dollars from about a dozen investors, including aliba ba william dollars from about a dozen investors, including alibaba and 10 cents holdings —— billion. this is pa rt cents holdings —— billion. this is part of the mixed ownership strategy that encourages state entitlements to ta ke that encourages state entitlements to take on private capital. a chinese bicycle sharing company is expanding into the us. it is applying 1000 bicycles to seattle this month as part of a pilot programme that will increase in september. like sharing has been

growing in countries, including singapore. —— like sharing. just below this building i see a lot of these bicycle sharing opportunities and you need an app to use them? these start—ups have expanded super aggressively across the globe, including in singapore. this is one of the two biggest and so what we do is you take your mobile app and you unlock the bicycle and then you can write it anywhere you want and park it pretty much anywhere you want for a small fee. in china you pay one yuan, about 15 us cents. really cheap. the interesting thing about ofo is it is valued at between $1 billion and $2 billion. the founder is 26 and he came up with the idea while eating fried chicken one night with his university schoolmates. but is this business sustainable? the

a nswer currently is this business sustainable? the answer currently is no and many investors question how they will make money because competition has become increasingly ferocious. ofo, the bicycles are yellow, but you have other companies that have theirs in orange, yellow, red and green... pick a colour! and they are all offering really aggressive discounts, sometimes offering the bicycles for free, just to get their name out there so people use them. when they don't make money and spend aggressively to expand, the question is how they will monetise. some people think that maybe what they have a big user base idyll can... that companies can eventually sell the market data. have you tried this bicycles ? the market data. have you tried this bicycles? i have. are they comfortable? singapore is flat see you can cycle wherever you want easily. you have convinced me! i will try one this afternoon. moving to the markets. the stocks

are down sharply. as you can see. this is following the deadly attack in spain and rising concerns president trump may have endangered the economy. as you can see, the nikkei is skidding to its lowest level in three months in early morning trade. the snp as 200 is also in negative territory. wall street down heavily overnight as you can see. with that we and this edition of asia business report. thanks were investing your time with us thanks were investing your time with us and have a happy friday! goodbye for now. the top stories this hour: three days of mourning have been declared after a van deliberately ploughed into a crowd in the centre of barcelona, killing 13 people. as the security operation gathers

pace, for people described as terrorists have been killed in cabril, south of barcelona. a leading geologist has suggested that the uk's rock formations are unlikely to hold large supplies of shale gas. professorjohn underhill says the shale rock deposits were formed 55 million years too late to trap substantial amounts of gas and that the future role of fracking in this country has therefore been exaggerated. the shale gas revolution in the usa. energy prices there tumbled after engineers discovered how to crack shale rocks to release gas trapped inside. the central part of the usa has a vast amounts of shale gas. in the uk, firms have started seeking gas in shale rocks too. they and the government hoped for an

american—style energy miracle, but a leading geologist says they may be disappointed. what are the reserves, can it be got out, does the geology work or not? that the key question. when they work on local scales, it is unlikely to give us the amount of gas production that we need to make a difference in terms of uk wide gas needs and demands. the problem he saysis needs and demands. the problem he says is an event 55 million years ago, when magma surged up under iceland, with great underground layers of rock that shift and float under the surface directly affected the uk. they disrupted and buckled the uk. they disrupted and buckled the shale rocks where gas could be formed. the uk is very different from the usa, the professor warns. shale gas firms are still optimistic. i would argue that it's better to actually take the scientific steps to understand the potential resource for the benefit of the uk and bring in tax revenues,

jobs and resource that we are declining in the uk. this may seem like a purely technical issue but it's not. most of us cook on gas and almost all of us peter holmes with gas, so if the uk can't get as much shale gas as it ought it will have to import more. —— heat our homes. that's another issue for a government already struggling with energy policy. the education watchdog ofsted has published a damning report into one of the uk's largest adult training and apprenticeship dividers. ofsted rated the company, which has received hundreds of millions of pounds of public money, as inadequate, the worst rating the watchdog can give. the department for education says it will withdraw all funding by nextjuly. that's it from me. sport today is next. hello, this is sport today,

live from the bbc sport centre. coming up on this programme: alastair cook and joe root both score centuries, as england hold the upper hand after the first day of the opening test against west indies. there was a shock defeat for ajax in the europa league play—offs, but first—leg wins for milan and everton. and victoria azarenka will miss the us open because she is not willing to leave her child at home in california. hello and welcome to the programme, where we start with the cricketing news that england are well on top after the opening day of the first test against west indies at edgbaston. the match is the first ever day—night test to be played in the uk, and the first involving england, and it saw alastair cook and skipperjoe root rescue their side after a slow start and two quick wickets, both scoring centuries