you are with business live from bbc news, with rachel horne you are with business live from bbc news, with rachel home and sally bundock. face to face talks — america and china meet to try to avert an all out trade war. live from london, that's our top story on tuesday 15th of may. us treasury secretary steve mnuchin hosts the chinese vice premier in washington — amidst signs that relations may be improving. also in the programme, the clothing giant gap has sparked a social media backlash — with a t—shirt! we'll be live in our asia business bureau for the details. and markets across europe are mixed with results coming in from the likes of easyjet and news of a ceo departure at vodafone. big data is big business. we'll find out why information about you is the cornerstone of a multi billion dollar industry.

new look says it's not a "fat tax" but as shoppers call out stores for charging more for larger sizes, we want to know what you think. just use the hashtag #bbcbizlive. hello and welcome to business live. do you get into each with your comments about the fat tax. keep them clean, we can share them on air. the world's two biggest economies are set to air their differences face to face later today. top officials from the us and china will sit down in washington with a new concillitary tone in the air after president trump defended his decision to try and get chinese telecoms giant zte back in business. he said it was part of the larger trade deal being discussed and it's a move welcomed by beijing. treasury secretary steve mnuchin will host china's vice premier liu he in washington.

and zte was on the agenda last time they met, in beijing at the start of this month. at those negotiations the us demanded a $200 billion a year cut to its trade deficit with china. in other words it wants a reduction by more than half in the difference between what the us buys from china and what china buys from the us. the fate of zte will be important to any progress. it was effectively forced out of business as a result of last month's us ban on buying american components. it was found to have breached a settlement for illegally selling telecoms equipments to north korea and iran. more broadly both countries have threatened each other with import tariffs. greg swenson is a partner at brigg macadam limited. hejoins me now. thank you for joining us in the studio. what are

you expecting from today's meeting? it is very hard to predict anything when the trump administration is involved, they like surprises. that is important to keep in mind, the zte news yesterday was huge news, even for the trump inner circle. you need to anticipate and excitement, but generally i think it is good news, there have been concessions, which is progress. the zt e situation shows how intertwined economies are? lots of free traders and conservatives like micelles were very much for punishing zte because there were violations that should be punished, as opposed to imposing ta riffs punished, as opposed to imposing tariffs or arbitrary numbers like 200 million reduction. i think arbitrary trade deficit numbers are meaningless and caps and floors never work. if there is something a company or person is doing wrong, it should be the rule of law. so i for zte was in trouble and should be in trouble, i was surprised and a

little disappointed that trump came back off that, as i think a lot of his inner circle was. why did he make the move? purely negotiating tactics. it is like north korea releasing three prisoners before the negotiations start in singapore. it is negotiating one—on—one. i don't necessarily discourage that and it is progress he has made, i think there are better ways to do it, but thatis there are better ways to do it, but that is the trumpian way. why do you think we are seeing this change from a very aggressive, convert of approach, to more conciliatory? is that his style or has something else shifted?” conciliatory? is that his style or has something else shifted? i think this is his style. i would not ignore the fact that the north korean meetings are coming up. i think that is part of it, you might not see it much in the press but i think it is related. there has to be concessions and i think he is doing the out of the deal thing, where he is aggressive at first making

concessions, it is just negotiating, that is. greg swenson, we will watch those meetings closely. thank you for your time. let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news. tesla boss elon musk says the company is going through a "thorough reorganisation" as it tries to get on top of a string of problems. the electric car maker has repeatedly failed to meet production targets and has seen a host of top executives leave in recent weeks. this month tesla reported a record loss of more than $700 million for the first three months of this year. vodafone's chief executive vittorio colao will step down in october after ten years in charge of the world's second biggest mobile operator. he'll be replaced by finance director nick read. the announcement came as the firm reported a 11.8% rise in core earnings over the past three months to $17.5 billion. the us city of seattle has voted to impose a new tax on the biggest companies based there. amazon — the city's biggest employer — and starbucks are amongst those who will pay $275 a year per employee.

the city council will use the money to tackle a housing crisis and provide services for the homeless. the us retailer gap has apologised to chinese authorities for selling a t—shirt which showed an incorrect map of the country. the apology came after pictures of the t—shirt were shared across social media, and showed that chinese—claimed territories, such as the island of taiwan, were omitted. asia first, sarah toms is in singapore. what more can you tell us? lots of people have been complaining about this on the chinese social media network. users are quick to point out that not only taiwan was omitted from the map design but also tibet

and even the south china sea. these are all areas that china is very sensitive about and which china sees as being chinese territory. gap said it was terribly sorry for what it called an unintentional error, it is, quote, respect the integrity of china's sovereignty and territory. gap also pulled the product from the chinese market and destroyed them all. gap, of course, isn't the first. it is one of a long line of foreign companies which has faced china's anger over this. marietta, zara, airlines have all been taken to task for not classifying taiwan as part of china on the websites. sovereignty is sensitive for china, it considers taiwan to be part of its territory, even though the island has been south ruled —— self

ruled since splitting from the mainland after a civil war in 1949. interesting story. as they say in london, mind the gap! japan is down slightly but toshiba made the headlines in tokyo, back in profit, it has avoided being delisted from the tokyo stock exchange, making an annual profit of $7.3 billion. that is a big turnaround, the previous year they made pretty heavy losses. corporate news making the headlines in europe. vodafone shares are down in london some 3%. the ceo, as you mentioned, is going. there is no void, they have said who is replacing him. easyj et easyjet shares easyj et shares a re easyjet shares are up 3%, the shares are easyjet shares are up 3%, the shares a re really easyjet shares are up 3%, the shares are really strong. i spoke to their ceo earlier and he explained how they have managed to make such a good quarter. and joe miller has the details about what's ahead on wall street today. as concerns over a trade war

between the us and china abate, the dowjones will likely continue its eight—day winning streak on tuesday when home depot reports results. the largest american home improvement retailer is expected to post a rise in first—quarter revenue and profits due to the housing market picking up in recent months. however the company's sales may have suffered little from unseasonable weather which could have caused many potential customers to wait for more diy friendly climate. 0n the economic calendar, retail sales figures are expected to show a 0.3% rise in april. the report will provide insight as to whether lower taxes are boosting us economic growth and any strong advance in sales will indicate take—home pay is more than compensating for a recent pick—up in fuel costs. joining us is alpesh patel from praefinium partners. thank you for coming in. let's start

with the vodafone story that sally mentioned. the ceo leaving, we know he was coming in, what is your take? i know sally particularly loves it when a ceo leaves and the share price drops, it means for once a ceo was beloved of his company, presumably rarely happens. he has been never pretty much a decade. what is interesting, however, and this does not seem the reason for thejump or this does not seem the reason for the jump or the push, this does not seem the reason for thejump or the push, is that this does not seem the reason for the jump or the push, is that over the jump or the push, is that over the last five years vodafone's share prices down i3%, not great since there was a massive bull run. the ftse was up i6%, so almost 30% gap between their performance and just rising with the tide. you would have thought might have gone earlier, but they have turned from being in the red last year to being in the black this year, not least helped by losses which were no longer accounted for this year which were caused by those pesky indians who had charge them retrospective taxes,

which the brits were not happy about. the british government had taken up the cause, to no avail, sadly. so why do you think the shares are down, having saddleback? one explanation could be the markets got it wrong, one could be that given it has underperformed, another could be that they actually thought he has not done a bad job, despite performance. i just think the pension funds are not focusing enough on shareholder value. as you are always playing with financial markets on behalf of your clients, what do you do with oil right now? i said on this programme before the orion agreement fell aparta before the orion agreement fell apart a little bit that it will probably reach $100 by the end of the year. —— be father iran agreement. i know there is talk that does not justify agreement. i know there is talk that does notjustify the massive ramp up in the futures price, the big bets that people have in agreement with me, i'm sure they saw me on this

programme and agreed with me... you are trading in oil? long oil at the moment, but that had nothing to do with announcing it and then trading off the back of it. just to make that clear. we want to be absolutely clear. interesting, though. it will be expensive at the pump. it already is. al pesch, we will speak to you later. —— alpesh, we will speak to you later. still to come... we'll find out how information about you is the crucial to the rapidly expanding data business. you're with business live from bbc news. let's talk about easyjet, i mentioned it earlier. it's cut its losses as it expands capacity and integrates the parts of air berlin that it bought last year. overall the uk based airline made a pre—tax loss of about $92 million in the six months to the end of march. joining us now from our business newsroom is theo leggett. what are the shares doing? they have

risen so far this morning, i think we mentioned a moment ago they were up we mentioned a moment ago they were ‘7. we mentioned a moment ago they were up 3%. that is no surprise, these are good results. if you strip away the effects of integrating the air berlin operations in berlin, the company actually made a profit. it is compared to a significant loss in the same period last year, which is really no surprise. back then the company was suffering from the after—effects of terrorist attacks in key markets, things like that. and a fall in the value of the pound. some of those effects have been mitigated. easyjet is benefiting from problems that other carriers, the bankruptcy of monarch, air berlin, which it has taken control of part of, also alitalia, which is currently in administration. easyjet has some difficult decisions to make with regard to alitalia, which it has been interested in in the past. but speaking earlier on the bbc the chief executive was fairly

noncommittal. i think noncommittal. ithink in noncommittal. i think in general we estimate there will be further consolidation in the industry. we publicly said we are interested in the possible solutions for alitalia. we just have to wait and see what happens. we will only doa and see what happens. we will only do a deal if it works for us, commercially and operationally. we are not desperate to do a deal between up to wait and see. 0bviously easyjet has to do a balancing act, it is already taking over a lot of operations air berlin in germany and it does not want to buy off more than it can chew but on the other hand alitalia could be a tempting prize is easyjet thinks it could make it work. this is a challenge but the other challenge is the oil price going up, it has a major impact on an airline's fuel costs. that could be an issue to watch for in the long run. thank you very much, ceo.

lots that are great fear. we have a lot of stories on the tablet, go there to make sure you are fully updated. you're watching business live. our top story... face—to—face trade talks take place later in washington led by the treasury secretary and the vice president of china. a quick look at how markets are faring.... lots of big company news coming out in the uk. the ftse is up and so slightly. if you run a business, data is becoming ever more important to how you operate, and how you interact with your customers. but whether you're running a single store or a multi—billion dollar operation, how do you make good use of those computer files about your customers and products? it's a big industry. according to gartner, the global market for business intelligence and analytics will be worth more than $22 billion by 2020.

the rapid changes because of data are evident in the finding that 90% of the world's data has been created injust the past 18 months. and most big companies are already using that data to improve performance. 98% of companies with turnovers of more than $500 million are using it in some form. 0ne company helping put that data to good use is israel's sisense. its clients include household names such as philips, airbus and hewlett packard. and sisense's chief executive amir 0rad is here. welcome. thank you. just explain, what is sisense do? we help our customers take a lot of data from bay area status ulcers, put it together, find —— various data sources, put it together, find patterns and use it to help them.

what does that mean for different companies? you work for a broad range of companies, the one thing they have in common is that they have customers, what do the companies want them to tell them? the main issue is we are flooded with data, there is so much data produced, it is not affected any more. for examples, we track safety issues with airlines, everything from luggage dropping to someone getting a bruise. track this together and find a pattern. certain flights are certain pilots have certain issues, we can help them. certain policies are not effective, we can change them, that is one except —— example. we can change them, that is one except -- example. it is about finding a pattern that would not be obvious if we sat down and tried to sift through the pages, what patterns can eat patterns can your sift through the pages, what patterns can your algorithms find? we had a nonprofit, they increased

their donations 100% because we found which people would donate more when they were targeted. it is about finding business metrics, putting them together and guiding the business. how did the new regulations that kick—off in europe in ten days, gdpr, how does that affect your clients? our approach is that we do not keep their data, we keep it with the customers, so the radiation stenotic —— so the regulations do not impact us. so the data already exists, from their day—to—day operations. data already exists, from their day-to-day operations. so you are not gathering data from customers, they are not unaware of this, it's something that we hear all of these horror stories, our mobile phone listening to us and devices in our home monitoring us, we are not talking about that? not at all. the

reality is every business is sitting ona reality is every business is sitting on a gold mine of data which is not utilised. big organisations like the national health service, many look at that kind of organisation and say, they could make so much money from their own data if they will utilise it properly. what are your thoughts on that aspect? that is true, they could run a better and faster business, lower cost and high impact. but they will have to upgrade their capabilities. every business is doing that. we work with philips, we are now invaded in every mri machine, helping them get more value from those machines. you are running a company which has grown rapidly, and you havejust introduced a three day weekend four times a year, way have you done that? when you starter start-up, you

are working overtime, and you are flooded with e—mails all the time even when you are away. so we have mandated a three—day weekend four times a year, you cannot reply to your e—mails, so you can relax a bit and think. you have to stop and think. that is where innovation comes from, the next big idea from your boys went they have some space. —— from your employees when have something. i think it is good for the business not to business sometimes! that is a good slogan! thank you very much your time. we need business on this programme! we would talk through all of the other stories in a minute but here it how to stay in touch. stay up—to—date

with what is going on with insight and analysis from our editors, right around the globe. get involved on our web page. we are on twitter and on facebook. alpesh patel isjoining us again to discuss things. this one has you hot under the collar, a story about the clothing retailer new look, what are they doing? i love this story, you have got a doing? i love this story, you have gota man doing? i love this story, you have got a man explaining to two women women's fashion pricing. it is not just women! it is on the story, new look are predominantly women. the story is not that the largest sizes are being charged more than this skinny assizes, let's put it that way, not that skinny people are

subsidising in the words of this story, fat people, just the same pairof story, fat people, just the same pair of trousers online and in the curves range were different prices. so if you are looking under a specific range, it is charged more. it looks like a pricing glitch between the rangers. there was a lot of righteous indignation on the intranet. if they a shrug if they did what they are accused of, using more fabric and so it is more extensive, why should size zero subsidise my fat bum? new new look have said they are not charging more for different items. much inclination on the intranet! —— righteous indignation! people are

saying things like tall trousers should be chargeable. saying things like tall trousers should be chargeablelj saying things like tall trousers should be chargeable. i love it when people try to be logical in 140 characters. there has been a lot of movement on twitter. this one says, with that logic, every size up should cost more money. more fabric, higher cost, only fair says this one. tracy says, there is no charge between size four and size 18, so why between size 18 and size 28?|j am impressed that you ladies can get trousers footage to pounce. as an man, where can i find them footage to pounce? they will flood in now! —— for £22. robert says, it is obvious we cannot stop ourselves eating so i suppose it is a good thing. so many views coming in. let's look at seattle now. yes, the front page of the seattle times.

seattle, the hunter bowen, microsoft, amazon and starbucks, a rich city you would think. —— the home of boeing. they have decided to tax the number of employees in companies, the number. because they have a homelessness problem. in seattle. so companies like amazon who have 400,000 employees. there is a homelessness problem, partly, some critics say, because the council is not spending money well, politicians wasting money is an old story. but they said because it is so successful as a city, rents have skyrocketed. this is a global problem, we will have to see if this solves the problem. they are saying that house prices have been pushed up that house prices have been pushed up making it unaffordable for a normalfamily, up making it unaffordable for a normal family, whereas those who work for amazon, the bill gates foundation, microsoft, can afford to

live in seattle but many others can't. you would think that you have got great employment, clearly, relatively highly paid jobs given that a lot of these are in the softwa re that a lot of these are in the software industry, i'm not talking about the starbucks the restart, but there would not be a homelessness problem. it is like london is not being able to live in london. problem. it is like london is not being able to live in londonlj think seattle on a gdp bases is more wealthy than london, i think. if they can solve the problem with this, there might be a lesson for the rest of the world. thank you for your time. the gloves are always off with you! we will see you again tomorrow. hello there. many of us woke up this

morning to blue skies and sunshine although around the coastal areas it was rather misty and murky, much of that will burn awaken and up towards the north—west, more cloudy skies and patchy rain. that is associated with this weather front on the satellite imagery which is moving south and east, bringing cloud further further south and east. south and east, bringing cloud furtherfurther south and east. it will be largely dry and bright. around the norfolk wash there could be misty miss continuing into the afternoon. lots of sunshine for england and wales where it will feel warmer than yesterday. 19—23d, cloud and patchy rain moving eastwards across scotland and northern ireland. that cloud and patchy rain will continue to spread south and east, it could turn heavy for a time across the far north of england into the early hours of wednesday morning before breaking up again. some clear spells for scotland and northern

ireland, a more cloudy picture across england and wales. there will be some early—morning brightness across the south—east which will disappear as the cloud moves in. just a bit of patchy rain here and there. brighter skies across scotland, northern ireland and the north of england, a better day than today. temperatures up to 17 degrees in edinburgh. cooler in england and wales with the cloudy skies. temperatures in the mid to high teens. behind that weather front we have a cooler, fresher air moving in across the uk which will continue with us into thursday and friday as well. on thursday cloud developing but otherwise another dry, settled date. some sunny spells, even clear blue skies across wales, southern england, and scotland as well. temperatures still a bit reduced, 17 or 18 degrees celsius at best on thursday. 0n

or 18 degrees celsius at best on thursday. on friday, this area of high pressure will be firmly in charge. into the weekend as well, that big area of high slap bang across the uk, it is fine, settled and dry, sunny spells and it will turn warmer. for the royal wedding, sunny spells will get going and cabbage is up to 19 degrees in the afternoon. pretty decent for most of us. “— afternoon. pretty decent for most of us. —— temperatures up to 19 degrees. hello, it's tuesday, it's nine o'clock. i'm victoria derbyshire, welcome to the programme. our main story today, gaza is braced for further protests today after at least 58 people died yesterday. who will walk meghan markle down the aisle on saturday? it's reported that her dad has decided not to attend, after he was accused of staging paparazzi photos. so how does that work? we'll be talking to a paparazzi photographer just after 9:30, as well as royal watcherjennie bond. and 02 apologise after racist hate

mail was sent out by them. the british muslim family received letters addressed to "mr isis terroriste" and "mr getout 0fengland." we'll bring you the exclusive story. and with gcse exams starting this week, we'll talk to one teenager who was so anxious about her exams, some of her hair fell out. we'll talk about the best techniques to cope with the pressure.