this is business live from bbc news with sally bundock and ben thompson. bp is back on track — the oil giant's latest results beat forecasts as it finally moves forward from the deepwater horizon disaster almost a decade ago. live from london, that's our top story on tuesday the 31st ofjuly. bp says it made $2.8 billion in the three months to the end ofjune thanks to rising oil prices — but what about its debt levels as the oil giant announces new investment plans? also in the programme... brexit bites in benidorm — the spanish holiday destination is seeing fewer brits vacationing there, and numbers are likely to keep falling as the march deadline approaches. and it's a busy day for the world's financial markets with the world's most influential central banks meeting and a slew of earnings reports.

a mixed day is emerging in europe. and rollup, rollup... the circus is in town. the founder of giffords circus is taking the tradition back to its roots as it tours the uk. we will meet her later in the programme. as the uk prepares to leave the eu, what impact could brexit have on holiday—makers? could it make travel more difficult? and what puts you off going abroad? security, visas, or the cost? let us know what it could mean for you, just use the hashtag #bbcbizlive. hello and welcome to business live. get your comments in. many of you have been in touch already and we will mention them later. british oil giant bp has reported earnings for the three months tojune — and it's good news. on the whole. net profitjumped to $2.8 billion, mostly boosted by higher oil prices. that's four times the amount

for the same quarter last year. and that continues the recent trend — shares have been recovering steadily over the last year and have gained around 16% since the start of march. that's down largely to the rise in oil prices. simple as that, really. brent crude — the benchmark — has risen from about $66 a barrel a year ago to $78. that means more money for the companies pumping it out of the ground. last week bp announced it would buy $10.5 billion in shale and natural gas assets in the us from bhp. that's the first major investment made by the oil firm since the deepwater horizon accident in 2010. the bill for clean—up and pay—outs related to that spill in the gulf of mexico is currently at $65 billion. with me is dana novakovic, managing director of lbc energy advisory.

nice to see you, welcome to business live. we will get onto some of the issues that sally outlined, but what do you make of these numbers overall? the numbers are excellent. it is not only that bp is beating expectations as compared to the second quarter of last year, the oil price has increased by 50%, quarter on quarter. but bp is also beating the first quarter of 2018. that is due not only to the increase in oil prices but increase production from three new projects, from improvements in the refining margins and also from a lower payments for the settlement of civil lawsuits in relation to the gulf of mexico.

that is particularly interesting, more than a decade on since the gulf of mexico still, it has cost them billions and billions of dollars. are they any closer to getting that off their balance sheets? absolutely. that goes hand—in—hand with sally's question, what is the level of the company? in the first quarter of 2018, because it was such a profitable quarter, the company paid 2.1 billion to settle a criminal lawsuit, reducing its liabilities. in the second quarter it paid $700 million to settle a civil lawsuit. we are seeing the end of the tale of the gulf of mexico issue. and going forward, bp will be paying approximately $1 billion per year. compared to 2.2 billion for

the first quarter? you can see the difference. they will welcome that because they want rid of that from what they had to pay out. assuming back continues and they can reduce exposure to that, what are the other challengers? oil prices are back up, thatis challengers? oil prices are back up, that is good news, what should they keep an eye on? the level of debt. at the moment their target is to keep it between 20 and 30%. they can reduce it by 8% this year. this year it is 28.7%, 27.7%, as opposed to 28.7% last year. this will be something to look out for. however, the good news is that the bhp billiton acquisition is cash generative, and that will help them with two objectives which they announced when they announced the

acquisition. the first objective is the 2.5% increase to 10.5 cents per share. the second objective was... so the cash generation will definitely assist. it is interesting, so many issues they are contending with. thanks for running through those for us, dana novakovic from lbc. let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news. uber has said it will stop developing self—driving trucks to focus its autonomous technology exclusively on cars. the programme started in 2016 and the idea was to improve the safety and efficiency of the trucking industry. huawei, the world's third—largest smartphone maker, says its revenue in the first half of the year was up 15% to $47.4 billion. the chinese company said the boost was thanks to a solid performance across its smartphone, telecoms equipment and business services. heavy equipment maker caterpillar says it bumped up its full—year forecast after reporting record second—quarter profits.

the company is especially vulnerable to trade tariffs and will be one to watch to see how us businesses are being affected. earlier this month, caterpillar raised prices to offset the rising cost of materials. loads of results for you today and many more we have not fit in the programme on the business live website. but we will talk about samsung. it has issued its latest figures. samsung electronics has reported a 0.1% dip in profit for the second year, compared to the year before. it's blamed that on slowing sales of high end smartphones which dented demand for its flagship galaxy devices. but the chip unit keeps thanks's head above water. katie silver is in singapore. a real mixed bag when you delve into

the numbers about what it tells us about samsung's business, and eve ryo ne about samsung's business, and everyone is looking at the smartphone bit of it? yes. it is the pa rt smartphone bit of it? yes. it is the part of the business doing particularly badly. we saw a 34% drop in that part of the business. they had the slowest quarterly profit growth and almost two years, it was still up about 5.7% with a growth of $13 billion, but the smartphones were down across the board. the iphone overtook the galaxy, that is a particularly bad pa rt galaxy, that is a particularly bad part of the building. —— business. the chip or semiconductor part of the business is going very well, contributing about 80% of their earnings. due to a growth of server data centres, they say we should see continued growth in that area but we will be on the lookout for potential fallout from the us/ china trade war. thanks very much, katie. let's look

at markets in general. in asia it was no big dramatic moves on the markets overall, the bank of japan met, they said they are keeping interest rates very low for the time being, monetary policy flexible at the bank of japan. being, monetary policy flexible at the bank ofjapan. we had all the earnings coming out. katie mentioned samsung. european markets are trading now, the main markets across europe are largely higher. bp shares are rub slightly off the back of their earnings. another big mover in their earnings. another big mover in the uk is centrica, the owner of british gas. when i last looked, shares were down 5%. they have basically said their customer account basically said their customer accou nt losses, basically said their customer account losses, another 140 , 000 customers account losses, another 140,000 customers have laughed at them and thatis customers have laughed at them and that is why their shares are languishing. let's look to wall street. paul blake has the details. well, as wall street presses ahead with earnings season, the focus turns to apple, which will announce its results after the closing bell.

as ever, traders will be glued to sales figures for the iphone, and the company is expected to say it sold about 42 million of them in its most recent quarter. but wall street will also have an eye out for information on apple's services business, which the company has been trying to grow in recent years. that's things like new subscriptions for apple music, icloud storage and app store transactions. unlike google, which is facing a fine from the eu, or facebook, which is embattled with concerns over data misuse and privacy, apple has been largely unencumbered with pr concerns in recent months. however, the growing trade dispute between the us and china could prove to be a problem for the company. wall street will be looking out for any comments on that. but good news could push the company's valuation past the $1 trillion mark, making it the first tech company to pass that milestone. paul blake in new york. michael hewson is chief market analyst at cmc markets. nice to see you in the studio and not down the line. nice to be here.

all eyes are on the tech firms right now because we have had a lot of the social media firms last week, tech firms in the spotlight. a lot of concern about whether they can keep delivering those bigger and bigger and bigger results? apple is the last of these big companies to report. we saw another sell—off last night, with facebook and twitter falling quite heavily. you need to create a difference the asian between apple, 03 tends to be their wea kest between apple, 03 tends to be their weakest quarter. they are projected to sell around 41.8 million iphones for q3, to sell around 41.8 million iphones for 03, that is likely more than projected this time last year. going forward , projected this time last year. going forward, your correspondent in the us is right and it is really about the services division, growth that has been going in the right direction for the last six years in terms of generating revenues, runs

about 8 billion now per year, it was round about 2 billion in 2012. for me, it is all about the next iphone, the upgrades in september, 04. q3 me, it is all about the next iphone, the upgrades in september, 04. 03 is a lwa ys the upgrades in september, 04. 03 is always the weakest quarter and apple is always different from the other social media companies simply because some of the declines we have seen because some of the declines we have seen has been because of a slowdown in subscriber growth. briefly, how much would you be watching the central banks this week? federal reserve not so much, we expect a rate rise in september so it is about the inflation expectation and the impact that the tariffs might have. for me it is about the bank of england on thursday, i would expect to see a 25 base point rate rise, if we do not, the pound could suffer. for now, michael, thank you. michael will tell as later why brits a p pa re ntly will tell as later why brits a ppa re ntly ta ke will tell as later why brits apparently take the fewest sick days, so stay tuned, because i do not believe it! still to come... taking the big top back to its roots — we'll speak to the founder of one circus giant about reviving

the industry, and why the comeback is proving so popular. you're with business live from bbc news. first, we have a real trouble seemed today. —— we have a real travel theme that today. in the uk, there has been a 3% drop in profits for travel firm thomas cook — despite summer bookings climbing by more than 10%. simon calder, the travel editor of the independent, joins us from our newsroom to explain why that might be. simon, what do you make of these numbers? we are told the package holiday is coming to an end, eve ryo ne holiday is coming to an end, everyone is doing separately, but the likes of thomas cook still doing pretty well? the package holiday is still doing pretty well, the big problem for thomas cooper, they have just revealed in the last 90 minutes or so has been the heatwave across northern europe which has really hit

the late to market. these cover the speu the late to market. these cover the spell from april to june, and effectively the warm weather in northern europe means that sales are not nearly as good as they might be. there is still about one in five of the summer holidays still to be sold. thomas cook realises they will not get the prices they wanted and so the chief executive has said this morning that profits will be at the lower end of expectations for the full financial year to the end of september, around $460 million. but he also said that winter is selling pretty well and the markets seem to ee, pretty well and the markets seem to agree, the share price is up 3.5% today. you mentioned the unusual summer we have experienced in many northern european countries, what about disruption, to what extent does that affect thomas cook and people's anticipation of a tough time in our ports and the eurotunnel

etc? really good question, we have seen a etc? really good question, we have seen a pretty appalling weekend this last weekend, the busiest one of the summer in the uk. we saw all sorts of problems and disruption caused by weather, eurotunnel problems, our traffic control and overall in the longer term there may be an impact, particularly as great weather is waiting in your home country. i tackled the chief executive about disruption and he said the main problem has actually been the air—traffic control staff shortages, and asa air—traffic control staff shortages, and as a result there have been lots of cancellations, costing the tour operators are forging. thanks, simon calder, always good to see you. his ta ke calder, always good to see you. his take on the earnings we had from thomas cook earlier today. your‘e watching business live. our top story... bp reports better—than—expected results in the three months tojune — the company's $2.8 billionn profit largely down to the rise in the oil price.

now something to entertain you! we're talking about circuses! the first modern circus was established in london way back in 1768 — that's 250 years ago. as an attraction it's become a global phenomenon. an estimated 4.12 million from us households went to a show in 2018. but circus business are under pressure, with that figure expected to decline to 3.99 million in 2020. nell gifford is the founder of giffords circus. good morning, welcome to business live. tell us about giffords circus, yours is quite different and that is how many circuses are having to sell

themselves these days? giffords circus is a small travelling show, we have a tent, sawdust, velvet curtains, jugglers, a live band, and we tour the south—west of the uk. we generally fill the tent, we seek 600 people and we do 14 shows a week and we are generally pretty busy. but what is different about your circus compared to what we might think in a mind isa compared to what we might think in a mind is a circus? it has a narrative, we designed the costumes and write the music ourselves, the whole thing is a design piece. there are no lions or elephants, the animals you use our difference? those are the animals i grew up with and understand, horses and dogs. i know how to look after them and work with, that is what we have in giffords circus. this year we have

some dax and miniature ponies, but there are always horses and i would not want to produce a show without horses. for me, the roots of circus are comedy and horses and that is what giffords circus is. and bag gets you a ransom of the criticism about whether it is cruel to animals to have them in captivity, we are talking about lions, tigers and elephants, but you do not do that, they are domesticated? yes. animals are used in entertainment, leisure, are used in entertainment, leisure, a pet is ina are used in entertainment, leisure, a pet is in a sense a performing animal because it is kept silly humans' pleasure. it is a really complex subjects and i have come to the conclusion that there are good and bad ways of animal husbandry. in all other fields, dog shows and riding schools, i know our animals

are incredibly well looked after with their own dentist, their own farrier, vets, assistants, they had time—outs, they go for rides, they get turned out in the field and they have a stimulating work to do. you are the founder of giffords circus, did you grow up in the circus, did you join it? ijoined did you grow up in the circus, did youjoin it? ijoined a did you grow up in the circus, did you join it? ijoined a circus did you grow up in the circus, did youjoin it? ijoined a circus in america when i was 18, a family connection through my sister—in—law‘s family, the balding is, they have a circus in america called circus flora. i worked there when i was 18, i was running away from home, sounded like a great great adventure. sounds like a musical to me! they had an african elephants, they used to do fundraising against the ivory trade, that elephant has gone back into the wild. there are so many ways in which animals find their way in and

out of circuses but i fell in love with the way the people and the horses and animals were all integrated and all these amazing families of children speaking lots of languages and i fell in love with the circus. let's talk about the resurgence in interest, i imagine brought about in a large part by the hugh jackman film the brought about in a large part by the huthackman film the great showman, which has got people into the mindset of a travelling show, something i want to see, i want a season think different. the greater showman has ta ken season think different. the greater showman has taken circus to a wider audience. film—makers and theatre makers are rediscovering circus, they are cottoning on to it as visually rich, full of stories, joy, the circus is beautiful but rough, there is an interesting combination. even something like paddington, you have a whole lot of scenes in the fairground, ina have a whole lot of scenes in the fairground, in a victorian fairground. it is like film—makers

are rediscovering the victorian world of circus and shows and fairgrounds. i think it is great, thatis fairgrounds. i think it is great, that is the world ijust adore and it is so fun to see other different creative people looking at it. it sounds magical. thank you so much... i could talk all day about this, but time is running out. thank you for coming in, nell, and good luck with everything. now, it's summer and that means holidays — and many britons will be heading to europe. probably as we speak. around 18 million brits travel just to spain. what will brexit mean? will it make any difference, or non—? adam fleming is in the costal resort of benidorm, where the impact of brexit is already being felt. the day after the referendum result in the uk tee years ago, the value of the pound against the row fell quite dramatically, making peoples holidays instantly more expensive. the pound has recovered some value

in the last two years, but it is still lower than where it was for many years and lots of the tour is businesses in benidorm are saying it is having an effect. people booking shorter stays, maybe staying for eight or 12 days rather than 14, maybe spending a bit less when they go to the bars and restaurants and maybe buying fewer optional add—ons. michael is back, as promised. are you changing your thoughts on trouble? not really. your previous report put it quite well. the only thing that puts me off going abroad as the travel chaos we saw earlier this year. me and my wife went ireland in earlyjune, decided to fly anyone other than ryanair because of the problems they are

having. they have lots of strike action this summer in particular. and there were the problems at the end of last year with widescale cancellations, the strikes in france are affecting scheduling. that is more off—putting than brexit?” would argue, because brexit is still in the distance and there is talk of the transition deal. it could be carry on as before. in 2008 and 2009, it really affected things more than a decline recently. so many of you are getting in touch. one here, brexit will have no impact on uk holiday—makers or travelling since the uk is not part of the schengen area, passport controls are as normal today as they would be elsewhere. sean says like all things related to brexit there is lots of uncertainty. we don't have any clarity, we don't know if we will need a visa or permit to trouble, we do not know if there will be long queues at passport control. and we

wa nt to queues at passport control. and we want to know. whenever i go to places like the united states, there are long queues anyway. in fact, they are worse in the us than in the uk. we hear lots of complaints about queues at heathrow and gatwick, but try going to the us. let's look at this story in the independent, in the uk we apparently take fewer sick days than anybody else? is that true? record low number of sick days, official figures show. true? record low number of sick days, official figures showlj looked at this report and i am a little bit sceptical, but i think working patterns have changed, lots more people work from home, if you have re m ote more people work from home, if you have remote working and you do not feel particularly well, you can work from home without passing onjones to your work colleagues. in the uk we are not bad for days off, we have bank holidays and lots of annual leave, compared to somewhere like

the united states. i suppose that encourages more of us... the united states. i suppose that encourages more of us... there is more flexible working, which i think is key. if you afford your employees more flexible working they will be less inclined to take days off. i can't remember my last sick day, it was probably six or seven years ago, simply because if i do feel particularly well, i will stay at home and post my reports from home. obviously i can't command great programmes like this if i am sniffily, but that tends to be the exception to the rule. skype from your sickbed, you never know. space—time! i don't think you would wa nt to space—time! i don't think you would want to see that. is it good television? probably not! thank you for watching, we will see you tomorrow. hello. certainly not welcome news

for all but temperatures are rising again as we move through this week, particularly in the south—east. a good day of dry weather around for most today, cloudy skies and sherry outbreaks of rain from northern ireland in western scotland is thanks to this weather fronts moving in from the west, gradually working eastwards through the day. the isobars on the northern half of the uk area isobars on the northern half of the uk are a bit closer together, a fairly breezy day here. a good deal of dry and bright weather across most of england and wales, perhaps some showers feeding into western scotland. showreel outbreaks of rain are working into western scotland, northern ireland and perhaps cumbria. the far east of scotland holding onto brighter weather. a maximum of around 25 celsius in the south—east today. this evening and overnight, the rain will tend to die out in northern ireland, becoming more confined to the far north—west of scotland. elsewhere, dry weather, clear spells and perhaps more cloud

for wales in south—west england, the risk of 12 showers. temperatures between 11 and 14, a touch cooler than in the south—east. for weapon states we start with a good deal of dry, bright and fine weather across england and wales —— for wednesday. showers pushing into western parts again, turning cloudierfor northern ireland, western part of scotland's west england. it will feel cooler, the yellow colours on the map. at the yellow colours on the map. at the further south and east you go, temperatures a maximum of 27 celsius by wednesday. still the best of the dry and bright weather in the south—east by thursday, cloudier skies for scotland, northern ireland and northern england, parts of wales and northern england, parts of wales and into the south—west. some patchy outbreaks of rain. dry and bright with a good deal of sunshine in the south—east, feeling hot with temperatures a maximum of 30. into friday, seeing the best of the dry and bright weather in the south—east, there will be a good

deal of dry weather and some sunny spells. the risk of some showers across parts of scotland and in the south—east, but a largely dry day with temperatures warm and still, a maximum of 33 celsius possible in the south—east on friday. always a touch cooler the further north you go. still fairly warm. hello it's tuesday, it's 9 o'clock, i'm chloe tilley, welcome to the programme. this programme has exclusively learned that women in england are resorting to illegally buying the abortion pill over the internet because they cannot get to clinics to take it. the practice of making women take the pill at either a hospital or clinic, before travelling home, has even led to some aborting on public transport. it was so painful and so frightening, that to scream would be to completely give into it. scotland and wales have both recently changed the law to allow women to take the pill at home so why is england

failing to do the same? sexual exploitation and abuse by aid workers has been rife across the sector for years, but agencies and charities have