on bloomberg television. ♪ betty: we are going to take you from new york to london to athens in the next hour. here's what we are watching. we are half an hour into the trading session, the start of the week in new york, and stocks are fluctuating at the highest levels of the year. in europe, stocks are rising for the first time in three days that confidence in the strengthening u.s. economy will help global growth. mark: a new report rocking global leaders from russia to argentina over allegations they used shell companies to hide billions of dollars. what is the chief executive of russia's dtd group telling bloomberg concerning the reports about vladimir putin's involvement. landing the arabia biggest economic shakeup since the founding of the kingdom. the deputy crown prince gives us

his exclusive details of his $100to raise an additional billion a year to balance the budget and offset those declining oil prices. let's head straight to the market desk where julie hyman has some of the breaking economic numbers to start the day off. a little bit worse than expected. julie: i want to start with labor market conditions because they are we see a drop or a game with anticipated labor market conditions. that index is down 2.1%. the estimate was a gain of 1.5%. thes are walkin watching labor market. overallnumbers are down in line with the median estimate. if you exclude transportation, you get a drop of a tenths of 1%. that is larger than estimated and that is the seventh decline in the past eight months. looking down, we have a decline

of 3% in goods orders. extra transportation, you have a 3/10 of a percent miss down. it looks like the numbers are slightly to the downside here. a slight downward bias is is what was estimated. this is coming on the heels of a comingk measure of imf in worse than estimated as well. it looks by and large that the economic data this morning has not been great. tomorrow, the big number be the imf services report that will be very much and focus. at theare not doing much moment. slight declines across the board with the nasdaq down the most this morning. if you look of the groups that are on the move he or we are got health care doing the best today followed by energy. take a look at the bloomberg utility stocks. they are lagging down a half of 1%.

tesla at a six month high after coming out with its model three and saying over the weekend that orders had reached more than a quarter million. the company is also going to come out with its first-quarter deliveries today. health care shares doing well today and part because of edwards help life-sciences came out with positive results in a study that was presented at the american college of cardiology annual meeting. deal of the big morning, which we are going to dig much more into and about 10 minutes -- alaska air agreeing to buy virgin america, something jetblue. alaska is down about 5%, mark. mark: check out the stoxx 600. we are up by one half of 1%. we were half of 1% lower. it is the lowest companies today that i want to focus on.

out to's orange is a big decline or today. what is happening in the french telecom industry? this affects the whole industry because it ensures that we have for big players in france. there was a hope that would be reduced to three and there would be less competition. sfr and iliad might have orended if it had sold orange and telecom united consolidated partner. that is the big mover today across europe. the vendee is a big story today and the media sector is the big side of the story coul. media shares are up 6%. vivendi is near an agreement to set'sontrol of media sai pay-tv. equal rupert

murdoch's company in your. melrose, the u.k. investment company, is dropping out of the running to buy philips lighting division. its increasing the likelihood of an ipo of that business. so say people familiar with the matter. discuss --ngs to some of things to discuss when it comes degrees. there was a follow-up between alexis tsipras and the imf the. we will hear more about that later from our main in athens. this is the six-month chart. toay, the yield is rising the highest in over two weeks. last august of course, when we had the fears that greece was not going to receive its third bailout, that is when it rose to 30%. it is still a far cry from there. investors are starting to say they need a deal soon or there may be talks of a grexit rather

than a brexit that will be familiar with investors. betty: it is good to get that perspective though even if you had to use the word grexit. vonnie quinn is that the news desk. vonnie: thank you so much. a new series of reports says world leaders, criminals, and celebrities have used companies to hide their well. ofording to a group investigative journalists, $2 billion of transactions involve people like vladimir putin for example. this is firm files from a law firm and panama after the head of a major russian state-owned bank dismissed the allegations. >> nobody said that mr. putin was involved because there is not his name registered anywhere. putineople who know mr. have certain offshore businesses or what. what is wrong about it?

companies can be legal but they are also used to hide well. 14 people were killed at a well-known restaurant popular shiite military fighters and the death toll was at least 29. u.s. coalition has led against the islamic group in recent months, but they have fought back, targeting millions. retook the tigris river could muzzle was captured by the islamic state in 2014. in the race for the democratic has him from nomination, hillary clinton are again taking shots at one another. sanders says clinton must be getting nervous as she was criticized for not fundraising for other democrats. polls show sanders leading clinton and tomorrow's wisconsin primary. president obama is heading to law school this week to press his case for the supreme court

nomination of merrick garland. meanwhile, garland's meeting with two more republican senators tomorrow. global news 24 hours a day powered by 2400 journalists in more than 150 news bureaus around the world. betty: we just got some fresh economic numbers as julie was telling us in a light economic data we couek. tomorrow, the focus will be on the february trade balance. wednesday, we get the march fed minutes. we will hear how that meeting went. investors will have plenty of fed speak to decipher with a big spotlight on thursday. that is when janet yellen takes part in a discussion with a liker fed share -- chairs alan greenspan and ben bernanke, all appearing in a room discussing the economy. logan, us now is kevin

who is forecasting a fed hike in june. before we get to what happens later this week, i'm cures about the labor conditions index which shows a negative reading for the second month in a row. as julie and i were talking about, we are now looking at it takes 19 indicators and puts them all together. it correlates very well with the economy. kevin: the fed put this index together to get a read on the economy away from the unemployment rate. why? because labor participation was falling. it led to declines in the unemployment rate but exaggerated the improvement in the labor market. it wanted another measure of what was going on. they put these 19 indicators together into an index. it is interesting that the index has actually fallen. the unemployment rate did go up. but also hours worked went down, manufacturing employment wind

down, and there's a low level of 37%. throwing all these numbers into the mix and you find that the labor market is not quite as strong as the headline payroll data suggest where we are clipping along a 250,000 new jobs every month. it looks very good could betty. betty: it looks very good on the surface. kevin: other indicators suggest that it's not as if everything is positive. part-time employment went up. the duration of unemployment was a little higher. betty: does it indicate ever session at all? kevin: no, but there's not that much inflation pressure. that is why the fed is interested in this index and the unemployment rate. are we seeing anything that would require a tighter policy? these indicators suggest no, not right now. mark: what is it mean with this pick up in the participation

rate went comes to future wage gain? should we be concerned especially when you smooth out wage inflation over 12 months? should we be concerned about a pickup and wage inflation? kevin: pickup and wage inflation is a good thing. wage gains have been stagnant for over four years. they've been running long 2.2%. as the labor market tightens, it is natural that and youe gains pick up see a division in income away from corporate profitability toward workers. would it potentially lead to inflation? we are a long way from that. the pickup and wages over the last several months is rather modest. we like to see it up higher around 3% or more, but it's running around 2.3%. it is not that strong yet. you asked about labor force participation. that suggests that the labor

supply is increasing and that is good for economic growth. if the supply of labor is increasing, it also suggests there will not be that much pressure on inflation. area when you look at the that had unemployment fall to sincev lowest level 2007, it's been stuck at 6% for the good part of seven years. there is a huge disparity. see the euro area of making real inroads to getting that unemployment rate? it's not going to be closer to the u.s. rate for many year, but once you see that rowing? narrowing? kevin: not for some time. even though there is a pickup in growth in the european union, it will not be so strong to push the unemployment rate down so much. that is why the european central bank is pursuing such aggressive usetary policy by moving

into negative territory with interest rates. it is a reflection of how weak things are in the euro area and they really need some stimulus to get things going again. sometimerobably be before we see a significant decline in the unemployment rate. betty: so kevin, i mentioned that janet yellen will be joined by greenspan, volcker, and bernanke on thursday. how do you think yellen is going to play what we saw with the jobs report on friday? issue going to change a messaging at all or how she can a play that report? kevin: right now the messaging is two parts good there's a focus on economic developments in the policy of normalization and the other part is risk management. when things flare up, financial market volatility, devaluations of other currencies that could affect the u.s., a slowdown in other economies that create more risks, then they tend to slow down the normalization. that comes down, they switch back to th.

discussion will not be on the last employment report, but normalization is the path they want to follow, but at the same time, it has to be tempered by risk management. it's interesting to see what the other fed chairman have to say about that because bernanke was ray strong on risk management . voelker was from a different error altogether. betty: cutting off the head of inflation. kevin, thank you so much. up next, alaska air is going to pay for billion dollars for virgin america. we are to have more on how this deal shakes up the u.s. airline industry. ♪

mark: live from london and new york, i mark barton. betty: i'm betty liu and you are watching "bloomberg markets." looking at some of the biggest business stories in the news right now, tesla says it now has new000 reservations forex model three electric cars. deliveries of the sedan will not begin for at least 18 months. lon musk says the average model three will cost $35,000 with the flashing options. million. is about $825 blackstone could end up paying as much as 1.1 billion dollars for maximum 75% stake in the indian company. that is your bloomberg business flash. let us head straight to the markets desk where julie hyman is looking at the big deal between alaska air and virgin america. julie: shares of virgin america

are rising with alaska making that deal for the company. are reporting says they have won out over jetblue airways, which is trading down. alaska air is trading down as well. a bloomberg intelligence analyst says the premium that alaska is paying for virgin is relatively hefty although the deal is supposed to be approved of within the first year of the acquisition. i've looked at the comparable performance of the stocks versus the bloombergs u.s. airline index. here is the airlines index. this goes back to when virgin became public, going back to 2014, november 20 14. the stock has outperformed other it has notthough done quite as well as alaska. i did the cutoff date is march 22 because that is the day before reports first began to surface about this deal potentially happening. betty: version group founder

richard branson spoke to us earlier on bloomberg on skype aboard his virgin plane. is on alaska's clientele. last nine years, we have been voted freshest airline in the state. there done a great job. therefore, we attract tech people who want to be flown in a slightly more hit airline than our competitors. betty: that is right. that is the thing about virgin, which is hit and it's cool. i do not know of alaska airlines has the same ring to it. mark: i need to share something with you. we have been doing this for five months and me and branson have something common. guess what it is? betty: i would have no idea. i don't even want to go there. mark: we share the same birthday. branson was born 20 years before

me. that is all i'm going to tell you. if you look at this wonderful function, you can find out when i was born and when you're going to send me that battle of the charts trophy as the birthday present. he also was the first to get a million linkedin followers. i thought you were the first to get a million linkedin followers. this is a brilliant function. betty: i'm looking on the screen there. what is the birthday? mark: july 18. betty: you just told everybody who is watching bloomberg your birthday. expect a flood of gifts. mark: no presence. still ahead on "bloomberg markets," saudi arabia's biggest economic shakeup ever. new details from our exclusive interview with the deputy crown prince of saudi arabia. that is next. ♪

betty: you are watching "bloomberg markets." i'm betty liu in new york with mark barton in london. turning to revelations from our exclusive interview with the deputy crown prince of saudi arabia. lastly, we learn the country is trying to create the largest world sovereign fund. details on the biggest economic shakeup since the founding of saudi arabia. it wants to generate $100 billion a year in non-oil revenue by 2020. joining us now on the phone in saudi arabia is on euro chief glenn carry. saudi arabia plan on raising this much revenue outside of oil? >> they are going to increase ,evenue through value-added tax what they are describing as a

syntax on sodas. they're going to have fees on luxury items and they are going to restructure subsidies. they think they are going to generate at least $30 billion in subsidies by 2020. subsidies,uce they're going to increase revenue by $30 billion by 2020. mark: what sort of risks does a plan like this hold? i mean saudi arabia is one of the world's most conservative societies. this heralds big change. glen: it's a good question. there's two points. first, how are they going to implement it? we don't know exactly. they have told us what they plan to do, but the implementation is still unclear. at the historyk of the country, saudi citizens have grown accustomed to living off of government largess.

the cost of gasoline has been historically cheaper than in most places in the world. water is cheap. the general consensus is you look at saudi arabia and joke and say that a gallon of gasoline is cheaper than a gallon of water. respond and i think they are moving forward tentatively, but i think they need to do it now. as the deputy crown france made it very clear to us during our five hour interview, he really wanted to see the country's dependency on oil decrease. betty: how does that play into these plans to tap into the international debt market? glen: i think the government of to this point as oil prices started falling and late 2014 to where we are today, the government has relied on the mastic debt issues and a strong dalliance for foreign's currency reserves. i think they're looking at

alternative sources of revenue for the country. they will want to tap international debt markets. they want to create, as one want adviser told us, they to have foreign institutions recognize that saudi arabia is ready to tap the international debt market. it is part of a bigger plan to diverse of either sources of revenue. and they have one of the lowest debt to gdp ratios in the world. there is room for them to borrow. betty: we will leave it there. thank you so much. y reporting from saudi arabia and you can read much more about this on bloomberg.com. still ahead on bloomberg television, a major data leak out of panama. ♪

betty: live from bloomberg world news headquarters, i'm betty liu. mark: i mark barton. let's get to bloomberg past first word news. vonnie quinn is at the news

desk. vonnie: more flights are scheduled to leave brussels airport today one day after it reopens. only three flights departed yesterday. brussels airlines has flights scheduled to the u.s. and africa. handling less than 20% of its normal passenger load. wisconsin is in front and center in the race for the white house. among republicans, ted cruz leads donald trump by about 10 percentage points in the latest polling. trump is telling john kasich to exit the race. trump said if i did not have kasich i automatically when. on the democratically side -- on the democratic side, pretty sanders has a lead over hillary clinton. the supreme -- bernie sanders has a lead over hillary clinton. the justices will hear the appeal of amerco says he did not get a fair trial because a juror made offensive comments about mexicans, depriving him of his constitutional right to an impartial jury.

he was convicted last year of unlawful sexual contact and harassment. woodrow wilson's name will remain on princeton university's of a policy school. students raise questions about his racist views and their impact on his policy. wilson's name has been associated with the school for more than eight decades. study of travel and air travel qualities is more flights are widening on time and airlines are arriving on time and airlines are you losing fewer bags. the top reasons for passenger frustrations, flight cancellations, the laser, and extra fees for things like baggage and reservation changes. global news 24 hours a day, powered by our 2400 journalists in more than 150 news bureaus around the world. i'm vonnie quinn. mark: let's have a peek at what is happening to you it can -- to

european equity markets. stocks opened low with the price of oil. oil rebounded. down for a index is sixth consecutive day. a lift to commodities and giving a lift to basic resource companies. all the main indices arriving. the telecom stocks, the big m and a story. essentially orange will be not be buying weeks telecom business. the french telecom industry has been battered by that news. there will still be four big players in france. the hope there would be three. 3-wood have been less competitive -- 3-wood have been less competitive. i'm finishing up with bonds and currencies. the greek bond market is interesting today. the yield on the two year is up 178 basis points. biggest jump in a couple of

weeks three at latest news out of greece. a lot of news today. christine lagarde says the imf is a good distance away from an agreement that would allow for additional loans to greece. the german 10 year is little changed and the pound decline continues. don't mention the brexit word. mark: let's move to the betty: -- let's move to the u.s.. abigail doolittle has the latest. we were up a little bit and now we seem to be drifting lower. abigail: some back and forth trade right around even but the big story today is undoubtedly virgin america. shares are soaring on the news that alaska air has bought the cashny for $2.6 billion in or $57 per share. .7% premium to friday's close jeff mccracken says the firm is up alaska air's spot as the number five domestic carrier behind the big for.

firmly in the new york markets along with los angeles and san francisco. the virgin america stock is up more than 130% from the november 2014 ipl. o. betty: didn't many think this deal would go to jetblue? what happened? abigail: in fact last week elaine becker said she thought jetblue was that most likely acquirer. virgin america ceo david kush put out a tweet saying it came down to price and plying that alaska air's did was better than that of jetblue. jetblue on this news is down. a continuation of its move down over the last six months. more than 20% below, flirting with a 50 day moving average suggesting selling pressure could be ahead. betty: abigail doolittle at the nasdaq. mark: reports of a starting -- a

stunning data leak. millions of documents reportedly leaked from a law firm in panama. they are dubbed the panama papers. they include financial records involving world leaders stretching back decades. john fry is here. is this embarrassing for world leaders? many of them seem to be brushing it aside saying it is a nonevent. jon: using language stronger than that. certainly it depends on where you are. the revelations have been met with a mixture of bluster and outrage. the other interesting thing to point out, there was quite a stunning array if you look at the volume of information that is come out. if you look at leaders who have suddenly been dragged into trouble by this, it is difficult to see.

mark: a vote of confidence to take place. john: looking at thursday, it is a question of whether the a the icelandic prime minister has two thirds of the seats in the parliament. it will be difficult to unseat him. fascinating information but whether it unseat anyone in a position of power remains to be seen. betty: give us a sense of the scope of this. you mention it is everybody from drug kingpins to heads of state. give us the scope and how much are we talking about and how was this done? john: if we are looking at the scope, it is literally worldwide . everything from hong kong tycoons to the current president of argentina. the scope is global. it is interesting to look at the fact that it is mostly non-us governments that have been

implicated in this. so far there has not been that much coming out on the u.s. executives or politicians. this is early days. who knows what is down the pipeline? mark: andre carson, chief prettyve of btb was vocal this morning in the news of the bs word. you don't hear the bs word every day on television. john: very entertaining. russia is an interesting case study. the details that come out about the purported channels through which putin's inner circles supposedly enriched our fascinating area details of a russian cellist, an old friend of putin who supposedly owns one of the shell companies. what's interesting about this, one of the great white whales of reporting is figuring out how much money is put in worth and finding direct evidence as he

himself is enriching himself from russian deals. we did not get any of that. -- now couldn't is couldn't's inner circle is circling the wagons and bluster and outrage seems to be the order of the day. mark: bloomberg executive editor fraher, thank you for joining us. carson rejected the notion of putin's involvement entirely. >> nobody said mr. putin was involved. there is not his name registered anywhere. some people who know mr. putin have certain offshore business or why. what is wrong about this? i have many comments on this. russia has no offshore zones. britain, america, europe, monaco, they do have. we have nothing to do with

offshore business as a country because we do not have offshore zones. russian business was using the marketnce economy started in russia in the 1990's when offshore was getting started in the 60's. a number of reasons. russian businessman felt it is more secure to have assets offshore and protect -- in for tax reasons as well. the three largest investors in russia, countries like cyprus, ,iechtenstein, and netherlands because it is an russian money coming back from offshore zones back to russia. russian government is now announced the program of the authorization. it means amnesty announced. the people who declare now their toets, they are not subject taxation for money earned before

jane were 2015. people have to register by the willof january 2015 start to pay taxes only into the 17 for this. the government is trying to bring money back. it is absolutely illegal for russian people to have offshore business. people were using it. most of the large russian companies register. >> anybody with an offshore account in russia is breaking the law? >> not breaking the law. i don't know why the reason. quite a big campaign on these related to russia, the ukraine, even to britain as i understand. anything which led to mr. putin directly. mr. putin was never involved. the fact that his daughter was celebrating a wedding in asia or expensive.

hweddings every week for dozens of people. i don't know how it can relate putin to any offshore businesses. it is -- sorry to say. interview, his kostin responded to allegations -- cyprus-based subsidiary he said that was "absolutely out of the question." betty: a very frank interview from constant. another leak making headlines this morning. pensions are rising between greece and the imf. managing director christine lagarde has rebuffed greece's calls to replace top officials overseeing the country's bailout . she said the imf is a good distance away from an agreement that would allow for additional you loans.

we go to athens where nico's chris louras is standing let's talk about this leak first which is i believe a transcript of a conversation among officials that essentially says, how are we going to force germany and the other member nations to take a haircut on greece's debt? greeceussions between and the imf have to send it to name-calling over this past weekend. after wikileaks published this transcript. the greek government was quick to accuse the imf of banking on credit default event in order to force everyone involved in the greek bailout to sign up. th-- christine lagarde responded with a letter saying this is all nonsense. she actually hinted the greek authorities have been spying on

imf officials. pretty strong statement. the greek government responded again today with a statement saying you are stalling the bailout. this is not the most fruitful way to resume negotiations for the disbursement of additional emergency loans to greece. lagarderebackdrop is does not seem keen to be involved in a bailout. whether this is handbags at dawn or serious, greece still meet its bailout and the imf is not part of the plan. what's going to happen next? the imf is saying that in order to sign up to a new bailout plan it needs to be credible. in order to be credible it has to ensure that greece's public debt will start dropping over the medium-term.

for this target to be achieved you need more austerity measures or deeper debt relief from the euro area. the greek government seems to have realized that it is not going to get meaningful debt relief from the euro area. it's target is to ever more austerity measures. they are trying to blame the imf for everything. they are hoping the euro area fundingates will keep greece without the imf being part of the program. this is a toxic discussion for many european parliaments including the german parliament. it is a dangerous path the greek government has started working but not the first time. we have seen many seasons of the greek drama unfold. somehow things work out in the end. betty: we certainly have been at the edge before. a programming note, we will hear

from greece and other global issues from imf managing director christine lagarde tomorrow on bloomberg's the pulse. francine lacqua will sit down with lagarde. that will be carried also on bloomberg radio. more on bloomberg markets ahead. ♪

.ark: this is bloomberg markets time for the lubricant is the/. time for the bloomberg business flash. the u.s. commerce department says factory orders fell 1.7%.

there was weakness in the number of categories led by a big drop in the volatile category of commercial aircraft. the u.s. supreme court is turning down appeals by walmart and wells fargo. multimillion dollar class action judgment. walmart was objecting to a judgment of more than $151 million in favor of employees forced to work through lunch breaks. wells fargo was appealing a 200 3 million judgment for charging customers to much in overdraft fees related to debit card purchases. global markets is making its second attempt at an ipo. it may value the second-largest u.s. stock exchange operator at $2.1 billion, more than twice the expected valuation in its first attempt. bats withdrew its 2012 ipl because of an error in trading software, stopping shares from opening costs. that is the bloomberg business flash.

betty: quest diagnostics is targeting a new market to boost revenue. weekend warriors. the company created a blood test for endurance athletes. the test a gave trial run and you can read about it in bloomberg businessweek. jason joins us now. what is the quest diagnostics blueprint for athletes? jason: this is a project that came out of some work to, which is the giant testing company, anyone who has been to a doctor or had blood test has probably encountered a quest diagnostics. facilities across the u.s.. this came out of work they were doing with professional athletes that goes into the body and tests all sort of biomarkers. the obvious stuff like sodium level and cholesterol in things but really down another level and what they are targeting is the weekend warriors, endured athletes. to get them stronger and faster

for their marathon. betty: you say this market, how much does it cost and how big is this market? jason: it is interesting to try and figure out this market. when you look at mobile health or digital health you are talking about hundreds of billions of dollars. what is interesting for quest, they are going after affluent endurance athletes. when you think about the folks who participate in an ironman, they can spend tens of thousands of dollars to participate as they are buying a bike and these different things. i spoke with a guy who runs the business and said -- and he said they're spending $15,000 a year, what is a couple hundred bucks to get a blood test? >> how is it that the annual average household income of ironman participants is $247,000? >> it is amazing. what it comes down to is ironman

specifically are drawing the most affluent, aggressive, tight a folks who participate in these things and they are willing to spend a huge amount of disposable income to get stronger and faster. to get the edge, a little quicker in the pool. to get the best choose -- the best shoes or shorts or whatever it takes. betty: i love that shot we had. the guy pounding his chest as he crosses the finish line. jason, thank you so much. jason kelly. you can read his story in bloomberg businessweek on quest diagnostics. ironman. we should do it. mark: me and you. betty: i will never make it. mark: i give it to you. chinese history on the auction

block. a sotheby's of hong kong to show you what is available at its spring sale. ♪

mark: we had to hong kong where sotheby's kicked off its spring sale. the auction house says it is putting the most important chinese historical object ever to be offered at auction on the block. >> this is the largest -- first grand rule had cast for himself. the meaning is the most powerful. to revere heaven and serve your subject. the markets for historical ,orks, object like this one that market has taken up in the

last 50 years since the mainland chinese -- this album records all the seals of the emperor. this one is the largest of them all. the impression is an absolute match. the last time this seal was in contact with this paper was in 1781, the year with this album was prepared. we will accept this for about $50 million on word. it is hard to say what it is worth. of the mandate of heaven. anyone in hong kong, mainland china or taiwan or elsewhere. this is pure power in an object. there is that thinking that is ingrained in china. particularly relevant to a collector or any liveperson. interest anyone

interested in power and with the means to buy it. chairmanheby's nicholas chow. travel watches, dining and of course property. pursuitsgo. we will follow all of the action heading for close. we look at wide talks collapsed between french telecom companies. the european close is next. ♪

betty: 11:00 a.m. in new york and 11:00 p.m. in hong kong. i'm betty liu. mark: live from london, i mark barton. you're watching the

european close on bloomberg markets. we will take you from new york to london to paris in the next hour. here's what we are watching. stocks remain higher in europe. the stoxx 600 rebounding from the lowest level since february sixth. still not finding too much of a direction area gains in health care shares upsetting decline among consumer companies. betty: alaska airlines beating out jetblue to buy virgin america for $2.6 billion. latest in a wave of consolidation in the airline industry. mark: after months of negotiation, orange and stage push to buy the phone business of bouygues. what it means for the telecom industry.