Catch up on the weekend's top five stories with this list compiled by The Fly: 1. Raytheon (RTN) and United Technologies (UTX) have entered into an agreement to combine in an all-stock merger of equals. The combined company will be named Raytheon Technologies Corporation, and will exclude Otis and Carrier, which are expected to be separated from United Technologies in the first half of 2020 as previously announced. The combined company will have approximately $74B in pro forma 2019 sales. Under the terms of the agreement, which was unanimously approved by the Boards of Directors of both companies, Raytheon share owners will receive 2.3348 shares in the combined company for each Raytheon share. Upon completion of the merger, United Technologies shareowners will own approximately 57% and Raytheon shareowners will own approximately 43% of the combined company on a fully diluted basis. The merger is expected to close in the first half of 2020, following completion by United Technologies of the previously announced separation of its Otis and Carrier businesses. 2. Group of 20 finance ministers have agreed to compile common rules to close loopholes used by global tech giants such as Facebook (FB) to reduce their corporate taxes, Reuters' Stanley White and Jan Strupczewski reported. Facebook, Google (GOOG; GOOGL), Amazon (AMZN) and other large technology companies face criticism for reducing their tax bills by booking profits in low-tax countries regardless of the location of the end customer, the authors noted. 3. Falling interest rates and a threatening economic slowdown bode ill for U.S. banks, and their stocks have fallen out of favor, but there are some compelling reasons to embrace the banks, especially JPMorgan (JPM), Andrew Bary wrote in this week's edition of Barron's. The company's strengths are underappreciated, with shares trading for 11 times projected 2019 earnings of $10 a share and yield almost 3%, the author noted, adding that the bank is expected to boost its quarterly payout to about 90c. 4. Comcast (CMCSA) subsidiary Universal's "The Secret Life of Pets 2" won the weekend's North American box office, earning $47.1M in its debut from 4,561 locations. The animated family film received a 54% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and an A- CinemaScore. "The Secret Life of Pets 2" is the tenth team-up for animation studio illumination and Universal. 5. Alibaba (BABA), Tencent (TCEHY) and British Land (BTLCY) saw positive mentions in this week's edition of Barron's, while Uber (UBER) was mentioned cautiously.
