Briefs for Friday

The Treasury Department, TikTok owner Bytedance Ltd. and Oracle Corp. have tentatively agreed to terms for Oracle’s bid for the U.S. operations of the social media service, according to people familiar with the matter.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin sent Bytedance a revised terms sheet late Wednesday and the company and Oracle accepted it, the people said. They described the changes as addressing national security concerns about the transaction and asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Bytedance is trying to win U.S. approval for a transaction with Oracle that would leave the Chinese-headquartered parent company with majority ownership of TikTok. President Donald Trump demanded the sale of the service in August, declaring in executive orders that the popular video-sharing app is a national security threat.

Any deal needs to be approved by both Trump – who could still reject the transaction – and the Chinese government, where officials have accused the U.S. of “economic bullying.”

Google receives $25M tax break in Nevada

RENO, Nev. – Google will receive more than $25 million in tax breaks after pledging an additional $600 million for a new data center in southern Nevada, state officials said.

The company previously committed $600 million to the data center in the Las Vegas suburb of Henderson.

Google also said it would invest $600 million to build a data center at the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center in northern Nevada, bringing its total investment in the state to $1.8 billion, Gov. Steve Sisolak said. To date, the company has invested $300 million in the Reno facility.

Sisolak and seven members of the state Office of Economic Development board approved more than $25 million in tax breaks for the construction of the company’s Henderson data center. The facility is expected to open in 2021, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported.

Stocks slide for second day as tech stocks hammered

Another slide in technology companies helped pull stocks lower on Wall Street Thursday, extending losses from the day before.

The S&P 500 lost 0.8% after having been down 1.7% earlier. The selling was widespread, with eight of the 11 sectors that make up the benchmark index ending the day lower.

The sectors that include Amazon, Facebook and Apple took the heaviest losses.

The selling came a day after the Federal Reserve said it will keep interest rates at nearly zero for years to support the wheezing economy. The statement failed to encourage Wall Street and the S&P 500 recorded its first loss in four days Wednesday.

Study shows workers being replaced by robots

PHILADELPHIA — The coronavirus pandemic is accelerating the trend of robots replacing humans in the workplace, which could result in a recovery from recession that nonetheless costs jobs, according to a new report.

Workers whose jobs can be done by machines suffered more layoffs per capita than those with jobs that aren’t as easily automated, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said in a report released Monday.

People of color were especially harmed, possibly because of their concentration in service jobs at risk of automation.

From wire reports