Meta has announced a new version of Instagram for teenagers and rules governing when bankers can receive bonuses have been relaxed. Meanwhile, the wheels are in motion for driverless taxis to hit the streets of London and Nestlé has announced pending job cuts. 

It’s Thursday, which means business as usual; we’re bringing you the top trending commercial news. 

In this week’s round-up, we take a look at the COP28 summit (which began today), train strikes, controversy surrounding Nigel Farage and Spotify wrapped. Find out more in the round-up.

Have you been staying up to date with the commercial news this week? Black Friday has seen a slowdown in shop price rises and several adverts have been banned over greenwashing. Meanwhile, UK farmers are facing poor harvests due to climate change and Gails Bakery is set to expand after a good year for sales.

If commercial awareness means to you trawling through the broadsheet newspapers every day to find out what’s happening in the stock market, you’re probably doing it wrong. It’s about bitesize chunks of knowledge and keeping updated with the most recent goings on in the business world – and understanding how these cross over into the world of law, technology and politics.

If you’re wondering exactly how to define commercial awareness, think of it as a way of looking at the world holistically and understanding that different industries will intersect and impact on one another.

It’s a big week for LawCareers.Net as we head off to Manchester for LawCareersNetLIVE. As we’re fully immersing ourselves in event organisation mode, this week’s round-up is a short one. But don’t worry, we’re still covering all the top stories.  

It’s hard to keep on top of everything, which is why we summarise the most important and interesting commercial news stories every week. The below stories can be taken at face value, or used as starting points to jump into further research. How could Germany’s economy affect the legal as well as the business world? Where could law firms have been involved in Eat and Patisserie Valerie’s sales? It’s up to you to find out!

As the 2023 World Cup came to a close on Sunday, with Spain beating England 1-0 in the final, we take another look at the commercial impact of the tournament, as well as tech giant Nvidia’s AI chip, the latest in Wilko’s administration, and the cited reasons law firms are closing offices in China. 

Students never stop asking us what they can do to improve their commercial awareness, and aside from reading the weekly Commercial Questions written by top firms, the next best thing you can do is to learn about the business news stories being reported each week. Read on for a short summary of just that.

In energy news, the UK government has struck a new deal to fund nuclear project Sizewell C and unions have called on the Labour government to create more jobs in the green energy sector. Meanwhile, the Australian government has lifted restrictions on US beef imports and Blackpool’s north pier is up for sale amid a decline in tourism.

Here’s our last round-up of 2023, covering plans to tackle spiking, a possible merger, Swiss business and 2023 awards. We’ve got it all, especially for you. 

HMRC has been dealing with a phishing attack and Shein has been accused of “dark patterns” such as “shaming” customers into buying more than they need to. Meanwhile, Nintendo fans have queued overnight to get their hands on the newly launched Switch 2 console and Amazon is trialling humanoid robots that could one day replace delivery drivers. Read on for a summary of this week’s commercial story picks!

This week's commercial news round-up brings you top stories from government scandal to legislative change; make sure you’re applying the wrestle with PESTLE technique to each of these stories.

US pharmaceutical giant Merck has abandoned its £1 billion UK expansion and John Lewis has reported significant losses in the first half of the year. Meanwhile, a groundbreaking climate study has directly linked emissions from fossil fuel companies to deadly heatwaves and, in the digital realm, Snapchat is under fire after a Danish watchdog exposed widespread drug dealing on its platform. Read on to discover the trending commercial news stories this week!

There’s another streaming service in town; car sales are back on the up following difficulty in the industry as a result of the pandemic; and a code of practice has been put together to govern researchers’ work on biological models of human embryos. 

What key skill do all firms want to see in their future lawyers? That’s right: commercial awareness. Building your commercial awareness will be a lot easier if you’re reading and keeping on top of an issue that you’re genuinely interested in. Get started now…

In advance of what is apparently the most depressing Monday of the entire year (third week in January, well known for its gloom-inducing properties) here’s some hard-nosed commercial news to take your mind off the fact that you’re broke and cold:

With the decisive 2019 general election already feeling like a distant memory, the focus of business has turned away from crunch votes and frantic parliamentary wrangling over Brexit to the many other tricky decisions and geopolitical issues that Boris Johnson’s government must now carefully navigate. 

In this week’s round-up we take a look at the latest devastation caused by the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s arrival in Israel. Moving away from the conflict, Netflix reports success from its crackdown on password sharing, Amazon launches a humanoid robot and Microsoft announces a new AI assistant. Find out more in the round-up below.