The daily business briefing: February 26, 2016

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1. China seeks to restore confidence in its economy as G20 meeting opens
2. SeaWorld admits employees spied on animal-welfare activists
3. Halliburton slashes 5,000 jobs as oil prices plummet
4. Apple asks court to reverse order to help FBI unlock shooter's iPhone
5. Gas prices about to jump in California

published 26 February 2016

1. China seeks to restore confidence in its economy as G20 meeting opens

China sought to reassure global finance ministers on the outlook for its slowing economy as the G20 summit got underway Friday in Shanghai. China's economy — the world's second largest — is growing at its slowest rate in 25 years, and fears of trouble ahead have dragged down stocks around the world this year. Chinese leaders said Beijing could manage the slowdown. "China will strike a balance between growth, restructuring, and risk management," said the head of the People's Bank of China, Zhou Xiaochuan.

SeaWorld admitted Thursday that several of its employees posed as animal-welfare activists to spy on the company's opponents. Seven months ago, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals first made the accusation that a San Diego employee attended protests pretending to be an animal rights activist, and made controversial comments on social media. The admission came at a difficult time for SeaWorld. Its business has suffered since the 2013 documentary Blackfish examined the stress of captivity on its killer whales.

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Oilfield services provider Halliburton Co. is slashing 5,000 jobs to cut costs as it contends with plunging oil prices, company spokeswoman Emily Mir said Thursday. The staff reductions amount to eight percent of Halliburton's work force. Crude oil prices have fallen by more than 70 percent since mid-2014, and since that year Halliburton has reduced its global work force by 25 percent, or nearly 20,000. Rival Schlumberger has laid off 34,000 workers, or 26 percent of its staff, since November 2014.

Apple filed a motion Thursday asking a federal magistrate to vacate the order that it unlock San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook's iPhone. The FBI says it is not trying to set a precedent, only to conduct a thorough investigation of the Dec. 2 attack, which killed 14 people. Apple said the dispute was not about "one isolated iPhone." It said the FBI was asking the court for "a dangerous power that Congress and the American people have withheld: the ability to force companies like Apple to undermine the basic security and privacy interests of hundreds of millions of individuals around the globe."

Gasoline prices in Southern California could shoot up by as much as 35 cents a gallon as early as this weekend, according to the Consumer Watchdog group and GasBuddy. Allison Mac, a GasBuddy petroleum analyst, said prices would rise, then plateau, as gas stations switch to a summer fuel blend that reacts better to higher temperatures but costs about 10 cents more per gallon to produce. "Prices have been low because stations are trying to get rid of winter blend gasoline," she said. "So they've been dropping very dramatically, more than they should be, like a blow-out sale."

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.