The daily business briefing: December 7, 2016

1. Japanese investor vows to create 50,000 U.S. jobs after Trump meeting

Japanese billionaire Masayoshi Son, the head of Japan's tech giant SoftBank, said Tuesday, after meeting with President-elect Donald Trump, that he would invest $50 billion in U.S. startups and create 50,000 jobs over an undetermined period. Apple supplier Foxconn also said it was involved in preliminary talks to expand in the U.S. The news came as Trump vows to make it one of his administration's top early priorities to bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. Trump, who has promised to encourage businesses to invest with deregulation, claimed credit in a tweet.

The Associated Press

2. Trump calls for canceling Boeing's Air Force One contract

President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday that Boeing's contract to build two replacement aircraft to serve as the new Air Force One should be scrapped, causing its shares to briefly plunge. The "costs are out of control," Trump tweeted. "Cancel order!" Trump said the cost of the Air Force One program exceeded $4 billion. Boeing said its current contract is only worth $170 million "to help determine the capabilities of these complex military aircraft that serve the unique requirements of the president of the United States." Several experts said Trump had his facts wrong. Conservative Republican opinion expert Frank Luntz said the actual cost of building two new Air Force One aircraft is $825 million each.

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The Washington Post

3. Trump aides say he sold his stock portfolio in June

President-elect Donald Trump sold all of his stock holdings in June, one of his spokesmen said Tuesday. The revelation came as critics raised questions about potential conflicts of interest after Trump criticized aircraft maker Boeing. Trump in May reported to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics that he had two brokerage accounts with 150 stock and bond investments, including stakes in Amazon, Apple, Boeing, and Visa. His Boeing stake was valued at less than $100,000. Trump, a billionaire real estate developer, has said he was never a big investor in stocks.

USA Today

4. Supreme Court hands Samsung a victory in its patent fight with Apple

Samsung scored a victory Tuesday in its patent fight with Apple when the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that Samsung should not have been ordered to give up $399 million for copying parts of Apple's wildly popular iPhone. The sum represented all of Samsung's profits from phones that mirrored the iPhone's distinctive front face and colorful grid of app icons. The justices said federal law calls for Samsung to hand over only the part of its profits directly derived from its infringement on design patents. An appeals court awarded Apple all of Samsung's profits from the phones, but the Supreme Court said that "makes no sense in the modern world." The justices sent the matter back to lower courts to come up with a better way to set damages.

CNET

5. Hospital groups warn ObamaCare repeal will spark health crisis

The two main U.S. hospital industry trade groups warned President-elect Donald Trump and congressional leaders in a letter Tuesday that repealing ObamaCare would create "an unprecedented public health crisis." The American Hospital Association and the Federation of American Hospitals said a consultant's study had found that repealing the Affordable Care Act could cost hospitals $165 billion over the next decade. The hospital groups' letter made them the first big sector of the industry to publicly oppose vows by Trump and Republican lawmakers to reverse President Obama's health care law. Health insurers have been lobbying to make sure repeal won't endanger newly gained coverage.

The Washington Post