Alas, it’s not all warm fuzzies in the U.S. retail space, following Walmart and TJX’s recent decisions to increase minimum wages.  Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT) announced Tuesday that it will be laying off “several thousand” employees, primarily in United States and Indian locations, as part of its broader plan to save $2 billion between now and 2017.

The budget cut initiatives are an important facet of Target Chief Executive Brian C. Cornell’s plans to go “lean and mean” in business parlance – in specific, he plans to have the company focusing on significantly fewer product lines, particularly those that are of higher quality and/or lower price, as well as spending money on increasing its online presence.  Cornell was also quoted as saying that Target may also be working on agility at a management level, and shifting corporate culture from a process-based one to a consumer-focused one.  Regarding consumers, Cornell wants Target to draw in more Millennial and Hispanic customers, with both sectors vital to driving a potential revival of fortunes.

According to Target, the layoffs will mainly be centered on its Minneapolis and India corporate offices, which employ a combined 26,000 individuals; the retailer added that the layoffs will not affect its 1,800 physical stores in the United States.  With the job cuts and a $1 billion investment in technology and supply chain upgrades, Target hopes that its profit margins remain between 9.5 percent and 10 percent over the coming five years.

Former Walmart and PepsiCo executive Cornell took over from former CEO Gregg W. Steinhafel in August 2014, and has been aggressive in helping rebuild Target’s damaged PR following a massive customer data hack that took place late in 2013. But in his commitment to making Target a more profitable and agile company, he has also made some bold moves, including eating a $5.4 million loss when it decided to leave the Canadian market in January.

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The Independent Na­tional Electoral Commission (INEC) has accredited and trained 134,000 members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to serve as ad hoc staff during this month’s general elections.

Director-General of NYSC, Brigadier-General Johnson Olawunmi, made the disclosure at a press conference held to announce the NYSC President’s Award cer­emony at the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Monday.

He said although about 34,000 corps members who passed out recently had been trained and accredited by the electoral body to be on duty during the elections, they would neither wear NYSC uniform nor be under the care of the scheme.

On the number of corps members mobilized for the general elections, he said: “You are all aware that we have an existing MoU with INEC on the participa­tion of corps members on elec­tion duties.”

“However, for this 2015 election, INEC brought a new dimension by asking interested corps members to reg­ister online and as at the close of registration in January this year, we had about 168,000 registered corps members to serve as ad hoc staff”.

Continuing, the D-G stated that “At every period, we have three batches of corps mem­bers, but due to postponement of the elections, the batch A of last year that registered to participate in the elections, passed out February 19 this year.

“Initially, our plan was to use them for both February 14 and 28 elections, but since keeping them due to the post­ponement of the elections will violate the NYSC Act, we had to pass out the corps members totalling about 34,000.

“We wrote to INEC to ex­plain to them that about 34,000 corps members registered and trained for the elections had finished their services with us and will no longer partici­pate in the elections as corps members.

“However, we made it clear that since they had been trained for the elections, INEC can still use them as ad hoc staff on the condition that they will not wear the NYSC uniform or be under our care”.

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European shares dipped on Friday morning, pausing after their best start to the year since regional benchmarks began in late 1986, while Airbus rallied after posting a sharp rise in operating earnings.

Shares in Airbus were up 6.1 percent, representing a gain in market value of 2.5 billion euros ($2.8 billion), roughly the price of six A380 superjumbos.

Shares in International Airlines Group surged 4.4 percent after the owner of British Airways upgraded its 2015 profit forecast by more than 20 percent, after reporting a 81 percent jump in profit last year as oil prices tumbled.

The 50 percent drop in crude prices since mid-2014 has greatly reduced input costs for airlines overall, as jet fuel accounts for around a third of the sector's operating costs.

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Iran's Revolutionary Guard launched large-scale naval and air defense drills near a strategic Gulf waterway on Wednesday in which dozens of speedboats swarmed a replica of a U.S. aircraft carrier.

The drill, named Great Prophet 9, was held near the Strait of Hormuz, through which one fifth of the world's oil passes. Iran's regular army carried out naval drills near the strait in December.

State TV showed footage of missiles fired from the coast and the fast boats striking the mock U.S. aircraft carrier. The drills, which also included shooting down a drone and planting undersea mines, were the first to involve a replica of a U.S. carrier.

"American aircraft carriers are very big ammunition depots housing a lot of missiles, rockets, torpedoes and everything else," the Guard's navy chief, Adm. Ali Fadavi, said on state TV, adding that a direct hit by a missile could set off a large secondary explosion. Last month Fadavi said his force is capable of sinking American aircraft carriers in the event of war.

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