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Leon Black accused of rape, RBC buys HSBC's Canadian business, BlockFi sues Sam Bankman-Fried

Yahoo Finance's Julie Hyman breaks down leading business stories as Apollo Global Management co-founder Leon Black is accused of rape, RBC buys HSBC's Canadian banking business for $10 billion, and BlockFi sues Sam Bankman-Fried after filing for bankruptcy. (Apollo Global Management is Yahoo Finance's parent company.)

Video transcript

JULIE HYMAN: Let's get a check on some other headlines that we are watching now. The billionaire co-founder of private equity firm Apollo Global Management Leon Black is being accused of rape. That's in the lawsuit filed by Cheri Pierson. It says that Black raped her at the mansion of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein two decades ago.

Pierson says she has rendered-- had rendered massages to Epstein and Black in 2002, but Black then had physically overpowered her. Lawyers for Black say Pierson's lawsuit is, quote, "categorically false," and, quote, "a scheme." A disclosure, Apollo Global Management is the parent company of Yahoo Finance.

The Royal Bank of Canada is buying HSBC's Canadian banking business for $13 and 1/2 billion in cash, marking the largest deal ever reached between two domestic banks in that country. If approved, the purchase would see RBC consolidate its position as Canada's largest bank and boost its business among wealthier Canadians.

The move comes as HSBC is pushed by shareholders to split its Asian and Western focused operations. This according to the FT. RBC says it expects to save $740 million in pre-tax costs annually and incur acquisition and integration costs of a billion dollars. That deal expected to close late next year.

And crypto lender BlockFi is suing Sam Bankman-Fried in an attempt to gain shares of Robinhood that Bankman-Fried had pledged as collateral before the collapse of FTX. BlockFi itself filed for bankruptcy protection yesterday and filed this suit hours later. BlockFi alleged a severe liquidity crunch triggered by the breakdown of FTX and its filing and says SBF attempted to raise funds by selling its Robinhood shares using the secure messaging app Signal. Sam Bankman-Fried purchased roughly 7 and 1/2% of Robinhood shares earlier this year.