The debate about “fake news” has gripped politics since the election of Donald Trump in November and has entered markets as investors spar over a “great rotation” from bonds into stocks. Long predicted by some analysts, expectations of a pronounced rotation out of low-yielding bonds and defensive share sectors into areas of the equity market that prosper from faster economic growth have been heightened by the prospect […]
For more evidence that central bank intervention in the foreign exchange market is increasingly becoming an exercise in futility – look no further than Mexico. The peso briefly sank to a fresh all time low against the dollar on Tuesday, dropping by as much as 1.1 per cent to MXN 21.6227, as concerns continue to mount over incoming US president Donald Trump’s trade rhetoric towards Mexico, report […]
By Parisa Hafezi | ANKARA ANKARA The death of former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani deprives Iran’s reformers of a powerful ally, boosting anti-Western hardliners before a presidential election which will determine how open Tehran is to the world. The loss of Rafsanjani’s skills as a factional powerbroker also means rivalries in Iran’s unwieldy dual system of clerical and republican rule could grow unchecked, testing the stability […]
Over 13 years, consumption of gasoline rose in countries that lowered taxes or raised subsidies The average tax on petrol in 157 nations fell 13 percent from 2003 to 2015, even as the world acknowledged the need to slash greenhouse gases from fossil fuels, researchers reported Monday. Over 13 years, consumption of gasoline rose in countries that lowered taxes or raised subsidies, they said in a study […]
Yep, it’s still falling. Turkey’s battered currency is taking no break from its recent woes at the start of European trading this morning and is down another 1.2 per cent against the dollar on the day. That takes its 2017 losses to an already whopping 7 per cent against the greenback at TRY3.7589 – another record low having suffered its worst daily blow since July just yesterday. […]
JOHOR BARU: An assistant officer in the Johor Baru Land District Office pleaded not guilty to receiving a bribe of RM150,000 at a Session court here today. Ahmad Ehwan Ahmad, 56, was charged under Section 165 of the Penal Code for allegedly committing the offence of receiving the money from businessman Toh Ang Poo, 49, for approving several rock mining permit applications from the land office. The […]
BEIJING A Chinese professor has been sacked after he criticised Chairman Mao Zedong on his 123rd birthday in an commentary he posted online that enraged leftists. Mao, who died on Dec. 9, 1976, is still officially venerated by the ruling Communist Party as the founder of modern China and his face appears on every yuan banknote. But he is particularly respected by leftists who believe the country […]
By Jessica DiNapoli | NEW YORK NEW YORK Canadian apparel maker Gildan Activewear Inc (GIL.TO) has won a bankruptcy auction for U.S. fashion retailer American Apparel LLC after raising its offer to around $88 million, a person familiar with the matter said Monday. Gildan’s takeover marks the end of an era for the iconic Los Angeles-based company, which was founded in 1998 by an eccentric Canadian university […]
The Federal Reserve should be ready to consider reducing the size of its balance sheet as part of its efforts to prevent overheating in the US, a senior policymaker said as he noted the pick-up in wage inflation and predicted a return of inflation to target by the end of the year. Eric Rosengren, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, said that if the […]
Tuesday 02:10 GMT Overview Stock and currency markets across Asia were mixed as Wall Street again pulled back from record highs, leaving the Dow Jones Industrial Average shy of the 20,000 milestone. Hot topic Producer price inflation in China continued to climb, with data showing wholesale prices rose in December at their fastest pace since September 2011. The producer price index was up 5.5 per cent year […]
Submitted by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute, “This light of history is pitiless; it has a strange and divine quality that, luminous as it is, and precisely because it is luminous, often casts a shadow just where we saw a radiance; out of the same man it makes two different phantoms, and the one attacks and punishes the other, the darkness of the despot struggles with […]
The military, security experts and soldiers at the scene quickly rejected that notion. “Those who ran from the scene were not concerned about Azaria, but about their own well-being,” said Yehuda Ben Meir, an expert in national security and public opinion at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University. Continue reading the main story Still, the argument — unfolding in full volume on Israeli […]
Credit: CC0 Public Domain What could be learnt about the world if you could read the news from over 100 local newspapers for a period of 150 years? This is what a team of Artificial Intelligence (AI) researchers from the University of Bristol have done, together with a social scientist and a historian, who had access to 150 years of British regional newspapers. The patterns that emerged […]
DUBAI An Iranian official confirmed on Monday that Saudi Arabia had invited Tehran to discuss arrangements for the annual Muslim haj, which Iran boycotted last year after hundreds died in a crush at the 2015 pilgrimage. Most were Iranians, and the incident infuriated Tehran. Soon after, ties between the two regional rivals worsened further when Saudi Arabia executed a Shi’ite cleric, angry Iranians stormed the Saudi embassy […]
By Svea Herbst-Bayliss | HARTFORD, Conn. HARTFORD, Conn. Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren on Monday called for the U.S. central bank to step up its pace of interest rate increases from the once-a-year pattern it has pursued since 2015, warning of inflation risks if it does not. “I expect that appropriate monetary policy will need to normalize more quickly than over the past year,” Rosengren told the […]
DUBAI // The main site for the UAE Food Bank was announced on Monday after the first meeting about the new charity initiative. The bank’s main branch will be in the Dubai Vegetable Market, while 15 other outlets are planned for inside and outside the UAE. Sheikha Hind bint Juma Al Maktoum, Chairwoman of the Food Bank, said it is hoped that it will become the “biggest […]
The world’s main repository for data on credit derivatives deals will move its database on to the blockchain, in the first big test case for whether the emerging technology can be employed across the finance industry. The DTCC, a US post-trade services group that processes more than $1,500tn of securities a year, will use technology from IBM and US blockchain start-ups R3 and Axoni as the basis […]
BAGHDAD Iraqi special forces made further advances against Islamic State in Mosul on Monday, pushing militants out of another district a day after driving them back to the eastern bank of the Tigris river, a spokesman said. The elite counter-terrorism service (CTS) had taken full control of the Baladiyat district and encircled neighbouring Sukkar, Sabah al-Numan told Reuters. The advance also consolidated Iraqi forces’ control of several […]
The humanoid robot ‘Jia Jia’ can hold a simple conversation and make specific facial expressions when asked “Jia Jia” can hold a simple conversation and make specific facial expressions when asked, and her creator believes the eerily life-like robot heralds a future of cyborg labour in China. Billed as China’s first human-like robot, Jia Jia was first trotted out last year by a team of engineers at […]
Doha, 9 January 2016 Dr. R. Seetharaman, Doha Bank CEO was conferred with the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award (PBSA) by the Hon’ble President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee at the PRAVASI BHARTIYA Divas Convention on 9 January 2017 which is the highest honour conferred on overseas Indians by the Government of India in recognition of their achievements both in India and abroad. The PBSA was conferred was […]
After India’s government took 86% of currency out of circulation a couple of months ago, its main policy think-tank has a new plan for the country: rendering plastic money “irrelevant” by 2020. Amitabh Kant, Chief Executive Officer of NITI Aayog, which helps the government formulate long-term policies, said Sunday that India was in the midst of a “huge disruption” in financial technology and innovation, which will enable […]
No one can ever confidently predict what will happen in the following 12 months, but forecasting 2017 is particularly difficult. The surprises of 2016 (Brexit and the election of Donald Trump are at the top of the list but there were others, including the sacking of the entire Kuwaiti parliament, Saudi Arabia’s backflip on its oil production policy and the sudden demonetisation in India) demonstrate that we […]
The meeting between Mr. Netanyahu and the publisher of Yediot Aharonot, Arnon Mozes, took place in 2014, according to Channel 2, but the discussion does not appear to have materialized into action. Continue reading the main story Still, the disclosure caused an uproar. Critics accused Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Mozes of plotting to upend the democratic principle of an independent, free and professional press. “We expect in […]
The pound was the biggest faller on foreign exchange markets on Monday, sliding to its lowest level against the dollar since late October, after Theresa May warned there was no prospect of Britain keeping “bits” of EU membership. In an interview at the weekend, the UK prime minister told Sky News that “often people talk in terms as if we are leaving the EU but we still […]
