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Senate committee seeks answers from Zuckerberg over news selection

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaks on stage during the Facebook F8 conference in San Francisco, California April 12, 2016. Reuters/Stephen Lam   A U.S. Senate committee launched an inquiry on Tuesday into how social media website Facebook selects its news stories after a report that company employees blocked news about conservative issues from its “trending” list.   The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation asked Facebook […]

Uber, Lyft spend big, lose big in Texas vote on driver fingerprinting

Taxi drivers protest against transportation network companies such as Uber and Lyft along with Assembly Bill 2293 at the State Capitol in Sacramento, California, June 25, 2014. Reuters/Max Whittaker/Files   AUSTIN, Texas On-demand ride companies Uber and Lyft suffered an embarrassing defeat in a Saturday election in Austin as voters backed a measure requiring fingerprint background checks for drivers.   The two companies spent more than $8 […]

UK crisis talks over Tata Steel sale

U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron will chair a meeting of ministers on Thursday morning as he weighs how to avoid the closure of an iconic steel plant in South Wales without making costly financial promises. Cameron called the meeting and Business Secretary Sajid Javid cut short a trip to Australia to address the crisis sparked by Tata Steel Ltd.’s decision late Tuesday to sell its plant in […]

Another Fed policy blunder

|By Matein Khalid| I was surprised by the dovishness of the Federal Reserve’s FOMC policy statement last week given the white hot US labour market and metrics of wage inflation. Hence the $29 rally in gold, the plunge in the Volatility Index to 15, the fall in the US dollar and the surge in oil/mining shares. The Yellen Fed is still worried about deflation risk in China, Europe […]

Italian firm brings concrete-eaters to revolutionize demolitions

|By Arabian Post Staff| The introduction of a new technique, using excavators that could virtually be called concrete-eaters, is set to revolutionize the way high rise structures are demolished in the UAE. The new method reduces the time required to bring down a high rise structure to a matter of days, instead of months and years required by conventional methods. The shorter time frames would mean much quicker […]

Mekka as most promising hotel investment market

|By Matein Khalid| It is no coincidence that the most profitable hotels on the planet are located in Makkah, the holiest city of Islam as the site of the Grand Mosque and the Kaaba. For fifteen centuries, Muslims have traveled to Makkah from all over the world for the Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages, making the city the highest source of inbound foreign visitors in Saudi Arabia. Makkah is […]

Oman’s resilient property markets

|By Matein Khalid| The sultanate of Oman has enjoyed phenomenal economic development success in the 45 year reign of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said. Modern Oman is one of the true social, political and economic success stories of the Arab world. However, the Achilles heel of the Omani economy is its huge dependence on oil and gas export earnings, 60% of the sultanate’s GDP. Standard and […]

Global shocks and UAE credit cycle

|By Matein Khalid| The global credit cycle has an immediate impact on the UAE via oil prices, the US dollar peg, cross border bank credit flows, Federal Reserve monetary policy and world trade. The IMF has cut its 2016 growth forecast to 2.6%, the lowest since 2010. A leading developer just booked a 20 fold rise in penalties from walkaway offplan home buyers. Banks hire “loan rangers” […]

Hong Kong asset market in state of siege

|By Matein Khalid| “One country, two systems”. This was the historic formula under which Margaret Thatcher agreed to hand over the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong to the People’s Republic of China, then ruled by Paramount Leader Deng Xiao Ping. The Hong Kong dollar’s spike to 7.81, on the high end of its 7.75 – 7.85 band, demonstrates the sheer scale of the speculative attack against […]

PLAYING SHABBY POLITICS FOR SMART CITIES

MODI SARKAR PICKS NAMES TO TRUMP RIVALS

By Arun Srivastava

The politics of vengeance has been the key factor in the Modi government denying the smart cities to the eastern Indian states. Except Bhubaneswar, Odisha’s capital, no city from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand or Bengal has made it to the smart list. Last year, when the names of the cities for including in the list of the smart cities were being finalized Bihar government was given the impression that at least three of its cities – Bhagalpur, Biharsharif and Muzaffarpur – are among the 97 shortlisted and would be upgraded. But none made it to the first list of 20 released by the Union minister Venkaiah Naidu.

Reacting to it Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar compared the Centre to the fabled “andher nagri (City of lawlessness)” for ignoring Bihar while picking the first list of 20 smart

NAVEEN PATNAIK GETS SMART CITY NOD

ALL EYES ON BHUBANESWAR OF FUTURE

By Ashok B Sharma

The mantra of maintaining equidistance from the Congress and the BJP has played well for the Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. He gets a certification of appreciation from the NDA government at the Centre for urban development. Another feather is on his cap as Bhubaneswar becomes the number one choice for development of Smart City under an ambitious flagship programme mooted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014.

The central government is slated to release appropriate funds for development of Bhubaneswar from the upcoming Budget which will be operationalized from April 1 – the day celebrated as Odisha Dibas in remembrance of the formation as a separate state in 1936.

Other major urban infrastructure developments on the anvil are the development of Paradeep as a port city and upgrada

CONGRESS STILL BRAZENS IT OUT IN KERALA

SOLAR-SCAM TAINTED CHANDY BUDGES NOT

By Amulya Ganguli

The Congress’s barefaced conduct in Kerala is typical of the coarseness, which Natwar Singh said he had detected in Sonia Gandhi in his autobiography, One Life Is Not Enough.

Oommen Chandy’s decision to stay on in the chief minister’s post by claiming that nothing has been proved as yet against him in the solar scam will not surprise the general public who are aware of the average politician’s fondness for the seat of power. They prefer to stick to it till all the options are exhausted. Given the slowness of the legal process, Chandy can hope to remain ensconced till the assembly elections.

What is unacceptable, however, is his move to reinstate even those who had left his ministry on various charges of corruption. These include the excise minister, K. Babu, who had been implicat

BJP’S ALLIANCE PLAN TO GRAB POWER IN TAMIL NADU

CAN JAYA OUTSMART BOTH BJP-LED NDA AND DMK?

By S. Sethuraman

Political parties in Tamil Nadu, ahead of the May elections to the Assembly, want to usher in a “change” in the state’s governance, and BJP is trying hard to bring NDA rule through an alliance by reportedly offering bulk of the seats to contest for the influential state parties, DMDK and PMK, and thus break the hold of “corrupt” regimes of AIADMK and DMK over the last five decades.

Whether the BJP dream fructifies or not, it could cut into the assumed strength of both the ruling AIADMK, which still remains confident of a renewed mandate for ‘Amma’s’ welfare schemes, and of a resurgent DMK which, however, faces difficulty in forging a stronger alliance, with only a divided and demoralised Congress willing to go with it at present..

Pri

NADIR IN UDF POLITICS: OOMMEN CHANDY’S RELIEF ONLY TEMPORARY

SMOULDERING CONGRESS EMBERS MAY LEAP TO FLAME ANY TIME

By P. Sreekumaran

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has survived a scare. Thus reads the headline in a prominent English daily. But has he really weathered the political storm?

Significant straws in the wind proclaim, loud and clear, that he has not. True, he has managed to secure short-term legal relief. But the price, both in political and electoral terms, the Congress and the party-led United Democratic Front (UDF) Government may be called upon to pay will be prohibitively high. That is for sure.

As for the UDF politics, it is stinking to the high heavens. It cannot get any worse than this. The only question is: how long can a thoroughly discredited Government brazen it out?

The legal relief for Chandy and Power Minister Aryadan Mohammed has

CHINA SLOWDOWN OFFERS OPPORTUNITY

INDIA IN SWEET SPOT TO BALANCE THE ACT

By K R Sudhaman

India is in a sweet spot as global economy is not looking good in the face of market turmoil in China. A global recession triggered by poor showing of European economy had hit badly the export led growth model of China, whose economy grew by 6.9 per cent in 2015, the slowest in two decades. Following this slowdown, high commodity prices had started correcting exerting more pressure on China down turn. The massive over investment in China in steel, cement, shipbuilding, petrochemicals, real estate and other infrastructure sectors began to burst. This volatility in equity and commodity markets did not augur well for the global and Chinese economies. Global economy may not be in a crisis as in 2008 during the financial meltdown but it is certainly not out of the woods and outlook for global economy is certainly bearish in 2016.

HINDU RIGHT DROVE ROHITH VEMULA TO SUICIDE

FATAL ANTI-DALIT BIAS OF MODI’S MINISTERS

By Amulya Ganguli

In a voice choked with (feigned?) emotion, Narendra Modi told the Ambedkar University convocation last Friday that Rohith Vemula was forced to take his own life. But he did not specify who forced the Dalit student although the prime minister knew that the “culprits” were in his cabinet. Moreover, they are likely to continue in their posts despite their guilt – unless they are booked for the abetment of suicide.

The two “guilty” ministers, however, must be wondering what they did wrong. After all, when labour minister Bandaru Dattatreya shot off a letter to the “high school girl” – SmritiIrani has studied only up to Class XII – in the human resource development ministry, complaining about how Hyderabad University has become a “den of casteism, extremism and anti-national politics”

MASSIVE GOLD INFLOW RUINING INDIA’S RUPEE AND RATING

ECONOMY BEING HELD HOSTAGE BY BULLION MERCHANTS

By Nantoo Banerjee

Swiss banks may not be too happy with India’s latest round of searches for big Indian accounts there. But, largely impoverished India’s endless gold hunt, especially at a time when the global economy and trade are shrinking and stock markets around the world are going topsy-turvy following economic slow-down in China, has placed the Geneva-based World Gold Council on top of the world. India’s gold import last month hit a new 120-day high at nearly $4 billion while all other imports to the country shrank by over 15 per cent in value.  The massive gold import by bullion merchants, mostly from Mumbai and Ahmedabad, widened the country’s trade deficit to $11.7 billion in just one month. In the pre-reform period, India’s annual trade deficit rarely topped $5 billion. During the current financial year 2015-16, t

Davos jittery over Trump, oil, China

As the chattering chieftains of the global economy gather this week in Davos, Switzerland, they’re facing the darkest outlook since the financial crisis tipped the world into recession seven years ago. The Chinese slowdown and accompanying slide in the yuan are imperiling already sluggish international growth, oil is trading at its lowest level in more than a decade, stocks have suffered their worst January ever, and the […]

Greed and glory in emerging markets equities

|By Matein Khalid| Emerging markets were an entirely predictable horror story once again in 2015. The oil/mining bust, currency meltdowns, China’s hard landing, sovereign credit downgrades, banking system crises, corruption scandals and geopolitical crises from Ukraine to Syria, the Black Sea to the South China Sea devastated investor wealth in emerging markets.   India’s Sensex and Nifty were down 9% while the rupee has depreciated to 66 […]

BJP IN BAD SHAPE IN WEST BENGAL

MAMATA WOOING CONGRESS AGAIN

By Ashis Biswas

For the Bharatiya Janata Party in Bengal, the theme song could well be akla chalo re: Ironically, as the weakest opposition party in West Bengal, the BJP alone is not contemplating any alliance, with only a few months left before the 2016 Assembly polls.

Among other parties, the usually derided, much weakened Congress has emerged as the prime choice as an alliance partner both for the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the CPI(M). Interestingly, the Left camp remains divided over the question of political alignments. For instance, the CPI a firm ally of the Congress during the seventies, has put its foot down to any linkage with it, as have smaller parties like the SUCI or the CPI(M-L). The CPI’s logic: it points to its own remarkable decline over the years, which it sees as a consequence of its earlier reliance on

TRINAMOOL CONFIDENT OF WINNING SOUTH BENGAL

RURAL DEVELOPMENT MAY CLINCH 2016 POLL FOR MAMATA

By Ashis Biswas

As the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and opposition parties gear up for the next round of West Bengal Assembly elections, their campaign themes have been established.

The TMC is contesting on a ‘development’ slogan, while the twin pillars of the opposition’s campaign will be ‘lawlessness and economic stagnation’, broadly speaking.

At first sight, the TMC’s claim of having improved the state’s economy may look suspect, if not downright dubious, to most observers. However, initial impressions may be deceptive. After 54 months of its tenure, the ruling TMC has consolidated its position in rural Bengal. Especially in the highly populated South Bengal districts, which account for most of the 294 seats in the Assembly, the TMC is confident of doing better than its op

RAHUL GANDHI DETERMINED TO GO TO JAIL ON NATIONAL HERALD ISSUE

By Nora Chopra

The Congress party is divided on the Congress strategy on the National Herald issue. While Rahul is adamant to go to jail, there are senior leaders who feel that it is not the correct strategy to be adopted at this time. According to a Congress general secretary, this is not the same time and neither is Rahul Gandhi an Indira Gandhi, while she had no charges of corruption against her. There are umpteen charges against the erstwhile UPA government. The Morarji government had been harassing Indira Gandhi. Thus when she went to jail there was a wave of sympathy in her favour. Congress senior leaders claim that Indira Gandhi was a mass leader which Rahul is not. Besides the Congress leaders are extremely concerned about the health of the 90 plus Motilal Vora and also ailing Sonia Gandhi

MAHARASHTRA PCC CHIEF GETTING CLOSE WITH STATE CHIEF MINISTER

Resentment is brewing within the Maharashtra Congress agains

PRIME MINISTER MODI’S MAIDEN KERALA VISIT A MAHA FLOP

SNDP BOSS’S LOSS IS CHIEF MINISTER CHANDY’S GAIN

By P. Sreekumaran

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: There is no mistaking it. Narendra Modi’s maiden visit to Kerala as the Prime Minister was a damp squib though the State BJP unit would have us believe that it was a roaring success.

Despite the strenuous efforts of the BJP to put a positive spin on the controversy-marred Modi visit, the stark reality is that it has defeated the very purpose for which Modi undertook the much-hyped visit.

The main purpose of the Modi mission was to unveil at Kollam the statue of former Congress Chief Minister R Shankar with the avowed objective of appropriating the legacy of Shankar like the way the BJP tried to hijack Sardar Vallabbhai Patel.  However the effort came a cropper in a most resounding manner. The most visible sign of the failure of the visit was the snu

Zuma protests: Indian family in the eye of storm

As South Africans endure their deepest economic crisis since 2009, it’s not just President Jacob Zuma they blame. There’s a family whose name is increasingly the target of protest: the Guptas. As tens of thousands marched in October in South Africa’s biggest wave of nationwide anti-government protests since the African National Congress came to power, one poster, broadcast on the nation’s television channels, captured the public anger: […]