“I’d like to see you hold back on settlements for a little bit,” Mr. Trump told Mr. Netanyahu on Feb. 15, during the Israeli premier’s visit to the White House. “We’ll work something out.” Continue reading the main story Mr. Netanyahu replied, “Let’s try it,” prompting Mr. Trump to joke, “Doesn’t sound too optimistic, but he’s a good negotiator.” On Thursday, a delegation of senior aides to […]
A U.S. judge on Friday refused to overturn the conviction of two nephews of Venezuela’s first lady on charges that they tried to carry out a multimillion-dollar drug deal to help their family stay in power. Franqui Francisco Flores de Freitas and Efrain Antonio Campo Flores had argued in a motion challenging their conviction that they were entrapped in a sting operation and that their trial was […]
HONG KONG — Middle-class mainlander Laura Zhang found the idea of owning a home overseas irresistible after being bombarded by commercials for an affordable project “near Singapore”. The Forest City project in the southern Malaysian state of Johor, the subject of the advertisement, is being developed by Country Garden, China’s third-largest home builder. Ms Zhang said she was told that a flat in Forest City, the developer’s […]
The highest-end Nokia 6 Arte Black is among the phones set for a global rollout. Image: HMD Global HMD Global has confirmed it will launch its Nokia Android handsets to the US and the rest of the world in the second quarter. The company said on its Twitter account today that its new Android handsets and one feature phone will launch worldwide between April and June. The […]
By Pavel Polityuk and Alessandra Prentice | AVDIYIVKA/KIEV AVDIYIVKA/KIEV Ukrainian government troops and separatist fighters have drawn closer to each other at several places along the tense front line in eastern Ukraine, monitors say, raising the risk of violent flare-ups that could wreck a shaky ceasefire. At some points, the sides have drawn within shouting distance of each other. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, […]
Gold ETFs or gold bars? Bars including one kilo gold bar at bullion dealers Goldcore, in London, U.K. (March 11, 2010). Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg Considering the public’s waning trust in the banking system, many investors find themselves wondering how GLD stacks up to owning the real thing. When you look at both assets more closely, it’s clear that gold ETFs and gold bullion are very different investments. […]
China-based Zhonghong Zhuoye Group Co Ltd will buy Blackstone Group LP’s (BX.N) 21 percent stake in SeaWorld Entertainment Inc (SEAS.N), the embattled U.S.-based marine park operator said on Friday. SeaWorld said Zhonghong Group would buy the stake for $23 per share, a premium of nearly 33 percent to the stock’s close on Thursday. Zhonghong Group – a diversified holding company for investments in real estate, leisure and […]
Not everything is Donald Trump’s fault. And by the same token, not everything that goes right in the world can be attributed to him. It can be difficult to remember this, particularly in the US where domestic politics is crowding out almost everything else from the news, and where most people are inclined to view the news through stridently pro- or anti-Trump lenses. Mr Trump seems so […]
By Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The Trump administration reiterated its concerns about Israeli settlement activity, the two sides said on Thursday, as a round of talks ended without agreement over limiting future construction on land the Palestinians want for a state. The four days of high-level meetings in Washington marked the latest step by President Donald Trump’s aides aimed at opening the way to renewed peace […]
By Henning Gloystein | SINGAPORE SINGAPORE Oil prices edged up on Friday, supported by a fall in Saudi exports to the United States, but overall markets remained under pressure on the back of a world market awash with fuel. Prices for front-month Brent crude futures LCOc1, the international benchmark for oil, were at $50.63 per barrel at 0343 GMT, up 7 cents from their last close. In […]
By Frank Jack Daniel and Matt Spetalnick | MEXICO CITY/WASHINGTON MEXICO CITY/WASHINGTON A group of 14 nations on Thursday urged Venezuela to hold elections and release “political prisoners,” in a joint statement that kept open the option of seeking to suspend the South American country from the Organization of American States. The statement, which Mexico’s Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said was aimed at encouraging Venezuela to “re-establish […]
ZTE Corporation has released its financial results for 2016, reporting full-revenue of 101.2 billion yuan, an increase of 1.04 percent to the 100.18 billion yuan reported in the previous corresponding period. The Chinese telecommunications hardware vendor, which had delayed the release of its 2016 annual report to assess the impact of the Iran sanctions case, admitted it slipped to a net loss of 2.36 billion yuan in […]
Following a day of narrative twists and turns ahead of what was supposed to be a Thursday night vote to repeal Obamacare, a vote which was pulled in the last moment when over 30 conservative and moderate House republicans threatened to vote against the Ryan/Trump plan, Trump has had enough with the Freedom Caucus dissenters and has issued an informal ultimatum: vote to repeal Obamacare on Friday […]
WASHINGTON A bipartisan group of U.S. senators including senior members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee introduced a bill on Thursday seeking to tighten sanctions on Iran over its ballistic missile launches and other non-nuclear activities. Democratic Senator Robert Menendez, a co-author of the measure with the Republican foreign relations chairman, Bob Corker, told Reuters it had been written specifically not to interfere with the international nuclear […]
Donald Trump suffered a big blow as Republican leaders postponed a vote on the party’s healthcare bill following their failure to unite conservatives around the effort to replace the Obamacare law that they had spent years vowing to repeal. Paul Ryan, the Republican Speaker of the House, abandoned the vote on Thursday afternoon after a final effort by the White House to convince conservative rebels to support […]
By Robin Emmott and Alissa de Carbonnel | BRUSSELS BRUSSELS Hours before Wednesday’s attack in London, the head of the European Union police agency Europol warned that a large group of radicalised individuals posed a constant threat to Britain and Europe. “Some of these are likely to succeed in the future,” Rob Wainwright, who is British, wrote in a blog to commemorate the attacks in Brussels that […]
Predicting and acting upon financial fraud is one of the prime areas of application of advanced big data techniques like machine learning (ML). Earlier this week, a case of money laundering known as the Laundromat was uncovered by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) involving a number of global banks active in the UK. Could ML help prevent such incidents? What progress is there on […]
Virtustream announced on Thursday that its enterprise cloud platform is officially available in Australia and New Zealand. The cloud company — which was acquired by EMC in 2015 for $1.2 billion, before the storage giant itself was acquired by Dell for $67 billion in 2016 — said the expansion is a strategic response to customers that are looking to bring their products and services to the ANZ […]
Former US VP Stresses Role of Governments in Reaching Global Consensus to Fight Climate Change SHARJAH-UAE: March 22, 2017 His Highness Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Mohamed Al Qasimi, Member of Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah today attended a conversation panel with Al Gore, former US Vice President and founder-chairman of the Climate Reality Project as part of the sixth edition of International Government Communication Forum (IGCF […]
False promises abound in Silicon Valley, especially when it comes to free products going paid. But what can you do? Nothing really, and that’s a problem. Silicon Valley works well with false promises. But what happens when those false promises cover free products that eventually require payment? In other words, who gets hurt? You might recall that in 2014, Microsoft […]
By Ankit Ajmera and Nathan Layne Sears Holdings Corp (SHLD.O), once the largest U.S. retailer, warned on Tuesday about its ability to continue as a going concern after years of losses and declining sales. “Our historical operating results indicate substantial doubt exists related to the company’s ability to continue as a going concern,” Sears said in the annual report for the fiscal year ended Jan. 28. (bit.ly/2mRUcce) […]
SHANGHAI U.S. short-term rental giant Airbnb Inc will triple its China staff this year as it targets the country’s millennial consumers, its chief executive said on Wednesday, even as the Silicon Valley firm faces competition from local rivals. Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky said China was a key market for the firm to achieve its global ambitions. He was talking at an event in Shanghai to […]
Alibaba has kicked off its grand plan for global trade without frontiers, signing a bilateral deal designed to ease the passage of goods shipped by smaller businesses between China and Malaysia. The pact, established as a public-private partnership in Malaysia’s digital free trade zone, is focused on infrastructure, including a fulfilment centre and co-operating on electronic payments and financing. Daniel Zhang, chief executive of the Chinese ecommerce […]
22 March 2017 EastNets, (eastnets.com), a leading provider of innovative global compliance and payments solutions, successfully held its 14th Annual Conference 2017 from 7th-9th March at The Grand Millennium Hotel, Amman Jordan. The event was described as one of the company’s most inspiring annual conferences, which has been a company tradition that has been in effect for the last 14 years. This year’s rallying call was ’Growth: […]
