Shares in Italian banks opened sharply lower Monday morning after voters rejected the country’s constitutional reform referendum, with investors questioning whether some of Italy’s largest financial institutions will now be able to raise capital needed to shore up their finances. Milan’s stock market benchmark, the FTSE Mib, was down 1.4 per cent to 16,857.0 in opening trading, led lower by its banks after Matteo Renzi, Italy’s prime […]
The company responsible for rolling out the National Broadband Network across Australia was directly warned that a draft opinion piece by its chairman, Ziggy Switkowski, could potentially be seen as favouring one side during an election campaign. (Screenshot: Chris Duckett/ZDNet) In a letter submitted in response to Senate Questions on Notice late Friday afternoon, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Communications and the Arts Ian Robinson told […]
Submitted by Michael Shedlock via MishTalk.com, On the same day Matteo Renzi suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of alleged “populists” in Italy, German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble ruled out debt relief for Greece ahead of a eurozone finance minister meeting. Schäuble says Greece Must Reform or Leave Eurozone. Greece must implement economic reforms if it is to keep its place in the eurozone, Germany’s finance […]
In late July, Moussa Aksar, the director of Niger’s L’Évènement newspaper, answered his phone and heard a familiar voice warning him that he was, once again, in danger. “Be careful,” a friendly source told Aksar. “Look out for yourself and be careful what you say on the phone.” Aksar had just published Niger’s first exposé from the Panama Papers, the investigation based on a leak of documents […]
SHANGHAI Chinese trainmaker CRRC (601766.SS)(1766.HK) plans to build more factories abroad as part of its plan to double sales outside of China to up to $15 billion by 2020, state-run China Daily reported on Monday. CRRC expects a total of $8 billion worth of orders from overseas customers this year, and was also open to teaming up with competitors to win bids in some markets, company executives […]
The Department of Human Services (DHS) has implemented an online compliance system that is using automation to help locate funds owed to the Commonwealth. Approximately AU$4.5 million that has gone awry is being pointed to each day by the online compliance system, allowing DHS to kick off the process to reclaim the funds. Before the new system, only AU$295,000 in missing funds was highlighted every 24 hours. […]
The cashless society is catching up to all of us. As SHTFPlan.com’s Mac Slavo notes, Most of Europe has shifted that way, and now India is forcing the issue. In the United States, people are being acclimated to it, and may soon find that no other option is practical in the highly-digitized online world. Once that takes hold, the banksters, bureaucrats and hackers will have total […]
By Nichola Saminather and Wayne Cole | SINGAPORE/SYDNEY SINGAPORE/SYDNEY The euro was under the gun on Monday, skidding to a 20-month low after Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said he would resign following a stinging defeat on constitutional reform that could destabilise the country’s shaky banking system. The single currency, which slumped to as low as $1.0505 EUR= in early Asian trade after opening at around $1.0685, […]
Don’t worry about the robots, worry about the humans. Image: iStock There’s a huge difference between the modest aims of the artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning being used today, and the grand ideas of creating an artificial general intelligence that could match — and then rapidly exceed – the capabilities of a human mind As they develop, AI and machine learning will be able to […]
Photo Coach Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide after Alabama won the Southeastern Conference championship Saturday. The team will play in a national semifinal on Dec. 31. Credit Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images The College Football Playoff’s selection committee on Sunday announced the four teams that will contend for this season’s national championship: Alabama (13-0), followed by Clemson (12-1), Ohio State (11-1) and Washington (12-1). Clemson, the second […]
By Saif Hameed and Ulf Laessing | BAGHDAD/BARTELLA, Iraq BAGHDAD/BARTELLA, Iraq Islamic State fighters retreating in the face of a seven-week Iraqi military assault on their Mosul stronghold have hit back in the last two days, exploiting cloudy skies which hampered U.S.-led air support and highlighting the fragile army gains. In a series of counter-attacks since Friday night, the jihadist fighters struck elite Iraqi troops spearheading the […]
By Rory Carroll | OAKLAND, Calif. OAKLAND, Calif. Recovery teams found a 10th body early Sunday morning in the charred ruins of an Oakland, California, warehouse after a fire broke out during a dance party, triggering one of the worst disasters in the city’s history. Authorities confirmed at least nine fatalities soon after the blaze was brought under control early Saturday morning. But local media reported early […]
High inventories and the potential for US shale production to respond quickly to any market tightening mean oil prices may flatline in 2017 before gradually moving higher over the next few years, according to Fitch Ratings. The ratings agency said it expects supply and demand to be broadly balanced in the first half of next year, with a move to a more pronounced deficit from July onwards. […]
Italians and Austrians headed to the polls in closely watched votes on Sunday that will gauge the strength of Europe’s populist and extreme right political parties. Italy’s constitutional referendum on Sunday will determine the political future of prime minister Matteo Renzi and test anti-establishment parties in the eurozone’s third-largest economy. The plebiscite on Mr Renzi’s flagship overhaul — which would shrink the powers of the Italian senate […]
Hotels operating in the UAE continued to see declines in occupancy and room rates during October, according to the latest data from industry consultants STR. It said the UAE’s hospitality sector reported an occupancy dip of 2.9 percent during the month to 75.6 percent, while average daily rates (ADR) dropped 9.6 percent to AED668.05, the lowest for an October since 2005. As a result, revenue per available […]
The UK’s Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, has been in post just under four months, but already the differences between her approach and those of her two most recent predecessors (Richard Thomas and Christopher Graham) are starting to become clear. This may be due partly to the fact that she comes to the role with six years’ experience as the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Columbia, whereas […]
When asked by two CNN shills who she thought should be the next Chair of the DNC, democrat statagist, and former Bernie Sanders spokeswoman, Symone Sanders said ‘we don’t need white people leading the democrats now.’ Instead, she felt someone of a darker persuasion should lead them, in order to best represent ‘diversity.’ Apparently, diversity doesn’t include all races — just the ones that aren’t white — […]
By Gavin Jones | ROME ROME Italians vote on Sunday in a referendum on constitutional reform which will decide the political future of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who has promised to resign if he loses. Financial markets and Europe’s politicians fear victory for the opposition ‘No’ camp could trigger political instability and renewed turmoil for Italy’s battered banks, pushing the euro zone towards a fresh crisis. Polls […]
Every year, Brazilian venture capital firm Monashees takes entrepreneurs from its portfolio companies on an overseas discovery tour. This year, instead of Silicon Valley, the firm headed to the Yangtze Valley, in a clear sign of a new front opening for Chinese investment in Latin America. China is seeking to expand lending and investment in Brazil and elsewhere on the continent, as it shifts from its traditional […]
On April 7, 14 large blue letters quietly disappeared from the outer walls of an office building in an exclusive neighborhood in northern San Salvador. One by one, the letters came down from the blue and beige stucco walls, leaving behind faint traces of the name of the law firm that had been working there just days before: M-O-S-S-A-C-K-F-O-N-S-E-C-A. Employees of the El Salvador branch of Mossack […]
BEIJING China’s armed forces must be smaller but more capable, and if reforms are not properly carried out the military risks falling behind, affecting its ability to wage war, Chinese state media on Saturday cited President Xi Jinping as saying. Xi unexpectedly announced in September last year that he would cut troop numbers by 300,000, or some 13 percent of the world’s biggest military, currently 2.3-million strong. […]
The commission, if not dead on arrival, quickly ended up on life support. Mr. Stiglitz and another board member, Mark Pieth, a Swiss anticorruption expert, resigned after only one official meeting because the government, they said, would not promise to make their final report public. Continue reading the main story “You can’t have a committee on transparency and not be transparent,” Mr. Stiglitz said. Photo President Juan […]
Submitted by Robert Parry via Strategic-Culture.org, Under the cover of battling “fake news,” the mainstream U.S. news media and officialdom are taking aim at journalistic skepticism when it is directed at the pronouncements of the U.S. government and its allies. One might have hoped that the alarm about “fake news” would remind major U.S. news outlets, such as The Washington Post and The New York Times, about […]
US technology shares faced one of their worst weeks of 2016 as investors shifted their focus to equities that will benefit from the soaring price of oil and the policies of the Trump administration. The S&P 500 technology index, a measure of large companies in the sector, has declined 3 per cent since Friday last week. The fall represents the steepest drop since late April, when Apple […]
