Opinion

  Far from jolting the US into a protectionist lurch, might President-elect Donald Trump unwittingly help buoy global trade next year? Here’s one scenario to mull over: A strong dollar and a tight US labour market, combined with Trump’s proposed fiscal plans, may fuel a rise in net US imports in 2017, a boon for commodity exporters and goods manufacturers …

  A new year is just around the corner, and pressure on the yuan means Beijing can look forward to a host of fresh outflows into Hong Kong insurance, curbs or no. The annual $50,000 cap on foreign-exchange conversions resets on Jan. 1, and it’s a safe bet sales of dollar-denominated premiums in the city will spike. Before October’s ban …

  There’s no good place to start a nuclear arms race — and Twitter is an especially bad venue. So it’s unfortunate that President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday tweeted his desire for the US to “greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability,” then followed up on Friday morning by saying, “Let it be an arms race.” It’s hard to know …

  The Obama administration abstained from voting on a United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s West Bank expansion. Israel reacted fiercely. Tel Aviv accused Washington of abandoning its closest Middle East ally. The resolution called Israeli settlements illegal and demanded that country immediately stop construction in West bank and other territories seized in 1967 Middle East war. Some 430,000 …

  This year’s news about what artificial intelligence can do in the arts has been both exciting and scary. Neural networks have learned to paint like masters and compose sophisticated music. Those of us in creative endeavours might be as endangered by technological advances as blue-collar workers are often said to be — though we are protected by certain limitations …

  It’s a Christmas fairy tale. After a 30-year sleep, during which costs have run out of control, investment banks have suddenly woken up to the fact that thousands of their customers don’t make them money. Cursing the ogres of Basel, they find a magic marker pen and cross the freeloaders off their client lists. It all ends happily ever …

  It’s not looking pretty for department stores. Other than electronics retailers and gas stations, department stores are the only major retail category in the US in which sales fell in the 11 months through November from a year earlier, according to US Census data released this week. And while most of the conversation about dying department stores centers on …

  Economists like to tell a possibly apocryphal story about Milton Friedman. The prophet of free markets, visiting an Asian country in the 1960s, witnessed a public-works project that had people making a road with picks and shovels. When he asked why they didn’t use earth-moving machines instead, a local official responded that the goal was to provide people with …

  Earlier this year, the Thai government announced its desire to create an economy of fresh new businesses through a 20 billion baht ($555 million) fund. Its stated goal was to “increase the number of startups in Thailand to 10,000 by 2018,” Information and Communication Technology Minister Uttama Savanayana was cited as saying in April, according to the Bangkok Post. …

  President-elect Donald Trump isn’t even in office yet, and he’s already delivered a helpful boost to the economy — the Japanese economy. At the end of a year of gloomy announcements, the Bank of Japan has raised its growth forecast for next year, and Trump deserves much of the credit. The main reason for the BOJ’s improving mood is …