Opinion

  Noah Smith In the past year, a huge amount of money has been flowing out of China. In the past, when this happened, it was because the Chinese central bank was buying foreign assets. But this time the People’s Bank of China has been selling foreign assets — it’s China’s citizens and companies that are sending their money overseas. …

  Markus Winter SPECIAL TO EMIRATES BUSINESS Kasumigaseki vs Nagatacho – Japan’s powerful bureaucracy versus its political center. For the past three years, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has decidedly tilted the balance in the latter direction. After over half a century of almost unbroken LDP (Liberal Democratic Party) rule, the Democratic Party (DPJ) won a landslide victory in 2009 to …

  WASHINGTON With Venezuela spinning into chaos and collapse, the Obama administration has pondered how to nudge the imploding nation toward political change — without making Uncle Sam a target. The administration appears to have found the right formula this week. Secretary of State John Kerry announced Tuesday at a meeting of the Organization of American States that the U.S. …

An ambitious European Union (EU) plan to curb migration from countries ranging from Lebanon to Nigeria could reduce pressure in Europe but would not fully eradicate the problem as some partners would need more engagement to resolve the growing phenomenon. The European Commission (EC) proposed to deploy 8 billion euros ($9.1 billion) over the next five years to tackle flows …

  Jonathan Bernstein Hillary Clinton delivered a substantive and somewhat bipartisan speech on Monday about the massacre in Orlando, Florida. She offered a number of specific-sounding prescriptions and recalled George W. Bush’s respect for the Muslim community. Donald Trump? He started by bragging about himself and hinting that Barack Obama might be part of a plot against the US. Then …

Some of China’s zombie firms may finally die. The State Administration for Industry and Commerce and the State Administration of Taxation jointly issued a statement Monday that requires dormant companies that have not submitted annual reports or tax declarations for at least two years to begin business operations once again or file for liquidation. Of the zombie firms, dormant firms …

  U.S. President Barack Obama’s call for a “moral revolution” in humanity’s approach to nuclear weapons was the highlight of his poignant recent visit to Hiroshima, while Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump similarly agree on the pressing need to secure loose nuclear material. However, speeches aspiring to a higher morality are only a beginning; morality is made truly meaningful though …

  Matthew Winkler A week before Britain votes on whether to leave the European Union, polls show that the public’s preference is too close to call. Financial markets provide a different view: a persistent expectation that the U.K. will remain. When markets and polls point in different directions, markets tend to be superior prognosticators. Will Britain Leave the EU? That’s …

  A growing number of economists seem convinced that the U.S., European Union and China are all headed for a prolonged period of sluggish growth — secular stagnation, in the words of former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers. A close parallel would seem to be 1990s Japan. There, too, the bursting of debt-funded asset price bubbles gave way to multiple rounds …

WASHINGTON Even by Donald Trump’s standards, his comments about the Orlando shooting have been reckless and self-serving. They are also dangerous for the country. Trump’s response to Sunday morning’s terrorist attack by Omar Mateen was initially an opportunistic tweet; then a boasting statement on his website: “I said this was going to happen”; followed by a renewed call to temporarily …