Opinion

China loves the blockchain, and the blockchain loves it back. Despite the People’s Republic having the least free internet in the world, and a ban on cryptocurrency trading, the Communist Party’s endorsement of the technology last month sent Bitcoin prices soaring almost 30% in a few days. The irony is striking, considering Bitcoin’s anarchic origins. But there’s something broader going ...

The Indian economy continues to slow. The monthly Index of Industrial Production fell to an eight-year low in the month of September, contracting by over 4%. According to India’s central bank, growth in bank credit to industries in the same month fell to 2.7%, the lowest in a year. While the numbers for services are a little better, even they ...

British Conservatives can claim to be the world’s oldest and most successful political party. They’ve been written off more than a few times in the 200-plus years they’ve been around. But they’ve always bounced back. Their secret? The ability and willingness to reinvent themselves – even when that means giving up what supposedly defines them and the values they hold ...

Hong Kong is doing everything it can to ensure Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s listing is a roaring success. That’s turning the $12 billion mega-sale into a hot item — if you can get your hands on the shares. Alibaba will initially offer only 2.5% of the offering to individual investors, a quarter of the allocation specified in Hong Kong’s listing ...

Startups and tech companies such as Uber, Airbnb, Gojek, Bird and Compass operate in many cities and often multiple countries, and they typically have a repeatable playbook for each time they arrive in a new place. What Gojek, the food delivery and rides startup in Southeast Asia, learns about optimal pay for couriers in Jakarta can translate, at least in ...

While almost everyone in Washington is glued to impeachment developments, Europe has been quietly drifting towards a recession. This is bad news for Christine Lagarde, the former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), who is now the president of the European Central Bank (ECB). It may also be bad news for the rest of us. By the usual indicators ...

Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party is behind in the polls for the UK election so it’s unsurprising that he’s chucking out more giveaways to voters. The policy to nationalise BT Group Plc’s fixed-telecoms networks business and provide free fiber broadband to every British household is a humdinger nonetheless. Of course, the chances of this becoming reality are slim given that Corbyn’s ...

Here’s a company that really wants to get bought: As you can see, that wasn’t the case with Carrizo Oil & Gas Inc. up until quite recently. Back in early 2018, when it was trading at about $17 a share, the exploration and production company rejected activist Kimmeridge Energy Management Co.’s calls to either sell the whole company or a ...

It’s still all about the central banks. If you care about allocating money between global assets, everything else remains ancillary, and all 2019’s biggest trends — from negative interest rates in Germany through the inverted US yield curve to the impressive global rebound in share prices — can be explained by the actions of central bankers. Many will find this ...

A long-held belief of analysts in India is that the economy is supply-constrained. Demand isn’t even worth a footnote, while a temporary squeeze in the onion market deserves obsession because it could be inflationary. It’s increasingly obvious that this view is outdated. In October, inflation quickened more than expected to 4.62% because of, yes, an onion shortage. Yet core inflation, ...