Opinion

If you’re impressed by Masayoshi Son’s $100 billion Vision Fund, China’s $856 billion in “guidance funds” will blow your mind. The country is quickly becoming a major player in the venture capital world. This year, Chinese investors are involved in over $90 billion worth of deals, second only to the US and up from only $11.5 billion five years ago. ...

For reasons largely outside its control, the Federal Reserve is now being widely blamed for fueling financial market instability and risking derailment of the US economy. This is quite a contrast from just a few month ago, when it was still being feted by many for its role as an active and effective repressor of financial market volatility. It is ...

As we enter 2019, the question that looms over America is simple: Can we govern? The answer is no. Unless this changes — truly a long shot — the New Year may be as disappointing as the old. Our society seems handcuffed by unsolvable problems: large and persistent budget deficits; global warming; uncontrolled immigration; an aging population; an underfunded military; ...

Who is the most important and disruptive leader in the world today? Most Americans would probably answer, Donald Trump — with Russia’s Vladimir Putin running a close second. But my choice for the must-read book of 2018, Elizabeth C. Economy’s “The Third Revolution,” makes a strong case that China’s Xi Jinping may deserve the title. Under Xi’s leadership since 2012, ...

In March, Huawei Technologies Co. announced a series of management changes that went almost unnoticed. Four executives were promoted to deputy chair while one, Liang Hua, was elected chairman of the board. Three of those deputy chairs were also given the position of rotating chairman. Founder Ren Zhengfei remained CEO and a board member, the Shenzhen-based company said in its ...

As China, Russia and the US ramp up their naval deployments, there’s no shortage of conflicts waiting to happen in the world’s oceans. Yet the most immediate cause for concern is something more mundane than great-power rivalries. Pay closer attention to fish. Seafood is the main source of protein for 3 billion people worldwide, and the industry employs more than ...

Physics is a very powerful and exact science. Physicists can predict how electricity will flow through the microscopic circuits in your computer, they can land a spaceship on the moon, they can even pick up a single atom. But when it comes to the origin of the universe, even the smartest physicists can’t give us definite answers. How did its ...

These days everything from cookies to orange juice carry labels boasting that they’re GMO free – a marketing ploy that assumes consumers still hate, fear or at least disapprove of genetically modified organisms (GMO) despite reassurances from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. While science journalists have bemoaned this as irrational fear, people might be making a reasonable ...

When Margrethe Vestager’s five-year term as European competition commissioner ends, the world’s biggest tech companies will breathe a sigh of relief. The Danish politician has been a thorn in the side of the Silicon Valley giants, imposing back taxes on Apple and Amazon.com and fines on Facebook and Google parent Alphabet Inc. “I suspect that, assuming as we all do ...

The president usually doesn’t do a lot to affect the US economy. When people say that President Barack Obama or President George W. Bush created jobs, it shouldn’t be taken literally — what really created the jobs was a confluence of vast and complex economic forces that the president affects only marginally. To substantially change the course of the economy, ...