Opinion

There were no signs of a rebound in Best Buy Co’s latest financial results. While the company is painting a hopeful picture for the longer term, prospects for the core retail business and new at-home services remain lackluster. Investors could be forgiven for wondering whether some problems are too hard to fix. The consumer-electronics retailer reported weaker-than-expected revenue for the ...

  For nearly two years, pandemic-weary Americans have been pleading for one thing: We want our lives back. And in many ways, we now have our lives back — just not our work lives. Too many employees are still working from home. It’s reached the point where employers need to prioritise returning to the office, an argument President Joe Biden ...

  When Russia began its invasion of Ukraine, cryptocurrency fans appeared to be trapped in a decadent fantasy. A batch of CryptoPunk NFTs (blockchain collectibles) had just been yanked from auction at Sotheby’s amid fading enthusiasm and a broader market sell-off. The seller tweeted Drake memes to laugh off the cancelled event, but considering the glitzy marketing campaign, it was ...

Sitting on the fence is uncomfortable. Faced with a geopolitical fight that is both unthinkably brutal and sprawling in its consequences, Beijing officials are finding that such a posture might also, in the long run, be impossible. When President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, he appears to have shocked Chinese officialdom along with the rest of the world. It’s difficult to ...

  Like someone mistaking a Target dress for a designer frock, the stock market has misread the retailer. Shares in the big-box store dubbed “Tarzhay” for its chic clothing outperformed strongly from 2017 until a few months ago. But since November they have underperformed both the market and shares of rival Walmart Inc Investors have worried that Target Corp’s profitability ...

One of Russia’s greatest strategic weaknesses has recently turned into an advantage. Climate change may tilt the balance further in Moscow’s favour. Farm production — traditionally an area in which Russia has underperformed due to the low quality of its frigid, drought-prone agricultural land — has boomed over the past decade. That’s important, because food exports have long been a ...

  Boris Johnson struggles for an asylum policy as generous as the rhetoric he has deployed. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has already offered to host a government in exile should Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy be forced to flee. Extending that same spirit of solidarity to those Ukrainians who are similarly dislodged from their homeland would give real underpinning to ...

There are many ways in which Russian President Vladimir Putin has made the world a more dangerous, brutish and frightening place. One is by raising the potential for nuclear Armageddon. Two scenarios stand out. The first involves the short term; the other, the long. In the short term, we’re all hoping his latest nuclear threat is just a bluff. During ...

Nike Inc is so on trend right now. By making its hottest sneakers harder to find, it’s on its way to becoming more a top-end name, like Gucci or Louis Vuitton, than a mainstream product. That’s of immense value to both the sportswear giant’s brand equity and its profits. And with American luxury on a tear, it’s a strategy the ...

  Something still feels broken in the labour market. There are many jobs and wages are up. But there is also a sense of uncertainty and misery. Service jobs can be grueling, and despite recent growth, people’s wages over the course of their careers aren’t increasing as fast as they once did — especially when you account for inflation. And ...