Opinion

  In 2013, a college student assigned to research a deadly substance sought help via Twitter: “I can’t find the chemical and physical properties of sarin gas someone please help me.” An expert at a security consulting firm tried to be helpful, telling her that sarin is not gas. She replied, “yes the [expletive] it is a gas you ignorant ...

  You break it, you fix it. That’s the sentiment ahead of India’s annual budget this week. Amid signs that New Delhi’s 8 November ban on 86% of the country’s currency has disrupted demand, snapped supply chains and cratered credit growth, investors expect a fiscal lollipop from Prime Minister Narendra Modi and finance minister Arun Jaitley. Bigger tax rebates for ...

  Hostility to supposedly bad trade deals was a main theme of President Donald Trump’s campaign, and he seems to mean business: Not only has he withdrawn the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but he also confirmed his intention to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta). His exact plans for Nafta, however, aren’t clear. Nafta could stand some ...

  Six people killed in an assault on a Quebec City mosque in one of the worst terrorist attacks in the Canada’s history. All the victims are male, ranging in age from 39 to 60 years old, and had gathered for prayers at the mosque. Alexandre Bissonnette, 27, a political science student at nearby Laval University, has been charged with ...

  The Chinese New Year holiday is traditionally a time of gift-giving and celebration in the Middle Kingdom. This year, no one celebrates more than China’s President Xi Jinping. On Monday, Xi’s US counterpart signed an order withdrawing American support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The move fulfilled one of President Donald Trump’s central campaign pledges. Since the 12-nation free-trade pact ...

  With all the attention being devoted to the policy intentions and actions of President Donald Trump, there has been a lot less focus on this week’s four meetings at systemically important central banks — the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank (though that meeting doesn’t involve monetary policy). Here are ...

  Consider the tragedy of a child killed by neglect and abuse. Now consider the tragedy of a child taken from parents who would not have criminally abused her. Which is worse? Computer algorithms might soon help humans make such difficult decisions — but only if we recognize the myriad ways in which they can go wrong. In countless cities ...

  It’s hard to remember India being anything other than a nuisance for Vodafone Group Plc. The group has taken writedowns of 6.6 billion pounds ($8.3 billion) on the asset since buying it in 2007, and got itself tangled up in a long tax fight with the Indian government. Lately it’s been gored by Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Ltd., whose ...

  Trade wars, encouraged by President Trump, are inching closer. The White House has rejected the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), an agreement involving 12 Asian-Pacific countries, including the United States, Japan, Malaysia and Vietnam. It is threatening to do the same with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) by slapping a 20 percent duty on Mexican exports to the United ...

  It’s hard to quibble with the continued success of Google’s advertising business. Already the dominant company in the $200 billion annual market for web and mobile commercials, Google parent company Alphabet Inc. padded its advertising revenue by about $12 billion from 2015 to 2016. That means in a single year, Google found new business that was equivalent to half ...