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Asia to shrink trade focus as protectionism rises

Lima / AFP Fast-growing Asia-Pacific economies will strike more trade deals among themselves as opposition grows in Europe and the US to globalization, analysts say, warning the West will lose out as the dynamic region powers ahead. The most high-profile victim of recent protectionist sentiments has been a major US-led trans-Pacific deal, which is as good as dead after the ...

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Asia-Pacific leaders vow to defend free trade

  Bloomberg Asia-Pacific leaders are expected to send a strong message in defense of free trade on Sunday as they wrap up a summit that has been overshadowed by US President-elect Donald Trump’s protectionism. The broad consensus at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, which features some of the world’s most powerful leaders on both sides of the Pacific, is ...

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Aussie mortgage bonds missing in action as cheaper funds beckon

  Bloomberg Home-loan providers in Australia are selling mortgage bonds at the slowest pace in four years, flocking instead to cheaper debt that doesn’t require collateral. Just A$14.8 billion ($11 billion) of new residential mortgage-backed securities have been issued so far in 2016 by banks and other housing lenders, 36 percent less than at this stage last year, data compiled ...

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S Africa proposes 3,500 rand monthly wage

  Bloomberg The country’s proposed national minimum wage amounts to 20 rand per hour and brings South Africa a step closer to tackling poverty, inequality and unemployment, South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa said to reporters in Johannesburg on Sunday. “It is by no means the final figure of what the national minimum wage is going to be,” Ramaphosa said. ...

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Trump must listen to these two Cold War lions

  Before President-elect Donald Trump brings in the bulldozers to “drain the swamp” in Washington, I hope he will consider the career achievements of two people who embody the nation’s tradition of bipartisan foreign policy leadership, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft. The two former national security advisers came from vastly different worlds to join in constructing the foreign policy tradition ...

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These models work best in the post-poll world

  It may be useful to imagine for the duration of Europe’s upcoming election season that we live in a world without public polling. Would that make further populist surprises look more or less likely? The post-Brexit, post-Trump world is not necessarily “post-truth” despite a certain blurring of lines between fact and spin. It is, however, definitely post-poll. U.S. pollsters ...

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UAE fast turning into world’s innovation capital

  The UAE is right on track to become world’s innovation capital. Its comprehensive and visionary policies are creating a conducive climate for innovation and innovators to thrive. As laid down in the National Innovation Strategy, innovation is being encouraged in key sectors like renewable energy, transport, education, health, technology, water and space. The second Innovation Week — which kicked ...

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Even Donald Trump believes that Keynes got it right

  What does the election of Donald Trump mean for macroeconomics? Above all else, it means that the half-century-long challenge to Keynesian ideas is over. The insurgents lost. First, some background. During the Great Depression, John Maynard Keynes suggested that government spending would boost the economy, by increasing aggregate demand. In a recession, there are unused resources — empty offices, ...

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