Bloomberg Escalating violence in India’s capital New Delhi has left at least 23 people dead after right-wing Hindu groups attacked mostly-Muslim protesters demonstrating against the country’s new religion-based citizenship law, the worst violence in the city in nearly three decades. Delhi’s chief minister Arvind Kejriwal called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to send in the army to calm the “alarming†...
Read More »Sanders, Bloomberg draw fire over ‘who can beat Trump’
Bloomberg Democrats running for president ripped into two of their own in the last debate before Super Tuesday, saying that nominating either front-runner Bernie Sanders or the best-funded candidate Michael Bloomberg would all but guarantee Donald Trump’s re-election. It’s a grim prescription for a party that still can’t believe it lost to Trump last time, but one that seemed all ...
Read More »Race to lead Malaysia comes down to two long-time rivals
Bloomberg In Malaysian politics, two figures have long played a crucial role: Mahathir Mohamad, who has ruled the country for almost a quarter century, and Anwar Ibrahim, who has perpetually waited to succeed him. Now the two are facing off head to head as both seek to corral enough lawmakers to form a majority in the 222-seat parliament. Mahathir said ...
Read More »HK to spend millions promoting rule of law
Bloomberg Hong Kong’s government will launch a multi-million dollar campaign to promote the rule of law after public trust in the government plummeted following months of violent pro-democracy protests and criticism over its handling of the coronavirus outbreak. In his budget speech on Wednesday, financial secretary Paul Chan announced a$58 million plan to “strengthen our community’s understanding of the concept ...
Read More »Brazil confirms virus case, first in LatAm
Bloomberg Brazil has confirmed the first coronavirus case in Latin America and will announce it shortly at a press conference, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. A 61-year-old Brazilian who recently travelled to Northern Italy for work tested positive in a preliminary test, the Health Ministry said in a statement. A second round of tests have ...
Read More »Donald Trump is hooked on the budget deficits
We are going to have this argument repeatedly between now and Election Day: Who gave us this lengthy economic expansion, which is now in its 11th year and is the longest in American history? Is it President Trump and his economists, who claim that their policies — tax cuts, deregulation, trade agreements — have restored dynamic growth? Or is it ...
Read More »The key to Bitcoin’s future: Inflation
Bitcoin is back, sort of. The original cryptocurrency hasn’t regained the lofty highs of its bubble peak in late 2017, but it has climbed back up to about $10,000. Predictions that Bitcoin would collapse have not borne fruit. Despite its bubbles and crashes, the cryptocurrency is now a semi-permanent feature of the global financial landscape. What it is not, however, ...
Read More »Dan Loeb’s $48bn target has some testy investors
Dan Loeb’s Third Point LLC says it has a history of working constructively with boards to promote the success of their companies. The activist’s latest goal seems to involve removing the board of Prudential Plc entirely, and dismantling the head office around it, as part of a breakup of the $48 billion insurer. That may not be as hard as ...
Read More »America’s bonds caught in European tractor beam
The yield on a 30-year USTreasury bond has finally fallen to a record low of 1.83%, having dropped a staggering 50 basis points this year already. With the coronavirus outbreak forcing people to look for havens, there are few signs that this investor frenzy for long-maturity sovereign debt is going to abate anytime soon. The US appears to be headed ...
Read More »The coronavirus outbreak is starting to go global
For a time, it looked like our defenses might hold. The extraordinary lockdown of China’s Hubei province over the past month had at times appeared to be halting the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus. For much of that period, new cases outside China were running at just a dozen or so a day, most of them with clear connections back ...
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