Bloomberg US officials reiterated their partnership with Taiwan and Democratic candidate Joe Biden advocated stronger relations with the island after President Tsai Ing-wen swept to victory in an election that pressured voters to pick sides in the battle for influence between America and China. “You are stronger because of your free and open society,†Biden, the former US vice president, ...
Read More »Iran girds for more protests over downing of Ukraine jet
Bloomberg Iranian security forces stepped up patrols in Tehran, seeking to quell further anti-government protests after the regime admitted downing a Ukrainian passenger jet, triggering anger on the streets and global outrage. Videos on social media, which couldn’t immediately be verified by Bloomberg, showed motorcycle-mounted security forces in green camouflage and anti-riot body armour stationed on the city’s Valiasr square ...
Read More »HK protesters rehearse ‘anti-communist march’
Bloomberg Thousands of people gathered in a square in Hong Kong’s city centre on Sunday for a peaceful rally under the watchful gaze of riot police who kept their distance from the event while patrolling the area. The authorised meeting was held by Hong Kong Civil Assembly Team, which described it as a “pre-march assembly†for a rally scheduled for ...
Read More »Thousands join rally against Thailand’s government
Bloomberg Thousands of people joined a rally in Thailand to protest against the military-backed government and call for more political freedom, less than a year after a disputed general election. The demonstrators gathered on Sunday in a Bangkok park for an early-morning protest jog against the administration led by prime minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha. Former army chief Prayuth seized power in ...
Read More »What is former Fed chair Bernanke thinking now?
One of the controversies that swirls around the Federal Reserve — America’s central bank — is whether it could rescue the economy from collapse in the event of another financial crisis. Among economists, there are many skeptics, but Ben Bernanke, who was Fed chairman during the 2007-09 Great Recession, isn’t one of them. In a long and detailed paper, Bernanke ...
Read More »Macy’s still has a lot of work to do
Give Macy’s Inc. a polite clap, and no more, for kicking off the retail holiday reporting season in reasonable style. The department store giant said that like-for-like sales from company-owned stores fell 0.7% in November and December, compared with the year earlier period. That’s by no means stellar, but it was much better than its dismal third quarter, when same-store ...
Read More »UK’s Willie Walsh wasn’t everybody’s favourite pilot
A perennial risk in the airline industry is that executives splash money on shiny new planes but fail to make an adequate return. Willie Walsh, the chief executive officer of International Consolidated Airlines Group, has tried to do things differently by — shock! — insisting that the British, Irish and Spanish airlines he oversees make decent money. (Created in 2011, ...
Read More »Energy markets have an interesting year ahead
The start of a new year brings with it a raft of data on the world’s energy systems. So far, electricity sector figures show a transition well underway — some sources increasing, others collapsing. Each market is different, but the trends in markets as diverse as the UK, Spain, Australia and Texas all show profound changes in what is a ...
Read More »Carlos Ghosn strikes back, and Nissan should beware
The Carlos Ghosn circus opened in Lebanon, with the ringmaster demanding rapt attention. Some 120 journalists from around the world, armed with cameras and cellphones, crammed in a room to hear Ghosn defend himself for the first time since he escaped from Japan last week. Ghosn, the former chairman of Nissan Motor Co. — and the creator of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi ...
Read More »How CLSA had life squeezed out of it
CLSA Ltd. is losing its identity. That’s bad news for its parent’s ambitions to build a globally competitive Chinese investment bank in the mold of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Citic Securities Co. is tightening control over CLSA following an exodus of employees and top executives from the Hong Kong-based brokerage last year, Cathy Chan of Bloomberg News reported, citing people ...
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