Bloomberg The US escalated its criticism of Pakistan’s decision to set free the alleged mastermind of the deadly 2008 attacks in Mumbai, with the White House warning that the move may damage bilateral relations. Hafiz Saeed, who allegedly planned attacks that left 164 people dead, had been detained at his house in Lahore without charges since January. A Pakistan High ...
Read More »Pakistan calls in army to control deadly clashes in Islamabad
Bloomberg Pakistan has called in the army to take control of violent demonstrations in the capital city, where protesters and police were killed in day-long clashes. The army moved in as a “preventive measure†after police suspended an operation to disperse a protesting religious group following the death of two officers, according to Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal. Six protesters also ...
Read More »US coal industry shows no sign of comeback
President Donald Trump has made clear his intention of “bringing back coal.†He has rolled back environmental regulations and moved to repeal the previous administration’s curbs on carbon emissions from power plants. Last week, adhering to a British-Canadian initiative presented at the 2017 United Nations climate change talks in Bonn, about 20 nations and regions (expected to grow to 50 ...
Read More »Europe’s dearth of diversity
Europe’s male, pale and stale boardrooms face the same fate as the most polluting companies — evolve or die. In recent years, the fund management industry has started to take its environmental, social and governance responsibilities more seriously, mostly by shunning investments deemed damaging to the planet. But there’s another thread to ESG that’s poised to reshape investment behavior and ...
Read More »Fast Retailing needs to look sharp
Fast Retailing Co. should consider applying the brakes. The owner of the Japanese chain Uniqlo is planning to open stores in India as part of a greater push internationally amid a shrinking population and sluggish wages at home. Building stores in Asia’s third-largest economy makes sense, so long as it’s done right. Fast Retailing expects Uniqlo’s international takings to surpass ...
Read More »Fixing UK’s student debt problem
Tuition fees have become one of the hot-button issues of British politics again and Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond is expected to confirm the Tory pledge to freeze tuition fees when he issues his budget today. The Labour Party wants to abolish them entirely, endearing itself to younger voters. But so far neither Conservative nor Labour approaches get at ...
Read More »China’s Communist party needs to save bike sharing
During its first six months of existence, Bluegogo, China’s third-largest bike-sharing firm, dumped 600,000 bicycles into Chinese cities. Twenty million people signed up to use them; investors showered the company with $58 million in funds. But with rental rates as low as $0.07 per half-hour, Bluegogo’s days were numbered and last week the company folded. In an apologetic letter, its ...
Read More »Black Friday may be getting stronger
Now that we’ve all eaten plenty of turkey and fallen asleep on the couch watching football, it’s time for yet another Thanksgiving weekend tradition: declaring Black Friday dead. This has been a common theme in analysis and media reports about retail’s annual deal extravaganza for years now. As online shopping grows, there’s less incentive to wait outside in the cold ...
Read More »Ending net neutrality isn’t the end of the world
Eliminating net neutrality is, in the best and worst case scenarios, either necessary to keep the internet up and running, or will lead to a dystopian future where a few major corporations control our thoughts. The more prosaic reality, however, is that a world without net neutrality will work just fine. I am therefore not incensed (or very excited) about ...
Read More »Bond traders start to see crack in Fed’s resolve about inflation
Bloomberg Traders are about to find out just how worried Federal Reserve officials are about the outlook for inflation. The depth of that angst has ramifications for the US bond market’s dominant trend: the flattening yield curve. Fed Chair Janet Yellen and the nominee to succeed her, Jerome Powell, lead a busy lineup of central bankers speaking this week. They ...
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