ASIA: China continued military exercises near Taiwan and flew drones near Japan on Friday, escalating cross-strait tensions that have threatened to boil over since Taipei welcomed US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for a historic visit. Taiwan’s defense ministry said Chinese warships and aircraft continued exercises in the waters around the island, adding that Chinese People’s […]

ASIA: Growth in India’s dominant services sector slowed sharply in July, weighed down by high inflationary pressures and weaker demand, leading to a further decline in business expectations, a private survey showed. The S&P Global India Services purchasing managers’ index fell to 55.5 in July from 59.2 in June, the lowest since March and below […]

ASIA: Japan’s central bank forecast inflation would exceed its target this year in new forecasts on Thursday but kept interest rates ultra-low, signaling its determination to remain an outlier in a wave of global central bank policy tightening. BOJ Governor Haruhiko Kuroda brushed off the chance of policy tightening in the near future, saying he […]

ASIA: An iPhone manufacturing plant in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen is being forced into a seven-day “closed-loop” lockdown by Chinese authorities, along with 100 other companies, to limit COVID-19 infections, Bloomberg reported. The “closed loop” system will mean that only employees who live on site will be able to work, blocking outside access […]

ASIA: Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC reported steady returns for the year but warned of “deep uncertainties” as investors face concerns over inflation, pandemic risks and geopolitical challenges. The fund’s portfolio posted an annualized nominal dollar return of 7% over the 20-year period ending March 31, 2022, GIC said in its annual report released on […]

ASIA: Ant Group executives are no longer part of Alibaba Partnership, a body that can nominate the majority of the e-commerce giant’s board, Alibaba’s annual report released on Tuesday showed. as both companies parted ways after China’s sweeping regulatory crackdown. The terms now allow only Alibaba employees to be part of the partnership. Seven Ant […]

ASIA: China’s new household deposits grew more than a third year on year to a record USD 1.5tn in the first half of 2022, while individual bank borrowings plunged more than half over the same period, official data showed. The inversion in savings rates followed an increase in bank deposits as Chinese savers raced to […]

Consumer price gains hit their highest level since January 1983 in Canada. The news comes one week after the Canadian central bank surprised the markets by implementing a 100 basis point rate hike. June’s 8.1% inflation rate acted as another indicator that the Canadian economy is in trouble. The BoC is expected to raise rates […]

ASIA: Chinese authorities on Sunday violently dispersed a peaceful protest by hundreds of depositors, who sought in vain to demand their life savings back from banks that have run into a deepening cash crisis. Since April, four rural banks in China’s central Henan province have frozen millions of dollars’ worth of deposits, threatening the livelihoods […]

It is very interesting how Volodymyr Zelensky is doing whatever he can, not merely to destroy all of Europe, but to push the world into World War III because of his and Ukraine’s inherent hatred of Russians. He has told Justin Trudeau that Ukrainians would never accept Canada’s decision to return a gas turbine intended […]