World

Tesla CEO Elon Musk and legendary investor Warren Buffett might disagree about the long-term value of cryptocurrencies, but they seem to share the same principles when it comes to investing in the stock market. Musk, the richest person on Earth according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, offered some investing advice in a tweet Sunday: "Since I've been asked a lot: Buy stock in several companies that make products & services that you believe in. Only sell if you think their products and services are trending worse. Don't panic when the market does." The tweet echoes the principles of value investing made famous by Buffett, currently the sixth richest person in the world. With value investing, you only buy the stocks of companies that have a business model that you believe in and und...

SINGAPORE: A man was on Friday (May 27) sentenced to two years and four months' jail for having sex with a teenage girl he met in a Japanese street style group. The man, now in his 30s, started having sex with the girl when she was under the age of 16. Both of their identities are protected by gag order. He pleaded guilty to three counts of having sex with a minor. Another four charges were considered for sentencing. The duo met in 2018, when the victim joined a local group that embraces "Harajuku culture", referring to a street style popular in Japan. The offender was then already part of the group, whose members regularly met up in town dressed in Harajuku style and lunched together. "The victim also attended several of these lunches on weekdays with the accused and began to develop...

You may not be ready to jump into the metaverse for fun, but it could be coming to work sooner than you think. Microsoft announced Tuesday that Kawasaki is a new customer for the tech giant's so-called "industrial metaverse" ⁠— a fancy way of saying factory floor workers will wear a HoloLens headset to help with production, repairs and managing supply chains. It will use the headsets to help build robots. HoloLens, first launched in 2016, lets the wearer experience augmented reality, which overlays digital imagery in a real world environment. For Microsoft's industrial metaverse, that means stitching together many of the company's technologies like cloud computing to help factory workers and managers build products faster and more efficiently. The idea is to create what Microsoft calls ...

HOUSTON :Oil prices rose nearly 1.5 per cent on Friday, posting a second straight weekly increase as impending European Union sanctions on Russian oil raised the prospect of tighter supply and had traders shrugging off worries about global economic growth. Brent futures rose $1.49, or 1.3 per cent, to settle at $112.39 per barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude climbed $1.51, or 1.4 per cent, to end at $109.77 a barrel. "In the near term, the fundamentals for oil are bullish and it is only fears of an economic slowdown in the future that is holding us back," said Phil Flynn, an analyst at Price Futures Group. For the week, WTI gained about 5 per cent, while Brent nearly 4 per cent after the EU set out an embargo on Russian oil as part of its toughest-yet package of sanctions o...

Singapore has built its food resilience with buffer stocks and by diversifying its sources, so that it can cope when any single source is disrupted, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Friday (May 27). Speaking to media at the end of a four-day working visit to Tokyo, Japan, Mr Lee was replying to a question on how Singapore will be responding to other countries’ export bans – and if it will seek redress at the World Trade Organization (WTO). He said the answer to such a situation “is not what we do now, but what we have been doing now for several years, which has been to build up our buffer stocks and our resiliency, and diversify our sources”. “So that (when) any single source is interrupted, we are not unduly affected. And if you can't buy chicken from one place, you can buy chick...

"COMPLETE LACK OF REMORSE" Deputy Public Prosecutors Mohamed Faizal, Senthilkumaran Sabapathy and Sean Teh said that Gaiyathiri's application only proved a "complete lack of remorse" on her part and that there were no grounds to disclose the materials requested. "With respect, the entire application reeks of an attempt to fish for evidence with the fanciful hope that some of the evidence could be used in her favour," said the prosecutors. They said it was "implausible" that the WhatsApp messages between Gaiyathiri and Ms Piang Ngaih Don's next-of-kin existed as there would have been no opportunity for such an exchange. They noted that Gaiyathiri was arrested soon after the victim's death on Jul 26, 2016 and has been in custody since then, with no access to her mobile phone or any devic...

LONDON: The UK government on Tuesday (May 17) unveiled a plan to drastically overhaul post-Brexit trade rules in Northern Ireland, arguing the changes are needed to end political paralysis in the divided territory. But the European Union, defending the so-called Northern Ireland Protocol and the integrity of its vast single market, vowed reprisals if Britain pushes ahead with its unilateral plans. London said it would introduce legislation reforming the protocol "in the coming weeks" - unless Brussels caves on its refusal to renegotiate the pact. The protocol was agreed as part of Britain's Brexit divorce deal with the European Union, recognising Northern Ireland's status as a fragile, post-conflict territory that shares the UK's new land border with the European Union. Its requirement...

HONG KONG :U.S. regulatory officials have arrived in Beijing seeking to settle a long-running dispute over the auditing compliance of U.S.-listed Chinese firms, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters. The stand-off, if not resolved, could see Chinese firms kicked off New York bourses. This week the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) added over 80 firms, including e-commerce giant JD.com and China Petroleum & Chemical Corp to the list of companies facing possible expulsion. The talks between officials from the U.S. Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) and their counterparts at the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) can be described as 'late stage' after China made concessions in recent months, the people said. The PCAOB officials are expecte...

JAKARTA : Indonesia will determine palm oil producers' mandatory domestic sales volume based on their refining capacity and local demand for cooking oil, a trade ministry regulation document showed on Wednesday, as the government plans an industry audit. The world's top palm oil producer allowed the resumption of crude palm oil exports and its derivatives from Monday but put in place a policy of mandatory sales to the local market at a certain price level, known as a domestic market obligation (DMO), to secure the supply of the vegetable oil at home. Traders in India had said Indonesian sellers were waiting for details of the DMO before they take on larger orders. Each company's compliance with the DMO will be used as the basis for the volume they are allowed to export, the regulation r...

NEW YORK : Wall Street ended a volatile trading day higher on Monday and benchmark U.S. Treasury yields breached the 3 per cent mark as investors braced for a widely anticipated U.S. Federal Reserve interest rate hike. All three major U.S. stock indexes gyrated between positive and negative territory throughout the session, and the 10-year Treasury yield touched its highest level in more than three years. Wall Street's last-minute rally came on the heels of the S&P 500's worst January-April percentage drop since 1932, as market participants steadied themselves for any signs of increased hawkishness from the Fed at the conclusion of its monetary policy meeting on Wednesday. "The market is faced with a number of challenges and there's not a lot of conviction one way or the other," said Ro...