World

WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden will host Southeast Asian leaders in Washington this week, seeking to show his administration remains focused on the Indo-Pacific and the long-term challenge of China despite the Ukraine crisis. A two-day summit with the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) begins with a White House dinner on Thursday (May 12) before talks at the State Department on Friday. It will be the first time leaders of ASEAN, created in some of the darkest days of the Cold War, gather as a group at the White House. President Barack Obama was the last US leader to host them, at Sunnylands in California in 2016. Up to eight ASEAN leaders are expected. Myanmar's leader has been excluded over a coup last year and the Philippines is in transition after an election. ...

Jerome Powell, Chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, attends the National Association of Business Economicseconomic policy conference in Washington, D.C, United States on March 21, 2022. Yasin Ozturk | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images The Federal Reserve is tasked with slowing the U.S. economy enough to control inflation but not so much that it tips into recession. Financial markets expect the central bank on Wednesday to announce a half-percentage point increase in the Fed's benchmark interest rate. The fed funds rate controls the amount that banks charge each other for short-term borrowing but also serves as a signpost for many forms of consumer debt. Doubts are rising about whether it can pull it off, even among some former Fed officials. Wall Street saw another day of whipsaw trading Mon...

PANIPAK WONGPATTANAKIT (THAILAND) The world number one in women's taekwondo in the 49kg category, Panipak was Thailand's only gold medallist at last summer's Tokyo Olympics and is also a two-time world champion. Called "Tennis" by her parents, who gave their children nicknames to kindle an interest in sport, she instead excelled at the Korean martial art. A favourite among Thai sports fans, the 24-year-old was hospitalised for COVID-19 in early April but is still expected to lead the way for her country in Hanoi. HIDILYN DIAZ (PHILIPPINES) Weightlifter Diaz made history by winning the women's 55kg class in Tokyo, a first Games gold for the Philippines in the country's nearly 100 years of Olympic competition. Stranded for nearly 18 months in Malaysia during the pandemic, the 31-year-o...

SINGAPORE: A patient service associate at the National Neuroscience Institute (NNI) used her niece's TraceTogether token to check into malls and a library while on a leave of absence. That was in April last year, when COVID-19 cases were reported in Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH) where NNI is located. The cluster would eventually grow to 48 cases, with three deaths. Priscilla Tan Siew Sin, 34, had been traced as a contact of a doctor who contracted COVID-19. She did not test positive for the coronavirus. Tan was fined S$10,000 on Monday (Apr 25) after pleading guilty to one count of fraud by making a false representation. Two more charges were considered for sentencing. On Apr 28, 2021, the Ministry of Health announced that a nurse working in Ward 9D of TTSH had tested positive for COVI...

CFOs on the recent CNBC CFO Council call were of the view that even if the Fed won't talk about a 75-basis point hike right now — Chair Jerome Powell said at last week's FOMC meeting it was not under active consideration — this may prove to be more of a negative than positive in the battle against inflation. The Fed's focus on doing "a few 50s" — 50-basis point rate hikes — is not surprising given that the central bank stresses a data-dependent approach and wants to view the results of its actions into the late summer and early fall. But this leaves concern among CFOs that it will fall short of the mark as a response to the current inflationary environment. This Wednesday's April CPI, with headline inflation still expected in the 8% range, will be a focus for the debate over peaking infla...

HONG KONG: China has relinquished its rights to host the 2023 Asian Cup finals due to the COVID-19 situation in the country, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) announced on Saturday. The event, which is played every four years and features 24 national teams from across the continent, was due to be held in 10 cities from Jun 16 to Jul 16 next year. "Following extensive discussions with the Chinese Football Association (CFA), the Asian Football Confederation has been officially informed by the CFA that it would not be able to host the AFC Asian Cup 2023," the confederation said in a statement. "The AFC acknowledges the exceptional circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to the relinquishment by China PR of its hosting rights." The AFC said a decision about the hostin...

Hannah Williams has millions of people talking about money. A few weeks ago, as the weather was getting warmer around Washington, D.C., she and her fiance, James Daniels, took the streets with an iPhone and a mic to ask what some might consider an inappropriate question: How much money do you make? Surprisingly to Williams, people opened up pretty quickly: An IT worker named Chris said he makes $70,000; a lifeguard shared she makes $15 an hour; Max, a contractor, earns $96,000; and a research scientist bringing in $52,000 a year says she loves what she does and that "passion matters more, but money is also really important, and people need to be able to make a living wage no matter what they do." It's one of about a dozen videos in the new Salary Transparent Street video series, led by Wil...

MILAN :Salvatore Ferragamo's CEO promised a quick turnaround for the Italian luxury group, vowing to increase investments, revamp stores and attract younger customers to double revenues to almost 2.3 billion euros by 2026. Marco Gobbetti, who joined the family-owned group in January from Burberry, forecast a rise in Ferragamo's sales this year despite problems in China, where retail revenues declined in the first quarter due to new COVID-19 restrictions. Gobbetti said that disruptions in China, which began at the end of March, had worsened in April. But he said a strong performance in the United States and Europe had helped Ferragamo to reduce its dependency on the Chinese market, where it made 30 per cent of its sales last year. Outlining his strategy, Gobbetti said the group aimed to ...

The World Bank's "Ease of Doing Business" report tracked and encouraged improvements in the business climate around the world. Then it got canceled. Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images The following commentary is co-authored by Curtis S. Chin, former U.S. ambassador to the Asian Development Bank and inaugural Asia Fellow of the Milken Institute, and Abhinav Seetharaman, a graduate student at Harvard Kennedy School and former Princeton-Asia-Fellow at the Milken Institute in Singapore. The conclusion of the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund (IMF) spring meetings in April left behind an elephant in the room. Since the cancellation of the World Bank's "Ease of Doing Business" Index and report late last year, the World Bank has so far failed to adequately replace what had been ...

An S&P Dow Jones Indices executive told Reuters on Wednesday it has removed electric carmaker Tesla Inc from the widely followed S&P 500 ESG Index because of issues including claims of racial discrimination and crashes linked to its autopilot vehicles, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk responded with harsh tweets including that "ESG is a scam". In it changes, effective May 2, the sustainability index also added soon-to-be-Musk-controlled Twitter Inc and oil refiner Phillips 66 while dropping Delta Air Lines and Chevron Corp, according to an announcement. The back-and-forth over the index changes reflects a wider debate about the metrics used to judge corporate performance on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues, a growing area of investing. Tesla has become the most valuable auto ind...