World

There's no question that Jordan Myers is a hard worker. As a mail carrier for the United States Postal Service, the 29-year-old typically works 12 to 13 hours a day, six days per week. During the business week, Myers works about five hours of overtime each day, and takes on even more on the weekends. Living in Memphis, Tennessee, Myers earns a base salary of around $41,000 per year. But with overtime, he's able to bring in far more: In 2021, Myers earned over $90,000. Myers' work ethic is especially impressive to Kevin O'Leary, O'Shares ETFs chairman and judge on CNBC's "Money Court." "He's delivering mail for over 12 hours a day. This guy knows how to work hard," O'Leary says as he watches Myers' episode of Millennial Money, which was published in November 2021. Most days, Myers walks aro...

The only thing that is certain about the future is uncertainty. And that is true of the future of trade as well. Despite repeated prior warnings of a possible global pandemic, COVID-19 took the world by surprise. The impact on trade was swift and dramatic. In the second quarter of 2020, when much of the world was under lockdown, the volume of global merchandise trade plunged by 15% year on year — the type of sharp decline rarely seen outside of wartime. Few would have guessed then that by the first quarter of 2021, less than a year after the pandemic began, trade volumes would surpass pre-pandemic levels and reach new record highs. Governments’ restraint in the use of protectionist trade measures, together with large-scale fiscal and monetary support, helped drive economic recovery. In O...

Forecasts for a second year of strong global growth face two main dangers: the health of China’s economy and the prospect of much higher U.S. interest rates. How the world’s commercial poles navigate these risks will determine whether 2021’s rapid expansion was a blip or whether the recovery will outlive the pandemic. China appears determined to quash — rather than live with — COVID-19. An overly muscular economic response, too, may do as much harm as good. Forces unleashed by the disease, such as supply chain snarls that are pushing prices higher and shutdowns of major Chinese cities won’t dissipate overnight. Success will hinge on the ability to be nimble. China reported Monday that gross domestic product rose 4% in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, down from the 4.9% initially ...

JAKARTA : A senior official at Indonesia's biggest palm oil group said on Wednesday the government was currently drafting a plan aimed at limiting shipments of the edible oil to tame domestic cooking oil prices, remarks the Trade Ministry swiftly denied. Togar Sitanggang, deputy chairman of GAPKI, told a parliamentary hearing that a plan was already in the works to restrict exports, by as much as 20per cent. He did not elaborate, or say how GAPKI learned of the information. "The Trade Ministry is drafting up a plan to limit exports ... What we heard is the regulation is being written up," he said. His comments came amid calls by lawmakers at the hearing for palm oil producers to meet domestic demand first before exporting. The world's top producer and exporter of palm oil has been tryi...

TOKYO : Toshiba Corp's proposal to split itself into three companies won't solve its governance issues and the conglomerate should prioritise an overhaul of its board and management, said a senior executive at one of Japan's largest pension funds. Ken Hokugo, corporate governance director at the Pension Fund Association (PFA), said the interests of Toshiba management and shareholders are "not aligned". "The most orthodox solution to the discrepancy is to bring onto the board someone who can monitor and discipline management, and to let the revamped board to select the new chief executive," he said in written responses to Reuters queries. Hokugo declined to comment on how the PFA, which owns an undisclosed amount of shares in Toshiba, would vote on the conglomerate's plan to break up int...

Ubon Chansoi has lived in a modest wooden home in rural Thailand for about 60 years, farming and rearing fish for a living that is now threatened by an ambitious plan to turn agricultural land in her village in Chachoengsao province into an industrial zone. Chachoengsao is one of three provinces covered by the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) project that includes several industries, a high-speed railway line, an airport and upgrades to two deep-sea ports in an area of about 1.3 million hectares. The $45 billion EEC project is a centerpiece of the Thai government’s efforts to boost economic growth and encourage investment with speedier approvals, tax breaks and special visas for investors, as well as land leases for up to 99 years. But for tens of thousands of villagers who have lived in...

At age 26, Collete DiVitto had just graduated from Clemson University. She moved to Boston in hopes of working and living on her own — but hiring managers kept saying she "wasn't a good fit." "I was ready to be independent," DiVitto, now 31, tells CNBC Make It. "[But] it was hard to find jobs." Coming from a family of entrepreneurs, DiVitto — who was born with the genetic disorder Down syndrome — had quiet aspirations to turn her baking hobby into her own business. The process felt daunting, so her mother, Rosemary Alfredo, decided to teach her the basics of getting a small business up and running. Today, DiVitto is the CEO and COO of Collettey's Cookies, a fast-growing bakery start-up that sells cookies online, at 7-Eleven convenience stores and at the TD Garden sports arena in Boston. Th...

Scientists are keeping a close watch on a recently discovered sub-variant of the omicron version of the COVID-19 virus to determine how its emergence could affect the pandemic going forward. The initial omicron variant has become the dominant virus strain in recent months but British health authorities have notably identified hundreds of cases of the latest version, dubbed BA.2. International data suggest it could spread relatively quickly. The U.K. Health Security Agency (UKHSA) identified more than 400 cases in Britain in the first ten days of this month and has indicated the latest variant has been detected in some 40 other countries, accounting for a majority of most recent cases in some nations including India, Denmark and Sweden. The UKHSA indicated Friday it had designated the BA...

BEIJING: China's factory activity unexpectedly accelerated in December, but only by a small margin, according to an official survey released on Friday (Dec 31), with analysts foreseeing more economic headwinds in the near term and policymakers being pressured to offer support measures. The official manufacturing Purchasing Manager's Index (PMI) rose to 50.3 from 50.1 in November, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed. Analysts had expected it to fall slightly to the 50-point mark, which separates growth from contraction. The world's second-largest economy has lost steam since the early summer after rebounding from last year's pandemic slump, weighed down by a slowing manufacturing sector, debt problems in the property market, carbon emissions-related curbs, and small-...

Indonesia’s parliament on Tuesday passed a law approving the relocation of its capital from slowly sinking Jakarta to a site 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) away on jungle-clad Borneo island that will be named “Nusantara.” The House of Representatives vote provides the legal framework for the move, which was first tipped by President Joko Widodo in April 2019, citing rising sea levels and severe congestion on densely populated Java island. Home to more than 30 million people in its greater metro area, Jakarta has long been plagued by serious infrastructure problems and flooding exacerbated by climate change, with experts predicting up to a third of the city could be underwater by 2050. The new capital will cover about 56,180 hectares (216 square miles) in East Kalimantan province on the ...