World

NEW DELHI: This was supposed to be the Asian century, with the ascent of China being only one – albeit a major – part of the story. The rest of it was going to be about other rising regional stars: Potentially huge economies like India, rapidly industrialising upper-middle-income countries such as Malaysia, strategically significant exporters of minerals and other raw materials like Indonesia, and some relatively new kids on the block, including Vietnam and Bangladesh. Many regarded Asia as the world’s most dynamic region, one with relatively favourable demographics and potential for economic diversification, while China’s increasingly gargantuan economy and evolving supply chains would inevitably pull along much of the region. China’s own external trade and foreign investment plans str...

The United States and its allies accused China on Monday of a global cyberespionage campaign, mustering an unusually broad coalition of countries to publicly call out Beijing for hacking. The United States was joined by NATO, the European Union, Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan and New Zealand in condemning the spying, which U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said posed "a major threat to our economic and national security." Japan said it "strongly supports" the statements by the United States, Britain and other countries, which "express the determination to uphold the rules-based international order in cyberspace." "Malicious cyber activities that could potentially undermine the foundation of democracy embodied by free, fair and secure cyberspace cannot be condoned," foreign press...

NEW YORK -Stocks on Wall Street fell as much as 2per cent on Monday, with the Dow posting its worst day in nine months, as a rise in worldwide coronavirus cases and increasing U.S. deaths drove investors out of risky assets, crushing bond yields and share prices. Oil prices plunged more than 6per cent, driven down both by worries about future demand and by an OPEC+ agreement to increase supply. U.S. Treasury bond yields tumbled to five-month lows, with the yield on benchmark 10-year notes sinking 12.2 basis points to 1.177per cent, close to the session's low of 1.176per cent, a level last seen in February. All three major U.S. stock indexes ended trading sharply lower, with the S&P and the Nasdaq suffering their largest one-day percentage falls since mid-May. Rising COVID-19 cases, spu...

BANGKOK: Thailand's exports have been a rare bright spot in the struggling economy, but migrant worker shortages are threatening labour-intensive sectors, undermining a fragile recovery as the country struggles with its worst COVID-19 outbreak yet. Even as global demand rebounds and this year's 9 per cent drop in the baht makes Thai goods more attractive, a lack of migrant workers is threatening exports as the economy already faces a tourism slump and sluggish domestic consumption due to virus containment measures. Key exporting industries such as food and rubber production can rely on migrant workers for as much as half of their workforce, according to company and industry officials. Exports accounted for 45 per cent of Thailand's gross domestic product in 2020. Thailand has about 3 mi...

BENGALURU: Global economic growth prospects are holding strong for this year and next, despite a significant majority of economists in Reuters polls warning new variants of the coronavirus pose the biggest risk to that outlook. A global survey of nearly 500 economists taken this month also concluded recent rising inflation in key economies around the world would be transitory. The global economy was now forecast to expand a sizzling 6.0per cent this year, which would be its fastest in nearly half a century, followed by a still-robust 4.5per cent in 2022. Both were marginal increases from the April poll. Slightly more than half the 48 economies polled on each quarter were upgraded for both years. But a surge in the latest variant of the virus, which has kept the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olymp...

ROME: Large cruise ships will be banned from sailing into the centre of Venice from Aug 1, Italy announced on Tuesday (Jul 13) after years of warnings they risk causing irreparable damage to the lagoon city. The decision, confirmed at a meeting of Prime Minister Mario Draghi's cabinet, comes just days before a meeting of the UN's cultural organisation UNESCO, which had proposed to add Venice to its list of endangered heritage sites. "The decree adopted today represents an important step for the protection of the Venetian lagoon system," Draghi said in a statement. He added that there would be money to mitigate the impact on employment. The move will see the biggest ships diverted to the city's industrial port of Marghera. However, this is viewed as only a temporary solution, with mini...

SINGAPORE: The first listing of a multibillion-dollar Southeast Asian tech company in Indonesia on Friday (Aug 6) will set the benchmark for IPO hopefuls in a region where global investors are chasing fast growing e-commerce markets. Bukalapak.com, a 11-year-old e-commerce company backed by Ant Group, Singapore sovereign fund GIC and local media and tech conglomerate Emtek, makes its market debut after raising US$1.5 billion in Indonesia's biggest ever initial public offering (IPO). The first listing of a venture-backed company in a country crowded with founder-led startups, has fuelled a frenzy among institutional and retail investors scrambling to get a piece of the IPO in a market that has seen few large flotations. "I'm expecting to get some capital gain for the listing since it wil...

KUALA LUMPUR: Most Malaysian states are likely to move into phase four or the final phase of the country’s COVID-19 exit strategy by October at the earliest, said Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin on Monday (Jul 26). He was speaking at the special sitting of the House of Representatives or Dewan Rakyat to brief the Members of Parliament on the government’s National Recovery Plan (NRP) to get the country out of the COVID-19 crisis. “With the continuous efforts to implement the recovery process and immunisation programme, which is currently running smoothly, we expect that most states to transition to phase four of the National Recovery Plan as early as October,” he said. First announced by Mr Muhyiddin on Jun 15, the national recovery plan outlined three key indicators on how the cou...

LONDON: Global shares rode earnings to a record high on Wednesday, while the dollar and Treasury yields languished in the wait for U.S. employment data to provide clues to the pace of monetary tightening in the world's biggest economy. Strong corporate profits have eased concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic, as vaccine roll-outs continue apace in developed markets, despite a resurgence of cases in Asian countries including China. While that has helped buoy equities, inflationary pressures and a growing belief the U.S. Federal Reserve may soon signal its intention to trim support to the economy continue to cause a tussle with the bond market over mid-term direction. "Macro data is coming at high expansionary levels but currently all the market is seeing is peak data. It wants to know what...

SINGAPORE: A 39-year-old woman who allegedly left the hotel room she was serving stay-home notice at in Sentosa and climbed up to the balcony of another room was on Friday (Jul 30) charged in court for breaching COVID-19 measures. Jin Chensu arrived in Singapore from Cambodia on Oct 4 last year and was served a stay-home notice until Oct 18, 2020, said the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) in a news release. "(Jin) was briefed by an ICA officer that she was required to serve her stay-home notice at a dedicated facility and was not allowed to leave her room for the duration of her stay-home notice," said ICA. She was later taken to Shangri-la Rasa Sentosa Resort, according to court documents. Jin allegedly left her room on Oct 6, 2020 without wearing a mask, said ICA in the re...