World

Let's get you caught up on the day's top stories. Before they went on the run, Pi Jiapeng and Siriwipa Pansuk were friends with some of their customers, inviting them to their home and having expensive meals together. Two of their victims, a husband and wife pair, told CNA how they had been sceptical of Tradenation at first, but eventually struck up a friendship - only to notice several red flags even as they bought more watches. The powerful, shallow quake struck the island of Luzon, damaging buildings in the northern Abra province and causing landslides. Among the dead was a 25-year-old man killed by falling debris, officials said. The quake hit close to the Marcos family's political stronghold of Abra. It was also felt in Manila, where several buildings were evacuated. Resident...

BEIJING: China's thunderous response to US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Taiwan visit brought cross-Strait tensions to their highest level in years and sparked an outpouring of nationalist zeal online, but the mood on the streets in mainland China is a little more circumspect. Enraged by Pelosi's trip, Beijing last week launched some of its largest military drills encircling the island while suspending cooperation with the United States on issues including climate change and defence. China's tight grip over the Internet, with a massive system of censorship that scrubs posts casting the Communist Party's policies in a negative light, has limited public debate over just how far Beijing should go in its showdown over Taiwan. While it is difficult to gauge Chinese public opinion, experts say...

(Refiles to adds dropped word in first paragraph) By Chuck Mikolajczak NEW YORK :The dollar rose against a basket of major currencies on Tuesday, reversing course after three straight sessions of declines as recession fears grew and investors awaited a Federal Reserve policy statement, while energy supply concerns weighed on the euro. European Union countries approved a weakened emergency plan to lessen gas demand on Tuesday, after striking compromise deals to limit the cuts for some countries, as they gird for further Russian reductions in supply. Risk-off sentiment helped boost the dollar, as U.S. equities were pulled lower following a profit warning from retail giant WalMart, which said it would slash prices to reduce inventory. The Fed is widely expected to raise interest rates by...

NEW YORK : A gauge of global stocks edged higher on Monday as a late-session sell-off in U.S. equities trimmed earlier gains while the dollar slipped as investors tamped down expectations that the Federal Reserve will take a more aggressive approach in hiking interest rates next week. Expectations for a 100 basis points rate hike by the Fed at its policy meeting next week stood at about 29 per cent, according to CME's FedWatch Tool https://www.cmegroup.com/trading/interest-rates/countdown-to-fomc.html?redirect=/trading/interest-rates/fed-funds.html after reaching as high as 80 per cent last week. Recent readings on inflation came in above expectations but showed tentative signs that higher prices may be starting to ease, giving the U.S. central bank a possible cushion to raise rates at a...

LONDON/HONG KONG : Hong Kong-based billionaire Calvin Lo is considering putting more money into Formula One following his connection with F1 team Williams, Lo told Reuters in an interview, adding other Asian investors were also interested in investing in the sport. Lo, chief executive of insurance broker RE Lee International, confirmed he has "some sort of exposure" to Williams, following the U.S.-based private investment firm Dorilton Capital's purchase of the team in 2020. He declined to give more detail, citing non-disclosure agreements. Dorilton Capital makes investments for Lo, according to media reports. "A lot of people, me included, are still looking to other teams, other opportunities, because...there are consistently good teams but they are not able to come up with the right c...

College is a great time to start a side hustle, and the pandemic — which resulted in lost internships and jobs — made exploring money-making options now even more important for students. In 2021, one in three Americans had a side hustle, according to a recent survey by workflow automation platform Zapier. And among the millions still "hustling" by 2022, Side Hustle Nation found that 24% were between the ages of 18 and 24. A side hustle can be anything, like tutoring, being an Uber or Lyft driver, selling clothing, testing products or being a virtual assistant. Recent UC Berkeley graduate Kiana Kazemi, who majored in data science with an emphasis in environment, resource management and society, co-founded her business Circularity during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. The multimedia pl...

WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping agreed to schedule their first in-person summit during a sometimes tense phone call on Thursday (Jul 28) where Xi warned the United States not to "play with fire" in Taiwan. Although this was their fifth phone or video call since Biden took office a year and a half ago, the summit would be their first in-person meeting as leaders. No detail was given on the timing or location. Biden and Xi "discussed the value of meeting face-to-face and agreed to have their teams follow up to find a mutually agreeable time to do so," a US official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Both sides described the call, which lasted two hours and 17 minutes, as a robust exchange on the many disputes between the world's two biggest ec...

BEIJING: Several COVID-hit Chinese cities from the country's east to west imposed fresh restrictions and lockdowns on their populations on Thursday (Aug 11) to contain flare-ups that are again threatening to disrupt local economies. Reducing people's unnecessary movement for a few days - a softer type of lockdown - as soon as dozens of new cases emerge is a key practice of China's "dynamic COVID-zero" strategy. The aim is to avoid turning efforts to halt an outbreak into the extended nightmares seen in Shanghai and Wuhan. The uncertainty over how long such smaller lockdowns may last - because Omicron's high transmissibility makes it harder to clear infections - has hurt business confidence and made people less willing to travel. The eastern export and manufacturing hub Yiwu said on Thur...

In 2021, 77% of workers with disabilities said their employer has done a better job supporting them since the pandemic started. Now, companies are building on that support, with significant increases in leadership and boardroom diversity, according to the 2022 Disability Equality Index report from Disability:IN, a global organization advocating for disability inclusion in the workplace. "People now understand that disability inclusion is not some kind of A compliance issue, but it's actually a business imperative," says Ted Kennedy Jr., co-chair of the Disability Equality Index. "People today want to go to work for companies that they think are doing the right thing, that share their values, and share their vision of the world, [including] making sure that people with disabilities have a...

SINGAPORE: Singapore's manufacturing output grew at a slower pace of 2.2 per cent year-on-year in June, dragged by decreases in semiconductor production and pharmaceutical output. Excluding biomedical manufacturing, factory output in June grew 4.2 per cent year-on-year, data from the Economic Development Board (EDB) showed on Tuesday (Jul 26). June’s growth is slower than the revised 10.4 per cent year-on-year growth in May. On a seasonally adjusted month-on-month basis, manufacturing output fell 8.5 per cent in June. Excluding biomedical manufacturing, output declined 6.9 per cent. CLUSTERS Output in the transport engineering cluster grew the most in June, expanding 32 per cent year-on-year. The marine and offshore engineering segment rose 44 per cent, supported by a higher level of ...