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7/31/2023, 11:08:27 PM What to watch in Asia today George Russell in Hong Kong Buddhist monks receive alms in the southern Thailand province of Narathiwat last week. The kingdom’s financial markets are closed for the Asanha Bucha festival on Tuesday © Madaree Tohlala/AFP via Getty Images Events: The Reserve Bank of Australia issues an interest

Rishi Sunak arrived in Aberdeenshire on Monday on a private jet, flying into exactly the kind of row he has been stoking since green issues handed his Conservatives a surprise by-election win less than a fortnight ago. Trailing Labour by about 20 points in national polls, the Tory triumph in Boris Johnson’s old Uxbridge and

China’s leader Xi Jinping has replaced the two missing generals who had been commanding the country’s missile forces, in effect confirming the largest purge at the top levels of the country’s military in a decade. General Li Yuchao, commander of the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, and his deputy General Liu Guangbin disappeared from public

The writer, an FT contributing editor, is chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts Driving down the M1 motorway in England recently, I was struck by a spray-painted message across a flyover: “Stop CBDC”. It was the same message I’d seen earlier that week on a placard opposite Downing Street. These are not isolated views.

China has slapped export controls on a wide range of drones and drone components, a move with potential impact on the Ukraine war and on public security applications in many western countries. “The risk of some high-specification and high-performance commercial-use drones being converted to military use continues to rise,” the Chinese commerce ministry said on

UK mortgage approvals rose unexpectedly in June, despite further increases in interest rates. Bank of England statistics showed net mortgage approvals for house purchases rose to 54,700 from 51,100 the previous month, while approvals for remortgaging rose to 39,100 from 34,100. Analysts had expected the housing market to slow in a month when stubbornly high

Big Ben’s clock tower is the unrivalled showpiece of Britain’s parliament. Enveloped by ugly scaffolding in recent years while it underwent an external restoration project, Elizabeth Tower (renamed after the late queen) has just reopened following internal renovation. But its gleaming condition — with regilded panels and a new coat of Prussian blue paint on

A year ago, Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, told Ukraine’s parliament: “There is a long road ahead but Europe will be at your side every step of the way, for as long as it takes, from these dark days of war until the moment you cross the door that leads into our

Good morning. Everyone likes devolution until they get punched in the mouth, as the political scientist Mike Tyson once said. The Conservative party’s narrow victory in the Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election continues to reverberate around British politics. Rishi Sunak is in Aberdeenshire today announcing plans to drill more oil and gas in the North

European stocks were flat on Monday, as weak data from China damped sentiment while investors waited for the latest eurozone inflation and economic growth data, to gauge whether the region’s interest rates would rise further.  Europe’s region-wide Stoxx 600 was little changed shortly after the market open, while France’s Cac 40 was up 0.1 per

Japanese government bond yields jumped on Monday as global debt, currency and equity markets began to absorb a landmark shift by the Bank of Japan to allow yields to rise more freely. Analysts said BoJ governor Kazuo Ueda’s decision to loosen the central bank’s grip on long-term bond yields marked a significant step towards unwinding

Rishi Sunak has announced a big expansion of carbon capture and storage, and plans for more oil and gas drilling in the North Sea, as ministers aim to “max out” opportunities in the basin. The prime minister, on a visit to Aberdeenshire, said the plans would help Britain make the move to a net zero

BT has appointed Allison Kirkby as its new chief executive, saying she will take over from outgoing boss Philip Jansen by the end of next January. Kirkby, who has been a non-executive director at BT since 2019, joins from Sweden-based telecoms group Telia, which operates across the Nordic and Baltic regions. She will become BT’s

For eight years, a docile fleet of bright orange, unmanned sailboats bobbed around the Bering Sea near Alaska, counting pollock and feeding data to the US government’s oceanic exploration agency. Amassing an unrivalled database of ocean maps which could then be analysed by machine learning programs, the autonomous vessels made by Saildrone, a start-up founded

The most-frequently aired concern when it comes to Hollywood’s current labour strikes seems to be the risk of missing new episodes of our favourite shows. But worker unrest in media and entertainment is an early indicator of the sort of technology-driven business disruption that many other industries will soon face as well.  Actors and writers

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Profits have flatlined at the UK’s elite corporate law firms as they reach a crucial stage in their battle to grow in the US, with higher costs and a deals slowdown hitting bottom lines. Clifford

One of the leading candidates to become the eurozone’s next chief banking supervisor has called for a more “critical mindset” in overseeing the sector and warned it still faces significant risks stemming from major macroeconomic upheaval. Claudia Buch, deputy head of Germany’s central bank, told the Financial Times that “cultural change” in eurozone banking supervision

Xi Jinping has unleashed a new campaign to enforce party discipline and root out corruption in the military, in a sign that the Chinese leader’s decade-long push to exert tight personal control over the armed forces has fallen short. At two high-level meetings in Beijing this month, Xi told military leaders they must “focus on

The UK government has made it cheaper for industry to pollute in Britain compared with the EU by watering down reforms to the carbon market, in the latest sign that the Conservative party is backsliding on its climate agenda. Whitehall recently quietly announced changes to the UK’s carbon trading scheme, including offering more allowances than

University leaders have stepped up calls for ministers to boost financial support in England for students from the poorest backgrounds after new research showed inflation-busting rises in the cost of housing. The demands follow a report that found the average annual rent for private student accommodation outside London for the 2023-24 academic year would be

A fundraising vehicle for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign spent more than $40mn on legal costs in the first half of the year, campaign finance filings are expected to show on Monday, as the Republican 2024 frontrunner tackles mounting legal troubles. News of the hefty legal bill comes as Trump’s team braces for more criminal charges