Scotland’s first minister has accused the UK government of undermining devolution and disrespecting his country’s parliament after London demanded that Edinburgh exclude glass from its planned recycling scheme. The dispute threatens to spark another constitutional fight between the administrations and jeopardises the viability of a scheme that the Scottish government insists is crucial to meeting
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If Recep Tayyip Erdoğan emerges triumphant in Sunday’s run-off election in Turkey, he will owe his victory in part to the powerful patronage networks he has built across two decades of power. Out of his Justice and Development party (AKP), formed in 2001, has emerged a sprawling system of influence, support and state largesse that
Sky is set to cut hundreds of jobs across the UK as part of a strategic shift from satellite broadcasting to delivering television over the internet. The move follows sweeping job losses at broadband rivals such as BT, which this month said that up to 55,000 jobs, or 42 per cent of its workforce, would
The writer is director of policy, research and impact at the Trussell Trust, a charity that supports food banks and campaigns to end the need for them across the UK If you were to imagine a cost of living crisis that inflicts maximum damage on those least able to bear it, it would look very
Joe Biden’s top trade official and China’s commerce minister have held talks over economic and trade disputes, in the latest signs of tentative efforts to stabilise ties between the two superpowers. US Trade Representative Katherine Tai met Chinese commerce minister Wang Wentao on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Detroit on Friday.
Just as I keep buying Asian stocks despite losing money, a fortnight ago I remarried. No longer is it my skin in the game alone. And while I feel like the luckiest man alive, the risk profile of my portfolio has suddenly jumped inversely with my freedom. That is because the spread of possible investment
Warren Buffett’s long record of picking winners made him a welcome presence last month in Tokyo. A recent move to increase the stakes held by Berkshire Hathaway in five general trading companies has been hailed as a vote of confidence in the country’s long-ailing corporate sector. Buffett, who began accumulating stakes in the so-called sogo
Decades ago, Carl Icahn gained a formative insight from reading the American novelist Theodore Dreiser. The billionaire investor was absorbed by two of Dreiser’s novels, The Financier and The Titan, which chronicle the rise of industrialist Frank Cowperwood. In a decisive financial stand-off, Cowperwood’s adversaries plot to have a bank call in his large personal
US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen has said the government could run out of money to pay all its bills on June 5, giving lawmakers a few more days of flexibility to strike a deal that would avert an unprecedented debt default. Yellen’s new estimate, released on Friday afternoon, came as the White House and House
The writer is a financial journalist and author of ‘More: The 10,000-Year Rise of the World Economy’ Deficits don’t matter. This quote comes not from some spendthrift European socialist but reputedly from the distinctly conservative Dick Cheney, vice-president of the US from 2001 to 2009. According to an account by former Treasury secretary Paul O’Neill,
When Sheldon Whitehouse, the Democratic senator for Rhode Island, was invited to a dinner at the culmination of the COP27 climate talks in Egypt last year, he was expecting to meet some American businessmen in the region. Instead, to his dismay, the dinner was co-hosted by the US Chamber of Commerce, a powerful lobbying group
Stronger than expected US inflation and a bump in consumer spending have fuelled worldwide expectations that interest rates will go higher, as predictions about future monetary policy rapidly shift. The Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation overshot expectations in April, data published on Friday showed, while US consumer spending rose last month and new orders
How will we keep our footing in the new gold rush? As investors and manufacturers saddle up and ride out for America, the EU is scrapping over how best to respond to President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction and Chips acts. But the UK seems marooned, with ministers shuddering at any mention of “industrial policy”. You
JPMorgan chief executive Jamie Dimon has lined up Henry Kissinger and a clutch of American and Chinese corporate leaders for a summit in Shanghai as global companies try to navigate the worst Sino-US tensions in years. The event next week, part of Dimon’s first visit to mainland China in four years, underscores corporate America’s attempts
In 2022, US chipmaker Nvidia released the H100, one of the most powerful processors it had ever built — and one of its most expensive, costing about $40,000 each. The launch seemed badly timed, just as businesses sought to cut spending amid rampant inflation. Then in November, ChatGPT was launched. “We went from a pretty
Jeremy Hunt has backed further interest rate rises to bring prices under control as figures showed only Argentina and South Sudan experienced bigger increases in underlying inflation last month. The UK chancellor signalled his support for Bank of England rate increases after a week when core inflation, which excludes energy and food, hit its highest
In its more than 130-year history the Financial Times has upheld the highest standards of journalism. As editor of this newspaper, nothing matters to me more than the trust of readers in the quality journalism we produce. Quality means above all accuracy. It also means fairness and transparency. That’s why today I am sharing my
The writer is director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute The US is set to breach its borrowing limit as early as next week, yet Republicans and Democrats have not secured a deal to increase the debt ceiling and avoid an economic and financial catastrophe. The nation has arrived at the brink
British Airways cancelled more than 140 flights on the busiest leisure travel days of the year as it grappled to resolve a computer problem that also affected some passengers’ ability to check in remotely. A person familiar with the airline’s operations said 23 departures from Heathrow were cancelled on Friday morning, leading to the scrapping
The emptiest aircraft on which I ever flew was an All Nippon Airways flight from Tokyo to London in June 2020 amid the pandemic. It was a Boeing 777-300 with about 250 passenger seats, of which four were filled: in airline lingo, it had a load factor of less than 2 per cent. We crossed
In the late 1970s, as Spain was shedding dictatorship for democracy, the future Socialist prime minister Felipe González said that his aim in politics was to turn “our country into a society similar to that of our neighbours” in western Europe. To Spanish ears, this goal was more noble and ambitious than it sounds today.