In April 2020 a cargo flight took off from Zhukovsky airport outside Moscow heading towards Khartoum. According to the documentation, the aircraft was carrying 28,000 kilos of Russian gingerbread cookies being flown to the Sudanese capital by an obscure company registered in St Petersburg called RN Trading. At the time, the flight passed largely unnoticed.
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The hedge fund management firm of billionaire trader Chris Rokos plunged to a loss in its most recent financial results after its fund was hit by a sharp sell-off in government bonds, even though its traders have since been able to profit handsomely from a surge in inflation. Rokos Capital Management, one of the world’s
Rupert Murdoch might be the most powerful man in news but for most of his career the 91-year-old fell short in one important respect: he did not have control of the family business. For roughly four decades, Murdoch’s reign depended on the goodwill of his siblings, three Australian women far from the public glare. Until
The British government has ordered the sale of Upp, a regional broadband provider owned by LetterOne, an investment company backed by oligarchs, citing concerns around national security. LetterOne acquired Upp in 2021 as part of a £1bn plan to build a regional British broadband network to compete with BT. It would have covered 1mn premises
Britain’s largest telecoms group has unveiled a sweeping restructuring of its business, combining its global and enterprise divisions into a slimmer unit called BT Business as it attempts to drive down costs and revive some of its most poorly performing segments. The move to create BT Business will create £100mn in cost savings by 2025,
The UK and Italy’s groundbreaking partnership with Japan to build a new combat jet could open up export markets in Asia that have historically proved difficult to penetrate, according to the chief executives of two of the industrial groups involved. Alessandro Profumo, chief executive of Italy’s defence champion Leonardo, said the tri-national alliance was significant
US scientists have achieved energy gain in a fusion reaction for the first time, the country’s energy secretary Jennifer Granholm has confirmed, heralding the breakthrough as evidence that the technology could eventually provide an abundant, zero carbon alternative to fossil fuels. “This is a landmark achievement,” Granholm said at a press conference in Washington on
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The chief executive of BHP has signalled that the world’s biggest mining company will resist the temptation to go on an acquisition spree despite a growing war chest. Mike Henry told the Financial Times that
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund has committed more than $2bn to new long-term football sponsorship deals this year in a sign of the kingdom’s growing ambitions in the world’s most popular sport. The Public Investment Fund said in its most recent financial statement that it had entered into sponsorship agreements “with multiple football clubs amounting
Calpers, the biggest public pension plan in the US, admitted a decision to put its private equity programme on hold for 10 years had cost it up to $18bn of returns as it announced an overhaul of its governance. In a frank assessment of past failings at the $440bn retirement system, chief investment officer Nicole
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Too many things get called Orwellian these days. Poor George Orwell — a man who advised writers to “never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in
Wang Chuanfu is not afraid of throwing investors curveballs. In fact, the Chinese billionaire appears to relish it. Twenty years ago, Wang unveiled plans for his BYD group to buy a failing state car manufacturer that had attempted to develop a sideline in making missiles. His logic: rip out the petrol-guzzling internal combustion engines from
After a decade of scandal shaped by billions of euros in losses, a flurry of misconduct and compliance cases and boardroom battles it looked — just for a few hours at the end of April — as if the outgoing Deutsche Bank chair Paul Achleitner was going to leave on a high. Germany’s largest lender
You can enable subtitles (captions) in the video player I’m here at the Kennedy Centre, where I’ve just spoken to Dr Henry Kissinger about the war in Ukraine, the prospects of it going nuclear, how that compares with the Cold War, which, of course, is his era. How China is viewing the situation between Nato
Two decades ago, HSBC made a bold gamble to recapitalise an ailing Chinese insurance firm, paying $600mn for 10 per cent of Ping An. The risk paid off handsomely netting the bank $2.6bn in profit when the stake was sold in 2012. But a decade on, Ping An has become HSBC’s largest shareholder and is
5 Belgrave Square, a stucco-fronted mansion complete with pillared portico, is one of London’s most exclusive addresses, overlooking leafy gardens and nestled between grand embassies and other private residences. Once home to Sir Henry “Chips” Channon, a US-born Conservative MP whose diaries published during the 1960s were a source of scandal about British high society,
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. On a bus for a “pilgrimage” to the grave of renowned Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani, Hoda overheard others discussing what they would pray for when they reached “the holy site”. Their words made clear to
The era of unlimited central bank largesse is drawing to a close, injecting intense volatility in to government bonds and inflicting heavy damage on a clutch of high-profile hedge funds. Superstars of the industry have been left nursing billions of dollars in losses after an abrupt rethink on how and when central banks will reverse
Telegram has raised more than $1bn through bond sales to investors including Abu Dhabi state funds, as the encrypted messaging app tries to capitalise on a surge in users. In his Telegram channel, chief executive Pavel Durov said the company had raised the funds from “some of the largest and most knowledgeable investors from all
January 30 2019: it was mid-afternoon on a grey Wednesday in London when a dozen or so anonymous Twitter bots burst into life. “McCrums a criminal . . . Dannyboy McCRIM is GOING TO JAIL!!” they sang. As this stream of online abuse gathered pace, another more formal voice joined the chorus, that of Heike Pauls, a respected and
This story is outside the FT’s paywall (you do not need a subscription to access it) so it can be shared freely. Deborah Fuller had just heard the sentences that were the closest she would get to justice. In March 2016, her daughter Sarah died from an overdose of drugs that included Subsys: a tiny