Malware related issues linked to using pirated software could cost companies and enterprises nearly $491 billion this year alone, according to a joint study by the National University of Singapore (NUS) and the International Data Corporation (IDC), with nearly $364 billion likely to be spent on handling data breaches.
Spain’s National Court has issued an international arrest warrant for China’s former president Jiang Zemin, after it ruled that the Chinese leader may have been responsible for “genocide, crimes against humanity, torture and terrorism” against Tibetans during the 1980s and 1990s.
The EU – whose most powerful members manifestly do not want to extend EU membership to Turkey – is once again going through the ritual of reconsidering the country’s application for membership. There are huge pluses and glaring minuses involved in any future Turkish membership; this dance still has a long way to run, it seems.
In a bid to promote a new high-speed train system, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has offered to fully pay for the first phase of construction of a possible rail route in the u.S., linking Washington to New York in just one hour.
Africa will have to spend between $200-350 billion a year in climate adaptation costs by 2070, if the current global temperature rises by more than two degrees Celsius, according to a UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report on Tuesday.
For the first time since the 1980s, Beijing is redefining China’s grand strategy. How Washington responds to these reforms has far-reaching implications in Asia, as well as across the globe.
In the 1980s, Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms and opening-up policies enabled China to industrialize through investment and export-led growth.
China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) is set to revise the method it uses to calculate the national GDP, in order to bring it in line with global standards, reported Reuters on Monday.
The new system, if implemented, will come online by the end of 2014 at the earliest, said NBS’s vice head Xu Xianchun; and would see China’s accounting measures adhere more closely to the 2008 United Nations system of national accounts.
The governments of Spain and Ireland on Thursday separately announced plans to exit from international banking bailout programmes, while opting too against taking up a precautionary credit line, as market conditions and banks’ stability improve.
According to Reuters, Spain had taken up 41 billion euros of aid last year to rescue a number of banks. Ireland on the other hand had sought 67.5 billion euros of rescue funds in November 2010.
China is set to usurp India as the world’s largest gold consumer this year, according to forecasts from the World Gold Council (WGC) on Thursday, as a slide in the rupee’s value and strict import curbs saw India’s gold demand drop by nearly 24 percent.
In a study, the WGC reported that China had already imported 797.8 tons of gold up till September 30 this year, while Indian demand stood at just 715.7 tons.
Chinese gold imports are expected to grow further to 1,000 tons by the end of year, while Indian will purchase around 900 tons.
Malaysia’s government has recently announced plans to turn its capital Kuala Lumpur into a major financial centre – rivalling the likes of London, New York, Singapore and Hong Kong. If Malaysia is to join the top flight of international financial centres, it must leverage its status as an established Islamic finance hub. And it must address the challenges associated with the supply of high quality human capital.
