Markets

The global financial crisis has brought a huge windfall for organised crime networks. Banks have profited handsomely from terrorists and drug lords, channelling billions of dollars through the U.S. financial system, while the European debt crisis has cemented the grip...

U.S. missions across the Middle East and Africa will remain closed until the end of the week for fear that terrorist cell al Qaeda will launch an attack to mark the end of Ramadan. Calling it one of the most...

Despite widespread investor concern, the Indian rupee, already Asia’s most volatile and worst-performing currency, continues to be weighed down by rising pessimism in Asia’s third largest economy, which is growing at a decade-low rate of 5 percent amid worsening public...

Once the most influential and dynamic bilateral relationship in the global economic sphere, thorny issues of unbalanced trade, cybersecurity and intellectual property rights are now testing the political wisdom and strategic judgment of the two countries’ leaders, threatening to shake...

The statutes of a new development bank proposed by leaders of BRICS could be ready as soon as next year, as leaders of emerging economies plan to create a funding institution that can rival Western institutions such as the World...

  Eager to contain the spike in CO2 emissions, the European Union in 2005 launched an emissions trading scheme which has since been copied by a number of countries, including Australia, South Korea and some Chinese provinces. However, the global...

The pace of oil and gas exploration is frightening, and discoveries are weekly, if not daily, with volumes investors would only have dreamt of a decade ago. Most of the discoveries in 2012 were concentrated in East and West Africa,...

In the coming years, China’s leadership will need to increase its reliance on financial services for consumption-led growth. However, plans to develop Shanghai as a free-trade zone should not be seen as a threat to Hong Kong’s prosperity and future,...

At the core of the Japan problem is the need to lift potential, efficiency and productivity in an economy that has a shrinking population and workforce. Migration is seen as central to overall reform efforts because it offers a way...

The mainstream debate on China has shifted from forecasts of how quickly China will overtake the United States to considerations of what the consequences of a Chinese crash would be.  Following weeks of financial drama and weak economic data, the...

The shale and oil revolution that has transformed U.S. and global energy markets is on its way to Australia. According to U.S. government report, resource-rich Australia could be home to as much as 10 times the existing known gas reserves,...

In the course of the 2008 financial crisis, the global geography of power has shifted from the G8 to the G20. Despite being a coalition of smaller economies, the G20 achieved relative success in consensus formation, effectively limiting the potential...

The U.S.-China split over climate change centres on the relative responsibilities of developed and major developing nations. China, along with other developing nations, argue that since advance economies continue to have far higher levels of emissions per capita, they alone...

  For a long time, the US economy had been on an upward escalator, fueled by the growth of cheap energy and loans. Continued growth in debt made sense, because growth seemed likely for as far in the future as...

The slew of economic data released last week has confirmed the worst fears of many global investors: China is serious about rebalancing its economy and growth rates of 6 – 7 percent will no longer be encouraged. Attempts to keep...