Category: TRENDS ON THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC FRONT

Each week, we report instances where the money junky hedge funds, private equity groups and the already big companies swallow another piece of the global economy. Here are some more of what the BIGS have been gobbling up and how the Bigs keep getting bigger and the rich keep getting richer. EU APPROVES AMAZON’S PURCHASE...

Japan is an outlier. Last month, Japan’s core consumer price index—which excludes fuel and fresh food costs—declined. Prices overall rose only 0.9 percent over the 12 months ending 28 February, far short of the Bank of Japan’s 2-percent inflation target. Hours after the February figures were released, the bank announced that it would continue to...

Hitachi, Toshiba, Toyota, and other major Japanese corporations have increased annual salaries by the most in seven years as part of prime minister Fumio Kishida’s “New Capitalism” campaign to narrow the gap between rich and poor. However, only a few companies reached Kishida’s 3-percent target for the raises. NEC and Nippon Steel hit the target;...

India is buying sanctioned Russian oil, the first step in what may become closer long-term trade ties. The two countries are talking about raising their two-way commerce from its $8 billion value in the 2021 financial year to $30 billion before 2025. India buys fertilizer, fuel, and gems from Russia and runs a trade deficit...

In the wake of a prolonged sell-off in Chinese stock markets, the government will take steps to “boost the economy in the first quarter” and implement policies “that are favorable to the market,” vice-premier Liu He, president Xi Jinping’s primary economic advisor, announced last week after a meeting of the State Council’s Financial Stability and...

The International Energy Agency (IEA) is urging its 31 member countries to implement “emergency measures” to reduce oil demand in the wake of a global oil shortage being worsened by the war in Ukraine. The measures include reducing speed limits on roads—driving slower increases gas mileage—and foregoing air travel when possible. Cutting road speeds by...

The Bank of England (BoE) raised its key interest rate to the pre-COVID level of 0.75 percent on 17 March, its third rate boost in as many policy meetings and the day after the U.S. Federal Reserve raised its base rate for the first time in almost four years. The rate had been at 0.1...

Inflation in the U.K. in January galloped at 5.5 percent, year over year, its fastest since 1992, driven by record high fuel prices and a shortage of goods that collided with a surge in consumer demand as the nation emerged from its Omicron lockdown. At the same time, average wages shrank 1 percent over the...

Consumer prices across the 27-member European Union swelled at an annual rate of 5.9 percent in February, the highest rate since the European Union was formed in 1999, the Eurostat official statistics agency reported. The continent’s inflation pace was 5.1 percent the month before. Prices rose 14 percent in Lithuania, 11.6 percent in Estonia, and...

Russia’s attack on Ukraine and resulting sanctions on Russia’s exports will inflate food and energy prices, disrupt global supply lines, weaken confidence, and weigh on the world’s economic expansion this year, the 37-member Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said in a 17 March statement. Late last year, the group foresaw the world’s economy...