US home price growth accelerated in April at the fastest pace in more than three decades as strong housing demand continued to come up against a shortage of residential properties. The S&P Case-Shiller national home price index, which covers all nine US census divisions, rose 14.6 per cent year on year in April, data on
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China’s strengths as a cyber power are being undermined by poor security and weak intelligence analysis, according to new research that predicts Beijing will be unable to match US cyber capabilities for at least a decade. The study, published on Monday by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, comes as a series of hacking campaigns
The UK’s financial watchdog has ordered Binance to stop all regulated activities in Britain and imposed stringent requirements in a stinging rebuke of one of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchanges. The intervention by the Financial Conduct Authority in recent days is one of the most significant moves any global regulator has made against Binance, a
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was sentenced to more than 22 years in prison on Friday for the murder of George Floyd, whose death became a watershed moment in the national debate over race and policing. The 270-month sentence handed down by Judge Peter Cahill was 10 years longer than state guidelines had suggested,
Wall Street equity markets moved further into record territory as investors shrugged off a high US inflation reading to focus on President Joe Biden’s latest stimulus deal. The S&P 500 index gained 0.2 per cent in early New York dealings, putting the blue-chip equity gauge on course for its latest record closing high. The technology-focused
Lithuania’s foreign minister has called a Franco-German initiative to push for a summit between the EU and Russian president Vladimir Putin “irresponsible” and a case of “historical myopia”, in a sign of the deep divergences within the bloc over how to address worsening relations with the Kremlin. Gabrielius Landsbergis was speaking to the Financial Times
Germany and France have called for a new EU strategy of closer engagement with Russia to build on discussions with Moscow in the wake of US president Joe Biden’s Geneva summit with Vladimir Putin. Diplomats said Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, wants the EU to consider inviting the Russian president to a summit with EU
The price of bitcoin has dropped below $30,000, wiping out almost all of its gains for the year, with a sweeping regulatory crackdown putting the world’s leading digital asset under persistent pressure. Bitcoin fell as much as 12 per cent on Tuesday to $28,824 in the latest leg of a sell-off that has pulled the
Hong Kong’s pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily is on the verge of closure after its assets were frozen by the government last week, restricting its ability to operate. The asset freeze follows the arrest of two of the newspaper’s senior executives who were charged under China’s tough national security law after a raid by 500 police
The Delta coronavirus variant that swept the UK has become dominant in Portugal and appeared in clusters across Germany, France and Spain, prompting European health officials to warn further action is needed to slow its spread. While the new strain, which first emerged in India, still only accounts for a fraction of the total coronavirus
Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative cleric, was set for a landslide victory in Iran’s presidential election that would give regime hardliners complete control over all branches of the state for the first time in almost a decade. Raisi’s two main rivals conceded on Saturday and congratulated the 60-year-old who many Iranians believe is the favoured candidate
The “reflation trade” that has dominated financial markets since the emergence of coronavirus vaccines last year has been pummelled after the Federal Reserve unexpectedly signalled a shift in its stance on inflation. Investors had rushed to buy securities that might benefit from faster inflation, betting that the combination of exceptionally easy monetary and fiscal policy
Global stocks continued a steady descent from record highs reached earlier in the week and the dollar strengthened after the US central bank brought forward the anticipated timing of its first post-pandemic interest rate rise. The FTSE All-World index of developed and emerging market stocks, which hit a closing record on Monday, headed for its
US president Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin are meeting in Geneva on Wednesday for talks aimed at arresting a rapid decline in relations between two countries beset by mutual distrust. In their first face-to-face encounter as leaders, the presidents will grapple with accusations, complaints and charges against one another, including alleged Russian
The EU has excluded 10 of the heaviest-hitting banks in the debt market from running lucrative bond sales as part of its €800bn recovery fund, over historic breaches of antitrust rules. Brussels’ biggest ever borrowing spree kicks off on Tuesday with the sale of a new 10-year bond to fund the NextGenerationEU programme under a
US president Joe Biden has challenged leaders of G7 countries to use their financial muscle to counter China’s rising global influence as he declared that western democracies were “in a contest with autocrats”. Biden said he was “satisfied” with the outcome of the G7 summit in Cornwall on Sunday, but pushed European leaders to be
Leaders of the G7 leading western economies will on Sunday back a western rival to China’s “belt and road” initiative, in a plan to mobilise billions of dollars to help developing countries tackle climate change. Joe Biden has been leading calls to offer poor countries a new source of infrastructure finance, providing a “democratic” alternative
Emmanuel Macron, French president, has warned Boris Johnson that efforts to reset relations between Paris and London will fail unless the UK prime minister keeps his word over the Brexit deal in Northern Ireland. At a breakfast meeting on the margins of the G7 summit in Cornwall, Macron made it clear he expected Johnson to
The private capital industry has grown to more than $7tn thanks to demand for higher-returning but pricey and opaque strategies, spurring the likes of Schroders and JPMorgan to launch new divisions and sending others on the prowl for acquisitions. Although still dwarfed by the traditional asset management industry — which primarily invests in mainstream, public
Global regulators are calling for cryptocurrencies to carry the toughest bank capital rules of any asset, arguing that requirements for holding bitcoin and similar tokens should be far higher than those for conventional stocks and bonds. Banks with exposure to volatile cryptocurrencies should face stricter capital requirements to reflect the higher risks, said the Basel