Israel will begin offering third doses of the BioNTech/Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine this week to adults with serious pre-existing medical conditions, becoming the first country in the world to officially offer a so-called “booster” jab. The move, confirmed by the health ministry on Monday, comes as US and European health authorities debate the need for booster
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Brussels will set out plans this week to increase taxes on polluting fuels and introduce an EU-wide levy on aviation kerosene for the first time, under measures intended to put it at the forefront of global efforts to reduce carbon emissions. The European Commission will propose a revamp of its 15-year-old rule book on carbon
The world’s largest economies have thrown their weight behind a global tax reform deal that would impose a minimum levy on multinational corporations, ramping up pressure on a small number of holdout countries to sign up to the agreement. G20 economy ministers and central bankers meeting in Venice on Saturday issued a joint communique endorsing
Joe Biden is set to sign a sweeping executive order to curb the power of big business by stamping out anti-competitive practices that harm smaller rivals. The White House on Friday unveiled 72 measures in Biden’s order, which include a ban on non-compete clauses for workers and span industries from technology and transportation to healthcare and
US government bonds rallied and global stock markets dropped sharply, as worries about inflation were replaced by concerns that the global economic recovery from coronavirus has peaked. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond, which moves inversely to its price, fell 0.04 percentage points to 1.276 per cent. The move put the world’s benchmark bond
The Gates Foundation has announced a plan that would allow Melinda French Gates to resign as co-chair and receive “personal resources” from her estranged husband for her own philanthropic effort if either she or Bill Gates decide they can no longer work together. The escape hatch, which would come into force after two years, was
Didi shares tumbled in pre-market trading on Wall Street, leading a decline in Chinese companies listed in New York following a clampdown by Beijing’s internet watchdog that rattled investors. Didi, which uses so-called American depository receipts to trade in the US, dropped 25 per cent in early dealings, a day after the Cyberspace Administration of
Oil prices jumped to the highest level in three years after Opec and its allies abandoned a decision over increasing oil production, as Saudi Arabia, Russia and the UAE struggled to reach a compromise. Opec+ oil ministers had been due to reconvene on Monday after failing to reach a deal at the end of last
China’s cyber security regulator has ordered that Didi be taken off domestic app stores just days after the ride-hailing giant raised $4.4bn in the biggest public listing this year. Didi’s app has “problems of seriously violating laws on collecting and using personal information”, the Cyberspace Administration of China said on Sunday evening, two days after
Opec and its allies failed to reach an agreement on raising oil production on Friday as talks hit a deadlock for a second day, with the UAE remaining opposed to a deal that does not address concerns over its own output target. As oil prices traded close to the highest level in three years, around
The US labour market created 850,000 jobs in June, as the world’s largest economy continued to heal from the Covid-19 shock and hiring caught up with the unrelenting demand for workers. Non-farm payrolls data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday came in well above economists’ expectations of 720,000 jobs created for the
Allen Weisselberg, the chief financial officer for the Trump Organization, has surrendered to New York authorities ahead of criminal charges expected to be announced later on Thursday against him and the former president’s company. The anticipated charges mark a decisive turn in a nearly three-year investigation of Donald Trump’s business by Cyrus Vance, the Manhattan
Elevated inflation will compel the Federal Reserve to raise US interest rates at least twice by the end of 2023, according to a new poll of leading academic economists for the Financial Times. The inaugural survey conducted by the FT and the Initiative on Global Markets at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business
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
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