China fears

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Chinese sailors march in a military parade in Beijing in this stock photo. Beijing has increased ... [+] land reclamation activities and artificial island building in the troubled body of water, while it is slowly bringing military assets into the area. With all of China's geopolitical posturing in the South China Sea, many are claiming that Beijing's aim to control more than 80% of the troubled waterway is purely based on national sovereignty claims. Others claim that Beijing's land reclamation and artificial island building in the region, including its illegal seizure of Scarborough Shoal from the Philippines in 2012, is not only based on sovereignty issues but also potential oil and gas resources. Meanwhile, most believe that the majority of these hydrocarbon resources are natural gas instead of oil. However, geologists are now taking another look at what might actually lie beneath the South China Sea and … [Read more...] about Why The South China Sea Has More Oil Than You Think

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin As we move into the second month of the year, dust is beginning to settle on the rush of early predictions for the fortunes of the airline industry in 2023. After the first few weeks of trading and the start of earnings season, we now have some better clues as to how the year ahead may play out. Ryanair, as a bellwether for the industry, points to reasons for optimism. How will 2023 play out? In Europe, the Ukraine war continues with no sign of an early ending. Household budgets are being squeezed by higher fuel bills and inflationary pressures. The UK economy looks weaker than its peers. There are many unknowns, but in survey after survey we see that people still want holidays and will prioritise them above other discretionary expenditures if they have the means available. In the US there has already been optimism from the major network carriers as to the outturn of the first quarter. United for example has indicated it … [Read more...] about Ryanair Results Point To A Better Year For Europe’s Airlines In 2023

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin The food world has been waiting for McDonald’s to wade into the plant-based burger competition. Now, it’s planning to do so, but Americans won’t get to try it, unless they take a road trip. McDonald’s said Thursday it is going to test its new P.L.T., which stands for plant, lettuce and tomato, at 28 restaurants in Ontario. The burger goes on sale September 30. The plant part of the burger is a patty developed by Beyond Meat, one of the two powerhouses in plant-based burgers, the other being Impossible Foods. Beyond Meat shares jumped $17.43 in mid-afternoon trading to $155.75. The experiment shows that the company has paid attention to consumers’ growing interest in plant-based burgers. However, the P.L.T. is not vegan. The sandwich includes a slice of processed cheese, and McDonald’s notes that it is cooked on grills with meat products, eggs and other burgers. Why sell it in Canada, rather than the … [Read more...] about O Canada: Why McDonald’s, Tim Hortons And Starbucks Are Testing New Food Items Up North

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin At this fall’s Forbes Global CEO Conference in Bangkok, I asked a panel of wisemen: Where is the transformative national leader of our day, akin to Lee Kuan Yew in 1960s Singapore or (forgetting Tiananmen) Deng Xiaoping in China? Worldwide, I suggested Abiy Ahmed, the peace-and-prosperity young reformer who is prime minister of Ethiopia. Were he to succeed in a country more populous than the Philippines, Africa’s chronically-beset Sahel region would be transformed. The panelists didn’t offer much.  Sinophile Allan Zeman suggested Xi Jinping.  Sorry, Allan, but I meant positive transformations. The implication of this exercise for Asia-Pacific in particular is that in an era when vast new possibilities loom, when widespread affluence has replaced common poverty in much of the region, public governance isn’t up to the raised expectations. The most crying shame is Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar, a tragedy of missed opportunity. But … [Read more...] about Asian Review: More $000s Than Heroes Of Late

Illustration: Suneesh Dear Reader, The Panorama newsletter is sent to Moneycontrol Pro subscribers on market days. It offers easy access to stories published on Moneycontrol Pro and gives a little extra by setting out a context or an event or trend that investors should keep track of. As finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman prepares to present the Union budget , she should spare a moment for the troubled job market in India. Information technology (IT) service, a large employer of skilled professionals in India, has more or less paused hiring. Postings in job portals have plummeted. The top four IT companies added less than 2,000 employees at the net level in the December 2022 quarter, the lowest in more than two years. Less than a year ago, in the March 2022 quarter, the top four IT companies added close to 80,000 employees at the net level. Worse, some companies such as Tech Mahindra are even paring down their employee base -- headcount declined sequentially in … [Read more...] about Moneycontrol Pro Panorama | Tech hiring hits the skids