The international role of the euro
WHEN THE European Union launched the euro two decades ago, economists wondered if this novel currency might pull off a feat none other had managed in the post-war period: to challenge the mighty American dollar. However, reserve managers at the world’s central banks, as well as business folk the world over, largely stuck with the…
Global markets adapt to a change in the Federal Reserve’s tone
FOR SEVEN months most investors have been singing the same uplifting song. Since Pfizer and BioNTech published the successful results of trials of their covid-19 vaccine last November, the way to make money in markets has been to bet on a roaring rebound in the global economy, as pent-up demand for all the things the…
Myanmar sinks deeper into civil war, as anti-army groups multiply
MOUNTED ON HIS bike, wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with a corporate logo, Kyaw Soe resembles one of the myriad food-couriers zipping through Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city. But his bag contains no food. It is a convenient disguise for somebody whose mission requires him to rove the city, looking not for door numbers but for hidey-holes…
Ebrahim Raisi wins a rigged election in Iran. What next?
Jun 19th 2021“THE HEART of elections is competition—if you take that away it becomes a corpse,” said Hassan Rouhani, the president of Iran, last month. To many Iranian voters, though, the presidential election on June 18th was more like a joke. In the days before the vote, some posted images on social media of Ebrahim…
Kenneth Kaunda was a bad Zambian leader but a great ex-president
Jun 18th 2021SOME LEADERS are born to greatness. Some rise to it in office. And some achieve it only after they have stepped down. One such was Kenneth Kaunda, Zambia’s founding president, who died on June 17th at the age of 97.Mr Kaunda, the son of a Church of Scotland minister and a schoolteacher, first…
ACL injuries are a growing problem
Jun 18th 2021AS THE COVID-19 pandemic abates and athletes around the world prepare to return to the sports field, new light is being shed on one of the gravest risks of injury they face. The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is one of four that hold the knee together. Tearing it, as at least 2m people…
India’s prime minister is down but not out
THE STORY of Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, has been a fable of extraordinary good fortune. From running a railway tea-stall in provincial Gujarat he rose to lead his state and then his country, the world’s biggest democracy. Yet no one’s luck lasts forever. And for Mr Modi the current monsoon season is not the…
A new weapon in the war against SARS-CoV-2 has been found
Jun 16th 2021Listen to this storyYour browser does not support the element.Enjoy more audio and podcasts on iOS or Android.AN ANTIBODY THERAPY from Regeneron, a firm in upstate New York, improves the survival of patients with covid-19 and offers renewed hope for the treatment of those most seriously ill with the disease. A study in…
Why China has learned to relax about its currency
Jun 19th 2021IN A WORLD in which transparency has become a fetish, it is refreshing to try to get a read on the People’s Bank of China (PBOC). Its various nods and winks give market analysts something to interpret—or over-interpret. On May 31st it announced that it would increase the proportion of foreign-currency deposits that…
Will America’s housing boom lead to another financial crisis?
Jun 19th 2021BEND, OREGONA FAVOURED PASTIME for city dwellers on holiday to quainter towns and villages is to peruse the windows of local property firms and dream of swapping their cramped two-bedroom flat for an entire house and garden. Your correspondent is not immune to the appeal: she gazed wistfully at a pretty house near…