The 1MDB saga reaches Goldman Sachs
IN 2010 GOLDMAN SACHS created a “business standards” committee to try to repair the reputational damage the financial crisis had done. Clients and transactions were to be screened for ethical shortcomings. Charges of money-laundering and bribery filed by federal prosecutors in a Brooklyn court on November 1st suggest that the investment bank had diagnosed a…
The benefits gap between high and low earners is widening
“I SEE PATIENTS every day who are going to have babies because they work at Facebook,” says Peter Klatsky of Spring Fertility clinic in Silicon Valley. Tech giants now include egg-freezing and in vitro fertilisation in their employees’ health coverage. But even as high-earning Americans have the cost of making a baby covered by their…
An Italian budget showdown underlines the need for euro-zone reform
THE FATE of the euro was always going to depend on Italy. With annual GDP of more than €1.6trn ($1.9trn), about 15% of euro-area output and debt of nearly €2.3trn, it poses a challenge to the single currency that Europe seems unable to manage but cannot avoid. Matters are now coming to a head, as…
A new commissioner at America’s main securities regulator causes a buzz
FOR ALL the talk about deregulation under President Donald Trump, when it comes to the financial industry the word used by many is “tailoring”—meaning trimming the loose threads of tangled rules, rather than unpicking them. An exception is Hester Peirce, who in January became one of the five commissioners at the Securities and Exchange Commission…
Sri Lanka’s president calls a snap election
MAITHRIPALA SIRISENA, Sri Lanka’s president, abruptly dissolved parliament on November 9th and called a snap general election. The move capped several weeks of political drama in the Indian Ocean republic as the president has tested—many would say has greatly exceeded—the constitutional limits of his power. The action began on October 26th, when Mr Sirisena abruptly…
New Zealand agonises about Chinese meddling
“WE ARE FREE from political interference,” protests New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern. A scandal in the National Party, the main opposition, suggests otherwise. Last month an embittered National MP, Jami-Lee Ross, accused the party’s leader, Simon Bridges, of breaking campaign-finance laws. He claims Mr Bridges deliberately disguised a donation of NZ$100,000 ($67,000) orchestrated by…
Bangladesh’s ruling party appears to be easing up ahead of elections
LIKE THE great, restless rivers that snake across Bangladesh, the country’s democracy seems to change shape with every season. Its people have voted in ten national elections since independence in 1971, but on each occasion the political landscape has looked radically different. There have been times of single-party dominance, of army rule, of fiery protest…
Vietnam is getting old before it gets rich
AS DAWN BREAKS in Hanoi the botanical gardens start to fill up. Hundreds of old people come every morning to exercise before the tropical heat makes sport unbearable. Groups of fitness enthusiasts proliferate. Elderly ladies in floral silks do tai chi in a courtyard. In the shade of a tall tree, dozens of ballroom dancers…
How to bring peace to Libya
IT IS BY FAR the preferred jumping-off point for migrants hoping to reach Europe. Jihadists use its ungoverned spaces to train and plot attacks at home and abroad. In short, Libya’s chaos is destabilising countries all around it. Yet European countries that helped set it down this path are ignoring it—or making matters worse. They…
Voters have many candidates, but little real choice
print-edition icon Print edition | Middle East and Africa Nov 8th 2018 | MORONDAVA IF THE HEALTH of a democracy were measured only by the number of candidates contesting a presidential election, Madagascar’s would be flourishing: a total of 36 were on the island state’s ballot on November 7th. Yet politics in Madagascar, beset by…