Georgia lawmakers’ decision to punish Delta Air Lines for publicly distancing itself from the National Rifle Association was an extraordinary act of political revenge.

By killing a proposed tax break on jet fuel, pro-gun Republicans won a political victory that could pay off in the short term, but other companies won’t soon forget that Georgia allied itself with the NRA over one of its largest private employers, with 33,000 workers statewide.

“When you inject naked politics — and that’s what this is — into the economic equation, I think that it does have the chance of spooking the business community,” said Tom Stringer, a New York-based consultant for the business-advisory firm BDO. “One thing about the business community is that it has a very long memory.”

How it began

The uproar began last Saturday when Delta stopped offering fare discounts to NRA members in the wake of the school massacre in Florida. On Friday, Delta CEO Ed Bastian insisted in a memo to employees that the company was “not taking sides” on gun control and made the decision in hopes of removing itself from the gun debate. He said the company’s “values are not for sale” and “we are proud and honored to locate our headquarters here.”

Delta recently signed a 20-year lease to keep its hub at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta, and business consultants said other Atlanta-based firms, such as Coca-Cola and UPS, will likely stay put, too. But GOP lawmakers’ willingness to use public money to try to intimidate corporations could damage Georgia’s ability to attract new industry, including Amazon, which recently named metro Atlanta a finalist for its coveted second headquarters.

“I think it’s fair to say that this situation would not be helpful to the state of Georgia in potentially securing the Amazon site,” said Jerry Funaro, Chicago-based vice president for global marketing at TRC Global Mobility, a relocation management company. “They could certainly say that this would be a reason to look elsewhere.”

Amazon didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

​Stage set with a tweet

Republican Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, who is running in a crowded primary for governor in May, set the stage for the fight with Delta with a tweet Monday saying conservatives would fight back. He defended the move Friday.

“We cannot continue to allow large companies to treat conservatives differently than other customers, employees and partners,” Cagle wrote in an opinion piece published by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “The voters who elected us and believe strongly in our rights and liberties expect and deserve no less.”

Another GOP candidate for governor, Secretary of State Brian Kemp, even suggested using the estimated $38 million the state would save by killing jet fuel tax break to pay for a tax-free “holiday” on purchases of guns and ammunition.

NRA or jobs

Other GOP leaders openly cringed at the combative tone Cagle and others took.

Republican Gov. Nathan Deal, who is term-limited and serving his final year, bemoaned the controversy as an “unbecoming squabble” fueled by election-year posturing. GOP House Speaker David Ralston called it “not one of our finer days” when the firestorm erupted Monday.

Republicans have controlled the governor’s mansion in Georgia since 2003, a deep red streak that makes this year’s GOP gubernatorial nominee a likely favorite in November.

Deal and other governors for decades have made it a priority to ensure Georgia was an attractive location for prospective employers, said Charles Bullock, a political science professor at the University of Georgia. Before the NRA controversy, he said, many GOP lawmakers defended the jet fuel tax break as necessary to protect jobs.

“What this really does is it says, in terms of setting priorities, that taking a stand on the NRA is more significant,” Bullock said. “The jobs thing now is pushed to the back.”

After Delta announced it was cutting ties with the NRA, it took pro-gun Republicans just days to make good on their threats by passing a sweeping tax bill, minus the jet fuel tax break.

Deal, who said an estimated $5.2 billion in overall tax savings was too important to sacrifice, swiftly signed the measure into law Friday. He vowed to keep pursuing the jet fuel exemption as a separate issue.

13 NRA discounts

Delta revealed Friday that the NRA discount that triggered the showdown had barely been used. Offered recently for NRA members flying to the group’s 2018 convention in Dallas, only 13 discounted tickets had been sold, Delta spokesman Trebor Banstetter said.

Delta isn’t the only company to take action since the Feb. 14 slayings of 17 students and educators in Parkland, Florida, by a gunman armed with an AR-15 assault-style rifle. Walmart, Kroger and Dick’s Sporting Goods have tightened their gun sales policies. Meanwhile, MetLife, Hertz and others have joined Delta in ending business ties with the NRA.

The extent of the backlash Georgia might face from businesses is unclear. But firms from outside the South may think twice about Georgia if they see a clash of corporate values on guns and other social issues, said Jon Gabrielsen, a business-strategy consultant who worked 17 years in Georgia before moving recently to Mexico.

“If you’re not there yet, why would you want to subject yourself to that potential grief with what the legislature just pulled?” Gabrielsen said.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to impose steep tariffs on steel and aluminum imports sparked concerns of a trade war Friday, with emerging markets trading lower and some world leaders threatening to take retaliatory measures.

Japan’s Nikkei share average fell to a more than two-week low Friday. The Nikkei ended 2.5 percent lower at 21,181.64 points, its lowest closing since Feb. 14.

“Automakers will have to bear the cost, and they may also have to raise prices while auto sales are already sluggish,” said Takuya Takahashi, a strategist at Daiwa Securities. “This isn’t looking good to the auto sector.”

​China, EU, Canada react

China on Friday expressed “grave concern” about the apparent U.S. trade policy but had no immediate response to Trump’s announcement that he will increase duties on steel and aluminum imports.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker denounced Trump’s trade plan as “a blatant intervention to protect U.S. domestic industry.” He said the EU would take retaliatory measures, it Trump implements his plan.

Canada said it would “take responsive measures” to protect its trade interests and workers if the restrictions are imposed on its steel and aluminum products.

Trump said Thursday the tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum imports will be in effect for a long period of time. He said the measure will be signed “sometime next week.”

The trade war talk had stocks closing sharply lower on Wall Street.

The American International Automobile Dealers Association said Trump’s tariff plans would increase prices substantially.

“This is going to have fallout on our downstream suppliers, particularly in the automotive, machinery and aircraft sectors,” said Wendy Cutler, a former U.S. trade official. “What benefits one industry can hurt another. What saves one job can jeopardize another,” she said.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the president’s decision “shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.” She said Trump had talked about the trade plans “for decades.”

Republicans speak out

Not all of Trump’s fellow Republican politicians agreed with his trade war talk.

Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska said, “You’d expect a policy this bad from a leftist administration, not a supposedly Republican one.”

A spokesman for House Speaker Paul Ryan said the House majority leader hoped the president would “consider the unintended consequences of this idea and look at other approaches before moving forward.”

Trump posted on Twitter Thursday about trade policy.

At the Thursday meeting, President Trump said the NAFTA trade pact and the World Trade Organization have been disasters for the United States. He asserted “the rise of China economically was directly equal to the date of the opening of the World Trade Organization.”

Trump told officials from steel and aluminum companies that the United States “hasn’t been treated fairly by other countries, but I don’t blame the other countries.”

In 2017, Canada, Brazil, South Korea and Mexico accounted for nearly half of all U.S. steel imports. That year, Chinese steel accounted for less than 2 percent of overall U.S. imports.

President Trump said he has a lot of respect for Chinese President Xi Jinping, and when he was in China, he told President Xi, “I don’t blame you, if you can get away with almost 500 billion dollars a year off of our country, how can I blame you? Somebody agreed to these deals. Those people should be ashamed of themselves for what they let happened.”

Xi’s top economic adviser, Liu He, is set to visit the White House Thursday to meet with top administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Trump’s chief economic adviser Gary Cohn.

A White House official speaking on condition of anonymity told Reuters that they expect a “frank exchange of views” and will focus on “the substantive issues.”

Ryan L. Hass, the David M. Rubenstein Fellow at John L. Thornton China Center and the Center for East Asia Policy Studies at Brookings Institution told VOA he believes in the best-case scenario, Liu’s visit will assure both sides that “they are committed to solving underlying problems in the bilateral trade relationship.” Hass noted, “In such a scenario, both sides would agree on the problems that need to be addressed, the framework for addressing them, and the participants and timeline for concluding negotiations.”

Hass said if Liu’s visit fails to exceed the White House’s expectations, then the probability of unilateral U.S. trade actions against China will go up.

“If the U.S. takes unilateral actions, China likely will respond proportionately, and that could set off a tit-for-tat cycle leading to a trade war,” Hass said.
…

Australia’s corporate watchdog is taking mining giant Rio Tinto and two former executives to court over the global miner’s “misleading and deceptive conduct” in reporting the coal reserves of a Mozambique mine purchased for $4 billion.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) launched the court action Friday against Rio Tinto, former Chief Executive Tom Albanese and former Chief Financial Officer Guy Elliott.

“ASIC alleges that RTL (Rio Tinto Ltd) engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct by publishing statements in the 2011 annual report, signed by Mr. Albanese and Mr. Elliott, misrepresenting the reserves and resources of RTCM (Rio Tinto Coal Mozambique),” the watchdog said in a statement.

Rio Tinto bought the mine in 2011 for $4 billion and wrote off $3.5 billion in loses several years later when it sold the mine. The mining company fired Albanese and Elliott over their involvement with the sale.

ASIC said in a statement, “… by allowing RTL (Rio Tinto Limited) to engage in such conduct, Mr. Albanese and Mr. Elliott failed to exercise their powers and discharge their duties with the care and diligence required by law as directors and officers of RTL.”

ASIC wants the court to fine the two former Rio Tinto executives and bar them from managing corporations “for such periods as the court thinks fit.”

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged the mining giant and the two executives with fraud last year over similar allegations.

Rio Tinto said last year the U.S. charges were “unwarranted.”

The company did not immediately respond to the Australian charges.
…

When refugees arrive in a new country, they bring little to no material possessions. But many bring something more valuable: their talent and skills. 

Twenty refugee women and asylum-seekers from different parts of the world recently came together at a pop-up store in Phoenix, Arizona, to display their homemade products and tell their compelling stories.  

The details and the countries may be different, but their stories are strikingly similar. 

From Iraq

Nada Alrubaye was an art teacher who fled Iraq. “I had two boys. One, my young boy, was killed in Baghdad,” she said. “I decided to go to Turkey with another son because I wanted to protect him.” They arrived in Arizona four years ago.  

“I escaped from Syria seven years ago when the war started,” said Rodain Abo Zeed, through an interpreter, “because there was no safety and no opportunities for my kids to continue their education, and because my husband’s restaurant got burned down to ashes.” She traveled first to Jordan and then came to the U.S.  

From Afghanistan

Tahmina Besmal was in her early 20’s when she fled Afghanistan. “Me, my mom, and two sisters because of safety and there was no opportunities for ladies to go to school, to do a job, to be independent.” Her family lived in India for six years before coming to Phoenix.

A step toward self-sufficiency

A team of graduate social work students at Arizona State University created the Global Market pop-up store to help these women become self-sufficient. They welcomed the opportunity to sell their homemade products at this donated retail space in downtown Phoenix.

“The global market project is developed in a collaboration between local non-profits and Arizona State,” one of the students, Alyaa Al-Maadeed, said. “So the way that we designed this project is just by using a concept from the world of business, which is a pop-up store, and integrated it into the world of social work.” 

Asna Masood is president of one of the nonprofit partners — the American Muslim Women’s Association (AMWA). “Last year, we started new beginning skills training program for refugee women,” she said. “We teach them how to sew and then help them sell those items to the community.”

Learning a skill

Tahmina Besmal acquired sewing skills in the program and brought aprons, purses, and tablet cases she sewed at home to the pop-up store.

Other items for sale at the store included handicraft arts, soap and organic body care products, international sweets, paintings, jewelry and more. An Iraqi refugee applied henna tattoos on customers’ hands.

“The pop-up market is good for me because I bring all my stuff here. They were only in my home,” said Nada Alrubaye. “I sold some of my paintings like today, I sold two paintings and some of my jewelry.” Alrubaye said she was happy with the opportunity.

The pop-up store was only open for a month. But Megan McDermott, another graduate student on the team, said organizers have a long-term vision.

“The goal of the project is not only to bring these women short-term income. We want to really provide them with the experience of learning how to run their own business and learning how to be entrepreneurs.” 

From Iraq

The goal resonates with Tara Albarazanchi, an Iraqi asylum-seeker who offered her homemade soaps and body care products.

“This pop-up market gives me that experience of working in a shop, dealing with people, dealing with cash, and knowing how to make the books,” she said.  “I am talking about my products. It gives me the exposure that I was looking for.”

Organizers hope visitors to the store learned something as well.

As Alyaa Al-Maadeed explained, “It offers an educational opportunity for the customers to come in and interact with people from different parts of the world and learn their stories and learn what is a refugee and what does it mean to come from another part of the world having nothing to begin with.” 
…

President Donald Trump says the United States will impose tariffs on steel and aluminum imports next week.

At a meeting Thursday with top executives from U.S. steel and aluminum companies, he announced tafiffs of 25 percent on steel products and 10 percent on aluminum.

Trump said in a Twitter post Thursday morning that “Our Steel and Aluminum industries (and many others) have been decimated by decades of unfair trade and bad policy with countries from around the world.” He continued, “We must not let our country, companies and workers be taken advantage of any longer. We want free, fair and SMART TRADE!”

The Trump administration has shown its desire to impose tariffs on various metal imports since last year.

Earlier this month, the Commerce Department announced that it found “the quantities and circumstances of steel and aluminum imports threaten to impair national security.”

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross recommended that President Trump impose a tariff of at least 53 percent on all steel imports from China and 11 other countries, and a tariff of 23.6 percent on all aluminum products from China, Hong Kong, Russia, Venezuela and Vietnam.

On Thursday China’s top economic advisor Liu He is scheduled to visit the White House to meet with top administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Trump’s chief economic advisor Gary Cohn.

A White House official speaking on condition of anonymity told Reuters that they expect a “frank exchange of views” and will focus on “the substantive issues.”

Ryan L. Hass, David M. Rubenstein Fellow at John L. Thornton China Center and the Center for East Asia Policy Studies at Brookings Institution told VOA he believes in the best case scenario, Liu’s visit will assure both sides that “they are committed to solving underlying problems in the bilateral trade relationship.”

Hass noted, “In such a scenario, both sides would agree on the problems that need to be addressed, the framework for addressing them, and the participants and timeline for concluding negotiations.”

Hass said if Liu He’s visit fails to exceed the White House’s expectations, then the probability of unilateral U.S. trade actions against China will go up. “If the U.S. takes unilateral actions, China likely will respond proportionately, and that could set off a tit-for-tat cycle leading to a trade war,” he said.
…

Environmental activists in Kenya have pledged to take further legal action against Kenyan and Chinese corporations if contractors move forward with construction of a railway bridge across Nairobi National Park. The activists held a demonstration Thursday outside parliament.

About 100 activists chanted as they marched through the streets of Nairobi Thursday to demand that phase 2 of construction of the Standard Gauge Railway be rerouted around Nairobi National Park.

The park is a rare wildlife sanctuary located just minutes from the city center of one of Africa’s rapidly growing economic and technological hubs.

“This is a tiny park. It’s an absolute jewel to the Nairobi citizens and all of Kenya. It is crowded with guests. Everybody who comes for safari, their first stop is Nairobi National Park before they go to the Mara and all those places, and it’s a disaster if they take it away,” said Patricia Heaths.

The six-kilometer bridge planned to cross over the park is part of a much larger project – the SGR, a massive regional rail network largely funded by China. Kenya opened the Nairobi to Mombasa line last year. This second phase of the SGR in Kenya is set to connect Nairobi to Naivasha.

Environmentalists say the construction would affect the ecology of the park, endangering the wildlife and their natural habitats. Paul Mark from Friends of Nairobi National Park read a petition outside parliament.

“…The purpose of this letter is to remind you of the court orders in place which stop the Kenya Railways Corporation and any other person from construction of the Standard Gauge Railway within the Nairobi National Park,” he said.

In 2017, the National Environment Tribunal ordered a temporary halt to construction in the Nairobi National Park in response to a petition from environmental groups. The activists demanded the government conduct an environmental impact study. The case is still pending.

However, Kenya Railways, a state company, and its partner, the China Road and Bridge Corporation, moved to begin construction work in the park in late February.

The Kenya Coalition for Wildlife Conservation and Management said in a statement Thursday that it would seek to have the contractors held in contempt.

Officials at Kenya’s Ministry of Transport and Kenya Railways did not respond to VOA’s requests for comment.

Marko Pruikma sits on the board of Friends of Nairobi National Park.

“Nairobi National Park is an open park, which means animals can migrate freely in and out the southern boundaries of the park. There will be a lot of noise because of construction in certain areas. You will see certain animals removed out of their particular area going to another area pushing out other animals, and they might go out of the park, causing extra human-wildlife conflict outside the park,” said Pruikma.

Last year, environmentalists unsuccessfully tried to stop construction of phase one of the SGR which passes through Tsavo National Park. Activists say the rail line interferes with elephant migration.

A total of seven possible routes were considered for phase two of the SGR, two of which did not pass through Nairobi National Park. The government said the current design was picked as the most cost-effective and technically feasible.

The Kenya Wildlife Service also rubber-stamped the decision to build the rail bridge over the park saying it would have minimal interference with the movement of the wildlife.
…

Americans lifted their spending just 0.2 percent in January, while their incomes jumped because of last year’s tax cuts.

The Commerce Department said Thursday that the modest spending increase followed gains of 0.4 percent in December and 0.8 percent in November. Incomes rose 0.4 percent, boosted by $30 billion in tax cut-related bonuses the government estimates were paid out in January.

After-tax income jumped 0.9 percent, the most in a year, lifted by the Trump administration’s tax cuts. With consumers holding back on spending, the savings rate rose. Savings had fallen to a 12-year low in December.

The figures suggest Americans took a breather in January after shopping enthusiastically over the holidays. The healthy income gains will likely spur more spending in the coming months. Still, the slow start to the year indicates the economy may grow more slowly in the first three months of the year than it did in last year’s fourth quarter, when it expanded at a 2.5 percent annual rate.

Consumers are feeling much more optimistic about the economy, which should help lift spending. Consumer confidence jumped in February to the highest level since 2000, according to the Conference Board.

“With consumer confidence elevated and disposable incomes rising, we don’t expect the softness in spending to last long,” Paul Ashworth, chief U.S. economist at Capital Economics, said.

There were some signs of inflation pressures. A key inflation gauge that excludes the volatile food and energy categories rose 0.3 percent, the most in a year and matching January 2017’s gain. The last time core prices rose faster was in January 2007.

Fears of rising inflation stemming from faster economic growth and a solid job market contributed to a sharp fall in the stock market in early February.

Yet core prices rose just 1.5 percent in January from a year ago, the same annual gain as in December. A broader inflation measure that includes food and energy increased 1.7 percent from a year earlier, also the same as the previous month. Both figures are below the Federal Reserve’s target of 2 percent.

Americans spent much less on cars last month, reflecting a slowdown after consumers replaced thousands of cars in previous months that had been destroyed by hurricanes. That pulled down spending on long-lasting goods by 1.6 percent, the steepest fall since last January.

Adjusted for inflation, Americans’ after-tax incomes rose 0.6 percent in January, the most in five years.

Overall, the economy and job market are mostly healthy. The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to 210,000, the lowest level in 48 years, the Labor Department said Thursday. That is a sign that employers anticipate solid growth and want to hold onto their staffs.

 
…

A company’s value is often tied to the message it portrays to customers. But what happens when other companies try to take advantage of your brand?

Take the Philadelphia Eagles, for instance. The American football team wants to exclusively own the phrase: “Philly Special.” That was the trick play that helped them win the Super Bowl, and the Philly Special is, by far, the most talked-about play of the Super Bowl.

Watch the play here:

It is a gutsy move. In football-speak, it is a direct-snap reverse pass to quarterback Nick Foles, who usually throws the ball. But the coach gives the OK, and Foles tells his teammates the plan in the huddle.

The team lines up, Foles runs up the field. Tight end Trey Burton throws the football, and Foles catches it in the end zone for a touchdown.

“Play of the century”

Now, the phrase, ‘Philly Special,’ has turned into a city-wide phenomena. Bakeries are making Philly Special pastries. Some people are getting the words or even a sketch of the play tattooed on themselves.

And stores, like Ashley Peel’s Philadelphia Independents, cannot keep enough Philly Special T-shirts in stock.

“It’s the ‘Nick Foles play of the century,’ as I’m dubbing it from the Super Bowl,” Peel said. “It has a layout of the [specifics] from the play. We just got it in and we’re almost already sold out of it. It’s definitely moving well.”

It’s moving well, even as several entrepreneurs are competing to be awarded a trademark — in other words, exclusive rights — to the phrase.  Many of the businesses filed their own trademark applications ahead of the Eagles.

“I do have a client that’s applied for the mark, ‘Philly Special,’” said Philadelphia-based lawyer Nancy Rubner Frandsen.

She filed a trademark application on behalf of a company called Whalehead Associates. She can’t comment too much about the application without violating attorney-client privilege, but admits the phrase goes beyond a football play.

“Obviously it brings everyone together, it was our Super Bowl championship that brought it all about,” she said. “It’s got the term ‘Philly’ in it — from the trademark standpoint, it would be deemed to be descriptive. But then you combine it with the term, ‘Special,’ and it could make a very unique trademark.”

Some of the other businesses that want to trademark the term include a sandwich maker, a gift shop manufacturer … and the Philadelphia Eagles. The team was actually the last to file a trademark application. Even so, experts say, it’s likely the rights will be awarded to the Eagles.

Newsjacking

“This particular term, ideally, should belong to the Eagles,” said Dr. Jay Sinha, an associate marketing professor at Temple University in Philadelphia.

He added the phenomenon around ‘Philly Special’ is not the first time there’s been a rush to trademark a term after a big event, like the Super Bowl. And it’s even got a name: ‘newsjacking.’

“The term, newsjacking, means where a company rides or takes advantage of some event happening in current affairs and uses it for their own commercial purposes, especially for marketing in branding,” Sinha said.

For example, think of famous movie lines, like: ‘May the force be with you,’ from “Stars Wars.” When sequels are released, other companies often try to take advantage of the film’s popularity for marketing purposes, like an ice cream shop that posts a sign reading, ‘May the swirl be with you.’

“If there’s anything which is relevant in popular culture as well as the news, companies like to ride on it,” Sinah said.

In this case, it likely will be several months before the U.S. Patent Office announces who will be awarded the rights to the now famous phrase. By then, though, another Super Bowl will be approaching and the excitement of the Philly Special could be fading.
…

Dick’s Sporting Goods, one of the largest sports retailers in the U.S., will immediately end the sale of assault-style rifles in its stores and stop selling guns of any type to anyone under age 21.

The company made the announcement Wednesday, precisely two weeks after a school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

“We deeply believe that this country’s most precious gift is our children. They are our future. We must keep them safe. Beginning today, DICK’S Sporting Goods is committed to the following: http://d.sg/RTC,” the company said in a post on Twitter.

“We need to make a statement,” chairman and CEO Edward Stack said in an interview Wednesday on CNN. “We don’t want to be part of this story any longer.”

Stack said the Florida shooting suspect, 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz, legally purchased an AR-15 assault rifle from Dick’s in November, but it was not the one used to kill 14 students and 3 staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Stack, who said he remains a strong advocate of the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment, asserted the nation’s gun laws do not prevent dangerous people from buying guns and that lawmakers must act to strengthen those laws.

The executive called on elected officials to ban assault-style firearms, high-capacity magazines and “bump stocks,” which are devices that enable semi-automatic rifles to fire hundreds of rounds per minute. Stack also proposed raising the minimum age to buy guns to 21.

He said Dick’s, which also stopped selling high-capacity magazines, is prepared for any backlash but will not change its policies on gun sales. “We’re comfortable with our decision,” he said, adding that Dick’s will continue to sell an array of hunting and sport firearms.

The announcement is one of the strongest positions taken by a major U.S. corporation since the massacre, which has reignited the national gun debate and sparked a wave of gun-control rallies across the country.

More than a dozen U.S. corporations have ended partnerships with the National Rifle Association since the mass shooting, including Delta Airlines and United Continental Holdings, Inc., which owns United Airlines.

NRA ties

Other companies that have cut ties with the NRA include Avis, Best Western International, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Metlife, the Hertz Corporation, and Wyndham Worldwide Corporation.

The NRA is one of the country’s most powerful lobbying groups for gun rights and claims 5 million members. In the 2016 elections, the NRA gave $54 million in political donations, much of that during the presidential race.

It is not unusual for some members of Congress to have individually received hundreds of thousands of dollars — even millions — from the NRA. While some Democrats are also recipients of NRA financial support, the top benefactors are currently members of the Republican Party.

NRA reaction

Last week, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre told the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington that those advocating for stricter gun control were exploiting the Florida shooting.

Gun control advocates have noted that many teenagers in America can legally purchase assault rifles before they’re eligible to vote or drink alcohol. Twenty-eight of the 50 states have no minimum age requirement for owning a rifle.

Another giant U.S. retail seller of guns, Walmart, Inc., stopped selling AR-15 rifles and other semi-automatic weapons in 2015.
…

Growth in China’s manufacturing sector in February cooled to the weakest in more than 11/2 years, raising concerns of a sharper-than-expected slowdown in the world’s second biggest economy this year as regulators tighten the screws on financial risks.

The weakness was driven by disruption to business activity by the Lunar New Year holidays and curbs to factory output from tougher pollution rules, but there are worries of a bigger loss in momentum.

“Although a recovery looks possible in the short-run as the anti-pollution campaign winds down, the risk is still that the economy fares worse this year than is generally expected,” said Julian Evans-Pritchard, senior China Economist at Capital Economics.

Index raises concern

The official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) released Wednesday fell to 50.3 in February, from 51.3 in January. But it remained above the 50-point mark that separates growth from contraction on a monthly basis, the 19th straight month of expansion.

The drop may raise some concerns for China’s leaders as they prepare for the start of the National People’s Congress (NPC) next week where Beijing will unveil its economic targets for this year.

Globally, solid demand has kept many export-reliant economies humming over the past year or so, though a move toward tighter policy in advanced nations could cut into growth this year.

The latest PMI’s subindex of new export orders fell to 49.0, the lowest in at least a year, as the yuan currency appreciated against the dollar.

Chen Zhongtao, an official with China Logistics Information Center (CLIC), said that “13.6 percent of firms reported concerns over the appreciating Chinese currency and greater currency fluctuations,” the highest number of companies to do so since March 2017.

CLIC said in a statement that export sluggishness is expected to continue this year as steel firms are more reluctant to ship goods in the face of rising global protectionism.

Lunar New Year effect

The index for output stood at 50.7, down from 53.5 in January as the Lunar New Year holidays disrupted factory activities, the statistics bureau said. Total new orders also expanded much slower in February.

Raw material input prices fell for the second consecutive month to the lowest since July 2017, indicating cost pressure from price rises on manufacturing firms is easing.

“I think besides the Lunar New Year factor, the stricter pollution measures in the north before the National People’s Congress might have weighed on activities as well,” said Betty Wang, Senior China Economist at ANZ.

Wang expects momentum to pick up in the months ahead as the pollution crackdown tapers off.

Still, there are signs that China may continue with the pollution crackdown, with top steelmaking city of Tangshan proposing new restrictions on production once the current curbs expire in March.

The weeklong Lunar New Year holidays, which fell in February this year but January in 2017, tend to distort data early in the year.

Many factories and offices start to scale back operations ahead of time before shutting for the entire holiday or longer, while some manufacturers front-load shipments or replenish inventories ahead of the break.

Moderating growth in 2018

Boosted by government infrastructure spending, a resilient property market and unexpected strength in exports, China’s manufacturing and industrial firms helped the economy post better-than-expected growth of 6.9 percent in 2017.

A sister survey showed activity in China’s service sector slowed to lowest since October last year in February. The official non-manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) fell to 54.4 from 55.3 in January.

The services sector accounts for more than half of China’s economy, with rising wages giving Chinese consumers more spending clout.

Chinese policymakers are counting on growth in services and consumption to rebalance their economic growth model from its heavy reliance on investment and exports.

Economists polled by Reuters expected China’s economic growth will moderate to around 6.5 percent this year as the property market cools and as authorities press ahead with a clamp down on riskier financial activity that is driving up borrowing costs.

Analysts and financial markets are widely expecting the government to announce a 2018 growth target of around 6.5 percent at the NPC, the same as last year.

A composite PMI covering both the manufacturing and services activity stood at 52.9 in February, down from January’s reading of 54.6.

“Looking ahead, we think growth is likely to fall short of expectations this year, with many underestimating the headwinds from slower credit growth and a cooling property sector,” Capital Economics’ Evans-Pritchard said.
…

The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday recommended raising import duties on Chinese-made aluminum foil it said is being sold at unfairly low prices due to improper subsidies to producers.

The ruling was praised by the Aluminum Association, a trade group that pressed the case and said cheap imports were threatening thousands of jobs.

Beijing faces complaints from the United States, European Union and other trading partners that a flood of Chinese aluminum, steel and other exports are being sold at unfairly low prices, threatening jobs abroad.

The Commerce Department said it concluded Chinese exporters were selling aluminum foil at 49 to 106 percent below fair value and were receiving unfair subsidies of 17 to 81 percent of the goods’ value.

Importers will have to post cash bonds to pay potentially higher duties while the recommendation goes to the U.S. International Trade Commission for a final decision, said a Commerce statement.

China’s Ministry of Commerce complained Washington was harming Chinese exporters and said Beijing was ready to take unspecified “necessary measures” to defend its interests.

Beijing has accused Trump’s government of disrupting global trade regulation by taking action under U.S. law instead of through the World Trade Organization.

“China will take necessary measures to defend its interests in response to the wrong practice of the United States,” said a Commerce Ministry official, Wang Hejun, in a statement.

The Trump administration earlier raised duties on Chinese-made washing machines, solar modules and some aluminum and steel products to offset what it said were improper subsidies.

The American Chamber of Commerce in China says Chinese officials have warned of possible unspecified retaliation if Washington took excessive steps in trade disputes.
…

The chairman of the U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee said Tuesday that there was not enough support in Congress to move forward with a plan backed by President Donald Trump to privatize the air traffic control system.

Republican Representative Bill Shuster of Pennsylvania said in a statement that the “air traffic control reform provisions did not reach the obvious level of support needed to pass Congress.”

But Shuster vowed to work with the Senate to move forward with legislation to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration, which expires at the end of March. Without authorization, the FAA would not be able to collect aviation taxes, and many of its employees would have to be laid off.

In June, Trump unveiled a plan to privatize air traffic control, saying it would modernize the system and lower flying costs.

Democrats contended it would hand control of a key asset to special interests and big airlines, and some Republicans opposed it.

On Tuesday, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, nearly 250 general aviation organizations, state and local aviation officials, labor unions, consumer groups and airports said they had sent a letter to congressional leaders vowing to oppose any effort to privatize air traffic control.

United Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, American Airlines and Southwest Airlines, all represented by the Airlines for America lobbying group, backed the plan.

Under the proposal, air traffic control would be spun off from the FAA and put under the oversight of a nonprofit corporation.

The FAA spends nearly $10 billion a year on air traffic control funded largely through passenger user fees, and has spent more than $7.5 billion on next-generation air traffic control reforms in recent years.

Trump has said current air traffic reform efforts have failed and were a “total waste of money.”

Opponents said the U.S. system is so large that privatization would not save money, would drive up ticket costs and could create a national security risk. Opponents also said technology upgrades would be sidetracked while the private entity was set up, potentially adding years to awarding contracts.
…

The U.S. negotiator for regional content requirements in autos flew back to Washington from a NAFTA round in Mexico on Monday to talk with car companies, officials said, in a development some hoped would lead to progress on the contentious issue.

Three Mexican, Canadian and U.S. trade officials said the negotiator, Jason Bernstein, had been called back, with two of the officials saying he was there to meet U.S. automakers. Another said he would also meet U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, and was due back later in the week.

The change in plans disrupted a schedule for talks early in the week about a proposal by the administration of U.S.

President Donald Trump to make automakers source more from the region and the United States, a major sticking point the industry warns would disrupt supply chains and raise costs.

Mexican negotiators have said the auto content issue must be resolved in large part between the White House and the Big Three Detroit automakers that dominate the industry.

“What I’ve heard is that he’s back in Washington because apparently they are meeting with the Detroit three. If that’s the case, that’s really positive,” said Flavio Volpe, president of the Toronto-based Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association.

“The timing is awkward. But if USTR is finally talking to those companies it’s something that we’ve been asking for for months,” Volpe said, referring to the United States Trade Representative (USTR).

U.S. trade officials and a Mexican auto industry official in Mexico City said they also believed the fact Bernstein had been called to Washington was a positive development for the talks to renegotiate the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement.

A seventh round of talks began on Sunday with the three sides aiming to finish reworking less contentious chapters while also meeting to discuss the trickiest subjects blocking progress to rework the pact that underpins $1.2 trillion in annual trade.

“We’re hopeful to make quite a bit if progress this round. So we’ll see how it goes,” said Steve Verheul, Canada’s chief

negotiator as he arrived at the negotiations on Monday.

Two auto lobbyists in the United States, who spoke on background, said they did not believe there was a joint meeting scheduled with the Detroit auto companies but individual consultations might happen.

Mexico’s government is concerned that a lack of progress on the automotive content issue could hurt the wider renegotiation, a former official still familiar with the process said.

Seeking to break the deadlock, the Mexican government has said it would put forward a proposal on rules of origin during the current round of talks, but a Mexican official said on Monday no new ideas had been presented so far.

The renegotiation began last year at the behest of Trump who said the agreement must be overhauled to better favor American interests or Washington would quit the accord. The latest round has been clouded by renewed tension between Mexico and Trump over his planned border wall.

Mexico has consistently rejected paying for the wall, and its government had hoped to arrange a meeting between President Enrique Pena Nieto and Trump in the next few weeks. However, a senior U.S. official said over the weekend that plan had been postponed after a phone call between the two soured over the wall earlier this month.

Mexico’s government has not commented officially on the derailment of the Trump-Pena Nieto meeting, but Juan Pablo 

Castanon, head of the powerful CCE business lobby, was less reticent as he took stock of the unfolding NAFTA negotiations in Mexico City.

“Obviously, the cancellation of the Mexican president’s trip to the United States is an important element in the negotiations: it’s politics that can help us resolve the technical issues we’re moving forward on,” Castanon said.

Castanon said several chapters are close to being finished, including measures on e-commerce, telecommunications and sanitary standards for agricultural products. Others close to the talks believe the energy chapter could also be concluded.

Officials do not anticipate major breakthroughs on other intractable issues such as agriculture and dispute resolution mechanisms in the Mexico City round, due to run until March 5.

There was little sign of compromise on any issues early on, with a senior Canadian agriculture official pushing back against U.S. demands to dismantle Canadian protections for the dairy and poultry sectors known as supply management.

“When it comes to supply management, we believe there can be no concession,” said Jeff Leal, the minister of agriculture, food and rural affairs for the province of Ontario. 
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Comcast Corp, the biggest cable operator in the United States, offered on Tuesday to pay $31 billion to buy Sky, challenging Rupert Murdoch’s Fox and Bob Iger’s Walt Disney for the European pay-TV jewel.

Comcast, a $184 billion media giant which owns NBC and Universal Pictures, said it was offering 12.50 pounds per share, significantly higher than the 10.75 pounds per share agreed by Fox. Shares in Sky soared 18 percent.

Present in 23 million homes across Europe and known for its technological innovation, Britain’s Sky has already agreed to be sold to Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox but the takeover has been delayed by concerns over the media tycoon’s influence in Britain.

That has complicated a separate $52 billion deal by Disney to buy Fox assets including Sky.

“Sky and Comcast are a perfect fit: we are both leaders in creating and distributing content,” Comcast Chief Executive Officer Brian L. Roberts, 58, said. “We think Sky is an outstanding company.”

The latest round of major deals indicates the pressures being felt by traditional cable television networks which have been losing customers to streaming services like Netflix Inc and Amazon.com Inc..

Media rivalries

Shares in Sky rose to 13.08 pounds as investors hoped the ensuing bid battle would push both sides to offer a higher price.

“The initial share price reaction suggests that this story has further to run, with Sky’s price leaping above the level of the already increased Comcast offer,” said Richard Hunter, Head of Markets at Interactive Investor.

The proposed offer pits Comcast’s Roberts against Murdoch, the 86-year-old tycoon who helped to launch Sky in Britain, and who has been edging towards finally getting his hands on Sky after he first bid for the company eight years ago.

It also pits Roberts against Disney’s Iger, a longtime rival after Comcast tried to buy Disney for $54 billion in 2004.

Comcast said it had not yet engaged with Sky over the proposal and nearly 90 minutes after the statement came out, Sky was yet to respond.

“We would like to own the whole of Sky and we will be looking to acquire over 50 percent of the Sky shares,” Comcast CEO Roberts said.

“Innovation is at the heart of what we do: by combining the two companies we create significant opportunities for growth,” he said.

All eyes on Sky

Sky’s chairman is Murdoch’s son James, who is the chief executive of 21st Century Fox, so Comcast will have to gain the support of the independent shareholders for its better offer if it does not make a hostile bid.

Fox agreed to buy the 61 percent of Sky it did not already own in December 2016 but the takeover has been repeatedly held up by regulatory concerns that Murdoch controls too much media in Britain.

Some Sky shareholders have also started to complain that the offer was too low. In December, hedge fund manager Crispin Odey argued that Sky was being sold too cheaply.

Britain’s competition regulator said in January that Murdoch’s planned takeover should be blocked unless a way was found to prevent him from influencing the network’s news operation, Sky News.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said that the deal would give Murdoch too much influence and so would not be in the public interest.

Murdoch’s news outlets are watched, read or heard by nearly a third of Britons and have a combined share of public news consumption that is significantly greater than all other news providers, except the BBC and commercial TV news provider ITN.

Last week, Fox made further concessions, with a promise to maintain and fund a fully independent Sky-branded news service for 10 years.

Comcast said it had only a minimal presence in the British media market and did not see any plurality concerns over its proposal.

Comcast said it recognized that Sky News was an “invaluable part of the UK news landscape” and it intended to maintain Sky News’ existing brand and culture, as well as its strong track record for high-quality impartial news and adherence to broadcasting standards.

“Our strong market positions are complementary with Sky’s leadership in Europe enhancing our preeminent position in the U.S.,” Comcast’s Roberts said.
…

A surge in sales of Cuba’s legendary cigars in China helped manufacturer Habanos S.A.’s global revenue rise 12 percent to hit a record of around $500 million last year, the company said on Monday at the start of Cuba’s annual cigar festival.

Habanos S.A., a 50-50 joint venture between the Cuban state and Britain’s Imperial Brands Plc, said sales in China, its third export market after Spain and France, jumped 33 percent in value in 2017.

“Without doubt, there is potential for China to become the biggest market at a global level,” Habanos Vice President of Development Jose María Lopez told Reuters after the company’s annual news conference, while puffing on a smoke.

The Cuban monopoly cigar company’s hand-rolled cigars, which include brands such as Cohiba, Montecristo and Partagas, are considered by many as the best in the world, and the festival attracts wealthy tobacco aficionados and retailers from all over for a week of extravagant parties and tours of plantations and factories.

Lopez said that growth in global sales of Cuban cigars last year outpaced the luxury goods market, which expanded 5 percent, according to consultancy Bain & Co. He put sales growth down to several good tobacco harvests and new products.

The Habanos executive said the outlook was also positive, given solid demand and “excellent” climatic conditions.

Hurricane Irma, which wrought havoc throughout much of Cuba last year, left the western, prime tobacco-growing state of Pinar del Rio mostly unscathed.

Cigars are one of the top exports for the Cuban economy, which is otherwise struggling with decreasing aid from key ally Venezuela, a cash crunch and a push back against market reforms.

However, the Caribbean island cannot sell its signature export to the biggest market worldwide for cigars, the United States, due to the decades-old U.S. trade embargo.

Improved U.S.-Cuba relations under former U.S. President Barack Obama stoked a boom in international travel to Cuba and boosted cigar sales on the island, with American visitors able to take home as many cigars as they wanted.

Lopez said U.S. President Donald Trump’s more hostile policy toward Cuba, including tighter restrictions on U.S. travel, did not appear to have impacted sales so far. Domestic revenue rose around 15 percent last year.

“We trust that despite Trump’s measures the Cuban market will continue to grow in 2018,” he said.

Cigars have been Cuba’s signature product ever since Christopher Columbus saw natives smoking rolled up tobacco leaves when he first sailed to the Caribbean island in 1492.

Late revolutionary leader Fidel Castro was often seen puffing on his favored kind, the long and thin ‘lancero’ until he quit in 1985.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday said he wants to bring the steel industry back to America even if it means applying tariffs to imports from other countries.

“I want to bring the steel industry back into our country.

If that takes tariffs, let it take tariffs, OK? Maybe it will cost a little bit more, but we’ll have jobs,” Trump told a meeting at the White House with state governors.

The U.S. Commerce Department has recommended Trump impose curbs on steel and aluminum imports from China and other countries. On Friday, the White House had said Trump has not yet made a final decision on the matter.
…

One of the hallmarks of India’s financial capital, Mumbai, is a food delivery system that involves 5,000 lunchbox carriers, who distribute over 100,000 home cooked meals to office workers with an efficiency that has been the subject of top business school studies. These men are now using their food distribution skills to deliver leftover food to the hungry. Anjana Pasricha has this report.
…

Days after saying that it would retroactively cut the profits reported over the past two years, General Electric Co. is reshaping its board of directors.

One person joining the board chaired the organization that sets accounting standards in the United States.

GE said Friday that it must cut its 2016 per-share earnings by 13 cents, and by 16 cents for 2017. It’s adopting new accounting standards for 2018.

The Securities and Exchange Commission investigating the Boston company over long-term service contracts and federal regulators are reviewing a $15 billion miscalculation that GE made within an insurance unit. GE disclosed last month that it would take a $6.2 billion charge in its fourth quarter after a subsidiary, North American Life & Health, underestimated how much it would cost to pay for the care of people who lived longer than projected.

After cutting the size of its board from 18 to 12 members, GE said Monday that a quarter of that board would consist of new members, including Leslie Seidman, former chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board. Also named were former Danaher Corp. CEO Lawrence Culp and one-time American Airlines CEO Thomas Horton.

CEO John Flannery, a longtime insider at GE, was tasked last year with reshaping the company, but the proposed changes at GE have grown more radical over the past several months as negative developments emerge. The company has shrunk dramatically since it became entangled in the financial crisis a decade ago and Flannery has vowed to shed $20 billion in assets quickly.

Former CEO Jeff Immelt left last June, three months early, and the company’s chief financial officer left several days later.

GE in November slashed its dividend in half and said that the sprawling conglomerate would focus on three key sectors – aviation, health care and energy. By January, after the $15 billion blunder, Flannery hinted that even more drastic changes in the makeup of the company could be on the way.

“All options on the table, no sacred cows,” Flannery said during a call with investors and industry analysts.

Shares slipped almost 2 percent to their lowest level in almost 8 years.
…

Three more companies say they have ended marketing programs with the National Rifle Association (NRA), as gun control advocates stepped up pressure on firms to cut ties to the gun industry following last week’s school shooting in Florida.

Activists have posted petitions online, identifying businesses that offer discounts to NRA members, in a push to pressure the companies to cut ties to the gun rights organization.

Corporations that ended their discount programs with NRA members on Friday included insurance company MetLife, car rental company Hertz, and Symantec Corp., the software company that makes Norton Antivirus technology.

The move comes after several other companies cut their ties to the NRA earlier this week, including car rental company Enterprise, First National Bank of Omaha, Wyndham Hotels and Best Western hotels.

The NRA is one of the country’s most powerful lobbying groups for gun rights and claims 5 million members.

Florida shooting renews debate

Last week’s shooting at a Florida high school that left 17 people dead has renewed the national debate about gun control.

Gun control activists have been mounting a campaign on Twitter, including using the hashtag #BoycottNRA as well as using social media to pressure streaming platforms, including Amazon, to drop the online video channel NRATV, which features gun-friendly programming produced by the NRA.

On Thursday, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) that those advocating for stricter gun control are exploiting the Florida shooting.

Receiving a rousing reception, LaPierre said, “There is no greater personal individual freedom than the right to keep and bear arms, the right to protect yourself and the right to survive.”

Arming teachers

On Friday, President Donald Trump reiterated to CPAC for the third time this week the need to arm teachers with concealed weapons to prevent more shootings in U.S. schools.

“It’s time to make our schools a much harder target for attackers. We don’t want them in our schools,” Trump said.

Trump has also proposed raising the age to buy assault-style rifles from 18 to 21, which is opposed by the NRA.

In his speech to CPAC, Trump indicated he does not intend to battle the powerful organization.

“They’re friends of mine,” Trump said of the NRA, which gave more than $11 million to his presidential campaign in 2016 and spent nearly $20 million attacking his Democratic Party general election challenger, Hillary Clinton.

The mass shooting in Florida on Feb. 14 has sparked a wave of rallies in Florida, Washington and in other areas of the United States in an attempt to force local and national leaders to take action to prevent such attacks.

 
…

The heaviest, the largest, the most impactful —  those were the superlatives the Trump administration used to describe its latest sanctions against North Korea.

But were the Treasury Department designations of more than 50 companies and ships accused of illicit trading with the pariah nation really the toughest action yet by the U.S. and the wider world?

Probably not.

Here’s a look at how President Donald Trump and a top lieutenant described Friday’s sanctions to punish the North for its development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles — and how they stack up against past economic restrictions that have been piled on Kim Jong Un’s government in response to its illegal weapons tests.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin: “The Treasury Department is announcing the largest set of sanctions ever imposed in connection with North Korea.”

Trump: “I do want to say, because people have asked, North Korea — we imposed today the heaviest sanctions ever imposed on a country before.”

As for Trump’s blanket assertion, in sheer dollar terms, the U.S. has actually imposed much costlier restrictions on countries such as Iran, a far richer economy than North Korea’s. Washington and its allies cut off tens of billions of dollars’ worth of Iranian oil exports and shut the country’s central bank out of the international financial system, among other steps, before eliminating those restrictions under a 2015 nuclear deal.

Correct on number

In terms of the number of entities targeted Friday, Mnuchin is probably correct about the history of sanctions on North Korea.

The department blacklisted “one individual, 27 entities and 28 vessels” located, registered or flagged in North Korea, China, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Marshall Islands, Tanzania, Panama and Comoros. That appeared to be the most companies or individuals designated by the U.S. at a single time. According to Mnuchin, there are now more than 450 U.S. sanctions against North Korea, about half of them levied in the last year.

But in purely economic terms, both Mnuchin and Trump are well wide of the mark.

The latest designations are primarily intended to crack down on North Korea’s evasion of wider-ranging sanctions adopted by the U.N. Security Council and the United States that are more economically significant.

Over the past year, the council has adopted three sets of sanctions banning North Korean exports of coal, iron ore, textiles, seafood products and other goods. If those measures are properly implemented, that would reduce the North’s export revenues by 90 percent from 2016 levels, or by $2.3 billion annually. Those sanctions are also heavily restricting North Korean fuel supplies. They capped refined oil imports at 500,000 barrels a year. That’s a reduction from the 4.5 million barrels North Korea imported in 2016.

It’s because of those draconian restrictions that North Korea wants to conduct trade on the quiet with “ship-to-ship” transfers that the U.S. is determined to stop. With Friday’s measures, Mnuchin said, the U.S. has gone after “virtually all their ships that they’re using at this moment.”

That’s certainly a significant increase in pressure on North Korea as its foreign trade diminishes. But the Treasury Department did not give an overall figure for how much revenue the North would be deprived of because of the latest actions, other than to say that nine of the newly blacklisted foreign vessels “are capable of carrying over $5.5 million worth of coal at a time.”

‘Underwhelming’ in scope

The conservative-leaning Heritage Foundation did not think much of the new steps.

“As impressive as the list is in length, it is underwhelming in its scope and fails to live up to the hype,” it said. “Like his predecessors, President Trump remains reluctant to go after Chinese financial entities aiding North Korea’s prohibited nuclear and missile programs.”

China is said to account for about 90 percent of North Korea’s external trade and be its main access point to the international financial system. Past U.S. sanctions that have targeted Chinese companies have probably had a much bigger impact on North Korea’s revenue streams.

In November, the Treasury Department blacklisted three Chinese companies that it said had “cumulatively exported approximately $650 million worth of goods to North Korea and cumulatively imported more than $100 million worth of goods from North Korea.”

An even bigger Chinese trading partner of the North was blacklisted in September 2016: Dandong Hongxiang Industrial Development Co. According to a report by the U.S.-based research group C4AD and South Korea’s Asan Institute for Policy Studies, Hongxiang carried out imports and exports worth a total of $532 million in 2011-15. It had also supplied aluminum oxide and other materials that can be used in processing nuclear bomb fuel.
…

Federal Reserve policymakers fretted on Friday that they could face the next U.S. recession with virtually the same arsenal of policies used in the last downturn and, with interest rates still relatively low, those will not pack the same punch.

In the midst of an unprecedented leadership transition, Fed officials are publicly debating whether to scrap their approach to inflation targeting, how much of its bond portfolio to retain, and how much longer they can raise interest rates in the face of an unexpectedly large boost from tax cuts and government spending.

After years of near-zero rates and $3.5 trillion in bond purchases all meant to stimulate the economy in the wake of the 2007-09 recession, the Fed has gradually tightened policy since late 2015. Its key rate is now in the range of 1.25 to 1.5 percent, and while the Fed plans to hike three more times this

year it has also forecast that it is about halfway to its goal.

That could leave little room to provide stimulus when the world’s largest economy, which is heating up, eventually turns around.

“We would be better off, rather than thinking about what we would do next time when we hit zero, making sure that we don’t get back there. We just don’t want to be there,” Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren told a conference of economists and the majority of his colleagues at the central bank.

Rosengren, one of only a few sitting policymakers who also served during the last downturn, said the expanding U.S. deficits could further erode the government’s ability to help curb any future recession. “With the deficits we are running up, it’s not likely [fiscal policy] will be helpful in the next

recession either,” he said.

Since mid-December, the Republican-controlled Congress and U.S. President Donald Trump aggressively cut taxes and boosted spending limits, two fiscal moves that are expected to push the annual budget deficit above $1 trillion next year and expand the $20 trillion national debt.

Overheating

That stimulus, combined with synchronized global growth, signs of U.S. inflation perking up, and unemployment near a 17-year low could set the stage for overheating that ends one of the longest economic expansions ever.

“We want more shock absorbers out there and really … the main shock absorber is the ability to reduce the fed funds rate, which means that you want to get to a higher inflation rate so that the pre-shock fed funds rate is 4 and not 2,” said Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist and professor at City University of New York.

In a speech to the conference hosted by the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Krugman said every recession since 1982 has been caused by “private sector over-reach” and not Fed tightening, as in decades past.

The conference’s main research paper argued the central bank should focus on cutting rates in the next recession and avoid relying on asset purchases that are less effective in stimulating investment and growth than previously thought.

In October the Fed began trimming some of its assets and it has yet to decide how far it will go. William Dudley, president of the New York Fed, told the conference that, to be sure, the ability to again purchase bonds if and when rates hit zero “seems like a good tool to have.”

The Fed’s approach to any economic slowdown would likely be to cut rates, pledge further stimulus, and only then buy bonds.

Rosengren and others dismissed the possibility of adopting negative interest rates, as some other central banks have done.

Yet five years of below-target inflation, combined with an aging population and slowdown in labor force growth, has sparked a debate over ditching a long-standing 2 percent price target.

Some see this month’s succession of Fed Chair Janet Yellen by Jerome Powell as ideal timing to consider new frameworks that could help drive inflation, and rates, higher. Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester, whom the White House is considering for Fed vice chair, told the conference the central bank could begin to reassess the framework later this year, though she added that the threshold for change should be high.
…

Leaders of Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan and its arch rival India jointly inaugurated construction work Friday on the Afghan section of a long-delayed multibillion-dollar gas pipeline connecting the four nations, raising hopes for regional cooperation and peace.

A ceremony took place in the ancient Afghan city of Herat, attended by President Ashraf Ghani, his Turkmen counterpart, Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Indian External Affairs Minister M.J. Akbar.

The long-awaited 1,814 kilometer pipeline, known as TAPI, will transport natural gas from the world’s fourth-largest reserves in Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to growing economies of Pakistan and India, which are facing energy shortages.

TAPI was originally conceived in the 1990s, but differences over terms and conditions, unending Afghan hostilities and regional rivalries are blamed for delays. Turkmenistan took the initiative in December 2015 and has since constructed its portion of the pipeline up to the Afghan border.

President Ghani, while addressing Friday’s ceremony, vowed Afghanistan believes in connectivity and will “not spare any efforts” to implement the project to connect South Asia with Central Asia after a century of separation.

“This is the beginning of confidence in Afghanistan, confidence on national unity and harmony of the state and the people of Afghanistan,” noted Ghani.

Pakistani Prime Minister Abbasi reiterated his country’s commitment to peace and stability in Afghanistan.

“We are turning, by the grace of God, TAPI into a reality. It will provide shared regional prosperity … and it will provide peace dividends,” said Abbasi, whose country is accused of covertly supporting the Afghan Taliban, charges Islamabad denies as baseless.

“I want to tell my Afghan brothers and sisters that your success is our success, your development is our development and peace in Afghanistan means peace in Pakistan,” Abbasi emphasized.

He termed TAPI critical for Pakistan’s energy needs, saying it will provide about 10 percent of his country’s total energy consumption.

Expected cost

Officials say the project, estimated to cost up to $10 billion, will carry 33 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually for 30 years and is extendable.

The final cost, however, is anticipated to be much higher because of an accompanying power transmission pipeline and the fiber optic cable to be laid from Turkmenistan to Pakistan.

Afghanistan will buy about five billion cubic meters of gas once the project is completed. Kabul also will earn up to $500 million in transit fees from the project, which Afghans expect will create about 25,000 jobs in their war-shattered nation.

The Afghan section of the pipeline will run through five provinces in the south and southwest, including Herat, Farah, NImruz, and Helmand, before entering the southern Pakistan city of Quetta.

Security concerns

Taliban insurgents control or contest much of the Afghan territory along the TAPI route, raising security concerns for the pipeline.

In a statement issued Friday, though, the insurgent group dismissed those concerns and pledged to protect the pipeline, reminding skeptics the TAPI was initially negotiated and brought to Afghanistan when the Taliban was ruling the country.

The insurgency, which currently controls or influences about 44 percent of Afghan territory, blamed the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of the country for the delay in TAPI’s implementation.

Groundbreaking for the Afghan section took place at a time when Pakistan’s relations with India have deteriorated and both countries are locked in daily border skirmishes in Kashmir.

TAPI is dubbed by some as a “peace pipeline,” citing the potential the project has to promote regional economic and security cooperation. But analysts remain skeptical about future progress in the wake of Islamabad’s prevailing tensions with Kabul and New Delhi.
…

Amazon’s assault on the retail industry has brought misery to traditional retailers without a strong web presence.

Less well noticed is the patchwork of European companies that are turning the e-commerce revolution to their advantage, supplying online giants with everything from forklift trucks and storage space to cardboard boxes and automated warehouses.

Mainly bricks-and-mortar retailers such as Debenhams, H&M, and Marks & Spencer have faced a torrid few years as stretched consumers increasingly look online for bargains.

Online retail sales are growing at double-digit percentage rates in every western European country, according to consultancy the Centre for Retail Research.

In Britain, a fifth of transactions are now conducted online, a five-fold increase over the last decade.

The world’s dominant online retailer Amazon, whose shares have soared 73 percent in the last year, is outside the remit of most European investors because it is U.S. listed, so they have had to look for other ways of buying into the trend.

One is investing in companies that have benefited from the rise of e-commerce.

On February 16, warehouse owner Segro’s shares hit a decade-high after it said space-hungry clients, many in online retail and logistics, continued to buy up storage.

“There is a bull market in impatience,” said Gary Paulin, head of global equities at broker Northern Trust. “Consumers want things sooner, faster, now.”

He advises clients to buy shares in Kion, a German forklift truck-maker that is automating warehouses for online retailers, speeding up deliveries in the process.

He also flagged a turnaround at online supermarket Ocado. The company has long been targeted by short-sellers betting its share price will fall, but recently it has signed tie-ups with food retailers Casino and Sobeys, and its shares have more-than-doubled since November.

Martin Todd, a fund manager at Hermes Investment Management, owns shares in Kion as well as DS Smith, a cardboard-box maker which supplies Amazon as well as a number of other online retailers.

DS Smith is developing technology to custom-make boxes for Amazon that will help reduce large gaps in packages that increase freight costs.

“You might think it is a pretty unsexy business … [but] it is getting more high tech in what is traditionally a very low tech industry,” Todd said.

The company recently entered Britain’s blue-chip FTSE 100 index for the first time.

Buying some stocks exposed to online retail does not come cheap. Ocado shares are currently trading at more than 800 times forecast earnings, according to Eikon data.

John Bennett, head of European equities at Janus Henderson Investors, said while traditional retailers were “absolutely dying,” stocks such as Kion were too expensive for him to own.

“It became a very popular name, and I tend to shy away [from widely-owned companies],” he said. “I am far too curmudgeonly on the multiples you pay.”

Reporting by Alasdair Pal.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump has called a meeting early next week with key senators and Cabinet officials to discuss potential changes to biofuels policy, which is coming under increasing pressure after a Pennsylvania refiner blamed the regulation for its bankruptcy, according to four sources familiar with the matter.

The meeting comes as the oil industry and corn lobby clash over the future of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a decade-old regulation that requires refiners to cover the cost of mixing biofuels such as corn-based ethanol into their fuel.

Trump’s engagement reflects the high political stakes of protecting jobs in a key electoral state. Oil refiner Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES), which employs more than 1,000 people in Philadelphia, declared bankruptcy last month and blamed the regulation for its demise.

Oil, farm state senators

The meeting, scheduled for Tuesday, will include Republican Senators Ted Cruz of Texas, Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst of Iowa, along with Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, and potentially Energy Secretary Rick Perry, according to the four sources, who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

One source said the meeting would focus on short-term solutions to help PES continue operating. PES is asking a bankruptcy judge to shed roughly $350 million of its current RFS compliance costs, owed to the EPA which administers the program, as part of its restructuring package.

The other sources said the meeting will consider whether to cap prices for biofuel credits, let higher-ethanol blends be sold all year, and efforts to get speculators out of the market.

Officials at the EPA, Agriculture Department, and Energy Department declined to comment. A White House official, Kelly Love, said she had no announcement on the matter at this time.

The offices of Cruz, Ernst and Grassley did not immediately return requests for comment.

The sources said the options moving forward would be constrained by political and legal realities that have derailed previous efforts at reform.

The Trump administration has considered changes to the RFS sought by refiners this year, including reducing the amount of biofuels required to be blended annually under the regulation or shifting the responsibility for blending to supply terminals, only to retreat in the face of opposition from corn-state lawmakers.

​Narrow options, broad resistance

The EPA is expected to weigh in officially in the coming weeks on request by PES to the bankruptcy judge to be released from its compliance obligations. But any such move would likely draw a backlash from other U.S. refiners, who have no hope of receiving a waiver.

Under the RFS, refiners must earn or purchase blending credits called RINs to prove they are complying with the regulation. As biofuels volume quotas have increased, so have prices for the credits, meaning refiners that invested in blending facilities have benefited while those that have not, such as PES, have had to pay up.

PES said its RFS compliance costs exceeded its payroll last year, and ranked only behind the cost of purchasing crude oil.

Other issues may have contributed to PES’ financial difficulties. Reuters reported that PES’ investor backers withdrew from the company more than $594 million in a series of dividend-style distributions since 2012, even as regional refining economics slumped.

Regulators and lawmakers have been considering how to cut the cost of the RFS to the oil industry.

In recent months, for example, the EPA has contemplated expanding its use of an exemption available to small refineries, a move that would likely push down RIN prices, but which both the oil and corn industries have said would be unfair.

Cruz last year proposed limiting the price of RINs to 10 cents, a fraction of their current value — an idea that was roundly rejected by the ethanol industry as a disincentive for new ethanol blending infrastructure investment.

Senator John Cornyn, also a Texas Republican, is preparing draft legislation to overhaul the RFS in Congress that would include the creation of a new specialized RIN credit intended to push down prices, but it too faces resistance from both the corn and oil lobbies.
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Saudi Arabia will stage more than 5,000 shows, festivals and concerts in 2018, double the number of last year, as it tries to shake off its conservative image in a drive to keep tourist dollars at home and lure in visitors.

The state wants to capture up to a quarter of the $20 billion currently spent overseas every year by Saudis seeking entertainment, lifting a ban on cinemas and putting on shows by Western artists.

U.S. rapper Nelly performed in Jeddah in December, albeit to a men-only crowd, and Greek musician Yanni played to a mixed-gender audience.

The gradual relaxing of gender segregation risks causing a backlash from religious conservatives, but public objections to a wider program of reforms have been more muted in recent months after several critics were arrested.

At an event to launch the 2018 entertainment calendar, Ahmed al-Khatib, chairman of the state-run General Entertainment Authority (GEA), said infrastructure investments over the next decade would reach 240 billion riyals ($64 billion), including an opera house to be completed around 2022.

That will contribute 18 billion riyals to annual GDP and generate 224,000 new jobs by 2030, the GEA said.

“The bridge is starting to reverse,” Khatib said, referring to the causeway linking Saudi Arabia with more liberal Bahrain where many Saudis flock for weekend getaways.

“And I promise you that we will reverse this migration, and people from Dubai, Kuwait and Bahrain will come to Saudi.”

However, on Thursday night, the Minister of Culture and Information said Khatib’s opera plans were an infringement of the role of the General Authority for Culture, a separate government body, the Saudi Press Agency said.

Economic hopes

The entertainment plans are largely motivated by economics, part of a reform program to diversify the economy away from oil and create jobs for young Saudis.

The Vision 2030 plan aims to increase household spending on cultural and entertainment events inside the kingdom to 6 percent by 2030 from 2.9 percent.

“We are bringing the most exciting and famous events to Saudi Arabia this year,” Khatib told Reuters in an interview, adding that state-sponsored entertainment events would be staged in 56 cities.

“We are creating new local events with local content,” he said. “Almost 80 percent of the calendar [events] are for families.”

Saudi Arabia lifted a 35-year ban on cinemas late last year, with plans for regional and global chains to open more than 300 movie theaters by 2030. The first cinemas are expected to start showing films in March.

Last year, the country announced plans to develop resorts on some 50 islands off the Red Sea coast and an entertainment city south of Riyadh featuring golf courses, car racing tracks and a Six Flags theme park.
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The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday updated guidance to public companies on how and when they should disclose cybersecurity risks and breaches, including potential weaknesses that have not yet been targeted by hackers.

The guidance also said company executives must not trade in a firm’s securities while possessing nonpublic information on cybersecurity attacks. The SEC encouraged companies to consider adopting specific policies restricting executive trading in shares while a hack is being investigated and before it is disclosed.

The SEC, in unanimously approving the additional guidance, said it would promote “clearer and more robust disclosure” by companies facing cybersecurity issues, according to SEC Chairman Jay Clayton, a Republican.

Democrats on the commission reluctantly supported the guidance, describing it as a paltry step taken in the wake of a raft of high-profile hacks at major companies that exposed millions of Americans’ personal information. They called for much more rigorous rule-making to police disclosure around cybersecurity issues, or requiring certain cybersecurity policies at public companies.

Commissioner Robert Jackson said the new document “essentially reiterates years-old staff-level views on this issue,” and pointed to analysis from the White House Council of Economic Advisers that finds companies frequently under-report cybersecurity events to investors.

The SEC first issued guidance in 2011 on cybersecurity disclosures.

“It may provide investors a false sense of comfort that we, at the Commission, have done something more than we have,” Commissioner Kara Stein, another Democrat, said in a statement. Significant breaches have included those at Equifax Inc. consumer credit reporting agency, and at the SEC itself.

The agency announced in September its corporate filing system, known as EDGAR, was breached by hackers in 2016 and may have been used for insider trading. The matter is under review.

The new guidance will mean that corporations disclose more information about cyberattacks and risks and take steps to ensure no insider trading can occur around those events, said several attorneys who advise businesses on the subject.

“This essentially creates a mandatory new disclosure category — cybersecurity risks and incidents,” said Spencer Feldman, an attorney with Olshan Frome Wolosky LLP.

Craig A. Newman, a partner with Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP, said the SEC guidance “makes clear that it doesn’t want a repeat of the Equifax situation.”
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Ford Motor Co. said Wednesday that Raj Nair, its president for North America, was leaving the company immediately after an internal investigation found his behavior was “inconsistent with the company’s code of conduct.”

Ford did not give any details on what that behavior entailed. His departure comes after several high-profile business leaders have quit or been fired following accusations of sexual misconduct.

“We made this decision after a thorough review and careful consideration,” said Ford Chief Executive Jim Hackett in a statement. “Ford is deeply committed to providing and nurturing a safe and respectful culture and we expect our leaders to fully uphold these values.”

Nair apologized, without elaborating.

“I sincerely regret that there have been instances where I have not exhibited leadership behaviors consistent with the principles that the Company and I have always espoused,” Nair said in Ford’s statement.

A spokesman for No. 2 U.S. automaker said the company would not comment on the nature of Nair’s behavior beyond what was in its official statement.

Nair was appointed to his current position last May when Hackett became CEO. Nair previously served as Ford’s chief technical officer.
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South Korea’s cryptocurrency industry is anticipating much better times as the market regulator changes tack from its tough stance on the virtual coin trade, promising instead to help promote blockchain technology.

The regulator said Tuesday that it hopes to see South Korea — which has become a hub for cryptocurrency trade — normalize the virtual coin business in a self-regulatory environment.

“The whole world is now framing the outline [for cryptocurrency] and therefore [the government] should rather work more on normalization than increasing regulation,” Choe Heung-sik, chief of South Korea’s Finance Supervisory Service (FSS), told reporters.

FSS has been leading the government’s regulation of cryptocurrency trading as part of a task force.

Cryptocurrency operators have drawn a new optimism from Choe’s comments, seeing them clearly indicating the government’s cooperation in their plans for self-regulation.

“Though the government and the industry have not yet reached a full agreement, the fact that the regulator himself made clear the government’s stance on cooperation is a positive sign for the markets,” said Kim Haw-joon of the Korea Blockchain Association.

Wednesday’s news is a stark reversal of the justice minister’s warnings in January that the government was considering shutting down local cryptocurrency exchanges, throwing the market into turmoil.

Instead, South Korea banned the use of anonymous bank accounts for virtual coin trading as of January 30 to stop cryptocurrencies being used in money laundering and other crimes.

Bitcoin, the world’s most heavily traded cryptocurrency, is now changing hands at a three-week high of $11,086 on the Luxembourg-based Biststamp exchange after falling as low as $5,920.72 in early February.

South Korean electronics giant Samsung has already started production of cryptocurrency mining technologies, local media reported in January.
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South Korea said on Wednesday it is signing free trade agreements with five Central American nations aimed at boosting market access for the Korean auto sector and electronics makers.

Trade minister Kim Hyun-chong will meet representatives from Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama in Seoul on Wednesday to sign five separate bilateral pacts which will eliminate duties on about 95 percent of traded goods and services, Korea’s trade ministry said in an e-mailed statement.

The agreements are subject to parliamentary approval in each country, and is likely to take effect at different times depending on the ratification process.

The five trade pacts open South Korea to key Central American countries after its deals with the U.S., the European Union and China helped boost exports.

“The South Korea-Central America free trade deals will enable the countries to build a more comprehensive, strategic partnerships going forward,” Kim said.

The ministry expects the five deals to accelerate South Korea’s economic growth by an overall 0.02 percent in the next 10 years, by boosting exports of cars, steel, cosmetics products, and auto components.
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President Nicolas Maduro said Tuesday that Venezuela had received $735 million in the first day of a pre-sale of the country’s “petro” cryptocurrency, aimed at pulling the country out of an economic tailspin.

Maduro is hoping the petro will allow the ailing OPEC member to skirt U.S. sanctions as the bolivar currency plunges to record lows and it struggles with hyperinflation and a collapsing socialist economy.

Blockchain experts have warned the petro is unlikely to attract significant investment. Opposition leaders have said the sale constitutes an illegal debt issuance that circumvents Venezuela’s majority-opposition legislature, and the U.S. Treasury Department has warned it may violate sanctions levied last year.

Maduro did not give details about the initial investors and there was no evidence presented for his figure. He added that tourism, some gasoline sales and some oil transactions could be made in petro.

“Today, a cryptocurrency is being born that can take on Superman,” said Maduro, using the comic character to refer to the United States, as he was flanked by mining rigs in a state television address.

The official website for the petro on Tuesday published a guide to setting up a virtual wallet to hold the cryptocurrency.

The cryptocurrency goes public next month.

Venezuelan Cryptocurrency Superintendent Carlos Vargas last week said the government was expecting to draw investors in Turkey, Qatar, the United States and Europe.

The value of the entire petro issuance of 100 million tokens would be just over $6 billion, according to details given by Maduro in recent months, though no new price information was provided Tuesday.

The tokens will each be valued at and backed by a barrel of Venezuelan crude oil, Maduro has said.

Advisers working for the government have in the past recommended that 38.4 percent of the petros should be sold in a private auction at a discount of 60 percent.

Maduro says his government is the victim of an “economic war” led by opposition politicians with the help of the government of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Sanctions levied last year by Washington block U.S. banks and investors from acquiring newly issued Venezuelan debt, effectively preventing the nation from borrowing abroad to bring in new hard currency or refinance existing debt.

The petro will not be a token on the Ethereum network, as was previously disclosed in a whitepaper provided by the government.
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