Banque Pictet & Cie SA opened an office in South Africa, the first time the Swiss private lender has had a presence in Africa in its 220-year history, Business Day reported. Banking regulator, the Prudential Authority granted Pictet a license to open a representative office in the country, the Johannesburg-based newspaper said. Pictet had 724 billion Swiss francs ($942 billion) under management at...
Banque Pictet & Cie SA opened an office in South Africa, the first time the Swiss private lender has had a presence in Africa in its 220-year history, Business Day reported. Banking regulator, the Prudential Authority granted Pictet a license to open a representative office in the country, the Johannesburg-based newspaper said. Pictet had 724 billion Swiss francs ($942 billion) under management at the end of 2024, according to its website. Read more: Where to Invest 1 Million Rand: Mobius, Other Experts Weigh In The number of millionaires in Africa is expected to surge 65% over the next decade, the paper said, without citing anyone.
About a decade ago, Saudi Arabia picked a veteran banker to help set up a debt-market program that’s since transformed the kingdom into one of the most prolific bond issuers globally. His next task is to help Riyadh draw in overseas cash and triple annual foreign direct investment to $100 billion by 2030. Fahad Al-Saif has become the new face of the Gulf nation’s push for capital, replacing Khalid...
About a decade ago, Saudi Arabia picked a veteran banker to help set up a debt-market program that’s since transformed the kingdom into one of the most prolific bond issuers globally. His next task is to help Riyadh draw in overseas cash and triple annual foreign direct investment to $100 billion by 2030. Fahad Al-Saif has become the new face of the Gulf nation’s push for capital, replacing Khalid Al-Falih as investment minister amid sweeping cabinet changes . In Al-Saif, the kingdom gets a finance veteran whose experience sits at the intersection of business, politics and sovereign wealth. Al-Saif worked alongside Finance Minister Mohammed Al-Jadaan as Saudi Arabia started its debt program and began tapping global bond markets in 2016. When it raised a record $21.5 billion a year later, putting the kingdom on the map as one of the most active sovereign emerging-market issuers, Al-Saif was at the helm. Read More: Saudi Bond Borrowing Exceeds $20 Billion to Hit January Record He’s held several positions at Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and at a Saudi banking giant backed by HSBC Holdings Plc , spending much of the last two decades navigating the worlds of investment and fundraising. That experience will be critical for the kingdom, which increasingly needs cash as it cuts down on costly projects while working overtime to advance Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ’s diversification plan. More recently, he led investment strategy for the PIF. The $1 trillion fund is expected to lay out its its plans for the next five years in coming weeks, potentially prioritizing domestic deals and targeting capital inflows to national champions like artificial intelligence firm Humain. It’s unclear what Al-Saif’s appointment means for the PIF, and his profile was no longer available on a website detailing senior officials as of this week. The wealth fund and the investment ministry didn’t respond to requests for comment. “He is fundamentally a banker and a financier, someone w...
Ceri Breeze Costco ( COST ) is reportedly facing a new lawsuit over its rotisserie chicken, after an animal rights nonprofit claimed that the company's chicken processing plant in Nebraska suffers from salmonella contamination. The proposed class action lawsuit filed on Thursday cited a December study . "Costco’s failure to control salmonella in its chicken supply is not a harmless technicality—it...
Ceri Breeze Costco ( COST ) is reportedly facing a new lawsuit over its rotisserie chicken, after an animal rights nonprofit claimed that the company's chicken processing plant in Nebraska suffers from salmonella contamination. The proposed class action lawsuit filed on Thursday cited a December study . "Costco’s failure to control salmonella in its chicken supply is not a harmless technicality—it poses a real danger to consumers and violates their trust," the complaint said, according to a Reuters report. In her complaint in Seattle federal court, the plaintiff, Lisa Taylor, of Affton, Missouri, said she routinely bought one or two rotisserie chickens a month at Costco warehouses in the St. Louis area and believes she overpaid because Costco didn't disclose the contamination risk, the report said. Rotisserie chicken sales topped 157 million worldwide in 2025, Costco said at its annual meeting last month. More on Costco Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) Period Ending/ Trading Statement Call Prepared Remarks Transcript Costco: Strong Start To 2026 Likely Short-Lived Costco: Sell The New Year Rally Costco is giving startups a path to national rollouts Schwab trading activity index reaches highest reading in almost a year
Former US president Barack Obama said in a podcast interview on the weekend that aliens are real, but they aren’t at Nevada’s Area 51. During an appearance on YouTuber Brian Tyler Cohen’s show, Obama said he hadn’t seen extraterrestrials but that they existed. “They’re not being kept in Area 51, there’s no underground facility, unless there’s this enormous conspiracy and they hid it from the presi...
Former US president Barack Obama said in a podcast interview on the weekend that aliens are real, but they aren’t at Nevada’s Area 51. During an appearance on YouTuber Brian Tyler Cohen’s show, Obama said he hadn’t seen extraterrestrials but that they existed. “They’re not being kept in Area 51, there’s no underground facility, unless there’s this enormous conspiracy and they hid it from the president of the United States,” Obama said during a rapid-fire round of questions at the end of the...
Kagenmi In Q4 2025, Japan's GDP grew by 0.1% quarter-on-quarter, recovering from a 0.7% decline in Q3 but falling short of the expected 0.4% rise. The annualized growth rate was 0.2%, compared to a revised 2.6% contraction in the prior quarter and less than the 1.6% forecast. Economic challenges from U. S. tariffs are easing, while tensions with China continue. Tokyo plans to boost investment thro...
Kagenmi In Q4 2025, Japan's GDP grew by 0.1% quarter-on-quarter, recovering from a 0.7% decline in Q3 but falling short of the expected 0.4% rise. The annualized growth rate was 0.2%, compared to a revised 2.6% contraction in the prior quarter and less than the 1.6% forecast. Economic challenges from U. S. tariffs are easing, while tensions with China continue. Tokyo plans to boost investment through public spending after a recent election win. Separate data showed Japan’s industrial production edged down 0.1% month-over-month in December 2025, in line with flash data, and followed a 2.7% decline in the previous month, marking the second straight month of decrease in industrial output. The Nikkei 225 Index fell 0.1% to around 56,900, while the broader TOPIX slipped 0.2% to 3,810 on Monday, extending declines from the previous session. The Japanese yen fell to around 153 per dollar on Monday, trimming last week’s gains after Japan’s fourth-quarter 2025 growth came in well below expectations. More on Japan's economy: Japan's Election Shock: The Yen Trade Wall Street Can't Ignore S&P 500 Earnings: Jump In S&P 500 EPS This Week; Japan Election This Weekend The Yen Carry Trade: Fears Are Blown Out Of Proportion Asian markets retreat from records as ‘AI scare’ triggers global tech rout; Taiwan inks historic 15% tariff cap with U.S. Asia markets mixed: Nikkei 225 hits 58,048 record, South Korea’s KOSPI breaks all-time highs; U.S. jobs in focus
Crackdown on undocumented people could lead to home raids, surveillance and racial profiling, 75 organisations say More than 70 rights organisations have called on the EU to reject a proposal aimed at increasing the deportation of undocumented people, warning that it risks turning everyday spaces, public services and community interactions into tools of ICE-style immigration enforcement. Last Marc...
Crackdown on undocumented people could lead to home raids, surveillance and racial profiling, 75 organisations say More than 70 rights organisations have called on the EU to reject a proposal aimed at increasing the deportation of undocumented people, warning that it risks turning everyday spaces, public services and community interactions into tools of ICE-style immigration enforcement. Last March, the European Commission laid out its proposal to increase deportations of people with no legal right to stay in the EU, including potentially sending them to offshore centres in non-EU countries. Continue reading...
Decisions outsourced, chatbots for friends, the natural world an afterthought: Silicon Valley is giving us life void of connection. There is a way out – but it’s going to take collective effort By Rebecca Solnit. Read by Laurel Lefkow Continue reading...
Decisions outsourced, chatbots for friends, the natural world an afterthought: Silicon Valley is giving us life void of connection. There is a way out – but it’s going to take collective effort By Rebecca Solnit. Read by Laurel Lefkow Continue reading...
This extraordinary diner is the final wonder of the great Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, who dreamt it up at the age of 103. And it’s a great place for a sunset kombucha and gin Perched among old brick buildings in an industrial neighbourhood of Leipzig in eastern Germany, a giant white sphere appears to hover over the corner of a former boiler house. Is it a giant’s golf ball? An alien space...
This extraordinary diner is the final wonder of the great Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, who dreamt it up at the age of 103. And it’s a great place for a sunset kombucha and gin Perched among old brick buildings in an industrial neighbourhood of Leipzig in eastern Germany, a giant white sphere appears to hover over the corner of a former boiler house. Is it a giant’s golf ball? An alien spacecraft? A fallen planet? Twelve metres in diameter, the Niemeyer Sphere is the final design of world-famous Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer and probably the most surprising creation by a visionary who valued the sensation of newness in art above all else, the result being mesmerising buildings that seem both space age and out of this world. The Sphere is like a vision from the future, dropped among used-car dealerships and construction equipment rental outlets, in a working-class neighbourhood that few tourists would ever pass through by design. Continue reading...
Once a whites-only enclave, the grand McMillan Memorial library is one of three in the Kenyan capital that have been transformed for the community Down a steep, narrow staircase, the basement of the McMillan Memorial Library in Nairobi holds more than 100 enormous, dust-covered bound volumes of newspapers. Here too are the minutes of council meetings and photographic negatives going back more than...
Once a whites-only enclave, the grand McMillan Memorial library is one of three in the Kenyan capital that have been transformed for the community Down a steep, narrow staircase, the basement of the McMillan Memorial Library in Nairobi holds more than 100 enormous, dust-covered bound volumes of newspapers. Here too are the minutes of council meetings and photographic negatives going back more than a century. “Here lie some of the minute-by-minute recorded debates from the time British colonial powers ruled Nairobi, when it was a segregated city,” says Angela Wachuka, a publisher. Seconds later, a power cut plunges the room into darkness. “We still have a great deal of work to do,” she adds. Continue reading...
The hit podcaster, author and former GP says a failure to regulate big tech is ‘failing a generation of children’. He explains why he quit the NHS and why he wants a ban on screen-based homework A 16-year-old boy and his mum went to see their GP, Dr Rangan Chatterjee, on a busy Monday afternoon. That weekend, the boy had been at A&E after an attempt at self-harm, and in his notes the hospital doct...
The hit podcaster, author and former GP says a failure to regulate big tech is ‘failing a generation of children’. He explains why he quit the NHS and why he wants a ban on screen-based homework A 16-year-old boy and his mum went to see their GP, Dr Rangan Chatterjee, on a busy Monday afternoon. That weekend, the boy had been at A&E after an attempt at self-harm, and in his notes the hospital doctor had recommended the teenager be prescribed antidepressants. “I thought: ‘Wait a minute, I can’t just start a 16-year-old on antidepressants,’” says Chatterjee. He wanted to understand what was going on in the boy’s life. They talked for a while, and Chatterjee asked him about his screen use, which turned out to be high. “I said: ‘I think your screen use, particularly in the evenings, might be impacting your mental wellbeing.’” Chatterjee helped the boy and his mother set up a routine where digital devices and social media went off an hour before bed, gradually extending the screen-free period over six weeks. After two months, he says the boy stopped needing to see him. A few months after that, his mother wrote Chatterjee a note to say her son had been transformed – he was engaging with his friends and trying new activities. He was, she said, like a different boy from the one who had ended up in hospital. Continue reading...
Gold, mahjong sets, fancy lai see packets and dinners with fireworks views are among the incentives Hong Kong banks are using to lure wealthy customers from the city and the mainland during the Lunar New Year, which kicks off on Tuesday. Hong Kong authorities estimated that as many as 1.43 million mainland visitors would cross the border during the holiday period, up 6 per cent from a year earlier...
Gold, mahjong sets, fancy lai see packets and dinners with fireworks views are among the incentives Hong Kong banks are using to lure wealthy customers from the city and the mainland during the Lunar New Year, which kicks off on Tuesday. Hong Kong authorities estimated that as many as 1.43 million mainland visitors would cross the border during the holiday period, up 6 per cent from a year earlier. The Year of the Horse begins on Tuesday, but the mainland holiday started on Sunday and ends on...
After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered an about-face on NATO membership, Sweden is starting to consider another historic shift: adopting the euro. While the debate is in its early stages, a subtle but notable shift is taking place as conditions change. In 2003, when voters rejected Europe’s common currency in a referendum, the focus was on the krona’s ability to act as a buffer for the large...
After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered an about-face on NATO membership, Sweden is starting to consider another historic shift: adopting the euro. While the debate is in its early stages, a subtle but notable shift is taking place as conditions change. In 2003, when voters rejected Europe’s common currency in a referendum, the focus was on the krona’s ability to act as a buffer for the largest Nordic economy, but now geopolitical concerns have added a new dimension. On top of threats from Russia and China, Donald Trump ’s America First foreign policy — including threats to acquire Greenland from neighboring Denmark — underscore how smaller economies are exposed in an era of great-power rivalries. “Sweden is now a full member of NATO and we are reinforcing our defenses alongside our EU partners,” Cecilia Rönn, a Swedish lawmaker from the Liberal party, said in an interview at the parliament in Stockholm. “But we are still standing with one foot outside, in that we are not part of the currency cooperation.” The argument in favor of the euro is that a shared currency would tighten political ties and give Swedes a seat at the table when it comes to pan-European monetary matters. That adds to traditional commercial arguments such as expanding trade and facilitating direct investment. If a shift does firm up, it would bolster the euro’s credibility at a time when dollar dominance in world trade and as a reserve currency is being questioned. Read More: China Urges Banks to Curb US Treasuries Exposure on Market Risk The first tentative steps were taken by the Swedish establishment late last month. At a parliamentary session called by Rönn, Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson announced her backing for an inquiry into the pros and cons of euro adoption. While that opens the debate ahead of elections in September, the evaluation would only start after the vote. “The world is changing, and the EU is changing,” Svantesson, a member of the Moderate Party, said during the ...
David Schwimmer was a mergers and acquisitions banker at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. before becoming boss of the company that owns London’s stock exchange. Now activist hedge fund Elliott Management Corp. is parked in his drive, he needs to think like a banker again. London Stock Exchange Group Plc is a risky target for investor activism. It’s big, with a market value of £38 billion ($52 billion). An...
David Schwimmer was a mergers and acquisitions banker at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. before becoming boss of the company that owns London’s stock exchange. Now activist hedge fund Elliott Management Corp. is parked in his drive, he needs to think like a banker again. London Stock Exchange Group Plc is a risky target for investor activism. It’s big, with a market value of £38 billion ($52 billion). And it remains a British icon even though moves into data and indexes have diluted the commercial significance of its share-trading revenue. Elliott has to find big prey given the size of its $80 billion fund. But the high-stakes dynamic makes it critical for billionaire Paul Singer’s firm that LSEG has untapped upside that can be released through pressure on the boardroom. At first glance, the opportunity seems to rest on a recent collapse in LSEG’s shares after markets started to see it as a victim of artificial intelligence rather than a beneficiary of new AI-driven data consumption. Several analysts reckon there’s a positive case to be made for the business given much of its data is proprietary. To simplify: You can plug in a chatbot but you still have to purchase a license from LSEG to play with its underlying data. Nevertheless, the company has a problem distinct from the AI noise. It trades at a large discount to most analysts’ fundamental valuations, such as the £57 billion calculated by Barclays Plc research. LSEG has also traded for several years at a stubborn discount to focused data peers such as Moody’s Corp., MSCI Inc. and S&P Global Inc., as well as versus stock-exchange rivals. This is “unwarranted given the structural growth of the industry,” according to analysts at JPMorgan Chase & Co. Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, competes with LSEG to provide financial news, data and information. LSEG has lower profitability than rivals. But suppose it can boost margins and earnings, and then get investors to apply a higher price-to-earnings ratio to...
Like the German mark, French franc and Finnish markka, Sweden’s krona may one day become a relic of the past — if the country’s proponents of the euro get their way. While Sweden is a longstanding member of the European Union, it’s thus far resisted joining the almost three-decade-old common currency. But tighter integration with the EU is starting to look more attractive as a shield against heigh...
Like the German mark, French franc and Finnish markka, Sweden’s krona may one day become a relic of the past — if the country’s proponents of the euro get their way. While Sweden is a longstanding member of the European Union, it’s thus far resisted joining the almost three-decade-old common currency. But tighter integration with the EU is starting to look more attractive as a shield against heightened geopolitical instability and the cooling of transatlantic relations under US President Donald Trump . Public support for euro adoption has grown in recent years in the Nordics’ largest economy, although it’s still a divisive issue and a currency switch would likely take years to complete. Nonetheless, a shift in Sweden’s position would be a milestone for the EU and add credibility to the euro — at a time when Trump’s unpredictability is undermining confidence in the dollar. Why isn’t Sweden part of the euro zone? Sweden joined the EU in 1995 and is legally committed to euro adoption once certain economic criteria are met. But after the single currency was launched by the bloc in 1999 , Sweden chose not to join for political and economic reasons, including concerns about sovereignty and losing the krona’s role in buffering the economy. In a non-binding Swedish referendum in 2003, some 56% of voters rejected adopting the euro and successive governments have respected that result. Economically, Sweden has preferred to retain control over its monetary policy and maintain a floating exchange rate. It’s stayed outside the EU’s ERM II mechanism that manages the euro’s exchange rate with other currencies in the bloc. Participation in ERM II is one of the requirements for adopting the euro. Sweden is one of just six EU countries in the 27-member bloc that still use their own currencies — the others being the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland and Romania. Denmark has negotiated a formal opt-out from euro adoption. Why is Sweden rethinking euro adoption now? Government mi...