War in Ukraine: how far will Putin go?

Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine is devastating the country and its people. How far will he go? The Economist's experts discuss the threat of escalation, from the use of nuclear weapons to attacks beyond Ukraine.

Tariff evasion on imports from China

 

"An easy way to avoid Tariffs? Make or produce your goods and products in the good old USA. It’s very simple!” 

In the days when Twitter was the main medium for presidential proclamations, that was what Donald Trump recommended to companies using China as a manufacturing base. He was half right: avoiding tariffs has proved to be quite simple. What he failed to see, though, was that avoidance is an eminently viable strategy for companies staying put in China.

The scale of avoidance is, to use a non-technical term, huge. A giant discrepancy that has opened up between Chinese and American trade data provides a window onto the tariff-dodging that has occurred over the past three years since America slapped duties on Chinese products.

So what is happening and how are they doing it? Find out more HERE. 

One of the largest cyber-espionage campaigns ever

American officials claim that a group of hackers known as APT29, or more evocatively as Cozy Bear, thought to be part of the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service, penetrated several American government bodies—the list so far includes the Treasury, Commerce, State and Homeland Security Departments, along with the National Institutes of Health—where they could read emails at will. It appears to be one of the largest-ever acts of digital espionage against America.

Full story on The Economist

US Banking - Optimism in the Trump Era

Bankers are happy so far with the Trump administration, but Congress could derail deregulation.

North American mobile payments usage stagnates

From Finextra –

“Apple and Google may have boosted awareness of mobile payments in North America over the last year, but actual usage has remained flat, according to a survey from Accenture.”

Read more>>

‘10 Years After Hurricane Katrina: Lessons in Preparedness, Response, and Resilience’

This August marks the tenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the costliest storm ever to make landfall in the United States; and a new report published by Marsh looks at the lessons that can be learned from the event.

In ‘10 Years After Hurricane Katrina: Lessons in Preparedness, Response, and Resilience’, executives from Marsh reflect on how property insurance, claims, analytics, risk engineering, and crisis management have changed since Katrina; and explain what we've learned from Katrina and other disasters about protecting people, property, and profits.

The key takeaways from the report include:

• The importance of reading and understanding your insurance policies cannot be underestimated.
• The benefits of ‘drilling’ your insurance policy to understand how it will respond to potential disasters.
• Why providing high-quality data for catastrophe (CAT) models is essential.
• How a robust business continuity and crisis management plan protects people and profits.

The report concludes that businesses can mitigate their risks and increase their resilience by focusing on four areas:

1. Protect your property,
2. Protect your profits,
3. Protect your people,
4. Protect your future.

Read/Download the Report>>