As many of you know, Joe Keery got rid of his iconic luscious locks (RIP,) and now, we have the curious case of Mike Fiers' beard to discuss.
For those who missed it, the Oakland Athletics pitcher debuted an extremely unique curl of facial hair at a game in Texas on Saturday night. He appeared to be sporting a beard that resembled the letter "G" and only covered half of his face. You love/hate to see it!
Enjoy YouTube's "leanback" interface while you can. A pop-up message on the streaming video site's TV-friendly landing page says it'll be gone soon.
There's no indication of when it will be going away or why, but Mashable reached out to Google for comment. The pop-up message makes it clear that TV watchers will have to turn to supported devices like game consoles or streaming boxes as a user-friendly alternative for watching YouTube in the living room.
"This version of YouTube will be going away soon," the pop-up message reads. "You'll still be able to view youtube.com, but you can get an optimized experience on a supported device." Users are then pointed to a YouTube help page that runs through exactly what qualifies as a supported device. (You probably own one.) Read more...
Things may not have ended well for Iron Man in Avengers: Engame, but the beloved hero will live on in fans' hearts and, of course, their Lego recreations.
At the 2019 San Diego Comic-Con, for instance, a team of Lego builders created a stunning life-size model of Iron Man, which stands at 6.5 feet tall and weighs 188 pounds.
The elaborate building process is shown in the video above, and Lead Model Designer Greg Omartian and Senior Model Builder Jeff Rushby discuss how they assembled the Lego hero using a whopping 35,119 Lego pieces.
Over the years, Lego builders have given fan favorite super heroes like Captain Marvel, Thor, The Flash, and more the life-sized model treatment, and they continue to be damn good at capturing likenesses. Read more...
Great literature is closer than you think, and you don't even need to visit a bookstore or pick up your e-reader to find it. If you haven't got time to sit down with a book — or if you just like being read to — check out one of these sites, which allow access to thousands of free audiobooks. There's the perfect one for you in the mix!
In the past, you might have known Loyal Books as Books Should Be Free (amen to that). The site offers free audiobooks from a multitude of genres, from adventure and romance to science fiction and historical fiction. Users can download titles from Loyal Books to be listened to via an MP3 file or through the Apple Podcasts app, or to stream on an RSS feed. The site offers content in 28 languages, from Ancient Greek to Urdu, not including multilingual titles. Volunteers from the site itself, or from Project Gutenberg and Librivox, which are listed below, digitize public domain books to make them accessible in the Loyal Books library. Read more...
Have you already pre-ordered the iPhone 11? If so, why use the headphones that are included in the box when you can snag yourself the latest AirPods with wireless charging case for $149.99 after coupon code at Rakuten.
Need a new laptop or desktop for work? Dell Small Business is offering an extra 17% off sitewide on select XPS and Inspiron computers.
After dropping your phone between the seat in your car and your center console more than once, you realize you desperately need a car mount. But most of the ones on the market either partially block your view (windshield mounts) or partially block your airflow (air vent mounts). The U-Grip, on the other hand, sits comfortably in your cup holder and features an adjustable neck that can rotate up to 360 degrees for the perfect viewing angle. Read more...
Pivotal Purchase is an ongoing series highlighting a watershed shopping moment — the thing you bought that made you feel like you were financially stable, that changed your perspective, that made you realize you were really, truly, finally an adult.
When I landed my first job out of college, my mom bought me an extremely practical housewarming gift for my first “grown-up” apartment: a high-quality, queen-size mattress. I’m sure she did so because she knew I couldn’t afford to buy one on my own, but, to me, the bed was a signal: that I’d outgrown my twin-bed years, moved beyond that dreaded collegiate extra-long, and was now an adult. Or at least a rudderless 22-year-old pretending with all her might to be one. Read more...
Love them or loathe them, spreadsheets are inescapable in practically every single industry. So, there's virtually no way to avoid the number-crunching powerhouse that is Microsoft Excel. Sorry.
Excel has been the leader in spreadsheet software for decades. Yet, despite its necessity, most people don't bother going deeper than the surface. But now, you can step out of the majority and learn how powerful and complex this software really is with the help of this Complete Excel Pro Tips Certification Bundle, which is on sale for just $19.
Anyone can tap numbers into a spreadsheet, but this training will take you beyond the basics. You'll learn what PivotTables are and how to master them, discover productivity shortcuts and automation techniques, and learn how to use the powerful visualization tools. Total beginners and self-proclaimed experts alike can benefit from this bundle and start slicing and dicing numbers like a pro. Read more...
TL;DR: Save up to 58% on premium knife sets, blocks, and cutting boards from Calphalon, Top Chef, Guy Fieri, and more.
A good kitchen knife is an extension of your arm. It sounds bizarre, but having the right knife set can really determine whether or not things go well in the kitchen.
What distinguishes a good kitchen knife from a crappy one, you ask? Well, you want knives that are sharp and that actually stay sharp, of course. You want something that feels comfortable in your hands, with well-distributed weight and an ergonomically-designed handle. And, while a proper kitchen arsenal really comes down to personal preference, the right material can really make or break your meal prep experience. Ceramic, stainless steel, and carbon steel are probably your best bets. Read more...
It's with heavy hearts that we report Joe Keery, whose luscious hair sent teenagers and grown adults alike swooning, got bangs.
The Stranger Things star appeared at a dinner hosted by Chanel with the remains of his once-glorious hair hacked away. What was left can only be described as a Will Byers-esque bowl cut complete with choppy FRINGE BANGS. His hair, known for its voluminous waves, also appears straightened.
Let's just take a moment of silence to remember a legend.
What prompted Keery to get rid of his signature mullet, the one characteristic that single-handedly carved him a spot in America's collective heart? The man once gave a detailed interview to GQ, describing the very process that breathed life into his hair, and told the reporter, "Do I get recognized? I guess it depends on if I’m wearing a hat or notThe hairdo is a dead giveaway. There’s nothing I can do. It’s just the way my hair grows." Read more...
Keke Palmer's reaction to Dick Cheney is, frankly, pure art.
The former Nickelodeon star-turned-Hustlers power woman took a lie detector test for Vanity Fair on Wednesday, where she answered questions about her birth place, her real name, and her dating preferences. When asked whether her character on the Nickelodeon show True Jackson, VP was a better VP than Vice President Dick Cheney, she balked.
"I don't know who this man is," she said, shaking her head. "He could be walking down the street and I wouldn't know a thingSorry to this man."
Iconic. According to the lie detector, Palmer was telling the truth when she said, with her whole chest, that she did not know Dick Cheney. Read more...
It would take about 48 hours if you were to watch every movie set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, according to some deep investigative work by Screen Rant. To be clear, that doesn't account for breaks to eat, sleep, pee, and go outside. That's two days straight of various planets, and eventually the universe, in peril over and over and over again.
You could do that, if you were a truly depraved soul. Or you could skim Wikipedia summaries and then watch this delightful 7-minute video of a high school homecoming dance that sums up Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame with some fun choreography. Read more...
Engineers at MIT have created a material that's so black it set a new blackness record.
This new ultrablack material, reported by MIT News Thursday, is made from vertically aligned carbon nanotubes grown on chlorine-etched aluminum foil and it captures 99.995% of light, making it about 10 times blacker than the previous record holder, Vantablack.
To show how the material eats light, MIT artist-in-residence Diemut Strebe collaborated with MIT engineer Brian Wardle to coat a 16.78-carat natural yellow diamond in the yet-to-be-named material. It basically makes the whole diamond disappear; there are no discernible features in the photo above. Read more...
Humanity may be able to save the northern white rhino after all, thanks to scientists who managed to create two in vitro embryos.
When Sudan, the last male northern white rhino left at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya, died in 2018, the two female rhinos Fatu and Najin were the only ones left of their species. Since they couldn't procreate, it seemed to be only a matter of time before the species would go extinct.
But on Wednesday, there was a breakthrough. An international consortium of scientists announced that they'd successfully extracted immature eggs from Fatu and Najin, and then airlifted them to Avantea laboratory in Italy. Read more...
TL;DR: The award-winning Sony Bravia AG9 4K OLED TV is on sale in the PCMag Shop for as low as $2,399 — saving you $302 off the 55-inch or $700 off the 65-inch.
Apple is feeling the love from tech junkies over the iPhone 11, but it'll earn some respect from TV and film obsessives in the coming months: Apple TV+ launches on Nov. 1.
PCMag has a deal to help you prep for all of the new content: Through Sunday, Sept. 16, you can save up to $700 on a 55-inch or 65-inch model of Sony's A9G Master Series OLED TVs. (PCMag is owned by Mashable's publisher, Ziff Davis.) Read more...
Mercedes-Benz's newest concept car is shocking, to say the least.
This is the Vision Mercedes Simplex, a new concept car from the German manufacturer that takes the nearly 120-year-old design of the Mercedes Simplex and re-imagines it with sleek, futuristic flair. The car was shown off at Mercedes' new design center in Nice, France, on Saturday, Cnet reported.
Mercedes-Benz chief design officer Gorden Wagener posed next to the new car, which gives us a nice sense of scale.
Enjoy these views of Alaska's Wolverine Glacier while you can. Soon enough, they'll be relegated to a distant memory.
As Earth's climate shifts under the strain caused by human civilization, scientists have turned to one of the world's oldest natural wonders for answers: glaciers. Since 1966, researchers have been measuring how the mass of these dense pockets of ice and snow changes over time.
The Wolverine Glacier is one of several examples in Alaska that has been monitored for decades. According to a U.S. Geological Survey study published in 2016 – 50 years after measurements were first taken – the stats aren't great. Read more...
If you're going to do an art heist, perhaps you shouldn't select a target that's as cumbersome and obvious as a solid gold toilet.
A golden toilet was stolen from Blenheim Palace, the birthplace of Winston Churchill, the palace announced on Twitter Saturday. The toilet, an art piece called America, was part of a collection by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan that was on display at Blenheim Palace.
The toilet was stolen from the palace around 4:50 a.m. local time by a group of people, according to a statement from Thames Valley Police. Although police have not yet recovered the toilet, they did arrest a 66-year-old man in connection with the heist. Read more...
Artists don't exactly make a ton of money from streaming or touring. So how does your favorite singer or rapper pay their rent? By endorsing products and getting paid to show up places, of course!
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The Guardian, Britain's leading liberal newspaper with a global reputation for independent and critical journalism, has been successfully targeted by security agencies to neutralize its adversarial reporting of the 'security state', according to newly released documents and evidence from former and current Guardian journalists.
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While taking Vanity Fair's lie detector test, the "Hustlers" star was asked "Would you say that True Jackson VP was a better VP than Dick Cheney?" Her response is already legendary.
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In the hottest Alaskan summer on record, amid countless signs of a climate in crisis, a camera phone captured a Republican fundraiser on Kenai Peninsula. Judging from the laughs and smiles, you'd never know that they are a few dozen miles from the Swan Lake Fire, now burning for over three months. But the mood is giddy because a surprise caller is on speaker -- President Trump.
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Saudi Arabia sees its oil output cut in half after drone attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels spark huge fires at a sprawling oil processing facility 200 miles northeast of Riyadh. https://t.co/JZRjvzzX6t
#UPDATE Saudi Arabia says it is ready to respond to drone attacks claimed by Iran-aligned Yemeni rebels on two major oil facilities, which severely disrupted production as Washington blames Tehran for the strike https://t.co/bvnqljLDRKpic.twitter.com/S6q3HSmyHP
Supporters of the ongoing protests for democratic reforms in Hong Kong clash with supporters of the central government at a shopping mall in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory. https://t.co/i9iWlWwYeD
The technological sophistication and audacity of Saturday's attack will linger over the energy market
Saturday's attack on a critical Saudi oil facility will almost certainly rock the world energy market in the short term, but it also carries disturbing long-term implications.
Ever since the dual 1970s oil crises, energy security officials have fretted about a deliberate strike on one of the critical choke points of energy production and transport. Sea lanes such as the Strait of Hormuz usually feature in such speculation. The facility in question at Abqaiq is perhaps more critical and vulnerable. The Wall Street Journal reported that five million barrels a day of output, or some 5% of world supply, would be taken offline as a result.
To illustrate the importance of Abqaiq in the oil market's consciousness, an unsuccessful terrorist attack in 2006 using explosive-laden vehicles sent oil prices more than $2.00 a barrel higher. Saudi Arabia is known to spend billions of dollars annually protecting ports, pipelines and processing facilities, and it is the only major oil producer to maintain some spare output. Yet the nature of the attack, which used drones launched by Iranian-supported Houthi fighters from neighboring Yemen, shows that protecting such facilities may be far more difficult today.
The man whose state surveillance revelations rocked the world speaks exclusively to the Guardian about his new life and concerns for the future
The world's most famous whistleblower, Edward Snowden, says he has detected a softening in public hostility towards him in the US over his disclosure of top-secret documents that revealed the extent of the global surveillance programmes run by American and British spy agencies.
In an exclusive two-hour interview in Moscow to mark the publication of his memoirs, Permanent Record, Snowden said dire warnings that his disclosures would cause harm had not come to pass, and even former critics now conceded "we live in a better, freer and safer world" because of his revelations.
* Hamza bin Laden, the son of former Al Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama, was killed in a U.S. led counter-terrorism operation * In a statement released by the White House Saturday morning, Trump confirmed the high-ranking Al Qaeda member was dead * The statement said he 'was killed in a United States counter-terrorism operation in the Afghanistan /Pakistan region' * The loss will deprive the group 'of important leadership skills and the symbolic connection to his father, the White House said
Hamza bin Laden, the son of former Al Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama, has been killed in a counter-terrorism operation along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, Donald Trump has confirmed.
In July, intelligence officials said that the younger Bin Laden had been killed sometime in the last two years in an operation that involved the United States.
Secretary of Defense Mark Esper confirmed the death last month, saying it was 'his understanding' that bin Laden was dead, but Trump and other senior officials had not publicly confirmed the news.
At Moscow meeting, Russia stresses importance of resumption of US-Taliban talks and group says eager to renew dialogue.
Taliban representatives have held discussions with Russian officials in Moscow, just days after US President Donald Trump declared months-long peace talks between Washington and the group "dead".
Taliban's Qatar-based spokesman Suhail Shaheen confirmed the meeting in the Russian capital on Friday, saying the group's delegation held consultations with Zamir Kabulov, Russia's special envoy for Afghanistan.
* Drone attacks sparked fires at Aramco oil facilities in eastern Saudi Arabia today * Attacks took place at 4:00am at world's largest oil processing plant Abqaiq * The Saudi interior ministry said the fires have now been brought under control * Iran-backed Houthis claimed responsibility for attacks in Buqyaq and Khurais * Tensions are running high in the region after attacks in June and July on oil tankers in Gulf waters that Riyadh and Washington blamed on Iran
en drones launched by Iran-backed militants sparked a huge fire at the world's largest oil processing facility and a major oilfield in Saudi Arabia in the early hours of this morning.
The fires at Abqaiq in Buqayq, which contains the world's largest oil processing plant, and Khurais, which contains the country's second largest oilfield, have now been brought under control since the drone attacks at 4.00am local time.
Tensions are running high in the region after attacks in June and July on oil tankers in Gulf waters that Riyadh and Washington blamed on Iran.
FEAR are growing that open warfare could break out in the Middle East after the US blamed Iran for a drone attack on Saudi Arabian oil facilities that could halve the Kingdoms oil output.
GERMANY should have been more flexible towards Britain ahead of Brexit and wants good relations with the UK, the former head of German intelligence has said.
ISRAEL Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned conflict with Islamic forces hiding in the Gaza Strip could be triggered "at any moment" as he signalled IDF troops would be ready to intervene next week.
BRITAIN has condemned a drone attack on Saudi Arabian oil facilities and called on Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebel group to stop targeting civilian and commercial infrastructure.
Protesters in Hong Kong once again defied a police ban Sunday to march through the enclave’s downtown districts in their push for greater political freedom.
Shopping malls, department stores and office buildings in the tourist and retail district of Causeway Bay pulled their shutters down around lunchtime as protesters began to congregate. Many carried the U.S. flag, and even banners for President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign, as they flooded the streets in their thousands chanting “Resist Beijing! Liberate Hong Kong!”
The former British colony’s democracy movement has repeatedly called for foreign intervention in its struggles with Beijing. Earlier on Sunday, a few dozen protesters gathered at the British consulate, waving Union Jacks and singing “God Save the Queen” as they petitioned Whitehall for assistance.
“I guess this is our last hope,” said 46-year-old marcher Selina, in reference to the appeals to Western powers for support. “Maybe with Trump or American help we can stop the police violence.”
“Americans care about freedom and rights and somehow I hope America will help us,” echoed Jackie, a 21-year-old student.
Local news broadcasts showed protesters burning the Chinese flag. They also tore down and burned a large banner that had been erected to commemorate China’s upcoming national day on Oct. 1.
By the late afternoon, protesters had set up barricades on Harcourt Road, near the city’s legislature and main government offices. They also vandalized subway stations, venting their fury at a train operator that they accuse of being in league with the the authorities by transporting riot police to demonstrations but shutting stations when protesters need to leave.
Sunday’s demonstrations come after a day of brawls across the city between protesters and pro-Beijing groups, with 25 people brought to hospital. A fire also broke out at the office of a pro-Beijing legislator.
Many protesters have threatened to escalate their campaign if the government does not meet their demands for, among other things, universal suffrage and an independent inquiry into what they say is the heavy handed way police have handled the demonstrations.
“When we say thing a quietly and peacefully and it doesn’t work you have to escalate,” Ken, a 46-year-old protester, told TIME. “We have no choice; give us a better choice.”
Semi-autonomous Hong Kong has been roiled by more than three months of unrest, which began as a series of demonstrations against a now withdrawn extradition bill. The movement quickly escalated into a full blown campaign for genuine democracy, with calls for the city’s leader to be elected by all eligible citizens instead of the small and carefully vetted electoral college that decides the appointment at present.
In recent weeks, calls for self-determination and even independence for Hong Kong have started to grow, leading a furious Beijing to denounce the protests as a separatist, color revolution.
Hong Kong was retroceded to China in 1997, after 156 years of British rule, but it’s 7.2 million people remain culturally and linguistically distinct from mainland Chinese.
—With reporting by Aria Hangyu Chen and Amy Gunia / Hong Kong
President Donald Trump offered U.S. support for Saudi Arabia’s self-defense in a call on Saturday with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, the White House said.
The pair spoke after a swarm of explosive drones hit key oil-industry targets in Saudi Arabia. The state-run Saudi Press Agency earlier reported on the call.
Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen claimed responsibility for the strikes, which forced Saudi Aramco to cut daily oil production in half.
The U.S. “strongly condemns today’s attack on critical energy infrastructure,” White House spokesman Judd Deere said in an emailed statement that was also posted on Twitter. The U.S. government “is monitoring the situation and remains committed to ensuring global oil markets are stable and well supplied.”
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a confidant of Trump, earlier urged a decisive U.S. response against Iranian targets.
“It is now time for the U.S. to put on the table an attack on Iranian oil refineries if they continue their provocations or increase nuclear enrichment,” Graham of South Carolina said on Twitter. “Iran will not stop their misbehavior until the consequences become more real, like attacking their refineries.”
John Abizaid, the U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, said in a tweet “attacks against critical infrastructure endanger civilians, are unacceptable, and sooner or later will result in innocent lives being lost.”
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump gave a boost Saturday to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu days before he faces his fiercest political test in more than a decade.
Trump publicly expressed support in a tweet for moving forward with discussions on a U.S.-Israel mutual defense treaty, embracing a Netanyahu priority as the Israeli leader hopes that his ties with the American leader will bring him another term. Netanyahu is perhaps Trump’s closest ally on the world stage, and the U.S. president has expressed optimism that he will survive Tuesday’s vote.
Trump said a formal defense pact would “further anchor the tremendous alliance between our two countries” and he looks forward to continuing the discussions after the election when they meet on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly later this month.
In a Twitter post, Netanyahu thanked his “dear friend” Trump. He added, “The Jewish State has never had a greater friend in the White House. I look forward to our meeting at the UN to advance a historic Defense Treaty between the United States and Israel.”
The vote this week is the second of 2019, after Netanyahu was unable to form a governing coalition following elections in April. The Israeli leader has been hampered by a hovering cloud of corruption charges that threaten not only to oust him from office but also to put him on trial.
Netanyahu, speaking Saturday on Israeli television, described such a defense pact as “historic” and “great,” but it was not clear what it would add to defense ties that are already very close. The U.S. gives Israel more than $3 billion a year in military aid and considers Israel a “major non-NATO ally.”
The idea of a formal treaty has been discussed before and been determined to be unnecessary.
Outside of NATO and the Rio Treaty with Latin American countries, the United States has separate mutual defense treaties with Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and Australia and New Zealand.
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump planned to have dinner Saturday with the parents of an American college student who died in 2017 shortly after being freed from captivity in North Korea.
An administration official said Trump was to host the parents of Otto Warmbier, who was convicted of trying to steal a propaganda poster while in the North Korea capital and spent 17 months in prison. He died at age 22 just days after being returned to the United States in a vegetative state.
Trump’s ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, was expected to join the dinner. Officials say he is among the 15 candidates Trump is considering to replace ousted national security adviser John Bolton.
Warmbier’s parents, Fred and Cindy Warmbier of suburban Cincinnati, say their son was tortured in prison and they were angered by Trump’s comments this spring that he took North Korean leader Kim Jong Un “at his word” that he was unaware of any mistreatment.
Trump later tweeted, “Of course I hold North Korea responsible for Otto’s mistreatment and death.” The tweet made no mention of Kim, with whom Trump is pursuing nuclear talks.
Doctors in Cincinnati said Warmbier had suffered severe brain damage, although they weren’t sure what led to it. North Korea denied mistreating him, saying he fell into a coma that resulted from botulism and a sleeping pill.
A law firm representing the Warmbier family didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
(DUBAI, United Arab Emirates) — Yemen’s Houthi rebels launched drone attacks on the world’s largest oil processing facility in Saudi Arabia and a major oil field Saturday, sparking huge fires at a vulnerable chokepoint for global energy supplies.
It remained unclear hours later whether anyone was injured at the Abqaiq oil processing facility and the Khurais oil field or what effect the assault would have on oil production. Rising smoke from the fires at the sites could be seen by satellites.
The attack by the Iranian-backed Houthis in the war against a Saudi-led coalition comes after weeks of similar drone assaults on the kingdom’s oil infrastructure, but none of the earlier strikes appeared to have caused the same amount of damage. The attack likely will heighten tensions further across the Persian Gulf amid an escalating crisis between the U.S. and Iran over its unraveling nuclear deal with world powers.
First word of the assault came in online videos of giant fires at the Abqaiq facility, some 330 kilometers (205 miles) northeast of the Saudi capital, Riyadh. Machine-gun fire could be heard in several clips alongside the day’s first Muslim call to prayers, suggesting security forces tried to bring down the drones just before dawn.
In daylight, Saudi state television aired a segment with its local correspondent near a police checkpoint, a thick plume of smoke visible behind him.
The fires began after the sites were “targeted by drones,” the Interior Ministry said in a statement carried by the state-run Saudi Press Agency. It said an investigation was underway.
Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil giant, did not respond to questions from The Associated Press. The kingdom hopes soon to offer a sliver of the company in an initial public offering.
In a short address aired by the Houthi’s Al-Masirah satellite news channel, military spokesman Yahia Sarie said the rebels launched 10 drones in their coordinated attack after receiving “intelligence” support from those inside the kingdom. He warned that attacks by the rebels would only get worse if the war continues.
“The only option for the Saudi government is to stop attacking us,” Sarie said.
The rebels hold Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, and other territory in the Arab world’s poorest country. Since 2015, a Saudi-led coalition has fought to reinstate the internationally recognized Yemeni government.
The U.S. Embassy in Riyadh said it was unaware of any injuries to Americans. Saudi Aramco employs a number of U.S. citizens, some of whom live in guarded compounds near the site.
“These attacks against critical infrastructure endanger civilians, are unacceptable, and sooner or later will result in innocent lives being lost,” U.S. Ambassador John Abizaid, a former Army general, said.
Saudi Aramco describes its Abqaiq oil processing facility in Buqyaq as “the largest crude oil stabilization plant in the world.”
The facility processes sour crude oil into sweet crude, then transports it onto transshipment points on the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea or to refineries for local production. Estimates suggest it can process up to 7 million barrels of crude oil a day. By comparison, Saudi Arabia produced 9.65 million barrels of crude oil a day in July.
The plant has been targeted in the past by militants. Al-Qaida-claimed suicide bombers tried but failed to attack the oil complex in February 2006.
The Khurais oil field is believed to produce over 1 million barrels of crude oil a day. It has estimated reserves of over 20 billion barrels of oil, according to Aramco.
There was no immediate impact on global oil prices as markets were closed for the weekend. Benchmark Brent crude had been trading at just above $60 a barrel.
While Saudi Arabia has taken steps to protect itself and its oil infrastructure, analysts had warned that Abqaiq remained vulnerable. The Rapidan Energy Group, a Washington-based advisory group, warned in May that “a successful attack could lead to a monthslong disruption of most Saudi production and nearly all spare production.” It called Abqaiq, close to the eastern Saudi city of Dammam, “the most important oil facility in the world.”
The Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies separately issued its own warning just last month.
“Though the Abqaiq facility is large, the stabilization process is concentrated in specific areas . including storage tanks and processing and compressor trains — which greatly increases the likelihood of a strike successfully disrupting or destroying its operations,” the center said.
The war has become the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The violence has pushed Yemen to the brink of famine and killed more than 90,000 people since 2015, according to the U.S.-based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, or ACLED, which tracks the conflict.
Since the start of the Saudi-led war, Houthi rebels have been using drones in combat. The first appeared to be off-the-shelf, hobby-kit-style drones. Later, versions nearly identical to Iranian models turned up. Iran denies supplying the Houthis with weapons, although the U.N., the West and Gulf Arab nations say Tehran does.
The rebels have flown drones into the radar arrays of Saudi Arabia’s Patriot missile batteries, according to Conflict Armament Research, disabling them and allowing the Houthis to fire ballistic missiles into the kingdom unchallenged. The Houthis launched drone attacks targeting Saudi Arabia’s crucial East-West Pipeline in May. In August, Houthi drones struck Saudi Arabia’s Shaybah oil field.
Burglars stole an expensive piece of art — a solid gold toilet— from Blenheim Palace in Woodstock, Oxfordshire, in the United Kingdom, Thames Valley Police confirmed Saturday.
In a statement, Detective Inspector Jess Milne, said: “The piece of art that has been stolen is a high value toilet made out of gold that was on display at the palace.”
Police said the burglars broke in overnight and left the scene around 4:50 a.m. BST Saturday morning. Law enforcement received a call about the burglary at 4:57 a.m. No one was injured.
The artwork, titled “America,” was created by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan and was first displayed in the Guggenheim in New York City, N.Y. in 2016. The fully functioning toilet — which visitors were welcome to use — is made of 18-karat gold and reportedly estimated to be worth more than $1 million.
It had just opened at Blenheim Palace on Sept. 12, and was scheduled to run through Oct. 27.
**OFFICIAL STATEMENT**
Following the Thames Valley Police statement we can confirm ‘America’, the art piece by Maurizio Cattelan has been stolen in the early hours of this morning.
We are saddened by this extraordinary event, but also relieved no-one was hurt.
In a press conference Saturday, Inspector Richard Nicholls said a 66-year-old man has been arrested “in connection with this incident.” He also said police believe the burglars used two vehicles.
“Due to the toilet being plumbed into the building, this has caused significant damage and flooding,” Detective Inspector Milne said in the police statement.
Blenheim Palace is the birthplace of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
The artwork has not been recovered and the investigation remains ongoing.
(LONDON) — The British prime minister who called the Brexit referendum and then saw the public vote to leave the European Union says he is sorry for the divisions it has caused.
David Cameron said in an interview published Saturday that he thinks about the consequences of the Brexit referendum “every single day” and worries “desperately” about what will happen next.
“I deeply regret the outcome and accept that my approach failed,” he said. “The decisions I took contributed to that failure. I failed.”
He admitted that many people blame him for the Brexit divisions that have deepened since the referendum and will never forgive him, but he defended his decision to call the vote.
He spoke to The Times newspaper to promote his soon-to-be-published memoir. Cameron, who had supported remaining in the EU, resigned the morning after the 2016 referendum. He has stayed out of electoral politics since then and largely kept out of the public eye.
His two successors — first Theresa May and now Prime Minister Boris Johnson — have wrestled with the Brexit issue and have thus far been unable to win parliamentary backing for an exit plan agreed with EU leaders.
Johnson faces an Oct. 31 deadline for leaving the EU and has been instructed by Parliament to seek an extension, which he says he will not do despite concerns that leaving without a deal would cause severe economic problems and possible food and medicine shortages. He will meet with European leaders Monday to search for some compromise.
The 52-year-old Cameron attacked former allies Johnson and Michael Gove, who helped spearhead the “Leave” campaign.
Cameron says they “left the truth at home” during the campaign, citing among other things the claim that Britain could save 350 million pounds per week that was being sent to the EU and could use that money to improve the National Health Service.
He said the referendum turned into a Conservative Party “psychodrama” and that he had been “hugely depressed” about leaving his post as prime minister.
(HONG KONG) — Skirmishes broke out Saturday at a shopping mall in Hong Kong between supporters of the ongoing protests for democratic reforms in the semiautonomous Chinese territory and people backing the central government in Beijing.
Hundreds of pro-Beijing demonstrators sang the Chinese national anthem, waved red flags and chanted slogans at Amoy Plaza in the densely packed Kowloon district. Opposing protesters quickly gathered there, sparking tensions as the two camps heckled each other.
The situation turned chaotic as groups of people traded blows and some used umbrellas to hit their opponents. Police later moved in to defuse the situation, with several people detained.
The clashes amid the mid-autumn festival holiday came after several nights of peaceful rallies that featured mass singing at shopping malls by supporters of the months-long pro-democracy protests.
Thousands of people also carried lanterns with pro-democracy messages in public areas and formed illuminated human chains on two of the city’s peaks on Friday night to mark the major Chinese festival.
Protesters have refused to yield despite the Hong Kong government’s promise to withdraw an extradition bill that triggered the protests. They have widened their demands to include direct elections for their leaders and police accountability.
Many saw the extradition bill, which would have allowed some Hong Kong suspects to be sent to mainland China for trial, as an example of Hong Kong’s autonomy eroding since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997.
Shops closed at Amoy Plaza after the brawls. The atmosphere remained tense as pro-democracy protesters jeered at police, some of whom were seen hitting detainees with batons to subdue them. Local media showed minor scuffles continuing outside the mall as people left.
In the northwestern suburb of Tin Shui Wai, several hundred people marched, carrying pro-democracy posters and waving American flags, in defiance of a police ban on a rally in the area. Riot police intercepted them and prevented them from marching to a park.
Some 200 high school students staged a sit-in Saturday at a downtown public square. Many students have formed human chains outside their schools as classes resumed two weeks ago after the summer break.
“Many students feel angry and unhappy. Today’s gathering is a platform for us to vent our frustrations,” said Lia Ng, 14.
More than 1,300 people have been arrested since the protests began in early June. Clashes have become more violent in recent weeks, with riot police firing tear gas as protesters vandalized subway stations, set fires and blocked traffic.
The unrest has further battered Hong Kong’s economy, which was already reeling from the U.S.-China trade war. It is also seen as an embarrassment to China’s ruling Communist Party ahead of Oct. 1 National Day celebrations.
At a netizens news conference earlier Saturday, activists warned that violence could escalate if the government continues to turn a deaf ear to citizens’ demands. They wore face masks to shield their identity for fear of reprisals from the government.
One of the activists said it was “natural behavior that people escalate their ways” if peaceful means failed to elicit any response.
Police have banned a major rally planned in central Hong Kong on Sunday, but protesters have vowed to turn up anyway. Some others are also planning to march to the British Consulate, after a similar march to the U.S. Consulate last weekend.
China’s ruling Communist Party, which has blamed foreign powers for fomenting unrest, said in a commentary on social media Friday that Hong Kong protesters should not turn to the west to resolve their problems.
The party’s Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission said high housing costs, lack of jobs and other issues sparked their grievances and that young people should “look north” to opportunities in mainland China.
“The way out is not in the West,” the commentary said.
“Where ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’ are brought in with the West’s help, there is scorched earth,” it said, adding that expecting Western countries to solve distant problems “can only be a fantasy story.”
(WASHINGTON) — The White House announced Saturday that Hamza bin Laden, the son of the late al-Qaida leader who had become an increasingly prominent figure in the terrorist organization, was killed in a U.S. counterterrorism operation in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.
A statement issued in President Donald Trump’s name gave no further details, such as when Hamza bin Laden was killed or how the United States had confirmed his death. Administration officials would provide no more information beyond the three-sentence statement from the White House. American officials have said there are indications that the CIA, not the U.S. military, conducted the strike.
The White House statement said Hamza bin Laden’s death “not only deprives al-Qaida of important leadership skills and the symbolic connection to his father, but undermines important operational activities of the group.” It said Osama bin Laden’s son “was responsible for planning and dealing with various terrorist groups.”
The U.S. officials had suspected this summer that Hamza bin Laden was dead, based on intelligence reports and the fact that he had not been heard from in some time. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters. Defense Secretary Mark Esper told Fox News Channel in a late August interview that it was “my understanding” that Hamza bin Laden was dead.
The younger bin Laden had been viewed as an eventual heir to the leadership of al-Qaida, and the group’s leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, had praised him in a 2015 video that appeared on jihadi websites, calling him a “lion from the den of al-Qaida.”
The U.S. government in February said it was offering $1 million for help tracking down Hamza bin Laden as part of the State Department’s Rewards for Justice program. The department’s notice said he was married to a daughter of Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah, an al-Qaida leader and Egyptian charged for his role in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa. They were said to have two children, Osama and Khairiah, named after his parents.
He was named a “specially designated global terrorist” in January 2017, and he had released audio and video messages calling for attacks against the U.S. and its allies. To mark one 9/11 anniversary, al-Qaida superimposed a childhood photo of him over a photo of the World Trade Center.
Video released by the CIA in 2017 that was seized during the 2011 U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden showed Hamza bin Laden with a trimmed mustache but no beard at his wedding. Previous images have only shown him as a child.
Hamza bin Laden is believed to have been born in 1989, the year of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, where his father became known among the mujahedeen fighters. His father returned to Saudi Arabia and later fled to Sudan after criticizing the kingdom for allowing U.S. troops to deploy in the country during the 1991 Gulf War. He later fled Sudan for Afghanistan in 1996, where he declared war against the U.S.
As al-Qaida’s leader, Osama bin Laden oversaw attacks that included the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, as well as the bombing of the USS Cole off Yemen. He and others plotted and executed the 2001 attacks against the United States that led to the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. U.S. Navy SEALs killed the elder bin Laden in a raid on a house in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in 2011.
This past March, Saudi Arabia announced that it had revoked the citizenship of Hamza bin Laden. The kingdom stripped Osama bin Laden’s citizenship in 1994 while he was living in exile in Sudan when Hamza bin Laden was just a child. It was unclear where Hamza bin Laden was at the time of the Saudi action.
Hamza bin Laden began appearing in militant videos and recordings in 2015 as an al-Qaida spokesman.
“If you think that your sinful crime that you committed in Abbottabad has passed without punishment, then you thought wrong,” he said in his first audio recording.
After the Sept. 11 attacks, a U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan sought to topple the Taliban, an ally of al-Qaida, and seize the elder bin Laden. He escaped and split from his family as he crossed into Pakistan. Hamza was 12 when he saw his father for the last time — receiving a parting gift of prayer beads.
“It was as if we pulled out our livers and left them there,” he wrote of the separation.
Hamza and his mother followed other al-Qaida members into Pakistan and then Iran, where other al-Qaida leaders hid them, according to experts and analysis of documents seized after U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden. Iran later put the al-Qaida members on its soil into custody. During this time, Hamza married.
In March 2010, Hamza and others left Iranian custody. He went to Pakistan’s Waziristan province, where he asked for weapons training, according to a letter to the elder bin Laden. His mother left for Abbottabad, joining her husband in his hideout. On May 2, 2011, the Navy SEAL team raided Abbottabad, killing Osama bin Laden and his son Khalid, as well as others. Saber and other wives living in the house were imprisoned. Hamza again disappeared.
In August 2015, a video emerged on jihadi websites of al-Zawahri introducing “a lion from the den of al-Qaida” — Hamza bin Laden. Since then, Hamza had been featured in al-Qaida messages, delivering speeches on everything from the war in Syria to Donald Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia on his first foreign trip as president.
But he hadn’t been heard from since a message in March 2018, in which he threatened the rulers of Saudi Arabia.
(KINSHASA, Congo) — Congo’s National Ebola Response Committee says confirmed Ebola deaths in the east of the sprawling African nation are nearing 2,000 and confirmed cases of the virus have exceeded 3,000.
The committee released the latest numbers Friday after a discussion in Goma by the Catholic Church and the Anglican Church about efforts to help stem the spread of Ebola in communities. A mistrust of health workers and widespread security issues still threaten the fight against the second deadliest outbreak of Ebola in history in a region where armed groups have fought for decades over the mineral-rich land.
The committee reported 3,002 confirmed Ebola cases with 1,974 deaths.
The World Health Organization said Friday they recorded the lowest weekly incidence of Ebola since March 2019 with 40 new cases, but said it was unclear if this positive trend would continue.
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Discover some of Ford Motor Company's most important subsidiaries and joint ventures. Learn more about what they do to further Ford's business interests.
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In May 27, billionaire banker Uday Kotak, one of India's most respected business executives, tweeted the image of a water dispenser at one of his offices. It featured a stylish retro Kilner glass jar (for bonus fun fact, see the end of this article) with "Yorkshire Glassware, established 1898" embossed on it, alongside a stack of paper cups. He wrote: "4.3 lakh plastic bottles saved per annum. Glass water jars and disposable paper cups in meeting rooms at Kotak Mahindra Bank Mumbai offices. Working to make it national. Environment is precious."When architect Manit Rastogi met Infosys founder and then chairman NR Narayana Murthy in 2014 for discussions about the tech giant's new campus in Nagpur, he says he got a one-line brief: "Create the world's most sustainable office building." When it comes up, the building, which will have a working population of 20,000, will be net zero in energy, water and waste-to-landfill (meaning its net consumption from electricity grid or outside water supply will be zero, and it will send no waste to a landfill). 71129924 When Indian Hotels Company (Taj Hotels) decided in 2018 to phase out plastic straws at its hotels and TajSATS aviation catering unit, it resulted in the elimination of 2 million straws in a year. It now uses biodegradable straws, bamboo straws and in its new property in the Andamans, papaya stems. These instances illustrate a heartening and accelerating trend among Indian corporations — a move to be thoughtful about their impact on the planet and the people around them, including employees, customers, partners and communities. What appears to be emerging is a more conscious, compassionate version of the bareknuckled capitalism of the 1980s and 1990s, when chief executives mostly talked business and money — profits, market share, interest rates. Now they are far likelier to share a Greta Thunberg clip on social media or laud a progressive Supreme Court verdict ending discrimination. The change might be too little, and some scepticism around image-building might even be warranted, but we now have to entertain the possibility that the Indian corporation is turning woke. At the very least, parts of corporate India are displaying a wokeness that's far ahead of the wider society it is based in. The phenomenon we discuss in this article is distinct from philanthropy and corporate social responsibility programmes of companies. The conscious corporation is tweaking its business operations, premises, hiring and policies to do good and be better. While many legacy Indian business groups can rightly claim a long history of efforts to be conscious, now the traction and pressure around the idea are such that all manner of companies — startups to multinationals, cement companies to phone makers — are acting, and telling the world about it. 71129933 "All companies are now under pressure to be more thoughtful and conscious of environmental and sustainability issues," says Gita Piramal, business historian and senior fellow at the University of Oxford. "Among traditional family business groups, the fourth generation, in many cases, appears to show a greater awareness than the second and third generations. Among the first generation, I would say there were both types of entrepreneurs."Indian entrepreneurship, she says, came into the fore from around the 1850s as the industrial revolution reached us through colonialism. Calcutta, Madras and Bombay became aggressive entrêports, and as banians (intermediaries) to the colonists, this generation was able to build large capital resources. In business history, she says, the Godrej family comes readily to mind as being at the forefront of environmental issues. "For the second and third generations, however, wealth creation was the priority as India stumbled along with GDP growth of around 3%. The fourth generation, often youngsters returning to India after studying or working overseas, appears to be far more aware of environmental, sustainability and related issues." An example could be found in one of India's top industrial houses. In a 2008 interview, Mukesh Ambani, India's richest man then, as now, told The New York Times that his teenage daughter Isha Ambani didn't like the plastics business in his portfolio. "It pollutes a lot," he quoted her as saying. She is now active in business, having been a board member at Jio, the group's multibillion-dollar telecom bet, since 2014, presumably bringing an environmentally conscious ethos to business. 71129937 Young customers and employees preferring brands and companies that adhere to certain values is another nudge. Unilever, the FMCG major with a long history in India, has embraced progressive values wholeheartedly in its operations as well as messaging."We believe that today'ss consumers, especially millennials, are highly woke and want to contribute in their own way to the environment as well as address societal issues. They are demanding brands that deliver more than just the functional benefit, and have a higher purpose that resonates with them. This is supported by research that indicates that millennials want to work for companies that have a purpose beyond their products and profits," says Anuradha Razdan, executive director-HR, Hindustan Unilever.Concerns around climate change and the uptick in extreme weather events are another factor that are nudging corporations onto a virtuous path.Examples abound. Here is a selection from across industries.Phone maker OnePlus has tied up with WWF India to mark 1,500 days of its mobile operating system OxygenOS. For every tweet with the hashtag OxygenOS, it will plant a tree. Online shopping giant Amazon has committed to eliminating the use of single-use plastic in their packaging by June 2020, a deadline they might have to advance as India is banning all single-use plastic by October. 71129943 Foodtech startup Zomato announced paternity leave of 26 weeks, explaining that lack of universal paid parental leave was one of the reasons why the number of women executives falls in higher organisational ranks. Drug maker Novartis followed suit.Fashion brand H&M has committed to sustainably sourcing all the cotton it uses by 2020. The Lemon Tree hotel chain is famous for hiring people with disabilities (PwD) and integrating them into all aspects of operations. Fast food chain KFC, Aegis BPO and Landmark Group also work on consciously hiring PwDs.Efforts at automaker Mahindra have meant it now uses 63% less energy to produce a vehicle compared with eight years ago (a tractor takes 33% less energy now to produce). The group saved 58 million kWh of energy through 700 energy efficiency projects implemented in the last five years. That's enough to power 67,000 average US homes for a month.Bath fittings maker Jaquar recycles 4,221 tonnes of brass and 8 tonnes of chrome annually, as well as 5 lakh litres of water every day. They have been making their showers and faucets with water-saving technology.HUL has made major strides in energy, water and waste. It managed to reduce water usage (cubic metre per tonne of production) by 55% in 2018, compared with a decade ago. Total waste generated in its factories reduced by 58% in the same period. HUL incorporates social causes in the advertising campaigns of its mass consumer products as well.In December 2018, Godrej Consumer Products introduced a gender affirmation policy for employees who wish to undergo gender transition. Staff can claim reimbursements for non-cosmetic surgeries and hormone replacement therapy. 71129945 These initiatives are apart from the impressive work being done by philanthropic foundations of groups and individuals such as Reliance, Bharti, Azim Premji, Shiv Nadar, the Birlas and others. Then there's also the work funded by corporate social responsibility. Law mandates that companies must spend at least 2% of their average net profits during the preceding three years on CSR activities.Rastogi, founding partner of the award-winning architect firm Morphogenesis, says companies have become very conscious of the environmental impact of their buildings. "Today, the 'going green' agenda is an integral part of most companies' initiatives. "Some of our projects across India, such as the corporate offices of ITC, Zydus, Infosys, Wipro and RP-SG, are all conceptualised as green buildings on the drawing board. The key has been to do away with myths of sustainability and instead adopt the right approach within the Indian context."Good Job What's going on? Why's everyone suddenly so intent on doing good and being seen as doing good? Some of this is inspired by the evolution of capitalism itself globally. In the US, after the financial crash of 2008 imposed hardship on the general public, companies have sought to project a softer side, talking up progressive causes, going against the grain of the popular ideas of economist Milton Friedman, who said the social responsibility of companies was to make profits. Business Roundtable, the influential grouping of CEOs of America's largest companies, recently cast aside its statement of corporate purpose formalised in 1997. It said:"The paramount duty of management and of boards of directors is to the corporation's stockholders." 71129950 Its new statement, formalised in August, is long and dwells purposefully on themes such as "value for customers", "diversity and inclusion", "protecting the environment", "dealing fairly and ethically with suppliers" and "supporting the communities in which we work".The first mention of shareholders comes in the penultimate paragraph and all it says is: "We are committed to transparency and effective engagement with shareholders".At the World Economic Forum in Davos, where the leading figures of corporate India are regulars, these ideas have been debated for a while. The two thinkers at the forefront of this idea - that shared value delivers shareholder value, or that business competitiveness and corporate social responsibility are closely linked -have been academics Michael E Porter and Mark R Kramer of Harvard University. The concept of "shared value" finds explicit mention in the communications of Godrej and Mahindra groups.But it's not as if these ideas are new or alien to Indian business. In fact, in some ways. Indian business groups pioneered many of these ideas."I am a big admirer of Jamshetji Tata who said over a century ago that the community is not just another stakeholder but the very purpose of business," says Amit Chandra, MD of Bain Capital and a former non-executive director at Tata Sons. 71129981 "The Tata group was accordingly designed with wealth creation as a means for the propagation of societal good in a compassionate way. India was, therefore, at the forefront of the philanthropic movement. The Tatas were not an exception and a few other families like the Godrej, Bajaj and the Birlas were deeply engaged in nation-building around the time of Independence. Over a century later, no one has epitomised this principle better than Azim Premji."Jamshetji Tata's American contemporaries were robber baron capitalists. Progressive ideas around business and wealth were expressed and practised here long before estate tax gave momentum and definition to philanthropy in the US.Considering Indian companies operate in some of the most polluted and unequal cities and towns in the world, all that has been done might just be a beginning. And many promoters have still, sadly, not made these matters a priority. "There is a great deal more to be done. The larger (promoter) community is still of those who just nod their heads to this and don't do enough," says Piramal.Bonus fun fact: The founder of Kilner glass jars was the great-great-great-grandfather of the controversial British TV host Jeremy Clarkson, who got to see none of that wealth.
Buy fish through a chat window — that is the USP of Parthaa Kundu's venture. Delhi-based Kundu, the founder of Fishappy, home-delivers fish from selected vendors. Customers can see videos of live fish, select what they want and type in their orders — all on WhatsApp's platform for business.Kundu, 47, started Fishappy in 2015 and promoted his business through word of mouth, a website and pamphlets in newspapers. He signed up for WhatsApp Business in June 2019. "The business exploded, as users were already familiar with WhatsApp.Now 97% of the business comes via the app," says Kundu, who was in the luxury travel industry before becoming an entrepreneur. He sources fish from select vendors in Delhi and sells to 500-550 customers a month in the Delhi-NCR region now, from around 300 customers 18 months back.Many small businesses like Kundu's around the country are finding that the business platform of the popular chat app might be the most fitting tech platform for their scale and nature. Small businesses struggle to be discovered on larger ecommerce platforms. And their scale does not permit them to invest in digital marketing and drive traffic to their own website or Facebook page. They find Whatsapp Business to be an acceptable substitute for a website or app and love that anyone can manage the backend. There is no need for dedicated customer service staff, as you can answer queries on the go. This helps improve customer satisfaction as users get instant replies. 71130364 Abhijit Bose, head of WhatsApp India, says the app enables end-to-end communication cycle between small businesses and customers. "What started as a P2P (peer-to-peer) service has enabled users to connect the same way in P2B (peer-tobusiness) conversations."About one million small businesses in India have already signed up on the platform. Globally, that number stands at 5 million.The two major drawbacks, however, are the absence of payments and features designed to support businesses of a relatively small scale. This means once a small business scales, the owner would have to find a more appropriate platform for their size. Once the platform throws opens payments, which the company says will happen within a few months, it could see rapid adoption by more small businesses."We can make business owners' life easier and it also help in increasing their sales," says Bose. "I think that will end up digitising them more as they get more comfortable. Another distinguishing factor is our scale and we are able to touch tier-2 and -3 cities because various sectors use WhatsApp. For example, agriculture is a huge sector where a lot of businesses run on WhatsApp for different needs."Businesses can download the app for free and create a profile of their offerings. But they have to register a separate phone number for business use as the number used for WhatsApp cannot be used for the business platform. It also allows a business to register using a landline number, unlike in the mother app. Businesses can easily sort and automate messages. 71130367 The flip side is that businesses would have to use online or offline campaigns to promote their presence on the messaging app. However, despite not supporting payments at the moment, the app has the potential for businesses to convert interest into a sale. Indu Wary, the founder of saree and accessory seller Asomkriti, discovered this in 2018. Bengaluru-based Wary, 32, a former product manager with an IT company, started the venture in 2017 to sell products such as mekhela chadar (traditional sarees from Assam), kurtis, jewellery and stoles sourced directly from 55 weavers in Assam. Though she was selling through Asomkriti's website, she soon realised that people often add items to cart but don't make an actual purchase. Ecommerce sites were overcrowded with large sellers. So Wary signed up on WhatsApp Business in mid-2018. "Things changed almost immediately, as people trusted the app. Our conversion from interest to sales increased to 60%." The startup sells 600 products a month now and does business worth Rs 5.5-6 lakh. The app has a green check mark on verified profiles, making it easier for people to know if the business is genuine or not. Ahmedabad-based Lightspeed Mobility, which makes battery-operated cycles, is another venture that has been able to close more online sales because of WhatsApp Business. 71130372 The company, founded by Rahil Rupawala, 33, in 2017 has 15 dealers in tier-1 cities but relies on online sales in smaller cities. "WhatsApp is crucial to talk to our customers. It helps us do personalised customer service," says Rupawala. Lightspeed handles 250300 queries a day over WhatsApp and sells 100 cycles—costing Rs 31,000-57,000 — a month now. Not just products, startups are also offering services over WhatsApp Business. For Mumbaiheadquartered Hey Deedee, an all-women courier service, the platform is the linchpin for seamless operations in 10 cities. The 900-women team of Hey Deedee, which delivers couriers for e-commerce companies such as Amazon, starts its day by checking updates (number of couriers, pick up points, etc) on the app. The crew then plans the deliveries and a territory head in each city coordinates with the field teams. "We do all product deliveries except food," says Revathi Roy, managing director & CEO. "Conversations with field staff happen over the business app and they update us over it in case of any issue. I have pan-India visibility of the business on the app." The app has reached the financial space, too. ScripBox, a Benguluru-based fintech company, uses WhatsApp Business to educate users on loans, mutual funds and other such products. It is also looking at collecting know-your-customer documents through the app. Manu Prasad, chief marketing officer, ScripBox, says, "Usage of internet is moving to mobiles. WhatsApp is attractive because of its popularity." Chandigarh-based Feetport uses the app to verify customer details for some banks. The startup also uses the app to manage field teams of clients, including Indraprastha Gas Limited and Jaquar bath fittings. A common theme among all these startups is that they have a small team — LightSpeed has 20, Feetport 18, Fishappy has four and Asomkriti has seven. The company has a separate solution for larger businesses as well, but is currently open only to a select few. Such entities pay for the service, get an API (application programming interface) and can customise the app. 71130377 For instance, users booking tickets on the websites of Makemytrip or PVR Cinemas can opt to receive booking notifications on WhatsApp. Users can get tickets or a QR code on the phone and also get access to a seat map to select their plane seats or book in-flight meals. Makemytrip.com's Chief Product Officer Anshuman Bapna says, "Majority of India is on WhatsApp already and it helps us easily contact people who have opted to use this method. The biggest use-case is customer support." Bose says, "An API (application programming interface) version is not something that your typical store owner would be able to support. But it can help companies that operate at a larger scale and responds to millions of request a day." Kotak Bank, OYO and BookMyShow are some of the other companies that have signed up for this service. Parikshit Dar, co-founder & director of BookMyShow, says, "The app helps us create a personal connection with our customers via instant communication updates." The app is like a default communication platform for BookMyShow. However, one complaint most small businesses have is that WhatsApp Business does not have a payment option. Ankur Pahwa, partner, EY, says, "One big challenge is payments. WeChat's success (in China) came with payments. Else it would have just be a platform for discovery, lead generation and there would be gaps between discovery and conversion." A payment service will be added to the app by the year-end, says WhatsApp India's Bose. Until then, people like Fishappy's Kundu will have to rely on other platforms, credit cards or cashon-delivery to collect money. That is not yet a problem for Kundu as he handles 500-550 orders a month. "If it scales to 1,000 orders or more a month, WhatsApp Business will continue to be an important part, but I might need other touchpoints as well." Or he would have to shift to the paid service. For now, the messaging app fills a void for entrepreneurs who find e-commerce marketplaces too big for comfort.
The years around 2000 saw India reaping higher rewards of the economic liberalisation it had set off a decade ago. An expanding India Inc required capable managers.This led to a flurry of resignations of officers of the elite Indian Administrative Service (IAS). Most were middle-level bureaucrats aspiring to fast-track their careers and earn more. So they quit the safety of a government job to join corporate India.The salary structure of government officers have improved a lot since then, leading to a drastic reduction in IAS officials resigning to join companies. But the recent resignations of a few IAS officers, albeit for various reasons, have again turned the spotlight on the much preferred branch of the bureaucracy.Take the example of Subhash Chandra Garg, 58, who sought early retirment after the government in July transferred him from the post of finance secretary to the relatively lowprofile ministry of power.Then came three more resignations of IAS officers in quick successions, all within a month and a half. Kannan Gopinathan, 33 — who was serving as the secretary of power, urban development and town & country planning in the Union territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli — resigned from government service over the clampdown in Kashmir. S Sasikanth Senthil, 40 — deputy commissioner of Dakshina Kannada district — resigned alleging "fundamental building blocks of diverse democracy are being compromised". Then came the resignation of Kashish Mittal, 30 — who was additional principal secretary to NITI Aayog vice-chairman — because he was unhappy at being transferred to Arunachal Pradesh.The resignations of four of the 5,205 serving IAS officers wouldn't have been news in Delhi's corridors of power but for a growing sense of anxiety among the IAS cadre, considered the elite among the two dozen-odd central services. And the reason for the concern has nothing to do with Kashmir Valley or democracy. 71129250 Half a dozen bureaucrats ET Magazine spoke to said they were unhappy that the role of IAS officers was diminishing at the Centre. There is no guarantee now of an IAS officer becoming a Union joint secretary even after she gets empanelled, they say. Empanellment is a process of shortlisting civil servants so that they can be made joint secretary, additional secretary or secretary. Earlier, IAS officers had a greater chance of being selected for these posts. But now, the Centre is looking for officials from other services as well.The first shift away from reliance on IAS officers was noticed in mid-2016 when the Modi government appointed a large number of non-IAS officers — income tax, railways, forest officers, etc — as joint secretaries in one go. Other services have had a long-standing grudge that the government always gave preferential treatment to the IAS cadre. Then came a blow from states such as West Bengal and Chhattisgarh, which blocked IAS officials from their cadre from joining the central government services on deputation."You can imagine the frustration of an IAS officer if she is to retire without even getting one posting outside the state. What is the point of then calling the IAS an all-India service?" asks one officer.If that wasn't enough, career IAS officials, particularly the younger and midlevel ones, consider the recent government move allowing lateral entry of nine private sector executives as joint secretaries as an early sign of the IAS getting marginalised.Their concern is what will happen if non-IAS and lateral entrants eventually capture a sizeable number of berths in the higher bureaucratic echelons, such as additional secretaries and secretaries, which are now dominated by IAS officials. 71132263 The worry is not entirely unfounded. In the past few years, IAS has lost at least two key traditional posts — as heads of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the Central Vigilance Commission. Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer Sanjay Kumar Mishra was made chief of the ED and Indian Police Service officer Sharad Kumar was made the interim chief vigilance commissioner.The government had also appointed a former IRS official, Sushil Chandra, as Election Commissioner in February. Going by conventions, all three election commissioners are usually IAS officials.The IAS is still a much favoured career path, says former cabinet secretary KM Chandrasekhar. "Resignations from the IAS to join politics or civil society or the corporate sector have happened in the past too." He points to the mushrooming of IAS coaching centres in Kerala, where he currently resides, to argue why the IAS has not lost its sheen.Every year, about a million graduates register for the civil services examination and the top preference of almost everyone is the IAS. After all, the clout of the premier administrative arm in the bureaucracy is widely known."The first change you feel after leaving the IAS is that you lack the authority that had come with the post," says OP Agarwal, who resigned from IAS in 2007 and is now CEO of World Resources Institute India. Agarwal was a joint secretary in the urban development ministry when he quit and later joined the World Bank's headquarters in New York as a specialist in urban transport systems. "No one comes to you anymore once you leave IAS. Instead, you struggle to get into government offices. But there are positives too. You no longer need permission to attend a seminar abroad!" he adds.The grass is not necessarily greener on the other side. 71129291
Even in the fast-paced disruptive world of startups, a few things are hard to change. Gender bias, for one.Sairee Chahal, founder of Sheroes, a community platform for women, is at times at the receiving end of it. Often it comes in the form of "innocent" remarks and "friendly suggestions". "You started this alone?" she often gets asked, with thinly veiled scepticism.Just the other day, an executive from the venture capital industry suggested to her: "You should have a male cofounder. It is easier." Her sense of dismay over the incident comes through in her voice as she spoke, over the phone, to me. "It felt stupid. I am not a spring chicken. This is my second startup. I have been an entrepreneur half my working life. There is so much resistance to solo female founders," she says. 71129577 So why did she start alone? I repeat the loaded question not because she's a woman but because starting up alone is tough and lonely, for men and women. MakeMyrip founder Deep Kalra recently told me that if there is one thing he would change about his entrepreneurial journey, it would be to have a cofounder. Chahal knows well the hardships of a solo founder. But she says she had little option. "I didn't know where to find them." A small-town Punjabi girl from a middle-class family, she had few networks in Delhi from her growing-up days. Nor did she form deep bonds during her corporate stint — a challenge that women often face — to scan for a cofounder. "Startups are tough. It is even tougher for women entrepreneurs who have to battle many tides," she says. 71129591 Chahal confirms what a survey of Indian entrepreneurs by Excubator, a startup incubator and consultancy firm, for ET Magazine, reveals.India's startups remain a man's world. They might be flush with funds and buzzing with bright ideas and disruptive technologies, but traditional gender biases and challenges remain in play here. The online survey was done in August and received valid responses from 299 entrepreneurs. Women comprised just 14% of total respondents.It is a good time to pause and understand Indian entrepreneurs. 71129609 Once on the fringes, starting up has become mainstream. Entrepreneurs are the new heroes of India's middle class. After two decades of boom-bust cycles, the ecosystem is both deep and rich, with 1,400 new startups created in 2018, (from a high of 3,560 new startups in 2016, it dipped in 2018, due to the onset of a funding squeeze). The funding landscape too has substantially matured with most global VC firms including those from the East (like China, Japan and Korea) setting up shop in India. In 2018, according to Venture Intelligence, VCs in India invested $8.5 billion in Indian startups.Also, amid all-round pessimism in the Indian economy, startups and their founders are a beacon of hope. Amid dreary headlines of bankruptcies, credit defaults and incarcerated promoters, new entrepreneurs, their surging ambitions and funding boom offer a much-needed respite.The survey attempts to understand Indian entrepreneurs, mostly of tech-led startups. Who are they? Where do they come from? What is their gender, demographic and psychographic profile? What drives their pursuits? What are their biggest challenges? "The survey busts a few myths and endorses some visible trends," says Guhesh Ramanathan, founder, Excubator. 71129644 First, the macro view. Bengaluru is unquestionably India's startup capital, with 37% of founders who responded to the survey coming from there. NCR is at the second spot — 16%. About 71% of respondents are from Tier-1 cities (Bengaluru, Mumbai and NCR). Like FreeCharge's Kunal Shah and Myntra's Mukesh Bansal, who have now started new ventures, 34% of survey respondents are serial entrepreneurs.Contrary to popular perception, "they aren't young, fresh college graduates," says Ramanathan. The median age for starting up is high — 35 years for men and 37 for women. They are well educated, too — 39% have a bachelor's degree and 53% have a master's degree/diploma. About 4% have a PhD; the same as school graduates.Their experience is fairly spread out, from 0 to 30-plus years. About 37% are solo founders but the most popular configuration is two cofounders for a company, at 47%. A vast majority has been set up over the last decade, with almost half in the last five years. About 26% of them have managed to raise funding. Raising funding seems to be their biggest challenge (59%), followed by finding and retaining talent (40%), government and regulatory issues (31%) and finding customers (30%).Entrepreneurs are also maturing in their mindset. What are the yardsticks these entrepreneurs use to benchmark their success? For about 58% it is generating profit, while for 42% it is the number of people they employe and for 20% it is fund-raising. 71129675 Signalling Indian startups' rising global ambitions, a high 66% say their focus is both Indian and global markets; 30% are focused only on India while a small but significant 4% are focused only on global markets. 71129806 Mature and more evolvedSeasoned startup watchers echo what the survey reveals. The first thing that Saurabh Srivastava, founder of Indian Angel Network, notices is the maturity of Indian entrepreneurs and their ideas."In 2010, we would get 200 startups annually and struggle to find even one or two to invest in. Last year, we vetted 10,000 and invested in 25-odd.The quality of ideas has improved substantially," he says. Arun Natarajan, founder, Venture Intelligence, says he sees more experienced — and hence older — entrepreneurs. "With age and experience, they have a better feel of the problems and hence go after business models that are sounder," he says. 71129869 The biggest thing that serial entrepreneur and investor K Ganesh notices is the surging aspirations and scale of ambitions of today's entrepreneurs. Sanjay Nath, managing partner, Blume Ventures, too, finds today's entrepreneurs a lot bolder. "They think global from day one. They are attempting to do things at a much grander scale. Flipkart's exit and the kind of money people made give confidence to many," he says. Oyo and its aggressive global expansion plans are now a Harvard case study. They could become bigger than Marriott, he says. 71129887 Successful exits have spawned a growing breed of serial entrepreneurs. "They come with a lot of experience. If you are doing anything for the second or third time, it is obvious you are going to be better and faster," says Rajan Anandan, managing director, Sequoia Capital India. Just look at the way Kunal Shah's Cred and Udaan, founded by former Flipkart employees, are scaling up. The latter, founded in 2016, is already a unicorn (valued at more than $1 billion). 71129899 "While the number of new startups is coming down, the quality of founders is going up. We are getting more nuanced and differentiated ideas," he says. This also has to do with the maturing of the funding ecosystem — in quality, quantity and spread. The biggest manifestation of all this, almost everyone agrees, is that Indian entrepreneurs today are thinking very hard about their ideas and the problems they are solving. They are less likely to chase the flavour of the season and have a more original and evolved approach to building their startups."Today's founders have a very different DNA.Many have studied or worked overseas. They have a global view and have a very healthy global network," says Nath. Consequently, in their mind and ambitions, they compete as equals with peers from Silicon Valley as they often think brand and build the latest tech products for global markets. A growing breed of B-to-B and SaaS (software as a service) entrepreneurs like Girish Mathrubootham of Freshworks, Ankur Kothari of Automation Anywhere and Umesh Sachdev of Uniphore are proof.Diverse flavoursA few things haven't changed. For example, 70% of entrepreneurs come from the top three cities. But things are likely to get better. "So far, horizontal ecommerce like Flipkat and Amazon were focused on the 50 million English-speaking urban consumers. The next wave of startups (think Meesho and Bulbul) will focus on Bharat, the 300 million consumers who may not be English-speaking but are literate and tech-savvy. This will attract a lot of entrepreneurs from smaller towns and cities," says Ganesh.A boost from a better ecosystem should help, too. Razorpay cofounder Shashank Kumar started in 2014 in Jaipur. Within nine months, they moved to Bengaluru where talent, funding and ecosystem were more vibrant. He sees a change, though."The Rajasthan government has taken a lot of initiatives to nurture the startup ecosystem there," he says.With Jio and the growth in digitisation, consumers in tier-2 and tier-3 cities are already becoming tech-savvy. "Over time, you will see these entrepreneurs from small towns starting to leverage technology for business, too," says Ganesh. 71129904 Gender bias in the startup world is disappointing.It may have something to do with having few women in the investor world. Not only are there fewer women founders (14%) but they also face significant odds and must prepare better. According to the survey, female founders are older (median age 37 years as against men's 35 years) and better qualified (74% of female founders have a master's degree as against 56% among male founders). To understand gender bias, two other survey data points are important to note.Funding probability of women-led startups halves (at 14%) as against those led by men (30%).It gets worse if the startup is led by a solo founder— just 5% of startups led by solo female founder like Chahal get funded as against 31% of startups run by solo male founder."Women's mobility is constrained. With the shifting focus to Bharat, I have a very strong feeling the women's numbers will rise," says Ganesh.Perhaps the startup world will then manage to disrupt this age-old imbalance in the corporate world.
KOLKATA: Integration of technology platform will remain the key challenge for the merger of Punjab National Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce and United Bank of India, senior executives of these banks said, even as the government has selected the merger partners on the basis of their IT compatibilities rather than geographical synergy.Harmonising human resource issues will be another key aspect of these mergers, as was seen in the past. "Asymmetrical entities are coming together, so there is bound to be some challenges" Ashok Kumar Pradhan, chief executive of UBI said Saturday, at an interactive meeting between the three banks and their customers held in Kolkata.PNB, OBC and UBI use Infosys' Financle software for their core banking solutions, while Allahabad Bank and Indian Bank are on TCS' BaNCS software, prompting the government to stitch these alliances for a smoother transition. Similarly, Canara Bank and Syndicate Bank are on the same iFlex platform. Union Bank of India, Andhra Bank and Corporation Bank are again on the Finance platform.UBI and OBC use Finance-7 while PNB uses Financle-10. So, UBI and OBC need to upgrade their software solutions to have a seamless integration.On the HR issues, Pradhan said that best available benefits from three banks will be passed on to employees. "There will not be any retrenchment or voluntary retirement scheme," he said.These banks have formed as many as 23 committees covering every aspect of banking merger such as IT, HR, product offerings etc to make the exercise less painful.Chief executives of all the 10 public sector banks, which are selected as merger candidates, had a meeting at Bank of Baroda headquarters in Mumbai on September 4 to get a lowdown on merger experiences. "Bank of Baroda has given us a template on merger and the likely challenges in this exercise. It was a great learning," UBI's Pradhan said.PNB board has already approved the merger while the UBI and OBC will consider it at their respective board meetings -- both scheduled on September 18.The merger is expected to take shape from April 1, 2020. Consequent upon this, the merged entity will become the convenor of state level bankers' committee in the states of Haryana, Punjab, Tripura and West Bengal, and union territories of Delhi and Chandigarh.
Mumbai: The Hotel Leela sale to Brookfield has come unstuck again. The new spanner has come in the shape of the Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) directing Hotel Leela Venture Ltd against declaring or acting upon the results of postal ballot resolutions seeking shareholders' approval for sale of its assets to Brookfield Asset Management Inc.This comes after ITC Ltd. moved the tribunal against the market regulator's order rejecting its contention that the sale should not be allowed because of related-party transactions.Hotel Leela had issued fresh postal ballot notices to its shareholders on August 13 and planned to declare results on September 18.ITC has argued that voting by JM Financial Asset Reconstruction Company Ltd., which owns 26 per cent in the company, on the postal ballot resolutions to approve the Rs 3,950 crore deal was a related-party transaction.The market regulator didn't agree even as it found conversion of debt to equity by JM Financial ARC a violation of the takeover code.On Friday, SAT heard arguments from ITC, SEBI and Hotel Leela.
Ritesh Jain, a Dalal Street veteran, trend watcher and Global Macro Investor, captures global macro investment opportunities and economic, business and financial trends with charts and commentaries in this space.Thomas Piketty is back with a 1,200-page guide to abolishing billionaires 71125696 Capitalism & markets have 3 driving forces, new GK paper argues: Schumpeterian (produce more with less), Ricardian (open new markets) & Malthusian (there won't be enough for everyone). Only one dominates at any one time. Currently Schumpeter in play but new wave may be about to take over. 71125699 Inventory/sales ratio in US is rising which is always followed by a slowdown or recession 71125702 When Consumer is indebted,Consumption cycle coming to an end and industry is going through disruption… you don't get into this business 71125703 Who is Buying US equities which are now trading at all time high…it is neither Household nor Institutions but solely Corporate Buybacks 71125705 The trade war has not dampened foreign direct investment FDI in China. Since the tariff war broke out in mid-2018 FDI has expanded about 3 per cent annually, roughly the same pace as in the previous five years. 71125711
NEW YORK: With US-China trade tensions roiling markets, investors are counting on support for stocks coming from a Federal Reserve willing to keep cutting interest rates to help the US economy avoid a severe downturn.A quarter-point rate reduction is widely expected when the Fed issues its next policy statement on Wednesday, which would be the central bank's second such cut after lowering rates in July for the first time since 2008. That puts the greater focus on clues about how much further the Fed will go."If the Fed gives forward guidance that suggests less than what the market is thinking, then you will probably see markets sell off," said Jamie Cox, managing partner of Harris Financial Group in Richmond, Virginia. "So long as the Fed plays along with what markets are pricing in...I think markets will be very stable."The Fed's 180-degree pivot from tightening monetary policy last year to easing it has helped drive the stock market's overall strong performance in 2019. The benchmark S&P 500 .SPX has climbed 20 per cent this year and is near all-time highs.The central bank in July cited signs of a global slowdown, simmering US-China trade tensions and a desire to boost too-low inflation as it lowered borrowing costs.Markets are pricing in a near 90 per cent probability that the Fed will shave another quarter point from its current overnight lending rate of 2.00 per cent to 2.25 per cent, according to the CME Group's FedWatch tool. There is a roughly 65 per cent probability that the Fed makes at least one more quarter-point cut by the end of the year, according to FedWatch."The market is going to want to see a focus that we have a cut and there is likely more coming," said Keith Lerner, chief market strategist at SunTrust Advisory Services in Atlanta. "They want to know that the Fed is vigilant and will act aggressively if needed."That raises the importance of the newest set of policymakers' rate-path projections - the so-called dot plot - that will be released along with the rate decision. UBS economists said in a note they expect that will shift lower overall for 2019, but project only two cuts total for the year, which could irk both investors and a US president eager for a more aggressive posture.President Donald Trump has frequently criticized the Fed for not cutting rates more swiftly and significantly, with the Fed chair he appointed, Jerome Powell, the primary target of his ire.The European Central Bank's decision on Thursday to cut interest rates and restart a larger stimulus program could further pressure the Fed to cut rates, as the ECB's move stands to weaken the euro against the dollar and thereby drive up the price of US exports - an issue that especially vexes Trump.Powell, who will give a news conference after the central bank issues its statement, has made comments in the past that have shaken the market, including in July, when he said the bank's rate cut might not be the start of a lengthy easing campaign to shore up the economy."Every meeting has the ability for Jay Powell to say something that upsets markets a little bit," said Arthur Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities Corp.Powell "has had enough practice to know that he does not want to move markets or make news," he added.Of the past eight easing cycles since 1981, four have been "insurance" cycles, when economic problems loom but the economy is not in a recession, while four were pre-recession cycles, according to research from Allianz Global Investors.One year into an easing cycle, the S&P 500 rose an average of 20.4 per cent during insurance cycles, while the index fell an average of 10.2 per cent during pre-recession cycles, according to Allianz."Historically, what they're doing now, which is cutting rates in an economy that is not in a recession and not really in any imminent risk of a recession, has been positive for the stock market," said Mona Mahajan, US investment strategist at Allianz.The stock market overall has typically responded well to a second rate cut, which Wednesday's would be, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rising an average of 20.3 per cent one year later, according to Ned Davis Research. The weakest performance has come when the Fed tried and failed to prevent a recession.The probability of a recession in the next 12 months is nearly 38 per cent, its highest in about a decade, according to the New York Fed's recession indicator, which is based on the US Treasury yield curve. Last month, yields on two-year US bonds exceeded those on 10-year notes, an inversion of the yield curve that is seen as an omen of recession.An escalation in the US-China tariff war is contributing to economic uncertainty and is top among concerns for stock investors. Late last month, a key speech from Powell was upstaged when Trump issued tweets that heightened trade tensions."I do think it's important that the Fed helps ease financial conditions and helps reduce the probability of recession," SunTrust's Lerner said. "If the tariff fight ratchets up more, then what the Fed does, the effect will be less."
Bihar drug menace: Amid liquor ban, state sees spike in substance abuse The drug consumption in Patna, capital of Bihar has significantly increased after a statewide ban has been imposed on alcohol. As a result, an increase in the secretive supply and sale of narcotics like brown sugar has been observed.
Gujarat govt plans Namami Narmade for PM Narendra Modi's birthday On his 69th birthday, PM Modi will visit Gujarat wherein he will offer prayers to Narmada as part of a festival called Namami Narmade.
For PM Narendra Modi's b'day, BJP sets off to observe week-long 'seva saptah' During the week, a plethora of social initiatives has been planned across the nation by the saffron party's cadres.
IMD warns of heavy rains in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh today The weather forecasting agency has predicted "generally cloudy sky with a few spells of rain or thundershowers" in Bhopal for the next seven days.
J&K: Pakistani Army targets schools, houses in ceasefire violations along LoC Pakistani troops resorted to mortar shelling along the Line of Control (LoC) since 10 am on Saturday, targetting residential areas and schools in the two districts.
Man rewarded Rs 50,000 for saving lives in Bhopal boat tragedy Nitin Batham have saved 8 people from drowning in the Chhota Talab near the Khatalpur ghat, Bhopal, where 11 people died when a boat capsized during Ganesh immersion.
Odisha: Man fined Rs 6.5 lakh for old rules violation The truck, registered in Nagaland, was fined by the enforcement team of the transport office in Sambalpur when the department found the vehicle violated multiple traffic rules
At event for minorities, Sharad Pawar praises Pakistan Raising the issue of mob-lynching, he said that a particular community has been targeted in the name of hate
'Full' festivities for Sardar Sarovar dam For the first time since stop gates were installed for the dam in 2017 and its height raised that the water touched this level
