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☆ Yevgeny Prigozhin: Wagner boss denies Washington Post report that he offered intelligence to Kyiv in exchange for territory
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( Kostan Nechyporenko Victoria Butenko Anna Chernova Sana Noor Haq | Kostan Nechyporenko | Victoria Butenko | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

Ukrainian soldiers, pictured in Bakhmut on Friday, fire a cannon near the eastern city, where a fierce battle for control against Russian forces rages. Prigozhin made the offer to Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate, known as HUR, in January, the Post alleged. It quoted one leaked document as stating that Prigozhin met HUR officers in an unspecified country in Africa. “Therefore, I simply could not meet with anyone there physically.”In his message, Prigozhin asked rhetorically, “Who is behind this? Kyiv also said it was operating “effective counterattacks” in the Bakhmut area, matching remarks by Prigozhin that Kyiv had recaptured some territory.

Major economic data from China and Japan, and a central bank rate decision from the Philippines could be the main regional drivers for Asian markets this week, with investors growing increasingly nervous about the U.S. and global macro outlook. These were some of the issues discussed at the three-day meeting of G7 finance leaders that concluded on Saturday. The MSCI World index fell 0.5% - not a big deal, perhaps, but the second weekly decline in a row and the steepest since the U.S. banking crisis blow-up two months ago. Japan's first-quarter GDP figures will be released on Wednesday, and perhaps more importantly, the latest inflation numbers are out on Friday. Core inflation is far higher than the Bank of Japan would like and is expected to have re-accelerated to 3.4% in April.

☆ My mom has 4 rules for a meaningful, fulfilled life: A happiness expert says she 'loves' them
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-14 | by ( Cameron Albert-Deitch | In Cameronalbertdeitch | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

As long as I can remember, I've known the secret to happiness — or, at least, my mom's four rules for a happy life. It's generational: My Nonni originally gave the first three rules to my mom when my mom was 6 years old. You don't have to do anything in this world that you don't really want to do. You don't have to do anything in this world that you don't really want to do? Still, if I really, really wanted to, it might technically be possible.

☆ Opinion | Leaders Stay, Others Run
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-14 | by ( Farah Stockman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When war broke out unexpectedly in the streets of Khartoum, Dr. Hiba Omer, a senior surgeon, could have fled like so many others. Even after a Sudanese military official accused her on social media of siding with its enemy, the R.S.F. “I will stay here, until death. But it’s the people who stay behind who will decide the country’s fate. His famous reply — “I need ammunition, not a ride” — shamed the West into providing more aid, boosted morale and inspired a nation.

☆ I Got My Name From Connie Chung. So Did They. - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-11 | by ( Connie Wang | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +21 min

In my freshman class alone, there was a Connie Zheng, a Connie Guo, a Connie Xu, a few Connie Chengs, and multiple Connie Wangs. That ayi was Constance Yu-Hwa Chung, or, as the world knows her, Connie Chung. Connie Chung hosting the “CBS Evening News” in 1991, the year after the author named herself Connie. Connie Wang Connie Koh Connie Yang Connie Tang Connie Jang Connie Chung Connie Moy Connie Huang Connie Kwok Connie Chang Connie Sun Connie Chung, center, surrounded by 10 members of Generation Connie. Clockwise from top right, Connie Yang, Connie Tang, Connie Moy, Connie Sun, Connie Chang, Connie Kwok, Connie Huang, Connie Jang, Connie Wang and Connie Koh.

☆ Biden is trying to lure Saudi Arabia's crown prince away from China with lucrative promises, despite once threatening to make him a 'pariah'
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Tom Porter | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The US has replaced its threats with lucrative contracts for the crown prince as part of a high stakes power game being waged over dominance of the region. Biden last weekend dispatched his national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, to Saudi Arabia, for discussions with Saudi officials. Last year, Crown Prince Mohammed and Xi agreed to deepen their cooperation across a range of economic and security issues. Chinese President Xi Jinping holds talks with Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud at the royal palace in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Dec. 8, 2022. "It is important to note that Saudi Arabia is not seeking to burn its bridges with the United States.

They have limited themselves to one meal a day, hoping their dwindling food supplies will last a month longer. "After that, we don't know what we'll do except survive off water and dates," he said by phone from Sudan's embattled capital. They face dwindling food supplies, power cuts, water shortages and patchy telecoms. He would have left Sudan but couldn't because he lost his passport before the fighting began. Life had come to a complete standstill, said Ahmed Khalid, 22, a college student still in Khartoum.

☆ The Real Reason Rent Costs Are Sky High: People Left Their Roommates
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( James Rodriguez | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +12 min

Though rent growth has slowed in recent months, renters in large cities are still feeling the effects of the 2021-22 rent boom. Residents of these places are now asking the question: If so many people left, why is my rent still so expensive? The first was outbound migration, which led to weaker housing demand in city centers. "High house prices, high rents, and rising interest rates are probably pushing back against household formation," Ozimek told me. If more employees keep adopting remote work — which, I'll admit, is a big "if" — that indicates housing demand is bound to increase.

☆ No office tower is safe from the roiling market — not even a trophy building housing Google and Visa deemed one of the best
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Daniel Geiger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Potential problems at One Market Plaza show how far San Francisco's office market may fall. One Market Plaza has long been considered the pinnacle of San Francisco's office market. Autodesk plans to downsize by about 73,000 square feet to 211,000 square feet, a spokeswoman told Insider. Google did not respond to a request for comment on its plans for One Market Plaza. One Market Plaza could indicate how far San Francisco's office woes reachTurbulence at One Market Plaza indicates the extent of the problems facing San Francisco's office market.

Tokyo CNN —Japan is in talks to open a NATO liaison office, the first of its kind in Asia, the country’s foreign minister told CNN in an exclusive interview on Wednesday, saying Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has made the world less stable. “We are already in discussions, but no details (have been) finalized yet,” Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said on Wednesday. The Nikkei Asia first reported plans to open the office in Japan last Wednesday, citing unnamed Japanese and NATO officials. China, which has previously warned against NATO expanding its reach into Asia or a similar bloc emerging in the region, has already responded angrily to previous reports on the possible Japan office. Hayashi played down concerns that opening a Tokyo NATO office could further inflame tensions, saying: “I don’t feel that’s the case.”The country has had a pacifist constitution since World War II – which he argued is reflected in this move.

☆ Geopolitical grains: Utilizing agricultural ETFs in a time of oversupply
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Kevin Schmidt | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

"There's an oversupply of wheat in Russia right now," he said. The Teucrium Wheat Fund (WEAT) , for example, spreads futures contracts across multiple maturities instead of concentrating holdings in front-month futures. In addition to WEAT, Teucrium offers four other ETFs with agricultural exposure: CORN , CANE and SOYB , as well as the Teucrium Agricultural Fund (TAGS) . "And so, without [the Black Sea Grain Initiative], shipping will become uncertain, because you'll be in a war zone." However, prolonged conflict or expansion of the conflict could continue to harm Ukraine grain production, he said, underpinning valuation uncertainty for the commodity regardless of the current oversupply.

☆ They bought a huge rundown Italian castle and transformed it into a luxury retreat
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Silvia Marchetti | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

“And to think that we never wanted a castle, never wanted to own one.”Castle homeMax and Joy Ulfane spent years renovating neglected Tuscan fortress Castello di Fighine into a luxury retreat. Although it was dilapidated and filled with rubble, the Ulfanes saw huge potential in Castello di Fighine and felt it was the right place for them. Castello di FighineThe Ulfanes later decided to purchase some of the rundown houses in the surrounding hamlet, and began renovating them once they’d completed most of the work on Castello di Fighine. They went on to purchase the hamlet’s old village school, and have since transformed it into a high-end restaurant, Ristorante Castello di Fighine. Built in the 11th century as a military lookout, Castello di Fighine is connected to the main road by one single unpaved public path.

☆ BOJ's Ueda says yield control will end when price goal achievement foreseen
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Leika Kihara | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

"We're seeing some positive signs in trend inflation, including inflation expectations," the BOJ chief said. Under yield curve control (YCC), the BOJ sets a short-term interest rate target of -0.1% and caps the 10-year bond yield around zero as part of efforts to durably hit its price goal. It also announced a plan to review its past monetary policy moves, laying the groundwork to gradually phase out his predecessor's massive stimulus programme. Ueda said the review will scrutinise the benefits and side effects of past monetary policy, including by conducting workshops with private academics. "We will take necessary policy steps at each of our rate reviews, with an eye on financial and price developments, even while we conduct the review," Ueda said.

☆ Opinion | I’m a Former U.S. Treasury Secretary. Here’s How I Make Hard Decisions.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Robert E. Rubin | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

But I examined the likely costs, did the same with the likely benefits, and then made a judgment that the latter outweighed the former. Performing that kind of analysis — one that doesn’t shy away from nuance and complexity — is an essential element of sound decision-making. Here, the mistake people too often make is to judge a prior decision solely based on the outcome that occurred. We concluded that intervention was unlikely to work. There is, however, a pressing need for leaders of today and tomorrow to make the best possible decisions in an uncertain world.

☆ Ukraine war live updates: Wagner leader says his forces will leave Bakhmut; Bill Clinton says he foreshadowed Russian invasion
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Natasha Turak | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Prigozhin lambasted Russian defense officials in a video where he stood surrounded by the dead bodies of Russian troops, blaming the officials for the deaths of the men. Sergey Lavrov once again pinned Wednesday's attempted drone attack on the Kremlin on the United States and Kyiv, saying that any self-respecting country should stop communicating with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at this point. Ukraine says the drone attack was staged by Russia. Meanwhile, Russian officials have warned that high water levels at a dam near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant could threaten the plant, which is Europe's largest of its kind. A rupture of the dam would create "functional problems for the operation of the plant and risks for nuclear safety," a Russian nuclear energy advisor said.

☆ A Ukrainian farmer stripped pieces off wrecked Russian tanks to make an armored, remote-controlled, mine-sweeping tractor
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Chris Panella | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A Ukrainian farmer has redesigned his tractor to remove mines from his crop fields. He stripped materials from wrecked Russian tanks to make the tractor armored and remote-controlled. The farmer told Reuters that rescue services are too busy to remove mines from the fields. While these Russian booby traps often require experience and intense focus to remove, one Ukrainian farmer has taken matters into his own hands: He's decked out a tractor with pieces from wrecked Russian tanks to remotely de-mine his farmland. By scavenging armor from wrecked Russian tanks and military vehicles, he's reconfigured a tractor into a machine able to detect and remove mines.

It also highlights Russian frustration at failing to complete the capture of Bakhmut after more than nine months of costly, intense battle. ANGRY TIRADEWhat looked real, however, was Prigozhin's fury at Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov. "If Putin wants him to be in combat, he'll force him in one way or another to do so." Marten said its involvement in the battle for Bakhmut, including fighters recruited from Russian prisons, had allowed Putin to avoid declaring a full-scale mobilization. Whatever its immediate intentions around Bakhmut, Wagner is likely to remain a significant player in the war, given Prigozhin's personal ambitions and determination to stay in the limelight.

☆ Kraft Heinz lifts profit outlook on price hikes, easing costs
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Aatrayee Chatterjee | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

(Reuters) -Kraft Heinz Co raised its full-year profit forecast on Wednesday on the back of higher prices and sustained demand for its packaged food items as raw material costs, which have plagued the industry, also ease. FILE PHOTO: A Heinz Ketchup bottle sits between a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese and a bottle of Kraft Original Barbecue Sauce on a grocery store shelf in New York March 25, 2015. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File PhotoShares of the Philadelphia Cream Cheese maker were up 3.9% in early trading after it also reported better-than-expected quarterly results. The strong outlook echoes comments from peers PepsiCo Inc and Mondelez, who have also lifted annual forecasts supported by price increases. Excluding one-off items, Kraft Heinz earned 68 cents per share, topping analysts’ estimate of 60 cents per share, according to Refinitiv IBES data.

☆ Australia to ban recreational vaping in e-cigarette crackdown
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Renju Jose | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

SYDNEY, May 2 (Reuters) - Australia on Tuesday proposed to tighten e-cigarette laws, including introducing new controls on import and packaging to stamp out vaping especially among kids, in the biggest crackdown on the tobacco industry in more than a decade. But Butler will say that vaping has become a recreational product now, mostly sold to teenagers and young people. "This is a product targeted at our kids, sold alongside lollies and chocolate bars," Butler will say. Tobacco firms were quick to switch to e-cigarettes that offer different flavours and created designs targeting a new generation of users. ($1 = 1.5088 Australian dollars)Reporting by Renju Jose in Sydney; Editing by Sonali PaulOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ King Charles' coronation is a great fit for London's Savile Row tailors
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Kate Holton | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

[1/5] Handmade suits are seen at Anderson & Sheppard tailor on Savile Row, ahead of the Coronation of King Charles and Queen Camilla, in London, Britain, April 27, 2023. REUTERS/Dylan MartinezLONDON, May 2 (Reuters) - On Savile Row, the London street long celebrated for turning out sharp suits, tailors have been racing to prepare the red and gold uniforms that will feature in Britain's first coronation for 70 years, adorned with the new insignia of King Charles. Savile Row tailors have dressed kings, queens and their offspring for more than 150 years, and their craft gets a particular boost from long-time customer Charles - a lover of the countryside who also champions the farmers, weavers and mills producing much of the fabric. 'SLOWEST FASHION'Henry Poole, credited with creating the dinner jacket, or tuxedo, has held a British royal warrant since the 1860s when it supplied Queen Victoria. "The sustainability side of that is a major part of what Savile Row has always had," he said.

☆ Supreme Court: New documents show how Sandra Day O'Connor helped George W. Bush win the 2000 election
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Joan Biskupic | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +14 min

CNN —Justice Sandra Day O’Connor provided the early framework that steered the outcome in the dispute over the 2000 presidential election and ensured George W. Bush would win the White House over Al Gore, Supreme Court documents released on Tuesday show. They also demonstrate the tension among the nine justices being asked to decide a presidential election on short deadlines. The five conservative justices (O’Connor, Kennedy, Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas) sided with Bush. The Florida results had been too close to call at the end of Election Day, November 7. The next day, Kennedy wrote to the chief justice, “Sandra’s memorandum sets forth a very sound approach” and said he wanted to build on it.

☆ Is It Time to Give Up on My White Sneakers?
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Vanessa Friedman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

As I enter the job market, I am reconsidering the staple of the white sneaker. If I wear sneakers, will people take me seriously? Or that the filmmaker Chloé Zhao wore Hermès white sneakers with her gown when she won an Oscar back in 2021. Once you start thinking about white sneakers, you start seeing them everywhere. British Esquire called the white sneaker “the blank canvas upon which any modern look can be built.” Harper’s Bazaar crowed, “The best white sneakers can do it all.”The fact is, more than 100 years after Keds introduced its white sneaker, almost 90 years since Chuck Taylor popularized the style with Converse and more than half a century since Stan Smith changed the game — and amid all the color-crazed mayhem of endlessly mutating sneaker culture — white sneakers remain the Platonic ideal of a shoe: eternal, versatile, comfortable.

☆ France pension protests explained: France is still mad -- but can the protests last?
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Joseph Ataman | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

In 1995, weeks-long mass protests forced the government of the day to abandon plans to reform public sector pensions. For many in France, the pensions system, as with social support more generally, is viewed as the bedrock of the state’s responsibilities and relationship with its citizens. Nathan Laine/Bloomberg/Getty ImagesIn contrast, during the Yellow Vest protests, started in opposition to hikes in fuel prices, violence gradually soured public support. That these pensions protests continue to hold such popular goodwill is an ominous sign for Macron’s future plans. The size and violence of pensions protests spiked when Macron forced the legislation past the country’s lower legislative house without a vote.

[1/4] Paraguayan presidential candidate Santiago Pena from the ruling Colorado Party gestures next to his wife Leticia Ocampos at the party headquarters as he and his running mate Pedro Alliana won Paraguay's presidential race, according to the preliminary official count, in Asuncion, Paraguay April 30, 2023. Still, Pena will be able to keep a cool head amid the tumult, his supporters say. "I think what characterizes him is that he has infinite tranquility," said Lea Gimenez, who served as Pena's deputy when he was finance minister and was later finance minister herself. Throughout the campaign the Colorado Party candidate has vowed to extend Paraguay's decades-long diplomatic relations with Taiwan, despite pressures to open up to China and its huge consumer demand for soybeans and beef. He became finance minister in 2015.

☆ Elon Musk earned a spot at the Museum of Failure, which listed 14 reasons including the strange names he gave 2 of his kids
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Sam Tabahriti | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Elon Musk earned a spot at the Museum of Failure in Brooklyn, which listed 14 reasons. According to the Museum of Failure, there's no such thing as innovation without a few bumps along the way. That's something Elon Musk is familiar with, and has earned him a spot at the museum for 14 reasons, which include the unusual names he gave two of his kids: X AE A-XII and Exa Dark Sideræl, who also now goes by Y. The museum aims to stimulate productive discussion about failure and inspire us to take meaningful risks," it says on its website. The museum is in Brooklyn until June 18 and has previously been on display in cities including Calgary, Canada and Taipei, Taiwan.

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