The Story of Vedomosti — A Russian Newspaper's Struggle for Independence

Source: The Moscow Times April 1, 2017

In the newsroom of Russia’s most respected business newspaper, editors and reporters are in a tense face-off with the paper’s owner Demyan Kudryavtsev (who also publishes The Moscow Times). He has just announced the name of their new editor-in-chief — an appointment that should reflect the paper’s editorial standards. But the mood is sour. 

Why bring in someone from outside the newsroom? Why someone from state television? What guarantee will there be of editorial independence? “Do you realize the first thing people will say?” one emotional staff member asks. “‘Vedomosti is going to be led by someone from Channel One!’” 

Even Germany’s Post Office Is Building an Electric Car

Source: Bloomberg March 26, 2017

This boxy, bare-bones van has no air conditioning or radio, no passenger seat and a top speed of less than 50 miles an hour. Yet the electric vehicle’s success has irked the likes of Volkswagen AG.

When Deutsche Post AG couldn’t find a zero-emission delivery van that met its needs, it bought a startup and developed one. Now Europe’s largest postal service may start selling those vehicles — dubbed StreetScooters — to others, showing the potential for disruption in the rapidly changing auto market.

With healthcare bill dead, Republicans turn to taxes

Source: Rueters March 26, 2017


After failing to repeal Obamacare, Republicans in the U.S. Congress quickly pivoted on Friday to President Donald Trump's next priority: overhauling the federal tax code, but their plan has already split the business community.
Division among Republicans was the chief cause of the embarrassing setback on Obamacare, and similar fault lines have been evident for months in the Republicans' tax plan, mainly over an untested proposal to use the tax code to boost exports.

Buhari Approves Release of More London-Paris Club Refunds to Governors

Despite allegations that some state governors diverted the first tranche of London-Paris Club refunds which was released to the states last year to enable them offset the salary arrears of their workers, President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday asked the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, and the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Godwin Emefiele, to immediately release the second tranche of the London-Paris Club refunds to the states to ease their financial difficulties.
The president, according to a statement by his media aide, Mallam Garba Shehu, gave the directive while addressing the National Economic Council (NEC), comprising the governors, finance minister and other appointees of the federal government such as the Director-General of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Babatunde Fowler, at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

It's what Trump didn't say with Merkel that worries Europe

President Donald Trump's press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel following the pair's meeting was largely positive, but there was one thing Trump didn't address that could be a problem, according to Nick Burns, former U.S. ambassador to NATO.
"If you were listening for U.S. support for the EU, you didn't hear it from President Trump. Europeans are worried about that," Burns said in an interview with "Power Lunch" on Friday.
"He's the first American president since Truman to be so negative about the project of building European unity. That's a problem."

Fed raises rates as job gains, firming inflation stoke confidence

Source: REUTERS

The U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates on Wednesday for the second time in three months, a move spurred by steady economic growth, strong job gains and confidence that inflation is rising to the central bank's target.
The decision to lift the target overnight interest rate by 25 basis points to a range of 0.75 percent to 1.00 percent marked a convincing step in the Fed's effort to return monetary policy to a more normal footing.
Fed Chair Janet Yellen pointed to growing faith in the economy's trajectory.
"We have seen the economy progress over the last several months in exactly the way we anticipated," Yellen said in a press conference following the end of a two-day policy meeting. "We have some confidence in the path the economy is on."