Singapore has topped the Global Talent Competitiveness Index in Asia-Pacific for the sixth straight year, coming in second in the global rankings behind Switzerland and ahead of the United States, which was third. Released yesterday in Davos, ahead of the World Economic Forum, the yearly index measures how 125 countries are able to draw, nurture […]
If Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon were to be the tour guide for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during his upcoming visit, he would show Mr Kim the city’s longest river and main train station. Mr Park, responding to a question by The Straits Times at his New Year’s address to foreign media yesterday, said […]
BRASILIA (Reuters) – Brazil’s government will announce the privatization of southern airports, including Curitiba, in the second quarter of this year, according to Adalberto Vasconcelos, head of the PPI government program tasked with luring private investment in the country’s infrastructure. Vasconcelos told Reuters on Monday that the Ferrograo and FIOL railway projects serving the central […]
BEIJING – To show how serious it is about the battle for blue skies, China has warned officials that those who fail to meet air quality targets will be punished. The warning comes as the environment ministry released the latest data on Monday (Jan 21) showing that levels of hazardous PM2.5 particulates in Beijing and […]
MATARAM, INDONESIA (AFP) – An accused French drug trafficker has broken out of an Indonesian jail by sawing through bars on a second floor window and rappelling to freedom with a sarong, police said Monday (Jan 21), as they launched a manhunt to find the fugitive. Felix Dorfin’s daring escape happened Sunday evening at a […]
LONDON (Reuters) – Buying sterling is not advisable because of Brexit uncertainty, UBS Wealth Management said on Monday, adding that hedging pound exposure over the next three months is one way to avoid market volatility. While the agreement over a deal could lift the pound to as much as $1.40, “in the case of a […]
SINGAPORE – Over the span of a week, a stock investor manipulated the share price of mainboard-listed dye maker China Fibretech in 2015, causing the price of the counter to plunge from $1.60 to as low as $0.54. Restaurateur Bruno Ludovic Soligny, 40, a naturalised Singapore citizen, was sentenced to 20 weeks’ jail and a […]
LONDON (Reuters) – European shares slipped on Monday from six-week highs after China’s fourth-quarter growth figures confirmed a slowdown in the world’s second-biggest economy with 2018 its weakest year since 1990. The pan-European STOXX 600 fell 0.3 percent by 0930 GMT and Germany’s exporter-heavy DAX .GDAXI dropped 0.5 percent while Britain’s FTSE 100 .FTSE held […]
BEIJING (BLOOMBERG) – Births in China dropped to the lowest level in almost 60 years in 2018, signalling the country’s looser two-child policy has done little to reverse its slowing birth rate, and worsening the outlook for growth in the world’s second-largest economy. The number of babies born last year fell to 15.23 million, down […]
TOKYO (Reuters) – Nissan CEO Hirota Saikawa said on Monday that he had not heard directly about a reported French proposal to integrate the Japanese carmaker’s management with Renault, adding that it was not the time to discuss revising the partners’ capital ties. The Nikkei newspaper reported on Sunday that a French government delegation had […]