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The rapid spread of the Delta coronavirus variant is causing economists to worry that Europe’s brightening economic outlook risks being undermined by rising infection levels and the reintroduction of travel and social restrictions. The lifting of most lockdown measures across the region in recent months has led to a surge in business activity, retail spending

The world’s largest economies have thrown their weight behind a global tax reform deal that would impose a minimum levy on multinational corporations, ramping up pressure on a small number of holdout countries to sign up to the agreement. G20 economy ministers and central bankers meeting in Venice on Saturday issued a joint communique endorsing

The world’s largest economies will this weekend pile pressure on to holdout nations which are refusing to sign up to a global tax reform deal that would impose a minimum levy on multinational corporations. G20 economy ministers and central bankers met in Venice on Friday to discuss the proposal, which was agreed by G7 nations

US government bonds rallied and global stock markets dropped sharply, as worries about inflation were replaced by concerns that the global economic recovery from coronavirus has peaked. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond, which moves inversely to its price, fell 0.04 percentage points to 1.276 per cent. The move put the world’s benchmark bond

Federal Reserve officials held a vigorous debate last month on whether the economic rebound in the US would soon be strong enough for the central bank to start dialling back its pandemic-era stimulus more quickly than expected. Minutes from the June meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee meeting released on Wednesday showed two prevailing

The Pentagon cancelled the highly-sensitive $10bn Jedi cloud computing contract that had been awarded to Microsoft, drawing a line under a contentious government bidding process that was marred by claims of interference from Donald Trump. The US defence department said on Tuesday it was reversing its decision to hand over large parts of its data

Oil prices jumped to the highest level in three years after Opec and its allies abandoned a decision over increasing oil production, as Saudi Arabia, Russia and the UAE struggled to reach a compromise.  Opec+ oil ministers had been due to reconvene on Monday after failing to reach a deal at the end of last

China’s cyber security regulator has ordered that Didi be taken off domestic app stores just days after the ride-hailing giant raised $4.4bn in the biggest public listing this year. Didi’s app has “problems of seriously violating laws on collecting and using personal information”, the Cyberspace Administration of China said on Sunday evening, two days after

Hackers began a global ransomware attack on Friday, hitting more than 1,000 companies, and forcing Sweden’s Coop grocery chain to close hundreds of stores. In what appears to be one of the largest supply chain attacks to date, hackers compromised Kaseya, an IT management software supplier, in order to spread ransomware to the managed service

Opec and its allies failed to reach an agreement on raising oil production on Friday as talks hit a deadlock for a second day, with the UAE remaining opposed to a deal that does not address concerns over its own output target. As oil prices traded close to the highest level in three years, around

The world’s leading economies have signed up to a plan to force multinational companies to pay a global minimum corporate tax rate of at least 15 per cent following intense negotiations in Paris at the OECD. The historic agreement among 130 countries will ensure the largest companies, including Big Tech, pay at least $100bn a

The US and Japan have been conducting war games and joint military exercises in the event of a conflict with China over Taiwan, amid escalating concerns over the Chinese military’s assertive activity. US and Japanese military officials began serious planning for a possible conflict in the final year of the Trump administration, according to six

US home price growth accelerated in April at the fastest pace in more than three decades as strong housing demand continued to come up against a shortage of residential properties. The S&P Case-Shiller national home price index, which covers all nine US census divisions, rose 14.6 per cent year on year in April, data on

China’s strengths as a cyber power are being undermined by poor security and weak intelligence analysis, according to new research that predicts Beijing will be unable to match US cyber capabilities for at least a decade. The study, published on Monday by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, comes as a series of hacking campaigns

The UK’s financial watchdog has ordered Binance to stop all regulated activities in Britain and imposed stringent requirements in a stinging rebuke of one of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchanges. The intervention by the Financial Conduct Authority in recent days is one of the most significant moves any global regulator has made against Binance, a

Johnson and Johnson has agreed to stop selling opioids in the US as part of a $230m settlement with the state of New York to resolve claims it helped fuel the prescription painkiller epidemic. The company, which made opioids including a fentanyl patch and a tablet, denied any wrongdoing but will stop manufacturing and distributing

Panasonic has sold its entire stake in longstanding battery partner Tesla for about ¥400bn ($3.6bn) as it seeks to raise cash to finance its biggest-ever overseas acquisition. The Japanese conglomerate, which has a $5bn joint battery manufacturing venture with Tesla in Nevada, said the sale would not affect its partnership with the US electric vehicle

Lithuania’s foreign minister has called a Franco-German initiative to push for a summit between the EU and Russian president Vladimir Putin “irresponsible” and a case of “historical myopia”, in a sign of the deep divergences within the bloc over how to address worsening relations with the Kremlin. Gabrielius Landsbergis was speaking to the Financial Times

Electronics groups including Japan’s Canon and Innolux, an affiliate of Apple supplier Foxconn, have been accused of locking up migrant workers in Taiwan as an outbreak of Covid-19 hits the country’s tech industry. The accusations highlight the labour practices used to sustain Taiwan’s position as a technology manufacturing powerhouse. The country is a linchpin of

A top investor at the world’s biggest hedge fund says he does not expect a repeat of the “Great Inflation” that took hold in the 1970s, in the latest sign that many big money managers are positioning for more subdued price pressure. Bob Prince, who runs Bridgewater Associates with Ray Dalio and Greg Jensen, told

The Delta coronavirus variant that swept the UK has become dominant in Portugal and appeared in clusters across Germany, France and Spain, prompting European health officials to warn further action is needed to slow its spread.  While the new strain, which first emerged in India, still only accounts for a fraction of the total coronavirus

Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative cleric, was set for a landslide victory in Iran’s presidential election that would give regime hardliners complete control over all branches of the state for the first time in almost a decade. Raisi’s two main rivals conceded on Saturday and congratulated the 60-year-old who many Iranians believe is the favoured candidate

The EU has lost a legal attempt to force AstraZeneca to speed up delivery of doses of its Covid-19 vaccines or face large fines, in the latest twist in a bitter battle over delivery shortfalls. A court in Brussels ruled on Friday that the company must deliver only a fraction of what the European Commission

Global stocks continued a steady descent from record highs reached earlier in the week and the dollar strengthened after the US central bank brought forward the anticipated timing of its first post-pandemic interest rate rise. The FTSE All-World index of developed and emerging market stocks, which hit a closing record on Monday, headed for its

The Tokyo Olympics will need a public bailout of about $800m if the games are held behind closed doors, as organisers delay a decision on domestic spectators to the last possible moment. Recent budgets show the Tokyo 2020 organisers are still assuming full stadiums. Having already spent the billions of yen raised from ticket sales,

The EU and US are poised to resolve a 17-year dispute over aircraft subsidies, lifting the threat of billions of dollars in punitive tariffs from their economies in a boost to transatlantic relations.  Diplomats and officials confirmed on Monday night that two days of intensive negotiations in Brussels had left the EU and the Biden

US president Joe Biden has challenged leaders of G7 countries to use their financial muscle to counter China’s rising global influence as he declared that western democracies were “in a contest with autocrats”. Biden said he was “satisfied” with the outcome of the G7 summit in Cornwall on Sunday, but pushed European leaders to be

Leaders of the G7 leading western economies will on Sunday back a western rival to China’s “belt and road” initiative, in a plan to mobilise billions of dollars to help developing countries tackle climate change. Joe Biden has been leading calls to offer poor countries a new source of infrastructure finance, providing a “democratic” alternative

Joe Biden has won support at the G7 summit for a “carry on spending” plan, as western leaders rejected austerity in a post-Covid world and vowed to tackle inequality at home and abroad. Biden’s call for continued economic stimulus was backed by fellow leaders at the summit in Cornwall in south-west England, in a gathering

Leaders of the G7 economies convening in the UK will announce a pledge to provide 1bn coronavirus doses to poorer countries as part of a plan to “vaccinate the world” by the end of 2022. The move, to be outlined at the start of the three-day summit on Friday, is designed to address criticism that