EU considers crackdown on short-selling following GameStop saga February 25, 2021 Ugo Bassi, director of Financial Markets in the European Commission’s DG FISMA (Financial services), said today the EU may consider tweaking disclosure rules for short selling to create more transparency. During a meeting of the European Parliament’s committee on economic and monetary affairs, he said he could envisage the possibility of lowering the 0.5 per cent [...]
Alexei Navalny: Destination unknown as Putin makes opponent disappear February 25, 2021 Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny has been moved to an undisclosed detention centre outside Moscow, his lawyer and a member of a rights organisation said this evening. One of his lawyers, Vadim Kobzev, said on Twitter that Navalny was transferred to a prison camp but it was not clear which one or where. Navalny, a [...]
Lady Gaga offers $500,000 reward for stolen dogs, ‘no questions asked’ February 25, 2021 Lady Gaga is offering a $500,000 reward for the return of her two French bulldogs after they were stolen on Wednesday in a night raid in which her dog walker was shot. Lady Gaga’s dog walker Ryan Fischer took the singer’s three pets out for a walk in West Hollywood around 10pm where he was [...]
Cathie Wood: Low rates and quantitative easing drive interest in Bitcoin February 25, 2021 Cathie Wood, the well-known U.S. investor and founder of Ark Investment Management, said today that Bitcoin is in its “early days” given its diverse use cases. However, Wood emphasised Bitcoin’s potential as a hedge in a global economy of low rates and quantitative easing. “The dollar is down which is normally a positive cue for [...]
Vanguard and BlackRock uncovered as largest investors in coal industry February 25, 2021 The US mutual fund company Vanguard has been named the world’s largest institutional investor in the coal industry, with holdings of almost $86 bn, according to research carried out by Rainforest Action Network, Urgewald and 28 other NGO partners. The investor is closely followed by BlackRock, which has invested over $84bn in the coal industry [...]
Goldman Sachs and Rolls Royce team up with Code First Girls to help close gender skills gap February 25, 2021 Goldman Sachs, Rolls Royce and Bank of America, among others, are teaming up with Code First Girls, a UK group dedicated to closing gender skills gaps and bringing women into technology roles. Code First Girls will provide mentorship programmes along with up to £10,000 in free education to women undertaking technology related training courses. The [...]
Nuns broke lockdown rules to perform exorcism in front of 70 people February 24, 2021 Two nuns have been caught breaking covid-19 lockdown rules after they performed a public exorcism in front of the Irish parliament. Mother Irene Gibson and Sister Anne Marie reportedly attended the exorcism, on 8 December of last year, of the Dáil in Hebert Park, Dublin. A video was later posted online which showed the exorcism, [...]
More than a dozen companies exit $11bn Nord Stream 2 project to avoid US sanctions February 24, 2021 Baker Hughes Co, AXA group and 16 other companies have stopped working on Russia’s Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline to avoid US sanctions, according to multiple media reports this evening. Russian energy company Gazprom and its partners are in the process of building an $11bn pipeline that will supply natural gas from Russia directly [...]
Covid-19: Hospitalisation risk 64 per cent higher with British variant February 24, 2021 People infected with the more contagious British mutation of the coronavirus, first discovered in Kent, have a much higher risk of being hospitalised, according to a new study. The data, published this evening by Denmark’s Serum Institute, which is part of the country’s Ministry of Health, monitored 2,155 people infected with the British variant. Of [...]
European bank giants plot payment network to rival Visa and Mastercard February 24, 2021 Members of the European Payments Initiative (EPI), a project launched with the help of 22 banks, said today that a pan-European payment network can be in place by 2025, making the continent “master of its own destiny.” The 22 banks, which include names such as Deutsche Bank, UniCredit and ING, are shareholders in the EPI [...]