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- Sea surface temperatures in March at 21.07C
Sea surface temperatures in March at 21.07C were the warmest on record for the 12th month in a row, Europe’s Earth observation agency said, confounding its climatologists.
- Scientists have established the slowing
Scientists have established the slowing effect of ice melt by measuring the changes in Earth’s gravity field, which have been recorded by satellites since 1976.
- Meanwhile the Australian referendum, proposed by a **jubilant** Anthony Albanese on the night of his 2022 election victory, also fell flat: he lost by a margin of 60.8 per cent to 39.2 per cent.
- Investors use them to hedge against sell-offs in sectors that are not underpinned by humanity’s tragic **propensity** for violence.
- And its own society has been **gravely** wounded.
- International migration to rich countries reached an all-time high last year, driven by global humanitarian crises and demand for workers, the OECD said on Monday.
- Chevron has agreed to buy US oil and gas producer Hess in a $ 53bn all-stock deal, doubling down on its bet that demand for fossil fuels will remain robust for decades to come.
- Britain’s deputy prime minister will on Tuesday announce the creation of a new UK public-private forum on economic security challenges, as he warns of the risk that the “world’s next shock will be a tech shock”
- The deal — the biggest in Chevron’s history — gives Hess an enterprise value
The deal — the biggest in Chevron’s history — gives Hess an enterprise value, including debt, of $ 60bn and delivers the supermajor a foothold in Guyana, home to the biggest oil discovery of the past decade
- Oliver Dowden will speak at the Saudi-hosted Future
Oliver Dowden will speak at the Saudi-hosted Future Investment Initiative, known as “Davos in the desert”, to highlight the threats as well as the opportunities that technological advances present to the UK and its allies.
- Inflation in the eurozone has fallen far more than expected to 2.4 per cent in November, the slowest annual pace since July 2021, providing some relief to consumers and fuelling hopes that interest rates could soon be cut.
- Opec+ members have agreed to make additional voluntary cuts to oil production in 2024 in an increasingly fraught attempt to bolster the market, but crude prices fell due to signs of ongoing strains in the group.
- New members of the global super-rich gained more of their assets through inheritance than through wealth creation this year — the first time that this has been recorded by Swiss bank UBS in its nine years of surveying global billionaires.
- Hamas on Thursday released six women and two children held in Gaza as the delicate exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages entered its sixth day, under the cover of a temporary truce brokered by Qatar.
- Endeavour Mining, one of the world’s top gold producers, has fired boss Sébastien de Montessus for alleged “serious misconduct” after discovering an allegedly irregular multimillion-dollar payment instruction.
- Sir Jim Ratcliffe has agreed to buy a roughly $ 1.3bn stake in Manchester United, ending more than a year of uncertainty over the English football club’s ownership and highlighting continued investor appetite for sports assets.
- Standing between two Christmas trees topped with red “Make America Great Again” caps this week, Donald Trump told a crowd of several hundred supporters in Waterloo, Iowa, that his poll numbers were “scary because we are leading by so much”.
- There is a moment in the latest Godzilla film when the creature glares directly into the camera, its snorting, radioactive rage every bit as infinite and incomprehensible as it was in the 1954 original.
- Property reinsurers are resisting calls to lower prices or soften terms for cover against extreme weather, brokers say, signalling there will be no let-up in affordability pressures that have had ripple effects throughout the global economy.
- Japanese authorities are investigating the communications between the control tower and aircraft in the moments before a deadly runway collision on Tuesday night between two planes at Tokyo’s Haneda airport.
- The post-Christmas period is often a time for weighing things up, whether taking stock at the end of the year or preparing for the one ahead. For others, it is simply a time for weighing: stepping on the bathroom scales while reflecting mournfully on the quantity of turkey dinners, mince pies and sherries consumed.
- In March 2022, as the sun set on a beachside stage in Maui, a rising star at SoftBank Vision Fund lavished praise on the leadership of a social media app the group had backed to become the next Facebook, and valued at more than $ 1bn.
- There is a fair chance that by the time the trees come into leaf in Washington, Frankfurt and London, this decade’s inflation crisis will definitively be over. The eye of the storm has already passed and prices have been rising at rates no higher than central banks’ targets in recent months.
- he lunar mission that was to have returned the US to the Moon for the first time in 50 years appeared to be in jeopardy after a failure in the propulsion system resulted in a “critical loss” of fuel.
- OpenAI has alleged The New York Times “intentionally manipulated” its chatbot to regurgitate whole lines from the newspaper’s articles, as it fights a copyright lawsuit from the newspaper that poses a threat to how it develops its technology.
- The yen suffered its biggest daily fall against the dollar since April on Tuesday after the Bank of Japan made only modest changes to its policy of holding down government bond yields.
- The US is to remove preferential trading access under the African Growth and Opportunity Act from Uganda, the Central African Republic, Gabon and Niger for human rights violations and for failure to make democratic progress.
- After Hamas’s **atrocities** in Israel and the state’s retaliation in the Gaza Strip, executives at companies including Goldman Sachs and Google emailed staff and made public statements expressing sympathy for victims.
- Prices of the precious metal have surged as much as 10 per cent to null,996 per **troy** ounce, hitting a five-month high, after Hamas launched attacks on Israel a fortnight ago.
- The US will forge strained but pragmatic relations with the new military government in Niger after recognising as a **fait accompli** a July coup in the west African nation, said President Joe Biden’s special assistant on Africa.
- Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni plans to spend €24bn on tax cuts and public sector pay rises next year to spur consumption and support faltering growth, despite investors’ concerns about the country’s finances.
- Goldman Sachs chief executive David Solomon has decided to stop DJing at high-profile events following criticism that his hobby created a distraction from his work leading the Wall Street firm, according to people with knowledge of the decision.
- The forecasts, if **borne out**, will make for a tough backdrop for the UK government as it seeks to demonstrate the country is putting the cost of living crisis behind it before the general election expected next year.
- Under the new rules, promoting crypto assets to UK customers without approval can result in an unlimited fine, and potentially up to two years **imprisonment**. They apply to all companies, whether based in the UK or abroad.
- “Our EV market is emerging from the early adopter phase. To move to the mass market, we need something to incentivise consumers,” said Mike Hawes, chief executive of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, which represents the UK car industry.
- Saudi Arabia’s energy minister has defended the kingdom’s decision to extend oil production cuts, insisting the move was not about “jacking up prices” even as crude futures push towards $100 a barrel.
- Several European countries, including Belgium, Germany, and Italy, are tracking a French regulatory action against Apple’s iPhone 12, raising the risk of more bans because of alleged breaches of radiation exposure limits.
- Russian president Vladimir Putin has accepted an invitation to visit North Korea made by Kim Jong Un during the two leaders’ landmark talks this week, the Kremlin and Pyongyang state media said on Thursday.
- Goldman Sachs has agreed to sell one of its personal financial management divisions as chief executive David Solomon continues to unwind a botched foray into consumer banking.
- The debate is a key test of western resolve over Ukraine, as war sceptics in Europe and the US begin to point to the limited gains made by Kyiv’s summer counteroffensive against Russia.
- Tapping the blue blood of horseshoe crabs to test vaccines and medical devices is coming under fire, with environmentalists and a large European investor putting pressure on pharmaceuticals groups to seek alternatives.
- The Korean ritual of pardoning convicted executives and politicians is long established. Last year, Yoon issued a pardon to Samsung princeling Lee Jae-yong, who served 19 months in prison for his role in a bribery scandal that also led to the imprisonment of former conservative president Park Geun-hye.
- Dalian University of Technology (DUT) is a national key university directly administrated by the Ministry of Education of China and sponsored by Project 211 and Project 985. In September 2017, after approval by the State Council, DUT was selected into the university of the “Double First-Class” Initiative, category A.
- In the midst of a rainy and foggy afternoon on August 6, Yao Shengwang had just returned from harvesting ginger in the fields. His raincoat bore muddy splatters as he grappled with unloading a hefty basket of ginger from his back. With muddy hands, Yao received his admission letter and flowers from the postman.
- The traditional Chinese calendar divides a year into 24 solar terms. Lìqiū (pīnyīn), literally "start of autumn") is the 13th solar term. It begins when the Sun reaches the celestial longitude of 135° and ends when it reaches the longitude of 150°. It more often refers in particular to the day when the Sun is exactly at the celestial longitude of 135°, which in the Gregorian calendar is around August 7. This year, it falls on August 7.
- Walk off the Earth, Canadian music group that gained a reputation for their playful videos of cover songs and unique blend of folk, rock, pop, and reggae. The band is among the few music groups that found fame and good fortune just by covering tunes from other people’s music.
- French luxury group LVMH has signed on as a partner for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, a last-lap deal that will help the event’s organisers bridge a budget gap after an increase in costs.
- A sharp rise in international students who pay higher tuition fees at top English universities is squeezing the number of places for UK students, according to data analysis by the Financial Times.
- Ambassador Cruise Lines① confirmed on Thursday that the arrival of their ship Ambition in Torshavn② in the Faroe Islands③ – located between Scotland, Iceland and Norway in the North Atlantic – coincided with the culmination of a hunt of 40+ pilot whales④ in the port area. The cruise line said it strongly objects to this outdated practice and would like to sincerely apologize to the passengers onboard. Moreover, the company would continue to educate its guests and crew not to buy or eat any whale or dolphin meat and stand against any profiteering from commercial whaling and dolphin hunts. The government of the Faroe Islands, however, said that the Faroese have eaten pilot whale meat and blubber⑤ since they first settled the islands over a millenia ago. Today, the whale drive has become a community activity open to all and has been well organized and regulated by national laws. In 2023 alone, the Faroe Islands has registered 646 whale killings to date, including the 78 on Sunday when the Ambition arrived. (ABC)
- When the Women's World Cup kicks off in Australia and New Zealand on Thursday, it'll be the first time the women's cup is hosted in two countries, with a newly expanded field of 32 teams. The U.S. will be looking to snag① their third straight World Cup title and its fifth overall. But this year's tournament② is considered fairly wide open③, with several teams having a decent shot④ at the title. Rapinoe announced this month that she will retire at the end of the NWSL⑤ season, making this her fourth and final World Cup. Marta is one of the world's best known soccer players, and has been named world player of the year six times. But a World Cup title has eluded her⑥, and at 37, this may be her last shot at it. She's on the squad⑦ but recovering from a knee injury, and the team's manager – former USWNT⑧ coach Pia Sundhage – says Marta may start the tournament on the bench. (NPR)