News

September 7, 2021 (Reuters) – The Taliban claimed victory on Monday in the last part of Afghanistan still holding out against their rule, declaring that the capture of the Panjshir valley completed their takeover of the country and they would unveil a new government soon. Pictures on social media showed Taliban members standing in front […]

September 7, 2021 The Chicago White Sox could play a role in determining a future playoff opponent when they kick off an important six-game sequence with the opener of a three-game series against the host Oakland Athletics on Tuesday night. Chicago (79-58) begins its week well in command of the American League Central, but also […]

September 7, 2021 The Washington Mystics and the host Seattle Storm are both struggling as they prepare to meet Tuesday night. The difference is that defending WNBA champion Seattle already has clinched a playoff berth while the Mystics are in a four-team battle for the two remaining playoff spots. The Storm (19-10) stopped a three-game […]

September 7, 2021 SYDNEY (Reuters) – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) Deputy Governor Geoff Bascand will leave the bank in January next year, it said in a statement on Tuesday. Bascand has been deputy governor since May 2013 and is also a member of the monetary policy committee. The RBNZ governor, board and […]

September 7, 2021 (Refiles to fix typo in headline) LONDON (Reuters) – Standard Chartered has agreed a joint venture deal to launch a digital-only bank in Singapore with the country’s National Trades Union Congress (NTUC). A Standard Chartered vehicle will take a 60% stake in the venture, worth 144 million Singapore dollars ($107.28 million), with […]

September 7, 2021 TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan could get up to 9 million doses of BioNTech SE’s COVID-19 vaccine this year, the founder of Taiwanese tech giant Foxconn said on Monday, laying out a delivery timetable for a vaccine order that became heavily politicised. Taiwan had blamed China, which claims the island as its own […]

Portcast founders Dr. Lingxiao Xia and Nidhi Gupta For many manufacturers and freight forwarders, managing logistics is still a very manual process: tracking shipments with a call or online lookup, and entering that data into an Excel spreadsheet. Portcast, which describes itself as a “next-generation logistics operating system,” makes the process more efficient by gathering […]

In the latest quasi-throwback toward ‘do not track‘, the UK’s data protection chief has come out in favor of a browser- and/or device-level setting to allow Internet users to set “lasting” cookie preferences — suggesting this as a fix for the barrage of consent pop-ups that continues to infest websites in the region. European web […]

September 7, 2021 By Kantaro Komiya and Daniel Leussink TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan’s household spending grew less than expected in July as a resurgence of COVID-19 cases hindered consumer activity, throwing broader economic recovery prospects into doubt. The world’s third-largest economy is struggling to shake off the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, which forced the […]

September 7, 2021 TOKYO (Reuters) – Fumio Kishida, a key contender to succeed Yoshihide Suga as Japan’s prime minister, called for compiling a stimulus package of over 30 trillion yen ($273 billion) to cushion the economic blow from the coronavirus pandemic, a magazine reported. Kishida also said that if he were to become prime minister, […]

ShopUp, a startup that is digitizing neighborhood stores in Bangladesh, has raised $75 million in a new financing round that is also the largest in the South Asian market. Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures led ShopUp’s $75 million Series B financing round. Prosus Ventures as well as existing investors Flourish Ventures, Sequoia Capital India, and VEON […]

September 7, 2021 By Amy Tennery NEW YORK (Reuters) – Her U.S. Open journey isn’t over but Emma Raducanu has already written herself into the history books, reaching her first Grand Slam quarter-final to take up the mantle of British tennis. With grand dame Virginia Wade looking on from the stands, the 18-year-old thrashed American […]

September 7, 2021 By Nick Carey MUNICH (Reuters) – As carmakers gathered in Munich on Monday to launch almost exclusively zero- or low-emission vehicles, an ongoing semiconductor shortage cast a long shadow over the first major car show since before the pandemic began. Forced to shut down plants last year, carmakers now face increasing competition […]

September 7, 2021 By Hideyuki Sano and Tom Westbrook TOKYO/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – While the race for ruling party leader remains wide open, the Japanese stock market has emerged as a clear winner of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s abrupt departure, with the broad Topix index soaring to 31-year highs. Suga said on Friday he would not […]

September 7, 2021 PARIS (Reuters) – Jean-Paul Belmondo, a star of France’s New Wave cinema after his breakthrough performance in Jean-Luc Godard’s “A bout de souffle” (“Breathless”) in 1959, has died. He was 88. The death of a leading figure in French cinema was felt across the country. President Emmanuel Macron tweeted that France had […]

September 7, 2021 CAIRO (Reuters) – Qatar’s ruling emir and the visiting U.S. secretaries of state and defense discussed developments in Afghanistan and efforts to enhance security there, the emir’s court said on Monday. The emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, received U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin after […]

September 7, 2021 SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea has elevated a general long seen as a rising star in the country’s powerful military and a major player in its missile programme to a position in the presidium of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) politburo, state media reported on Tuesday. Pak Jong Chon will […]

September 6, 2021 (Reuters) – An Australian court fined local units of Allianz SE for selling travel insurance to ineligible customers and not properly disclosing how it calculated premiums on Expedia websites, the country’s corporate watchdog said on Tuesday. Two units of German insurer Allianz were fined a total of A$1.5 million ($1.12 million) in […]

September 6, 2021 By Huw Jones LONDON (Reuters) – Britain needs to ease taxes on banks and make it easier to hire staff from abroad, its financial and professional services lobby said in a blueprint to help London unseat New York as the world’s top international financial centre within five years. The strategy paper on […]

September 6, 2021 LONDON (Reuters) – British consumer spending jumped last month thanks to a post-lockdown splurge on holidays at home and entertainment, payment card company Barclaycard said on Tuesday. Spending rose by 15.4% last month compared with its pre-pandemic level in August 2019, marked by higher spending across all categories apart from international travel, […]