Higher interest rates and tighter financial conditions can kill the AI boom, but those forces are already at work in the bond market.
The post Breitbart Business Digest: The Bond Market Is Already Doing Warsh’s Work appeared first on Breitbart.
The agreement was signed in Brussels on Monday, 19 October, by representatives of the European Commission and the two governments, marking the conclusion of negotiations that began more than a decade ago.
The arrangement covers trade, investment and regulatory cooperation, alongside provisions concerning financial services, education, environmental protection, consumer rights and other areas normally governed by EU legislation.
However, the agreement has not yet entered into force. It requires further approval procedures, including consent from the European Parliament and ratification by the participating countries. Andorra intends to submit the agreement to a binding national referendum.
According to the European Commission’s announcement, the agreement will provide Andorra and San Marino with access to the single market under shared regulatory requirements and conditions intended to ensure fair competition.
The principal objective is to remove barriers that continue to restrict economic activity between the two countries and the EU’s 27 member states.
For businesses, the arrangements should provide greater predictability concerning the rules governing cross-border trade, investment and commercial operations.
Participation will nevertheless require both countries to implement relevant EU legislation and maintain systems capable of enforcing the applicable standards.
In practice, access to the European market will carry obligations comparable to those imposed on companies established inside the Union, particularly concerning product standards, competition, environmental rules and consumer protection.
The agreement also establishes institutional arrangements for managing cooperation and dealing with future regulatory developments.
For two countries whose economies are closely connected to neighbouring EU members, greater regulatory consistency could reduce administrative barriers and facilitate commercial expansion.
Financial services represent one of the more sensitive elements of the agreement.
Andorra has a banking and financial sector with substantial links to Spain and France, while San Marino’s economy is closely integrated with Italy.
Both countries already use the euro under separate monetary arrangements with the European Union, although neither is a member of the eurozone or the EU.
The new association framework would provide a route towards broader participation in the EU financial services market, but integration will be gradual and subject to specific conditions.
The Commission has made clear that the process will involve assessments of the regulatory and supervisory arrangements operating in both countries.
This means the signature does not provide their financial institutions with immediate, unrestricted access to all services available within the EU.
Brussels has also signed updated monetary agreements designed to remove overlapping requirements between existing arrangements and the new association framework.
Financial supervision, the prevention of money laundering and compliance with European regulatory standards will be central to the implementation process.
The agreement illustrates how the Union can extend significant elements of its economic framework to neighbouring countries without admitting them as members.
Andorra and San Marino will not acquire voting rights in EU institutions or the political representation enjoyed by member states.
Their participation will instead depend on accepting relevant common rules and complying with the institutional provisions established under the association agreement.
The EU already operates differentiated arrangements with several non-member European countries, including Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein through the European Economic Area.
Earlier European Council conclusions on relations with non-EU Western European countries identified Andorra and San Marino among the states with which Brussels sought closer economic and institutional cooperation.
The newly signed agreement does not replicate every aspect of existing arrangements, but it follows the broader principle that access to the single market can be negotiated separately from EU membership.
That principle is also relevant to discussions about how candidate countries might receive selected economic benefits before completing the full accession process.
Brussels has been considering wider market participation for countries such as Ukraine and Moldova ahead of possible membership.
The immediate political challenge now moves from negotiation to approval.
Following the signature, the Council will seek the European Parliament’s consent before the agreement can be formally concluded. Its application will also depend on the completion of the necessary national procedures.
In Andorra, Prime Minister Xavier Espot’s government has committed to a binding referendum, although no voting date has yet been fixed.
The referendum will determine whether Andorran voters accept the economic opportunities and regulatory commitments established by the agreement.
San Marino must also complete the procedures required under its constitutional system.
Until those requirements have been satisfied, the agreement remains a signed framework rather than an operational extension of the EU single market.
For both countries, the eventual implementation will determine how far their economies can integrate with the Union while retaining their existing status as independent non-member states.
2026, it is learning how quickly an index provider can show Southeast Asia’s biggest economy the exit, wreaking havoc on its stock market. The provider is MSCI, which may be about to follow through on its threat to downgrade Indonesian stocks to “frontier” status, or to something worse: a standalone market category. President Prabowo Subianto’s […]
The post Ghosts of ’97 haunt Prabowo as MSCI eyes Indonesia’s exit appeared first on Asia Times.
I am writing this from Singapore, where the haze is back. For the uninitiated, smoke from fires several hundred kilometres away drifts over the island, the skyline turns the color of weak tea and the whole city checks its air-quality app with a devotion normally reserved for share prices. Nothing here is on fire. It […]
The post For Seoul and Taipei markets, blue skies above the haze appeared first on Asia Times.
© Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times
The European Parliament has begun examining legislation that would give cities and national governments greater legal certainty when restricting short-term rentals and the use or acquisition of residential property in areas where housing has become difficult to afford.
The proposed Affordable Housing Act, presented by the European Commission on 9 September, was on Parliament’s agenda in Strasbourg on Tuesday as housing costs move further into EU-level politics.
The legislation does not transfer general housing policy to Brussels. Decisions on construction, planning, rent policy and social housing would remain primarily with national, regional and local authorities.
Instead, the proposal would establish a common EU legal framework governing some restrictions that member states and cities may introduce when attempting to protect housing supply.
The draft regulation specifically covers measures restricting short-term accommodation in residential properties other than a host’s primary residence. It would also cover restrictions on the acquisition or use of land and housing that is not intended as somebody’s principal home.
Those provisions are designed partly to resolve a legal problem that has become increasingly important in cities with large tourism markets.
Local governments have introduced restrictions on holiday rentals and second-home use, but such measures can clash with EU single-market rules governing services, property and establishment. The Commission says the legislation would provide authorities with a clearer method for demonstrating when restrictions are justified and proportionate.
The law would therefore not impose a common European cap on Airbnb-type accommodation. Nor would it oblige cities to introduce restrictions.
Authorities choosing to intervene would instead have to demonstrate housing stress and ensure that their measures meet EU requirements on proportionality, transparency and review.
Brussels argues that the scale of Europe’s housing problem now affects more than social policy.
According to the Commission’s European affordable housing plan, house prices across the EU have risen by more than 60 per cent since 2013, while average rents have increased by about 20 per cent. Short-term rentals increased by 93 per cent between 2018 and 2024.
Only between six and seven per cent of EU housing stock is classified as social housing, while about 20 per cent of homes are recorded as unoccupied.
The Commission estimates that Europe needs to build more than two million homes a year to meet current demand — around 650,000 more annually than are presently being constructed. It estimates the additional investment requirement at approximately €153 billion each year.
Those figures underline a central difficulty in the housing debate: restrictions on tourist accommodation may return some properties to residential use, but they do not address the full shortage of new homes.
EU Today examined that wider supply issue when the Commission launched its European Affordable Housing Plan, which combines proposed regulation with investment, faster permitting, construction reform and changes to state-aid rules.
The debate is becoming more politically prominent as housing affordability affects a growing share of middle-income households as well as those on lower incomes.
Berlin offers one example. EU Today reported last month that advertised rents in the German capital had risen by roughly three-quarters in less than a decade, while the city calculates that it will need another 211,000 homes by 2040.
Pressure is particularly acute in large cities and tourism centres, where residential demand competes with short-term accommodation and investment properties.
The Commission argues that this has consequences for the wider economy because workers who cannot find affordable accommodation may be unable to move to areas where jobs are available.
That is why Brussels increasingly presents housing not only as a social concern but as part of the competitiveness and single-market agenda.
The proposal is still at an early stage. Parliament and the Council must negotiate the legislation under the ordinary legislative procedure, and substantial amendments remain possible.
Questions are likely to centre on how “housing stress” is defined, what evidence authorities must provide before restricting property use and how far EU law should permit local intervention in property markets.
The political dividing line is already apparent. One side of the debate stresses that cities need more freedom to protect permanent housing stock. The other warns that regulation of short-term rentals or second properties can affect tourism businesses, property owners and investment without necessarily creating sufficient new supply.
The Affordable Housing Act attempts to establish legal rules for that dispute rather than settle it centrally.
If adopted, its importance will therefore depend less on a single Brussels policy than on how individual European cities use the powers and legal protection it provides.
In September, Ukraine struck more Russian air defense systems than in each month since 2024. Its Defense Ministry reports that Ukraine stepped up strikes on targets deep in the Russian rear, and this is how it hit this amount of protective systems, radars among them, in the history of the ePoints program.
ePoints are points that Ukrainian units earn for verified combat missions, from strikes to reconnaissance and evacuation, and spend on drones, ground robots, and electronic warfare systems on the state's Brave1 Market. In September, units confirmed hits on 33,087 Russian soldiers under the program, more than in any month this year except March and April.
Every result is recorded on video in the DELTA battlefield system and verified by the Brave1 defense innovation cluster, the ministry said. Russian losses are also growing far from the contact line, it added, and units are finding new and unconventional ways to inflict them.
The strikes are meant for "bleeding the Russian war machine," Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara said on 4 October.
In September, the number of hits more than 20 kilometers behind the front line exceeded 11,000 for the first time. Hits beyond 50 kilometers also set a record, most of them along the Russian logistics route between Mariupol and Crimea. One air defense system was hit 552 kilometers away.
Ukraine also now has a ballistic missile for such depths, not simply drones. It fired its first FP-7 in combat on 1 October, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced without naming a target. Its maker, Fire Point, plans an interceptor version that aims to achieve a first ballistic missile shoot down by mid-2027.
Even as Russia kept changing its air attack tactics and launched more jet-powered drones, Ukrainian troops shot down 28% more non-jet-powered Shahed drones in September than in August, the ministry said.
Jet drones remain the harder target. Ukraine shoots down 85 to 92% of propeller-driven Shaheds but only 50 to 60% of jet-powered ones, Zelensky said on 4 October, when he announced a new small missile called Nika for testing against them. Ukraine's military intelligence estimates that Russia builds about 3,000 jet-powered drones a month.
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz have called for a new European Union trade instrument capable of acting rapidly against countries whose economic practices cause serious disruption to the European market.
In a joint initiative sent to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Monday, the two governments proposed strengthening the EU’s ability to respond to what they describe as systemic market distortions, including dumping, widespread subsidies and restrictions affecting access to critical supplies.
The Franco-German proposal does not formally identify China as its target. However, many of the practices it describes correspond directly to long-standing European concerns over Chinese industrial policy, including excess manufacturing capacity, state support and restrictions on exports of critical minerals.
The initiative represents a further development in a harder European approach towards Beijing. EU Today reported last week that China had warned it would respond if the EU introduced new restrictions against Chinese companies or products.
Macron and Merz are proposing two additional instruments.
The first would be intended to reduce European companies’ dependence on single suppliers for strategically important products and raw materials. The second would allow the EU to restrict access to its internal market when a third country uses political or economic measures that seriously undermine fair competition.
Under the proposal, the Commission could initiate countermeasures unless a qualified majority of EU governments voted to block them. That would reverse the normal political dynamic in which Brussels must first secure sufficient support before acting.
German officials have argued that the EU needs powers comparable in effect to the United States’ Section 301 trade measures or China’s ability to restrict exports of critical raw materials.
The Commission has welcomed the Franco-German intervention as a contribution to its work on economic security and global trade imbalances. Any new instrument would, however, require legislation and approval by both EU governments and the European Parliament before it could be used.
The proposal comes amid growing concern in both Paris and Berlin over the effect of subsidised Chinese production on European manufacturers.
Germany’s position is particularly significant. Berlin has traditionally been more cautious than Paris about measures that could restrict trade with China, reflecting the importance of the Chinese market to German carmakers, engineering companies and chemical producers.
That position has shifted as German industry faces increased competition from Chinese electric vehicles, machinery and other manufactured goods.
EU Today has previously examined the emerging Franco-German alignment on tougher China trade defences and demands from German manufacturers for broader European action rather than product-by-product investigations.
The new proposals go considerably further by seeking a mechanism capable of dealing with entire sectors and acting much more quickly than conventional anti-dumping proceedings.
Chemicals, PET plastics and hybrid vehicles are among sectors identified in the Franco-German document as areas where additional action may be required.
The timing is also significant. EU leaders are due to discuss trade relations with China at their summit in Brussels on 15–16 October, while Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič is expected to hold talks with Chinese officials beforehand.
The Commission is already attempting to balance two objectives: maintaining Europe’s access to the Chinese market while reducing strategic dependencies that could be used as political leverage.
The Franco-German plan would give Brussels another instrument at the more coercive end of that policy. Its eventual importance will depend on whether governments agree to create it and how readily they would permit the Commission to use it against a major trading partner.
On September 30, SK Hynix’s American depositary shares closed at US$184.15 on the Nasdaq. Earlier that day in Seoul, one ordinary share closed at 1,776,000 won, about $1,308.80. Ten ADSs represent one Seoul share, so each ADS’s slice was worth about $130.88. Comparing those two closing prices gives the ADSs a 40.7% premium. The markets […]
The post Why Americans pay 41% more for SK Hynix shares than Koreans appeared first on Asia Times.
Under a draft proposal reported on Tuesday, Brussels would offer what it describes as “gradual integration”, extending access to trade, research, innovation and industrial cooperation as individual candidates bring their legislation into line with EU rules and demonstrate that they can enforce them.
The proposal would take considerably further an approach the Commission has been developing for several years. Its existing policy review on pre-enlargement reforms already provides for gradual integration into selected EU policies before accession, including early access to parts of the single market.
According to the reported draft, earlier integration would create new opportunities for EU businesses, reinforce European value chains and reduce strategic dependencies.
“Earlier integration will unlock opportunities for Union businesses, strengthen European value chains and reduce strategic dependencies,” the draft states.
The Commission would determine where sufficient regulatory alignment and enforcement capacity existed to permit deeper participation in research, innovation and industrial cooperation, as well as broader market access.
The arrangement would remain conditional. Candidate countries would not receive unrestricted access simply because accession negotiations had begun.
Instead, the extent of integration would depend on progress in adopting and enforcing EU legislation, as well as cooperation with Brussels on foreign policy, sanctions, investment screening, export controls and the protection of sensitive technologies.
One of the most significant elements of the proposal is the connection between economic integration and the EU’s wider security policy.
As industrial and market integration deepens, participation in sensitive sectors would have to be accompanied by cooperation on investment screening, export controls, sanctions implementation and protection of sensitive technologies, according to the draft.
Access would also take account of strategic alignment, critical dependencies and a candidate country’s ability to manage risks involving infrastructure and supply chains.
The Commission has already established the principle that early integration into the single market requires both alignment with EU legislation and effective enforcement. Existing arrangements with Ukraine, Moldova and Western Balkan countries have been used to test integration in individual sectors before membership.
The new proposal would expand that model considerably.
It could also increase pressure on candidate countries whose foreign policies diverge from those of the EU, particularly over relations with Russia and China.
Ukraine, Moldova, Albania and Montenegro are expected to be offered specific roadmaps intended to accelerate their integration over the coming years.
All four have advanced in the accession process, although at different speeds.
Ukraine and Moldova have moved into substantive negotiations covering the legislation and institutional reforms required for membership. As EU Today reported in June, the process now involves detailed scrutiny of the rule of law, public administration, democratic institutions and the ability to implement EU legislation.
Moldova is already being integrated into selected areas of the European economy. It has joined the Single Euro Payments Area and the EU’s roaming regime, while Brussels has also expanded its participation in European programmes. The Commission said after the EU-Moldova summit in June that gradual integration into the single market was already under way.
Ukraine has similarly been moving towards deeper economic integration through its existing free-trade arrangements with the EU and sector-by-sector alignment with European legislation.
Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos has previously said that Brussels intends to accelerate Ukraine’s integration into additional parts of the single market before membership, adding that ideas developed for Ukraine should also be considered for other candidates.
The proposal comes as the EU attempts to resolve a central problem surrounding its current enlargement round: accession can take many years, while the political and economic consequences of keeping candidate countries outside the Union continue to grow.
Croatia, which joined in 2013, remains the EU’s most recent new member.
Several candidates have spent years — and in some cases decades — within the accession framework. Negotiations with Türkiye are effectively frozen, while Serbia, North Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina have experienced prolonged delays.
Brussels is also considering how to protect EU decision-making and rule-of-law standards as membership expands. EU Today reported earlier this year that five member states had proposed additional safeguards for future members, including stronger monitoring and mechanisms intended to prevent individual governments from obstructing EU decisions.
Gradual integration offers a separate response to the same enlargement problem: economic integration would no longer have to wait until every stage of accession had been completed.
The European Parliament has backed the principle of merit-based and reversible gradual integration, including access to parts of the single market for candidates making sufficient progress. Parliament has also stressed that such arrangements should not become a substitute for membership or create different permanent categories of EU states.
Under the Commission’s emerging model, candidates could therefore move progressively into the EU’s economic and regulatory system while accession negotiations continue.
Full membership would remain the stated objective. But a process in which most of the economic advantages arrive only at the end could increasingly be replaced by one in which access is granted sector by sector as candidates meet the required conditions.
The Commission is due to present its assessment of how future enlargement will affect major EU policies, and what changes the Union itself will need to accommodate new members, on 6th October.
TOKYO — Anyone betting that inflation risks are fading should look at the US Treasury market. The sharp selloff in Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) suggests the world’s biggest bond market is growing less convinced that price pressures are contained. Investors are rethinking the inflation outlook, with implications for Federal Reserve policy, real rates and stock […]
The post Bond markets aren’t buying the inflation-is-tamed fairy tale appeared first on Asia Times.
The European Commission wants to cut the EU’s public procurement rulebook from around 900 pages to 200, in a sweeping reform that aims to simplify tendering while giving governments greater scope to favour European economic and security interests, writes Catherine Feore.
Executive Vice-President Stéphane Séjourné held up the existing body of rules alongside its much slimmer replacement, to illustrate his point.
“These here are the European rules which currently govern public procurement in Europe: 900 pages,” he said. “And this is what we are proposing today… down to 200 pages.”
The proposed Public Procurement Act would replace three EU procurement directives with a single regulation, with a view to simplifying procurement provisions spread across 26 sectoral laws and cutting the number of procedures from five to three.
The Commission estimates the changes could save businesses and public authorities €650 million a year in administrative costs.
The reform matters because of Europe’s massive purchasing power involved. EU public procurement exceeds €2.5 trillion annually, around 15% of EU GDP, covering everything from trains and hospitals to energy infrastructure, schools and IT systems.
From lowest price to strategic purchasing
The proposal is not just about cutting red tape. Brussels wants governments to use their purchasing power more strategically.
The Best Price-Quality Ratio would become the standard method for awarding contracts, with quality normally accounting for at least 30% of the assessment and 50% for labour-intensive contracts. Authorities could consider environmental and social performance, innovation, security and resilience alongside price.
The commitment to a so-called European preference has been tempered by the EU’s international commitments, but access can be restricted when a country doesn’t reciprocate market access. Restrictions could also be imposed where reliance on foreign suppliers creates security-of-supply dependencies or threatens EU economic security.
“European public money should, wherever possible, create jobs, investment and opportunities in Europe rather than filling the order books of our competitors,” Séjourné said.
Five procurement procedures would become three: open, dynamic and innovation procedures. Each would allow negotiation between buyers and bidders.
The Commission also plans an integrated EU digital procurement marketplace connecting national e-procurement platforms. A company registered through one connected system should be able to bid elsewhere in Europe without repeatedly submitting the same documentation. This is intended to reduce bureaucracy and tackle one of the current system's weaknesses: too little competition, particularly from SMEs and companies bidding across borders.
National, regional and local priorities may appreciate this flexibility in theory, but constrained budgets often mean that price will remain the bottom line for many. This legislation offers greater freedom in determining needs, but it remains to be seen what its impact will be.
PHOTO CREDIT: European Commission Executive Vice-President Stéphane Séjourné says the rules reduced from 900 pages to 200 pages © European Union
The European Commission calls it the Affordable Housing Act and says it can “truly bring a change in people’s lives”. But how much will it actually do to make housing more affordable, asks Catherine Feore?
The tension at the heart of the proposal is that Brussels is making ambitious claims about tackling the housing crisis while simultaneously making clear that it is not imposing new housing policies on governments or cities.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the measure fulfils a promise to tackle housing affordability, describing it as “one step in this direction” and declaring: “Today, we are delivering for all Europeans.” Housing Commissioner Dan Jørgensen went further, saying the Act gives governments and cities tools to “make more affordable homes available”.
Yet the proposed legislation itself is considerably more cautious.
The Commission acknowledges that insufficient housing supply is the structural cause of the affordability crisis. Short-term rentals, second homes and other non-primary uses are not the root problem, although they can exacerbate shortages and push up prices in already constrained markets.
Housing stress test
The Act principally delivers a common legal framework for authorities that choose to intervene.
Central to this is a new EU test for housing stress. An area would normally qualify where an average home costs at least eight years of disposable per-capita income, that ratio has increased over the previous decade, and pressures are unlikely to ease over the next three years. At a ratio of ten or more, the historical deterioration test is dropped. Population dynamics, housing supply and demand must also be assessed.
Authorities could then restrict short-term rentals outside a host’s primary residence or tackle second homes, prolonged vacancy and certain other non-primary uses. But there is no obligation. They must also demonstrate that the activity has significantly harmed housing affordability or availability for at least three years, and any restriction must be targeted, necessary and proportionate. This seems to set a high bar of evidence for most local authorities.
Currently, local authorities must notify the Commission of short-term rental restrictions under the Services Directive. That notification requirement will no longer be required. Cities can use the new framework without seeking prior Commission approval, although measures must be published and remain open to legal challenge. Officials argue this will remove a burdensome procedure and make intervention easier.
But the Commission is equally explicit about what it is not doing. The Act does not regulate rents, harmonise housing policy, give Brussels new housing competences, dictate taxation, inheritance or planning, or require, recommend or encourage authorities to impose restrictions. Housing policy choices “remain national, regional and local”.
Executive Vice-President Teresa Ribera says that when markets fail to provide affordable homes, “public authorities have a responsibility to act”. But the Act does not compel that action; it provides a stronger legal framework if authorities choose to act independently.
Its impact could be real in tourist hotspots where non-primary housing use is demonstrably worsening shortages. But it cannot itself build a home or lower a rent. The question is whether a clearer legal toolbox matches the expectations created by the Commission’s promise to tackle Europe’s housing crisis. When asked to quantify how much of a difference the new provisions could make, the Commission couldn’t give precise figures, saying that it would depend on the measures adopted.
PHOTO CREDIT: Teresa Ribera, Executive Vice-President of the European Commission for a Clean, Just and Competitive Transition, and Dan Jørgensen, European Commissioner for Energy and Housing, give a press conference on the affordable housing Photographer: Jennifer Jacquemart © European Union
KARACHI: Pakistan LNG Limited has issued a fresh tender on Wednesday to procure a spot LNG cargo for delivery between September 8 and 12, after rejecting the sole bid received for an earlier delivery window as too expensive. The state-owned buyer turned down an offer from BP Singapore at $26.969 per million British thermal units ... Read more
The post Pakistan floats fresh LNG tender after rejecting costly single bid appeared first on BOL News.
Login