标题: 2022.06.18 全球股市遭遇了两年多来最大的周跌幅 [打印本页] 作者: shiyi18 时间: 2022-6-18 22:51 标题: 2022.06.18 全球股市遭遇了两年多来最大的周跌幅 Global stockmarkets suffered their biggest weekly fall in more than two years. The FTSE All-World index fell by 5.6% after a series of interest-rate increases by central banks threatened economic slowdown. America’s Federal Reserve said its commitment to fight inflation is “unconditional”.
Russian forces appear to have renewed their advance south of Izyum, a city in eastern Ukraine, seeking to penetrate deeper into the Donetsk region, according to Britain’s defence ministry. Meanwhile, the governor of Luhansk, the other half of Ukraine’s embattled Donbas region, said shelling continued in the city of Severodonetsk, with 568 civilians trapped in the Azot chemical plant.
The Supreme Court of Iowa ruled that the state’s constitution does not guarantee a “fundamental right” to abortion. In a 5-2 ruling, the court upheld a law requiring a woman to wait 24 hours after an initial appointment for an abortion. A lower court had blocked that law. The new ruling comes ahead of a forthcoming decision by the nation’s Supreme Court on Roe v Wade, which could allow states to restrict access to abortion.
Bitcoin fell below the $20,000 threshold for the first time since November 2020 amid monetary tightening by central banks. The decline in value of the largest cryptocurrency, which serves as a reference point for other digital assets, erased years of gains for its owners and sparked worries that it could force liquidations of leveraged bets, prompting further sell-offs.
In a speech at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, declared that “the era of the unipolar world” has ended. He said that America and its allies were living “under their own delusions”, and blamed the West for rising food prices. He later said Russia had “nothing against” Ukraine joining the EU. The European Commission this week endorsed its candidacy.
Boris Johnson, Britain's prime minister, said his country would oversee a big training programme for Ukrainian armed forces fighting Russian troops in Ukraine. On his second visit to Kyiv since the war began four months ago, Mr Johnson said the proposed scheme could involve training up to 10,000 soldiers every four months. It had the potential to “change the equation” of the war, he added.
Police in Brazil identified the remains of one of the two bodies found in the Amazon as those of Dom Phillips, a British journalist. The second body is believed to be that of Bruno Pereira, an indigenous expert. The pair had disappeared in the remote Javari Valley, after Mr Pereira received death threats for campaigning against illegal fishing. A fisherman has confessed to murdering them, but police said they thought more people were involved.
Word of the week: Chivo, the name of El Salvador’s digital wallet (meaning “cool”), part of a scheme thrown into chaos by the falling price of cryptocurrencies. Read the full article.
The pitiful state of mental health
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
The World Health Organisation’s report into global mental health, published on Friday, was the largest such review in 20 years. It paints a grim picture of unmet global need. For decades, mental health has been one of the most overlooked areas of public health. Yet in 2019 nearly 1bn people were living with a mental-health disorder, the WHO estimates. Anxiety and depression are the most common afflictions.
Thanks to the pandemic, this picture has undoubtedly worsened since the report was drawn up. In the first year of covid-19, cases of depression and anxiety increased by more than 25%. The current economic downturn, social polarisation and the climate crisis threaten to make matters worse. What is striking, though unsurprising, is the poor availability of care for those who are unwell. About 71% of those with psychosis have no access to any mental-health services. Globally, the availability of doctors and drugs is poor and “most people with diagnosed mental health conditions go completely untreated”. Things evidently need to change, fast. Business as usual, the WHO says, “simply will not do”.
Why China’s shoppers want fridges
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
The “618” shopping festival, which reaches a climax this weekend, is providing an early test of Chinese consumer sentiment as shoppers in Shanghai and elsewhere emerge from prolonged lockdowns. Last year sales from China’s e-commerce giants reached an estimated 578.4bn yuan ($85.9bn) during the festival, which celebrates the anniversary of JD.com, one such behemoth. JD started selling things online after a previous epidemic—SARS in 2003-04—kept customers off the streets.
E-tailing has fared better than the offline kind during China’s recent Omicron outbreak, too. Online sales of goods grew by 7% (in nominal terms) in May, compared with a year earlier, even as retail sales overall fell by 6.7%. Analysts expect refrigerators and freezers to do well during this year’s jamboree: people want to stockpile food in case of future lockdowns. There also seems to be strong interest in camping equipment. There is nothing like being confined inside to enhance the appeal of the big outdoors.
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Rethinking Shakespeare, for all
PHOTO: THE PUBLIC THEATER
Shakespeare in the Park began as a scrappy experiment by a Jewish communist, Joseph Papp, who thought the bard should be available to all. Now a New York institution, the annual festival continues to stage acclaimed productions beneath the stars in Central Park—for anyone willing to stand in a queue from dawn, that is. On Saturday, it celebrates its 60th anniversary.
The celebrations kick off in earnest on Tuesday with a production of “Richard III”, starring Danai Gurira, of “Black Panther” fame, as the charismatic, hubristic antihero. At a time when classical theatre companies around the world are diversifying their casts, the decision to have a black woman portray a white tyrant feels au courant. Yet Papp explored non-traditional casting as early as the 1950s, guided by his belief in democratic, inclusive theatre. New Yorkers watching this summer’s first show—which, in a world of strongmen, feels especially timely in its depiction of a manipulative, deceitful, power-mad leader—will be grateful his vision endures.
A German art show full of surprises
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
Documenta, the contemporary-art show in the German city of Kassel that launched artists such as Ai Weiwei onto the world scene, opens on Saturday. The 15th edition of the five-yearly exhibition is hoping to defy conventions. It will be curated not by a single artistic visionary, but by an artists’ co-operative. A group from Indonesia, ruangrupa, has directed it around the idea of lumbung (meaning communal rice barn), which embodies collectivity and shared resources. Their ever-growing guest list reached a record 1,500 artists.
Yet even before its opening, Documenta has attracted unsolicited buzz. Its artistic directors have been at the centre of a media storm, after invited pro-Palestinian groups were accused of antisemitism. A budget scandal also overshadowed the show’s last iteration, in 2017. The collective’s members say their aim is for even the show’s artistic team to be “surprised at what happens”. That could cut both ways.
Weekend profile: Pierre Poilievre, Canada’s populist politician
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
At the start of this year Canada was the scene of unaccustomed excitement. Truckers opposed to a vaccine mandate parked their rigs in the centre of Ottawa, the country’s capital, and blocked one of the main bridges to America. Among their loudest supporters was Pierre Poilievre, a Conservative MP. Police eventually broke up the “freedom convoy”, but its message is still being spread by Mr Poilievre, now the country’s most talked-about politician—and the front-runner to become the leader of the opposition Conservative Party.
Like populists everywhere Mr Poilievre fulminates against elites, in his case the sort of people who hobnob in Davos; the central-bank governor, whom he holds partly responsible for inflation; “gatekeepers”, who make housing unaffordable; and, of course, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the son of another prime minister. Mr Poilievre has Donald Trump’s knack of talking about himself while still making audiences feel he is talking about them.
But Canada is not America, and Mr Poilievre is not Mr Trump. In Canada most voters are not as angry as the protesting truckers and national elections are won or lost in the multi-ethnic suburbs of Toronto. So Mr Poilievre chooses his targets carefully. He can safely lambast the CBC, Canada’s public broadcaster. But immigrants are off limits.
Thus Mr Poilievre’s core beliefs seem closer to the small-state ideology of Ronald Reagan than to Mr Trump’s incontinent chauvinism. Adopted by schoolteachers in Saskatchewan, Mr Poilievre grew up believing that “the greatest social safety-net we can ever have” is “voluntary generosity among family and community”.
He seems to have long had aims of high office; in high school he wrote to a newspaper denouncing Canada’s Liberal government for raising pension contributions. He is inching closer to that goal. After a barnstorming tour this spring, membership of the Conservative Party supposedly more than doubled to around 600,000, a record for a Canadian political party. Mr Poilievre’s campaign claims to have signed up more than half of those (his rivals in the party dispute that).
His first opportunity to become prime minister is likely to be in an election due in 2025. But first he faces a leadership election in September, where he must convince Conservatives that his calibrated version of populism has a chance in Canada.
Weekly crossword
Welcome to our new crossword, designed for experienced cruciverbalists and newcomers alike. Both sets of clues give the same answers, all of which feature in articles in this week’s edition of The Economist:
Factual clues
1 down The fibre from which globalisation is woven (6,5)
1 across Leads a government yet to unveil a promised new China strategy (6)
2 across This goes up when prices go down (5)
3 across A country where nearly half of new homes are factory-made (6)
Cryptic clues
1 down Any chip, plus manufacturing goods needed for a finished product (6, 5)
1 across Leading SPD character hates opulence, loves zeal (6)
2 across Idly echo, ignominiously surrender (5)
3 across In Europe, but not with a young leader (6)
Email all four answers by 9am BST on Monday to crossword@economist.com, along with your home city and country. We will pick randomly from those with the right answers and crown one winner per continent in Friday's edition.
The winners of this week’s quiz
Thank you to everyone who took part in this week’s quiz. The winners, chosen at random from each continent, were:
Asia: Chris Williams, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
North America: Jane Gose, Kihei, United States
Central and South America: Gines Sánchez, Panama City, Panama
Europe: Alastair Brockie, Sterling, Scotland
Africa: Hasit Raja, Nairobi, Kenya
Oceania: Inge Nusselder, Cust, New Zealand
They all gave the correct answers of Ronald Reagan, Indira Gandhi, John Lennon, Louis Armstrong and Charles de Gaulle. The theme is they have all had airports named after them: Washington, New Delhi, Liverpool, New Orleans and Paris.