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The World
A Stunningly Sudden End to a Long, Bloody Conflict in the Caucasus. Tens of thousands died fighting for and against it, destroying the careers of two presidents — one Armenian, one Azerbaijani — and tormenting a generation of American, Russian and European diplomats pushing stillborn peace plans. It outlasted six U.S. presidents. But the self-declared state in the mountainous enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh — recognized by no other country — vanished so quickly last week that its ethnic Armenian population had only minutes to pack before abandoning their homes and joining an exodus driven by fears of ethnic cleansing by a triumphant Azerbaijan. After surviving more than three decades of on-off war and pressure from big outside powers to give up, or at least narrow, its ambitions as a separate country with its own president, army, flag and government, the Republic of Artsakh inside the internationally recognized borders of Azerbaijan collapsed almost overnight. Or Slava Grigoryan, one of the thousands this week who fled Nagorno-Karabakh, said he had only 15 minutes to pack before heading to Armenia along a narrow mountain road controlled by Azerbaijani troops. On the way, he said, he saw the soldiers grab four Armenian men from his convoy and take them away. (New York Times)
“Days after Azerbaijan defeated the ethnic Armenian authorities who have long ruled the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh, speculation is swirling over whether another government could fall: that of Armenia itself.” (Los Angeles Times)
Ian Bremmer offers a “brief history of Nagorno-Karabakh” that begins: “In the wake of the Russian Empire’s collapse in 1917, Armenia and Azerbaijan declared independence and laid claim to Karabakh (along with two other ethnically mixed regions, Nakhchivan and Zangezur). War broke out in 1920, but before the matter could be settled, the Soviet Union conquered the entire Caucasus, and by the following year Joseph Stalin had designated Nagorno-Karabakh an autonomous region within the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic with no land connection to Armenia.” (GZERO Media)
Russia’s Wagner troops are back on the battlefield, Ukraine says. Mercenaries from the Russian Wagner Group are back fighting on the front line in Ukraine, a senior Ukrainian military official told POLITICO on Wednesday. Several hundred fighters from the group once ruled by now-dead warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin were spotted fighting in the ranks of different Russian military units on the eastern front, said Colonel Serhiy Cherevatyi. (Politico)
The Netherlands is planning to deliver its first F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine at some point in 2024, the country’s defense minister, Kajsa Ollongren, said. (Politico)
Key European business group in China is urging mainland authorities to renew their efforts to turn Shanghai into a global financial hub to increase the flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) into the troubled economy. Shanghai has to cut red tape, reduce tax rates, make the yuan fully convertible and broaden market access for foreign companies to attract businesses, talent and capital, said Jens Ewert, a board member of the Shanghai chapter of the European Union Chamber of Commerce, adding that liberalisation over the past two decades has not lived up to expectations. (South China Morning Post)
Six young Portuguese people brought a case to the European Court of Human Rights, alleging that 32 nations have failed to act on global warming. The six, aged 11 to 24, claim they are suffering from “having to live with a climate that is getting hotter and hotter.” (DW)
Days after Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare snubbed an invitation to meet President Biden at a Pacific summit, Solomon Islands has joined the China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. El Salvador, “which deepened its relationship with Beijing a few years after switching ties from Taipei,” and Tanzania, “another key Beijing ally and where China has vast interests,” have also been admitted to the AIIB. (South China Morning Post)
Both federal funding and the law underpinning the existence of the FAA are set to lapse at the end of the week, “leaving the agency facing an especially broad double government shutdown. If the FAA law and federal funding expire simultaneously, air traffic controllers and some aviation safety inspectors would continue to work while being unpaid. But the training of new air traffic controllers would cease” and work on technology upgrades would be disrupted. (Washington Post)
Trump and Biden woo striking workers in preview of 2024. Donald Trump is heading to Michigan to woo striking car-workers, a day after President Joe Biden turned up on the picket line in the Midwestern state - an early skirmish in the battle for the blue-collar vote ahead of next year's White House election.The former president is skipping tonight's televised Republican debate over in California to deliver primetime remarks at a non-unionised car parts supplier just outside Detroit. On Tuesday, Mr Biden's glad-handing of United Auto Workers (UAW) members, also near Motor City, was a first for a sitting US president during a strike in modern times. But clusters of red-shirted car workers on the picket line in the Detroit suburb of Wayne on Wednesday had few illusions about what's driving these back-to-back visits by the two men most likely to contest the 2024 polls.One of the striking car workers at Ford, 38-year-old Tony Branner, said he had voted for neither candidate in 2020.He told the BBC he had not been paying much attention to the election campaign so far.But with the two rivals practically at his doorstep, he was ready to listen. (BBC)
Economy
Key measures of consumer sentiment “are flashing warning signs that show the American vibe shifting downward again.” The data show that the “recent reversal in gas prices (heading up) and in the stock market (heading down) are weighing on our mood. So is the continuing reality of living in a higher-price world.” (Axios)
As mortgage rates rise to the highest level in two decades, demand “is now sitting near a 27-year low. Total mortgage application volume fell 1.3% last week compared with the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s seasonally adjusted index. Volume was 25.5% lower than the same week one year ago.” (CNBC)
Millions of U.S. homeowners “are facing higher insurance rates due to the risk of wildfires, high winds and flooding,” according to an analysis by climate data nonprofit First Street Foundation. About 12 million properties “may see premium hikes because of the risk of flooding, nearly 24 million because of potential wind damage, and about 4.4 million because of wildfire risk.” (Axios)
HSBC is set to acquire Citigroup's China consumer wealth management business, which manages more than $3 billion in assets, two sources with knowledge of the matter said, in a major boost to the London-based bank's business in that country. The transaction, the financial details of which were not immediately known, will also see Asia-focussed HSBC taking over "a few hundreds" of Citi's China-based staff, said one of the sources. (Reuters)
Europe stocks close at six-month low as global data continues to cause concern. European markets slipped Wednesday as investors continued to assess inflation, interest rates and the health of the global economy. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index provisionallly closed 0.2% lower after muted trading through the day, marking its fifth straight decline and its lowest close since March 28. (CNBC)
Oil majors boost investments in LatAm. Chevron will ramp up oil output in Venezuela as it seeks to recoup $3 billion in unpaid debt from Caracas. In exchange for easing sanctions on Venezuela’s beleaguered oil industry, the U.S. is seeking a commitment from Caracas for free and fair presidential elections next year. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, keen to revive his country’s devastated economy ahead of the vote, has also courted China. During a state visit to Beijing last month, Maduro said Venezuela and China would build a partnership “where energy and oil are at the axis.” Despite having enormous renewable energy potential, Latin American countries have maintained their focus on exploiting their fossil-fuel deposits. Brazil is likely to approve a Petrobras oil exploration project near the mouth of the Amazon, while Mexico has committed tens of billions of dollars to an oil refinery that has ballooned in cost multiple times. Bucking the trend, Ecuadorian activists celebrated the cancellation of an oil project in the Yasuni National Park this year. But if Latin America’s economies continue to struggle, “sooner or later that oil is going to be exploited,” the head of an Amazon non-profit said. (Semafor)
“Many energy analysts think that oil prices will soon rise above $100 a barrel for the first time in more than a year, since the turmoil that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.” The price of Brent crude has gained about 30% since the start of July, “trading at about $96.50 a barrel on Wednesday. (New York Times)
Delta CEO Says Airline Went ‘Too Far’ With New SkyMiles Requirements: Bastian said the carrier will make modifications to the new changes to the loyalty program. (Wall Street Journal)
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is pressing SEC Chair Gary Gensler “to push out a strong climate risk reporting rule, saying voluntary disclosures by Wall Street firms can’t be trusted.” Warren wants Gensler “to stand by the SEC’s plans to require that certain public companies report data on the greenhouse emissions generated throughout their supply chains — so-called Scope 3 emissions — along with other disclosures.” (Politico)
Thailand's central bank “brought its policy rate to 2.5%, an eighth-consecutive increase that came in defiance of market expectations and in a bid to keep inflation in check.” Thailand's chief consumer price index rose 0.88% in August from a year earlier, “remaining below the central bank's target range of 1% to 3% for four consecutive months.” (Nikkei Asia)
Technology
FTC Chair Lina Khan defended the agency’s antitrust case against Amazon, saying in a Wednesday interview that the lawsuit “is ‘fundamentally about protecting free and fair competition’ and den[ying] suggestions that the FTC is interested in punishing large companies for their success.” (CNBC)
The lawsuit “faces a tough uphill climb because it takes a lot of certainty before the U.S. government will hogtie a U.S. corporation. … As with the Justice Department's antitrust suit against Google, which is now being tried in a Washington, D.C. courtroom, there's a long list of complex hurdles that the government has to clear in order to win.” (Axios)
Surprisingly Large Sums Have Gone Into Bug Farming Startups. Eat more bugs. That is the last thing on most of our to-do lists. Startup investors, however, seem to think otherwise. At least that’s the impression one gets looking at insect cultivation-related funding over the past couple years. Venture capitalists have poured hundreds of millions into upstarts aimed at getting livestock, pets, and even people, to consume more bug products. Examples abound. InnovaFeed, a French biotech developing insect-based protein for the agriculture and aquaculture industries, landed a $250 million Series D just last year. Ynsect, a mealworm cultivator, picked up $170 million in April. And Protix, a Dutch supplier of insect ingredients for humans and animals, has scooped up nearly $120 million to date. (Crunchbase)
Iran says it successfully launched an imaging satellite into space, “a move that could further ratchet up tensions with Western nations that fear its space technology could be used to develop nuclear weapons.” Iran claims the Noor-3 satellite had been put in an orbit 450 kilometers (280 miles) above the Earth’s surface. (Associated Press)
iPhone 15 Pro Owners Complain About Overheating Problems: The issue could threaten Apple’s premium phones, a cash cow essential to its growth and profits. (WSJ)
Smart Links
The United Auto Workers union will announce expanded strikes against the Big Three if significant progress in negotiations is not made by Friday morning. (CNBC)
Mitsubishi has decided to withdraw from automobile production in China. (Nikkei Asia)
The UK has approved the exploration of oil and gas in the Rosebank field, the largest undeveloped field in the North Sea. (DW)
Wells Fargo to pay $550mn for Neiman Marcus’s empty space at Hudson Yards. (Financial Times)
Startups Squint to Read the IPO Tea Leaves. (The Information)
How Microsoft could supplant Apple as the world’s most valuable firm (Economist)