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The World
Chinese President Xi Jinping cautioned the French and German leaders that sanctions on Russia could “drag down” the global economy, as Europe stepped up a lobbying campaign for China to mediate on Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Xi told French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz that he “deeply regretted the return of war to the European continent” and supported a diplomatic resolution to the crisis. He reiterated Beijing’s opposition to sanctions, which have become a cornerstone of the West’s response to Russian aggression. (South China Morning Post)
China’s rise to Russia’s most important trade partner: Russia has continuously expanded the share of its imports from China over the past two decades. The share of the total value of Russia's imports coming from China is around 24%. At the beginning of the millennium, Russia still obtained most of its imports from Germany (13.8%). Since 2007, China has been supplying more goods to Russia than it imports from there. China, for its part, mainly imports crude oil and petroleum products from Russia. Only a few weeks ago, Putin agreed on new investment projects and trade deals with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. A roadmap envisages increasing the bilateral trade volume to $200 billion by 2024. In 2021, the joint exchange of goods had reached a record $140.7 billion, according to Russian customs statistics. (Statista)
Iconic U.S. brands Coca-Cola, Pepsi and McDonald’s suspended business in Russia. The market represents one of the few regions worldwide where rival PepsiCo has a larger presence than Coke. Both McDonald’s and Starbucks announced that their Russian restaurants would temporarily close. Starbucks also said that all of its Russian business activity is suspended, including shipping its products. (CNBC)
Venezuela’s president Nicolás Maduro has described landmark talks he held with a US government delegation as “respectful” and “cordial”, as Washington explores a rapprochement with Caracas to secure alternative oil supplies to Russia. (Financial Times)
How Ukraine could keep the lights on as Russia attacks its power supplies: Officials and energy executives in the nation are pushing for rapidly integrating the country’s grid with the European Union’s system. That effort was already underway, but was expected to cost at least €600 million and take years to complete. The question now is whether that can be shrunk down to weeks by dropping some of the usual requirements and agreements. (MIT Technology Review)
Ukraine Philanthropy:
Google will use office space in Poland to support Ukrainian refugees, utilizing its Startups Campus in Warsaw as a space for local nongovernmental organizations to provide legal and psychological services to refugees. (CNBC)
Airbnb said it would offer free housing to up to 100,000 people fleeing Ukraine. As of Sunday, CEO Brian Chesky said that more than 11,000 hosts signed up to offer their homes to Ukrainians in need. But Airbnb is also being used to funnel donations directly to people, rather than acting as a liaison between charities and the country. People are booking Airbnb stays and experiences in Ukraine that they don’t intend on using. Nearly 61,500 nights were booked in Ukraine, giving $1.9 million to hosts in the country, Chesky tweeted. The platform is also temporarily waiving guest and host fees on bookings in the country. Without that, the bookings wouldn’t make much sense as a charitable move, since Airbnb takes about 17% of a typical transaction. (Protocol)
Russians are trying to flee Putin’s chaos: Using data from Google Trends, The Economist has tracked the discontent. Putin, so intent on bringing Ukraine under his control, is neglecting the problems facing Russians at home. A survey conducted between February 17th and 21st—that is, in the week before Mr Putin’s invasion—by the Levada Centre, an independent Russian pollster, found that 43% of Russians between the ages of 18 and 24 wanted to leave the country for good. And 44% of those who hoped to emigrate cited the “economic situation” as their motivation. (The Economist)
Disney’s CEO addressed employees about the company’s stance on Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill. Bob Chapek sent a lengthy email to workers to address concerns of LGBTQ+ staff over the company’s public silence on legislation that would squelch discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools. Chapek said corporate statements “do very little to change outcomes or minds.” (Los Angeles Times)
L.A. is suing Monsanto and two related companies over toxic chemicals. The city is suing for past and future costs of dealing with contamination of waterways by long-banned chemicals called polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, the city attorney announced. (Los Angeles Times)
Six in 10 Americans are satisfied with the position of women in the U.S., which is similar to what Gallup has found over the past four years but well below the average of 71% from 2001 through 2008. As has typically been the case, women are less satisfied than men with their gender's position in society, and this year's 10-percentage-point gender gap nearly matches the average gap since 2001. (Gallup)
Economy
This Russian metals giant might be too big to sanction: From its base at a former Arctic gulag, Russia’s MMC Norilsk Nickel PJSC digs up a large portion of two metals that are essential to greener transport and computer chips. So far the U.S. and its allies haven’t sanctioned the company, or its oligarch chief executive, underscoring the dilemma some analysts say governments face in seeking to punish Russia without hurting their own access to key commodities. The mining company is responsible for about 5% of the world’s annual production of nickel, a key component of electric-vehicle batteries, and some 40% of its palladium, which goes into catalytic converters and semiconductors. Nornickel, as the company is known, also supplies energy transition metals such as cobalt and copper. (Wall Street Journal)
The London Metal Exchange will not resume nickel trading this week as it works on ways to close a huge short position that has upended the market for one of its most important contracts. The LME suspended its nickel contract and cancelled all trades on Tuesday after the price doubled to a record above $100,000 a ton after a vicious short squeeze, which has left a Chinese metals tycoon facing billions of dollars in potential losses. (Financial Times)
Why is nickel important: Russia plays an important part in the production of the nickel that ends up in batteries used by many electric vehicles. When it comes to mining nickel, Russia isn’t a massive player, supplying up to 6% of the world’s nickel. (That puts it a distant third behind Indonesia and the Philippines.) But Russia’s role in producing the battery-grade nickel used in EVs is a different story — the CEO of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence says 20% of that supply comes from a single Russian company. (The Verge)
Visa and Mastercard are preparing to increase the fees that many large merchants pay when they accept consumers’ credit cards. The fee increases—delayed during the past two years because of the pandemic—are scheduled to kick in next month. (Wall Street Journal)
China inflation: China’s official consumer price index (CPI) rose by 0.9% in February from a year earlier, unchanged from January. China’s producer price index (PPI) rose by 8.8% in February, down from a rise of 9.1% in January. (South China Morning Post)
Japan downgrades Q4 GDP on consumer spending miss. (Nikkei Asia Review)
A crypto lobbying boom is sweeping Washington: Public Citizen, the consumer advocacy group said the number of lobbyists representing the industry reached 320 last year — up from 115 in 2018. Spending quadrupled too, reaching $9 million, from $2.2 million just three years earlier. (Protocol, Public Citizen)
Medical groups say prior authorization burdens persisted during pandemic: A new survey of doctor practices from the Medical Group Management Association found 98% of respondents wrestled with an increased or steady level of prior authorization requirements over the past year. (Healthcare Dive)
Enthusiasm for fintech funding wanes: VCs’ enthusiasm for fintech, which ranked as the hottest sector for startup investment last year, is showing signs of waning. In the past two weeks, a total of 51 fintech companies across the globe collectively raised $1.1 billion in seed through late-stage venture funding. This represents a definite drop. (Crunchbase)
Technology
The 7 biggest announcements from Apple’s Peek Performance event: 1) The M1 Ultra, basically two M1 Max chips put together, supporting up to 128GB of RAM. Apple says it’s eight times faster than the standard M1 chip. 2) The Mac Studio — like a Mac Mini aimed at creative professionals, with tons of I/O, cooling, and processing power. 3) The Studio Display monitor has a 27-inch, 5K screen encased in an aluminum enclosure. Above the screen is a 12-megapixel ultrawide camera for video conferencing. 4) Apple’s new iPhone SE has 5G and an A15 bionic CPU. 5) The new iPad Air has an M1 chip inside. 6) Apple TV Plus announces Friday Night Baseball, plus a new 24/7 MLB livestream with replays, news, highlights, and analysis. 7) Now you can get the iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Pro in green. (The Verge)
The M1 Ultra is essentially two M1 Max chips put together, making it even better suited to intensive creative applications like video editing and 3D rendering. During its launch event today, Apple revealed that the M1 Max chips housed a secret feature: a die-to-die interconnect, dubbed "UltraFusion," that allows it to connect multiple chips. Conceptually, it's similar to AMD's Infinity Fabric, which ensures speedy communication between the CPU, GPU and other components. (Engadget)
Apple will release iOS 15.4, macOS Monterey 12.3, watchOS 8.5, and tvOS 15.4 to all users next week. (9to5Mac)
Apple has finally discontinued the 27-inch iMac. Minutes after Apple’s Peek Performance event wrapped, the last of the Intel iMacs disappeared from its online store. (The Verge)
Publishing company Gannett provided inaccurate information to advertisers for nine months, misrepresenting where billions of ads were placed, according to researchers who provided their findings exclusively to The Wall Street Journal. Gannett owns USA Today as well as news outlets in 46 U.S. states, from the Arizona Republic to the Detroit Free Press to the Palm Beach Post. Like many publishers, it sells ad space on its sites through real-time digital auctions. In the case of Gannett, advertisers thought they were buying an ad on one Gannett site—very often the flagship USA Today—but actually purchased space on another, such as one of its many local outlets, according to ad industry researchers. (Wall Street Journal)
Amazon’s Clubhouse competitor has arrived. The retail giant on Tuesday launched a new mobile app called Amp, which allows people to create live “radio shows” where they can act as a DJ by taking callers and playing tracks from its catalog of tens of millions of licensed songs, ranging from classic titles to today’s music. The app is available in a limited U.S. beta. (TechCrunch)
Panasonic will begin commercial production of batteries for U.S. electric vehicle maker Tesla after struggling to bring a large U.S. battery plant online. The company will mass produce its latest power cells in Japan, where it has a large pool of skilled engineers. (Nikkei Asia Review)
Top podcast genres for females, by age: True Crime was the top overall genre listened to across females 18+. True Crime also claimed the top spot for females between the ages of 25-34, and females between 45-54. Fiction was the top genre for females ages 18-24. Kids and family was the top genre for females ages 35-44. News was the top genre for females ages 55+. (Triton Digital)
Smart Links
Russian sanctions drive renewed focus on Asia semiconductor reliance. (Axios)
Two new pledges to reduce food loss and waste at Google. (Google Blog)
A glaring gap in Congress’ surprise billing law leaves patients on the hook for pricey, out-of-network lab tests. (STAT News)
Lead exposure in last century shrank IQ scores of half of Americans. (Duke University)
Uber, Lyft and others are moving to head off labor unions. (Wall Street Journal)
Jack Ma’s Ant Group delays IPO as Beijing’s tech crackdown continues. (The Information)