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The World
Leaker of U.S. secret documents worked on military base, friend says: The online group that received hundreds of pages of classified material included foreigners, members tell The Post. The man behind a massive leak of U.S. government secrets that has exposed spying on allies, revealed the grim prospects for Ukraine’s war with Russia and ignited diplomatic fires for the White House is a young, charismatic gun enthusiast who shared highly classified documents with a group of far-flung acquaintances searching for companionship amid the isolation of the pandemic. United by their mutual love of guns, military gear and God, the group of roughly two dozen — mostly men and boys — formed an invitation-only clubhouse in 2020 on Discord, an online platform popular with gamers. But they paid little attention last year when the man some call “OG” posted a message laden with strange acronyms and jargon. The words were unfamiliar, and few people read the long note, one of the members explained. But he revered OG, the elder leader of their tiny tribe, who claimed to know secrets that the government withheld from ordinary people. (Washington Post)
China warned that a deepening security alliance between the U.S. and the Philippines should not harm its security and territorial interests and interfere in long-simmering territorial disputes in the South China Sea. Combat exercises between American and Filipino forces began on Tuesday in the Philippines. (Associated Press)
Japan’s Defense Ministry signed contracts worth nearly 380 billion yen ($2.8 billion) with the country’s top defense contractor, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, to develop and mass produce long-range missiles for deployment as early as 2026 amid growing fears of China’s increasing military strength. (Associated Press)
A large majority of U.S. adults (83%) continue to have negative views of China, and the share who have very unfavorable views (44%) has increased by 4 percentage points since last year. Around four-in-ten Americans also now describe China as an enemy of the U.S., rather than as a competitor or a partner – up 13 points since last year, according to a March 20-26, 2023, Pew Research Center survey. People are broadly concerned about China’s role in the world, both geopolitically and in terms of specific issues. For example, in the wake of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent visit to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin, 62% of Americans see the China-Russia partnership as a very serious problem for the U.S., up 5 points since October and back to the original high levels seen in the immediate aftermath of the Ukraine invasion in 2022. (Pew Research Center)
North Korea fired a ballistic missile of intermediate range or longer, South Korea and Japan said, prompting an alert for residents in Japan's northern island of Hokkaido to take cover. Japanese authorities later retracted the alert, saying an emergency warning system had made an erroneous prediction the missile would fall near the island. (Nikkei Asia Review)
Europe’s eastern half claps back at Macron: We need the US. “Instead of building strategic autonomy from the United States, I propose a strategic partnership with the United States,” Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said. Privately, diplomats were even franker. “We cannot understand [Macron’s] position on transatlantic relations during these very challenging times,” said one diplomat from an Eastern European country, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to freely express themselves. “We, as the EU, should be united. Unfortunately, this visit and French remarks following it are not helpful.” The reactions reflect the long-simmering divisions within Europe over how to best defend itself. (Politico EU)
Germany's foreign minister begins a visit to China aiming to reassert a common European Union policy toward Beijing days after remarks by French President Emmanuel Macron suggested disarray in the continent's approach to the rising superpower. (Reuters)
A Parkinson’s ‘game changer,’: New findings provide the clearest evidence yet that the presence of a particular misfolded protein can be used to determine if people have Parkinson’s. It is an advance, funded by the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, that could lead to new diagnostics very quickly, and could rapidly accelerate the search for treatments for the disease. (STAT News)
Severe flooding strikes Fort Lauderdale as parts of South Florida face historic amounts of rainfall, leading to a flash flood emergency in Broward County and one mayor calling the deluge the “most severe flooding that I’ve ever seen.” Around 10 to 14 inches of rain have fallen across the area Wednesday and an additional two to four inches are possible as heavy thunderstorms continue to move slowly across the area. (CNN)
Economy
Federal Reserve officials appear on track to extend their run of interest-rate hikes when they meet next month, shrugging off their advisers’ warning of recession with a bet that they need to do a little more to curb inflation. Minutes of last month’s policy meeting showed officials dialed back expectations of how high they’ll need to lift rates after a series of bank collapses roiled markets last month. Still, officials raised their benchmark lending rate a quarter point to a range of 4.75% to 5%, as they sought to balance the risk of a credit crunch with incoming data showing price pressures remained too high. (Bloomberg)
After worrying inflation data so far this year, March's numbers offer room for guarded optimism: Some key underlying details of the report pointed to downward inflation momentum. Rent, part of the massive shelter category that's helped push up inflation for months, may finally be reflecting the moderation that has appeared in private sector data. The index rose 0.5% in March — slowing from the 0.8% rise in February — with further downshifting expected. There was also moderation in the "supercore" measure being watched closely by the Fed (i.e. core services excluding housing), given the close ties to labor market dynamics. For now, America's inflation story remains the same: too high and too sticky for the appetite of Fed policymakers, with no guarantee of a straight downward path. (Axios Macro)
US-Saudi Oil Pact Breaking Down as Russia Grabs Upper Hand: An empowered OPEC+ led by Saudi Arabia and Moscow is calling the shots on oil prices, boosting inflation and raising recession risks. (Bloomberg)
Silicon Valley investors are touring the Middle East, seeking to build long-term ties with sovereign wealth funds during the worst funding crunch for venture capital firms in almost a decade. Top technology VCs such as Andreessen Horowitz, Tiger Global and IVP have jetted teams of executives to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in recent weeks, according to people with knowledge of the trips. These visits come after their traditional North American and European backers contend with an economic downturn that has forced them to rein in private investments. “We came to San Francisco looking for them in 2017. Now . . . everyone is coming to [us],” said Ibrahim Ajami, head of ventures at Mubadala Capital, part of Mubadala Investment Company, a $284bn Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund. “The tech correction has humbled the industry.” (Financial Times)
A New Way to Push People Back to Offices: Tying Pay to Attendance. The law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, whose clients include some of Wall Street’s biggest banks and other companies, has told staffers that those who don’t adhere to the firm’s policy to spend at least three days a week in the office could see their bonuses reduced. The shift reflects a desire among the firm’s leaders to see associates in the office on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, as is currently required. On Wednesday, the operating committee of JPMorgan Chase & Co. issued a memo to the company, telling managing directors—among the company’s most senior employees—that they would now be required in offices five days a week. The company also reminded other employees on hybrid schedules that attendance is expected three days a week at a minimum. (Wall Street Journal)
Technology
Rising export restrictions on lithium, cobalt and other raw materials critical to the energy transition threaten to slow the move to a greener economy, according to the OECD. A new report indicates that over the last decade, export restrictions on critical minerals—usually in the form of taxes—have increased more than fivefold. From January 2009 to December 2020, the total number of export controls on industrial raw materials surged to 18,263 from 3,337. Now roughly 10% of the global value of critical raw material exports face at least one export restriction measure. (WSJ Sustainable Business)
ChatGPT Can Give Great Answers. But Only If You Know How to Ask the Right Question. That’s why companies are hiring ‘prompt engineers’—experts in talking to AI systems effectively. LinkedIn says the use of the terms ChatGPT, prompt engineering, prompt crafting, generative AI and generative artificial intelligence in member profiles increased 55% globally in February from January and then 71% in March from February. “We have dog whisperers and horse whisperers,” says Peter Lin, a computer-science professor at the University of Waterloo. “And now we’re developing large-language-model whisperers.” (Wall Street Journal)
Universal Music Group has asked streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple to stop allowing services that use artificial intelligence to train their models on copyrighted song melodies and lyrics. (The Information)
Google, Meta Struggle to Figure Out Employee Reviews. Last year, Google cut the number of employee performance reviews it conducts annually from two to one, responding to complaints that twice-a-year reviews consumed too much time. In the new system, managers were asked to talk more casually—but more frequently, once a quarter—with their subordinates about their performance. And Google wanted managers to record the results of the conversations. But the new system hasn’t worked as intended, according to one current and two former employees. Some managers delivered their quarterly performance summaries late or wrote only brief, one-sentence recaps of the conversations. In at least one case, a manager labeled the calendar invites for some of their meetings as performance discussions but instead used the meetings to merely assign or receive updates on tasks. (The Information)
Mass Layoffs and Absentee Bosses Create a Morale Crisis at Meta. (New York Times)
Americans’ adoption of electric vehicles is proving to be slow, as relatively few currently own one (4%) or are seriously considering purchasing one (12%). Another 43% of U.S. adults say they might consider buying an electric vehicle in the future, while 41% unequivocally say they would not. (Gallup)
Smart Links
Mysterious dark matter mapped in finest detail yet. (BBC News)
Health misinformation is lowering U.S. life expectancy, FDA Commissioner Robert Califf says. (CNBC)
Twitter Inc. Changes Its Name to X Corp. and Moves to Nevada. (Wall Street Journal)
Twitter Has 1,500 Employees Remaining, Musk Says. (The Information)
Google Maps is adding new features to make it easier to explore national parks.(TechCrunch)