PARIS-French President Emmanuel Macron's government bypassed Parliament and invoked special constitutional powers on Thursday to raise the country's retirement age, a step that places him at odds with France's legislative branch and millions of protesters.
By requiring workers to stay on the job until they are 64 years old, rather than 62, Mr. Macron is rolling back an entitlement that lies at the heart of France's social model. Long and cushy retirements are weighing on national finances while Mr. Macron wants to boost military spending amid the war in Ukraine.
Poland Says Russian Spies Sought to Sabotage Western Arms Transfers to Ukraine
WARSAW-Poland's domestic security agency detained nine foreigners suspected of planning to sabotage Western weapons shipments to Ukraine, in the largest known attempt by Russia to target arms deliveries from within Europe.
Interior Minister Mariusz Kami?ski said Thursday that the nine people, who have been detained in recent days, had been paid by Russian special services.
Poland to Send Four MiG-29 Jet Fighters to Ukraine
Poland said it would send four MiG-29 jet fighters to Ukraine in coming days, making it the first Western nation to supply warplanes to Kyiv, which is preparing a counteroffensive against Russia's invading forces.
The move puts Poland once again at the center of European policy-making on Ukraine, following Warsaw's successful efforts earlier this year to cobble together a coalition of countries willing to send German-made Leopard 2 tanks to Kyiv.
U.N. Sees Wide Range of War Crimes by Russian Forces in Ukraine
United Nations investigators have gathered evidence of a range of atrocities that Russian forces committed against Ukrainians that amount to war crimes, a United Nations commission found.
An independent commission formed under the U.N. Human Rights Council cited evidence of killings, imprisonment, torture, sex crimes and the deportation of civilians, according to a report released on Thursday. Ukrainian forces also committed "a small number of violations" of international law, the commission found, including the shooting and torture of Russian prisoners of war, the report stated.
Europe Unveils Clean-Tech Plans in Bid to Rival U.S., China
BRUSSELS-The European Union, fresh from targeting U.S. and Chinese green-tech subsidies, Thursday set out steps to make its industries more globally competitive in emerging environmental sectors.
The European Commission, the bloc's executive body, published a raft of proposals aimed at growing Europe's share of the global clean-tech market. The plans include measures to speed up permitting and boost workers' skills and to help clean-tech companies secure the raw materials needed to build wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles and other technologies.
GLOBAL NEWS
China's PBOC to Cut Banks' Reserve-Requirement Ratio by 0.25 Percentage Point
China's central bank said Friday that it will lower the amount of deposits banks have to set aside, underscoring Beijing's efforts to kick-start economic growth this year.
The People's Bank of China said it would cut banks' reserve-requirement ratio by 0.25 percentage point, which will bring the weighted average RRR level for the whole banking system to 7.6%. The change will take effect March 27, the PBOC said in a statement.
Bank Failures, Like Earlier Shocks, Raise Odds of Recession
Banking-sector turmoil raises the odds that the U.S. economy, already widely seen as prone to recession, might actually tip into one.
After a week of federal interventions to stabilize the banking system and market volatility driven by investor uncertainty, the economic outlook now hangs on two factors: private- sector confidence and Federal Reserve interest-rate policies.
Surging Chinese Oil Demand Pushes Shipping Costs Sharply Higher
China is on an oil-supertanker hiring spree, a sign energy demand has sped up after the world's second-largest economy limped out of its Covid-19 lockdowns.
Traders carry crude to China, the world's biggest oil importer, in Eiffel Tower-size tankers called Very Large Crude Carriers that each lug two million barrels of oil. The cost of chartering the most coveted type of these tankers, featuring modern exhaust systems, has shot up to nearly $100,000 a day, ship brokers say. That is double the rate from a month ago.
Ignorance Really Is Bliss When it Comes to Investing
The opening shot in "Animal House" pans across the campus of idyllic Faber College, focusing on a statue of its founder inscribed with the words "KNOWLEDGE IS GOOD."
The statement is so obvious as to be laughable-the perfect way to kick off an hour and 49 minutes of not-so-subtle humor. But is knowing more always good? In investing at least, it isn't. It could even hurt.
Pro Take: Can the Fed Hold the Line on Job Losses in Its Inflation Fight?
The Federal Reserve believes it can hold the economy to 1.7 million job cuts as it cranks up interest rates to tame inflation. But can it? Some lawmakers had doubts even before the Silicon Valley Bank-triggered crisis.
And Johns Hopkins University economics professor Laurence Ball says he thinks the Fed's jobless estimate-published in December-is based on "the vision of optimists."
First Republic Stock Falls Despite $30 Billion Big Banks Rescue Package
Regional bank stocks fell early Friday even after the country's biggest lenders agreed to inject $30 billion in uninsured deposits into First Republic Bank.
The rescue plan, involving many of America's largest banks, including Bank of America (ticker: BAC), Citigroup (C), and JPMorgan Chase (JPM), initially brought some relief to shares of regional banks but that optimism appears to have been short-lived.
Silicon Valley Bank's Distress Wasn't Reflected in Credit Ratings
Credit-rating firms held regional banks in high regard-until two of the biggest banking failures in U.S. history.
Rapid collapses at Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank cast doubt on whether bondholders will ever be repaid. Uninsured depositors worried they would lose their money before regulators stepped in to guarantee those funds.
Why Investors Should Be Scared of St. Patrick's Day This Year
Investors might need the luck of the Irish this St. Patrick's Day.
Friday is a so-called triple witching day: One of the four days a year that stock options, stock index options, and stock-index futures contracts all expire on the same trading day. It occurs on the third Friday of March, June, September, and December each year.
China's Xi to Meet Putin in Moscow Next Week
Chinese leader Xi Jinping plans to visit Moscow next week for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the latest marker of the deep ties between Beijing and Moscow as the war in Ukraine continues into its second year.
During the visit, which will take place March 20-22, the two leaders will discuss "topical issues of further development of the comprehensive partnership relations and strategic cooperation between Russia and China, " the Kremlin said Friday. Several bilateral documents will be signed during the visit, it said.
Silicon Valley and Capitol Hill Build an Anti-China Alliance
A group of Silicon Valley executives, including investor Peter Thiel, and Washington lawmakers are quietly mobilizing against China's involvement in the U.S. tech industry ahead of TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew's Capitol Hill testimony next week.
They plan to meet for a private dinner on Wednesday to discuss China, national security and the intensifying competition between the tech sectors of the U.S. and China. Mr. Chew is scheduled to testify the following day.
U.N. Sees Wide Range of War Crimes by Russian Forces in Ukraine
United Nations investigators have gathered evidence of a range of atrocities that Russian forces committed against Ukrainians that amount to war crimes, a United Nations commission found.
An independent commission formed under the U.N. Human Rights Council cited evidence of killings, imprisonment, torture, sex crimes and the deportation of civilians, according to a report released on Thursday. Ukrainian forces also committed "a small number of violations" of international law, the commission found, including the shooting and torture of Russian prisoners of war, the report stated.
Poland Says Russian Spies Sought to Sabotage Western Arms Transfers to Ukraine
WARSAW-Poland's domestic security agency detained nine foreigners suspected of planning to sabotage Western weapons shipments to Ukraine, in the largest known attempt by Russia to target arms deliveries from within Europe.
Interior Minister Mariusz Kami?ski said Thursday that the nine people, who have been detained in recent days, had been paid by Russian special services.
Wave of Stealthy China Cyberattacks Hits U.S., Private Networks, Google Says
State-sponsored hackers from China have developed techniques that evade common cybersecurity tools and enable them to burrow into government and business networks and spy on victims for years without detection, researchers with Alphabet Inc.'s Google found.
Over the past year, analysts at Google's Mandiant division have discovered hacks of systems that aren't typically the targets of cyber espionage. Instead of infiltrating systems behind the corporate firewall, they are compromising devices on the edge of the network-sometimes firewalls themselves-and targeting software built by companies such as VMware Inc. or Citrix Systems Inc. These products run on computers that don't typically include antivirus or endpoint detection software.
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03-17-23 0705ET
