I just returned from a week in Istanbul, where I was reporting a piece on what Turkey’s burgeoning contemporary art scene tells us about where the country is headed politically (you can look for that in our upcoming style and …
Europe
Euro Banks Swap Cash for Trash
Cheap loans being offered by the European Central Bank to help reflate the Eurozone are encouraging some banks to boost their profits by loading up on risky bonds.
Why the Latest Euro Zone Debt-Crisis Agreement Shows How Europe Just Doesn’t Get It
I just landed in Rome for some on-the-ground reporting on the latest twists and turns in the euro-zone debt crisis, and I immediately got some sound insights from our reporter here, Stephan Faris. Faris watches the situation in …
My Top Five Takeaways from Davos
One of the challenges of covering the World Economic Forum at Davos as a journalist is making sense of the whole thing. The forum is days and days of wandering conversations and endless debates on just about every subject you can …
Why the Eurozone Can’t Just Muddle Through
There’s a growing optimism that the common European currency can be saved, but the numbers argue that this is unrealistic.
Are Companies More Powerful Than Countries?
In 2008, after Lehman Brothers fell and the financial crisis and global recession began, the conventional wisdom was that we were entering an era in which government would take back power from business. In fact, just the opposite …
Couldn’t Make Davos This Year? Here Are the 5 Things Everyone’s Talking About
The topics and tropes fall faster than snowflakes here in Davos, where several thousand of the world’s leading business people, politicians and policy makers gather once a year for an annual think-fest. And with literally …
Smack Down at Davos: Merkel and Soros Spar on the Euro’s Future
The weather in Davos has offered a perfect setting for this year’s World Economic Forum. Heavy snowfall has made simply keeping your footing a difficult challenge; one ill-timed misstep on the ice could easily send you head …
The Challenge at Davos: A Crisis of Global Politics, Not Just the Economy
Despite its rugged alpine beauty, there are few places where the world seems more flat than Davos, Switzerland. The World Economic Forum’s grand annual conclave, set to kick off this Wednesday, draws myriad heads of state, …
The Limitations of Looking at the Big Picture
On Wednesday, the World Economic Forum will gather on a pretty mountain in the Swiss village of Davos. Immortalized as the Magic Mountain in Thomas Mann’s classic novel about a tuberculosis sanatorium, Davos today attracts those
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Why This Stock Rally Can’t Be Trusted
This may be one of those rare moments when market strength is a signal of growing danger, rather than a sign of better times to come.
Is U.S. Manufacturing Really Back?
Is America in the middle of a manufacturing job revival? The latest numbers would make it seem so. The U.S. has added more net manufacturing jobs since the start of 2010 than the rest of the G7 nations put together, with only two …