It’s not over yet

It’s been difficult to read global economic tea leaves of late, but this week provided one fairly clear message: Most central banks haven’t fully contained inflation, and more rate hikes are likely. In the US, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said policymakers expect to lift rates “perhaps twice” more despite a pause this month. While overall inflation has slowed significantly, core inflation—which strips away volatile elements of food and energy—has proven stickier. Even still, the US economy is expected to dodge any downturn this year, according to the latest Bloomberg survey of economists. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen predicted the same, pointing to a resilient job market while suggesting consumers might hold the key. “We probably need to see some slowdown in spending in order to get inflation” under control, she said. Her comments came during a summit in Paris where world leaders discussed overhauling the global lending architecture and ways to help developing nations especially hard-hit by disruptions from the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s war on Ukraine. As part of the gathering, Zambia reached a preliminary deal to restructure $6.3 billion of debt, setting a precedent for a growing list of countries struggling to service their liabilities. Rethinking the impacts of the climate crisis and how traditional creditor nations lend money is “what’s needed to support the accelerated development of the world,” Akinwumi A. Adesina writes in Bloomberg Opinion.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping issued rare praise during US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip this week to Beijing, saying it was “very good” the nations made progress on stabilizing their relationship. But the good feelings may have been deflated somewhat when US President Joe Biden seemed to liken Xi to a dictator during a Democratic fundraiser, though Biden brushed off any concern his remark about Xi, now in an unprecedented third term as president of the Communist country, undermined Blinken’s efforts. China also accused the US of tampering with its political promises on Taiwan.

It’s been one year since the Republican-appointee controlled Supreme Court overturned the 50-year-old federal right for American women to end a pregnancy. With a 6-3 supermajority, the court is aggressively reshaping US law and dismissing long-held precedent as public confidence in the institution plummets. Before its terms ends, the high court is set to decide on university affirmative action, student-loan relief and the rules for federal elections. In all three cases, legal observers warn the GOP appointees may again dictate seismic rightward shifts. Making matters worse for the court’s credibility, ethics scandals involving its most conservative members—Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas—have illustrated how easily benefits can be conferred on members of the court, often by interested parties, with no recourse for the public.

India Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a high-profile visit to the US as the two nations seek to expand ties as a counterweight to China and to fulfill India’s growing ambitions in the tech sector. At a meeting in Washington, Modi and Biden announced a series of defense and commercial deals, including plans for General Electric to jointly manufacture F414 engines for Indian fighter jets. Modi addressed Congress, was guest of honor at a state dinner at the White House and met with Elon Musk, who said Tesla is likely to make a “significant investment” in India.

The search for the missing submersible headed to the Titanic wreck site garnered international attention, though the US Navy had earlier detected an implosion at the site where the vessel, called Titan, lost communications. The five crew members died in the disaster, the US Coast Guard said after examining debris found not far from the Titanic. The owner of the sub company, OceanGate, had previously called safety “a pure waste,” while some scientists and at least one former employee sounded alarms for at least five years.

How much less are women paid than men? And is pay transparency exposing, and thus helping, to close the gap? The answer, of course, is sort of. One of the richest people in the world, Warren Buffett, has donated roughly $4.6 billion of Berkshire Hathaway shares to five charities including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as part of an annual pledge the billionaire made nearly two decades ago.

A deep-pocketed US government program designed to finance futuristic energy businesses is issuing a conditional $9.2 billion loan to Ford for the construction of three battery factories. The enormous loan—by far the biggest government backing for a US automaker since the bailouts in the 2009 financial crisis—marks a watershed moment for Biden’s aggressive industrial policy meant to help American manufacturers catch up to China in green technologies.

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