Comment, analysis and other offerings from Thursday’s FT,
John Gapper: Oil has become the new tobacco
When Tony Hayward, BP’s chief executive, testifies to the US Senate on Thursday about the company’s Gulf of Mexico oil leak disaster, he will be only the latest corporate leader in the Washington hot seat, writes the FT columnist. The contest on show on Thursday – also evident in President Barack Obama’s televised address this week – will not be Americans against Brits but US politicians, channelling the mood of voters, versus big corporations.
David Cameron and Fredrik Reinfeldt: Curbing Europe’s deficits
The time has come for the EU to stop talking and start taking action – on debt, on fixing the banks, on creating the conditions for growth, on promoting free trade, write Cameron and Reinfeldt, respectively the UK and Swedish prime ministers. Both of us are convinced of the strengths and potential of this union. Now we need to make use of them.
Insight: Michael Pettis – don’t rely on China’s markets
This has been an awful year for the Shanghai stock market, writes Pettis, a finance professor at Peking university and chief strategist for Shenyin Wanguo Securities (HK). Volatile periods of sideways trading have alternated with vertiginous drops, leaving the SSE Composite index down 20 per cent for the year. Stock markets are supposed to react to economic expectations. Is the performance of the SSE predicting a Chinese economic collapse?
David Pilling: China and America still march out of step
For a while, the world became infatuated with the notion of a Group of Two, writes the FT’s Asia editor. The idea was that a weary America and a resurgent China would co-operate ever more closely to tackle the most intractable global problems. Yet before getting carried away with the idea, one should take a hard look at relations between the two countries’ militaries. Here, an atmosphere of distrust would suggest that talk of the two drawing ever closer is premature at best.
Analysis: Europe – a tent to attend to
W ith undisguised relief, the officials and diplomats who prepare EU summits are saying that Thursday’s one-day event in Brussels will be the quietest so far this year – no bail-outs, no emergency statements, no panic, writes the FT’s Brussels bureau chief Tony Barber. Yet with Spanish government bonds under increasing pressure and a majority of the country’s banks and companies shut out of international capital markets, Europe’s financial troubles are clearly far from over.
Editorial comment: Two more twists in the Greek tale
Of the two latest twists in the economic saga of Greece – the downgrade of its public debt to junk status by Moody’s and renewed interest by China in investing there – markets have reacted more visibly to the former, says the FT. But the latter matters more.
Lex on global luxury property
When the world’s priciest apartment turns out to be a phantom sale you know there are cracks in the top-end of the real estate sector. And cracks there are, says Lex.
View from the Top (video): Bob Iger, Disney CEO
Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, speaks to the FT’s editor Lionel Barber about the fundamental changes taking place at the company and how Disney is putting more power in the hands of the consumer. The FT’s LA correspondent Matthew Garrahan analyses the interview.
Energy Source: Brazil pursues deepwater riches
The BP debacle in the Gulf of Mexico has thrown a shadow over the global oil industry that, strangely, has not reached as far as Brazil, writes the FT’s Brazil correspondent Jonathan Wheatley.
Beyond Brics: Time running out for ‘Putin’s banker’?
Will the Russian government cut off the man once dubbed “Putin’s banker”?, ask the FT’s Catherine Belton and Courtney Weaver. Investors are worried that Sergei Pugachyov, the mysterious founder of Mezhprombank and a senator representing the Siberian republic of Tuva, could become the first high profile Russian tycoon to default on a eurobond since the 2008 crisis swept the market.
FT.com In-depth: World Cup 2010
See the FT’s comprehensive coverage, including news, analysis and commentary on the football World Cup in South Africa.