These Republican Governors Are Delivering Results, and Many Voters Like Them for It

Opinion

August 1st, 5:15am

Liz Mair

Liz Mair - Liz Mair is the founder and president of Mair Strategies

Republican flamethrowers and culture warriors like Donald Trump and Representatives Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene typically draw an outsize amount of media attention. Americans may conclude from this that there is a striking, and perhaps unfortunate, relationship between extremism and political success. But Republicans aren’t hoping for a red wave in the midterms only because norm-thrashing or scandal sells. The truth is much more banal, yet also important for parties to internalize and better for politics generally: In states across the country, Republican governors are delivering real results for people they are physically more proximate to than federal officials. Now, it’s true that the party that controls the presidency nearly always gets whipped in midterm elections, and inflation would be a huge drag on any party in power. And it’s also true that among those governors are culture warriors like Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas. But people too often overlook the idea that actual results, especially ones related to pocketbook issues, can often be as important as rhetoric. Looked at that way, lots of Republicans — some with high public profiles, and some who fly below the radar — are excelling. Start with the simplest measure: popularity. Across the country, 13 of the 15 most popular governors are Republicans. That list does not just include red states. In fact, blue-state Republican governors like Phil Scott of Vermont, Charlie Baker of Massachusetts and Larry Hogan of Maryland are among the most popular. There are many reasons that G.O.P. governors seem to be succeeding. It’s true that governors can’t take credit for everything. Sometimes they just get lucky. But they do make policy choices, and those made by governors since the start of Covid have made a difference in particular. For example, take a look at the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics data on unemployment. In the 10 states with the lowest rates as of June, eight were led by Republican governors. Several governors who don’t make frequent appearances in national news stand out, like Pete Ricketts of Nebraska, Chris Sununu of New Hampshire, Spencer Cox of Utah and Phil Scott of Vermont. Their states have unemployment rates under 2.5 percent, and of the 20 states with the lowest unemployment rates, just four are led by Democrats. States with Republican governors have also excelled in economic recovery since the start of the pandemic. Standouts in this measure include Mr. Abbott and Doug Ducey of Arizona. These results reflect many things — some states have grown and others have shrunk, for example — but are at least in part a result of policy choices made by their elected leaders since the start of the pandemic. For example, governors like Kristi Noem in South Dakota often rejected lockdowns and economic closures. Republican governors were also far more likely to get children back to in-person school, despite intense criticism. Covid policy doesn’t explain everything. Fiscal governance has also made a difference. The Cato Institute’s Fiscal Report Card on America’s governors for 2020 (the most recent edition available), which grades them on tax and spending records, gives high marks to many Republicans. Nearly all of the top-ranked states in this report have Republican governors, like Kim Reynolds of Iowa or Mr. Ricketts. (Some Democratic governors also ranked highly, including Steve Sisolak of Nevada and Roy Cooper of North Carolina.) Some have made their mark with employer-attracting tax cuts, others with spending controls, others with a mixture. Most states mandate a balanced budget, so taxing and spending policies are important for fiscal stability. Low taxes tend to attract and keep employers and employees. Restrained budgets help ensure that taxes can be kept low without sacrificing bond ratings, which may matter if debt-financed spending is needed in a crisis or to try to stimulate businesses to hire more. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas has cut taxes for individuals, reduced the number of tax brackets and cut the corporate income tax rate. Mr. Sununu has restrained spending, vetoed a payroll tax proposal and cut business taxes. Brian Kemp of Georgia, by contrast, actually paused some tax cuts that had been scheduled — and focused almost exclusively on spending restraint, issuing a directive for state agencies to generate budget cuts and keeping 2020 general fund growth to a tiny 1 percent. Even in blue Vermont, Mr. Scott — despite being an odd duck among governors because he is not constrained by a balanced-budget amendment — kept the increase in general fund spendingto an annual average of just 2.4 percent between 2017 and 2020, and he has also cut taxes. He signed a bill to ensure that the federal tax reform instituted under Mr. Trump and limiting state and local tax deductions wouldn’t result in Vermonters getting hammered. He has also cut individual income tax rates, reduced the number of tax brackets and resisted new payroll taxes in favor of voluntary paid leave plans for private-sector employers. Republicans who have a big impact on the day-to-day lives of many Americans — unlike, say, Representative Kevin McCarthy or certainly Mr. Trump, and in terms of the quality of state economies, local job markets and education — are delivering. In our federalist system, a lot of power still sits with states and not the federal government and determines much about citizens’ lives. This is a big reason that Republicans are well positioned heading into the midterms. It should be a warning to Joe Biden and Democrats — and to some of the culture warriors. Cable-news combat over whatever the outrage of the day is may deliver politicians the spotlight. But sound economic policy and focusing on the job, not theatrics, are delivering basic day-to-day results that Americans want, need and will reward. The New York Times

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3791396/liz-mair/these-republican-governors-are-delivering-results-and-many-voters-them

Oil Drops as Weak China Factory Data Fan Demand Concerns

Business

August 1st, 4:11am

Asharq Al-Awsat

A oil pump is seen at sunset outside Scheibenhard, near Strasbourg, France, October 6, 2017. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann/File Photo

Oil prices dropped on Monday, as weak manufacturing data from China and Japan for July weighed on the outlook for demand, while investors braced for this week's meeting of officials from OPEC and other top producers on supply adjustments. Brent crude futures were down $1.19, or 1.1%, at $102.78 a barrel at 0212 GMT. US West Texas Intermediate crude was at $97.19 a barrel, down $1.43, or 1.5%. Fresh COVID-19 lockdowns snuffed out a brief recovery seen in June for factory activity in China, the world's largest crude oil importer. The Caixin/Markit manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) eased to 50.4 in July from 51.7 in the previous month, well below analysts' expectations, data showed on Monday. Japanese manufacturing activity expanded at its weakest rate in 10 months in July, data showed on Monday. "China's disappointing manufacturing PMI is the primary factor that pressed on oil prices today," CMC Markets analyst Tina Teng said. "The data shows a surprising contraction of economic activities, suggesting that the recovery of the world-second-largest economy from the covid lockdowns may not be as positive as previously expected, which darkened the demand outlook of the crude oil markets." Brent and WTI ended July with their second straight monthly losses for the first time since 2020, as soaring inflation and higher interest rates raise fears of a recession that would erode fuel demand. ANZ analysts said fuel sales to drivers in Britain were waning, while gasoline demand remained below its five-year average for this time of the year. Reflecting this, analysts in a Reuters poll reduced for the first time since April their forecast for 2022 average Brent prices to $105.75 a barrel. Their estimate for WTI fell to $101.28. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)and allies including Russia, a group known as OPEC+, will meet on Wednesday to decide on September output. Two of eight OPEC+ sources in a Reuters survey said a modest increase for September would be discussed at the Aug. 3 meeting, while the rest said output would likely be held steady.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3791376/oil-drops-weak-china-factory-data-fan-demand-concerns

Paris Faces an Even Colder, Darker Winter Than Berlin

Opinion

August 1st, 3:57am

Javier Blas

Javier Blas -

In the European energy crisis, all of the attention is focused on Germany and gas from Russia. But France and its fleet of struggling nuclear reactors are at least as important. Indeed, the first European city to suffer a blackout as temperatures drop toward the end of the year may well be Paris rather than Berlin. As winter approaches, the outlook in France is increasingly dire. Electricite de France SA, the state-owned utility, is running only 26 of its 57 reactors, with more than half of its chain undergoing emergency maintenance after the discovery of cracked pipes. With atomic reactors generating the lowest share of the country’s power in 30 years, France faces an electricity ‘Waterloo.’ The slump in nuclear availability is forcing France to rely more than ever on gas-fired plants, intermittent wind and hydro as well as imports. That’s pushing up the cost of electricity in the wholesale market for the whole of Europe, with French forward prices surging to almost 1,000% more than their decade-long average through 2020. In the middle of the summer, when French electricity demand hovers around 45 gigawatts per hour, that’s not an insurmountable problem. But on a cold winter evening, when French households can push consumption above 80 or 90 gigawatts, it could be catastrophically expensive. Although the French economy is smaller than Germany’s, Gallic power demand surges well above that of its neighbor during the winter as households there rely more on electricity for heating and hot water. While EDF has promised that at least some of its reactors will be back online in time for the colder months, the company has a nasty habit of over-promising and under-delivering. The severity of the winter could be key: Each degree Celsius the temperature drops below normal, French power demand surges by about 2.5 gigawatts an hour — equivalent to the output of two nuclear power stations. During a late cold snap last April, the French grid was forced to issue a rare orange alert — the second highest — asking households and companies to “moderate their consumption.” Those alerts will become a staple this coming winter, and very likely will escalate to “red alerts” that indicate a risk of blackouts unless families and businesses reduce demand. Electricity traders are taking the risk seriously. In the wholesale market, the benchmark one-year French baseload power contract has jumped to a record high of 507 euros ($512) per megawatt hour, well above German prices of 350 to 370 euros for the parallel contract. French retail consumers are protected for now thanks to a price cap, but businesses are fully exposed. Come winter, it will get much worse. For December, baseload French power is trading above 1,000 euros, almost double German prices, while peakload power — typically in the evenings when families gather for dinner and the heating is on — is changing hands at more than 2,000 euros. In practice, that means traders expect French power demand may be so high relative to supply that so-called hourly prices will bump against the 4,000-euro limit set by the exchange many times in December. The market, aware of what’s coming, is trying to kill consumption ahead of time, in an effort to avert blackouts. It’s a costly way of attempting to force electricity-intensive companies, such as smelters, to plan to shut down in December. The French problem is spilling over into the rest of Europe, including the UK. EDF, long a source of national pride as well as low-cost electricity exports, is having to buy power to meet daily requirements. Earlier this month, the French grid made an emergency request to the British network for extra power — and that was in summer, when demand is low. In the past, EDF only imported electricity on a net basis for a few days a year, if at all. For example, between 2014 and 2016, France didn’t import power on a single day. But as the nuclear troubles mounted, it’s relied increasingly on imports. Last year, it bought electricity from overseas for 78 days. So far this year, it has been forced to do so on a record 102 days. France’s purchases put further pressure on a European electricity and gas market that’s already under stress. If French President Emmanuel Macron wants to help ease the European energy crisis, he needs to focus at home. Fixing EDF should be his top priority — well above his phone conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Paris has taken a first step, announcing the nationalization of the company at a cost of 10 billion euros, although not earlier than September. Puzzlingly, Macron has yet to bring in a new executive team. The company’s chief executive is set to depart, but perhaps not until March 2023. The rest of the senior team, including the executive in charge of nuclear power who has overseen the disastrous performance of the last couple of years, appear to be safe in their jobs for now. Macron also hasn’t curbed the influence of the trade unions within EDF — another perennial issue that’s stymied reform at the company. Time is running out. Paris is delightful in the autumn and the winter; it’ll be much less attractive if the “City of Light” is forced to go dark. Bloomberg

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3791361/javier-blas/paris-faces-even-colder-darker-winter-berlin

Giant Sequoias Are Built to Withstand Fire, But Not These Fires

Opinion

August 1st, 3:49am

Faye Flam

Faye Flam -

No sooner had one fire in Yosemite been contained than a new one erupted in a different part of the park. This summer’s Western wildfires have brought attention to the risks that climate change brings to America’s national parks and the treasures they contain — like the giant sequoia trees, the largest trees on Earth. In the last two years, fires have consumed nearly 20% of them, according to the Forest Service. The people who know these forests told me the best place to go to understand the fate of these trees is Kings Canyon, a national park a three-hour drive south of Yosemite. What has happened there is unprecedented in natural history. In Kings Canyon, hundreds of giant sequoias have burned to death — even though these trees were built to burn and survive, and rely on fire to reproduce. At the park’s visitor center, I met up with Tony Caprio, a fire ecologist who studies the longstanding relationship between fires and forests. The fire that caused the most trouble as it raged through the park was the KNP complex fire of 2021. A normal lightning strike became a freakish mega-fire, exacerbated human-generated climate change and our misguided attempts to control the natural cycles of fire. Human-generated carbon emissions have contributed to the drying out of the Sierra and other mountain forests by warming the air and reducing snowfall. Since rain tends to run off slopes quickly, snow is crucial for preventing the ground and plant life from drying out. Then there’s fire suppression. “We suppressed fire in those areas for hundred-plus years,” Caprio told me. That meant there was a tremendous amount of fuel on the ground. The drought conditions made that fuel more flammable. When it caught fire, it burned very hot. “This is something that’s probably unprecedented in the history of sequoias.” Standing on a ridge above the area that had burned, Redwood Canyon, he pointed to a healthy grove of the giant trees. These sequoias were saved by “prescribed” burns — planned, small fires done in 2011 and 2012. The clearing of brush and small trees from those fires acted like a wall, protecting the groves from the massive fires that devastated other parts of Redwood Canyon. The giant sequoias thrived for centuries in a normal, natural cycle of fires. The trees have adapted so the cones open and release their seeds when heated by a fire — a fire that in turn clears the ground so that those seeds can reach soil and germinate. Some of the trees in this grove are 3,000, even 3,400 years old. In the back of his pickup, Caprio had a core sample of a tree — a stick more than five feet long that recorded thousands of tree rings. He pointed to a section about eight inches from the outer edge, or present time. That was A.D. 1295, he said, when you could see the tree survived a fire, and then had a growth spurt. The fire happened right at the end of the Medieval warm period, and from the rings it looks to have been the worst fire for several thousand years — but it didn’t kill the tree, and the growth spurt probably resulted from the clearing away of competing plants. We drove partway into Redwood Canyon, and Caprio removed some barriers from the road so we could enter a region that had been closed to tourists because downed trees hadn’t all been cleared. That led to a hiking path through the fire-ravaged area. The first thing I noticed was how many trunks were black. Everything was covered in soot. But this, he assured me, was the healthier part of the area. You just had to crane your neck to see the crowns of the trees, 200 or more feet in the air, covered with live green needles. Cones were falling, sometimes piled up by squirrels. Each one contained hundreds of seeds the size of oatmeal flakes. A tiny fraction of those would sprout, and a tiny fraction of those sprouts would become new trees. After two miles of hiking, we reached the bad part — a place called the Sugar Bowl Grove, where we were suddenly surrounded by a ring of blackened trunks. And now, if we looked up, there were no live, green branches. The fire here got so hot, and so high, that it jumped as if climbing a ladder from smaller trees to the crowns of the giants, and spread from one to another until all were dead. This is something that’s probably unprecedented in the history of sequoias as far as we know, he told me. He was the first person to see the remains, and the one to deliver the bad news to others who worked in the park. “People cried when they saw this,” he said. Something else is going wrong with some of these trees. Bark beetles started killing sequoias — something never seen until 2014. The beetles are native to this area, and until now, no match for the giant trees, with 15-foot diameter trunks, thick leathery bark and resin that blocks the beetles from boring in. But we’re in a prolonged drought amplified by human-generated global warming. Some of the trees are stressed, weakened. Giant sequoias aren’t going to go extinct any time soon. Some of the oldest trees have lived in drier areas for decades and have harder wood that better withstands the beetles’ assault. But they live and reproduce so slowly that whenever they do die, they won’t be replaced for centuries, if ever. Reducing emissions will help more trees survive in the long term. And in the shorter term, prescribed burns can mitigate the threat caused by all those decades of fire suppression and unnatural fuel build up. The downside to prescribed burns is that the smoke won’t stay in the park; it can affect nearby communities. Getting it right isn’t easy: Recent burns in New Mexico got out of control and destroyed hundreds of people’s homes. But there’s always hope. Americans used to be so callous about these natural wonders they would chop them down for lumber. Anything to make money — even if the wood easily shattered and ended up being used for fence posts. So we’re learning. And thanks to controlled burning in the past, the Yosemite fire is coming under control, and the sequoias there survived. On the hike back, Caprio bent down and pointed to a tiny little sprig of green sprouting from the ground. That’s an infant sequoia, he told me. And maybe, someday, it will live to be the next generation of giants. Bloomberg

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3791351/faye-flam/giant-sequoias-are-built-withstand-fire-not-these-fires

Sudan Reports First Confirmed Monkeypox Case

Arab World

August 1st, 3:42am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Test tube labelled monkeypox virus positive. Reuters file photo

Sudan reported its first confirmed Monkeypox case, the country's health ministry said late on Sunday. A 16-year-old student was confirmed sick with the disease in West Darfur state, the ministry said in a statement posted on its Facebook page.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3791346/sudan-reports-first-confirmed-monkeypox-case

Cyprus Tourism Rebounds despite Sanctions-hit Russia Plunge

Varieties

July 31st, 6:55am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Hoping to draw tourists to Cyprus this summer, officials cite the "open-air lifestyle, abundance of personal space" and clean air. Petros Karadjias/AP

Beside sparkling Mediterranean waters at the Cypriot resort town of Ayia Napa, the bars are bouncing with foam dance parties as tourist numbers rebound following two tough years of pandemic. But one key nationality is effectively missing: Russian visitors, as the once lucrative market has been hit by European Union sanctions imposed after Moscow invaded Ukraine, AFP said. "This year, we expected 800,000 Russian tourists," said Haris Loizides, head of the Cyprus Hotel Association. The Russian market "was wiped out from one day to the next," said Christos Angelides, head of the Pancyprian Association of Hotel Managers. "Nobody was prepared for this huge change." The key tourism sector, which had contributed 2.68 billion euros ($2.72 billion) in 2019, 15 percent of GDP, is still counting the cost of the disastrous years of Covid travel chaos. In 2019, before the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, a fifth of tourists were Russian -- 782,000 out of 3.9 million -- making it the holiday island's second largest market after Britain. Last year, despite tough Covid travel restrictions, that share rose to more than 25 percent, with arrivals from Russia totaling nearly 520,000 out of 1.93 million. Operators had hoped this summer would see Russian numbers return to pre-pandemic levels. - Flight bans, banking sanctions - Some 18,000 Russians are resident in Cyprus, many in the seaside town of Limassol -- dubbed by some "Moscow on the Med." But, with EU sanctions on Russia continuing and with no let-up in the bloodshed on Ukraine's battlefields, just 17,000 Russian tourists came to Cyprus between January and June. "Our hotel is doing well, but others -- who had 100 percent Russian clientele -- are not," said Angelides, who is also manager of the Napa Mermaid Hotel. Nicosia and Moscow have close political and cultural ties, but when Russia sent troops into Ukraine, the Cypriot parliament unanimously passed a resolution condemning the invasion. Cyprus, the EU's most easterly member, backed the bloc's actions on Moscow, including a flight ban and sanctions barring some Russian banks from the SWIFT financial system. The tourism ministry says fewer Russian visitors could mean some $600 million in potential lost earnings. Overall, tourist arrivals in Cyprus are bouncing back, thanks to strong demand in other key markets following the lifting of coronavirus restrictions. From January to June, Cyprus recorded 1.2 million visitors, nearly five times the level last year, and the white sand beaches at Ayia Napa are crowded with sunseekers and partygoers. But that is still 25 percent down on the same period of 2019, when 1.63 million tourists came to Cyprus. "We have somewhat limited the damage, but it is impossible to replace this huge number of customers," Angelides added. - 'Big gap' - In the first half of this year, British tourists made up nearly two-fifths of visitors, followed by Israelis, making up seven percent of visitors, then Poland, Germany and Greece. "There have been many attempts by several sectors to encourage tourists from other markets, such as the German, Polish, Italian and French markets," said Charis Papacharalambous, spokesman of the Association of Cyprus Travel Agents (ACTA). But it was still "very difficult to fill the big gap" left by Russian tourists, he added, with industry experts fearing the impact may still worsen, since many Russians previously preferred to visit later in the year. For Loizides, from the island's Hotel Association, the war in Ukraine has also provided another problem. Surging global costs of fuel sparked by the conflict have driven electricity prices higher. With tourists turning air conditioning on full blast to counter the sweltering heat of Cyprus, hotels are struggling with "astronomical bills", Loizides said. "The EU must remedy this situation and help companies, especially at a time when inflation is raging," he added.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789871/cyprus-tourism-rebounds-despite-sanctions-hit-russia-plunge

Morocco's King Reiterates Openness to Restoring Ties with Algeria

Arab World

July 31st, 6:29am

Asharq Al-Awsat

King Mohammed VI of Morocco (AFP)

Morocco's King Mohammed VI used an address on Saturday to "once again" reiterate his openness to restoring ties with Algeria, which broke off diplomatic relations with Rabat last year. "We aspire to work with the Algerian presidency so that Morocco and Algeria can work hand in hand to establish normal relations between two brotherly peoples," Mohammed said during the traditional speech marking the anniversary of his accession to the throne. "I stress once again that the borders that separate the Moroccan and Algerian brothers will never be barriers preventing their interaction and understanding." He urged Moroccans to "preserve the spirit of fraternity, solidarity and good neighborliness towards our Algerian brothers". Morocco and Algeria have long been at odds over the disputed territory of Western Sahara, where the Algiers-backed Polisario Front is seeking independence from Rabat's rule, AFP said. Algeria broke off diplomatic relations with Morocco in August 2021. The decision was "completely unjustified," Rabat said. The disputed status of Western Sahara -- a former Spanish colony considered a "non-autonomous territory" by the United Nations -- has pitted Morocco against the Polisario Front since the 1970s. Rabat, which controls nearly 80 percent of the territory, is pushing for autonomy under its sovereignty. The Polisario Front, however, wants a UN-sponsored referendum on self-determination. Morocco's sovereignty over the territory was backed by Washington in a 2020 deal that also saw Rabat normalize ties with Israel. Algeria, which supports the Palestinian cause in addition to the Front, has taken the opportunity to criticize Morocco's growing military cooperation with Israel. Referring to "allegations that Moroccans insult Algeria and Algerians", Mohammed said they were the work of "irresponsible individuals who are trying to sow discord". "This gossip about Moroccan-Algerian relations is totally senseless and frankly appalling," he added. The king also used Saturday's speech to pledge reform of the family code in favor of women's rights, social protections and price controls at a time of rising inflation. He also pledged to redouble vaccination efforts to fight Covid-19. The reformist king, 58, has ruled Morocco since July 1999, when he succeeded his father, Hassan II.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789841/moroccos-king-reiterates-openness-restoring-ties-algeria

Pro-Sadr Protesters Vow to Remain Inside Iraq Parliament

Arab World

July 31st, 6:15am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Supporters of Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr protest inside the parliament building in Baghdad on July 30, 2022. Thaier Al-Sudani, Reuters

Supporters of powerful Iraqi cleric Moqtada Sadr occupied the country's parliament on Saturday with no plan to leave, deepening a months-long political standoff. It is the second time in days that supporters of the firebrand Shiite cleric have forced their way into the legislative chamber, after October elections failed to lead to the formation of a government, AFP said. "The demonstrators announce a sit-in until further notice," Sadr's movement said in a brief statement to journalists carried by state news agency INA. In multi-confessional and multi-ethnic Iraq, government formation has involved complex negotiations since the 2003 US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein. Supporters of Sadr, who once led a party against US and Iraqi government forces, oppose a rival, pro-Iran Shiite bloc's pick for prime minister -- Mohammed Shia al-Sudani. The post conventionally goes to a figure from Iraq's Shiite majority. "We don't want Mr Sudani," said one protester, Sattar al-Aliawi, 47. The civil servant said he was protesting against "a corrupt and incapable government" and would "sleep here" in the gardens of parliament. He added: "The people totally refuse the parties that have governed the country for 18 years." Sadr's bloc emerged from elections in October as the biggest parliamentary faction, but was still far short of a majority. The cleric is now using street protests to pile pressure on his political opponents. Demonstrators inside the legislature waved Iraqi flags and pictures of the cleric. They crowded the chamber, where some sat at lawmakers' desks while others milled about, raising their mobile phones to film the occupation. Outside, protesters erected a large tent as they settled in, with volunteers delivering hot meals and bottled water. Security forces looked on as one man lit a fire in the gardens to warm some tea, another sold cigarettes, and women and children trickled in to join Sadr's other supporters. - 'The people are with you' - Parliament speaker Mohammed al-Halbussi said "all parliamentary meetings" had been suspended. The crowds entered the chamber after thousands of protesters had massed at the end of a bridge leading to the heavily fortified Green Zone before dozens pulled down concrete barriers and ran inside, an AFP photographer reported. Security forces had fired tear gas and water cannons near an entrance to the district, also home to foreign embassies and other government buildings. Some protesters on the bridge were injured and carried off by their fellow demonstrators. The health ministry said at least 100 protesters and 25 security personnel had been hurt. "All the people are with you, Sayyed Moqtada," the protesters chanted. Long a player in Iraqi politics, Sadr has a devoted following of millions among the country's majority Shiite population. His supporters oppose the candidacy of Sudani, the pick for premier of the Coordination Framework, an alliance of pro-Iran Shiite factions. The protests are the latest challenge for a country trying to overcome decades of war. Despite oil wealth and elevated global crude prices, Iraq remains hobbled by corruption, unemployment and other problems, which sparked a youth-led protest movement in 2019. - 'Revolution' - Saturday's demonstration came after crowds of Sadr supporters breached the Green Zone and entered the legislature on Wednesday. They left two hours later after Sadr told them to. After the latest occupation began, the Coordination Framework called on "the popular masses... to peacefully demonstrate in defense of the state and its legitimacy". The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq said the "ongoing escalation" was deeply concerning. Noting the protest injuries, a spokesperson for UN chief Antonio Guterres echoed that concern in a statement on Saturday, while calling on parties to "de-escalate the situation". "The Secretary-General urges all parties and actors to rise above their differences and form, through peaceful and inclusive dialogue, an effective national government... without further delay," the statement said. Caretaker Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi, in a televised address, called on political blocs "to sit down, negotiate and reach agreement". Hadi al-Ameri, who heads a faction of the Hashed al-Shaabi -- pro-Iran former paramilitaries now integrated into the regular armed forces -- made a similar appeal. Intense negotiations between factions over the past several months have failed to bridge the divide. In June, Sadr's 73 lawmakers quit their seats in a move seen as an attempt to pressure his rivals into fast-tracking the formation of a government. "The Sadrist movement has a problem with the idea that the Coordination Framework will form a government," Ammar al-Hakim, whose Hima movement is part of the group, said in a recent interview with BBC Arabic.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789826/pro-sadr-protesters-vow-remain-inside-iraq-parliament

Crypto Clients Beg for their Cash Back after Lender's Crash

Technology

July 31st, 6:07am

Asharq Al-Awsat

An advertisement of Bitcoin, one of the cryptocurrencies, is displayed on a building in Hong Kong, on Nov. 18, 2021. (AP)

An Irishman at risk of losing his farm. An American having suicidal thoughts. An 84-year-old widow's lost life savings: People caught in the meltdown of crypto lender Celsius are pleading for their money back. Hundreds of letters have poured in to the judge overseeing the firm's multi-billion-dollar bankruptcy and they are heavy with anger, shame, desperation and, frequently, regret, AFP said. "I knew there were risks," said a client whose letter was unsigned. "It seemed a worthwhile risk." Celsius and its CEO Alex Mashinsky had billed the platform as a safe place for people to deposit their crypto currencies in exchange for high interest, while the firm lent out and invested those deposits. But as the value of highly volatile crypto currencies plummeted –- bitcoin alone has shed over 60 percent since November -– the firm faced mounting troubles until it froze withdrawals in mid-June. The company owed $4.7 billion to its users, according to a court filing earlier this month, and the endgame is unclear. The letters –- posted to a public online court docket –- come from around the world and recount tragic results of users' money being frozen. "From that hard-working single mom in Texas struggling with past-due bills, to the teacher in India with all his hard-earned money deposited in Celsius –- I believe I can speak for most of us when I say I feel betrayed, ashamed, depressed, angry," wrote one client who signed their letter E.L. While the letters vary in their level of sophistication about the crypto world -– from self-confessed novices to all-in evangelists –- and the monetary impacts range from a few hundred dollars to seven-figure sums, nearly all agree on one thing. "I have been a loyal Celsius customer since 2019 and feel completely lied to Alex Mashinsky," wrote a client who AFP is not identifying to protect his privacy. "Alex would talk about how Celsius is safer than banks." Many of the letters point to the CEO's AMA (Ask Mashinsky Anything) online chats as key to their confidence in him and the platform, which presented itself as stable until days before it froze users' funds. - Repeated assurances before fall - "Celsius has one of the best risk management teams in the world. Our security team and infrastructure is second to none," the firm wrote on June 7. "We have made it through crypto downturns before (this is our fourth!). Celsius is prepared," the firm wrote. The message also said the company had the reserves to pay its obligations, and withdrawals were being processed as normal. One client, who reported having $32,000 in crypto locked up at Celsius, noted the impact. "Right up until the end, the retail investor received assurance," the client wrote to the judge. But that changed quickly, and on June 12 Celsius announced the freeze: "We are taking this action today to put Celsius in a better position to honor, over time, its withdrawal obligations." Some clients got the news in a message from the company. "By the time I finished the e-mail, I had collapsed onto the floor with my head in my hands and I fought back tears," wrote one man who had about $50,000 in assets with Celsius. The clients who said they were hardest hit, including a man who said he placed $525,000 he got from a government loan on Celsius, disclosed they had considered killing themselves. Others reported heavy stress, lack of sleep and feelings of deep shame for putting their retirement savings or their children's college money into a platform that was far riskier than they knew. "As a private unregulated company, Celsius does not come under any requirement for disclosure," is how the Washington Post summarized the situation. Celsius did not reply to a request for comment on the clients' letters. For people like one 84-year-old woman, who only had her roughly $30,000 in crypto savings on Celsius for a month, their hope lies in the bankruptcy proceedings. "It's just not unusual for people to come out of something like this with zero," said Don Coker, an expert witness on banking and finance. "Obviously I feel sorry for anyone who loses an investment like this, but it is just something where they need to be aware of the risks," he said.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789806/crypto-clients-beg-their-cash-back-after-lenders-crash

Can We Resist the Age of the Algorithm?

Opinion

July 31st, 4:50am

Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat - Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times

I have few stronger opinions about movie characters than my view that Miranda Priestly, the demanding fashion-magazine boss in “The Devil Wears Prada,” is actually the heroine of the movie. Not an uncomplicated heroine, certainly not a nice person. But a figure to be celebrated nonetheless: a demanding, uncompromising aesthete whose decisions ripple through the wider culture, whose idiosyncratic taste can affect the palette of the world. In one of the movie’s famous set pieces, Miranda explains how her assistant’s cheap blue — sorry, cerulean — sweater is actually “a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room,” the bargain-basement endpoint of a complex aesthetic-commercial process that starts with a single brilliant idea. I’m no fashionista (to put it mildly), but I still love that scene. So I was struck by Amanda Mull’s recent essay for The Atlantic suggesting its fundamental obsolescence. The Miranda Priestlys don’t rule fashion anymore, Mull argues. The algorithm does. Her essay starts with a seeming paradox: At a time when we “have more consumer choice than ever, at least going by the sheer volume of available products,” she writes, “much of the clothing that ends up in stores looks uncannily the same.” The explanation, she suggests, is that fashion is increasingly separated from “the ideas and creative instincts of individuals” and directed instead by a combination of cheaper production models and forecasting systems that takes “the guesswork out of trends.” The production churns out fashions; the algorithm doubles down on whatever sells the fastest. Predictably, “when enough brands and retailers begin using these inventory tactics and trend-prediction methods, the results homogenize over time.” Everything is popular, but nothing is the thing you didn’t know you wanted. And even outfits that look superficially novel are usually repurposings — “gussied up with new details” but the same dress underneath. This algorithmic repetition isn’t just a fashion trend; it’s the prevailing spirit across multiple cultural domains. What Mull observes about clothes, the critic Ted Gioia has been analyzing in music, where the Spotify era delivers what’s already tested and popular while the opportunities for new artists diminish. Instead of entering a process of discovery, the online music browser is constantly borne backward — and not into some consciousness-expanding communion with classical-music history but just back to Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, David Bowie, an endless boomer-era loop. According to recent market research, Gioia observes, “the new music market is actually shrinking,” even as “the largest investments in music are the acquisition of old publishing catalogs, while almost nothing is spent developing new artists.” And this tracks with developments in film and television as well — the rule of superheroes, the box-office dominance of aging movie stars and the feel of a certain kind of streaming television, usually on Netflix, that seems to have been scripted by an A.I. in imitation of 16 other hits. But I don’t want to blame these patterns on technology alone. People can choose to be ruled by algorithmic thinking without running a literal program to figure out what’s popular. And the fact that we have a specific form of technology that makes it easier to squash risk and creativity is hard to separate from wider trends toward sclerosis, repetition, what I spent an entire book calling decadence. Consider a couple of recent controversies in medicine and medical research, fields distant from Miranda Priestly’s world. First, there was the revelation that billions of dollars and years of Alzheimer’s research were based on papers that appear to include significant fabrications. If it pans out, this is a remarkable example of the medical establishment marching into an incredibly expensive blind alley, without skeptics getting a full hearing for about a decade and a half. Second, there’s the continuing discussion, pegged to a pair of studies that came out this spring and summer, about how and whether the most commonly prescribed antidepressants actually work. Some of the new research has been overread by psychiatry’s critics; the assumptions that depression has important chemical components and that antidepressants help people, especially people with severe depression, have not suddenly been overturned. But both papers add to the strong suspicion that these drugs are oversold and overprescribed — that we’ve made them a default response to late-modern misery based more on hopeful groupthink than on certain evidence. Possible fraud and possible over-prescription are different kinds of problems, but they both illustrate how bad cultural and institutional incentives can deaden creativity as surely as Netflix’s algorithms. A flood of research dollars and prescriptions going in the wrong direction, because everyone wants to imitate everyone else, is the scientific equivalent of everybody making the same dress because that seems to be what the consumer wants — no literal algorithm at work, just a hive mind in which a dissenting voice struggles to be heard. This kind of system isn’t impermeable to innovation or critique; otherwise, scientific fraud would never be found out, and Netflix wouldn’t have recently lost nearly one million subscribers. But resisting the rule of the algorithm takes energy and creativity and courage, and the risk for our culture is that our technological skill and our cultural exhaustion are working together, defending decadence and closing off escape. The New York Times

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789761/ross-douthat/can-we-resist-age-algorithm

Recession? Not for Big Tech.

Opinion

July 31st, 4:42am

Farhad Manjoo

Farhad Manjoo -

When the president, the treasury secretary and other Biden administration officials insisted this week that the American economy is not currently in a recession, they were mocked for weaseling out of bad news on a technicality. The Commerce Department announced on Thursday that the broadest measure of economic activity, gross domestic product, fell for a second quarter in a row — meeting a widely held, though unofficial, definition of recession. It is true, as the Biden folks argued, that the nation’s official recession arbiter, the National Bureau of Economic Research, has yet to call one, because it relies on many more signals. Still, it sure sounded as if the Biden team was splitting hairs. Over the past few days, though, I’ve spent more time than is healthy listening to C.E.O.s expound on their businesses during quarterly corporate earnings calls. (What can I say? I’m a sucker for a good time.) And I was surprised by what I heard. The C.E.O.s convinced me that the Biden people — not to mention Jay Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve, who also said this week that a recession has probably not yet begun — have a point. The economy is in a really weird place. There are definitely signs of trouble. Yet at some of the biggest companies in the country — especially in the tech industry — business is hardly all glum. And even at companies that are struggling, the numbers aren’t nearly as bad as investors had feared. At the start of the week, I told my editor I’d be writing about how the tech industry might be facing one of its worst slowdowns in two decades. By the end of the week, I found myself backing off anything so dramatic. Yes, some companies are facing unusually difficult times. Business models are blowing up. Competition is heating up. Regulators are getting tougher. Hiring is slowing down. Workers are being asked to do more with less. And all that’s just at Facebook! But there are also signs that some huge businesses are ably navigating tougher times — or, in a label adopted by so many C.E.O.s that I wondered if they agreed on it in a secret meeting, a challenging macroeconomic environment. Consider some of the brightest spots: Qualcomm, the chip-making giant, reported that despite that “challenging macroeconomic environment,” profits grew more than 50 percent over last year because of strong sales of its processors used in phones and automobiles. Ford reported that hefty sales of its SUVs and crossovers pushed its adjusted earnings before taxes and interest to more than triple from a year ago. Meanwhile Visa, Mastercard and American Express said Americans are still spending as though there’s no tomorrow. “We’re seeing no evidence of a pullback in consumer spending,” Vasant Prabhu, Visa’s chief financial officer, told investors. Many on Wall Street had been especially worried about results from the behemoths of Big Tech — Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet and Meta, the parent companies of Google and of Facebook. These are among the most valuable American companies, and they soared during the pandemic. But this year Big Tech’s growth has slowed, and its stock prices have been crushed. Dan Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities who has been bullish on the tech giants, said that sentiment among tech investors was the most negative he’s seen since 2009. Then on Tuesday, Microsoft and Alphabet released their numbers and turned the narrative around. Alphabet said its revenue grew by 13 percent over last year — lower than usual for a money-printing machine like Google but not much less than analysts had been expecting and better than many had feared. Ives said Google’s not-too-bad results suggested that the online advertising market was holding up. Microsoft’s results were also lower than analysts had been expecting, but investors were still thrilled by them, especially the 40 percent growth in Microsoft’s cloud services business. Because Microsoft’s core business is in providing tech services to large companies, its strong cloud number shed a positive light on the entire economy, Ives said. “That was probably one of the most important data points in years for the tech sector,” he told me. On Wednesday, Meta put out what for it are some pretty dismal numbers; among other things, for the first time, the company posted a drop in quarterly revenue from the same period a year ago. But expectations had been very low for Facebook. The company’s stock plummeted this year after it reported that Apple’s new privacy features have hampered its ability to collect data on users. It has also faced persistent competition from TikTok. And because Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder and chief executive, is spending billions to pivot the company from social networking to “the metaverse” — the still-in-development virtual realm that he believes will one day be at the center of our computing experience — its future looks more than a little cloudy. But there was light even in Meta’s grim report. Zuckerberg said that Reels, the company’s competitor of TikTok, is gaining in popularity with users and with advertisers. Its user numbers have also held up. Meta has been dealing with so much bad news — this week the Federal Trade Commission announced that it would sue to block the company from purchasing a small virtual reality start-up — that expectations could hardly fall lower. “The street was expecting just an absolute legendary disaster,” Ives said. But compared with the expected hurricane of terrible earnings, Facebook’s numbers were more like “a little rainstorm,” he said. After the markets closed on Thursday, Amazon and Apple reported their quarterly numbers. Guess what? They’re also mostly crushing it. Amazon said its cloud business grew by 33 percent over last year. Apple’s C.E.O. told CNBC that the company expects revenue to “accelerate” next quarter. This year I argued that despite recent slowdowns, the reign of Big Tech was just beginning. As the economy softened over the course of the year, I began to doubt my bold prediction. But now I’m redoubling. Tech giants, like the rest of the economy, may soon face tougher times. But Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Google and even Facebook are weathering difficult times much better than expected. Big Tech isn’t going away anytime soon. The New York Times

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3789756/farhad-manjoo/recession-not-big-tech

ADNOC Reveals Second Gas Discovery in Abu Dhabi Offshore Block

Business

July 30th, 5:20am

Asharq Al-Awsat

This latest discovery builds on previously announced exploration concession discoveries. (WAM)

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) revealed on Friday a second discovery of natural gas resources in the first exploration well in Abu Dhabi's Offshore Block 2 Exploration Concession, operated by Eni. The find from a new deeper reservoir. which indicates between 1 – 1.5 trillion standard cubic feet (TSCF) of raw gas in place, builds on the initial finding in February 2022 from a shallower target, taking the total amount of gas in place from this single well to 2.5 - 3.5 TSCF. A consortium, led by Eni and PTT Exploration and Production Public Company Limited (PTTEP), was awarded the exploration rights for Offshore Block 2 in 2019 as part of ADNOC's debut competitive block bid round. ADNOC Upstream Executive Director Yaser Saeed Almazrouei said that the discovery highlights ADNOC's accelerated exploration and development program and how it's "identifying untapped hydrocarbon resources, creating long-term value for the UAE". "We are particularly pleased to see Eni and PTTEP pursuing deeper zones, which has demonstrated additional potential resources in place. We look forward to continuing to work with all our strategic partners to sustainably identify and further unlock Abu Dhabi's hydrocarbon resources," he said, state news agency WAM reported. In May 2022, ADNOC also announced the discovery of approximately 100 million barrels of oil in place in Abu Dhabi's Onshore Block 3, operated by Occidental, while in December 2021, up to 1 billion barrels of oil equivalent (BBOE) in Onshore Block 4 Exploration Concession, which is operated by INPEX/JODCO was confirmed. ADNOC launched Abu Dhabi's first and second competitive block bid rounds in 2018 and 2019, respectively, offering a set of major onshore and offshore blocks to international companies, on behalf of the Government of Abu Dhabi.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788061/adnoc-reveals-second-gas-discovery-abu-dhabi-offshore-block

IHR: Iran Executes Three Women In Single Day

Iran

July 30th, 5:03am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Illustrative: A prisoner being held in an Iranian prison. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil, File)

Iran this week executed three women in the space of a single day, all on charges of murdering their husbands, an NGO said on Friday. There has been growing concern over the increasing number of women being hanged in Iran as the country sees a surge in executions. Many killed husbands who were abusive or they married as child brides or even relatives, AFP reported activists as saying, Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) said that on July 27 three women were executed in different prisons for murdering their husbands in separate cases, meaning at least 10 women have now been executed by Iran in 2022. Senobar Jalali, an Afghan national, was executed in a prison outside Tehran, it said. Meanwhile Soheila Abedi, who had married her husband when aged just 15, was hanged in a prison in the city of Sanandaj in western Iran. She had committed the murder 10 years after their marriage and was convicted in 2015, IHR said. Faranak Beheshti, who had been convicted around five years ago for the murder of her husband, was executed in the prison in the northwestern city of Urmia, it said. Activists argue that Iran's laws are stacked against women, who do not have the right to unilaterally demand a divorce, even in cases of domestic violence and abuse. A report by IHR published in October last year said that at least 164 women were executed between 2010 and October 2021. But activists are alarmed by a surge in executions in Iran this year, coinciding with the rise of former judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi to the presidency in 2021 and protests over an economic crisis. At least 306 people have been executed so far in Iran in 2022, according to a count by IHR. Washington-based Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran and London-based Amnesty International said Wednesday that Iran is carrying out executions at a "horrifying pace" in an "abhorrent assault" on the right to life. Those arrested in recent weeks in a crackdown against critical voices include the director Mohammad Rasoulof, whose lacerating film "There is No Evil" about the effects of the use of the death penalty in Iran won the Golden Bear at the 2020 Berlin Film Festival.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788051/ihr-iran-executes-three-women-single-day

Yemen’s Ancient Honey Production a Victim of War, Climate Change

Varieties

July 30th, 4:53am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Experts consider Yemeni honey one of the best in the world but "enormous losses" have been inflicted on production since war broke out in 2014, the International Committee of the Red Cross says AHMAD AL-BASHA AFP

For Yemeni beekeeper Mohammed Saif, honey production used to be a lucrative business but years of war and climate change have taken the buzz out of the family hives. The business, handed down from father to son, "is slowly disappearing", Saif told AFP. "The bees are being hit by strange phenomenons. Is it due to climate change or the effects of war? We really don't know." Yemen, one of the world's most impoverished countries, has been gripped by a deadly conflict since 2014. In the southwestern region of Taiz, Saif recently took stock of his hives in a rugged valley surrounded by mountains. Before the war, Saif said, the family managed 300 hives, now only 80 are left. Experts consider Yemeni honey some of the best in the world, including the prized Royal Sidr known for its therapeutic properties. The United Nations says honey plays a "vital role" in Yemen's economy, with 100,000 households dependent on it for their livelihoods. - Bee ecosystems battered - But "enormous losses have been inflicted on the industry since the outbreak of the conflict", the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a report in June. "Armed conflict and climate change are threatening the continuity of a 3,000-year-old practice," the ICRC said. "Successive waves of displacement to flee violence, the impact of weapon contamination on production areas, and the growing impact of climate change are pushing thousands of beekeepers into precarity, significantly reducing production." Saif knows it all too well. "Last year in our village a missile struck a beekeeper's hives. He lost everything," he said. "The war has had a very bad impact on us. The fighters have targeted many zones where bees are found," he added. The ICRC's Bashir Omar said the conflict had limited the ability of beekeepers to freely roam the land whenever flowers were in bloom to collect the honey. Landmines and active front lines are among the challenges they face. "To make matters worse, Yemen, like many conflict-affected countries, is disproportionately affected by climate change," the ICRC report noted. "Temperature rises in recent years, combined with severe alterations caused to the environment, are disturbing the bees' ecosystem which is impacting the pollination process," it said. "With water tables falling and increased desertification, areas previously engaged in agricultural activities and beekeeping no longer sustain these livelihoods." The ICRC is providing financial support and training this year to beekeepers, after a similar initiative in 2021 that helped nearly 4,000 of them. Nabil al-Hakim, who sells Yemen's celebrated yellow nectar in Taiz shops, also recalled the golden days before the conflict ravaged his country. "Before the war we could make a good living by selling honey... but honey has become rare and customers can no longer afford it," he said. "Before, I used to sell up to 25 five-liter jars a month. Now I can't even sell one."

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788031/yemen%E2%80%99s-ancient-honey-production-victim-war-climate-change

Chips Act Skips US Leaders for Asian Winners

Opinion

July 30th, 4:46am

Tim Culpan

Tim Culpan -

Long-awaited funding for the CHIPS Act is a win for a cabal of US chipmakers and foreign companies, but largely ignores the nation’s true semiconductor leaders who have been propping up the domestic sector for two decades. Three-quarters of the $52 billion allocated to the industry by Congress was earmarked “to strengthen semiconductor advanced test, assembly, and packaging capability in the domestic ecosystem.” The rest of the funds will largely go to a technology center to be set up by the Commerce and Defense departments, and a new Manufacturing USA Institute that will mostly research new ways to make chips, according to the funding schedule outlined in Senate Amendment 5135. It passed the House Thursday. The act was designed to help close the gap with Taiwan and South Korea in terms of manufacturing capacity and prowess, while ensuring the US stays ahead of China, which is also spending significant sums to boost its own chip sector. But the move will barely put a dent in American reliance on foreign manufacturing, and won’t boost resilience against supply shocks, either. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.’s factory in Arizona will end up accounting for a minuscule 1% of its global capacity. And even then, once those chips are manufactured, they’ll be popped straight onto a plane to be tested and packaged in Asia, before being assembled into a phone or PC in China. Even after all this government money is spent, Taiwan and South Korea will retain a dominant share of capacity and continue to be technology leaders. That said, Intel Corp., which designs, manufactures and packages chips at factories in global locations including the US, Israel, China, Vietnam and Ireland, is set to be a big winner. Texas Instruments Inc. can also expect to benefit. Neither company is capable of making chips using the world’s leading manufacturing nodes. Yet foreign players, including TSMC, Samsung Electronics Co. and materials supplier GlobalWafers Co. have already put their hand up for subsidies and are likely to receive funds, too. Missing out, though, will be the companies that have come to dominate the most-advanced semiconductor technologies on the planet including Nvidia Corp., Qualcomm Inc. and Broadcom Inc. That’s because these companies, each of which have a larger market capitalization than Intel and TI, are purely focused on the design and development of chips, without manufacturing them. Driving the political rhetoric behind the promotion and drafting of the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) Act is the notion that making physical goods — manufacturing them — is more important and crucial to national security than designing them. In fact Apple Inc., which also develops advanced chips, is proof that being a technology leader doesn’t mean being a manufacturer since the Cupertino giant doesn’t actually make most of its gadgets. And it’s the chips from the iPhone designer, as well as Nvidia — a world leader in artificial intelligence — and Qualcomm, the biggest name in wireless communications, that are filling up TSMC’s leading-edge facilities in Taiwan and Samsung’s in Korea. Intel fell so far behind that it needs TSMC’s factories to churn out some of its best products. You wouldn’t have the world’s most powerful machine-learning tools, global cellphone communications, or the hottest-selling device on the planet without fabless chip designers. Still, you won’t hear Nvidia, Apple and Qualcomm complain — at least, not publicly. Although they were passed over for Congressional candy, they’ll end up benefiting from the fact that this largess will help their suppliers of choice (TSMC and Samsung) set up facilities on US soil. Neither was particularly keen to shift focus away from their manufacturing hubs at home, but a change in the global political environment coupled with promises of tax breaks and other subsidies meant they couldn’t resist. Yet they’ve also made clear that the money better come through if the US wants such projects to continue. A vast amount of its materials and equipment come from abroad, too. While Lam Research Corp., KLA Corp. and Applied Materials Inc. hail from the US, dozens more, such as ASML Holding NV of the Netherlands, BASF SE from Germany, and Tokyo-based Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., form part of an international network. Few of the hundreds of global suppliers will have the funds or personnel to shift any operations to the US, even with the incentives on offer. Reality often doesn’t matter in politics. The long-awaited funding for the Chips Act is being hailed a victory for the White House and proof of bipartisan collegiality, but in reality it’s a victory for America’s semiconductor laggards and the foreign companies that dominate them. Bloomberg

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788026/tim-culpan/chips-act-skips-us-leaders-asian-winners

Amazon’s Ad Business Is a Star. But Where Are the Details?

Opinion

July 30th, 4:38am

Martin Peers

Martin Peers -

For the big internet companies that make their living from selling advertising, these are troubled times. As happens in any kind of economic slowdown, businesses cut ad spending quickly. For Amazon.com Inc., though, whose e-commerce business is getting hammered, advertising is proving to be a bright spot. Well, relatively speaking. Just as it did for Amazon’s rivals in digital advertising, the company’s ad revenue growth rate slowed in the second quarter to 18% from 32% in the fourth quarter, before the recent slowdown began, Amazon reported Thursday. But it’s still cruising on the highway at a decent speed compared with some other digital ad companies. Ad revenue at Meta Platforms Inc., most obviously, decelerated to minus 1.5% in the second quarter from 20% in the fourth quarter. Even Google’s ad revenue slowed to 11.6% in the quarter from 32.5% in the fourth quarter. And compared with the rest of Amazon’s business — aside from Amazon Web Services, investors’ favorite business — advertising is a star. After all, online sales fell 4% in the quarter. Moreover, given the high-profit nature of advertising, the business is likely now a key contributor to the company’s bottom line. AWS’s operating profits of $5.7 billion offset losses of $2.4 billion at the rest of Amazon. But without advertising, the rest of Amazon would have lost much more money. Having said all that, it’s important to acknowledge that much is unknown about Amazon’s ad business, which makes assessing its growth prospects and true profitability difficult. Investors deserve more clarity about it. For instance, how much of the $8.7 billion in advertising in the second quarter was driven by merchants that sell their goods on Amazon’s marketplace and want to ensure prominent placement? It’s not clear these merchants do so willingly or happily. A 2020 congressional report on competition in digital markets cited evidence that “Amazon may require sellers to purchase their advertising services as a condition of making sales on the platform.” (An Amazon spokesperson denied that merchants that sell on Amazon’s marketplace are required to buy advertising.) One potential reason for investors to be concerned, then, is that any kind of regulatory action against such practices could squeeze Amazon’s ad revenue. Another, related point: Search results on Amazon have become so crowded with ads that the company risks alienating shoppers looking for actual results. Even so, there’s no question that Amazon is an increasingly successful ad platform. People in the ad industry say that Amazon is seen as an effective place for brands to buy ads. Its wealth of data on what consumers are shopping for means advertisers can target their ads precisely at the customers they’re trying to reach. Other retailers are building similar ad businesses, with some success. Indeed, GroupM, the world’s biggest media buyer, says its biggest packaged-goods clients increased their spending on what it calls “retail media” — Amazon and the websites of Walmart Inc. and Target Corp. — to 12% of their total US ad spending in 2021 from 3% in 2019. Moreover, Amazon is not just selling on ads on its marketplace but on other properties, such as its Freevee video streaming service and on its Twitch gaming site. And it sells ads on websites it doesn’t own across the internet, just as Google does. Unlike Google, though, Amazon doesn’t break out any details about how much of the revenue comes from which bucket. That’s important for understanding the profitability of the revenue — and even how much of the revenue that Amazon actually keeps. When Google or Amazon sells ads on properties it doesn’t own, it gets only a cut of the revenue. Google discloses what it shares with those other properties. It’s not clear from Amazon’s disclosures what exactly it is reporting — net or gross ad revenue. Another thing: Selling ads on Freevee can’t be as profitable as selling ads on Amazon’s marketplace, given the cost of producing or licensing programming for the service. So how much ad revenue is Freevee contributing to the total? It is time to stop talking about the digital ad market as one dominated by two companies, Alphabet Inc. and Meta. Amazon’s share of the US digital ad market is expected to reach 12.6% this year, Insider Intelligence estimates, up from 7.7% in 2019. Meta and Google, which had a combined 55.2% share of the market in 2019, will this year take 50.5%. And given that Meta’s ad revenue is likely to shrink in the next 12 months, Amazon’s share seems likely to grow through this downturn. As encouraging as that may be to investors, though, it is time for Amazon to provide clearer disclosure about the nature of its ad business. Bloomberg

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788021/martin-peers/amazon%E2%80%99s-ad-business-star-where-are-details

Rich Tourists Can Actually Preserve the Arctic

Opinion

July 30th, 4:28am

Adam Minter

Adam Minter -

Are crowded airports and hotels ruining your summer vacation plans? A cruise to the North Pole on the world’s first and only luxury icebreaker might be just the antidote. The custom-built tourist ship Le Commandant Charcot plowed through sea ice on July 13 to make its first successful passenger voyage to the top of the Earth. More sailings are scheduled through the end of summer, with tickets starting around $40,000 per passenger and topping out at $126,000. There’s no shortage of takers for the 245 slots aboard. This summer, at least 57,000 cruise passengers will arrive at Longyearbyen, the Norwegian archipelago from which Le Commandant Charcot and many other Arctic cruises sail. The environmental risks of polar adventure tourism are substantial, including the possibility of pollution. But if managed sustainably, tourist cruises can help build support for Arctic conservation and climate mitigation and adaptation efforts. The Arctic has long drawn tourists. Decades before the first successful expedition to the North Pole, they were exploring the Scandinavian Arctic, enjoying the fjords and the mountaineering, hunting and fishing expeditions enabled by indigenous guides in the early 19th century. Steamships created the market for Arctic cruises, including, eventually, visits to Alaskan destinations, Iceland and Greenland. By the early 1900s, Arctic tours were a thriving business, boosted by guidebooks and breathless media coverage. Technology made Arctic exploration progressively easier, and 52 icebreakers made it to the North Pole between 1977 and 2004. Thirteen of those voyages were devoted to scientific research; the remaining 39 were for tourists. Over the last decade, the retreat of the Arctic Ocean and a lengthening summer have further boosted Arctic cruising. Between 2013 and 2019, the number of unique tourist ships entering the Arctic increased from 77 to 104. The capacity of those ships, on an annual basis, grew from 74,177 to 91,166. Those are modest numbers — more people visited Venice over Easter weekend, after all — but the steady growth is drawing concern about tourism and overtourism. There are good reasons to worry. In the event of a fuel spill, sewage leak or other accident, there’s little infrastructure available to clean up a mess. Larger cruise ships mean more human impact on wildlife hotspots, altering animal behavior and potentially trampling flora and scarce habitats. Finally, Arctic tourists and operators can’t ignore their climate impact. In 2016, carbon emissions associated with tourism transportation (planes, ships, cars and other conveyances) represented about 5% of total global emissions. Emissions contribute to global warming and the melting of sea, creating more opportunities to cruise in the Arctic. It’s a wicked feedback loop that serves to encourage even more tourism, especially from affluent tourists in search of vanishing landscapes. But the potential for harm should be seen as a reason to manage Arctic cruises wisely, not to shame and halt them. For over a century, conservation of wild places and the environment has entailed ensuring a steady supply of visitors. Those visitors not only create economic incentives for preserving the shrinking wilderness, they also create constituencies that want to protect them. Sir David Attenborough, the famed British naturalist and TV personality, put it best when he famously noted, “No one will protect what they don’t care about; and no one will care about what they have never experienced.” The Arctic needs people to care about it. Sea ice will continue melting, perhaps at a quickening rate, well into the future. The Arctic Council — the non-binding organization of eight Arctic nations that could advance reasonable tourist regulations — is faltering because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Tourists, even those who can afford $126,000 tickets on luxury icebreakers, can’t by themselves stop climate change and habitat deterioration. But they are not powerless, either. Over the past century, affluent tourists committed to wild places have played a crucial role in preservation, from the forests of Nepal to the early years of the now wildly popular US national park system. The Arctic and its supporters could do worse than to befriend luxury-loving elites wowed by the sea ice on the way to the North Pole. That doesn’t mean cruise companies should get a free pass on how they conduct themselves at the top of the world. A trade association, the Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators, has developed sustainability guidelines for Arctic cruises, and represents and certifies most Arctic cruise operators. Among other requirements, tourist cruises are expected to contribute to science and research while running clean, sustainable ships. Le Commandant Charcot, owned by the French cruise operator Compagnie du Ponant, is equipped with two science laboratories and several scientists (who also provide lectures to the passengers) and can serve as an example to other Arctic shipbuilders and tour operators. As the world warms, a trip to the Arctic will be an expensive luxury. But it’s a ticket that might lead humanity toward a cooler future. Bloomberg

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/3788016/adam-minter/rich-tourists-can-actually-preserve-arctic