The Economist (April 25 Issue)
“Xi Jinping wants a powerful currency. America’s war has helped.” Usage of the yuan is expanding, but the currency remains far from the status of a global reserve currency. “Last month China’s currency accounted for over 8% of global trade finance, according to SWIFT, second (but a distant second) to the dollar, on over 80%.” Nevertheless, the yuan is becoming “a source of comfort for countries and firms disconcerted by America’s haphazard stewardship of the truly powerful dollar.”
Tags: 80, China, Comfort, Countries, Disconcerted, Finance, Firms, Global reserve, Global trade, Haphazard, Powerful currency, Stewardship, Swift, U.S., Xi, Yuan
Wall Street Journal (April 22)
Giant investment companies like Blackstone, Franklin Templeton, BlackRock and KKR “are taking over the financial system.” They now “control sums rivaling the economies of many large countries. They are pushing into new businesses, blurring the lines that define who does what on Wall Street and nudging once-dominant banks toward the sidelines.” Their outsize roles are, according to investors, creating “risks markets have never encountered before.”
Tags: Banks, BlackRock. KKR, Blackstone, Blurring lines, Countries, Financial system, Franklin Templeton, Investment, Investors, Markets, Risks, Sidelines, Wall Street
