Chicago Tribune (May 11)
“COVID-19 vaccines finally are headed for more kids as U.S. regulators Monday expanded use of Pfizer’s shot to those as young as 12, sparking a race to protect middle and high school students before they head back to class in the fall.”
Tags: 12, Class, COVID-19, Expanded use, High school, Kids, Middle school, Pfizer, Protect, Race, Regulators, Students, U.S., Vaccines
Wall Street Journal (March 13)
“Regulators are pressuring Wall Street to do away with the London interbank offered rate by year-end. Companies are still making the switch.” The Federal Reserve is pushing the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR) as a replacement, but “the U.S. is running behind the U.K. and Europe, where investment firms and companies have been faster to transition to alternative rates,” including the Sterling Overnight Index Average (Sonia).
Tags: Europe, Fed, Investment firms, LIBOR, Regulators, Replacement, SOFR, Transition, U.K., U.S., Wall Street
Responsible Investor (February 12)
“The UK’s government and financial regulators have laid out a series of plans to bolster climate disclosure and become the first country in the world to have mandatory TCFD reporting, despite growing uncertainty over its ability to host a successful COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland.”
Tags: Climate disclosure, COP26, Glasgow, Mandatory, Regulators, TCFD reporting, UK, Uncertainty
New York Times (December 12)
“If there is one singular issue that defines the intersection of business and policy at this moment, it is a deepening trust deficit…. Businesspeople and policy leaders are scrambling for new ways to engender trust with constituents, including shareholders, employees and regulators. Some are trying to be more transparent. Others are diving into political and social issues that used to be verboten. Perhaps more than anything, they’re speaking publicly more about their thinking.”
Tags: Business, Businesspeople, Constituents, Employees, Intersection, Leaders, Policy, Regulators, Shareholders, Singular, Trust, Trust deficit
Fortune (December 10)
“For years, the aerospace industry has been talking about whether electric-powered commercial air travel is viable.” On Tuesday, a flight by an electrified de Havilland Canada DHC-2 ended the debate, signaling “what many aerospace industry insiders say is commercial aviation’s future.” The airline behind the first flight, Harbour Air, “is betting its business on electric motors. The airline expects regulators to certify its retrofitted aircraft in about two years, with commercial flights beginning in 2022.”
Tags: Aerospace industry, Airline, Canada, Commercial aviation, Electric, Harbour Air, Regulators, Retrofitted
American Banker (November 5)
“The closing of three banks in the span of a week should be viewed as a reason to exercise caution — though it is too early to expect a run of failures. Regulators shuttered City National Bank of New Jersey, Louisa Community Bank and Resolute Bank between Oct. 25 and Nov. 1. It had been four years since two banks failed on the same day.”
South China Morning Post (April 2)
Banks and regulators in China have engaged in a delicate dance between reducing non-performing loans (NPLs) and maintaining profits. “That’s why the NPL ratios of the nation’s key banks all hover at about the same level–now around 1.7 per cent of loans,” though “Fitch estimates that the real ratio could be as high as 20 per cent, implying total NPLs of 19 trillion yuan (US$3 trillion).” But the regulator is now becoming more demanding in NPL reduction and unforgiving of gimmicks previously employed to hide NPLs. “Given Beijing’s focus on the stability of the financial system, the flow of NPLs into the market should pick up considerably in the next two to three years, providing ample opportunity for new investors.”
Tags: Banks, China, Fitch, Gimmicks, Investors, Market, NPLs, Opportunity, Profits, Regulators
Bloomberg (July 3)
“Strenuous efforts by Chinese regulators to ensure market stability are having the opposite effect.” The rationale is unimportant. “Whether such efforts are meant to protect important companies, stabilize markets or avoid national embarrassment, they’re preventing China’s markets from growing up. And it’s increasingly clear that they’re unnecessary.” Furthermore, “infantilizing Chinese firms…prevents the professionalization of management and improvements in corporate governance.”
Tags: China, Corporate governance, Embarrassment, Infantilizing, Management, Market stability, Professionalization, Rationale, Regulators
Bloomberg (June 22)
“In the culmination of a long-running saga, MSCI Inc. yesterday announced that it would include some Chinese stocks in its widely used benchmark indexes, starting next year.” The decision beggars belief. “China is undeniably an increasingly important market…. But lowering the standards of what constitutes a market and obfuscating real problems just exposes unknowing foreign investors to elevated risks. If Chinese investors and even regulators are so wary of Chinese stocks, why encourage foreigners to enter the fray?”
Tags: Benchmark, China, Foreign investors, Index, MSCI, Problems, Regulators, Risks, Saga, Standards, Stocks
LA Times (December 17)
‘’Uber built its business by challenging regulators and entrenched assumptions about how best to assure public safety. It successfully evaded the strict local rules that the taxi industry faces on fares, licenses and driver background checks by arguing that smartphone-summoned rides were different from taxis and should be regulated under new state standards. It has also avoided a variety of mandates on employers by classifying its drivers as independent contractors, not employees.” But when it comes to testing driverless vehicles on California roads, the technology company should play be the rules.
Tags: ” Driverless vehicles, Assumptions, California, Contractors, Drivers, Employees, Employers, Fares, Licenses, Mandates, Public safety, Regulators, Rules, Smartphone, Taxi industry, Uber
