Early Headlines: China Not Ready for Reserve Currency Role, Grexit is Near, North Korean Drought, World Refugee Crisis and More

Early Bird Headlines 17 June 2015

Econintersect: Here are some of the headlines we found to help you start your day. For more headlines see our afternoon feature for GEI members, What We Read Today, which has many more headlines and a number of article discussions to keep you abreast of what we have found interesting.

Global

• World Hasn’t Had So Many Refugees Since 1945, Report Says (Bloomberg) About 1 percent of the global population, or about 73 million people, have been forced to leave their homes amid a spike in armed conflict over the past four years, the Institute for Economics and Peace, which compiles the Global Peace Index, said in a report published on Wednesday.

U.S.

• Head of hacked U.S. agency says problems ‘decades in the making’ (Reuters) Katherine Archuleta, director of the Office of Personnel Management:

“I want to emphasize that cyber security issues that the Government is facing is a problem that has been decades in the making, due to a lack of investment in federal IT systems and a lack of efforts in both the public and private sectors to secure our internet infrastructure.”

Greece

• Greek Capital Controls Baked In as Companies Store Cash Abroad (Bloomberg) Now as Greece and its creditors head for a showdown that’s raising the spectre of the country’s exit from the euro or the imposition of capital controls, crisis-hardened company executives, although nervous, say the drawn-out turbulence has prepared them for the worst.
• Juncker says Greece is ‘misleading’ voters over debt (BBC News) Jean-Claude Juncker has accused the Greek government of misleading voters as Alexis Tsipras said its creditors were trying to “humiliate” the country.

Egypt

• Will Egypt send Morsi to the gallows? (Al Jazeera) Death sentence of deposed president was upheld Tuesday, but analysts are skeptical he will ever hang.

Syria

• Kurds deal major blow to Islamic State (LA Times) Kurdish fighters and allied Syrian rebels consolidated their control Tuesday of the strategic Syrian Turkish border town Tal Abyad, whose capture dealt the militants of the Islamic State a major blow by cutting a key supply route.

Russia

• Putin’s Economic Aides Worry About What He Won’t Tell Investors (Bloomberg) Vladimir Putin’s economic team is more worried about what he won’t say on Thursday than what he will. Absent from the president’s annual address to investors at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum will be any mention of meaningful initiatives to pull Russia out of recession, curtail corruption or strengthen property rights.

North Korea

• North Korea says hit by worst drought in 100 years (Reuters) North Korea has been hit by what it describes as its worst drought in a century, which could worsen chronic food shortages in a country where the United Nations says almost a third of children under five are stunted because of poor nutrition.

China

• 4 Trillion Reasons China’s Currency Isn’t Ready for Prime Time (Foreign Policy) China isn’t ready to supply the rest of the world with RMB. So why does it matter if the currency gets the IMF stamp of approval? Any country that wants its currency to actually function as an international reserve must supply the rest of the world with claims in that currency, either by running trade deficits or by providing large amounts of aid or investment capital. Quite to the opposite effect, China has imported $4 trillion of other countries’ currency to hold as central bank reserves.
  
• Hong Kong government debates divisive political reforms (BBC News) Hong Kong’s government is debating a controversial political reform package ahead of a much-anticipated vote later this week.

BECOME A GEI MEMBER – IT’s FREE!

Every every afternoon What We Read Today featured column is available only to GEI members.

To become a GEI Member simply subscribe to our FREE daily newsletter.