BitGou: Friday Morning Briefing: Britain quits EU, steps into transition twilight zone

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The United Kingdom leaves the European Union for an uncertain Brexit future, the most significant change to its place in the world since the loss of empire and a blow to 70 years of efforts to forge European unity from the ruins of war. The country will slip away an hour before midnight from the club it joined in 1973, moving into the no man’s land of a transition period that preserves membership in all but name until the end of this year. At a stroke, the EU will be deprived of 15% of its economy, its biggest military spender and the world’s international financial capital of London.

Democrats appeared to have fallen short in their bid to garner the votes needed to call witnesses in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial clearing the way for his likely acquittal as early as this weekend. Democrats have worked to get at least four Republicans to support the effort, but their hopes appeared dashed when Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, who had been undecided, declared further evidence in the case was unnecessary.

The United States warned Americans not to travel to China as the death toll from a new virus rose and the World Health Organization declared a global health emergency. Stock markets steadied slightly after the WHO praised China’s efforts to contain the virus, following a tumble the previous day over a rising toll in the world’s second-biggest economy. “Do not travel to China due to novel coronavirus first identified in Wuhan,” the U.S. State Department said in a new travel advisory on its website, raising the warning for China to the same level as Afghanistan and Iraq.

The FBI is investigating the role of Israeli spyware vendor NSO Group Technologies in possible hacks on American residents and companies as well as suspected intelligence gathering on governments, according to four people familiar with the inquiry. The probe was underway by 2017, when Federal Bureau of Investigation officials were trying to learn whether NSO obtained from American hackers any of the code it needed to infect smartphones, said one person interviewed by the FBI then and again last year. NSO said it sells its spy software and technical support exclusively to governments and that those tools are to be used in pursuing suspected terrorists and other criminals.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo underscored Washington’s support for Ukraine on a visit to Kiev, as both countries sought to smooth over relations buffeted by the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. Ukraine was thrust center stage in a domestic political battle in Washington last year as Trump faced down allegations he pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate the son of his Democratic rival Joe Biden. Pompeo has also walked back from comments he was accused of making to a National Public Radio reporter ahead of his trip that appeared to play down Ukraine’s importance to Americans.

World

Australian authorities warned of severe fire danger in densely populated areas this weekend, declaring a state of emergency in the capital, Canberra, as soaring temperatures and strong winds whipped up huge, unpredictable blazes. With temperatures above 104 Fahrenheit, emergency officials urged people to prepare for fires in parts of the southeast including hundreds of miles of coast south of Sydney that has already been badly hit in months of blazes.

Bewildered, sad and disappointed, Brazilians migrants sent from the United States to Mexico this week were left wondering how they had ended up in another country whose language they do not understand. The United States began sending some Brazilian migrants who had crossed the border with Mexico back there to await their U.S. court hearings under a program known as the Migrant Protection Protocols. It is one of several moves by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump aimed at reducing the number of people seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border. Since the program began a year ago, more than 57,000 non-Mexican migrants have been returned to Mexico.

Two patients from the same family in England have tested positive for coronavirus, the first such cases in the country. British health officials had previously warned that the United Kingdom was highly likely to have cases of the new type of coronavirus, which first emerged in China’s central province of Hubei and has killed 213 people so far. “The patients are receiving specialist National Health Service care, and we are using tried and tested infection control procedures to prevent further spread of the virus,” England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, said.

Turkey may launch a military operation into Syria’s northwestern Idlib province if the situation is not resolved immediately, President Tayyip Erdogan said as attacks by Russia-backed Syrian government forces risked a new wave of refugees. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, backed by Russian air power, have since last week rapidly advanced on Idlib. They have taken dozens of towns, including the key city of Maarat al-Numan, upending the last major rebel-held stronghold in Syria’s nearly nine-year war. The recent campaign has also raised tensions between Ankara and Moscow, which back opposing sides in the conflict.

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Shares struggle for footing after virus-battered week

World share markets fought to regain their footing on Friday as investors clutched at hopes that China could contain the coronavirus, even as headlines spoke of more cases and deaths, travel bans, evacuations and factory shutdowns.

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