BitGou: Wednesday Briefing: Biden heads to Europe as Russia shells Ukrainian cities

Wednesday, March 23, 2022

by Linda Noakes

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Here's what you need to know.

Putin gets Chinese backing to stay in the G20, Biden's approval rating drops to a new low, and Musk hands drivers the first Teslas from a new German gigafactory

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Firefighters work in a residential district that was damaged by shelling in Kyiv, March 23, 2022

RUSSIA AND UKRAINE AT WAR

U.S. President Joe Biden flies to Europe today for an emergency NATO summit on Ukraine, where invading Russian troops are stalled, cities are under bombardment and the besieged port of Mariupol is in flames.

Four weeks into a war that has driven a quarter of Ukraine's 44 million people from their homes, Russia has failed to capture a single major Ukrainian city, while Western sanctions have ostracized it from the world economy.

Russia's combat power in Ukraine has declined below 90 percent of its pre-invasion levels for the first time since its attack began, a senior U.S. defense official said, suggesting heavy losses of weaponry and growing casualties.

Russia condemned what it called a "reckless" Polish proposal to send international peacekeepers into Ukraine and warned that it could lead to a direct clash between Russian and NATO forces. We look at how NATO's bi-annual Arctic drill is taking on a new significance.

Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to attend the next G20 summit in Indonesia later this year and received valuable backing from Beijing in a pushback to suggestions by some members that Russia could be barred from the group.

Here's what you need to know about the conflict right now

U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson participates in her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Capitol, March 22, 2022

U.S.

Senate Democrats are defending Ketanji Brown Jackson, Biden's nominee to become the first Black woman on the U.S. Supreme Court, from Republican attacks painting her as a liberal activist in confirmation hearings that enter a third day.

Biden's public approval rating fell to a new low of 40% this week, a clear warning sign for his Democratic Party as it seeks to retain control of Congress in the November 8 election, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll.

Former President Donald Trump's Save America group has quickly become one of the top Republican fundraising organizations ahead of the congressional elections. But so far it has been stingy with its spending on Republican efforts to win in November compared to the expenditures of other groups, according to a Reuters analysis.

A New Mexico county commissioner who founded a group called 'Cowboys for Trump' was found guilty by a judge of breaching the Capitol during the January 6, 2021 riot, a second consecutive win at trial for the Justice Department.

About one-in-three COVID-19 cases in the United States are now caused by the BA.2 Omicron sub-variant of the coronavirus, according to government data that also showed overall infections still declining from January's record highs.

WORLD

South Korea's total coronavirus infections topped 10 million, or nearly 20% of its population, as surging severe cases and deaths increasingly put a strain on crematoriums and funeral homes nationwide. The country has been battling a record COVID-19 wave driven by the highly infectious Omicron variant.

Chinese searchers found one of two black boxes from a China Eastern Airlines plane that crashed this week in forest-clad mountains with 132 people onboard. The device was severely damaged, and it was not immediately clear if it was the flight data recorder or the cockpit voice recorder.

The Taliban backtracked on their announcement that high schools would open for girls, saying they would remain closed until a plan was drawn up in accordance with Islamic law for them to reopen.

Britain's Prince William and his wife Kate arrived in Jamaica as part of a week-long Caribbean tour, hours after activists protested to demand reparations for slavery amid growing scrutiny of the British Empire's colonial legacy.

A series of multiple small earthquakes that have been rattling a mid-Atlantic Portuguese island for three days could trigger a stronger tremor or a volcanic eruption, experts said, as authorities urged people not to travel there.

Elon Musk dances at the opening ceremony of the new Tesla Gigafactory for electric cars in Gruenheide, Germany, March 22, 2022

BUSINESS

Elon Musk was cheered as he oversaw the handover of Tesla's first German-made cars at its Gruenheide plant, marking the start of the U.S. automaker's inaugural European hub just two years after it was first announced. Meanwhile, the top U.S. securities regulator urged a federal judge not to let Musk escape an agreement requiring that his Twitter use be monitored, which the Tesla chief executive considers part of a campaign of harassment.

World stocks climbed to five-week highs as investors ignored a broadening selloff in global bond markets fueled by a combination of soaring inflation and hawkish comments from U.S. policymakers.

Russian holders of domestic corporate Eurobonds face delays in receiving payments settled through international agents, as transactions get snarled up by sanctions, Russia's National Settlement Depository, companies and analysts said.

British inflation shot up faster than expected last month to hit a new 30-year high, worsening a historic squeeze on household finances that finance minister Rishi Sunak is under pressure to ease in a budget update today.

Hundreds of customers of digital authentication firm Okta have possibly been affected by a security breach caused by a hacking group known as Lapsus$, the company said. The breach has sparked concern since the cyber extortion gang posted what appeared to be internal screenshots from within the organization's network.

BREAKINGVIEWS

Agenda-setting insight from the international commentary brand of Reuters

Read Sharon Lam on how Canada offers Western countries a path towards handling the Ukraine refugee crisis, Karen Kwok on Saudi Aramco's health adding spice to the kingdom's yuan dilemma, and Robyn Mak on why China's technology emperors have no clothes