Kia ora and welcome to your Friday summary of global business and political news.
First up, US President Donald Trump has hosted a ‘Board of Peace’ ceremony in Switzerland at the World Economic Forum to introduce the founding members of his committee.
The world leaders include Argentina's President Javier Milei and Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban, as well as officials from Azerbaijan, Indonesia and Kosovo. A leaked charter suggested the organisation might be designed to replace functions of the UN, the BBC reported.
Meanwhile, Trump’s announcement of a “framework of a future deal” that would settle his bid for Greenland was met with profound scepticism, the Guardian reported.
“The day ended better than it started,” Danish foreign minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said.
“Now, let’s sit down and find out how we can address the American security concerns in the Arctic while respecting the red lines of the Kingdom of Denmark,” he said. Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte, who negotiated the deal with Trump, cautioned there was “a lot of work to be done”.
Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen said he wasn’t sure “what’s concrete” in Trump’s announced framework for a future deal, CNN reported.
“What we have said from the beginning is we want a respectful, peaceful relationship and a strong partnership as an ally,” Nielsen said. “But no doubt, the rhetoric we have heard the last year is unacceptable for us.”
Elsewhere, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Europe of being “lost” and trying to convince Trump to help them, rather than uniting to defend itself, CNBC reported.
“Instead of taking the lead in defending freedom worldwide, especially when America’s focus shifts elsewhere, Europe looks lost trying to convince the US president to change,” he told the World Economic Forum. “President Trump loves who he is, and he says he loves Europe, but he will not listen to this kind of Europe. Europe still feels more like geography, history, a tradition, not a real political force, not a great power.”
Later, Zelensky said officials from Ukraine, Russia and the United States would hold trilateral meetings for the first time this week as the US continues to push for an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine, Al Jazeera reported.
Zelensky said that the terms of security guarantees for Ukraine had been finalised, and a deal was almost ready on economic recovery after the war.
US President Donald Trump.
The French Navy has intercepted an oil tanker in the Mediterranean Sea that travelled from Russia and was operating under international sanctions. French maritime authorities said the ship, the Grinch, was suspected of operating with a false flag, the AP and Reuters reported.
French President Emmanuel Macron said the operation was conducted "with the support of several of our allies".
"We are determined to uphold international law and to ensure the effective enforcement of sanctions," Macron said.
Elsewhere, Trump has sued JPMorgan Chase and its CEO Jamie Dimon for at least US$5 billion over allegations that the lender stopped offering Trump and his businesses banking services for political reasons, Bloomberg reported.
The complaint accuses the bank of trade libel and breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. The bank said it doesn’t close accounts for political or religious reasons and added that the lawsuit has no merit.
Meanwhile, Dimon said artificial intelligence “may go too fast for society” and cause “civil unrest” unless governments and business support displaced workers, the Guardian reported.
While advances in AI will have huge benefits from increasing productivity to curing diseases, the technology may need to be phased in to “save society”, he said.
“Your competitors are going to use it, and countries are going to use it. However, it may go too fast for society and if it goes too fast for society that’s where governments and businesses [need to] in a collaborative way step in together and come up with a way to retrain people and move it over time.”
JP Morgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon.
Over the Ditch, an intense heatwave in south-eastern Australia in early January was made five times more likely by human-caused climate change. The multi-day event was the most severe heatwave since the devastating Black Summer of 2019/20, the ABC reported.
For several days in a row, temperatures rose to above 40 degrees, causing fires across the state of Victoria.
New analysis found that prior to human-caused climate change, events like the one just experienced did happen infrequently on average about four times a century. In today's climate, they were more common every decade.
India’s biggest airline IndiGo reported a disappointing quarterly result after unprecedented disruptions that caused about 3000 flight cancellations late last year, Bloomberg reported.
Revenue rose 6.2% to 234.7 billion rupees, which missed estimates. Total costs were up 9.6% to 224.3b rupees as the carrier absorbed expenses, including refunds and payouts.
Finally, UK government borrowing fell sharply last month because of more income from taxes and higher National Insurance contributions outweighing spending. In December, government borrowing – the difference between public spending and tax income – was £11.6 billion, according to the Office for National Statistics.
That was 38% lower from the previous December, and below economists’ expectations, but still higher than the same month in 2023, the BBC reported.
