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The contrast between the scarcity of investments in infrastructure and the excess of savings invested in liquid and low-return assets in the global economy must be dealt with. Greening infrastructure in emerging and developing economies would benefit from being able to attract greenbacks into the business. Development of pipelines of projects with homogeneous regulations and standards, as well as with minimum mismatch between risks and comfort of private investors to manage them will be needed. First appeared at Policy Center for the New South (July 7, 2021) The world faces a huge shortfall of infrastructure investment relative to its needs. With a few exceptions, such as China, this shortfall is greatest in emerging and developing countries. The G20 Infrastructure Investors Dialogue estimated the volume of global infrastructure investment needed by 2040 to be $81 trillion, $53 trillion of which will be needed in non-advanced countries. The Dialogue projected a gap—in other wo...

02 Sep, 2021 Naomi Osaka has stormed the tennis scene, snatching up enough titles and endorsements to break some of the game’s most impressive records. Her victories over Serena Williams at the 2018 US Open and the 2021 Australian Open have cemented her reputation as the future of tennis. Osaka’s business portfolio has put an end to Williams’ four-year run as the world’s highest-paid female athlete. Her impressive performance — on and off the court — allowed her to unseat Maria Sharapova as the highest-earning female athlete. According to Forbes, while Sharapova earned $29.7m in 2015, Osaka brought in $37.4m during the 2019-2020 fiscal year. Osaka, 23, holds the top ranking in the Women’s Tennis Association, with four Grand Slam singles titles as well as US and Australian Open championships. When she burst onto the scene at age 18, Williams described her as young, aggressive, talented — and “very dangerous”. Williams has been a role model for Osaka since she grabbed her firs...

05 Sep, 2021 The International Monetary Fund’s tenth annual External Sector Report (ESR, August 2021) shows how current account deficits in the global economy widened in 2020 during the pandemic. On the other hand, the ESR also argues that overall, the misalignment between fundamentals and current account balances has not been exacerbated. The pandemic widened current account imbalances… The sum of absolute values of current account deficits and surpluses went from 2.8% of global GDP in 2019 to 3.2% last year, reversing a downward trajectory since 2015. The report points out four major impacts brought about by the pandemic to explain that increase. First, the dramatic drop in travel and tourism has significantly shrunk the balances of countries dependent on tourism receipts, including some Caribbean countries, Thailand, Turkey, Spain, and others. Additionally, the demand for oil and its price underwent a deep collapse. Although oil prices began a recovery in the second hal...

07 Sep, 2021 Mahendra Singh Dhoni Mahendra Singh “MS” Dhoni, one of India’s most celebrated cricket players, has earned the nickname “Captain Cool” for his calm resolve on the pitch. His reticence with the media has lent Dhoni an air of mystique, too. On the rare occasions that he breaks his silence, journalists jump at the chance for an exclusive. But the champion cricketer has taken media matters into his own hands. He has launched a video in which a young, long-haired Dhoni, shy and a little awestruck in 2005, sits opposite himself to interview the Dhoni of today. The video was released on April 2 to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of India’s historic win over Sri Lanka in the 2011 World Cup. The media campaign was sponsored by Gulf Oil, where Dhoni — a keen motorcyclist — is a brand ambassador. “I am delighted to be associated with a brand like Gulf Oil that is driven by passion to move forward. As an avid biker myself, I can very well connect with the brand’s p...

08 Sep, 2021 The gig economy is anything but stable — but it can be the last line of defence in a crisis , argues Yogesh Patel The pandemic has left 25.7m people in the US either without work or facing pay cuts. In the UK, the unemployment rate hit five percent for the first time since 2016. These cuts were especially noticeable to 16- to 24-year-olds, where unemployment hit 11.1 percent. The Resolution Foundation, a think-tank aiming to improve the lives of those on low- to middle incomes, found that those from minority ethnic backgrounds, and those aged 18-24, bore the brunt of job losses. And this, coincidentally, is the demographic that commonly works in the gig economy. Many have been left unemployed or on furlough, without readily available full-time work. Businesses such as Amazon, Uber and the slew of delivery apps provide an accessible income source with low entry barriers and flexible hours. In the US, the grocery delivery company Instacart saw an explosion of popu...

09 Sep, 2021 Teresa Barger spent 21 years at the  International Finance Corporation (IFC) investing in emerging market companies around the world. At the IFC, she held the positions of division manager for Africa, deputy director of investment review, director of private equity and investment funds.  Co-founder & CEO of Cartica Management : Teresa Barger What are your hopes for the future of your business, and for the industry as a whole? TB: I would like to see diversity of firm sizes, of active and passive strategies, of country allocation, and of finance professionals. At the same time, I would like to see convergence around support for transparency, honest financial statements, and good governance. What relevant changes to legislation or regulation would you like to see? TB: My pipedream would be to see all stock exchanges everywhere outlaw dual-class structures and the concomitant divergence between economic stakes and voting power. Do you have any anecdotes t...

24 Sep, 2021 Author: John Gandolfo The Covid-19 crisis has impacted the health and livelihoods of many millions of people across the planet, and it continues to impose an enormous toll on the poor, threatening decades of progress towards raising living standards in the developing world. Massive unemployment generated by the spread of the pandemic highlights the importance of jobs and economic transformation, and it also puts added urgency on gender and development. Maintaining a strong focus on climate change is critical to long-term goals. More than ever, innovative solutions are needed to bridge the estimated $2.5tn annual funding gap so that the world can meet the 2030 development goals. This means turning the billions now invested in sustainable, green, and socially responsible finance into the trillions required if we are to end poverty and boost shared prosperity. We must dramatically scale-up investments in sustainable finance in this decade, and sustainable bonds...