Crypto News: Biden’s big pitch

US President Joe Biden hasn't said for sure he plans to seek reelection in 2024. But his first big campaign speech will take place tonight regardless.

Beyond the standard fare that comes with any State of the Union address, the president is likely to lay out the case to tens of millions of voters watching at home for why he deserves a second term.

Key reading:

No task is more urgent for Biden, 80, who faces renewed scrutiny about whether he should seek four more years in the White House or turn over the keys to a new generation of leadership.

Polls taken just before the speech show that Americans believe Biden has not accomplished very much as president, even though he enacted major legislation, such as a landmark climate and health law and a bipartisan infrastructure package, when Congress was under Democratic control.

The president is also grappling with investigations into his handling of classified documents.

In his speech, Biden needs to explain how his policies are helping people while arguing that Republicans — who now control the House and remain at least somewhat beholden to former President Donald Trump — are unfit to occupy the Oval Office.

There are also the not-insignificant matters of how he'll handle the fallout from a Chinese balloon that transited the US before being shot down, and persuade Congress to raise the debt limit in the face of Republican demands for spending cuts to avoid default, not to mention ongoing support for Ukraine almost a year into Russia's invasion.

All that is to say, an annual tradition that many say has outlived its usefulness may contain more than meets the eye. — Jordan Fabian

Biden walks on the South Lawn of the White House yesterday. Photographer: Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA

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Rescue efforts | Rescue teams from across the world began deploying in Turkey after powerful earthquakes yesterday killed at least 4,000 people there and in neighboring Syria, leaving millions to suffer without power or heat throughout a snowy night. Rescuers are searching the ruins of thousands of buildings left damaged or demolished by the quakes that hit near the Turkish city of Gaziantep.

You can follow our rolling coverage of the quake aftermath here.

Testing evidence | The first major criminal charges that Trump could face for interfering in the 2020 election might come from Atlanta. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis said her decision is "imminent" on a potential indictment, which would make Trump the first president charged with a crime. A case could provide a blueprint for prosecutions involving other battleground states where Trump and his supporters tried to undermine Biden's win.

Alleged Chinese spy balloons were spotted on several occasions during Trump's presidency, including near sensitive US military facilities and training areas, sources say.

Visitor traffic between Hong Kong and mainland China doubled yesterday, as the border fully reopened for the first time after three years of Covid-induced closure. The crossings helped boost the overall number of trips in and out of the city, including via the airport, by 64%.

Under pressure | UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak plans a mini reshuffle of his cabinet as soon as today after a rocky first 100 days in office, sources say. Sunak will appoint a new Conservative Party chair after he sacked Nadhim Zahawi over a tax scandal more than a week ago, and is under pressure to reconsider the decision to appoint Dominic Raab as Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary amid a probe into bullying allegations.

Britain's postal workers won't go on strike this month after Royal Mail challenged a planned walkout.
Retail sales disappointed in the UK last month as Britons facing higher household bills reined in their spending after splurging on Christmas festivities.

Growing presence | Top Russian oil and gas industry executives were out in force at India Energy Week, a day after a European Union ban on the Kremlin's seaborne fuel shipments took effect. Russia has risen from a very small presence in early 2022 to become the largest seller of crude to India, as Europe and the US turn their backs on Moscow's energy supplies over its invasion of Ukraine.

Cash flows | Millions of dollars are being smuggled into Afghanistan from Pakistan every day, providing support for the squeezed economy after the US and Europe denied the Taliban access to billions in foreign reserves. The illicit flows show how the regime is evading sanctions after the 2021 US withdrawal and Taliban takeover of the country, while for Pakistan the outflows are exacerbating a rapidly developing economic crisis.

A wooden case holding US dollar bills at the Sara-e Shahzada exchange market in Kabul in October 2022. Photographer: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg

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French unions are holding a third day of mass strikes against government plans to raise the retirement age, keeping up pressure as parliament debates the proposed reform.
Japan's ruling party will prepare to submit a bill encouraging understanding of issues concerning the LGBTQ community, seeking to repair the damage from discriminatory comments made by a former aide to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
India issued orders to block a further 232 apps and websites, most of which were linked to China, a sign that relations remain fraught between Asia's two most populous countries.
The inability of states to provide basic services and create jobs across much of Africa has made the continent the global epicenter of extremist violence, the United Nations Development Programme said.
The White House slammed a proposal by House Republican committee and caucus chairs to set up a panel examining Social Security and Medicare solvency as part of debt-limit negotiations, likely shutting the door on the approach.

And finally ... Google is getting its competitor to OpenAI's ChatGPT ready for prime time. The company said its conversational AI service, called Bard, would be opened to trusted testers and that it's readying the service for the public "in the coming weeks." The release of Bard comes as Google faces potential challenges to its flagship search business from AI services. Microsoft, which announced an unspecified news event at its headquarters today, has been working on integrating ChatGPT into its Bing search engine, a source said last month.