Crypto News: A gripping US drama

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Going by Wikipedia, the 2024 US presidential campaign effectively began four years ago on Nov. 7, the day that Joe Biden was declared the winner of the 2020 race against Donald Trump.

That about sums up the US electoral cycle: It's relentless, and all-pervading.

Given the stakes for the world, the rest of us are compelled to look on. Like a never-ending Netflix series, the characters may change but the episodes keep coming, with all the plot twists its writers can summon.

There's certainly been no shortage of drama: a woeful debate performance for Biden that was hard to watch; an assassination attempt on Trump carried live on TV; a sudden switch of Democratic candidate to Kamala Harris; some billionaire endorsements, and more than a dash of legal suspense.

After all that, the nation still appears undecided. The candidates are statistically tied in each of the seven swing states that will decide the race, according to a Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll.

Considering what's come already, it's hard to imagine that Harris' denouncement of Trump as a "fascist" will move the needle. After all, Trump's own former chief of staff reached the same conclusion.

Equally, will any undecided voters be swayed by the former president's comments questioning Harris' mental acuity?

The world is used to the daily soap opera that is the US, of course: We watch Hollywood movies, lap up American celebrity culture, and appreciate its sports.

But this election psychodrama has many viewing with a mix of fascination and horror. For this is more like reality TV, with real-world consequences for the global economy, Russia's war in Ukraine, China ties and a Middle East in an uproar.

The best that can be said is there are only 12 more days of this show to run.

Then it starts all over again. — Alan Crawford

WATCH: Harris lambasts Trump for his reported suggestion that Adolf Hitler did some good things.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping yesterday followed months of pressure by Indian businesses on his government to relax restrictions on China, sources say. It became clear that New Delhi's tough stance on Beijing after a 2020 border clash killed at least 20 Indian soldiers was hurting Modi's push to attract more high-end manufacturing, including chipmakers.

North Korea is sending troops to Russia and they may be put into combat in Ukraine, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said. While an initial US assessment indicates about 3,000 troops are being trained at three sites in Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said this week that North Korean military personnel have been spotted visiting Russian-occupied territory in his country.

Turkey carried out airstrikes against Kurdish militant groups in Syria and Iraq that it accused of a deadly bombing and gun attack on its capital. The military action is in retaliation for yesterday's raid on the state-owned Turkish Aerospace Industries that killed five people and wounded 22 others in what authorities called an "act of terrorism."

The Liberal Democratic Party has held power in Japan for all but a handful of years since the 1950s by winning strong support in rural areas. But polls show that while Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's ruling coalition will likely get the most votes in Sunday's national vote, it may fail to win a majority for the first time since 2009, largely due to the fallout from a slush-fund scandal.

The arrest of two suspects believed to be behind the January attack on a television station in the Ecuadorian port city of Guayaquil has given President Daniel Noboa a much-needed boost amid a severe electricity crisis. Spanish federal police in Catalonia apprehended the men, whose alleged assault on the broadcaster made global headlines and triggered Ecuador's war on gangs.

Indonesia's Maritime Security Agency said it intercepted and drove out a China Coast Guard ship that entered the Southeast Asian country's territory for the second time in a week.

Somalia's government asked the African Union and the United Nations to exclude Ethiopian soldiers from a revamped peacekeeping force fighting al-Qaeda-linked insurgents, deepening the strain in relations between the neighboring countries.

The European Union is debating whether to hike tariffs on more Russian agricultural and food products, as well as fertilizers, sources say.

While Democrats, including Biden, have clamored for a tax on unrealized investment gains, Harris has not said whether she would pursue the proposal if elected.

Harris does support a billionaire minimum tax, according to a campaign official. At the same time, she has pledged to scale back one of Biden's key policies on capital gains taxation, declining to give specifics about her support for other pillars of the administration's vision to raise levies on businesses and the wealthy.

The plan to tax unrealized gains is designed to increase levies on the richest Americans who can often avoid taxes under the current rules. Harris' silence accompanies her pro-business rhetoric and a policy agenda that tacks to the middle to court Republicans and independents.

She described herself as a "pragmatic capitalist" on Telemundo earlier this week, and during the CNN town hall last night was vague as to how, exactly, she would raise taxes on well-off Americans.

One thing to watch today: Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will meet with UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves.

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The World Bank is set to double farming investments to $9 billion a year as it seeks to transform agriculture. Farming is increasingly vulnerable to climate risks and new financing tools are enabling private capital to flow to the sector, according to the lender's president, Ajay Banga. Those shifts have the potential to reshape the industry, making it the right moment for a new approach for the World Bank, he said.

With its towering spires, pristine courtyards and cobblestone streets, Cambridge rarely evokes thoughts of a tech hub, but that's what it has become. The English university city is the fastest-growing in Britain and home to the "Cambridge Cluster," a group of knowledge-intensive businesses that has generated a double-digit number of startup unicorns. It shares characteristics with the high-tech San Francisco Bay Area in many ways, but one stands out: It is one of the most unequal cities in the UK.

The AstraZeneca Discovery Centre in the Cambridge Biomedical Campus. Photographer: Vivian Wan/Bloomberg

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