Crypto News: The risk of emboldening Putin

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Neither Vladimir Putin nor Volodymyr Zelenskiy are among world leaders at the Group of 20 summit that begins in Brazil today, but Russia's war on Ukraine is forcing itself into the discussions regardless.

US President Joe Biden's administration has authorized lifting some restrictions on Ukraine's use of Western-made long-range weapons against military targets in Russia.

That's a step Zelenskiy has long sought and that Putin has warned would mean the US and its NATO allies are at war with Russia.

The arrival of thousands of North Korean soldiers to join Putin's forces fighting Ukrainian troops in Russia's Kursk region apparently influenced Washington's thinking.

WATCH: Bloomberg's Bill Faries discusses the US decision to lift some restrictions on Ukraine's use of Western-made weapons to strike limited targets in Russia. Source: Bloomberg

The North Korean involvement — as many as 100,000 may eventually rotate to Russia in batches — is adding to Chinese President Xi Jinping's challenges in managing US relations as Donald Trump returns to the White House in January. The US has called on Beijing to use its influence on Pyongyang to avoid escalating the war.

It's all spurring a flurry of activity in Europe among leaders fearful about the war's direction. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is bringing a plan to the G-20 that proposes freezing the conflict and postponing talk of Ukrainian membership in NATO for a decade.

That's after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz held a rare phone call with Putin on Friday to urge him to engage in negotiations. French President Emmanuel Macron signaled his readiness to speak to the Kremlin leader yesterday, even as he declared that Putin "doesn't want peace."

Zelenskiy says he wants the war to end next year, and with a "strong Ukraine." After nearly 1,000 days of resistance, nowhere is fatigue over Russia's aggression felt more deeply than in Kyiv.

In their push now for a way out of the war, the risk for Ukraine's allies is they encourage Putin to conclude his best strategy is to continue it. — Anthony Halpin

Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang on June 19. Photographer: Vladimir Smirnov/AFP/Getty Images

China wants to be friends, but is ready for a fight if necessary: That was the message Xi sent to Trump during his final meeting with Biden as US president. Xi laid out "four red lines," signaling that Trump must avoid any moves to undermine the Communist Party's grip on power, push the nation toward democracy, contain its economic rise or encourage independence in Taiwan.

Taiwanese training on American M109 self-propelled howitzers on Aug. 7. Photographer: Daniel Ceng/Anadolu/Getty Images

President-elect Trump is fuming over the behind-the-scenes jockeying for the post of Treasury Secretary in his new administration that has spilled into public view. The search devolved into disarray over the weekend when billionaire Elon Musk endorsed one candidate over another Trump was considering for the powerful cabinet post that oversees the $28 trillion Treasuries market and economic sanctions.

Mexico's new president, Claudia Sheinbaum, is walking a fine line as she shows a willingness to cooperate with the US on curbing immigration and on cooling relations with China without coming across as a pushover. That stance is likely to be tested to the extreme in Trump's second term. As the largest US trading partner, Mexico is about to find itself on the front line of the incoming Trump administration's policies of slapping tariffs on all imported goods and deporting undocumented migrants.

Scholz received support from leading Social Democrats after several party officials questioned whether the chancellor should be the top candidate in Germany's snap election in February given his unpopularity. The backing follows calls by lawmakers who urged a quick decision in favor of Scholz to end a potentially bruising debate for the party that trails Friedrich Merz's Conservative bloc and the far-right Alternative for Germany in polls.

Limiting global warming to 1.5C has been a rallying cry for climate action for almost a decade. Now, with the planet almost certain to blow past the target, diplomats and campaigners at the COP29 summit in Azerbaijan have found themselves awkwardly clinging to a goal that no longer makes sense.

Kim Jong Un vowed to bolster North Korea's nuclear capabilities "without limit" to counter the threats posed by the security partnership between the US and its allies, state media reported today.

Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye looks set to secure a parliamentary majority that will enable him to implement reforms needed to stabilize the nation's finances.

The US and the Philippines today signed a deal on sharing classified military information at a time of growing assertiveness from Beijing over the South China Sea and Taiwan.

Voters in Gabon have agreed to extend the country's presidential terms to seven years from five in a referendum on a new constitution that's seen as an important step toward a return to civilian rule.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, who in the new Congress will again preside over a narrow Republican majority, has taken a let's-see attitude when asked about implementing the president-elect's campaign promise to abolish income tax on tips.

Johnson, who also vowed to quickly advance Trump's economic agenda, said on CNN's "State of the Union" yesterday that the tax cuts would have to "be paid for and make sure the economy is a pro-growth economy."

Trump's 2017 tax overhaul expires next year and he wants to extend all of the personal income tax cuts and further reduce the corporate rate. Trump also proposed ending the tax on Social Security benefits entirely.

Speaking during the campaign about the costly promises of both Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, Erica York of the nonpartisan Tax Foundation described them as "scattershot" and "really detached from reality."

One person to watch today: Biden attends the G-20 summit in Rio de Janeiro.

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Economists have given up hope that Germany can avoid a second consecutive year of shrinking output, a Bloomberg survey found. Analysts see gross domestic product contracting 0.1% in 2024, after a 0.3% fall in 2023. The outlook has also darkened because of heightened political uncertainty after the coalition's collapse and Trump's reelection.

Biden announced new conservation efforts and funding as he became the first sitting US president to visit the Amazon region, touring part of a rainforest nature preserve and meeting with local environmental activists. He announced new initiatives including doubling the US contribution to the Amazon Fund to $50 million and a $37.5 million loan from the Development Finance Corp. to support the planting of native trees in Brazil. The incoming Trump administration may try to delay the clean energy transition in America, he said, but "nobody can reverse it."

Biden signs a proclamation designating Nov. 17 as International Conservation Day during a tour of the Museu da Amazonia in Manaus yesterday. Photographer: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Thanks to the 31 people who answered the Friday quiz and congratulations to Gerard Verschoyle, who was the first to name Zimbabwe as the country whose second-biggest city is set to run out of water by the end of the year.

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