Opinion

Musk-driven Dogecoin surge is a warning to Twitter

The bursting of social media’s ad-funded bubble is creating big market waves. Meta Platforms Inc. is less valuable than Home Depot Inc., Snap Inc. is worth less than Deutsche Bank AG (which underwrote its IPO), and Twitter is now privately owned by Elon Musk after almost a decade of cumulative...

Opinion

The European ‘way of life’ isn’t looking too sweet

The European “way of life” has always been a vague concept, but — after Covid-19 — it chimed with a new generation looking for la dolce vita.Citigroup Inc. is one unlikely poster child. At its new office in Malaga, Spain, junior bankers can expect to be paid half the salary o...

Opinion

Truss, the iron weather vane, faces chilly EU wind

Liz Truss isn’t Boris Johnson. That was the main crumb of comfort for European Union diplomats and leaders as congratulations from Paris to Helsinki flowed to the new resident of 10 Downing Street. After years of Johnson’s antics, from threats over post-Brexit trade to calling the French...

Opinion

­Brexit threats in wartime are doubly wrong

Of the many diplomatic spats and snubs that summarize the dismal relations between the UK and its historic continental frenemy of France, one phrase sticks in the mind: “Prenez un grip, and donnez-moi un break.”The patronizing put-down by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, delivered i...

Opinion

Macron’s win is an opportunity for France and the EU

In 2017, France bucked the populist trend by voting for Emmanuel Macron against europhobic Marine Le Pen. In 2022, it has done so again – just as Slovenia looks set to eject its nationalist leader.An overwhelming display of pro-EU values? Not quite. Macron’s lead is narrower than last ti...

Opinion

The French want protection, not reform

“Google it, mate” — such was the response of an Australian politician who bristled at a journalist testing him on wage data, earning laughter as he rebuked such “gotcha” questions.The scene has echoes in France’s presidential runoff vote, due later this month, whi...

Opinion

Macron knows inflation is Le Pen’s best weapon

“Google it, mate” — such was the response of an Australian politician who bristled at a journalist testing him on wage data, earning laughter as he rebuked such “gotcha” questions.The scene has echoes in France’s presidential runoff vote, due later this month, whi...

Opinion

Macron’s ‘revolution’ faces a reckoning

As French voters go to the polls on April 10 for the first of two voting rounds, gone is the enthusiasm or interest in the election of 2017, when Macron came to power as the youngest leader since Napoleon Bonaparte, with a new party promising to sweep out the establishment, knock out a rising Europh...

Opinion

The silver economy gets a Covid reality check

French care-home operator Orpea was once a bet on better retirement. In an aging society, demand for long-term care would only rise — and so would demand for long-term returns, hence why Canada’s top pension fund bought a 15% stake in 2013. It was going to be the virtuous circle of the &...

Opinion

Lessons from Europe’s response to Omicron

As Omicron, the newest variant of Covid-19, made landfall in Europe over the weekend, governments across the continent faced a quandary: How to put their citizens on alert without causing panic? The conundrum was made even more complicated by the fact that nobody — not even the world Health Or...

Opinion

France’s Merkel or Thatcher moment?

Valerie Pecresse, the French center-right’s pick to challenge Emmanuel Macron for the presidency next year, describes herself as a mix of Angela Merkel and Margaret Thatcher. This is bold talk for a candidate currently polling at 10%, who looks set to fail even to make the run-off vote.The 54-...

Opinion

Winter is coming for Europe’s pandemic optimists

Before the arrival of safe and effective vaccines, dealing with COVID-19 in Europe was dominated by fear, uncertainty and blunt tools like lockdowns and travel bans to keep hospitals from being overrun.Countries with blanket curbs such as Israel, Austria and Denmark — whose leaders self-identi...

Opinion

Winter is coming for Europe’s pandemic optimists

 Before the arrival of safe and effective vaccines, dealing with Covid-19 in Europe was dominated by fear, uncertainty and blunt tools like lockdowns and travel bans to keep hospitals from being overrun. Countries with blanket curbs such as Israel, Austria and Denmark — whose leaders self...

Opinion

Austria is a new front in Europe’s fight against Covid

Winter is drawing in, Covid-19 cases are rebounding and European Union countries with middling vaccination rates are tightening the screws.What began as an arm-twist in July, when France’s Emmanuel Macron rolled out a mobile health pass to control access to leisure venues, has become a headloc...

Opinion

Europe is experiencing two very different pandemics

A year ago, the course of the pandemic changed, thanks to the first safe and effective vaccines against Covid-19. Today, after administering 7.3 billion doses and preventing countless deaths, we have more data than ever to justify that early enthusiasm — and the need to keep jabbing.On top of ...

Opinion

Climate populism is a gathering storm in Europe

After European governments sought to do “whatever it takes” to protect people from the economic effects of pandemic lockdowns, politicians are once again taking out their checkbooks to help consumers — this time to ride out a post-reopening jump in energy prices.France will hand ou...

Opinion

The UK’s bizarre $1.7 billion vaccine rug pull

Back in February, biotech firm Valneva SE’s proposed COVID-19 vaccine was touted by Boris Johnson’s government as a key plank of its ambitious, whatever-it-takes race to immunize the Brits.The U.K. had poured millions of pounds into Valneva’s Scottish factory, secured an extra 40 m...

Opinion

Can the EU make the UK a good neighbor?

Boris Johnson’s top Brexit official David Frost wasn’t picked to build bridges. Since being elevated to a cabinet position in February, the former whisky lobbyist and proud wearer of Union Jack socks has gleefully lobbed diplomatic grenades at the European Union, accusing Brussels of inf...

Opinion

Europe’s long march toward living with Covid-19

Living” with Covid-19 has been talked about since the pandemic first began: A moment when the coronavirus disease becomes part of everyday life, rather than an overpowering wave of cases and deaths that overloads hospitals and triggers society-crushing lockdowns. This so-called “endemic&...

Opinion

How to make sure climate war doesn’t become class warfare

Trade in coal and steel powered the European Union’s formative years. Now the bloc wants to lead the world on climate responsibility, with a bumper package of proposals from expanding an emissions-trading system to banning fossil fuel cars to reach its 2050 target of carbon neutrality. But for...