The fact that the yen has been so weak against a falling greenback is remarkable. It is doubly striking, because the gap between Japan’s low interest rates and America’s higher ones has shrunk by ...

Inflation itself might provide another explanation for the yen’s weakness. Since 2024 prices rose faster in Japan than in all ...

This is the introduction to Plot Twist, our weekly culture newsletter, in which correspondents spotlight important authors and performers, and tell you about the works of art and the stories they love ...

A MERICA STARED into the void this week, but pulled back. Federal action in the streets of Minneapolis goes well beyond ...

So it is good news that Africa’s sleeping giants seem to be waking up. In South Africa prudent policies helped bring inflation down to 3.2% in 2025, lower than at any point in the past 21 years, and ...

Nearly three years on, Nigeria’s 230m people, especially the poor and the middle class, are still reeling from increases in fuel and food prices. Poverty has risen. But it looks as though Mr Tinubu’s ...

The Economist takes a simpler approach. Since 1986 we have compared the price of one item, the Big Mac, across the globe. To ensure the sameness of the product across countries, we have relied on the ...

On January 20th the yield on Japan’s 30-year government bond hit 3.8%, the highest in its quarter-century history, as the market digested scenarios for a snap election called for February 8th, which ...

T HE FEDERAL government’s assault on Minneapolis continues but, for the past few days, it is Donald Trump’s shock-and-awe ...

Not nearly as much as it could be ...

When Mr Xi talks of promoting the “Yan’an spirit”, he is not suggesting a need for similar bloodletting—Mao’s orgy of ...

Coupang’s problems started in November when it revealed that a former employee in China had gained access to data on about ...