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Low interest rates have pushed investors to invest in riskier credit, flooding emerging market funds and driving down borrowing costs and causing debt stocks to climb, economists and investors have told GlobalMarkets

In August 2019 corporate bosses including Jeff Bezos, Jamie Dimon and Tim Cook used their Business Roundtable platform to declare that the purpose of business had to change in ways that moved attention away from shareholder value to a more purposeful approach that improved our society. This followed Larry Fink who, in January 2018, wrote a letter to 500 CEOs asking them to rethink their sense of purpose. “To prosper over time,” he wrote, “every company must not only deliver financial performance, but also show how it makes a positive contribution to society.”

Seen and heard in the corridors of the Annual Meetings

The idea of the Green New Deal, a package of policies addressing environmental, social and economic needs together, is spreading around the world and is likely to be on show first in Europe.

Leading ministers and financiers have told GlobalMarkets that the EU is likely to redouble efforts to reform its financial system, as member states brace for Brexit and try to protect themselves against a shift away from globalisation.

Around 50 finance ministers gathered in Washington on October 19 to put into action measures to implement the six Helsinki Principles that they agreed on five months ago. They are set to issue a communique that will acknowledge that the world is in the grip of a climate emergency.

The increasingly obvious threat of climate change is leading central banks into new territory, as they begin to analyse the risks it poses to the financial system. It is stretching them intellectually and posing new questions about how they interpret their mandates, and whether they can lead society or must travel at its pace.

Saudi Aramco has delayed the launch of its mega-IPO for the second time in two years and investors are starting to tire of continued speculation and no hard numbers on valuation

Investors have hailed the new ethics code for banks, the UN Principles for Responsible Banking, as an important advance in making banks more sustainable. But they want to see the fine words lead to action — above all, real decarbonisation.

Investors in Turkey enjoyed some relief after the government agreed to withdraw from northern Syria. The country’s finance ministry has told GlobalMarkets it is confident but some fears that measures passing through the US Congress could lead to fresh sanctions being imposed that one said was a threat

The barricades are burning in Lebanon, with people angry at their government’s plans to impose taxes on WhatsApp calls. But the authorities desperately need more money to stave off a default

Estonia’s finance minister tells GlobalMarkets why he does not believe that the EU should set up its own anti-money laundering agency but should instead focus on more effective cooperation and faster information-sharing