Author: LoveWorld UK

Finance sector professionals in Shanghai are preparing to move back to Hong Kong and other offshore centres after spending only a few years in the Chinese city as a harsh COVID-19 lockdown has hurt their business prospects and upended daily lives. Thousands of bankers, traders and investors in the financial hub of the world’s second-largest economy have found themselves confined to their homes, with some even struggling to secure food and other essentials for their families. The four-week-long lockdown, which has forced most of the city’s 26 million people indoors, has started to weigh on prospective financial deals with some…

A senior European Union official said Tuesday that the bloc plans to cut Russian oil and gas imports to zero by the end of 2027, with his remarks coming as EU leaders continue to deliberate on moves to accelerate reducing the region’s dependence on Russian energy. EU Economic Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni told Italian daily Il Messaggero in an interview published Tuesday that European Union aims to reduce its dependence on Russian oil and gas by two-thirds by the end of this year and phase it out completely by the end of 2027. Gentiloni’s remarks provide more clarity around the timeline for the EU’s member…

Real Madrid are close to signing Antonio Rüdiger on a free transfer after reaching a verbal agreement with the Chelsea defender over a lucrative four-year contract. Rüdiger held positive talks with the Bernabéu club’s hierarchy over the weekend and is set to receive a considerable pay rise having decided to leave Chelsea when his contract expires at the end of the season. Real’s manager, Carlo Ancelotti, has identified the Germany international as a key signing and while the move has not been finalised it is should be confirmed soon. The 29-year-old is expected to earn at least £200,000 a week. Chelsea were desperate…

Sue Gray expects to complete her report into Covid law-breaking parties across Westminster at the end of May at the earliest, the Guardian has been told. Sources said that the senior civil servant, who for months has been forced to sit on her findings about illegal gatherings while Scotland Yard carries out its own inquiry, believes the police investigation could drag on for several more weeks. It may then take Gray a further fortnight for her to compile her report, meaning that it is possible the final version will not be delivered to No 10 for at least another month.…

Britain’s gradual emergence from the Covid-19 pandemic meant government borrowing more than halved in the latest financial year but remained the third highest on record, the latest official figures show. The Office for National Statistics said the gap between the state’s revenues and its spending stood at £151.8bn in the 12 months to March, down from £317.6bn in the previous year. Despite the improvement over the year as a whole, the total deficit for 2021-22 was more than £20bn higher than forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility predicted when preparing estimates for Rishi’s Sunak’s spring statement last month. The chancellor said…

Elon Musk has reached a $44bn deal to buy Twitter in a takeover that will give the world’s richest man control of a social network with more than 200 million users. The sale will put the Tesla chief executive in charge of a company that he has frequently criticized, claiming it has not lived up to its potential as a platform for “free speech”. The deal on Monday comes after a dramatic few weeks of speculation about Twitter’s future, triggered by Musk’s emergence as the platform’s largest single shareholder on 4 April. He then declared a takeover bid on 14 April, offering…

Twitter began negotiations with Elon Musk on Sunday after he wooed shareholders with financing details on his $43bn acquisition offer, people familiar with the matter said. The company’s decision to engage with Musk, taken earlier on Sunday, did not mean it would accept his $54.20 a share bid, the sources said. It signified, however, that Twitter was exploring whether a sale to Musk was possible on attractive terms. Musk, chief executive of Tesla, has been meeting with Twitter shareholders in the last few days seeking support for his bid. He has said Twitter needs to be taken private to grow and become a genuine…

Frank Lampard claimed Everton were denied a blatant penalty at Anfield where a 2-0 defeat by Liverpool left his club in the relegation zone for the first time since December 2019. Liverpool maintained their title challenge with second-half headers from Andy Robertson and the substitute Divock Origi but had to overcome an obstinate Everton. In the 53rd minute, with the game goalless, Anthony Gordon went down in the Liverpool penalty area under an apparent push by Joël Matip. He retweeted footage of the incident along with two emojis expressing his disbelief. The referee, Stuart Attwell, who had booked Gordon for diving in…

Heart inflammation requiring hospital care was more common among people who received COVID-19 vaccines than those who did not, according to a new study of tens of millions of Europeans. Rates of myocarditis or pericarditis, two types of heart inflammation, are above the levels in an unvaccinated cohort, pegged at 38 per 100,000 after receipt of a second dose of a vaccine built on messenger RNA (mRNA) technology in males aged 16 to 24—the group studies have shown are most at risk of the post-vaccination condition—researchers with health agencies in Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway found. “These extra cases among men aged 16–24…

The city clerk of Green Bay, Wisconsin, participated in illegal absentee ballot harvesting in the local election on April 5, a new legal complaint filed with the Wisconsin Elections Commission claims. Several voters reported seeing City Clerk Celestine Jeffreys accepting multiple absentee ballots from the hand of a single person several times, according to Erick Kaardal, special counsel with the Thomas More Society, a not-for-profit public interest law firm. Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich, a Democrat, appointed Jeffreys to her current post. “This is ballot harvesting and it is illegal,” Kaardal said in a statement. The complaint (pdf), cited as Roeser v.…