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FILE PHOTO: The headquarters of the European Central Bank (ECB) is illuminated with a giant euro sign at the start of the “Luminale, light and building” event in Frankfurt, Germany, in this March 12, 2016 file photo. REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach/Files
April 12, 2019
FRANKFURT (Reuters) – The European Central Bank is looking for three bank supervisors to join the depleted board of its supervisory arm after years of delay and recent criticism from a European lawmaker, the bank said on Friday.
ECB President Mario Draghi has put off replenishing the central bank’s delegation on the Single Supervisory Board since 2017, leaving it under-represented in an institution it shares with watchdogs from the euro zone’s 19 countries.
After being left with just two out of six board representatives, the ECB finally decided to act at this week’s meeting of its Governing Council.
“On 9 April 2019 the Governing Council approved the vacancy notice for the selection of up to three ECB representatives to the Supervisory Board,” the ECB said on Friday.
The job adverts will be posted on its website shortly and candidates would be given four weeks to submit applications.
A German member of the European Parliament, Markus Ferber, in February voiced fears for the quality and balance of the Single Supervisory Board due to the many empty ECB seats.
Andrea Enria, who chairs the board, and Pentti Hakkarainen currently occupy just two of the six seats allocated to the ECB, pending approval of Yves Mersch’s appointment as vice chair by the Council of the European Union.
Power-sharing between the ECB and national authorities has not always been easy, with the latter occasionally fighting to protect their domestic banking system.
Last year Italian authorities staged a concerted effort to push back against an initiative to rid banks of unpaid loans, with the ECB eventually coming up with a watered down proposal.
(Reporting By Francesco Canepa; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
Source: OANN
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin arrives for a G-20 Finance Ministers and Bank Governors’ meeting at the IMF and World Bank’s 2019 Annual Spring Meetings, in Washington, April 12, 2019. REUTERS/James Lawler Duggan
April 12, 2019
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the United States opposes increasing overall funding and shareholding quotas for the International Monetary Fund, but supports extending a portion of the IMF’s $254 billion crisis fund.
In a statement for the IMF’s steering committee meeting, Mnuchin said it was important for the Fund to maintain sufficient financial resources to respond to potential crises.
“In our view, the IMF currently has ample resources to achieve its mission, and countries also have considerable complementary resources should a crisis emerge,” Mnuchin said in the statement, which was posted to the IMF website on Friday as global central bankers and finance leaders met in Washington for the IMF and World Bank spring meetings.
“Thus, we do not see a need for a quota increase at this time and support closure of the 15th General Quota Review as soon as possible.”
The IMF’s last quota increase was agreed in 2010, boosting the shareholding and influence of major emerging markets including China and Brazil.
The IMF has current total lending capacity of about $1 trillion, including the New Arrangements to Borrow crisis fund that was greatly expanded in 2009 at the depths of the last financial crisis.
That fund is set to expire in November 2022.
“We look forward to working closely with the IMF and other members to identify options for extending a portion of these borrowed resources so that the IMF can maintain adequate resources to deliver on its mission,” Mnuchin said, adding that the United States was seeking a “reasonable timeframe” for the next quota review.
Mnuchin also said the IMF should work to promote debt transparency and sustainability. Mnuchin and other U.S. Treasury officials, including David Malpass, who started this week as president of the World Bank, have been highly critical of China’s lending to emerging markets through its “Belt and Road” infrastructure program.
Mnuchin’s statement did not single out China, but he said: “Increasingly, opaque or unsustainable lending practices weaken investor confidence, erode governance and accountability and create a drag on economic growth.”
He said the IMF should promote greater transparency of borrowing from all creditors in its programs, laying a new benchmark for future programs.
(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Paul Simao)
Source: OANN
Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro, reacts during a ceremony marking his first 100 days in office at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil April 11, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado
April 12, 2019
By Jake Spring
BRASILIA (Reuters) – The American Museum of Natural History said on Friday that it is “concerned” an event booked to be held at the New York museum will honor far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro as a “person of the year,” a move that has triggered online outrage.
The Brazilian-American Chamber of Commerce is holding its annual Person of the Year gala at the museum on May 14, during which it will give the award to Bolsonaro, according to the chamber’s website. The award is typically given to one Brazilian and one American each year, although this year’s American recipient is not listed.
Bolsonaro, who styled his campaign for office last year after that of U.S. President Donald Trump, has considered pulling out of the Paris Agreement on climate change and railed against what he sees as indiscriminate fines for environmental crimes. He continues to support mining and other development in the Amazon rainforest region, considered by most scientists as the world’s biggest natural defense against climate change.
“The external, private event at which the current President of Brazil is to be honored was booked at the Museum before the honoree was secured,” the museum said on its official Twitter account. “We are deeply concerned, and we are exploring our options.”
Bolsonaro’s office and the Brazilian-American Chamber of Commerce did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The responses to the museum’s tweet included hundreds of messages urging that the event be canceled, with people identifying themselves as activists and scholars saying it was inappropriate that Bolsonaro be honored at an institution of science because of his views.
“It certainly is cause for outrage,” Philip Fearnside, an American professor at Brazil’s National Institute of Amazonian Research and one of the most cited experts on the jungle, said in a telephone interview.
“He denies the existence of anthropogenic climate change and he’s appointed several other denialists to his Cabinet,” Fearnside said. “And he is also dismantling the environmental protections in Brazil … so obviously it’s not something to be celebrated by science.”
(Reporting by Jake Spring; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
Source: OANN
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is declining to say whether he thinks his chamber would confirm Herman Cain to join the Federal Reserve board, casting doubt on the former Republican presidential candidate’s prospects should President Donald Trump advance him for the post.
Asked Thursday if a Cain nomination would face problems , McConnell, R-Ky., noted that successful nominees must pass background checks and have a likelihood of confirmation.
“And, as you know, some of my members have expressed concern about that nomination,” McConnell told reporters. “But as far as I know, it hasn’t been made yet.”
Trump’s interest in potentially nominating Cain along with another political ally, conservative commentator Stephen Moore , has sparked questions among lawmakers from both parties in Congress about the president’s influence on the central bank.
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated the importance of the Fed’s independence during a talk Thursday evening with House Democrats meeting in Virginia for their annual issues retreat, according to a source in the room unauthorized to discuss the private session.
Powell told lawmakers that he saw his role as totally apolitical. He also said the Fed does not consider political pressure in its decision making, the source said. Another source in the room confirmed the remarks.
The chairman fielded questions from lawmakers during a question-and-answer session in Lansdowne, but declined to comment on the president’s potential picks.
Powell was Trump’s choice to lead the Fed, but the president has been critical of him for raising interest rates.
Earlier Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said elevating Cain and Moore to the Fed would risk politicizing the nation’s central bank and endangering the economy.
“These two appointments to the Fed are the worst, ill-suited appointment that the president could come up with,” she told reporters.
Three GOP senators — Utah’s Mitt Romney, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski and North Dakota’s Kevin Cramer — told The Associated Press they’d likely vote against Cain. With Republicans controlling the Senate 53-47, it would take opposition from just four GOP senators to sink the nomination, assuming all Democrats are also “no” votes.
As he did earlier this week, McConnell also sidestepped a question about whether he would back Cain or Moore, a Fed critic and former Trump campaign aide, for the board. Trump has said he will nominate both men.
“We’ll see who’s actually nominated,” said McConnell.
Cain has run into concerns by lawmakers from both parties that, as a Trump loyalist and deeply conservative political figure, he would threaten the Fed’s traditional political independence. Trump himself has taken a nontraditional approach to the Fed, repeatedly accusing it of mismanaging the economy by not pushing hard enough for low interest rates.
The White House offered no fresh comment Thursday about Trump’s intentions, referring reporters to his earlier comments about Cain.
Trump initially called Cain “a very terrific man” who would “do very well there.” But he said earlier this week that he didn’t know how Cain was faring in the vetting process and that Cain “will make that determination” whether to continue.
Cain, former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, ran for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. He dropped out of the race after allegations of sexual harassment and infidelity, which he denied. Last year, in September, he helped found a pro-Trump super political action committee, America Fighting Back PAC, whose website says, “We must protect Donald Trump and his agenda from impeachment.”
Cain formerly served on the board of the Fed’s Kansas City regional bank. He has also called for a return to the gold standard to control inflation, which most economists consider unworkable.
Moore is a conservative commentator and another Trump political ally.
Source: NewsMax Politics
FILE PHOTO: Firearms and accessories are displayed at Gun City gunshop in Christchurch, New Zealand, March 19, 2019. REUTERS/Jorge Silva/File Photo
April 12, 2019
SYDNEY (Reuters) – New Zealand’s state pension fund will sell off investments of NZ$19 million ($13 million) in makers of weapons outlawed by tough new firearms laws following the country’s worst peacetime mass shooting, it said on Friday.
Lawmakers voted almost unanimously this week to ban military-style semi-automatic guns and assault rifles less than a month after a lone gunman used them to kill 50 worshippers in attacks on mosques in Christchurch.
“Companies involved in the manufacture of civilian automatic and semi-automatic firearms, magazines or parts prohibited under New Zealand law have been excluded from the NZ$41 billion NZ Super Fund,” the fund said on its website.
The move was a response to the new law, it said, and identified holdings in seven companies to be affected by its decision, including American Outdoor Brands Corp, Sturm, Ruger & Co Inc and NOF Corp.
The others are Vista Outdoor Inc, OLIN Corp, Richemont and Daicel Corp.
Others may be identified in future, added the fund, which gave no timeframe for its divestments.
Makers of tobacco and some other munitions are already excluded from its investment mandate.
Authorities have charged Australian Brenton Tarrant, 28, a suspected white supremacist, with 50 counts of murder following the Christchurch attacks.
(Reporting by Tom Westbrook; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
Source: OANN
Have you ever wondered why most church services in America seem to be filled with lots of fluff and very little substance?
As America’s moral foundations literally collapse right in front of our eyes, a large percentage of our pastors are afraid to speak out about controversial topics because they might offend someone. And it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why they are so afraid. Most U.S. churches are shrinking, and more than 100 die every week. In a day and age where pastors are judged by attendance numbers and budget levels, scaring people away is bad for business.
With all that in mind, the results from a recent Barna survey shouldn’t be surprising at all…
We wanted to know if pastors felt limited or pressured when it comes to speaking about controversial topics. Half of Christian pastors says they frequently (11%) or occasionally (39%) feel limited in their ability to speak out on moral and social issues because people will take offense. The other half of pastors say they only rarely (30%) or never (20%) feel limited in this way. When asked to identify the source of the concerns, pastors are much more likely to say that they feel limited by those inside the church than those outside. In other words, the reactions of those in the pews are most on the minds of today’s pastors.
And remember, these numbers just show the percentage of pastors that are willing to admit that they are afraid to speak out about controversial issues.
In reality, the percentage of U.S. pastors that actually hit the hard issues on a consistent basis is exceedingly low.
Not offending people is obviously a strategy that can work, because many of America’s largest churches today are pathetically shallow. In fact, one of America’s most famous pastors absolutely refuses to ever use the word “sin” because it might offend someone.
Matt Bracken gives his take on the social media unpersoning epidemic sweeping across the internet.
But eventually people get tired of superficial religion that doesn’t have any substance, and nobody can deny that there has been a mass exodus from the Christian faith in this country. In fact, the number of Americans with “no religion” has risen by 266 percent over the last three decades.
In particular, young people crave authenticity, and they can spot a fake a mile away. They are leaving America’s churches faster than anyone else, and that is incredibly sad.
Some churches are attempting to reverse this trend, and many of them seem to think that being “hip” and “trendy” is the key to winning young people back. For example, the following comes from a profile on C3 Church in New York City by Topic Magazine…
Have you ever been to a church where the Jesus music is so loud that some congregants—young, hip urbanites all—wear earplugs? Where the Christian pop-rock stirs people into such rapture that they jump up and down, both feet leaving earth, both hands raised ecstatically skyward, as if in a mild-mannered mosh pit? Where half the pastors, band members, and congregants have nose piercings and the other half have forearm tattoos, and a teeny-tiny beanie is the accessory du jour?
There is certainly nothing wrong with having good music and a modern presentation, but it must also be accompanied by truth if it is going to do any good.
In the profile, the reporter for Topic Magazine asked “Pastor Josh” about his stand on one of the most controversial issues of our day, and he did his very best to dance around it…
But Pastor Josh knows that some of his congregants are gay—or, in his words, “would say they’re gay”—and he’s happy to tell them where he feels “the truth lands on the issue.” He just doesn’t want “the conversation” to end the moment someone reads on C3’s website that gay marriage is an affront to God. “To me, that’s a shame,” he says. “I’m trying to show, ‘Hey, I’m not judging anyone. I’m not condemning anyone.’ We’ve all got our views and attractions and all those kinds of things.” He knows that young people, especially, inhabit a complicated, alienating world.
“I think every one of us is searching for love,” Pastor Josh says. “Even though we might disagree on where the best place to look for love is.”
I have read that quote several times, and I still don’t understand what he is trying to say.
Whether people agree with it or not, Pastor Josh owes it to all of us to tell us directly what he really believes.
Of course there are thousands upon thousands of other ministers just like “Pastor Josh” in America today.
The church business has become all about making people feel good, and in this type of spiritual environment even Kanye West can start a church…
Imagine stumbling into a church you’ve never seen on Sunday morning. As you approach you hear rapper DMX praying, “I have special privileges. I am God’s favored child.” In front of you sit Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom, who were both raised Christian but now consider themselves “spiritual.”
The prayer ends, and a gospel choir in matching Yeezy merchandise belts out rapper Kid Cudi’s “Reborn.” Presiding over it all is Pastor Kanye West.
It isn’t a dream. Kanye reportedly started his own church on the first Sunday of the year, and since then, he’s attracted celebrities to his entertaining, religion-laced gatherings.
Of course not all is lost. There are some pastors out there that are doing a fantastic job, and all over the world God is raising up a Remnant. But overall, the institutional church in America is failing to influence the culture because pastors are deathly afraid of scaring their customers away.
All that it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
And right now a whole lot of good men are doing precisely that.
Source: InfoWars
Ice Hockey – 2018 IIHF World Championships – Group A – Russia v Slovakia – Royal Arena – Copenhagen, Denmark – May 14, 2018 – Nikita Gusev of Russia in action. REUTERS/Grigory Dukor
April 12, 2019
The Vegas Golden Knights could be getting some offensive punch for their playoff push, and it could come from a player who has never played in the NHL, multiple outlets reported Thursday.
Nikita Gusev, the reigning MVP of Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League, could be on his way to the United States after his current team, SKA St. Petersburg, was eliminated from the playoffs by SCKA Moscow.
Gusev, 26, had 82 points in 62 games this season to lead the KHL, according to NHL.com. The left wing scored 17 goals with 65 assists. Canada’s TSN reported that Gusev’s representatives were working on a release from his current contract, which officially expires at the end of April.
“I don’t know much about him,” Vegas head coach Gerard Gallant said, according to the league website. “(Golden Knights general manager) George (McPhee) mentioned it today. … If he joins us, we’ll see what’s going to happen. Hopefully he does join us and gets some practice time in with us, but I have no idea where that’s going.”
Vegas trails its best-of-7 Western Conference playoff matchup with San Jose 1-0, with Game 2 set for Friday in the Bay Area. The Golden Knights are the defending Western Conference champions.
Gusev was a seventh-round draft pick by the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2012, but his rights were traded to Vegas in the 2017 expansion draft.
-Field Level Media
Source: OANN
A SpiceJet passenger aircraft Boeing 737-800 is seen after it overshoot the runway while landing on Tuesday night at the airport in Mumbai, India, September 20, 2017. REUTERS/Shailesh Andrade
April 12, 2019
By Jamie Freed
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Budget Indian airline SpiceJet Ltd said on Friday it planned to lease a “first lot” of 16 Boeing Co 737-800s to help fill a gap in aviation capacity that ratings agency ICRA said has pushed up fares by 30 to 40 percent since September.
SpiceJet had canceled some flights due to the grounding of its 12 737 MAX planes after Ethiopian Airlines’ deadly March 10 crash. However, the bulk of the reduction, which ICRA said removed 15 percent of market capacity, is due to Jet Airways Ltd grounding more than three-quarters of its fleet as a result of funding problems.
“The sudden reduction of aviation capacity has created a challenging environment in the sector,” SpiceJet Chairman Ajay Singh said in a statement. “SpiceJet is committed to working closely with the government authorities to augment capacity and minimize passenger inconvenience.”
India’s civil aviation minister Suresh Prabhu has directed the civil aviation secretary to review issues related to Jet Airways and take steps to minimize the inconvenience to passengers and ensure their safety, the minister said in a Tweet on Friday.
India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation has de-registered 11 737-800s that had been leased by Jet Airways on request from lessors, the agency’s website said, and another 14 requests for de-registration remain pending.
SpiceJet did not say whether it planned to lease planes that had previously been flown by Jet. The budget carrier’s shares rose 5 percent in early trade on Friday.
(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)
Source: OANN
Trivago pitchman Timothy Williams was arrested for allegedly driving while intoxicated, CNN reports.
Police say Williams, 52, was found passed out at the wheel of a car with his foot on the brake in moving traffic in Houston on Wednesday at around 3:15 p.m. CT.
The Houston native reportedly failed a field sobriety test and was charged with driving while intoxicated. He was released on bond and is set to appear in court April 17.
Williams has appeared in a number of movies and TV shows but is best known as the Trivago guy. Trivago is a German discount travel website.
Source: NewsMax America
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