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The COP26 climate summit in Glasgow succeeded in getting 197 countries to agree new rules on limiting greenhouse gas emissions, but last-minute objections from India and China stymied a commitment to end coal use and fossil fuel subsidies. Conference president Alok Sharma fought back tears in the final minutes as he apologised to other ministers

In early March 2020, Pfizer’s chief scientific officer was summoned to the White House to discuss the disease that was sweeping across the world. Mikael Dolsten did not talk about the vaccine that would later bring the company fame and enormous wealth: instead, in those early days, he described how the drugmaker was working on

Jes Staley exchanged 1,200 emails with Jeffrey Epstein over a four-year period with content that included unexplained terms such as “snow white”, according to people familiar with the correspondence between the former Barclays chief executive and the convicted sex offender. Staley resigned from Barclays last week after seeing preliminary conclusions of an investigation by UK

Alexander Lukashenko has threatened to cut the transit of gas and goods through Belarus to Europe if the EU imposes further sanctions on his regime over the migrant crisis on the Belarusian-Polish border. The Belarus president was responding to an announcement by Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission president, on Wednesday that the bloc would

US consumer prices are expected to have surged in October at their fastest pace in three decades, as bottlenecks and other supply-chain disruptions intensify and inflationary pressures broaden. Consensus forecasts compiled by Bloomberg indicate that the consumer price index to be published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Wednesday rose 5.9 per cent in

US industrial group General Electric is to split itself into three public companies from 2023, a big step in chief executive Larry Culp’s plan to streamline the sprawling conglomerate. The companies will focus on healthcare, energy and aviation. GE Healthcare will be spun off in 2023, with GE retaining a 19.9 per cent stake in

Tesla shares were under pressure on Monday after millions of Twitter users polled by chief executive Elon Musk concluded that he should sell 10 per cent of his stake in the electric carmaker. The 24-hour poll, which was conducted over the weekend, is the latest stunt by Musk to delight fans but risk controversy. When

China reported dozens of new local coronavirus infections on Saturday, a day after the government reaffirmed its commitment to strict measures designed to limit the pandemic’s spread within its borders. The country’s National Health Commission on Sunday reported 74 new cases for the previous day, of which 50 were locally transmitted. A wave of cases

Nancy Pelosi stared down progressives in her own party on Friday, vowing to press ahead with a vote on a $1.2tn bipartisan infrastructure bill while delaying consideration of a separate, larger social spending package popular with the leftwing of the Democratic party. The move breaks a longstanding promise to move the two bills through Congress

US jobs growth picked up after two straight months of disappointing gains as Covid-related concerns that have kept workers on the sidelines eased. Employers in the world’s largest economy added 531,000 jobs in October, above the upwardly-revised 312,000 positions created the previous month and closer to the roughly 560,000 monthly average seen since the start

One of Austria’s most senior military officials has been removed from a sensitive government position amid concerns over his links to Jan Marsalek, the former chief operating officer of fraudulent payment company Wirecard. Brigadier Gustav Gustenau was until recently head of the office of security policy within the Austrian ministry of defence — which provides

The Mark Carney-led coalition of international financial companies signed up to tackle climate change has up to $130tn of private capital committed to hitting net zero emissions targets by 2050. The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (Gfanz) — which is made up of more than 450 banks, insurers and asset managers across 45 countries

Pfizer has more than doubled the 2021 sales forecast for its Covid-19 vaccine since February and predicted another bumper year in 2022 as it expands global distribution and begins shipping jabs for boosters and children. The US company said on Tuesday that it expected to generate $36bn in sales this year and $29bn in 2022,

Jes Staley is to step down as Barclays chief executive following a regulatory investigation into the way he described his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. In a statement on Monday, Barclays said that it was made aware of the results of the investigation from the FCA and PRA on Friday and that: “In view of those

G20 leaders have sealed a deal to end international financing of coal power in a boost ahead of the opening of the COP26 climate summit. Leaders at a G20 summit in Rome agreed to end financing for coal-fired power plants overseas by the end of this year, according to the final text of their communiqué.

Mario Draghi has warned the leaders of the world’s 20 largest economies that “going it alone is simply not an option,” as they gathered in Rome to start a two-day race to reach a deal on global climate change targets. The Rome G20 summit will set the tone for the COP26 meeting in Glasgow next

The eurozone’s economic rebound gathered pace with growth of 2.2 per cent in the third quarter, closing the gap with the US and Chinese recoveries and keeping the bloc on track to regain its pre-pandemic level of output later this year. However, there was a mixed picture between the four largest eurozone countries that reported

US economic growth slowed considerably in the third quarter due to supply-chain disruptions, a resurgence of Covid-19 and slower consumer spending. The world’s largest economy expanded 2 per cent on an annualised basis in the three months to the end of September, according to data from the commerce department on Thursday, marking the weakest quarterly

Senior Democrats have laid out detailed plans for a new tax hitting about 700 American billionaires, in an attempt to extract revenue from the ultra-wealthy to pay for Biden’s $2tn flagship spending plan. Ron Wyden, the chair of the Senate finance committee, said on Wednesday the plan would apply to taxpayers with more than $100m

One of the world’s largest pension funds, ABP of the Netherlands, is to sell its entire holdings in fossil fuel companies worth more than €15bn as pressure mounts on retirement schemes to protect long-term savings from the threat of catastrophic climate change. ABP, the Dutch pension fund for educational workers and civil servants, said on