More than 106,000 people have been infected by the coronavirus across the world and at least 3,600 have died as the disease upturns a modest growth in the world economy since mid-2019 and threatens key sectors of India's economy where some see a “silver lining” in China practically shutting down.
Multilateral lending agencies, like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), estimate that the coronavirus will have a long-term impact on global economic growth.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) estimates that the world's gross domestic product (GDP) could reduce by 0.1%-0.4%, noting that financial losses could range from $77 billion to $347 billion. Growth in China could reduce by 0.3% to 1.7% and in developing Asia, excluding China, by 0.2% to 0.5%, the ADB said in an analysis outlining best- and worst-case scenarios.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the influential think tank, reckons this year world economy may grow at its slowest rate since 2009 because of the coronavirus.
The OECD has forecast a 2.4% growth for the world economy in 2020, down from 2.9% in November. A longer "more intensive" outbreak could halve growth to 1.5%, it said.
The IMF has promised $50 billion and World Bank $12 billion to fight the disease and its impact.
India: risks a lot, gains some
India's economy hasn't caught the bug but if the coronavirus crisis persists worldwide its plans to revive growth could be disturbed.
India's gross domestic product (GDP) growth fell to an unprecedented 27-quarter low of 4.7% in the quarter ended December 2019 (with the previous quarter’s growth having been corrected) due to contraction in investment and manufacturing output for two successive quarters. GDP growth is set to stagnate at 4.7% in the March quarter (Q4) too, according to the annual estimate by the National Statistical Office (NSO).
According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), India could lose $348 million in trade because of the coronavirus. India figures among UNCTAD's top 15 economies most affected by the slowdown in manufacturing in China.

India's chemicals sector could lose $129 million, textiles and apparel $64 million, automotive $34 million, metals and metal products $27 million--to list just some businesses.

Malaysian PM Mahathir accepts failure of the boom he launched 30 years ago

International News
Peter Barbey’s great-grandfather John started the Reading Glove and Mitten Manufacturing Co. 120 years ago. Known today as the VF Corp., it owns outdoorsy brands like Timberland and North Face. In its last fiscal year, VF reported nearly $14 billion in revenue and $1.5 billion in net income. Its market cap hovers around $35 billion. The Barbeys, who still own around 20 per cent of the company, are very rich.
Barbey, 62, went to the University of Arizona. He met his wife, Pam, there. They planted roots in Phoenix, where he invested in commercial real estate while also running the city’s most beloved independent bookstore, Houle Books. But in 2011, Peter and Pam moved to Reading, Pennsylvania, to take charge of another property that had been in the Barbey, DuPont and Flippin families for over a century: the Reading Eagle. With a Sunday circulation over 70,000, a team of sports writers as good as any in Pennsylvania, and a news staff that took seriously its watchdog role, the Eagle was one of the best medium-sized newspapers in the state, if not the country.
When I asked Barbey recently how he felt about leaving behind his life in Arizona to become president of the Eagle, he shrugged. “I’d been on the board since 2000,” he said. “I knew the company well. And I felt it was my duty to my family’s legacy, and to this community, to take this on.”
Eight years later, the Barbey, DuPont and Flippin families no longer own the Reading Eagle. In May, the paper was sold to MediaNews Group Inc., the newspaper company owned by the hedge fund Alden Global Capital LLC, which has a well-deserved reputation for asset stripping and layoffs. Barbey cared deeply about the Eagle; he sold it with great reluctance, helpless to reverse the paper’s economic decline.

 You sometimes hear journalists saying that if only their paper’s owner had beefed up the staff, had given reporters more time to do better stories, had made the paper indispensable to its community...Read More

The days of national airlines are over: Why flag carriers must be shut down

Companies News

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad told reporters he's studying whether to sell, shut down or refinance Malaysia Airlines Bhd., the troubled national carrier. A decision needs to be made soon. In 2018, the perpetually money-losing airline accounted for about half of the $1.5 billion in losses suffered by its parent, Khazanah Nasional Bhd., Malaysia's sovereign wealth fund.

On purely economic terms, Mahathir’s decision should be easy. In 2014, following the loss of planes and lives in the MH370 disappearance and the tragic downing of MH17 over Ukraine, Khazanah announced a restructuring intended to make the airline profitable by 2018. It’s failed for one central reason: Malaysia Airlines remains a state-owned flag carrier, slow-moving and burdened by political expectations. At a time when low-cost airlines offer a perfectly adequate and more competitive alternative, Malaysia isn’t the only country that should rethink whether it really needs a national airline.

The concept of a flag carrier dates back to the establishment in the mid-1940s of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a United Nations regulator. Every nation was given the opportunity to operate international air services. Some countries, including the U.S., chose to let private companies do the flying. Others decided to establish, subsidize and protect flag carriers, even to the point of restricting competition on key routes.


 Those airlines had goals other than profits. For decades, according to Brian Summers at Skift, "nearly every national airline within 12 hours of New York flew to John F. Kennedy Airport, or wanted to -- whether the flights lost money or not."