Fiscal Discipline Faces Another Downgrade In Japan’s Election

In Japan, rice isn’t just food — it lies at the heart of the nation’s culture and identity. Even the emperor himself grows rice for sacred rituals.

But ever since it started disappearing from store shelves last year and prices reached new highs, rice has also become a flashpoint for public frustration.

Long lines formed for stockpiles released by the government to ease the shortage. Convenience store Lawson jumped on the trend to sell \ balls using grain from an old harvest. And an agriculture minister was ousted after a joke about never having to buy rice – a gaffe that struck a nerve amid inflation.

The crisis can be traced back to 2023 when a sweltering summer hit harvests just as an influx of tourists put pressure on demand. But long-held government policies effectively capping output and discouraging imports have made it tough to remedy the problem.

Even US President Donald Trump seized on the issue in ongoing tariff talks, accusing the country of being “spoiled” and slamming its rice import policies.

Now, as Japan heads to polls this Sunday, rice is also at the center of a political gambit.

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba from the Liberal Democratic Party is attempting to win over inflation-squeezed urban voters. He’s leaning on Agriculture Minister Shinjiro Koizumi, who in just two months slashed prices by bypassing long-standing distribution networks and challenging agricultural cooperatives.

The rice shortage has eased and prices have dropped about 16% since May (though they still remain 50% higher than a year ago). But as that provided some relief to consumers, it has angered farmers, with some openly considering voting against the party that had long protected them.

It wouldn’t be the first time that food and farming has stirred up voter sentiment. In the past few years, a wave of farmer discontent has shaken up politics from Europe to India, while high grocery prices featured prominently in elections including that in the US last year.

And even as the cost of living, pension reform and planned tax cuts are other top issues for Japanese voters, rice has become a symbol of the strain on households. The results of the Sunday election will tell whether the intervention from the ‘rice minister’ was enough to secure the government’s future.

Flipping burgers won’t be cheap during the next few months, argues Bloomberg Opinion’s Javier Blas. Record beef prices may sound counterintuitive when vegetarianism seems to be on the rise, but the problem is supply. The world is running out of calves while ranchers face much higher rearing costs — due to more expensive feed and costs of meeting animal welfare regulations.

Source: Bloomberg Europe

EU approves 18th package of sanctions against Russia.Russia has sold most of its oil above G7 price cap of $60.Kremlin says Russia is immune to sanctions.Russia sells oil mostly to China, India and Turkey.

Russian government and trading sources played down the impact of new restrictions on trade in Russian crude that the European Union approved on Friday in a new package of sanctions against Moscow over the conflict in Ukraine.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also said Russia had built up a certain immunity to Western sanctions.

Russia has managed to sell most of its oil above a price cap of $60 a barrel that the Group of Seven Western economies have tried to enforce as the G7 mechanism makes it unclear who must police its implementation.

Since April 1, Urals oil has been mostly trading below $60 anyway as the price of global crude benchmarkshas fallen. The current Urals price in Russian ports is around $58 per barrel, according to Reuters calculations.

The EU sanctions seek to be more effective by setting a moving price cap at 15% below the average market price of Russian oil, EU diplomats said. That means roughly $47.60 per barrel at present.

"We have repeatedly said that we consider such unilateral restrictions illegal; we oppose them," Peskov told a daily conference call with reporters.

"But at the same time, of course, we have already acquired a certain immunity from sanctions; we have adapted to life under sanctions ...

"Furthermore, each new package adds a negative effect for the countries that join it. This is a double-edged sword."

TRADERS DOUBT EFFECTIVENESS OF NEW MEASURE

Traders doubt the new EU sanctions will significantly disrupt Russian oil trade, though sellers might face more challenges in booking the vessels and increased transport costs.

"The $60 price cap hasn't worked, do you think $47 will work?" said a Russian government source who asked to remain anonymous.

Analysts have said the absence of the U.S. from the EU's price capping scheme will further erode its effectiveness.

One Russian trader said European sanctions were not critical and only U.S. sanctions were influential.

But he said trade would be more challenging for some Western shippers, including some from Greece, who had been increasingly involved in the Russian oil trade. If some players quit, freight costs might rise, he said.

Another trading source said Russian oil's "toxicity" would not increase due to the sanctions, although the options for any diversification had now shrunk further.

Russia sells 80% of its exports to China and India, while Turkey also takes a significant chunk of Russian oil.

Russia still sells some oil via the Soviet-built Druzhba pipeline to Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

Source: TradingView

Global investors pulled money out of equity funds in the week through July 16 as U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff threats and an inflation report indicating an increase in U.S. consumer prices, dampened risk sentiment.

Investors withdrew a net $5.3 billion from global equity funds during the week, registering their first weekly net sales since the week to June 25, LSEG Lipper data showed.

A U.S. inflation report on Tuesday showed that consumer prices increased at the sharpest pace in five months in June, suggesting tariffs were starting to have an impact on prices and potentially keeping the Federal Reserve on the sidelines until September.

Investors divested a net $11.75 billion worth of U.S. equity funds following two weekly net purchases in a row. In contrast, they added European and Asian funds worth a net $4.66 billion and $718 million, respectively.

Sectoral funds had a mixed set of data as the healthcare and technology sectors witnessed $1.91 billion and $578 million net outflows, while investors snapped up industrial and financial sector funds totaling a net $1.11 billion and $791 million, respectively.

Global bond funds saw a buying spree extended into a 13th straight week, with approximately $12.85 billion net investments flowing into these funds.

Euro denominated bond funds, short-term bond funds, high yield bond funds and government bond funds were popular as these funds witnessed a robust $3.57 billion, $3.08 billion, $1.98 billion and $1.33 billion, respectively in net inflows.

Money market funds, meanwhile, lost about $21.3 billion in their first weekly net sales in three weeks.

Gold and precious metal commodity funds remained popular for an eighth straight week as these funds saw nearly $741 million worth of weekly net investments.

Emerging market funds came under pressure during the week as equities lost $208 million, while bonds had a net $1.12 billion weekly sales that ended an 11-week-long buying trend, data for a combined 29,644 funds showed.

Source: Yahoo Finance

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba that their countries can reach a "good agreement" on tariffs, Ishiba said on Friday after meeting Bessent in Tokyo.

No specific terms were discussed, such as the 25% tariff U.S. President Donald Trump has said he will impose on Japan from August 1, Ishiba said, but he added that Bessent would continue "active talks" with his top tariff negotiator Ryosei Akazawa.

Akazawa, who also joined the meeting, told reporters that both countries agreed to carry on a "constructive dialogue". Bessent left Ishiba's office without speaking to reporters.

The comments from top Japanese officials came after Bessent made a courtesy visit to Ishiba in Tokyo, before attending a U.S. national day event on Saturday at World Expo 2025 in Osaka.

The White House did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Japan's shaky minority government is poised for another setback in an upper house vote on Sunday, an outcome that could jolt investor confidence in the world's fourth largest economy and complicate tariff talks with the United States.

Japan's Mainichi Shimbun daily reported on Friday evening that Akazawa has started making arrangements to visit the United States next week for further tariff talks with Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

Source: Reuters

From crypto coins to bibles, overseas development deals to an upcoming line of cellphones, President Donald Trump's family businesses have raked in hundreds of millions of dollars since his election.

That flood of money — from billionaires, foreign governments and cryptocurrency tycoons, often with interests before the federal government — has permitted the president to leverage the power of his office for personal gain unlike any of his predecessors.

The sums collected are far greater than those made by the family during Trump's first term, when patronage of his hotels and other properties was de rigueur to curry favor with the famously transactional commander-in-chief.

Here are some takeaways from The Associated Press' reporting on the Trump family's latest money-making ventures:

By the numbers

Trump made money during his first term by turning his hotels and resort properties into destinations for his MAGA allies — and those who sought to curry favor with him.

This time around, the family's ambitions are grander. One of Trump’s cryptocurrencies is conservatively estimated to have pulled in at least $320 million since January, while another received a $2 billion investment from a foreign government wealth fund. A third has sold at least $550 million in tokens.

His sons have jetted across the Middle East to line up new development deals, while his daughter and son-in-law are working with the Albanian government to build a Mediterranean island resort. Even first lady Melania Trump has inked a $40 million documentary deal with Amazon, whose founder, Jeff Bezos, was a frequent target of Trump during his first presidency and whose companies contract extensively with the federal government.

He’s also touted a line of Trump shoes, a Bible that is made in China, and Trump guitars, one of which is a Gibson Les Paul knockoff, featuring “Make America Great Again” fret inlays, that sells for $1,500.

He’s continued to make money from political spending at his hotels, resorts and golf courses, as he has done for over a decade. Conservative groups and Republican committees have spent at least $25 million at Trump properties since 2015, with most of it coming from Trump’s own political organization, campaign finance disclosures show

Is this normal?

Since Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace, presidents have gone to great lengths to avoid the appearance of such conflicts.

Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan kept assets in a “blind trust,” while George H.W. Bush used a “diversified trust,” which blocked him from knowing what was in his portfolio. His son, George W. Bush, used a similar arrangement.

Source: Yahoo Finance

The Group of 20 finance ministers are expected to agree on a communique at their meeting on Friday, achieving a rare consensus despite strains caused by US President Donald Trump’s trade war.

The statement will likely include language on economic uncertainties and trade issues that have been sticking points in the past, said several officials who requested anonymity to discuss the talks.

“At a time when the world is more uncertain, we need more engagement not less, we need more robust and resilient and reliable markets for our exports,” said Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers. “That’s the spirit which has guided people’s contribution here – probably the main reason we’ve been able to get a communique,” he told Bloomberg at the event in South Africa’s eastern province of KwaZulu-Natal.

Trump’s trade war, which is poised to escalate with new tariffs on Aug. 1, has strained the G-20’s multilateral foundations and complicated South Africa’s efforts — as this year’s rotating president — to keep the group’s agenda on course.

By imposing trade levies, scorning South Africa’s G-20 motto of “solidarity, equality and sustainability” and pulling billions of dollars in funding for climate finance and international aid, the US is testing a world order that’s dominated since the end of World War II.

That makes achieving a joint communique — rather than a chairman’s summary, achieved at a previous G-20 finance meeting in the country — even more significant.

“We are very optimistic that a final communique will be issued today, sending a strong signal in favor of multilateralism,” German Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil told reporters at the event. “This is a major achievement for the G-20 presidency, which has conducted these negotiations with prudence and skill.”

The gathering, at a lush resort on the Indian Ocean near the port city of Durban, was able to make progress despite the absence of several finance ministers including US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who is traveling to Japan.

South African Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana had voiced confidence on Thursday that a communique would be signed, despite the lack of Washington’s top finance official.

While the US didn’t send Bessent, those who came had “a clear mandate” to speak on behalf of their government, he said.

Source: Bloomberg Europe