4 minute read
PRESS EUROPEAN
Denmark
Staying home
QUEEN MARGRETHE of Denmark, 82, who recently underwent major back surgery, will not attend her grandson’s Confirmation in Paris next month. She will also miss the coronation of her distant relative King Charles III on May 6, but will be represented by Crown Prince Frederik and Princess Mary.
The Netherlands
Their choice
ACCORDING to Statistics Netherlands, (CBS)
8,720 requests for euthanasia were approved last year, revealing that 5 per cent of recorded deaths were the result of legally assisted dying 2022. Euthanasia in the Netherlands is allowed only when requested by the patient, not their family or friends.
Belgium
Flying high
FIVE US paratroopers were stuck in a tree during a training exercise at the Hechtel-Eksel military base in Limburg province. Two were soon freed using a ladder lorry, but three others who were too high up in the tree had to wait for firefighters using specialist treeclimbing equipment.
Germany
Shut down
GERMANY has abandoned nuclear power, taking the last three plants off its national grid after the government decided not to keep them operative. Two thirds of the population opposed the shutdown and advocates of nuclear technology argued that abandoning it was “premature.”
France
On watch
A 2013-2017 survey by France’s public health service found that two-year-olds spent 56 minutes a day in front of a screen, increasing to 80 minutes by the time they were threeand-a-half. The survey also found that 13.7 per cent of parents admitted ignoring recommendations restricting screen time.
Norway
On their way
MORE than 30 Norwegian billionaires and multimillionaires left Norway in 2022 after the wealth tax rose by 1.1 per cent, the Dagens Naeringsliv newspaper reported. This was more than the total number of super-rich people who left Norway during the previous 13 years, the newspaper said.
Finland
Name-calling
AS in 2021, Olivia and Leo were the first names most often chosen for the country’s Finnish-speaking children in 2022. “There has been little variation in names in recent years, and traditional names continue to be the most popular,” Finland’s Digital and Population Data Services Agency said.
Ireland
Bard on display
THE only copy in Ireland of the first edition of William Shakespeare’s collected plays has been put on public display, 400 years after it was published, at Trinity College Dublin. The exhibition can be visited in the Long Room of the Old Library at the college until June.
Italy
Deadly attack
A BEAR that killed 26-year-old Andrea Papi earlier this month while jogging in woods close to his home in Caldes in northern Italy, has been identified as a 17-year-old female that had previously attacked two people. Papi was the first person to die in a bear attack in modern times.
Portugal
Money spinners
A TOTAL of 59,470 Portuguese families declared incomes of more than €100,000 a year in 2021, a 14 per cent increase on 2020, the country’s tax authority (IRS) revealed. These households declared a combined income of €9.4 billion, amounting to approximately 8.8 per cent of the taxman’s gross 2021 income.
Ukraine
Ikea helps
UKRAINE has received household supplies worth €9 million from Ikea, the Swedish home furnishing chain, and Ingka, the group’s largest retailer. Approximately 200 lorries have now delivered 850,000 items to UN’s Refugee Agency to assist relief efforts in Kyiv and Lviv.
Sweden
Wrong choice
SWEDEN’S biggest pension fund, Alecta, sacked chief executive Magnus Billing after his confidence in failed US lenders Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank left the fund with losses of almost $2 billion.(€1.8 billion). Alecta, said on April 11 that these losses had “seriously damaged confidence” in its investment strategy.
Spend big
THE TUC, which represents 48 UK unions, called for a “radical increase” in investment in public transport. More spending on the trains, trams and buses that are needed to cut down on car use could give the economy an annual boost of £50 billion (€58.6 billion) a union report claimed.
Scant interest
SPAIN’S banks save an annual €1.5 billion by paying lower interest on savings accounts than their Eurozone counterparts, according to the European Central Bank (ECB). As a result, Spanish families lose €924.16 million on their savings accounts, while non financial bodies lose €548 million, the ECB found.
Never-never
YOUNG Britons and Millennials aged up to 42 are four times more likely to take on debt to meet rising costs this year, credit broker Credit Karma found. Unlike those aged between 59 and 69 who use credit cards, the young tend to choose an overdraft or a pay now, pay later arrangement.
IT blip
COMPUTER sales are at their lowest in 10 years, falling worldwide by 29 per cent to 56.9 million systems during the year’s first quarter. “Demand has slowed but we expect it to overtake pre pandemic levels in the second half,” said Alberto Ruano, Lenovo’s director general in Spain.
Co-op hiccup
CUSTOMERS threatened to leave the Cooperative Bank after its mobile app stopped working for three consecutive Fridays recently. After the latest incident a Co operative spokesperson apologised and said the bank “would put right” any problems clients might have encountered when making payments.
Linda
Hall
ACCOUNTANCY firm Ernst & Young (EY), which is London based, has abandoned proposals to restructure its global operations.
Plans to separate the consultancy and audit divisions were scuppered by EY’s New York office following disputes over the future structure of the new businesses.
Spadework for what was codenamed Project Everest began last year, as the big four accounting firmsDeloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers
KPMG and EY faced increasing criticism regarding conflicts of interest between their two divisions.
Politicians and regulators, particularly those in the UK, questioned whether EY’s ability to challenge audit clients could be conditioned by the possibility of securing juicy consulting, tax and dealadvisory contracts from
THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted that the UK would be one of the world’s worstperforming major economies this year.
Popularly known as the G20, these 20 countries include sanctionshit Russia.
The IMF expects the UK economy to shrink by 0.3 per cent in 2023 and to grow by 1 per cent in 2024, according to the World Economic Outlook report presented on Tuesday April 11 in Washington.
The IMF had already forecast that the UK would experience a downturn in 2023, descending to the bottom of the G7 group of
Padua exit
ANTONIO CATALAN, chairman of AC Hotels by Marriott, continues to reduce commitments in destinations he does not view as priorities.
Sources close to Catalan confirmed to the Spanish media that he is negotiating the sale of a hotel in Padua (Italy).
This will be his second Italian disinvestment following the 2008 sale of an hotel in Rome to the Spanish chain H10.
The same sources emphasised that the AC Hotels by Marriott sale was not linked to asset rotation but to the strategy of relinquish ownership of a hotel while continuing to run it after reaching agreement with the new owner.
