Aurelia Butler

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – U.S. targeting of certain investments in artificial intelligence in China is not helpful to the “healthy development” of AI technology and will be divisive when it comes to global governance, China’s U.N. envoy said on Monday.The United States last month issued draft rules for banning or requiring notification of certain investments in artificial intelligence and other technology sectors in China that could threaten U.S. national security.”We are firmly opposed to these sanctions,” Chinese U.N. Ambassador Fu Cong told reporters after the 193-member U.N. General Assembly adopted by consensus a Chinese-drafted resolution aimed at boosting international cooperation on AI capacity-building. The U.N resolution calls upon the international community to “provide and promote a fair, open, inclusive and non-discriminatory business environment across the life cycle of safe, secure and trustworthy artificial intelligence systems.”Fu said the U.S. actions do not foster an inclusive business environment and he urged Washington to reverse its decision.”We don’t believe that the U.S. government’s position or decision will be helpful to the healthy development of the AI technology, per se, and will – by extension – divide the world in terms of the standards and in terms of the rules governing the AI,” he said. The U.S. Treasury Department published the proposed rules after U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order last August as part of a broader push to prevent U.S. know-how from helping the Chinese to develop sophisticated technology and dominate global markets. More

LONDON (Reuters) – The World Bank Group said on Monday it had started operating a new one-stop-shop loan and investment guarantee platform which it hopes will triple the provision of guarantees and risk insurance provided around the world to $20 billion a year.The target, which it wants to hit by 2030 and which aims to lift investment in riskier areas from Africa to Ukraine, will combine key units of World Bank, International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA).Hiroshi Matano, MIGA Executive Vice President, told Reuters that the combination would see it start to back new innovative financing including carbon credits, debt-for-nature swaps and off-grid energy solutions in remote parts of Africa.Guarantees could also be used to attract private sector investors to provide “take-out” financing to replace standard World Bank or IFC loans, freeing up overall lending capacity.He said that with guarantee products becoming more mainstream across the World Bank Group, there would be new uses developed for them, adding: “How you use it, I think it’s where we can be really innovative and creative.”For context, the World Bank Group gave almost $6.5 billion of guarantees last year and is expecting to provide roughly $10 billion this year, so the target will see a huge expansion and swell MIGA’s balance sheet which currently sits at around $30 billion.Asked whether the annual amounts could even top the $20 billion target he added World Bank president “Ajay (Banga) wants us to be ambitious, so if there is demand, of course, we’ll consider that.”The changes are the first tangible results from a group of private-sector investment executives assembled last year by Banga, dubbed the Private Sector Investment Lab, to develop ideas to draw more private capital to clean energy and other investments in developing countries.The plan aims to simplify guarantee products into a single comprehensive menu that would allow clients to easily identify and select the instrument best suiting their needs. A new common approach should standardize guarantee reviews, replacing a patchwork of different processes, rules and standards. More

(Reuters) -A U.S. appeals court allowed President Joe Biden’s administration to move forward with implementing a key part of a new student debt relief plan designed to lower monthly payments for millions of Americans.The Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Sunday put on hold an injunction issued by a judge in Kansas last week at the urging of Republican-led states that argued the U.S. Department of Education’s debt relief plan was unlawful.The Education Department said that as a result of the stay issued by the 10th Circuit panel, it will continue cutting undergraduate loan payments and has directed loan servicers it contracts with to move forward with changes under the plan.U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona in a statement said the court “sided with student loan borrowers across the country who stand to benefit from the SAVE Plan – the most affordable repayment plan in history.”The Saving on a Valuable Education Plan provides more generous terms than past income-based repayment plans, lowering monthly payments for eligible borrowers and allowing those whose original principal balances were $12,000 or less to have their debt forgiven after 10 years.U.S. District Judge Daniel Crabtree in Wichita, Kansas, on June 24 had concluded that the Higher Education Act of 1965 did not clearly authorize the type of “unprecedented and dramatic expansion” of income-based repayment plans envisioned.Crabtree, in ruling in favor of state attorneys general from South Carolina, Texas and Alaska challenging the plan, had limited the scope of his decision, enjoining only aspects of the SAVE Plan not already in effect.But in a brief, the administration told the 10th Circuit that Crabtree’s ruling was only “technically prospective” and that, in fact, the Education Department and loan servicers would have to reprogram complex software to calculate borrowers’ new monthly payments, prepare billing notices and process payments.That work would take months, and in the interim many borrowers enrolled in the SAVE Plan would need to be placed into forbearance until their loans could be serviced with a correct calculation of payments due, the U.S. Department of Justice argued on the administration’s behalf.The Education Department last week said about 3 million borrowers who under SAVE would have lower monthly payments would be placed into forbearance. Those borrowers would not accrue interest during that time.The White House has said that more than 20 million borrowers could benefit from the SAVE Plan. The administration in May said 8 million are already enrolled, including 4.6 million whose monthly payments have been reduced to $0.While the administration sought a stay of Crabtree’s ruling, it did not seek a similar pause of a separate injunction by a federal judge in Missouri that barred it from granting further loan forgiveness for borrowers under the SAVE Plan. More

NEW YORK (Reuters) -BlackRock won a fight with hedge fund manager Boaz Weinstein last week when shareholders voted at four of its closed-end funds, data showed, keeping the asset manager’s directors in place and retaining it as the manager.Weinstein’s Saba Capital Management, a large owner in BlackRock (NYSE:BLK)’s closed-end funds, and BlackRock have been locked in battle for months over the future of 10 of the funds.BlackRock is the world’s biggest asset management company with more than $10 trillion in assets under management. Saba wanted investors to replace the BlackRock directors by electing its own nominees to the funds’ boards. It also wanted investors to fire BlackRock as manager at some of them.”Shareholders rejected Saba’s efforts to unseat BlackRock as investment adviser and voted to support the Board’s nominees at several funds,” Glenn Hubbard, Chair of the Boards of BlackRock Closed-End Funds said in a statement on Friday. “For the second year in a row, Saba has failed to convince shareholders that Saba will deliver more value than the funds’ current stewardship and management teams,” he added.”There is a great injustice that continues as BlackRock refuses to let its fund owners have their voices heard,” Saba said in a response to the vote on Monday.Saba has cited poor performance as the reason change is needed at the funds, which jointly manage roughly $10 billion.Investors voted at four BlackRock funds last week () after having voted at six (, and) the previous week.Meetings at and have been adjourned until next month due to a failure to achieve quorum.The BlackRock funds require that a majority of the outstanding shares — 50% plus 1 share — are voted in favor of a director to secure election. At several funds neither side met that level, which means the current directors will be held over and stand for election again next year.Saba did not secure enough votes to replace directors or fire the fund manager at any of the eight funds.The preliminary vote count is subject to final certification by the independent inspector of elections, BlackRock said.Closed-end funds, unlike open-end funds, don’t issue or redeem new shares, which can leave them trading above or below the value of the securities held by the fund.For months, Saba has argued that investors will benefit when the discount to the BlackRock funds’ underlying assets is shrunk and that BlackRock should buy back shares from investors which could unlock some $1.4 billion in value.BlackRock said it has taken action to improve performance and that its directors are better choices than Saba’s nominees.The battle between BlackRock, which manages money for retail investors and pension funds and advises governments, and Weinstein, who made headlines last year when he and other prominent investors tried to buy hedge fund Sculptor Capital Management (NYSE:SCU) after it agreed to sell to someone else, is shining light on an often overlooked part of the mutual fund industry.Saba, which has taken the fight to court, said in its statement on Monday: “Looking ahead, we plan to hold BlackRock accountable in court”.BlackRock was advised by JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), Sidely Austin LLP, Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP, Stradley Ronon, and Georgeson. More

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