trade News

Senate Panel Approves Russia Trade, Human Rights Bill

The Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday unanimously approved a bill to ensure U.S. exporters share in the benefits of Russia’s accession to the World Trade Organization but also to punish Russian officials for human rights violations. The legislation still faces …

Negative Rates and Currency Wars: Commentary by James Saft

It may be better to think of the outbreak of negative interest rates as simply another weapon in an ongoing and global low-grade currency war. It’s not that negative interest rates – under which investors pay for the privilege of …

Russian Lawmakers Ratify WTO Entry

Russian lawmakers voted on Tuesday to ratify accession to the World Trade Organization, bringing the world’s largest country into the club that sets global trade rules after a tortuous 18-year negotiating marathon. The lower house vote, carried by a majority …

WTO Risks its Future by Keeping Doha Talks Alive

The 153 members of the World Trade Organization agree on two things: We’re in a hole. And we must keep digging. The hole is the Doha Development Round, a decade-old negotiation that was billed as the next stage of trade …

U.S. Ambassador Urges China Not to Interfere in Business

China should allow domestic and foreign companies to make investment decisions without government interference, the U.S. ambassador to China said on Friday. Ambassador Gary Locke also said the United States would work to double exports to China by 2015, and …

Australia Urges Breaking up Doha Round into Smaller Pacts

Australia wants World Trade Organization members to recognize that reaching a comprehensive deal in decade-old world trade talks has become impossible and to focus instead on a series of smaller pacts, the country’s top trade official said on Wednesday. “We …

EU Says Doha Deal Could Boost World Exports by $505 Billion, If Revived

Moribund talks for a global accord to open up trade could boost world exports by more than half a trillion dollars a year if they were revived and completed, lifting global economic growth by 0.2 percent, an EU report said …

US Congress OK’s Korea, Panama, Colombia Trade Pacts

Congress Wednesday approved long-delayed trade pacts with South Korea, Colombia and Panama that are expected to lift exports by about $13 billion a year and give U.S. employment a boost. Republicans and Democrats joined together in the House of Representatives …

WTO’s Lamy Sees Paralysis in Global Trade Talks

The head of the World Trade Organization castigated its 153 members on Tuesday for failing to agree a watered-down global trade deal by December and called for “an adult conversation” over what to do next. “What we are seeing today …

U.S. Defends Doha Trade Strategy after Zoellick Barbs

President Barack Obama’s administration on Tuesday fired back at World Bank President Robert Zoellick’s criticism that it has not done enough to bring the nearly decade-old Doha round of world trade talks to a successful close. “Our goal has been …