| Americans split on Obama's handling of Russia, Post-ABC poll finds
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 A bipartisan majority of Americans support hitting Russia with sanctions for its actions involving Ukraine, but the public splits on President Obama's handling of the issue in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. A solid 56 percent supports a coordinated effort of U.S. and European sanctions against Russia, which continues to strengthen its grip over […]
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| Macro Horizons: China Central Bank Chief Outlines Profound Changes
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 By Michael J. Casey, Alen Mattich and Colin Ng Macro Horizons covers the main macroeconomic and policy news events affecting foreign-exchange, fixed income and equity markets around the world, as selected by editors in New York, London and Hong Kong. WRAP: Markets are focused on month-by-month economic data out of China, with the weekend's disappointing trade data unsettling some investors on Monday. But the longer-term pathway to monetary reform – hinted at by Chinese central bank chief Zhou Xiaochuan Tuesday – which includes liberalizing both interest rates and the foreign exchange market, will ultimately have the greatest impact on the global economy. People have been talking about the need for China to submit its financial system to market forces for some time. But with the People's Bank of China now driving down the yuan in an apparent prelude to widening its trading band at the same time that Mr. Zhou is offering a timetable for liberalizing interest rates, it now seems like a reality. Why does this ...
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| Breaches Highlight Cybersecurity Issues at PE-Backed Companies
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 Getty Images/Joe Raedle The data breaches at retailers including Target Corp., Neiman Marcus Group and Michaels Stores Inc. shine a spotlight on the potential risks facing businesses both publicly and privately held. Private equity firms may regard those threats as even more urgent knowing that point-of-sale malware used in the cyberattacks was "relatively unsophisticated" and had likely been purchased "off the shelf from the cybercrime-as-a-service community," according to cybersecurity intelligence firm McAfee Labs. "We believe these breaches will have long-lasting repercussions," McAfee said in a statement introducing its fourth quarter threat report. "We expect to see changes to security approaches and compliance mandates and, of course, lawsuits." At private equity firms and their portfolio companies, changes are starting to happen—but according to some consultants, the changes may not be fast enough. "Dozens of large private equity firms are currently compromised, and they don't even know about it," ...
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| China's Tencent Is Now Bigger Than Intel
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 This post originally appeared on China Real Time. Zuma Press Tencent Holdings isn't yet a household name in the U.S., but it should be. With a market cap now slightly above $150 billion, the Chinese social networking and gaming firm is already larger than staid U.S. tech giants like Intel, Cisco Systems and Hewlett-Packard. And given Tencent's shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange are up more than 25% since Jan. 1, if it keeps up the momentum, it could soon eclipse AT&T, which had a market cap at close Monday of $169 billion. Though few outside of China use Tencent's services, the company's increasingly massive value shows it pays to be one of the kings of the Chinese Internet, which now has more Web and smartphone users than any other market in the world. The company's scale, combined with its increasing ambitions abroad also serve as a reminder that those who ignore the company do so at their own peril. The most recent example of this came Tuesday in the form of a CLSA report valuing Tencent's ...
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| Iran Lays Its Cards on the Table
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 Here's your morning jolt of news, insight and analysis on the global energy business. Send us tips, suggestions and complaints: ben.winkley@wsj.com Click here to receive this morning email newsletter Click here to follow Ben Winkley on Twitter BACK IN IRAN At the last meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Iran took center stage. As relations between the Islamic Republic and the West looked like thawing, a queue of oil company executives formed outside the Iranian oil minister's hotel room. Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh talks to journalists before a meeting of OPEC oil ministers at OPEC's headquarters in Vienna in December. Iran has outlined the terms on which it will do business with foreign oil companies. Reuters Royal Dutch Shell, Vitol, OMV and Eni all got face time with Bijan Zanganeh, just to test the water in case sanctions are eased. That was December. In January, in the privacy of Davos, the process took a step up the ladder—Iran's President Hasan Rouhani joined ...
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(sources)
