The U.S. Trade Representative said on Thursday it has added Pinduoduo.com, China’s third-largest e-commerce platform, to its “notorious markets” list for a proliferation of counterfeit products, as the agency also called out China as a priority to watch for intellectual property rights concerns.

In its annual review of trading partners’ protection of intellectual properties rights and so-called “notorious markets,” the U.S. Trade Representative said 36 countries warranted additional bilateral engagement over these issues. The agency kept China on the list and lifted Saudi Arabia up as a priority.

The release of the report comes as the United States and China are embroiled in negotiations to end a tit-for-tat tariff battle that has roiled supply chains and cost both countries billions. The two countries are due to resume talks in Beijing next week.

USTR also kept Alibaba Group’s taobao.com on the “notorious” list, even though the parent company has “taken some steps” to curb the offer and sale of copyright infringing products, according to the report.

The agency bumped Saudi Arabia up to priority in part due to an illicit service for pirated content called BeoutQ, the report said.

Despite “extensive engagement” in Saudi Arabia by both U.S. government and private stakeholders, treatment of intellectual property rights “continued to deteriorate,” USTR said.

 
…

Brent oil rose above $75 per barrel on Thursday for the first time this year as quality concerns forced the suspension of some Russian crude exports to Europe while the United States prepared to tighten sanctions on Iran.

Brent crude futures were at $75.24 by 1156 GMT, up 67 cents. They earlier hit a session high of $75.60, their strongest since Oct. 31.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was at $66.14 per barrel, up 25 cents.

Poland and Germany have suspended imports of Russian crude via the Druzhba pipeline, citing poor quality. Trading sources said the Czech Republic had also halted purchases.

The pipeline can ship up to 1 million barrels per day, or 1 percent of global crude demand, with around 700,000 bpd of flows suspended, according to trading sources and Reuters calculations.

U.S. attempts to drive Iranian oil exports down to zero also boosted prices.

The United States this week said it would end all exemptions for sanctions against Iran, OPEC’s third-largest producer, demanding countries halt oil imports from Tehran from May or face punitive action from Washington.

The U.S. decision comes amid supply cuts led by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries since the start of the year aimed at propping up prices.

Still, Brian Hook, U.S. special representative for Iran and senior policy adviser to the secretary of state, said on Thursday “there is plenty of supply in the market to ease that transition and maintain stable prices.”

Consultancy Rystad Energy said Saudi Arabia and its main allies could replace lost Iranian oil.

“Saudi Arabia and several of its allies have more replacement barrels than what would be lost from Iranian exports,” said Rystad’s head of oil research, Bjoernar Tonhaugen.

“Since October 2018, Saudi Arabia, Russia, the UAE, and Iraq have cut 1.3 million bpd, which is more than enough to compensate for the additional loss,” he added.

On the supply side, U.S. crude production has risen by more than 2 million bpd since early 2018 to a record of 12.2 million bpd currently, making the United States the world’s biggest oil producer ahead of Russia and Saudi Arabia.

In part because of soaring domestic production, U.S. commercial crude inventories last week soared to 460.63 million barrels, their highest since October 2017, the Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday.

 
…

Національний банк України знизив облікову ставку до 17,5% річних з 18%, повідомила прес-служба регулятора. Зміни набувають чинності 26 квітня.

«Наразі стійка тенденція до уповільнення інфляції до цілі 5% дає змогу Національному банку розпочати цикл зниження облікової ставки. Разом з тим правління бачить ризики, реалізація яких може стати цьому на заваді», – заявили в НБУ.

Головним внутрішнім ризиком Нацбанк називає «традиційне посилення невизначеності в рік президентських та парламентських виборів».

Востаннє Національний банк знижував облікову ставку в травні 2017 року. На рівні 18% вона була з вересня 2018 року.

Облікова ставка є одним із інструментів, за допомогою якого Нацбанк встановлює для комерційних банків орієнтир щодо вартості залучених і розміщених коштів. Фактично вона визначає ціну грошей.
…

На міжбанківському валютному ринку 25 квітня попит і пропозиція майже вирівнялися, котирування не надто відрізняються від рівнів вчорашнього закриття торгів – 26 гривень 62,5 – 65 копійок за долар.

Національний банк України встановив опівдні довідкове значення курсу на рівні 26 гривень 62 копійки, це на 3 копійки більше за офіційний курс на 25 квітня.

Свого пікового значення 28 гривень 39 копійок за курсом НБУ впродовж останнього року долар сягнув 30 листопада 2018 року. На 12 березня 2019 року офіційний курс становив 26 гривень 31 копійку, це найвищий курс гривні від липня 2018 року.
…

South Korea’s economy unexpectedly shrank in the first quarter, marking its worst performance since the global financial crisis, as government spending failed to keep up the previous quarter’s strong pace and as companies slashed investment. 

The shock contraction reinforced financial market views that the central bank is likely to make a U-turn on policy, shifting to an easing stance and possibly cutting interest rates to counter declining business confidence and growing external risks.

A worse-than-expected downturn in the memory chips sector hit first quarter capital investment, while slumping exports amid the Sino-U.S. trade dispute erased gains from private consumption, the Bank of Korea said Thursday.

Gross domestic product (GDP) in the first quarter declined a seasonally adjusted 0.3 percent from the previous quarter, the worst contraction since a 3.3 percent drop in late 2008 and sliding from 1 percent growth in October-December, the Bank of Korea said Thursday.

None of the economists surveyed in a Reuters poll had expected growth to contract. The median forecast was for a rise of 0.3 percent.

Government spending

“Government spending failed to keep up the bumper boost of the fourth quarter, especially for construction investment, while a drop in business investment was worse than expected due to a downturn in the chips sector,” a BOK official said, adding there was also a strong base effect after solid fourth-quarter growth.

The grim data came a day after the Moon Jae-in government unveiled a 6.7 trillion won ($5.9 billion) supplementary budget to tackle unprecedented air pollution levels and boost weak exports.

Capital investment tumbled 10.8 percent, the worst reading since 1998, while construction investment inched down 0.1 percent, the BOK said.

Exports fall

Exports fell 2.6 percent quarter-on-quarter, a sharper drop than the 1.5 percent decline in the previous three months.

Private consumption gained by 0.1 percent because of a rise in demands for durable goods.

From a year earlier, Asia’s fourth-largest economy grew 1.8 percent in the January-March quarter, compared with 2.5 percent growth in the poll and 3.1 percent in the final quarter of 2018.
…

Facebook on Wednesday blew away Wall Street profit estimates in the first quarter as it kept a lid on the costs of making its social networks safer, and set aside $3 billion to cover a settlement with U.S. regulators, calming investors who had worried about the outcome of a months-long federal probe.

Shares of the world’s biggest online social network jumped more than 10% after hours.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has been investigating revelations that Facebook inappropriately shared information belonging to 87 million of its users with the now-defunct British political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.

The probe has focused on whether the sharing of data and other disputes violated a 2011 agreement with the FTC to safeguard user privacy. Facebook set aside $3 billion to cover anticipated costs associated with the settlement, but said the charges could reach as high as $5 billion.

Civil penalty

If the settlement is in that range, it would be the largest civil penalty paid to the agency, said David Vladeck, a former FTC official now at Georgetown Law School.

“Everyone expected there would be a substantial civil penalty in this case,” said Vladeck. “There’s no question that Facebook is going to have to settle this matter. Investors want this behind them.”

The accrual cut the company’s net income in the first quarter to $2.43 billion, or $0.85 per share.

Excluding the $3 billion it set aside, Facebook would have earned $1.89 a share, up from $1.69 the year prior and easily beating analysts’ average estimate of $1.63 per share, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

Total first-quarter revenue rose 26% to $14.9 billion from $12.0 billion last year, compared to analysts’ average estimate of $15.0 billion.

Shares rise 

Shares of Facebook rose 10% to $200.50 in after-hours trade, demonstrating the company’s resilience despite a series of scandals over improperly shared user data and propaganda that made it the target of political scrutiny across the globe.

The company’s shares lost a third of their value last year, after executives first warned about costs associated with its drive to improve safety and slowing growth in revenue and operating margin.

Total expenses in the first quarter were $11.8 billion, up 80% compared with a year ago. The operating margin fell to 22% from 46% a year ago, but would have been 42%  without the one-time expense.

“This is a strong report suggesting that advertisers still see value in Facebook’s platform, as they did before the controversies and scandals erupted,” said Haris Anwar, senior analyst at financial markets platform Investing.com.

Expenses will grow

Executives have forecast that expenses will grow 40% to 50%  in 2019, but say they expect the downward trend to taper off after this year as revenue from new ways of pushing ads and facilitating transactions offset the security spending.

Monthly and daily users of the main Facebook app compared to last quarter were both up 8% to 2.38 billion and 1.56 billion, respectively.

Estimates were for 2.4 billion monthly users and 1.6 billion daily users, according to Refinitiv averages.

 
…

Microsoft said profits climbed in the past quarter on its cloud and business services as the U.S. technology giant saw its market value close in on the trillion-dollar mark.

Profits in the quarter to March 31 rose 19 percent to $8.8 billion on revenues of $30.8 billion, an increase of 14 percent from the same period a year earlier.

Microsoft shares gained some 3% in after-hours trade, pushing it closer to $1 trillion in value. 

It ended the session Wednesday with a market valuation of some $960 million, just behind Apple but ahead of Amazon.

In the fiscal third quarter, Microsoft showed its reliance on cloud computing and other business services which now drive its earnings, in contrast to its earlier days when it focused on consumer PC software.

“Leading organizations of every size in every industry trust the Microsoft cloud,” chief executive Satya Nadella said in a statement.

Commercial cloud revenue rose 41% from a year ago to $9.6 billion, which now makes up nearly a third of sales, Microsoft said.

Some $10.2 billion in revenue came from the “productivity and business services” unit which includes its Office software suite for both consumers and enterprises, and the LinkedIn professional social network.

The “more personal computing” unit which includes its Windows software, Surface devices and gaming operations generated $10.6 billion in the quarter.
…

У Кабінеті міністрів України очікують подальшого зниження ціни на газ для населення.

Як заявив на засіданні уряду прем’єр-міністр Володимир Гройсман, 24 квітня спливає термін, протягом якого НАК «Нафтогаз України» мав знайти рішення для зниження ціни на газ для населення – згідно з динамікою світових ринків.

«У понеділок, 22 квітня, «Нафтогаз» мене почув. Вони зменшують з 1 травня ціну на тисячу кубів. Думаю, це буде не останнє зниження, адже ринки показують (відповідну динаміку)», – цитує Гройсмана прес-служба уряду.

Він також нагадав, що питання ціни газу стало «другим попередженням» для менеджменту «Нафтогазу».

«Перша епопея була з контрактом, друга – з цінами на газ, третьої не буде. Якщо менеджери НАК не зрозуміють, що вони найняті державою, аби ефективно управляти компанією, а не гратися з народом, наслідок буде один – зміна менеджменту «Нафтогазу», – сказав прем’єр.

Тим часом, 24 квітня у команді Володимира Зеленського, який, за даними ЦВК, перемагає на виборах президента України, закликали «НАК «Нафтогаз України» і Кабінет міністрів провести відповідні консультації з МВФ та, замість запланованого підвищення, вийти на відповідне пониження ціни газу для населення із 1 травня».

При цьому ще два дні тому, 22 квітня, в уряді повідомили, що узгодили з «Нафтогазом України» механізм зниження ціни на газ для населення і теплової генерації з 1 травня – до рівня 8247 гривень за тисячу кубометрів.

Згідно з урядовим рішенням, ухваленим на засіданні 3 квітня, якщо кон’юнктура газового ринку демонструє зниження цін на газ для промисловості, «Нафтогаз» зобов’язаний продавати газ для населення за ціною, що визначається як середньоарифметична ціна газу, за якою державна компанія пропонує паливо промисловим споживачам за умови передоплати.

У березні прем’єр-міністр України Володимир Гройсман заявив, що доручить Міністерству фінансів і «Нафтогазу» почати переговори із Міжнародним валютним фондом, щоб запобігти росту тарифів на газ для населення в майбутньому.

Підвищення цін на газ було однією з умов схвалення МВФ та іншими глобальними фінансовими організаціями нових програм співпраці з Україною.

У грудні 2018 року МВФ затвердив нову програму фінансової підтримки України на суму 3,9 мільярда доларів США.
…

Валютний ринок продовжує зміцненням гривні реагувати на спокійне завершення президентських виборів в Україні. Опівдні 24 квітня Національний банк України оприлюднив довідкове значення курсу на рівні 26 гривень 59 копійок за долар. Це на 10 копійок менше за офіційний курс на 24 квітня.

Пропозиція долара суттєво переважає попит, відзначає сайт «Мінфін», який відстежує перебіг торгів на міжбанківському валютному ринку.

«НБУ вже виходив на торги в «анонімному» форматі через Matching і купив не менш як 15 мільйонів доларів за ціною 26,59-26,595 гривні. Учасники ринку чекають на продовження купівлі валюти регулятором, і багато клієнтів впевнені в тому, що цими інтервенціями Нацбанк утримає долар від просідання нижче рівня в 26,50 гривні», – вказують експерти.

Почесний президент Київської школи економіки, заступник голови Ради НБУ Тимофій Милованов заявив Радіо Свобода, що курс гривні до долара та інших світових валют від результатів виборів «зараз ще не залежить».

«Це буде залежати від економічної політики, яка буде впроваджуватися. Думаю, що ринки, економіка і люди в цілому придивляться до того, які будуть перші призначення, перші політичні, економічні рішення нової команди, хто буде в цій команді», – вказав фахівець.

Свого пікового значення 28 гривень 39 копійок за курсом НБУ впродовж останнього року долар сягнув 30 листопада 2018 року. На 12 березня 2019 року офіційний курс становив 26 гривень 31 копійку, це найвищий курс гривні від липня 2018 року.
…

China is getting ready to welcome representatives from 150 nations, including senior leaders of 40 countries, to discuss its international infrastructure program at the second Belt and Road Forum, beginning Thursday and running through Saturday in Beijing.

Analysts say it is not merely a conference on infrastructure building, but an attempt by China to display its popularity and power as a political rallying force. This is significant in view of severe criticism by the United States, which has described the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, as China’s “vanity project.”

“It is a political show of strength. BRI has assumed the characteristics of a global public good,” said Sourabh Gupta, senior fellow at the Institute for China-America Studies in Washington. “In a sense, conceptually, it is about China slipping itself into American clothing which the U.S. itself has discarded. It is about mainstreaming China as a leader of the global development system.”

China has repeatedly denied it has a political purpose in trying to construct connectivity projects across the world. “The ‘Belt and Road Initiative’ is not a geopolitical tool but a platform for cooperation. We welcome all parties to take part in it,” Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said at a recent press conference.

The forum is expected to see an emphasis on the importance of multilateralism and its criticism of protectionism in business and world affairs. Some observers see this as a veiled attempt by Beijing to build up world opinion against the United States.

Countering US clout

Zhiqun Zhu, chair at the department of international relations at Bucknell University in Pennsylvania, said the meeting will reflect China’s growing clout. “When the U.S. focuses on “America first” under President [Donald] Trump, China is quickly emerging as a leader in the global economy and global governance.”

Political clout comes from success in international affairs, however, and not by merely hosting political theater. Although China has achieved some success in its infrastructure program, it has faced several setbacks, with Sierra Leone, Malaysia and Myanmar canceling or scaling back previously negotiated construction deals.

“A lot of the forum will be an attempt at restoring the Belt and Road brand, which has been tarnished over the past two years,” said Jonathan Hillman, director of the Reconnecting Asia project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

The U.S. has said it will not send a high-level delegation to the forum. It expressed disappointment at Italy’s recent decision to join the BRI. “Secretary Pompeo has very publicly gone to every corner of the world and denigrated China’s overseas development lending and projects-based model,” Gupta said, referring to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Foreign Minister Wang Yi said no country has a right to stop others from attending the forum. “All countries have the freedom to participate, but they don’t have the right to prevent other countries from taking part,” he said.

Zhiqun Zhu said instead of running a smear campaign, the U.S. should work with China to ensure that investments in BRI projects are more rule-based and transparent.

World opinion

Germany, France, Japan and Australia are expected to send mid-level officials. They have raised serious objections, saying they would like to see BRI become more transparent, environmentally sustainable and offer equal business opportunities to all participating countries.

“At the end of the day, Europe genuinely wants China to grow into the role of a ‘responsible stakeholder;’ but, responsible stakeholder-ship means that China needs to up its game and conform to prevailing international standards in its practices – be it trade, investment or development,” Gupta said.

India, China’s neighbor, is expected to stay away from the forum. It has said the BRI program violates the country’s sovereignty because some of its projects are located in Pakistan-controlled areas that India regards as its own. India was the only major country to stay away from the first meeting of the forum in 2017.

“India’s stand has increased international attention on some of the troubling aspects of the BRI plan,” said Ananth Krishnan, visiting fellow at Brookings India.

“India was the only country to publicly flag issues such as opacity and debt when the first Belt and Road Forum was held in 2017.”

Gupta at the Institute of China-America Studies thinks many of the objections raised against BRI will be sorted out in negotiations between China and different countries.

“A Chinese menu is on offer but it is not pre-set and it is not being force-fed to host countries,” he said. “It is for host countries, though, to impose themselves and set the minimum standards of project integrity – although China would do well to set a reasonably high bar in this regard of its own volition.”
…

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday failed to meet a final congressional deadline for turning over President Donald Trump’s tax returns to lawmakers, setting the stage for a possible court battle between Congress and the administration.

The outcome, which was widely expected, could prompt House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal to subpoena Trump’s tax records as the opening salvo to a legal fight that may ultimately have to be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Neal set a final 5 p.m. EDT (2100 GMT) deadline for the Internal Revenue Service and Treasury to provide six years of Trump’s individual and business tax records. But the deadline passed without the panel receiving the documents.

After the deadline lapsed, Mnuchin released a letter to Neal in which he pledged to make “a final decision” on whether to provide Trump’s tax records by May 6. It was the second time the administration has missed a House deadline for the tax returns since Neal requested them on April 3.

“Secretary Mnuchin notified me that once again, the IRS will miss the deadline for my … request. I plan to consult with counsel about my next steps,” Neal said in a statement.

In his letter, Mnuchin said he was still consulting with the Justice Department about Neal’s request, which he termed “unprecedented.”

“The department cannot act upon your request unless and until it is determined to be consistent with the law,” the Treasury secretary told Neal.

‘Not Up to the President’

Earlier on Tuesday, the White House said Trump was unlikely to hand over his tax returns. “As I understand it, the president’s pretty clear: Once he’s out of audit, he’ll think about doing it, but he’s not inclined to do so at this time,” White House spokesman Hogan Gidley told Fox News in an interview.

“This is not up to the president. We did not ask him,” said a Democratic committee aide, who cited a law saying the Treasury secretary “shall furnish” taxpayer data upon request from an authorized lawmaker.

Neal informed IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig earlier this month that failure to comply with the deadline would be viewed as a denial.

Legal experts said House Democrats could vote to hold Mnuchin or Rettig in contempt of Congress if they ignored a subpoena, as a pretext to suing in federal court to obtain Trump’s returns. Experts say administration officials could ultimately risk financial penalties and even jail time by defying the committee.

As Ways and Means chairman, Neal is the only lawmaker in the House of Representatives authorized to request taxpayer information under federal law. Democrats say they are confident of succeeding in any legal fight over Trump’s tax returns.

“The law is on our side. The law is clearer than crystal. They have no choice: they must abide by (it),” Representative Bill Pascrell, who has been leading the Democratic push for Trump’s tax records, said in a statement to Reuters.

Democrats want Trump’s returns as part of their investigations of possible conflicts of interest posed by his continued ownership of extensive business interests, even as he serves the public as president.

Republicans have condemned the request as a political “fishing expedition” by Democrats.

Despite the law’s clarity, Democrats have long acknowledged that the effort would likely result in a legal battle that could end up with the U.S. Supreme Court.

“If the IRS does not comply with the request, it is likely that Chairman Neal will subpoena the returns,” Representative Judy Chu, a Democratic member of the Ways and Means Committee, told Reuters.

“If they do not comply with that (subpoena), a legal battle will begin to defend the right of oversight in Congress,” she said.

Trump broke with a decades-old precedent by refusing to release his tax returns as a presidential candidate in 2016 or since being elected, saying he could not do so while his taxes were being audited.

But his former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, told a House panel in February that he does not believe Trump’s taxes are under audit. Cohen said the president feared that releasing his returns could lead to an audit and IRS tax penalties.
…

Oil prices reached a six-month high Tuesday after the Trump administration announced it would no longer exempt countries from U.S. sanctions, if they continue to buy Iranian crude oil, a move aimed at imposing a complete oil embargo on Iran.

Waivers granted to eight countries, including big Iranian crude importers China, India, Japan, Turkey and South Korea, are due to expire on May 2.

RBC Capital Markets, a global investment bank, has told clients it anticipates a loss of 700,000 to 800,000 barrels of oil a day from markets as a consequence of the waivers-withdrawal.

That will tighten oil supplies as seasonal demand picks up in the Northern Hemisphere, forcing importers to seek alternative supplies, a search made more challenging with production falling off in Venezuela and Libya because of domestic unrest and conflict.

U.S. sanctions were snapped back on Iran last year when President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear deal, signed by his predecessor Barack Obama, in which Tehran agreed to nuclear curbs in return for sanctions relief.

The European Union has been at loggerheads with Washington over Iran and the nuclear deal, which the Trump administration fears only delays Iran from developing nuclear weapons.  

“Today I am announcing that we will no longer grant any exemptions,” Mike Pompeo, the U.S. secretary of state, said Tuesday.  “We’re going to zero.  We will continue to enforce sanctions and monitor compliance.  Any nation or entity interacting with Iran should do its diligence and err on the side of caution.  The risks are simply not going to be worth the benefits,” he added.

The Trump administration gave waivers last year to avoid a price spike.

Some oil analysts are predicting the price of a barrel could rise to $80 as a result of the withdrawal of the exemptions and say the Trump administration may have to release oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, an emergency supply of up to 727 million barrels, if the administration wants to keep prices low.

“There isn’t much doubt about the trigger for the latest rally, with Trump’s decision not to extend waivers on imports of Iranian oil beyond May unsurprisingly providing further upward pressure,” according to Craig Erlam, an oil market analyst at OANDA, a U.S. currency brokerage.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have said they will in principle increase production, but are unlikely to do so before a meeting in June of the 14 members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).  Analysts say they will want to wait to see the effect of the withdrawal of exemptions before committing to make up the shortfall on the international market.

Last year, OPEC countries increased production when the Trump administration first announced the return of U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Brent crude and West Texas Intermediate oil have surged in price more than 30 percent this year because of production disruptions in Venezuela, Nigeria, and Libya.

Amrita Sen, chief oil analyst of Energy Aspects, a research consultancy, says a jump in OPEC cartel production won’t necessarily keep prices in check.  “The problem we have is the quality of the crude.  Iran produces a lot of medium to heavy crudes, whereas the spare capacity in Saudi Arabia and the UAE is of lighter crudes.  The quality issue is going to become a very big problem,” she says.

One of the big questions when it comes to oil prices is whether importers decide to comply with the U.S. demand to stop buying Iranian oil.

Sen says China has made very strong statements it is within its legitimate rights to do business with Iran.  “We think Iranian exports will still be about 600,000 to 700,000 barrels per day.  And if prices rise quite substantially and compensates for the drop of 500,000 to 600,000 the revenue shortfall [for Iran] might not be that substantial,” Sen added.

Just hours after the Trump administration’s announcement that it wouldn’t renew waivers, the World Bank issued a report saying it was expecting oil prices to drop this year because of weaker global economic growth. The report, though, was drafted before the announcement and noted “the outlook for oil could be swayed by a range of policy outcomes, including whether the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and partners extend production cuts, the impact of the removal of waivers to the U.S. sanctions on Iran, and looming changes in marine fuel emissions regulations.”

In retaliation for the withdrawal of waivers, Iran has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, the only sea passage from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean and one of the world’s most strategically important maritime choke-points.  Few analysts believe Iran will follow through on its threat as it would risk a firm U.S. response and undermine Tehran’s efforts to keep Europeans wedded to the 2015 nuclear deal.

More likely is Iran will use “proxy wars” in the region, in Syria and Yemen, to retaliate, they say.

The U.S. withdrew from the nuclear deal in part because, it said, Iran was failing to act  like “a normal country.”  Trump officials laid down a dozen conditions Tehran would have to fulfill for sanctions to be lifted, including an end to all uranium enrichment, stopping its support of Hezbollah, Lebanon’s radical Shi’ite movement, and other militant groups including Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Houthi rebels in Yemen.

 
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У конкурсі на посаду голови Державної податкової служби переміг заступник міністра фінансів України Сергій Верланов, повідомила прес-служба Міністерства фінансів України.

«Трійка фіналістів у прямому ефірі представили членам комісії свою програму розвитку Служби у вигляді презентації, а потім протягом години відповідала на запитання представників бізнесу, народних депутатів, експертів та членів комісії, демонструючи фахові знання, лідерські якості, організаційні навички та стресостійкість», – заявили в Міністерстві фінансів.

Сергій Верланов отримав сумарно 16,45 бала, Сергій Петухов – 13,54 бала, а Дмитро Олексієнко не набрав балів, достатніх для рейтингового оцінювання.

За результатами оцінювання кандидатів комісія рекомендувала Кабінету міністрів України призначити Сергія Верланова головою Державної податкової служби.

Верланов призначений заступником міністра фінансів 26 липня 2018 року. У 2015-2017 роках був співголовою юридичного правового комітету Американської торгової палати в Україні. З 2016 року є членом Громадської ради доброчесності, Вищої кваліфікаційної комісії суддів України (делегований Асоціацією правників України).

Наприкінці 2018 року Кабінет міністрів України розділив Державну фіскальну службу на податкову і митну служби й повідомив про намір провести конкурс на керівників новоутворених відомств.
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