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Nicola Sturgeon’s iron grip on the Scottish National party is starting to loosen, with signs of internal dissent in Edinburgh and Westminster, as she also faces questions about her strategy for securing an independence referendum. Eight years after she became Scotland’s first minister, Sturgeon is no closer to securing a plebiscite, while her plan to

European natural gas prices have fallen to levels last recorded before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February, as warmer weather helps the continent to preserve its reserves. The Dutch TTF gas future for the coming month, the benchmark European contract, dropped as much as 7.4 per cent on Wednesday to €76.78 per megawatt hour

For centuries, Sri Lanka has been renowned for its vast and varied produce, its fertile soil fostering everything from cinnamon and black pepper to fruits and fragrant teas. But over the past 18 months, the country has become a cautionary tale for global agriculture. Vital inputs such as fuel and fertilisers are in short supply,

Former South Korean president Lee Myung-bak will be pardoned after serving almost four years of a 17-year sentence for corruption, embezzlement and bribery, the country’s justice ministry has said. President Yoon Suk-yeol said on Tuesday that the special pardon had been issued for Lee, 81, in the name of promoting national unity, though many South

A blizzard described by meteorologists as a “bomb cyclone” has killed more than two dozen people and left thousands without power in western New York state. States across the US have been struck by the storm, with the hardest-hit area being New York’s Erie County, which includes the city of Buffalo, the state’s second-largest city.

Algerian authorities have arrested prominent independent journalist Ihsane El-Kadi and shut down his Radio M internet station, which was seen as the last remaining space for free political debate in the country. El-Kadi was arrested in the early hours of Saturday by six plainclothes police officers at his home in a village east of the capital

One online commentator asked for teddy bears shopping for groceries in the style of ukiyo-e, and seemed impressed. Another wasn’t so happy; they’d ordered up an image of cats drinking soup in the style of Gustav Klimt (“The Kiss” is apparently a favourite picture). An earlier request, for a Formula One race on Mars in

Australians’ love of beer once fed the idea that it was a country where the “amber nectar” ruled supreme, from Paul Hogan’s Foster’s adverts to the often-told story of cricketer David Boon downing 52 cans on a flight from Sydney to London. Yet 2022 was the year when beer lost its mantle as Australia’s favourite

It’s been quite a year, much like all the others, but this time with recency bias. Summarising it shouldn’t be the responsibility of just one publication. Welcome, then, to a crowdsourced FTAV Further Reading year-end special. We asked FT staffers to choose their favourite stories published elsewhere in 2022. A few took the time to

This winter, it’s cold outside in more ways than one. Households preparing for the first festive season unaffected by Covid restrictions since 2019 will have to open their wallets wide for a very costly Christmas. The highest inflation rate in four decades, combined with pandemic-related supply chain issues, the impact of extreme weather, and the

The way UK public sector wages are set is being called into question after high inflation and tight government spending have put the system of independent pay review bodies under extreme strain. With striking nurses and ambulance workers in deadlock with the government over pay, and the results of teacher ballots for industrial action due

Once upon a time, private equity was — relatively — simple. Buy a company, oversee a turnround tricky to do in the public markets, and then sell at a profit. Even the cynical version of the above isn’t terribly complicated: buy a company, load up with debt, cut costs, shut off investment, hope for a

Italy’s rightwing government has scrapped plans to allow local merchants to refuse digital payments for transactions under €60, averting a potential a showdown with Brussels on the use of cash Finance minister Giancarlo Giorgetti told legislators the controversial proposal, which would have scrapped penalties for merchants rejecting digital payments for transactions under €60, was being

There is some merit in thinking of a long-term ceasefire to end the war in Ukraine, as Gideon Rachman does in “Ukraine and the shadow of Korea” (Opinion, December 13). However, I think Kashmir is a better model. Indian and Pakistani maps still show all of Kashmir in each respective country, giving the politicians a

France has called on Britain to overhaul its asylum system and sign border security pacts with Belgium and the Netherlands to help prevent people endangering their lives by crossing the Channel in small boats to reach the UK. Interior minister Gérald Darmanin said in an interview with the Financial Times that such steps would complement

Outflows from Binance accelerated to $6bn in the first half of this week, while accounting firm Mazars has halted its work on crucial “proof of reserves” reporting, as the crypto exchange battles to avert a crisis of confidence. Binance, which suffered $1bn outflows in a single day on Tuesday, is battling to reassure investors of

The garden in winter, stripped of its finery and laid bare to the world, can be a stark place. But there’s a beauty to that. Whether it’s silvered seed heads of summer flowers, the weblike strands remaining of the pumpkin plant or the recently clipped hedge, what’s left in winter says a lot about the

A month after Donald Trump launched his third presidential campaign with a declaration that “America’s comeback begins now”, his attempt to recapture the White House is floundering amid a drumbeat of criticism from Republican lawmakers and ever mounting legal woes. Perhaps more worryingly for the former president, his once cast-iron grip on the party grassroots

Hedge funds have been upping their short positions against shares of cryptocurrency miners, betting that more will go to the financial brink after the collapse of the FTX exchange. With the bitcoin price down by nearly two-thirds this year and the cost of the power that miners require to fuel their energy-intensive computers having risen

Christine Lagarde used to claim that the Federal Reserve had a bigger inflation problem than the European Central Bank. Now the ECB chief admits the eurozone may be in a bigger mess. The risk of inflation staying uncomfortably far above the 2 per cent level targeted by both central banks was now greater in Europe