The money of Venezuela is becoming useless, and its cash crisis is getting worse. The nation is spiraling farther into a humanitarian catastrophe spurred by the government's economic policies, which have caused the currency, the bolivar, to plunge in prices and value to skyrocket. Food and medication shortages have been reported across Venezuela. The bolivar has lost 96 percent of its value this season. As of Tuesday, it took 84,000 bolivars to buy an American buck. At the start of this month, a dollar was worth 41,000 bolivars. And at the start of this season, it just required 3,100 bolivars to buy a dollar, according to DolarToday, a website that monitors the exchange rate. Millions of Venezuelans look at DolarToday or a different site, Paralelo Venezuela, to discover how much money they should purchase groceries -- if there's food on the shelves at all. The official exchange rate of the government has been deemed meaningless. Interest in Venezuela has soared to 4,115 percent in comparison to a year ago, based on Steve Hanke, a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University, who's an expert on hyperinflation. The crisis has deepened because the authorities relied on some of its debts. "The economy is really in a complete death spiral," says Hanke. "It's gotten a lot worse there in the last two weeks."
Other estimates are lower than Hanke's but exorbitant by the standards of any country. The research firm Ecoanalitica estimates that costs spiked compared with a year ago. Prices at hotels and restaurants have been up 70% in the month earlier in October. Soaring prices force Venezuelans to wait for hours in line at the supermarket, the ATM or possibly, just to get by. And things can get worse shortly. The government and its state-run petroleum service, PDVSA, lately relied on some debts. Investors can organize and grab the only valuable asset -- oil -- in the USA of Venezuela if more defaults follow. This would choke off the government's primary source of cash, which it needs to import food and medicine. President Nicolas Maduro, whom the Trump government labels a dictator, demanded earlier this month that the nation's debt is restructured. The authorities and PDVSA owe over $60 billion. The central bank has less than $10 billion in reserves, which have dwindled during the last few years as trades have been paid by the country. The nation's obligations extend much beyond debts to bondholders. In total, Venezuela owes $141 billion to bondholders, Russia, China, builders and petroleum service providers, based on an analysis by Moody's Investor Service.
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Venezuela is on the verge of revolution as its economy collapses.
Russian business should be prepared to switch to needs at any moment to production, said Vladimir Putin on Wednesday. The president spoke at a summit of leaders in Sochi. "The ability of our economy to improve military production and services at a given time is among the most important aspects of military security," Mr Putin said. "To this end, all strategic, and simply large-scale venture ought to be ready, regardless of ownership." A day earlier, the president had spoken to catch up and overtake the West in technology. "Our army and navy need to have the very best gear -- better than overseas equivalents," he explained. "If we want to win, we have to be better." Since the army has undergone extensive modernisation. Ageing gear has gone. There's a testing approach that is new. There are new command structures. The funding has increased exponentially. This year, military expenses will cross 3 trillion roubles, or 3.3 percent of GDP. This would be a listing were it not for one-off costs in 2016. Over the next two decades, spending is forecast to be cut back slightly, to about 2.8 percent of GDP.
Though that budget remains less than 30 percent of their joint Nato budget in Europe, many nations are increasing their military spending in response to the "Russian threat". Nato command has been restructured -- it says to military dangers and cyber in reaction. Last Monday, British Prime Minister Theresa May said the UK would lead a response to counter "Russian hostility." "We know what you are doing," she explained. By making Ms May its attention of the Vesti Nedeli flagship propaganda programme on Sunday, a generally diplomatic response was delivered by Russia. Presenter Dmitry Kiselev maintained his most disparaging remarks for the look of the Prime Minister. Saudi Arabia granted Sophia the humanoid robot with 'robot citizenship' ahead of the Future Investment Initiative conference.
The future of work is evolving. Across industries, technology remains a huge disruptor like it or not. Change in the workplace isn't only coming, it is already here, and you also want to make sure that you're together with the skills that are forming the tasks marketplace and are impacting your ability to stay relevant in your field. A recent analysis by Upwork, an online marketplace for freelancers, identified a few of fastest growing skills that are shaping the freelancer market. A sharp spike in interest surrounding technologies, especially about cybersecurity, blockchain, and artificial intelligence inform what have been the ten fastest-growing abilities:
Blockchain robotics and Bitcoin are all currently making first looks. The freelancer marketplace, according to online freelance platform Upwork's senior vice-president, Rich Pearson, functions as a sign for workplace trends on a far larger scale for the next several years. "it is a window to how companies are embracing new technologies," he tells Entrepreneur. "The fact that robotics, blockchain, and bitcoin associated skills are among the list suggests that many companies are unable to discover these skills locally and are turning to freelance specialists to allow them to provide new products to market." Cryptocurrency and blockchain are becoming mainstream.
Even though cryptocurrency is due to its character intangible, the frenzy and hype round it's prompted venture capitalists to invest a fair amount of cold, hard cash into companies that are focusing on the evolution and integration of Blockchain, a distributed ledger platform (DTL) that verifies and documents transactions, such as with Bitcoin. Based on CB Insights, a firm that predicts technology trends, since 2012, there have been over 650 equity deals made with blockchain companies, investments totaling over $2.1 billion. In October 2017, 95 VCs be the year's conclusion and had a minimum of one blockchain investment, that number is expected to reach 120. "[Bitcoin payment] approval by retailers is still comparatively low. But important companies, such as Overstock, Dish Network, Microsoft, Intuit, and PayPal have all integrated Bitcoin payments into their solutions," says Pearson, who notes that the adoption of the technology by these stalwarts leads the way for a bigger trend throughout the retail sector. "A lot of times when [retailers] do prototyping or feasibility [testing], they will hire freelancers to see how it would operate." Bitcoin has certainly captured notoriety and public fascination, and while one Bitcoin is now equivalent to $7,759.98, it is the Blockchain technology that's being hailed as a game changer in how we do matters. Many companies are still on how to best use and incorporate distributed ledger technology in the testing and experimentation stage. What's evident is that like with any fast-growing technology, the skills associated with construction, maintaining and working with those systems are in short shrift, so owning these skills will lead to more opportunities for work across some businesses, full-time or freelancer. The Financial Times reports that blockchain associated ads have shrunk on LinkedIn within the past year. For companies on high alert, data safety is in high demand. Cybersecurity is another valuable place. Security breaches, such as the ones that have happened to Yahoo and Equifax, are growing increasingly commonplace, and consumers are demanding companies do a better job. Skills, such as penetration assessment, which comes in at number four of fasting skills on Upwork's list, is the way you test the vulnerability of the infrastructure of a system. The researchers noted that the U.S. State of Cybercrime 2017 survey, which found that 36 percent of businesses reported being impacted by a phishing attack in 2016, compared to 26 percent in 2015. "The Bureau of Labor Statistics states the rate of growth for work in information security for 2014 to 2024 will be at 18 percent, which is the quickest of all jobs," notes Pearson. He clarified that the most frequent use instance that Upwork sees is when a company is testing out a particular cybersecurity issue that they know or suspect is occurring, and they can produce solutions and policy in a significantly faster pace by obtaining a market of salespeople, unhindered by the abilities' location. Every company should be utilizing A.I. The study also cited that international spending on robotics is projected to more than double from $91.5 billion in 2016 to more than $188 billion in 2020. This means the skills in demand is going to be associated with augmented reality and machine learning, thanks to A.I.'s broader adoption across sectors, particularly in the automobile market. These days, it's become standard for companies, from airlines to hotels to banks, to employ chatbots to offer 24/7 client service. According to UBS, the A.I. industry is forecast to rocket from a $5 billion in revenues in 2015 to more than twice the revenue at $12.5 billion in 2020. Pearson noted that A.I. adoption is driving a requirement for freelancers who have a center with deep learning, natural language processing, and machine learning skills. In particular, he says that those three experienced more in in the year's next quarter. Skills like image processing systems and neural networks also have seen high growth. "A.I. [is] a way to look at different types of items and identify them fast, label them and then build a logic off of them," explains Pearson. For anyone who would like to stay applicable being a freelancer having a learning mindset is crucial. The programming and coding skills being taught in universities now will probably be a couple of years out of date from today, so the technology-minded have been challenged to keep updating their skills. New ground is all breaking, but what technology does is force us to be nimble. Who would not want a robot that could mimic your every movement? Toyota is in the business. It turns out that along with creating cars, it has also been creating robots. This week, Toyota rolled out a movie introducing the that the T-HR3. The human operator of the robot wears data gloves and an HTC Vive VR headset, which allow the user to find that the robot's point of view.
The service developed the robot, which stands more than five feet and weighs 165 pounds, to help individuals in rebuilding after disasters or in outer space. The robot has 29 connected body parts, including ten fingers that the operator can proceed. If it runs into another item, it can also walk in different directions and can continue to keep its balance. The robot will receive its debut at the International Robot Exhibition in Tokyo. A huge rescue effort is under way after a powerful earthquake struck Iran's mountainous border with Iraq, killing more than 400 people and injuring more than 7,000.
President Trump said the U.S. is designating North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism on Monday. The designation "should have happened a long time ago," the president said at the start of a Cabinet meeting. He also cited the death of 22-year-old student Otto Warmbier of Cincinnati, acts of terrorism, and also the regime's nuclear weapons program. The designation will impose penalties and sanctions on the regime of Kim Jong Un. Trump said additional sanctions would be announced by that the Treasury Department on North Korea on Tuesday. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the sanctions would be like sanctions that were previous, but wider. He explained the sanctions on the plan are affecting fuel supply and the country's revenues. "This is a process that began really several months past," Tillerson said during a media briefing Monday at the White House. The move returns North Korea to the list of nations the U.S. viewpoints as state sponsors of terror for the first time since 2008. That is if the North was removed in a bid to salvage a deal to halt its development.
U.S. officials cited the killing of Kim's estranged half-brother Kim Jong Nam at a Malaysian airport this year as an act of terrorism. "The assassination in Malaysia was a substantial event," Tillerson said to reporters on Monday. Warmbier was killed after being returned to the US from North Korea in a comatose state. He was sentenced to attempting to steal a banner while visiting North 24, after confessing. North Korea joins Iran, Sudan, and Syria about the U.S. list of state sponsors of terror. |