Good morning, Quartz readers!
What to watch for today
The Fed gives a major policy statement. The US central bank is set to announce plans to start offloading its $4.5 trillion debt portfolio, accumulated in the wake of the financial crisis. The Bank of Japan will also kick off a two-day monetary policy meeting.
World leaders discuss Iran’s nuclear accord. Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the US will revisit the disarmament deal (paywall) negotiated with Tehran in 2015. Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said the US will pay a “high cost” if president Donald Trump follows through with his threats to scrap the pact.
World leaders and business bigwigs discuss “a new multilateral economic order.” That’s one of the themes of the inaugural Bloomberg Global Business Forum, an invite-only event in New York on the sidelines of the UN general assembly. (Quartz is a media partner.) Mike Bloomberg, Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, Christine Lagarde, Jack Ma, Emmanuel Macron, and Justin Trudeau are among the speakers. Sessions will be streamed online starting at 8:30am ET.
Hurricane Maria heads for Puerto Rico. The category 5 storm, which lashed the US Virgin Islands, is set to hit Puerto Rico midday Wednesday local time with maximum sustained winds of 160 mph. The island’s public-safety commissioner urged people to “evacuate or die.”
While you were sleeping
The death toll from the Mexican earthquake hit 217. The epicenter of yesterday’s 7.1 magnitude was 100 miles south of the capital, and nearly half of those killed were in Mexico City. The earthquake struck on the anniversary of the one that destroyed Mexico City in 1985. It’s also the second quake in a month for the country, where 100 people were killed.
Amazon’s making Alexa-enabled glasses. The e-commerce giant’s first wearable device (paywall) will be “smart glasses” that would allow you to summon its virtual assistant while on the move. The glasses would pair with a smart phone, and a bone-conduction audio system would let the wearer hear Alexa without using headphones.
German and Indian titans forged Europe’s second-largest steel company. Pending EU approval, Thyssenkrupp and Tata Steel will form a joint venture, based in the Netherlands, second only in size to European leader ArcelorMittal. The deal is expected to create savings of up to $700 million a year. The downside is the possible loss of up to 4,000 jobs.
Toshiba picked a buyer for its memory chip unit. After weeks of deliberation, the Japanese company’s board settled on an international consortium led by US private-equity firm Bain Capital (paywall) to buy the prized unit in a deal worth a reported ¥2.1 trillion ($18 billion). Toshiba is expected to finalize the deal later today.
Refugees on Manus and Nauru will finally be sent to the US. The Australian government said that the first group of refugees will be resettled in the US in the coming weeks as part of an Obama-era deal between the two countries—the one Trump called “dumb.” There are around 2,000 migrants languishing in rough conditions in Australia’s poorly run offshore camps on the Pacific islands.
Quartz obsession interlude
Annalisa Merelli on Trump’s rating of countries. “Trump’s first address at the UN general assembly was a 41-minute-long declaration of US power and military prowess, a celebration of sovereignty over international collaboration, and a threatening condemnation of America’s enemies… Trump took the opportunity to share his view of an international community broadly divided into very bad, bad, sad, and good countries. (Plus one that is the greatest of them all.)” Read more here.
Matters of debate
We have the wrong ideas about political violence. Non-violent political resistance is not as tactically successful as history books suggest.
Team-building exercises create toxic companies. They create in-groups and out-groups that can lead to an exclusive workplace culture.
US teens are delaying sex and booze. For adolescents, 18 is the new 15 due to smaller families and more parental attention.
Surprising discoveries
Beyoncé fans got a punk-rock surprise on the vinyl version of Lemonade. A printing error resulted in one side being filled with songs from the Canadian punk band Zex.
China shut down a sex-doll rental service. The dolls on offer were marketed as Chinese, Korean, Russian, and Wonder Woman.
Morgan Freeman says the US is “at war” with Russia. The actor with the “voice of god” has been enlisted by the newly formed Committee to Investigate Russia to promote its message.
Some dinosaurs laid blue eggs. Most birds, lizards, and mammals have all-white eggs; colored eggs suggest the dino nests were exposed.
Indian feminists organize monthly Wikipedia Edit-a-Thons. The activity is meant to address the gender imbalance in Wikipedia editing—only 3% of the site’s editors in India are women.
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