Good morning, Quartz readers!
What to watch for today
Southeast Asian leaders discuss their territorial disputes with China. Foreign ministers from 10 countries will meet in Beijing to for contentious talks over the South China Sea. China claims sovereignty over the vast area, but countries including Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, and Taiwan have competing claims.
The IMF addresses China’s exchange-rate maneuvers. Deputy managing director, David Lipton, will present the fund’s annual financial stability report in Beijing. Since August, China has spent $470 billion in foreign reserves to support its currency.
The Oslo Forum convenes. US secretary of state John Kerry, Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Zarif, and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini will meet to discuss the Iran nuclear deal. The Oslo Forum is an annual meeting of leaders focused on mediating and resolving global conflicts.
While you were sleeping
Microsoft added LinkedIn to its professional network. The software giant is paying about $26 billion in cash—its biggest-ever acquisition—to buy the job-oriented social network. The deal could create new networking functions within Microsoft Office, along with some questionable data-mining opportunities.
Apple took on just about every competitor with its new software upgrades. The company’s annual event for developers included a slew of new features aimed at rivals such as Spotify, Snapchat, and Google Photos. Apple also announced performance upgrades for the Apple Watch that could actually make it useful, and eliminated a long-standing iPhone annoyance.
Barack Obama said the Orlando shooter was “homegrown.” The US president said that there is no evidence that Omar Mateen, the gunman responsible for the country’s deadliest mass shooting, was communicating with overseas extremists. Officials also said Mateen, who killed 50 people at a gay nightclub, visited Walt Disney World (paywall) while looking for targets.
The Feds said FedEx is a drug courier. Prosecutors cited dozens of internal emails as proof that the shipping company was knowingly shipping painkillers and other prescription pills from “shady” online vendors. The company could be forced to pay up to $1.6 billion in penalties.
Airbus will build helicopters in China. The French aerospace group will become the first non-Chinese manufacturer (paywall) to do so. Airbus also agreed to sell 100 H135 helicopters to state-run businesses as part of a €700 million (5.2 billion Chinese yuan) deal.
Quartz markets haiku
Next, it’s Brexit with
“Leave” vote’s effects, complex-it
May be a regret-xit
Quartz obsession interlude
Kevin Delaney on a Silicon Valley plan to create a new “long term” stock exchange: “US tech startups have long wanted to overhaul the process for firms to list their shares and to find ways to minimize pressures on public companies from high-frequency trading, cynical activism, and any distorting incentives of quarterly results.” Read more here.
Matters of debate
Inequality isn’t making us sick. A study of Swedish lottery winners shows they don’t get any healthier.
Want more entrepreneurs? Fix the student debt crisis. Bill Clinton thinks the current system is “insane.”
We’re near the end of the fossil fuel era. We’re not running out—the alternatives are just getting cheaper.
Surprising discoveries
Germans are no longer the world champions of nude sunbathing. Landlocked Austria has nabbed the crown.
Qatar convicted a rape victim of having extra-marital sex. She received a one-year suspended sentence and an $824 fine.
Facebook accidentally declared war in the Philippines. It has apologized for not using the country’s peacetime flag.
Job-stealing robots are a very old story. The hype goes back to the 1920s.
Mongolia is changing its addresses to three-word phrases. The vast country is using a proprietary system that maps out GPS coordinates.
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