Good morning, Quartz readers!
An invitation
Take part in the political chatter. On Nov. 8, election day in the United States, we’re inviting our readers around the world to join Quartz reporters and editors for a discussion of US politics. It will be hosted all day long on Slack, the group messaging tool. Click here to participate.
What to watch for today
Theresa May in India. The UK prime minister joins Indian PM Narendra Modi at the India UK Tech Summit. It’s Britain’s first big overseas trade mission since the vote for Brexit. May promised to make it easier for wealthy Indian business executives to get UK visas—but Modi wants to see more study visas for young Indians, something the British PM isn’t prepared to offer.
Climate-change haggling begins in Marrakech. The Paris Agreement on limiting global average temperatures finally came into force last week. Now it’s time for the Conference of the Parties (COP22) to start hammering out details on how to achieve that goal. The prospect of climate-change denier Donald Trump becoming president has conference delegates on edge—Trump has vowed to “cancel” the Paris accord.
The US election countdown. With the clock ticking down to Nov. 8 and polls looking pretty close, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump make their last-ditch pitches across the country. Clinton will hit up Oakland and Philadelphia in Pennsylvania, Allendale, Michigan, and Raleigh, North Carolina. Trump travels to five states today: Florida, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.
Over the weekend
The FBI confirmed (again) that Hillary Clinton’s emails are fine. Director James Comey informed Congress that “based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July,” when the agency said criminal prosecution was not warranted. European and Asian markets enjoyed a “Hillary bump” on the news.
Domestic telecoms demand boosted SoftBank’s bottom line. The Japanese telecom giant’s second-quarter operating profit rose 4.8% to $3.2 billion from the previous quarter and nearly 7% from the same time a year ago. It said its US mobile division, Sprint, was making “solid progress.” SoftBank bought British chip maker ARM for $30 billion earlier this year.
Beijing blocked two new lawmakers in Hong Kong. After a night of violent protests in Hong Kong, China’s highest legislative body prevented two pro-independence lawmakers-elect from taking office, after the pair used a derogatory term to refer to the mainland during their swearing-in session.
HSBC’s profit took a nose-dive. The British bank posted a pre-tax profit drop of 86% in the third quarter, due to a $1.7 billion loss on the sale of its Brazilian business earlier this year. However, adjusted profit excluding those one-off costs was up 7% and the banks shares rose 2% in Hong Hong after the results. Its long-serving chairman Douglas Flint leaves next year and investors are keen to see an outsider replace him.
Samsung tried to move on. The Korean electronics maker, still smarting from the Galaxy Note 7 fiasco, and embroiled in a fresh recall over its washing machines, is already laying plans for the Galaxy S8. On Sunday, a Samsung executive promised the new phone, due to drop in 2017, will include artificial-intelligence features that are “significantly differentiated” from the competition.
Volkswagen’s chairman got pulled into the diesel-emissions probe. German prosecutors have widened their investigation to include Hans Dieter Pötsch, who was made chairman in the wake of the emissions scandal—an appointment that netted him a €20 million ($22 million) bonus, according to Der Spiegel. If investigators find the board didn’t properly inform investors about the scandal, Pötsch could be looking at prison time.
Quartz obsession interlude
Devjyot Ghoshal on how Myanmar is faring under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi. “There are some promising signs, but only a diehard optimist could pretend it’s going well for Suu Kyi so far, a year after the elections, and six months after the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner formed her government. To be fair, transforming the world’s youngest democracy is a huge task.” Read more here.
Matters of debate
Philosophers are failing the public. They once considered it their civic duty to write and speak about current affairs, but now most stick to academia.
There’s a role for religion in the hospital ward. It can be a comfort when doctors pray for their patients.
Every nation has a shadow in the Jungian sense. When we avert our eyes from the negative aspects of society, we do ourselves a disservice.
Surprising discoveries
Kinky sex can enhance creativity. The exhilarating high lifts our consciousness into a heightened state of “flow.”
We’re just a century away from Christmas in July. Quartz’s Christmas Creep Calculator™, showing how the holiday lights on London’s Oxford Street get turned on earlier and earlier, is now updated with 2016 data.
Wikipedia is way less biased than it used to be. Researchers from Harvard find it filled with neutrality.
Cows can now text their owners when they’re sick or pregnant. The messages are generated by sensors inserted in the cows’ stomachs.
There more words in Apple user agreements than in The Hobbit. If you own a Mac, an iPhone, an Apple TV, an Apple Watch, and an Airport router, you’ve probably agreed to at least 100,000 words of legal contracts.
Our best wishes for a productive day. Please send any news, comments, bovine text messages, and Apple disclosures to hi@qz.com. You can follow us on Twitter for updates throughout the day or download our iPhone app.