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Different estimates on how quickly and how much additional oil would come into world oil markets if sanctions are lifted. The time estimates range from quickly to 6 months for additional new supplies into world oil markets. Estimates of how much production can be added range from 500,000-800,000 barrels a day from private estimates to 1 million additional barrels a day from Iran's oil company, if sanctions are lifted. UK foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, says "there is still a long way to go if we are going to get there." He told a parliamentary committee that the nonnegotiable part is a window of one year advance notice if Iran were to break out and go for a nuclear weapon, which would be based on technical expert opinion of how long it would take Iran to build a nuclear weapon using its knowhow and materials at that Mr Zanganeh took over as oil minister after the election of Rouhani as president 18 months ago. Zanganeh calls the effect of sanctions and the mismanagement of the previous government as "a catastrophe," and he has tried to instill anew discipline in the oil sector. Iran currently produces about 1-1.2 million barrels a day under sanctions, half of earlier levels before sanctions were tightened in 2012 because of the nuclear weapons development issues....

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Greece's minister for migration tells the Times that seven charities including one in London form part of a chain stretching from Somalia to Britain in which smugglers move migrants illegally.  One of the seven charities is in London and is seen as colluding with human traffickers who are putting lives of migrants at risk. Greece has 70,000 migrants living in squalid refugee centres. Of these 17,000 are on islands in the Aegean sea. Europe cannot cope with all these migrants illegally making the crossing, much less during this pandemic. It has also unsettled the countries where migrants are settled on a humanitarian basis as there is at the same time serious neglect of poverty stricken communities inside Europe who are not getting the assistance they deserve. The result is even less focus on the development needs, on infrastructure, education and healthcare of the countries in Europe where migrants are headed, with the attention diverted to the migrants issue. Economic progress in Europe and rapid development could not only improve the condition of people in all communities, it could also help finance more foreign aid development project assistance to Africa and other countries. This would if vigorously done keep people in their home countries and help fulfill their development aspirations there, which is the better way.  Chancellor Merkel of Germany should have opted for a better way by setting up a program for aspiring migrants in the countries of Africa with a generous visa program offering training and technological skills, which could then be brought back to the country in Africa where it could generate jobs and opportunities with the necessary capital from European and other financial institutions and governments. This effort made in alliance with Britain and France could be powerful in its impact. Instead a haphazard three years of migration led to internal divisions, loss of confidence in the CDU and the SDP, FDP parties in coalitions, ending up where it should have started in the first place- reducing the migration to a trickle, returning some migrants back to their countries, and focussing on bringing economic assistance and development assistance to African countries for opportunities in these countries and a brighter future so that no one would want to leave and drift on oceans in tiny boats in the first place. The condition of the people in Africa is not so hopeless that the best they can do is to send their young people to drift on boats on the high seas in the hope of refugee status. China has shown that the there is a path from famine during the years following the Great Leap Forward to the development of today. India is doing that now and can repeat that story. Japan and South Korea, Taiwan have done this after devastating wars and out of nothing. Imagine what the world would be like if all these people in Asia set out on small boats for Europe.       ...

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Local investment companies were allowed to borrow beyond their limits after the financial crisis of 2008. There are about 8000 local investment companies (LIC's) and they were used during 2008-2010 to get funds quickly to projects. The LIC's borrowed for local governments, and borrowed extensively to build roads, railroads, power plants, and other infrastructure and buildings. Northwestern University Professor Shih has followed this carefully, and estimates LIC debt owed to banks at $1.68 trillion, or 34% of China's GDP. Some of the banks have collateral in land, but many banks are relying on the ability of the local governments to pay back the loans. And some of this is in money losing projects.

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Robert Selander, retiring CEO of MasterCard, talks about the questions he asks and what he looks for when interviewing and hiring for jobs in the organization. His experience in multicultural and multilingual environments like Brazil has shown him the value of not judging by linguistic skills alone how knowledgeable and capable a person is. He asks about strengths and weaknesses, and asks how the interviewed person is going to work on his weaker side to be able to overcome these barriers. He looks for chemistry and initiative, the kinds of things that tell him that that person would be right in the infield with him. For leaders he look for how they have brought in talent and pulled the team together to get a real business together from scratch, if it is a new business.

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Research firm Dragonomics says real estate prices fell 4.9% in April from the prior year for nine cities in China. In 2010 prices in these nine cities went up by 21.5%, the increase in 2009 was 10%. Standard Chartered estimates China's second tier cities, such as Dalian and Tianjin, could have 20 months of housing inventory by the end of 2011. Standard Chartered says price declines of 10-20% can be expected. Government data understates the extent of the bubble and the drop in prices say analysts. Beijing real estate consultant, Soufun, confirms the slowdown in price increases, saying its data show average property prices went up by 5.1% in May over the prior year, compared to the jump in prices in 2009 and 2010. Prices of copper and steel are coming down after rapid increases. The price increases in the Chinese real estate market have put housing out of the reach of ordinary couples. In 2006 an average price of a new apartment in Beijing cost $100,000, by 2011 this had gone up to $250,000. It woud take 57 years of saving for an average person to buy the apartment at todays cost. The government's response has been to boost down payments on mortgages for second homes to 60% from 40%, prohibiting state owned enterprises outside the real estate sector from investing in real estate, and raising the reserve requirements of banks....

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ZTE of Shenzen, China has 3% global market share and has a new model the F230 which can show streaming video at broadband internet speeds. ZTE will double its cellphone sales to 60 million this year. In the mobile phone business things can change very quickly. The market for mobile phones can change very quickly, is defined by a younger demographic that loves to try new things, and where new technologies and capabilities get incorporated very quickly and in new combinations, navigation, video, broadband, different market segments from the lower end to the upper end especially in developing countries of Brazil, India and China, and the constant competitive churn that brings in new technologies and new companies like ZTE into the market. Upper management at Nokia realizes this as Motorola twice came up with hit models the Star-Tac and the Razr in 1996 and 2005, and each time falling behind after the one time hit. Motorola is even looking at exiting this market. New competitors are in the field with Apple's I-phone in 2007 and with Google and Microsoft developing new software for this market. It requires not just a product hit but a management team and a structure for manufacturing and distribution that is strong and resilient enough to respond to the changing market and to anticipate market trends that are just taking shape and to have the cultural mindset in management at upper and middle levels to deal with huge fast growing markets like India and China, and also Brazil, Russia and other developing countries in Asia and Latin America and Africa where the nature of the demand is different and varies among the different regions also. Nokia has come closest to putting this capability together. It has market share of 40% in this global market with sles in India of 8 million phones a month. There is room for competiton as competitors like Samsung sell about 200 million cellphones a month and are growing at 25% a year. Nokia is also taking a new approach to stay ahead. Its buying smaller companies and developing in-house technology to build its own mobile services business named Ovi. It acquired a number of software companies, acquiring Navteq for $8.1 billion for software on satellite location services. It has its own web portal and and lets wireless providers like Vodafone and Verizon offer their subscribers the option of using portals of Vodafone, Verizon or Nokia's....

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The continued debate about the relevance of a G-8, the need for more countries. OBama sees the G-20 as the really important meeting, and the G-8 meetings as a smaller less significant meeting between the G20 meeting in London and the next one in Pittsburgh. This however leaves the other leaders outside of the G-8 meeting on the sidelines at G-8 meetings, which does not work very well. In this meeting in Italy, Turkey and Egypt were also present, as were leaders from Africa, and from Australia.

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Adam Bryant talks to 4 women executives about the problems women face in taking up higher management positions. One of the problems addressed directly and at length by the head of Pfizer Nutrition, Amy Schulman, is what she calls "the dutiful daughter," doing what is expected of you. This is also described as a serious problem for women executives in Asia by Riva Gold, where women not having 100% of the skills for a higher management job will step back, whereas men with only 50% of the skills step forward. Schulman says women have to be well prepared and have a good grasp of the subject matter, have acquired experience, and having done that they need to make their voice heard. Any anxieties about not getting it just right, or asking the question about whether "she belongs" need to be left behind. The leaders of companies need to create the environment in which biases and assumptions about women in the workplace do not hinder getting a mix of different voices in the corporation, which can only benefit from that diversity of people and styles. Another point she makes is that women have to spend their political capital, to stand up for colleagues and the team where appropriate, for principles that are significant, to be build credibility and win credit. ...

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Freeman contrasts the speeches given by Obama and Trump, one in Cairo after becoming president, and the other in Riyadh. Freeman says Obama did not give enough credit to American leadership and progress on women's rights, and was not critical of Iran during a period in which sectarian strife has led to the situation in Syria and Iraq. 

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As China's food retail stores landscape has changed with more and better options offered to consumers, they have shifted upscale, especially with the rapid growth of incomes in China in the last decade. With a decline in growth for Yum Brands in China the company has decided to spin off its operations in China into a separate company, in the hope of giving the local company more room to respond to competitive changes in the food retail store business. As Chinese consumers urban disposable income showed rapid growth from 7700 yuan in 2002 to 23,700 in 2015, the market for food retail chains has changed. With this growth came other competitors such as Pizza Express, a UK chain at the higher end with local Chinese partners, and at the lower end Taiwanese competitors Ting Hsin International Group with its Discos fried chicken chain competing with KFC Yum Brands stores. Local Chinese competitors also moved upscale with Xiabuxiabu Catering serving hot pot, for consumers to cook meat and vegetable in broth doing it themselves. Other factors hurt Yum Brands growth and brand respect with the media reporting use of growth hormones and antibiotics by Kentucy fried chicken suppliers in 2012. And a local media report in 2014 saying that a KFC supplier supplied expired meat hurt sales with adecline of 14% in the fiscal 3rd quarter 2015. The opinion for Pizza Hut, a Yum brand has changed from as recently as 2012, with one survey showing a drop from 39% to 25% for consumers who see it as a desirable brand. A Beijing teacher for example now sees Pizza Hut as a cheap option compared to spending 128 yuan or $20 on a better quality pancetta and sun dried tomato pizza. More discriminating Chinese consumers means this trend will continue, and the media constantly looking for flaws in quality standards. As many companies are finding out the Chinese market is not going to be easy for the complacent....

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Yuka Hayashi's interview with Gen. Shigeru Iwasaki, Chief of the Joint Chiefs of Japan's Self Defence Forces. Iwasaki says Japan will improve its defense capabilities in the southwestern part of Japan and protect Japanese airspace. Japan will increase defense spending under the government of LDP leader Shinzo Abe.