What does ‘poorly’ mean? It is highly unusual for an institutional investor like this to divest (let alone from a dozen or so companies from a single country). Most of their assets never turn over.

Yeah, and let us not forget the abducted children (just read the post prior to that one) and the other war crimes. Will those responsible be punished?

(This may be a bit off-topic, but I had a discussion yesterday in another thread on the number of propaganda posts that has allegedly increased in recent months here on Lemmy, and low-quality posts/comments that seems to follow an authoritarian disinformation and misinformation playbook. I feel somehow the linked article is one of these posts. There are many “poll says”, “survey says”, “politician X says”, articles followed by highly biased and often misleading and very brief content. Maybe I am wrong, I am not here for too long and just another random guy on the web, but this is my impression.)

There is a similar trend in the Eurozone, the U.S., China, and practically all other larger areas. To provide a broader picture and a bit of a forecast:

• The HCOB Eurozone Manufacturing PMI was confirmed at 49.8 in July 2025, up from 49.5 in June, marking the slowest contraction in the sector since July 2022 and signaling a move toward stabilization. Output continued to grow, albeit at the weakest pace since March … At the country level, Ireland led euro area manufacturing, while the Netherlands, Spain, and Greece also saw solid growth. Elsewhere, PMI readings improved but remained below the 50.0 threshold … Germany’s PMI reached a near three-year high, while France and Austria recorded the weakest performance in the bloc.

• The S&P Global US Manufacturing PMI was revised slightly higher to 49.8 in July 2025 from a preliminary estimate of 49.5, but it remained the lowest reading since December and continued to signal deteriorating operating conditions in the US goods-producing sector. Demand stagnated and tariff uncertainty continued to dominate the manufacturing landscape.

• The Caixin China General Manufacturing PMI fell to 49.5 in July 2025, down from 50.4 in June and below forecasts of 50.2. The latest reading marked the second contraction in factory activity in three months, driven by a sharper decline in new export orders amid global trade uncertainty. Output fell for the second time since October 2023 due to a slowdown in new orders growth. Employment declined, while purchasing activity expanded after falling over the previous two months. Supplier performance continued to deteriorate due to shipment delays and supplier shortages.

You’ll find all other countries at Trading Economics.

[For those who may not know: The PMI - Purchasing Managers Index - is an indicator that measures the activity level of purchasing managers in the manufacturing sector. A reading above 50 indicates expansion in the manufacturing sector, while a reading below 50 suggests contraction. According to Trading Economics macro model, the PMIs of the cited areas/countries and most other regions will be 50.0 or above by the end of the third quarter 2025.]

[Edit to correct a typo.]

They can say whatever they deem appropriate, but oil markets data tell a different story. Indian refiners are pulling away from Russian crude.

The world’s largest trading bloc may have dodged higher tariffs, but it has also rubber stamped the US president’s new world order.

How does the US president’s new world order look like with respect to this agenda? This EU-US trade ‘deal’ isn’t largely a deal, because it is not even legally binding, and many points are fully unclear to this point. Even the article says that (“Trump’s deals are not set in stone”) slightly contracting its own headline.

I wrote a longer comment in another thread yesterday and don’t want to repeat here. Articles on that issue are popping up every day now, and this one among the ones which are less substantiated imho. What I miss in most of these comments is the effects on the US economy. U.S. Fed chief Powell left U.S. interest rates unchanged today - at more than twice the EU rates - arguing that U.S. inflation is too high. So these tariffs are not good for Europe, but worse for the U.S. This is one point I miss in this discussion.

Yeah, that was not meant to be a critique for the post itself (sorry if I came off a bit too strong in that regard).

Please correct me if I get this wrong, but the EU-US trade deal is a legally non-binding agreement with a lot of points still to be discussed. There are a few points that are supposedly negative (for both the EU and the US, though many of the tariffs are still being negotiated further, so it’s everything but clear), the largest part of this agreement is still opaque, though.

For some points it is even unclear whether they will ever become reality, e.g., the ‘agreed’ EU investments by private companies of 600 billion dollars in the US. Neither an EU nor a national public authority will be monitoring this (and they could do nothing if companies don’t want to invest, it is similar to the Japan-US deal reached last week). In addition, the 600bn dollars appear to be a joke, as foreign direct investments by EU companies in the US have been increasing tremendously in the last decades and reached 3.4 trillion dollars in 2023 (the latest number I could find). This is more than seven times the agreed volume.

Even the agreed 750 billion dollars purchase of US liquid gas is not clear. There is no legally-binding commitment either on such a purchase since the EU may at best engage in some sort of facilitating and coordinating, but it will be the member states and their energy companies that do the actual buying.

All these discussion appear to be a bit overblown to me, but maybe I don’t understand the thing and I get it wrong.