Attractions

A big change to China's constitution could have major consequences for the world's second largest economy. China's rubber stamp parliament on Sunday amended the constitution to remove the limit on the number of terms the president can serve. That means President Xi Jinping could rule for life. Political experts say the move means China is becoming more authoritarian. Some economists are worried, too. "Concentrating power in fewer hands is risky," said Julian Evans-Pritchard, a China economist at Capital Economics. He says other top officials will be less likely to push back against a more powerful Xi, even if the president's plans could harm the economy. If that happens, "the quality of policy making will suffer," Evans-Pritchard added. The stakes are high. China's economy needs big reforms, particularly to address its soaring corporate debt. Debt worries China's total debt has increased rapidly since the global financial cri...

Next stop: Geneva? Now that President Trump's tariffs on steel and aluminum are official, America's trading partners are threatening to take their grievances to the World Trade Organization. You might wonder why a distant international body has a say in US decisions on imports and exports. Here's a primer on the WTO, and how it's linked to the current trade fight. What is the WTO? The WTO is the center of the global trading system. Made up of and governed by member nations, the WTO administers the network of international trade rules currently in place. It serves as a place to negotiate changes to existing agreements and, when issues come up, for member countries to mediate any disputes. Who's in the WTO? About 160 countries belong to the WTO, including the United States, the UK, Germany, Brazil, South Korea, Japan, Canada and Mexico. China joined the WTO in 2001. This was a major moment in China's journey to becoming a global trade powerhouse...

It's starting to look like President Trump will name CNBC commentator Larry Kudlow to replace Gary Cohn as the head of his National Economic Council. Trump even said Tuesday there was a "very good chance" Kudlow would get the job. It's a pick that Wall Street will probably like, but it's also one that might be at odds with the increasingly protectionist economic stance that Trump has taken lately. Kudlow was a former Reagan administration economist, who became the chief economist for now-defunct Wall Street investment bank Bear Stearns.   He is staunchly pro-free trade. In fact, Kudlow co-wrote an editorial for CNBC and theNational Review earlier this month with prominent economists Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore, a CNN contributor, urging Trump to consider that tariffs will wind up as taxes on American consumers. They added that the tariffs could also lead to massive job losses. Kudlow says tariffs put 5 million US jobs 'at risk' Kudlow, L...

Two top free trade advocates have left the Trump administration in one week — just as fear of a trade war ramps up. The departures of Gary Cohn as chief economic adviser and Rex Tillerson as secretary of state come as the president prepares to impose sweeping tariffs on steel and aluminum next week. Cohn, a former Wall Street executive at Goldman Sachs, resigned last week because he was opposed to the tariffs. Tillerson was a moderate voice on NAFTA, the trade pact with Canada and Mexico that has been under renegotiation since August. NAFTA talks are at a critical point: Trump says if progress isn't made, he will withdraw from NAFTA or extend the tariffs to Mexico and Canada, which have so far been excluded. "Tillerson was a steady hand. ... He seemed to be a voice of reason," says Chris Gaffney, president of world markets at Everbank, a firm based in Florida. "That's what is scaring the markets a bit — if we get protectionist people." Trump...

In a rare move, GE says that its top leaders will not get bonuses after the company's terrible year. No past or present CEO, CFO, vice chair, general counsel or HR director will receive a bonus in 2017, GE said in a corporate filing on Monday, which cited the company's "poor performance." There was one exception made for the head of GE's aviation unit, the company said, which "performed very strongly in 2017." "The last year has been a difficult one for GE's shareowners, and no one is more disappointed in our results than your Board of Directors,"  GE   ( GE )  said in the filing, which provides information to shareholders ahead of the company's annual meeting in April. The change is a big one for a company that has always richly compensated its C-suite. Still, the company reported that compensation for CEO John Flannery is 157 times that of the company's "median employee," a healthcare worker in Germany. Je...

The White House has taken an extraordinary action to block a major corporate deal that could give China more influence in global technology. In an order Monday, President Donald Trump blocked Broadcom's $117 billion bid for Qualcomm due to national security concerns. He wrote that there is "credible evidence" that Broadcom and its affiliates "might take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States." He said the two companies must "immediately and permanently abandon the proposed takeover." Broadcom said in a statement late Monday that it is reviewing the order and that it "strongly disagrees that its proposed acquisition of Qualcomm raises any national security concerns." Broadcom's hostile takeover of  Qualcomm   ( QCOM )  — the latter company rejected the bid — would have combined two computer chip makers. It had been under investigation by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States...

After the massive data breach at Equifax, consumer advocates called on Congress to make credit freezes free. Now, six months later, the Senate is set to pass legislation that would do just that. The provision is tucked into a broader bill that would roll back regulations on banks created by Dodd-Frank. After the major hack exposed the personal information of millions of consumers, experts recommended credit freezes as a way to prevent identity theft. While   a credit freeze won't prevent your personal information from being stolen in another data breach, it can protect you from thieves who try to open a line of credit in your name by blocking access to your credit reports. The catch is that under current state laws, there's often a fee to freeze. Plus you have to temporarily lift the freeze if you want to get a loan or open a credit card yourself. That may come with another fee. States currently set the fees for placing and/or lifting the freeze. Most se...

A Powerball winner is allowed to stay anonymous while collecting her $560 million jackpot, a New Hampshire judge ruled on Monday. The winner sued the New Hampshire Lottery last month under the name of Jane Doe, in a bid to collect the winnings through a trust to protect her anonymity. The lawsuit challenges the New Hampshire Lottery's rule that she must identify herself in order to collect her money. A judge in the New Hampshire Superior Court ruled in her favor, according to her lawyer, William Shaheen. "If I told you she was ecstatic it would be an understatement," Shaheen said in an email to CNNMoney. "We are very pleased with the judge's order." The judge had already ruled last month that the winner could start collecting funds while remaining anonymous as the issue played out in court. "While we were expecting a different outcome and believed the state had a strong argument, we respect the court's decision," said a statement f...

The royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle is not expected to translate into an immediate boost for British tourism. Industry experts say the nuptials will act as a powerful marketing tool to entice tourists in the years to come. But there won't be more visitors during the wedding month of May. "Don't expect visitors from abroad to come for this royal wedding; it is a pageant for domestic consumption," said Tom Jenkins, CEO of European tourism association ETOA. The 2011 wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton did not result in a noticeable uptick in tourist arrivals or spending, according to the UK Office for National Statistics. This wedding shouldn't be any different. "There was no discernible increase in bookings for the UK as a consequence of the royal wedding," said Olivier Jager, CEO of the ForwardKeys, a travel research firm that monitors 17 million flight bookings a day. Analysts expect that any spike in visits from r...

Why did President Donald Trump kill a $117 billion tech takeover? It's all about China and 5G. The White House on Monday blocked a hostile takeover of US chip-maker  Qualcomm   ( QCOM ) by its rival  Broadcom   ( AVGO ) , citing "credible evidence" that the deal would "impair the national security of the United States." The race for 5G US regulators have in recent weeks expressed concerns that the takeover could cause the United States to fall behind China in the race to develop 5G networks. Qualcomm and Broadcom, which is moving its headquarters from Singapore to the United States, are both working to develop the super-fast fifth generation wireless broadband technology. But the United States is worried that a takeover would dramatically reduce investment and research at Qualcomm, giving an advantage to China. The US Treasury Department warned in a letter made public in early March that since Broadcom was financing the deal with over $100 billion i...

Microsoft has received hundreds of harassment and discrimination complaints from female employees in recent years, according to court documents made public this week. Women at  Microsoft   ( MSFT )  filed 238 complaints with the company's HR department between 2010 and 2016, including 108 complaints about sexual harassment and 119 about gender discrimination, according to a filing. There were also eight complaints of retaliation and three about pregnancy discrimination, it said. The court documents are part of a gender discrimination lawsuit against Microsoft filed in 2015 by Katherine Moussouris, a computer security researcher who worked at the company from 2007-2014. She claims she was passed over for promotions while male colleagues, who were less qualified, were promoted. Two other Microsoft employees, Holly Muenchow and Dana Piermarini, later joined the suit. The attorneys representing them are seeking class-action status for the case. No tria...

A sharp decline in the number of international student visas has many of America's colleges and universities on edge -- and some say the Trump administration's tough stance on immigration might be partly to blame. The number of F-1 visas issued to foreign students seeking to attend college and other types of academic institutions in the United States decreased by 17% in the year that ended September 30, 2017, according to recent State Department data. "The current administration's 'America First' mantra is causing [international students] a great deal of anxiety and fear," said Earl Johnson, vice president   of enrollment and student services at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma. "Also, the cost of college tuition, on average, has gone up 40% in the last 10 years. It's weighing on them." That's bad news for schools that have large international student populations. Nearly 20% of the University of Tulsa's 4,400 enrolled stud...

New Treasury Department numbers show that the US government racked up a $215 billion deficit in February -- the largest monthly deficit in six years. It was also $23 billion higher than the deficit for the same month last year. Deficits are a measure of the gulf between what the government spends and what it collects in revenue. Last month, the federal government spent roughly $371 billion, up $7 billion from February 2017. Tax receipts, meanwhile, fell to $156 billion from $172 billion a year earlier. Interest payments on the nation's debt, Social Security and Medicare, and outlays by the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Defense, are the areas where spending has gone up the most, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO attributed the drop in revenue to higher tax refunds and a reduction in income and payroll taxwithholding in the wake of the tax cuts that went into effect on January 1. For the first five months of this fiscal year, whi...

The royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle is not expected to translate into an immediate boost for British tourism. Industry experts say the nuptials will act as a powerful marketing tool to entice tourists in the years to come. But there won't be more visitors during the wedding month of May. "Don't expect visitors from abroad to come for this royal wedding; it is a pageant for domestic consumption," said Tom Jenkins, CEO of European tourism association ETOA. The 2011 wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton did not result in a noticeable uptick in tourist arrivals or spending, according to the UK Office for National Statistics. This wedding shouldn't be any different. "There was no discernible increase in bookings for the UK as a consequence of the royal wedding," said Olivier Jager, CEO of the ForwardKeys, a travel research firm that monitors 17 million flight bookings a day. Analysts expect that any spike in visits from r...