In his decade of ruling China, Xi Jinping has tried to imbue its people with confidence, telling them that the country is doing very well compared with the chaotic West.

He has told the younger generation that China can finally look at the world as an equal. “It’s no longer as backward,” he said last year.

“The East is rising, and the West is declining,” he declared, at a time when the United States and other Western countries seemed mired in high Covid infection rates, racial tensions and other problems.

Daniel B. Maffei is at once a crucial player in the campaign to subdue inflation, and a figure virtually unknown outside the confines of his wonky Washington domain.

He’s the chairman of the Federal Maritime Commission, a small, traditionally obscure institution that has been thrust into a central role in the Biden administration’s designs on taming soaring prices — a menace that could determine which party next controls Congress.

The commission regulates the international shipping industry at American ports, an element of modern life that is typically ignored but has emerged as a reason major retailers are short of popular goods, and why people renovating homes are waiting months for doorknobs.

The Treasury Department on Monday prohibited Americans from using the cryptocurrency platform Tornado Cash, saying the service has helped criminals launder more than $7 billion of virtual currencies.

The crackdown was the U.S. government’s latest effort to rein in the crypto industry, as lawmakers and regulators grow increasingly concerned over the volatility of virtual currencies and their role in facilitating hacking and other crimes. Calling the platform a “threat to U.S. national security,” the Treasury Department placed Tornado Cash on a blacklist of entities, making it illegal for Americans to send or receive money using the service.

“Despite public assurances otherwise, Tornado Cash has repeatedly failed to impose effective controls designed to stop it from laundering funds for malicious cyber actors,” Brian Nelson, the under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said in a statement.

In another sign of the fragility of Europe’s dependence on Russian energy, the state-owned pipeline operator said Tuesday that oil had stopped flowing through the southern branch of the main link to Eastern Europe.

Transneft, which controls Russia’s stretch of the pipeline, said its July payment to the Ukrainian operator of the artery, Ukrtransnafta, had been returned. Transneft blamed issues related to European sanctions aimed at punishing Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.

In response, Ukraine halted oil deliveries to Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic through the pipeline, according to Transneft. The three countries have been exempted from a European Union decision to ban imports of Russian oil starting later this year.

Ford Motor on Tuesday became the latest automaker to raise the price of electric vehicles when it significantly increased prices of its popular F-150 Lightning because of rising materials costs.

The company began making the Lightning in April and had sold more than 4,400 through the end of July. Ford has taken reservations for more than 200,000, and the higher prices will go into effect for the 2023 model year.

Ford said it was increasing the starting prices of the truck by $6,000 to $8,500 for newly ordered vehicles. After the increase, the truck will cost from $46,974 for a base model to $96,874 for a Platinum version with an extended-range battery pack.

For Theresa Clarke, a retiree in New Canaan, Conn., the rising cost of living means not buying Goldfish crackers for her disabled daughter because a carton costs $11.99 at her local Stop & Shop. It means showering at the YMCA to save on her hot water bill. And it means watching her bank account dwindle to $50 because, as someone on a fixed income who never made much money to start with, there aren’t many other places she can trim her spending as prices rise.

“There is nothing to cut back on,” she said.

Jordan Trevino, 28, who recently took a better paying job in advertising in Los Angeles with a $100,000 salary, is economizing in little ways — ordering a cheaper entree when out to dinner, for example. But he is still planning a wedding next year and a honeymoon in Italy.

And David Schoenfeld, who made about $250,000 in retirement income and consulting fees last year and has about $5 million in savings, hasn’t pared back his spending. He has just returned...

The Japanese conglomerate SoftBank reported on Monday its largest-ever quarterly loss, $23.4 billion, driven by poor performance of its flagship tech investments and a weak yen.

It was the second straight quarter of enormous losses for the company, which has been staggered by broad weakness in global stocks, causing paper losses in the company’s portfolio of publicly traded tech giants as well as markdowns on its holdings in hundreds of unlisted companies.

The losses are the biggest in decades for the company’s eccentric founder, Masayoshi Son, who staked its future on huge, often undisciplined investments in tech companies that he believed would transform entire industries — from grocery shopping to construction — as the world transitioned into a digital age.

Daniel B. Maffei is at once a crucial player in the campaign to subdue inflation, and a figure virtually unknown outside the confines of his wonky Washington domain.

He’s the chairman of the Federal Maritime Commission, a small, traditionally obscure institution that has been thrust into a central role in the Biden administration’s designs on taming soaring prices — a menace that could determine which party next controls Congress.

The commission regulates the international shipping industry at American ports, an element of modern life that is typically ignored but has emerged as a reason major retailers are short of popular goods, and why people renovating homes are waiting months for doorknobs.

Daniel B. Maffei is at once a crucial player in the campaign to subdue inflation, and a figure virtually unknown outside the confines of his wonky Washington domain.

He’s the chairman of the Federal Maritime Commission, a small, traditionally obscure institution that has been thrust into a central role in the Biden administration’s designs on taming soaring prices — a menace that could determine which party next controls Congress.

The commission regulates the international shipping industry at American ports, an element of modern life that is typically ignored but has emerged as a reason major retailers are short of popular goods, and why people renovating homes are waiting months for doorknobs.

Policymakers in Washington are promoting electric vehicles as a solution to climate change. But an uncomfortable truth remains: Battery-powered cars are much too expensive for a vast majority of Americans.

Congress has begun trying to address that problem. The climate and energy package passed on Sunday by the Senate, the Inflation Reduction Act, would give buyers of used electric cars a tax credit.

But automakers have complained that the credit would apply to only a narrow slice of vehicles, at least initially, largely because of domestic sourcing requirements. And experts say broader steps are needed to make electric cars more affordable and to get enough of them on the road to put a serious dent in greenhouse gas emissions.

Policymakers in Washington are promoting electric vehicles as a solution to climate change. But an uncomfortable truth remains: Battery-powered cars are much too expensive for a vast majority of Americans.

Congress has begun trying to address that problem. The climate and energy package passed on Sunday by the Senate, the Inflation Reduction Act, would give buyers of used electric cars a tax credit.

But automakers have complained that the credit would apply to only a narrow slice of vehicles, at least initially, largely because of domestic sourcing requirements. And experts say broader steps are needed to make electric cars more affordable and to get enough of them on the road to put a serious dent in greenhouse gas emissions.

For Theresa Clarke, a retiree in New Canaan, Conn., the rising cost of living means not buying Goldfish crackers for her disabled daughter because a carton costs $11.99 at her local Stop & Shop. It means showering at the YMCA to save on her hot water bill. And it means watching her bank account dwindle to $50 because, as someone on a fixed income who never made much money to start with, there aren’t many other places she can trim her spending as prices rise.

“There is nothing to cut back on,” she said.

Jordan Trevino, 28, who recently took a better paying job in advertising in Los Angeles with a $100,000 salary, is economizing in little ways — ordering a cheaper entree when out to dinner, for example. But he is still planning a wedding next year and a honeymoon in Italy.

And David Schoenfeld, who made about $250,000 in retirement income and consulting fees last year and has about $5 million in savings, hasn’t pared back his spending. He has just returned...

The Japanese conglomerate SoftBank reported on Monday its largest-ever quarterly loss, $23.4 billion, driven by poor performance of its flagship tech investments and a weak yen.

It was the second straight quarter of enormous losses for the company, which has been staggered by broad weakness in global stocks, causing paper losses in the company’s portfolio of publicly traded tech giants as well as markdowns on its holdings in hundreds of unlisted companies.

The losses are the biggest in decades for the company’s eccentric founder, Masayoshi Son, who staked its future on huge, often undisciplined investments in tech companies that he believed would transform entire industries — from grocery shopping to construction — as the world transitioned into a digital age.

The Roomba and iRobot’s other cleaning devices, including robotic mops and air purifiers, join a portfolio of Amazon-owned smart home devices that includes Ring doorbells and Alexa, Amazon’s virtual assistant and speaker. iRobot also makes an educational robot called Root that allows children to experiment with coding.

BUENOS AIRES — Eduardo Rabuffetti es un argentino que visitó Estados Unidos una sola vez, en 1999, durante su luna de miel en Miami. Sin embargo, es posible que conozca los billetes de 100 dólares mejor que la mayoría de estadounidenses.

In his first extensive response to Twitter’s suit against him, Elon Musk accused the social media company of fraud, reiterating arguments that it concealed the true number of spam and bot accounts on its platform. in a legal filing made public on Thursday, Mr. Musk’s lawyers asserted that the proportion of those accounts was closer to 10 percent, while Twitter has maintained it was less than 5 percent. His lawyers also accused Twitter of hiding the number of its users who see ads. Twitter continues to say its figures are accurate. The two parties are still slated to resolve their disputes in Delaware’s Court of Chancery in October, when a judge will decide whether Mr. Musk’s claims that Twitter withheld information about spam accounts on the site are legitimate or if he must still complete the $44 billion deal.

Policymakers in Washington are promoting electric vehicles as a solution to climate change. But an uncomfortable truth remains: Battery-powered cars are much too expensive for a vast majority of Americans.

Congress has begun trying to address that problem. The climate and energy package passed on Sunday by the Senate, the Inflation Reduction Act, would give buyers of used electric cars a tax credit.

But automakers have complained that the credit would apply to only a narrow slice of vehicles, at least initially, largely because of domestic sourcing requirements. And experts say broader steps are needed to make electric cars more affordable and to get enough of them on the road to put a serious dent in greenhouse gas emissions.

Daniel B. Maffei is at once a crucial player in the campaign to subdue inflation, and a figure virtually unknown outside the confines of his wonky Washington domain.

He’s the chairman of the Federal Maritime Commission, a small, traditionally obscure institution that has been thrust into a central role in the Biden administration’s designs on taming soaring prices — a menace that could determine which party next controls Congress.

The commission regulates the international shipping industry at American ports, an element of modern life that is typically ignored but has emerged as a reason major retailers are short of popular goods, and why people renovating homes are waiting months for doorknobs.

The Japanese conglomerate SoftBank reported on Monday its largest ever quarterly loss, $23.4 billion, driven by poor performance of its flagship tech investments and a weak yen.

It was the second straight quarter of enormous losses for the company, which has been staggered by broad weakness in global stocks, causing paper losses in the company’s portfolio of publicly traded tech giants as well as markdowns on its holdings in hundreds of unlisted companies.

The losses are the biggest in decades for the company’s eccentric founder, Masayoshi Son, who staked its future on huge, often undisciplined, investments in tech companies that he believed would transform entire industries — from grocery shopping to construction — as the world transitioned into a digital age.