It’s official: Biden won, Trump lost
The US electoral college met online and officially voted Joe Biden as the next US president and Kamala Harris as the next US vice president. Biden received 306 votes and Donald Trump received 232 votes. In a shift away from supporting Trump’s baseless election fraud claims, several Republican senators acknowledged Biden’s victory. Biden and Harris take office on 20 January. Sources: AP, CNBC, Financial Times, The Guardian, NPR and Reuters.
Vaccinations begin in US as death toll passes 300,000
The first doses of the Pfizer/Biontech coronavirus vaccine was administered to US health workers on Monday. The vaccination drive started the same day that, according to Johns Hopkins University, more than 300,000 people had died due to covid-19 in the US. Sources: CNN, The Guardian, Marketwatch and Reuters.
UK: new strain discovered
Health officials in England identified a new variant of the coronavirus which causes covid-19, which they suspect is more transmittable than previous strands. The UK health secretary told parliament that, despite the mutation, the current vaccine was likely to still be effective. Sources: BBC, Financial Times, Reuters and Sky News.
Netherlands shutdown for 5 weeks
The Dutch government announced another strict lockdown to combat the pandemic. Non-essential shops and services will be closed from today to 19 January. Sources: AP, BBC, Bloomberg and Politico.
Luxembourg covid-19: record ICU patients
Out of 1,313 PCR tests conducted on Sunday 13 December, 182 Luxembourg residents were positive for the coronavirus. The RT effective reproduction rate was 0.87, below the target threshold of 1.00 (compared to 0.91 ten days prior). There were 239 patients in hospital (compared to 193 on Thursday 3 December), including 50 in intensive care (compared to 41). Sunday’s figure was the highest number of intensive care patients recorded during the pandemic (the previous record was 47 on 9-11 December). Eight people died due to covid-19, bringing the national total to 410. Sources: Delano, health ministry and Paperjam.
Cross-border teleworking exemption to continue
Luxembourg agreed with the Belgian, French and German governments to extend the social insurance waiver for cross-border telecommuters until 30 June. That means commuters will not be forced to switch social security systems. Sources: Delano and Paperjam. Background: Delano.
Cops catch illegal party-goers
Luxembourg police said they broke up a party, held at a private home in Rodange on Sunday night, which had “more than 100 people” in attendance. Source: Luxembourg police.
Pornhub pulls unverified user uploads
Pornhub, the adult entertainment site owned by Luxembourg-domiciled Mindgeek, removed videos posted by unverified users, about 70% of the total. The move followed Mastercard and Visa suspending payments in response to reports that Pornhub was hosting videos of child abuse and sexual assault. Pornhub said that it now had the strictest policies of any digital media site and has been unfairly targeted by anti-pornography campaigners. Sources: BBC, The Guardian, Reuters and Vice.
Russian agents named in Navalny poisoning
An investigation led by the Bellingcat news site identified 8 suspected Russian intelligence operatives who allegedly poisoned the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Moscow has previously rejected the accusation that it was involved in the attack on Navalny. Additional sources: BBC, DW and The Guardian.
Why Romania got European cybersecurity centre
As Delano reported last week, Luxembourg lost out to Romania in its bid to host the EU’s new electronic security body. Following the announcement, Politico proffers “5 reasons why Bucharest won the EU cyber center race”.
Global Google outage
Most Google services--including Youtube, Gmail, and Google’s maps and storage services--were offline in most parts of the world for about 45 minutes on Monday. Google said the outage was caused by internal technical issues and not a cyberattack. Sources: AP, CNBC, Financial Times and The Guardian.
Google delays return to office
Google said it would not call its staff back to the office until 1 September 2021. While it will not institute permanent remote working, Google will experiment with a “flexible work week”. Sources: CNBC, CNN and New York Times.
Adidas reviewing Reebok
The German sportswear group Adidas is reportedly considering a sale of its Reebok brand. Sources: BBC, Financial Times and Reuters.
Exxon Mobil climate pledge
The oil giant Exxon Mobile outlined a 5 year plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions that it said matched the Paris climate goals. Sources: CNBC, Financial Times, Seeking Alpha and Wall Street Journal.
Ineos to build 4x4s in nearby Smart plant
Last week the British carmaker Ineos cancelled plans to build its new 4x4 in Wales, and instead said it would produce the Grenadier offroad vehicle in eastern France. Ineos bought the Smart facility in Hambach, which is is located approximately 100km southeast of Luxembourg, from Mercedes-Benz. The site will continue to make two-seat Smart electric vehicles and parts under a contract with the German group. About 1,300 employees will keep their jobs. Sources: BBC, Financial Times, The Guardian, the I and Reuters.
Zoox unveils self-driving car
Amazon-backed Zoox showcased its fully autonomous vehicle, which does not have a steering wheel. Sources: Axios, CNN, Seeking Alpha and The Verge.
Brexit: Brits asked not to ‘panic buy’
The British Retail Consortium said stockpiling ahead of Brexit is causing bottlenecks at ports in the EU and UK. The trade group urged Britons not to panic buy and promised that, despite Brexit, supermarket supplies of food and toilet roll would hold up. Sources: BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, The Guardian and Independent.
Agenda
Tuesday 15 December, 6pm: British Chamber of Commerce’s online Christmas pub quiz. Wednesday 16 December, 7pm-8:15pm: Paperjam’s top 100 economic decisionmakers ceremony. Thursday 17 December, 5pm-6pm: Chinalux hosts a virtual beer tasting. Saturday 19 December, 6:30pm: Toastmasters’ Robert Schuman open speech contest. Tuesday 22 December, 10am-12noon: House of Entrepreneurship online workshop on how to start a business in Luxembourg.
US senator asks Netflix for free Christmas streaming
Angus King, a US senator for Maine, asked Amazon, Apple, Disney and Netflix to make their video streaming services free over the Christmas holidays, in a bid to encourage Americans to stay at home and not spread the coronavirus. Sources: Fox Business, The Sun and Yahoo Finance.
Today’s breakfast briefing was written by Aaron Grunwald