The company says an online shop made profits on the unauthorized sale of NFTs
Sports apparel giant Nike has filed a lawsuit against online reseller StockX in a New York federal court on Thursday for the unauthorized sale of Nike shoe NFTs (non-fungible tokens).
In the court filings, Nike complained that StockX began selling NFTs of its sneakers last month, informing customers they would be able to exchange the virtual tokens for real shoes “in the near future.” The online platform has allegedly sold over 500 Nike-branded NFTs so far.
Nike deemed the action an infringement on its trademarks and said the NFT sales would confuse customers. In the lawsuit, the company demanded an order to block the Nike-associated NFT sales on StockX. It also wants the reseller to pay damages, but the amount has not been disclosed.
The lawsuit states that the NFT sale “inflated prices and murky terms of purchase and ownership,” while also marring Nike’s business reputation.
Nike announced it will release a number of its own virtual products later in February in collaboration with digital art studio RTFKT, which it bought last year.
It is not the first lawsuit over NFTs, which have been gaining in popularity recently. Earlier this month, US rapper Lil Yachty sued music NFT start-up Opulous for trademark infringement, claiming that the firm “maliciously” used his name and image. In January, French luxury design house Hermes sued artist Mason Rothschild over ‘MetaBirkin’ NFTs named after Hermes’ famous Birkin handbags. In November 2021, Miramax studio sued director Quentin Tarantino after he announced plans to auction ‘Pulp Fiction’ movie NFTs.
NFTs are non-fungible tokens, which are units of digital data stored and traded online. Most NFTs are digital files such as photos, videos, and audio recordings.
Billionaire Alberto Bailleres made his fortune in mining and retail, and was also known as an arts and education patron
Billionaire Alberto Bailleres, Mexican gold and silver mining tycoon, has died at the age of 90. The cause of death has not yet been revealed.
Bailleres made his fortune across a range of industries, but started out in gold and silver mining alongside his father, which won him the nickname of Mexico’s ‘King Midas.’ He was the founder of the Industrias Penoles mining company, a global leader in silver production, and owned the Fresnillo silver mine and the largest gold deposits in Mexico.
Bailleres had an estimated net worth of $8.6 billion in 2022, according to Forbes. He owned a number of firms in a variety of sectors from insurance to retail under the umbrella of Grupo BAL.
Bailleres was also known as a prominent supporter of arts and education. He was chairman of the board of trustees of the Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico (ITAM) and a key sponsor in many of Mexico’s other prestigious universities.
“His academic legacy at ITAM is invaluable. He transformed each and every sector and life he touched,” Jose Antonio Meade, a former Mexican finance minister and ITAM graduate, told Reuters.
Bailleres retired from Grupo Bal last spring and handed over the business to his son Alejandro. Last year, the Bailleres family ranked as fourth richest in Mexico and 255th in the world.
The 30-year agreement will boost gas supplies by 10 billion cubic meters and will be settled in euros
Russia’s Gazprom and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) signed a second long-term contract on Friday for the supply of 10 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas from the Russian Far East. The agreement comes as Russian President Vladimir Putin is in China on an official visit.
According to Gazprom, the agreement is “an important step in further strengthening mutually beneficial cooperation between Russia and China in the gas sector.” After the project reaches its full capacity, the volume of Russian pipeline gas supplies to China via the Far East route will reach 48 billion cubic meters per year (including deliveries via the Power of Siberia gas pipeline).
Gazprom’s largest natural gas deposit in the Far East is the Yuzhno-Kirinskoye field, where production is due to begin in 2023.
“The signing of the second contract for the supply of Russian gas to China testifies to the highest level of mutual trust and partnership between our countries and companies. Our Chinese partners from CNPC confirm that Gazprom is a reliable gas supplier,” the head of Gazprom, Alexey Miller, said. Russian energy supplies to China have reached record highs, according to Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov.
Gazprom and the CNPC signed their first 30-year contract on gas supplies via the Power of Siberia pipeline in 2014. The 3,000km (1,864 mile) cross-border pipeline, the first natural gas pipeline between Russia and China, started deliveries three years ago.
In 2015, the sides agreed on gas supplies via the western route, or the Power of Siberia 2, which will deliver gas from Siberia’s Yamal Peninsula, where Russia’s biggest gas reserves are. The new pipeline will be able to transfer up to 50 bcm more gas through Mongolia to China annually.
In January, Gazprom completed an analysis of the project to build the Soyuz Vostok gas pipeline through Mongolia to China, which will make it possible to supply up to 50 billion cubic meters of gas per year to China.
Analysts say Moscow’s ‘gas pivot’ to China poses a challenge for Europe, which has been struggling with skyrocketing energy prices in recent months. Russia remains Europe’s main gas supplier, but the changes it is currently making to its energy transport infrastructure should be taken seriously, analysts note.
Europe’s 541 bcm of annual gas consumption is more than China’s 331 bcm, but the latter is expected to rise to 526 bcm by 2030 as Beijing reduces its dependence on coal. Consulting firm McKinsey estimates that China’s demand for gas will double by 2035. Its annual gas consumption is expected to reach 620 bcm by 2040 and overtake oil as the leading fuel source by 2050, according to data made public in September by Chinese energy giant Sinopec.
The risk lies in an explosive mix of large deficits, high taxes, inflation, and a wealth gap, Ray Dalio warns
The founder of the world’s largest hedge fund Bridgewater Associates, Ray Dalio, has warned on Thursday that the US is on a “classic path” toward “some form” of a civil war.
The current financial conditions and irreconcilable differences in desires and values are consistent with the ingredients leading to civil strife, according to him.
“Not knowing what is true because of distortions in the media and propaganda increases as people become more polarized, emotional, and politically motivated,” Dalio wrote on LinkedIn.
He pointed to a number of factors that led him to this notion, including large deficits, high taxes, inflation, and wealth disparity that bring about political polarization.
“When that happens at the same time as there are foreign powers that are becoming strong enough to challenge the leading world power that is encountering this civil war dynamic, it is an especially risky period. That is the period I believe we are now in,” Dalio stressed, adding that “the biggest question is how much the system will bend before it breaks.”
He noted that political powers from opposing sides are “fighting to win at all costs,” making it impossible to compromise and leaving many “too afraid” to speak up or run for public office.
“History shows that the biggest risk to democracies is that they produce such fragmented and antagonistic decision-making that they are ineffective and disorderly, which leads to bad results and revolutions.”
Dalio predicts that this year’s elections will become the turning point for US internal politics.
“In the 2022 elections we will see losses by moderates and gains by extremists/populists […] because each side wants fighters not compromisers. The Supreme Court will make decisions on contentious issues that people are willing to fight over. There is a big risk that each side will view the decisions as unfairly made by the other side and not accept them, which will lead to tests of power,” he predicts.
This is not the first time Dalio voiced such dire forecasts. In November last year he published a book ‘Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail’, where he also warned of a “dangerously high risk” of a civil war in the US within the next 10 years due to the “exceptional amount of polarization.”
India has turned down Tesla’s request to lower import taxes on electric cars, encouraging Elon Musk’s company to produce locally instead
New Delhi has refused to provide the US-based electric car maker Tesla with tax breaks, the chairman of India’s Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, Vivek Johri, confirmed in an interview on Thursday.
“We looked at whether the duties need to be rejigged, but some domestic production is happening and some investments have come in with the current tariff structure,” Johri stated.
India levies extremely high import duties on complete vehicles, ranging from 60 to 100% depending on a car’s characteristics and price. The threshold for imposing the maximum possible tax is set at $40,000, which effectively makes all the electric cars produced by Tesla fall under that category. The existing tariffs structure has not deterred other companies from importing, so no exceptions will be made, Johri pointed out.
“Some investment has already come in with the current tariff structure. So why can’t others also come in?” the official stated. “There are other foreign brands also that are being sold in the country with the current tariff structure.”
While Tesla announced its intent to enter India’s market as early as 2019, the electric car giant has still not been able to do so. The Indian government has been encouraging the company to establish local production, pointing out that importing partially-built cars and assembling them locally would mean significantly lower levies. The car maker urged New Delhi to reduce the tariff rates on high-end cars to 40% instead, branding the standing rules “prohibitive” for the import of pricey vehicles.
Asked on Twitter in mid-January when Tesla cars would be available in India, the company’s CEO Elon Musk said he has been “still working through a lot of challenges with the government” to make the possible launch happen.
