Jamie Dimon gets real with Europe about shrinking to just 65% of American GDP over 10-15 years: ‘That's not good'
Dimon highlighted a dramatic shift in Europe's economic standing relative to the U.S. 'Europe has gone from 90% of U.S. GDP to 65% over 10 or 15 years. That's not good,' he told the audience, which included Irish officials and business leaders.
He attributed this decline to structural issues and urged European policymakers to take bold action to reverse the trend. He added 'the EU has a huge problem at the moment' when it comes to the competitiveness of its economy. Simply put, he said, 'You're losing.'
The JPMorgan chief argued Europe's best chance at becoming more competitive is to finish building a truly unified internal market that works seamlessly across all industries. He referenced the report on EU competitiveness written in 2024 by former European Central Bank President Mario Draghi, emphasizing that deeper integration is essential if Europe wants to rebuild its global economic position.
While Dimon praised Ireland's open economy, business-friendly policies, and strong education system, he contrasted this with the broader European picture. He described Ireland as a model for economic openness but warned the wider region is hampered by regulatory fragmentation and lagging innovation.
Dimon also addressed the importance of transatlantic cooperation, stating, 'America First is fine as long as it isn't America alone.' He called for a new EU-U.S. tariff framework to be completed as soon as possible, warning that escalating trade barriers—such as recent U.S. tariffs on copper, Brazilian imports, and pharmaceuticals—could have significant negative effects, particularly for export-driven economies like Ireland.
Dimon cautioned financial markets are underestimating the risks posed by higher U.S. interest rates and new tariffs. He said the market is pricing only a 20% chance of further U.S. rate hikes, but he would put the odds at 40%-50%, citing inflationary pressures from tariffs, migration policies, and persistent budget deficits. He said he thinks there is 'complacency' in markets.
Given Dimon's status as an influential voice representing Wall Street, his remarks may serve as a wake-up call for European leaders and investors, underscoring the need for structural reforms and closer U.S.-EU collaboration to navigate an increasingly complex global economic landscape. Dimon's remarks were previously reported by the Financial Times, Bloomberg, and the Irish Examiner, among others.
For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
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New York Times
8 minutes ago
- New York Times
Inside the world of sporting directors: What do they do? And what makes a good one?
Players are the focus of any football transfer storyline. Managers, agents and club owners add to the intrigue, of course, but it's a relatively new role which has been garnering increased attention with every transfer window — the sporting director. Fundamentally, the remit of the sporting director is to be be a link between the coaching staff and the club's hierarchy, providing continuity, sustainability and a stable strategy in the club's football operations. Advertisement 'The sporting director is the safeguard of the culture of the club,' says Damien Comolli, Juventus' general manager and previously sporting or football director at Fenerbahce, Liverpool, Saint-Etienne and Tottenham. 'We need to make sure that short term, medium term and long term are looked at with the same level of interest.' While sporting directors were scarce in the Premier League at the start of the 21st century, they have become the norm at top-level clubs, with many known among fans by name. Last October, Txiki Begiristain announced that he is leaving Manchester City this summer after 12 years at the club, with Hugo Viana replacing him. On the other side of the city, controversy ran high when Dan Ashworth left his role as Manchester United sporting director after just five months in the role. Former Atletico Madrid sporting director Andrea Berta was confirmed as Arsenal's new sporting director in March, replacing Edu after the Brazilian's shock resignation in November to join Evangelos Marinakis' multi-club group. Meanwhile, Richard Hughes arrived as Liverpool's sporting director last summer with a daunting in-tray that included crucial contract negotiations for star trio Virgil van Dijk, Mohamed Salah and Trent Alexander-Arnold. The lens on the sporting director has never been sharper, yet what they do is still often misunderstood. To gain a better understanding, The Athletic interviewed several sporting directors and collaborated with analytics company Traits Insights who collected data — including sporting background and experience — on over 300 sporting directors (or equivalents) across 15 major European competitions. Crucially, what makes a successful one? For all the attention it has garnered, there is still ambiguity about the role itself between different clubs. The title of 'director of football', 'sporting director', 'general manager', 'chief football officer' and 'technical director' are ultimately synonyms for the same job, though what clubs expect from that job does vary. Advertisement While the role of a head coach or manager is clearly defined, a sporting director does not have a one-size-fits-all approach. Depending on the level of the club or league, the infrastructure built around the role can vary hugely. For some clubs, there will be a single director who sits at the centre of the system; for others, there will be shared responsibilities spanning multiple roles. 'In Germany, you might have a sporting director, a 'kaderplaner' (head of recruitment), a technical director, and then an executive only responsible for sport,' says Jonas Boldt, former sporting director at Hamburg and Bayer Leverkusen. 'When you also think about the coach too, this can have issues at times, because it is difficult to know who has the power or responsibility, and where to share those roles out clearly.' The fact that football is developing so rapidly, not just the Premier League, has added to the uncertainty over exactly what the sporting director is responsible for. As Comolli says, 'The structure of clubs is changing.' 'These roles have existed for much longer in Germany, Italy and Spain than it has in England,' he continues, 'but I would not distinguish from country to country — I would say the industry is changing as a whole. 'In the last five years, I've seen the role evolve. For example, Manchester City were very successful with Txiki (Begiristain), and then they brought Simon Timson in as a performance director (in 2020), who gets involved in a lot of areas. 'Ten years ago, I would have told you that they are taking work from each other, but actually they complement each other really well — the job of one becomes two, and the industry is now going in that direction.' Brentford is a good example of two roles dovetailing together in the Premier League. Director of football, Phil Giles, is responsible for squad management, squad planning and contract renewals at the club while technical director, Lee Dykes is in charge of Brentford's recruitment department. Advertisement The two work in tandem towards a shared goal of ensuring the best possible talent ends up on the pitch — or as Giles puts it, 'Mine and Lee's job is to do the nuts and bolts of the transfer.' When looking through the number of sporting director (or equivalent) roles across Europe's major leagues, the contrast in structure starts to become clearer. As Comolli said, sporting director roles have long been established in Italy, Germany and Spain, as well as in the Netherlands, with a minimum of one position filled within each club across each of those respective leagues. Ligue 1 had the lowest share of sporting directors within the league, with 15 of 18 clubs having a position filled. With the Premier League catching up in recent years, 19 of the 20 clubs had at least one sporting director (or equivalent) in place last season — up from 13 out of 20 in 2016-17. Of the 20 clubs, eight (40 per cent) split the structure across two roles, akin to Giles and Dykes. Previous experience among sporting directors can vary significantly. Returning to Giles and Dykes as an example, the former gained a PhD in statistics before working his way up to head of quantitative research at Smartodds, which is owned by Brentford majority owner Matthew Benham. Meanwhile, Dykes joined Brentford as head of recruitment after being sporting director at Bury FC — with a background in coaching having previously been assistant manager at Carlisle United. Analysis by Traits outlined four 'archetypes' that best describe the most common pathways sporting directors follow prior to landing the role. They are: Crucially, these archetypes are not mutually exclusive. Rather than pigeon-holing specific sporting directors to specific categories, it is better to think of the diverse pathways as a Venn diagram with plenty of crossover in the skills that are acquired from the respective backgrounds. 'I would add one other pathway, which is the academy pathway,' says Comolli. 'Dan Ashworth comes from an academy background, for example. Sassuolo have won promotion back to Serie A this season, and their sporting director, Francesco Palmieri, was the club's academy manager for nine years before he got this role. Incidentally, he was also a former player himself.' Advertisement It is a sentiment shared by others across the industry, with a club's academy acting as an ideal breeding ground for a role within the senior set-up. 'I think working as an academy manager can be a useful step to prepare (to be a sporting director),' says Johannes Spors, sporting director at Southampton and formerly of multi-club 777 Partners, Genoa, and Vitesse Arnhem. 'You basically make the same decisions, just with less financial impact. At times, academy directors manage more staff members than I do, but the decisions simply become more impactful the higher you get.' It is common for appointed sporting directors to arrive into their roles having had experience elsewhere within football clubs. For example, Norwich City's sporting director Ben Knapper was the loan and pathway manager at Arsenal before making the move to the Championship side. However, Traits' analysis showed that 17 per cent came from non-technical roles or roles outside of football altogether. A notable example would be Tottenham Hotspur's recently departed chief football officer Scott Munn, who held roles in commercial operations of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League before later working as a CEO at Melbourne City and later City Football Group. His role at Spurs as chief football officer saw him focus more on football strategy, with the role created after an external review of the club's footballing activities. The core management skills and business acumen required to fulfil the role are often separate from the football industry itself. There can often be a cyclical criticism between 'people who know the game' and 'those who know how to run a successful business' when discussing those within the boardroom, but the evidence shows that having a background within football is not always a precursor to working within the industry. As a further example, Aston Villa's director of football operations, Damian Vidagany, worked as a journalist in his early career before taking a role as Valencia's chief media officer and later becoming chief executive of DV7, a media agency founded by former Spain international David Villa. Working alongside Monchi, the renowned sporting director who is now Villa's president of football operations, Vidagany is regarded as one of Unai Emery's most trusted colleagues as the club aims to re-establish itself among Europe's elite. 'My role allows Monchi to be focused on the sporting and scouting side of football, creating and developing a strong network of scouts,' Vidagany said in 2023. 'We work as Batman and Robin because the structure of Villa needs to grow very fast.' In his current role at Southampton, Spors is keen to highlight that a large part of being a good sporting director is about appointing the right people and developing the club's structure. 'I think it's getting more and more important that you are simply a good leader for the organisation,' says Spors. 'This is the most important thing. There is such a diversity of clubs and how they see their identity, but diversity is always the best — it is important to have people from every background. Advertisement 'For example, data is obviously becoming more important in this space — especially with the rise of American ownership. When I arrived at Southampton, the first thing I did was to hire my assistant (Elliott Stapley), who was the former head of data and analytics at 777, and the second thing I did was to change the whole recruitment structure to make sure the data and analytics team were reporting to me.' Much like the role itself, measuring success depends on the context of the club. Silverware might be the ultimate physical representation of success, but victories can be just as important off the pitch as on it. 'This is a very technical job, so I need to innovate each department to make sure that we have a communication structure and a leadership structure with accountability in every department,' says Spors. 'The better we get there, the more we can increase the chance of on-pitch success.' For Boldt, who was sporting director at Hamburg from 2019 to 2024, the club's finances impacted much of his tenure. The 2021-22 financial year was the first time the club posted a positive annual profit in 12 years. 'My job was to make the club more stable, to recreate the identity, to develop young players and to help the coaches to do their job,' Boldt said. 'I'm not there anymore, but it's the same team, and this project together was four years in the making — and we can now see the output from their efforts.' Now, the structure of the club is in a far stronger position after securing a return to the Bundesliga this season following six seasons out of the top flight. Last year saw the club record a financial profit for the third year in a row, with its Volksparkstadion stadium debts paid off two years ahead of schedule. While Boldt was not the one holding the purse strings, Hamburg's financial landscape meant he had to be skilful in ensuring the club operated within its means when buying and selling players. Advertisement 'To have success, you have to be one step ahead. Sometimes, you need to let young players go to another club and give them space to develop (elsewhere) — but in football, nobody sees this as success because you're often linked to how many titles you won,' he says. 'For a sporting director or executive, we are responsible for the strategy and the vision of the club. I understand that you need results, but Hamburg is more stable than ever before, with less debt than ever before. If we had been promoted immediately (back to the Bundesliga), it would have likely been a disaster because the club was unstable, but now the base is so much stronger than the years before. That is success for me.' Stability should be synonymous with the role. It might sound obvious, but a sporting director needs to be in the position for the long term to implement such stability, which has not always been the case among some Premier League sides. Ashworth left Newcastle United before his short-lived stint at Manchester United, with his replacement Paul Mitchell announced that he was also parting company with Newcastle last month after less than a year in the role — leaving the club with the task of appointing their third sporting director in rapid succession. Liverpool's appointment of Hughes brought stability to the club last summer after a disruptive 18 months that saw Jorg Schmadtke hired on a short-term contract following the departure of previous sporting director Julian Ward — who had only replaced Michael Edwards a year before. Had a long-term sporting director been in place, the public contract sagas involving Van Dijk, Salah and Alexander-Arnold might have been handled differently. The common thread is that nothing is ever guaranteed on the pitch, but the good sporting directors will find a way to control the controllable and give the club long-term improvement, regardless of short-term ups and downs. 'All I can do is try and increase the chance of success,' says Spors. 'As a sporting director, we can do much more than just sign players or a coach. We can build the culture. We can make sure every department is on the best level and is pushing to the next level.' 'Getting three points on a Saturday is just the result of all the work that sits behind it.'
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an hour ago
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I saw first-hand how Putin and Xi manipulate the naive British state
It has taken six months and the deaths of thousands of Ukrainians but now, at last, Donald Trump may have grasped the truth about Vladimir Putin. As he threatens new sanctions and denounces Putin as 'crazy', the president is finally working out that Russia's leader is implacably determined to conquer Ukraine and rebuild an empire, at whatever cost in blood. But Trump is not alone in having lessons to learn: so, in all honesty, does the Foreign Office. Ever since Putin launched his full-scale invasion in February 2022, our diplomats have been at the forefront of backing Ukraine and maximising the pressure on Russia. They saw the onslaught coming and their response has won immense goodwill for Britain among Ukraine's government and people. On Friday, the Foreign Office named and sanctioned 18 Russian spies accused of covert bombings or acts of sabotage in Britain and elsewhere, designed to prevent support for Ukraine. Yet before 2022, the truth is that British diplomacy was not always so clear and resolute about countering Putin's aggression. Now that we are re-engaging with China – by far the most powerful of our adversaries – it has never been more urgent to understand the dangers of dealing with hostile states. I spent nearly eight years in the Foreign Office and Downing Street writing speeches for three foreign secretaries and one prime minister. For much of that time my desk was in the Private Office, outside the great oak door of the foreign secretary's magnificently gilded room overlooking St James's Park. This was where all the papers arrived, the high officials gathered and everything that 'the boss' needed to see or do was filtered and prepared. Anyone who works in the controlled bedlam of this extraordinary room has a privileged window into the soul of British diplomacy. I found that our diplomats profoundly believe that 'engagement' is almost always the answer to any international problem. Engagement is what they do and they are convinced that it serves our national interest and makes the world a better place. For countries that are more or less friendly – thankfully the huge majority – the diplomats are right. But what about hostile states that strive to do us harm and will not abandon their threatening ambitions? As a minor cog in the engine room of British diplomacy, I saw how dealing with them involves cost, risk and moral compromise. And here is the problem: some of our diplomats, particularly at senior level, instinctively underestimate or overlook the price of engagement with hostile powers and this may, unwittingly, make the world even more dangerous. What exactly are the hazards? Dealing with hostile states can demean you, distort your analysis and lead you to constrain your own options. At worst, you may end up emboldening the adversary to go further and inflict more harm than he would have done anyway. The easiest and perhaps most demeaning compromise is self-censorship in the cause of maintaining engagement. One evening in late 2016, as darkness settled over the trees of St James's Park outside my window in Private Office, I finished drafting a newspaper comment piece about Russia for the foreign secretary, then Boris Johnson. Before submitting my work to him, I had to send it for clearance by some of our most senior diplomats. Back came the answer: all fine, just one thing, please delete the phrase 'Russian aggression'. I asked why? Putin had grabbed Crimea and invaded eastern Ukraine two years earlier; he was, at that moment, waging a war on Ukrainian soil which had already claimed 8,000 lives and driven two million people from their homes. For good measure, his air force was carpet-bombing Aleppo in Syria. Didn't all of that justify the phrase 'Russian aggression'. Of course, I was told. But our boss met Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, in New York a few months ago and we're looking for more engagement. So best not to use that phrase. Just the prospect of dealing with Lavrov – apparently as an end in itself – was enough to produce a minor but demeaning act of self-censorship. As it happens, I had been in that meeting in New York and Lavrov's bristling mendacity had been so obvious as to be almost comical. Given that nothing he said could be relied upon, it wasn't clear to me why Lavrov was worth the foreign secretary's time at all, let alone if there was a moral price to be paid. How could experienced diplomats, who were surely not naive or credulous, see Lavrov differently? The answer is that if you start with a sincere belief in the power of engagement, then you more or less have to regard the person you will engage with as a worthy interlocutor, even when it's Lavrov. The same impulse may cause diplomats to go further and misread not just individuals but regimes. The Foreign Office's Russia department was generally composed of people with a grimly realistic view of Putin: most had no illusions about what we were facing. I sometimes thought we would be better off if they were in charge. But as late as 2019, I remember one of our leading Russia experts describing Putin's annexation of Crimea as not an 'imperialist' but a 'defensive' project. The irony was that Putin himself begged to differ. He was very clear about why he was dismembering Ukraine. He told anyone who would listen that he grabbed Crimea for the obviously imperial motive of restoring the territory annexed by Catherine the Great in the 18th century to the Russian motherland. Credit: Soon after achieving this in 2014, Putin made a triumphal progress through his new province, hailing the 'return' of Crimea to the 'native land' and describing this as a tribute to 'historical truth and the memory of our ancestors'. He did not trouble to pretend that his motives were defensive. How could a Civil Service expert suggest otherwise? The only plausible explanation is that this person genuinely believed in the necessity of engaging with Russia. If Putin's motives really were implacably imperialist and expansionist, then there would be nothing to talk about. So those must not be his motives. If your starting point is that engagement is the answer, then it becomes tempting to define the problem to suit the solution, rather than vice versa. The danger is that you trap yourself in a giant circular argument with the following stages. Engagement is the answer. But the leader of the hostile state says that he's determined to rebuild his empire, invade his neighbours and overturn the entire global security order. Yes it's very worrying but he may not mean it, and even if he does we can still dissuade him. How and why? With engagement, because that is always the answer. Diplomats caught up in this way of thinking may be the last to realise the truth about a hostile dictator, even if he is proclaiming it to the world. They will want to believe that his future course is still an open question and engagement might yet divert him from the path of bloodshed and folly. They will struggle to see when the dictator's mind is made up and all that remains is to oppose him and ensure that he fails. The West has the collective power to thwart any expansionist regime, provided that it uses its leverage hard and early. But some of our diplomats will always prefer to advise against this. They will caution that if we do get tough, then the hostile state will cancel our engagement, which we must of course seek to preserve. They will warn about jeopardising the next meeting and 'empowering the hardliners and marginalising the moderates' (an unfalsifiable and formulaic argument). They will say that the regime is not monolithic, that not everyone around the dictator agrees with him, that somehow the moderates could still prevail, and we should look for the cracks and widen them, rather than give the hostile government something to unite against. This might sound like a sophisticated analysis, but the problem is that our adversaries know exactly how our diplomats think because this approach goes back many years. So they play along and create the impression that they want nothing more than serious engagement. They will agree to dialogue and say conciliatory words simply to tie us down and lead us to constrain our own options, delaying the moment when the penny finally drops and we use our leverage. For hostile states, the purpose of engagement is seldom to reach an agreement, but rather to stop us from actually doing something against their interests. That is exactly how Putin has handled Donald Trump for the past six months. Iran has been doing the same for years, often successfully until the recent 12-day war. Some of our diplomats are vulnerable to this tactic because their belief in 'keeping channels open' really can lead them to recommend staying our hand and limiting our options. In March 2018 Russian intelligence tried to murder a former spy, Sergei Skripal, and his daughter, Yulia, at their adopted home in Salisbury using novichok nerve agent, which later killed an innocent British mother, Dawn Sturgess. The Foreign Office disclosed on Friday that two Russian spies had been hacking Yulia Skripal's mobile phone as early as 2013. Britain responded to the Salisbury poisoning by expelling 23 Russian diplomats and urging our allies to follow suit, mounting a highly effective campaign which caused the removal of another 130 Russian officials by 29 countries and international organisations. At the time, this was the biggest coordinated expulsion of Russian diplomats in history. Our officials were genuinely outraged by the recklessness of what the Russians had done and the danger of mass civilian casualties. They raised the ceiling on the counter-measures they were prepared to recommend against Russia by several feet. But I noticed how they remained careful to draw limits. This became clear to me when I asked whether we should arm Ukraine? It seems incredible now but after Russia's first invasion in 2014, Britain and most of our allies decided not to supply Ukraine with weapons, imposing a de-facto arms embargo on the target of aggression which lasted right up until Putin was massing his forces for the second onslaught in 2022. And in 2018, with Theresa May as prime minister, I was briskly told that arming Ukraine was out of the question. Why? Because we would be on our own and there was no telling how Russia might react. Any weapons we might supply would make little difference anyway. Besides – and this was the decisive point – we still needed to keep our channels with the Russians open and such a drastic step would risk closing them, perhaps literally in the case of our embassy in Moscow. The irony is that less than four years later, once the full-scale invasion loomed, there was enough political will to override these objections and turn arming Ukraine into a central priority of British foreign policy. In January 2022, barely a month before the second invasion, Boris Johnson as prime minister dispatched 2,000 anti-tank missiles which were soon vital in the defence of Kyiv and Kharkiv, littering the streets and boulevards with the blackened carcasses of Russian armour. That consignment, delivered when no other state was publicly sending weapons, established Britain as Ukraine's strongest supporter and generated goodwill and influence which persist to this day. But suppose we had been arming Ukraine not for four weeks before the onslaught, but four years? Wouldn't Ukraine have been able to resist even more strongly and save lives by holding back the Russian advance? Wouldn't Britain have amassed yet more goodwill and diplomatic access? And what exactly was achieved by keeping our channels to the Russians open after the Salisbury poisonings? What did we gain by not supplying weapons to Ukraine? If that was the price of preserving engagement, it was surely not worth paying. I came to the conclusion that if engagement with hostile states leads to self-censorship, wishful thinking and self-imposed constraints, then it may be worse than pointless. The danger is that our adversary might be emboldened to cause even more damage. Remember that the cumulative effect of all the West's engagement with Putin was that he concluded that he could get away with destroying Europe's biggest country. In fairness, Britain was probably least culpable for this outcome. Our prime ministers and foreign secretaries had far less contact with Putin than some of their European counterparts. Angela Merkel, who clocked up 101 meetings or phone calls with Putin during her time as German Chancellor, must carry the greatest share of blame. After she left office, Emmanuel Macron became the European leader in most frequent contact with Putin, once hosting him at the French President's summer residence by the Mediterranean. Even before 2022, our diplomats were towards the hawkish end of Europe's spectrum on Russia. Whatever mistakes they made were committed on a greater scale by their colleagues from other European countries and by the US under President Obama's administration. But there is no avoiding the tragic reality that the West's collective effort to engage with Russia and 'keep channels open' ended in Europe's bloodiest war for 80 years. Surely it would have been better if we had all worried a lot less about engagement and got on with arming Ukraine straight after the first invasion in 2014? The results could hardly have been worse. Primary responsibility must of course rest with the politicians who were in charge and whose decisions the diplomats merely enacted. David Cameron and William Hague, the prime minister and foreign secretary respectively during the first invasion, must answer for Britain's response. But the politicians inevitably depend on expert advice from the professionals, particularly at moments of history when hostile states are amassing their power and becoming steadily more dangerous. Now, as we engage with China, we should learn from the searing experience of dealing with Putin's Russia. The main lesson is: never allow engagement to come at a price. If China poses a threat to Britain, then say so. If President Xi Jinping's rhetoric hardens and he escalates the pressure on Taiwan, then resist any temptation to refrain from drawing the obvious conclusion. If there is a list of Chinese companies that deserve to be sanctioned for supplying the invasion of Ukraine, go ahead and sanction them even if that might jeopardise the next 'dialogue' with China. But I can already spot warning signs. Turn to page 28 of this year's Defence Review and you will see Russia described as an 'immediate and pressing threat', while China is a 'sophisticated and persistent challenge'. The same passage describes Chinese technology as a 'leading challenge for the UK'. Why 'challenge'? Back in Private Office, I would try to keep that word out of the foreign secretary's speeches for the simple reason that 'challenge' is usually a euphemism for either 'problem' or 'threat'. Like other hostile states, China is anxious to police the language in which they are described. Have Xi's officials privately warned our diplomats against describing China as a 'threat'? Have they said that doing so would risk engagement and make it harder to improve bilateral relations? I don't know the answer. But it would be entirely in character for Chinese diplomats to threaten us about the consequences of calling them a threat. If so, we should reply that they have no right to try to dictate what we say in public, particularly as China self-evidently does pose a threat. Every Russian drone and ballistic missile that smashes into Kyiv is stuffed with Chinese systems and components, revealing how Putin's campaign to destroy Ukraine has always been underwritten by China. Those killer drones all have Chinese-made engines. In fact, just about every advanced conventional weapon in Putin's arsenal depends at some level on Chinese technology and industrial prowess. Russia's war machine is, in good measure, a creation of China. If Russia poses a threat to Britain, then China must too. Our ministers and officials should not allow their wish to engage to inhibit them from stating the obvious. In fairness, David Lammy, the Foreign Secretary, described China as a 'sophisticated and persistent threat' in the Commons in June. But why did the Defence Review settle for the euphemism 'challenge'? None of this rules out engagement with hostile states. If there is a clear objective, backed by collective leverage, then we should go ahead. But we must do it without repeating the old mistakes. And self-censorship is where the error begins. Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
an hour ago
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New Range Rover, Jaguar electric cars delayed amid tepid EV market, report says
LONDON— Jaguar Land Rover has postponed the launch of its full-electric Range Rover and new-generation Jaguar electric cars, a report said. JLR is delaying the models to allow time for more testing and for EV demand to pick up, the Guardian newspaper reported, citing sources familiar with the matter. Deliveries of the Range Rover Electric will not start until next year, the paper said. The SUV was due to arrive in showrooms at the end of this year after its original 2024 launch was delayed when JLR slowed the pace of its EV push because of lower demand for high-end electric cars. Sign up for the Automotive News Europe Cars & Concepts newsletter, which covers the biggest moves in Europe's product market. The launches of two planned Jaguar electric cars may also be pushed back by several months compared with original plans, the Guardian said. JLR is pivoting its Jaguar marque to be all-electric and had planned to launch the first of its new-generation EVs in late summer 2026. The first Jaguar electric car under its rebrand, prviwed by the Type 00, is now set for August 2026, the Guardian quoted a source as saying. The second Jaguar model would follow in December 2027. A smaller electric Range Rover expected to replace the Velar and due in April 2026 could also be delayed and a Defender Sport electric SUV will not arrive until the first quarter of 2027, the paper said. JLR has said it's happy to delay EVs if it means getting them right. 'We're not going to rush that transition, we are going to nail it,' CEO Adrian Mardell said during an investor day June 16. Unusually the company didn't give an update to analysts on timings for its electric vehicles, except to say that the first electrified Freelander launched in co-operation with its Chinese partner Chery would arrive in the second half of 2026. JLR has said it has a waiting list of more than 60,000 for the Range Rover Electric. JLR has warned that its profitability will be hit this year by headwinds such as President Donald Trump's high tariffs on auto imports and a weaker dollar that makes its vehicles more expensive in the U.S., its biggest market. Its sales in China have also been hit as Chinese consumers increasingly choose domestic luxury cars instead of Western premium brands. The company said on July 17 it is cutting 500 management jobs. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
