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Topic Review
Cancellation of Debt (COD) Income
Taxpayers in the United States may have tax consequences when debt is cancelled. This is commonly known as COD (Cancellation of Debt) Income. According to the Internal Revenue Code, the discharge of indebtedness must be included in a taxpayer's gross income. There are exceptions to this rule, however, so a careful examination of one's COD income is important to determine any potential tax consequences. Billions of dollars of cancelled debts will generate many unexpected tax bills, due to debt cancellations that financial institutions have started accelerating in 2012.
  • 505
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
2015–16 Stock Market Selloff
The 2015–16 stock market selloff, also known as The Great Fall of China, was the period of decline in the value of stock prices globally that occurred between June 2015 to June 2016. It included the 2015–16 Chinese stock market turbulence, in which the SSE Composite Index fell 43% in just over 2 months between June 2015 and August 2015, which culminated in the devaluation of the yuan. Investors sold shares globally as a result of slowing growth in the GDP of China, a fall in petroleum prices, the Greek debt default in June 2015, the effects of the end of quantitative easing in the United States in October 2014, a sharp rise in bond yields in early 2016, and finally, in June 2016, the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, in which Brexit was voted upon. By July 2016, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) recovered and achieved record highs. The FTSE 100 Index did not do so until later in 2016.
  • 5.7K
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Minitel
The Minitel was a Videotex online service accessible through telephone lines, and is considered one of the world's most successful pre-World Wide Web online services. The service was rolled out experimentally in 1978 in Brittany and throughout France in 1982 by the PTT (Postes, Télégraphes et Téléphones; divided since 1991 between France Télécom and La Poste). From its early days, users could make online purchases, make train reservations, check stock prices, search the telephone directory, have a mail box, and chat in a similar way to what is now made possible by the Internet. In February 2009, France Télécom indicated the Minitel network still had 10 million monthly connections. France Télécom retired the service on 30 June 2012.
  • 974
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Low-Level Equilibrium Trap
The low-level equilibrium trap is a concept in economics developed by Richard R. Nelson, in which at low levels of per capita income people are too poor to save and invest much, and this low level of investment results in low rate of growth in national income. As per capita income rises above a certain minimum level at which there is zero saving, a rising proportion of income will be saved and invested and this will lead to higher rate of growth in income.
  • 20.4K
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Sustainable Drive Tourism Routes
Drive tourism (DT) has become an attractive way to visit tourism destinations for an increasing number of visitors along driving routes. This flow of visitors has made sustainability a major issue, that is, the way by which tourism development ensure economic benefits for local communities and preserves local identity, along the route, without compromising the environmental resources. Many studies focused the topic of DT, mainly the analysis of a particular angle, either be economic sustainability, e.g., advantages of the ones related to economic and environment sustainability, such as the impact of tourists along the route environment. 
  • 559
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Weaponization of Finance
The term weaponization of finance refers to the foreign policy strategy of using incentives (access to capital markets) and penalties (varied types of sanctions) as tools of coercive diplomacy. The term was first coined by political scientists Ian Bremmer and Cliff Kupchan. It became one of the main themes of the Eurasia Group’s Top Risks 2015 report. It is a reference to the new ways in which the United States is using its influence to affect global outcomes. Rather than rely on traditional elements of America’s security advantage – including US-led alliances such as NATO and multi-lateral institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund – Washington is now ‘weaponizing finance’ by limiting access to the US marketplace and US banks as an instrument of its foreign and security policy.
  • 1.5K
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
History of the Euro
The euro came into existence on 1 January 1999, although it had been a goal of the European Union (EU) and its predecessors since the 1960s. After tough negotiations, particularly due to opposition from the United Kingdom, the Maastricht Treaty entered into force in 1993 with the goal of creating an economic and monetary union by 1999 for all EU states except the UK and Denmark (even though Denmark has a fixed exchange rate policy with the euro). In 1999 the currency was born virtually and in 2002 notes and coins began to circulate. It rapidly took over from the former national currencies and slowly expanded behind the rest of the EU. In 2009 the Lisbon Treaty finalised its political authority, the Eurogroup, alongside the European Central Bank.
  • 3.2K
  • 29 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Offshore Software R&D
Offshore Software R&D is the provision of software development services by a supplier (whether external or internal) located in a different country from the one where the software will be used. The main reason behind companies using offshore software development services is the higher development cost of the local service providers. The global software R&D services market, as contrasted to ITO and BPO, is rather young and currently is at a relatively early stage of development.
  • 476
  • 28 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Doubling Time
The doubling time is time it takes for a population to double in size/value. It is applied to population growth, inflation, resource extraction, consumption of goods, compound interest, the volume of malignant tumours, and many other things that tend to grow over time. When the relative growth rate (not the absolute growth rate) is constant, the quantity undergoes exponential growth and has a constant doubling time or period, which can be calculated directly from the growth rate. This time can be calculated by dividing the natural logarithm of 2 by the exponent of growth, or approximated by dividing 70 by the percentage growth rate (more roughly but roundly, dividing 72; see the rule of 72 for details and derivatiatives of this formula). The doubling time is a characteristic unit (a natural unit of scale) for the exponential growth equation, and its converse for exponential decay is the half-life. For example, given Canada's net population growth of 0.9% in the year 2006, dividing 70 by 0.9 gives an approximate doubling time of 78 years. Thus if the growth rate remains constant, Canada's population would double from its 2006 figure of 33 million to 66 million by 2084.
  • 8.8K
  • 28 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Ecosystem Services
Ecosystem services are the many and varied benefits to humans gifted by the natural environment and from healthy ecosystems. Such ecosystems include, for example, agroecosystems, forest ecosystems, grassland ecosystems and aquatic ecosystems. These ecosystems, functioning in healthy relationship, offer such things like natural pollination of crops, clean air, extreme weather mitigation, human mental and physical well-being. Collectively, these benefits are becoming known as 'ecosystem services', and are often integral to the provisioning of clean drinking water, the decomposition of wastes, and resilience and productivity of food ecosystems. While scientists and environmentalists have discussed ecosystem services implicitly for decades, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) in the early 2000s popularized this concept. There, ecosystem services are grouped into four broad categories: provisioning, such as the production of food and water; regulating, such as the control of climate and disease; supporting, such as nutrient cycles and oxygen production; and cultural, such as spiritual and recreational benefits. To help inform decision-makers, many ecosystem services are being valuated in order to draw equivalent comparisons to human engineered infrastructure and services.
  • 1.8K
  • 28 Nov 2022
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