Iranians protesting government policies have shut down parts of the Tehran Grand Bazaar. Social media posts showed Iranian merchants gathering outside the parliament building yesterday chanting anti-regime slogans. The protests, which began in the capital, have reportedly spread to several other towns, with other bazaarsshuttering on Tuesday.
Why it matters: Protests in any Iranian bazaar, but especially Tehran’s, carry tremendous political weight. In 1978–1979, Tehran bazaar strikes were instrumental in bringing down the U.S.–allied Shah, and could now signal further unrest.
National Security Advisor John Bolton will travel to Moscow later this week to nail down a meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. The scheduling will be easy; the summit agenda itself, much harder.
The big picture: No issue divides Trump and his advisers more than Russia. He wants to “get along” with Putin; they object to one Russian policy after another. But the Singapore summit showed Trump’s inner circle how to solve this problem: Give the boss a showy, feel-good session he can call a breakthrough and leave the important business for a senior official to handle later.
People around the world are traveling more: There were 1.2 billion international tourism arrivals in 2016, according to the UN's World Tourism Organization. That number is climbing steadily and has about doubled since 2003.
The big picture: They’re going to a lot of the same places. Since 1995, China (7th to 4th), Germany (11th to 7th), Turkey (15th to 10th) and Thailand (16th to 9th) have jumped in the global destination rankings, while Poland (8th to 19th) and Canada (10th to 17th) have fallen. Otherwise, things look just about the same.
For every woman on a dating app in India, there are typically three or four men, reports the Wall Street Journal. In a country where arranged marriages are still extremely common, many women are concerned that dating is too stigmatized or too dangerous.
The big picture: India and China have two of the largest and fastest-growing populations of smartphone users in the world, a big draw for dating apps. But cultural barriers keep some apps from taking off in Asia as they have in the U.S.
The trend: Xi has long been trying to control what he sees as traditional Chinese values through web site and social media censorship in an effort to avoid social unrest. And this isn’t Oliver’s first time has been hit by China's strict controls — last week, Chinese authorities blocked all mentions of his name on Weibo, China’s Twitter.
Meituan-Dianping, a Beijing-based company that offers on-demand services like food delivery and hotel booking, has filed to go public on Hong Kong's stock exchange later this year.
The details: Meituan-Dianping is reportedly seeking to raise between $4 billion and $6 billion through its IPO, at an ambition valuation of $60 billion.In 2017, the company had a net loss of $2.9 billion (19 billion yuan), much more than in previous years, though it also had $ 5.2 billion (33.9 billion yuan) in revenue, more than twice its revenue in 2016.
