by downloading duckduckgo on all your devices today. this is gps the global public square. welcome to all of you in the united states and around the world. i m fareed zakaria coming to you from new york. today on the program, the growing fear that the war in gaza will spread. could it happen? is it likely? i ll ask the new yorker s robin wright and general mark berkmeyer land. also, a.i. it s what everyone is talking about from davos to detroit, shenzhen to silicon valley. i ll talk to two of the smartest brains in technology who will tell you what you need to know now. first, the man behind chatgpt, sam altman, the ceo of openai. then bill gates, the co-founder of microsoft. but first, here s my take. for all of the focus on the many geopolitical crises across the globe, the one that is potentially the most dangerous has actually been trending in a positive direction. ian bremer, the founder of our asia group said to me the biggest up side in the past months has got
more than 3/10 of a percent. this is what they call a bull run. the market s been on the upswing since october 2022, and it s thanks to a few tailwinds. among them, an outperforming tech sector and a resilient labour market. the federal reserve has a role too. so far it s been able to cool inflation without tipping the economy into a recession. that s called a soft landing and it s buoying wall street. stocks are rallying in anticipation of interest rate cuts that the fed has signalled this year, which would let interest rates fall from a 22 year high. when interest rates go down, it makes it cheaper for businesses and individuals to borrow money. so spending increases and usually that makes stock prices go up. meanwhile, it s a different story for the chinese stock markets, which have been struggling in the new year. chinese premier li qiang pledged to take forceful and effective action to support market confidence. shares in mainland china and in hong kong have been hoverin
they were looking to salvage a terrible financial performance that it has been seen, but also for sony, which is also really facing stiff competition right now in the indian market from the likes of amazon, netflix as well as a potential merger between disney and reliance industries. these two giants were looking to come together and consolidate their presence against this competition, but of course it has now fallen through because there was no consensus it has been said between the two companies and who would lead the merged entity. zee of course wanted its current loss to be leading it. sorry of course had reservations about that because of a number of corporate governance cases that have been pending against him. so despite nearly two years of negotiations and a 30 day grace period, the deal has now fallen through. it doesn t look like this is the end because sony is now seeking a $90 million termination fee and zee has said it will go to the courts as well. we will have
on who would have led the merged entity, zee essentially wanted it to be opening but sony was opposed to that because of a number of regulatory cases that are pending against him, such as corporate governance. despite nearly two years of negotiations and a 30 day grace period, this deal which would have created one of india s largest media entities has fallen apart. there are large implications of this, particularly on zee. they have been battling quite a terrible financial performance over the past years, but also for sony, given the huge amount of competition in the indian market. both of them wanted to face up to this competition jointly, but now they will have two face the likes of amazon, netflix and also potentially a merged entity between reliance industries and disney, single handedly that is of course something that has been speculated that there will be a merger between reliance and disney. it doesn t look like the saga is going to end anytime soon because sony has