are in the public domain? inflation fears mount as attacks and continue. wall street presents for the federal reserve �*s first 2024 meeting later this month. plus, what if it took you three hours to get to work every day? a special report on how people deal with long commutes. hello and welcome to asia business report. we begin the programme at this hour with news about the us federal reserve. because investors hoping for a quick interest rate cut from america's central bank may be disappointed. discussions about a timetable following rates were absent from minutes in their last meeting but it did show that officials believing further hikes are off the table as inflation calls. from europe, our north america business

correspondence sent this report. the december note on the us central banks asked meeting showed policymakers are feeling better about inflation. they agreed with investors that interest rates are at or near the peak of the cycle. they also agree it will come down this year. they offered no clues as to how or when that will happen. to remind viewers come at the federal reserve started raising rates in march 2022 to tame inflation. it is so 11 times, taking the benchmark rate to 5.5%. inflation by the time of the last meeting had dropped to 3.2% from a peak of 9.1%. meanwhile, new data out on wednesday showed the number of job openings in the united states fell to 8.79 million in november. this points to weaker demand for labour but is still well above pre—covid levels. that is consistent with the fed's goal. to slow the economy without

triggering a nasty recession. the feds first ratesetting meeting this year starting january 30. that disappointment is reflected in how us stocks closed in the second trading session of this year. take a look at this. all the major indices closed lower. the tech heavy nasdaq led the drop which included stocks that are sensitive to interest rates like apple, nvida, and tesla. all of which traded lower. it is a sign investors are cautious about what direction the fed will be taking for this year. shedding the optimism they had at the end of 2023. anna rathbun, chief investment officer at cbiz explains. certainly there is walking back of some of the excitement we saw in december. december was really extraordinary. the fed went to suggesting there may be three rate cuts, they didn't say when in 2024, just the entire calendar year. the market interpreted that as we

have reached peak rates and now we asked going to start cutting. they became very aggressive in expectations. today's meeting minutes basically tell us the fed was not looking at it it that dovishly. relative to market expectations, we are looking at a relatively hawkish fed. investors are walking some of that back. investors are also holding their breath as fed officials prepare to hold their first meeting this year in about three weeks. already there are worries about inflation running higher again. that is because developments in the red sea may add pressure to inflation. attacks on ships by iran—backed houthi rebels in the yemen crucial waterway has forced a growing list of companies to temporarily redraw their shipping routes. including maersk and furniture giant ikea. the much longer route around the cape hope in south africa has also delayed goods and pushed up freight rates. and adding to that cost is the higher prices

shipping companies are paying for insurance because of the increased danger. according to blake evans—prichard from re—in asia, an insurance insights platform. i spoke to him a little earlier. i have been speaking to a number of insurance brokers about the situation thre for people that sort of quote the insurance prices. and the prices are rising quite significantly. but there was a big variety of how much people can expect to put their ships through the red sea. it used to be sort of 0.1% or 0.2% of premium charged on the value of the ship. it now has gone up to 0.5% or 0.7% which could be significantly higher. that can add hundreds of thousands of us dollars to what people have to pay to sort of ship the goods through that channel. do you think this could have the

knock on effect of increasing inflation? yeah, definitely. i don't see how this can't put inflation pressures on consumer goods and other things. notjust the sort of consumer goods that are being shipped through this neck of water but also oil and raw materials, and things like that, that is definitely going to have inflation pressure. it has been 45 years since china and the us established diplomatic ties. in theirtime, china's economy has grown to become the the second largest in the world behind the us. that rapid rise was largely built on a relationship that encouraged strong business ties between the two countries. but in the last few years, that has been marked by tension, tariffs and export restrictions. nick marsh has more on what we can expect in the economies that are intertwined. 0n the surface, things seem to have improved between the us and china recently. their leaders met in

november and then mood was pretty positive. but when you get down to the nitty—gritty, to the economic relationship, things are still as tough as ever. first, let's talk about trade. the idea of the two countries completely breaking off ties or decoupling, that is not going to happen anytime soon. but trade between the us and china is down and china says that is because of us tariffs, us export controls and curbs on investment. clearly china is a country that relies a lot on exports and understandably, it is not very happy. translation: it is biased and hostile and has no - rationality to speak of. next, the green economy. both countries are dead set on transitioning to electric vehicles. but china is way ahead. both in terms of production and also in terms of access to the critical metals you need to build them. so expect a race for

resources starting in 2024. washington inflation reduction act will offer subsidies on evs. provided they are free from any chinese manufacturing or supply chains. that is clearly going to put third—party countries in a tight spot and beijing says it is an anti—china piece of legislation which is something i put to the us climate envoy john kerry recently. no, it is not. in fact, china may benefit like every other country in the world may benefit from new technology. lastly, chips. the us may go even harder in restricting technology to china but china is making important strides in becoming self—sufficient. domestic companies such as huawei are innovating fast and us companies such as nvidia are working hard to make sure their ai chips do not compromise us national security regulations which kind of sums up us—china relations at the moment. tense, competitive

but always evolving. something we will always keeping an eye on as well. many of us dislike a long commute. even an hour can seem like a long time to take to get to work. but for many people in large african cities, a lengthy commute of nearly three hours to get to work is part of daily life. nkechi 0gbonna reports from nigeria's most populous city of lagos. lagos isn't the only african city with traffic issues. kampala and nairobi also have some of africa's longest commute times, owing to huge traffic gridlocks. in kampala, the 2022 report showed commuters lose the equivalent of one working day to traffic jams each week. here in lagos, home to over 21 million people, spending long hours in traffic like this is not only a problem for workers. lagos cab drivers say their productivity levels have reduced,

owing to the number of hours they spend commuting. you sleep in the car just to have a rest. sometimes what you see is up to four and five hourjourneys. you have to decide to find somewhere to rest. some days i don't see my family. because of traffic. for me to meet my target. a 2023 report from the dean institute for research says lagoscommuters spend an average of 2.5 hours daily in transit. unintelligible for commuters who can't sit

in traffic for up to four hours, using the new lagos blue rail or the ferries could be an alternative. but these two means of transportation come at a cost. the fare is better, shorter. i decided taking the boat to meet up with work on time. before we go, japan airlines is offering refunds with no additional fees for customers following the accident on tuesday. flightjl156 collided with a coastguard aircraft as it was landing at haneda airport this week. none of the passengers were injured but five of the six people on board the small aircraft died and had been due to the delivery aid to the victims of the powerful new year's day earthquake. that is it for us on this edition of asia

business report. bye for now. bbc news, bringing you different stories from across the uk. we are currently inside the centre. we have been here for a couple of years now and in an effort to have a bit of attraction, i have agreed to box 25 rounds against 25 members. i have had to say to everyone, have you ever hit someone before? make it a good laugh, make it very entertaining. we offer boxing training classes but with our kids we incorporate a lot of social training and a lot of education as well. so large proportion of kids that train with us are autistic or adhd. we incorporate a lot of the elements into the session. i have been weight training for years. so good for you. i was absolutely terrified when i came but they.

make this so much at l ease when you turn up. they are all a good bunch. all friendly - and it is incredible. i think i originally went because i wanted to lose weight. being someone who gets that tunnel vision, ijust found something i was able to obsess over. it did not rely on your ability to communicate with other people, it did not rely on your ability to make eye contact or anything like that. for more stories from across the uk, head to the bbc news website. hey, i'm zoff with the catch up. tonight, junior doctors on strike. the ladies top the charts and it is headcount day at london zoo. we start with junior doctors as thousands of them are on picket lines across the uk. this is day one of a six—day walkout which started on wednesday morning. nhs bosses are worried it will be brince services pretty much

to a standstill in some areas. striking over the ongoing issue of pay and working conditions. callan is a junior doctor taking part in the london strike. when i started working as a doctor last year i was paid £14 an hour, i spent six years at university, i am in £120,000 of debt which you can appreciate is a large amount. i have to pick up extra shifts to pay my bills. and some good news. it was a great year for the girlies in music as female artists had a record year on the uk singles chart. spending the most at numberi since records began in 1952. if you could not get miley cyrus's flowers out of your head, you were not the only one as it was the biggest single of the year with the album hitting almost 200 million streams. time now to leave you for ten seconds of the annual london zoo headcount. as they are tallying

their animals to keep track of them. the zoo home to over 300 different animals from penguins to tigers, you see them coming up and they are just adorable. i love it. and you all caught up now. have a good night.

hello and welcome to sportsday. i'm paul scott at the bbc sports centre. here's what's coming up. bullseye — luke humphries wins the darts world title after seeing off 16—year—old sensation luke littler in the final. girona keep pace with real madrid at the top of la liga after a dramatic late win against atletico. and trailblazing boxer jane couch prepares to become the first british woman inducted into the international hall of fame. hello, welcome to the program. we begin at alexandra palace in london, where it's been a tournament to remember at the world darts

championship. luke humphries has been crowned the new world champion,