An infographic, made by Visual Capitalist, compares some cities in China, which has a population of 1.4 billion people. The numbers are gross domestic product (GDP) by purchasing power parity (PPP). Have you heard of the cities of Suzhou, Wuhan or Tangshan, which are as wealthy as Austria, Israel or New Zealand?
These Chinese towns are not isolated, and are connected creating megaregions like the Northeast US, in which New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, and Washington, DC are close to each other, creating a mega economic zone, Visual Capitalist explains.

In China, there are three important megaregions.

Yangtze River Delta
With a combined GDP of $2.17 trillion, the region unites cities like Shanghai, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Wuxi, Ningbo, and Changzhou, and is economically as big as Italy.

Pearl River Delta
With a combined GDP of $1.89 trillion, the region unites cities like Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan, Dongguan, and Macao, and is as wealthy as South Korea.

Beijing-Tianjin
With a combined GDP of $1.14 trillion, the region unites the two largest cities in northern China, Beijing, and Tianjin. This megaregion's economy can be compared to Australia.

Bitcoin dropped to as low as $5,605 on Monday, from a record high $7,882 reached on Wednesday, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Bitcoin cash rose to $2,426 on Sunday, before plunging to $1,379 as of 9:32 a.m. in Hong Kong, according to Coinmarketcap.com.

Bitcoin has slumped since the cancellation of a technology upgrade to increase its block size, amid speculation supporters of the proposal bid up bitcoin cash to undermine the original bitcoin.

“It’s the bitcoin cash pump,” said Arthur Hayes, chief executive officer of BitMEX, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Hong Kong. “It’s obviously a coordinated action of certain individuals who have a vested interest in bitcoin cash.”

At the heart of the debate is how bitcoin’s underlying technology can accommodate rising transactions as its popularity booms. While increasing its block size would help, opponents argue it would only concentrate mining power, undermining the decentralized nature of bitcoin.

According to The Seattle Times, Pacific Coast Coal Co. wants to mine 85,000 to 90,000 tons a year over six years from the privately owned, 480-acre site.

If the plan is successful, it would mean the first time any coal has been mined from John Henry since 1999. Mining first began there in 1986.

The proposal is under federal review but the restart looks promising according to a September 2017 Department of the Interior report which found that coal mining would not have a significant impact on the environment. However the report also states that the proposed mine "would result in negligible beneficial economic impacts," with just 50 jobs created throughout the six years of mining plus a year of reclamation.

The Seattle Times notes that Washington and Tennessee are the only two states that delegate mining regulation to the federal government.

Of course the proposal is not without opposition, with King County Executive Dow Constantine vowing to stop the project.

“The Earth is rapidly moving toward global climate catastrophe, and the notion that we would have a company here digging up rocks and burning them, rocks that should be left underground, is not consistent with the values of the people of our county,” Constantine was quoted saying. “I am going to do everything I can, legally and politically, to prevent us from having to suffer the impacts from coal mining in King County.”

Meanwhile Bloomberg reports that a year after Donald Trump won the presidency promising to put coal back on track, it hasn't happened:

In fact, what was true under President Barack Obama is still true today: Coal’s share of the power mix is declining, and wind and solar remain the fastest-growing U.S. sources of electricity.

Building and operating a utility-scale wind farm costs as little as $30 a megawatt-hour over its lifetime — as little as $14 if you count subsidies. Keeping an existing coal plant running costs $26 to $39 a megawatt-hour, according to Lazard Ltd. And solar is on its way to becoming the cheapest power source on Earth.

Venture capital firm Benchmark, an early investor with a board seat in the ride-services company, and Kalanick have reached an agreement over terms of the SoftBank investment, which could be worth up to $10 billion, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The Uber board first agreed more than a month ago to bring in SoftBank as an investor and board member, but negotiations have been slowed by ongoing fighting between Benchmark and Kalanick. The agreement struck on Sunday removed the final obstacle to allowing SoftBank to proceed with an offer to buy to stock.

Uber confirmed the deal was moving forward.

“We’ve entered into an agreement with a consortium led by SoftBank and Dragoneer on a potential investment,” an Uber spokesman said. “We believe this agreement is a strong vote of confidence in Uber’s long-term potential.”

SoftBank, a Japanese conglomerate that has become a heavyweight in Silicon Valley tech investing, is joined by Dragoneer Investment Group in leading a consortium of investors that plans to invest $1 billion to $1.25 billion in Uber, and in addition, will buy up to 17 percent of existing shares from investors and employees in a secondary transaction. The terms were signed on Sunday, although the tender offer would likely take weeks to complete.

Uber is valued at $68 billion, the most highly valued venture-backed company in the world. SoftBank’s roughly $1 billion investment of fresh funding is expected to be at the same valuation. The secondary transaction, or the purchases from employees and existing investors, would be at a lower valuation.

A spokeswoman for Benchmark did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and a spokesman for Kalanick declined to comment.

Completing the SoftBank deal would allow Uber to open a new chapter after a year of controversy, including the resignation of Kalanick, the ouster of several top executives, sexual harassment and discrimination allegations, and multiple federal criminal probes. The deal is also tied to new governance rules that aim to distribute power more equally and bring more oversight to the company.

The state-run company said in a filing on the Bombay Stock Exchange that its board has increased its borrowing limit and approved the formation of a joint venture with National Aluminum Company and Mineral Exploration Corporation for exploring and mining strategic metals abroad, according to Business Standard.

It plans to invest about $700 million in six expansion projects including a near tripling of production at its largest mine, Malanjkhand in Madhya Pradesh. The mine would up its production from 2 million tonnes annually to 5.2 million, by building an underground mine under the current open-cast operation. Located 20 kilometres from a national park, Malanjkhand contains almost 70 percent of India's copper reserves and represents around 60 percent of Hindustan Copper's output, states Business Standard.

Copper prices have risen above 23 percent year to date. Despite a sharp drop in copper imports from China, which consumes nearly half of the metal seen as a bellwether for economic growth, the copper price hit an intra-day high of $3.25 a pound on Wednesday – the highest since February 2014. Copper last closed at $3.07 a pound or $6,777 a tonne.

The same day Bloomberg reported that trading in copper futures is reaching a frenzy, with bets for December 2018 skyrocketing above $10,000 a tonne. Red metal futures haven't been that high since 2011 and Bloomberg says it suggests traders are becoming increasingly bullish due to the need for copper in electric cars.

The three billionaires are sitting on a combined $248.5 billion fortune, which outstrips the combined net worth of an estimated 160 million Americans, or 53 million US households. The study entitled Billionaire Bonanza 2017 was compiled by the Institute for Policy Studies.

“So much money concentrating in so few hands while so many people struggle is not just bad economics, it’s a moral crisis,” said Josh Hoxie, the report's co-author.

The 400 richest people in the US have a combined $2.68 trillion wealth, more than the gross domestic product (GDP) of the United Kingdom, France or India.

“Our wealthiest 400 now have more wealth combined than the bottom 64 percent of the US population, an estimated 80 million households or 204 million people. That’s more people than the population of Canada and Mexico combined,” the report says.

Tax cuts, proposed by US President Donald Trump, are likely to widen the gap, according to the findings, as 80 percent of the tax relief would benefit only the wealthiest one percent of households.

“Wealth inequality is on the rise. Now is the time for actions that reduce inequality, not tax cuts for the very wealthy,” said the co-author of the report Chuck Collins.

The study suggests two ways of narrowing the wealth gap.

“First, we must not make inequality worse through new tax cuts for the wealthy. The proposed Trump tax cuts, as currently designed, would grow top one percent fortunes and do little to reduce the ranks of America’s “underwater nation.”

The second way is to implement policies to reduce concentrated wealth, the report suggests.

”Inequality will continue to widen unless we intervene directly to reduce grand concentrations of private wealth. By taxing our wealthiest households, we could raise significant revenues and then invest these funds to expand wealth-building opportunities across the economy.”

Authorities will also move to lift the ceiling on foreign ownership limits for securities funds and joint ventures to 51% over the course of the next three years.

Currently, global banks are only allowed to have a 49% interest in such ventures, thus removing their ability to control Chinese-based entities.

The announcements were made by Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao in Beijing, who said authorities are in the process of drafting detailed rules which will be released shortly.

According to reports from Reuters, Zhu said the time is right for China to announce major steps for the opening up of its financial sector.

A short time ago, the CSI300 Financials Index was up 0.83%, adding to the gains seen earlier in the session.

The broader CSI300 index tracks movements of the top 300 companies by market capitailisation listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen. So far this year, it’s added over 18%.

The benchmark Shanghai Composite index is broadly unchanged in the wake of the announcement, trading up 0.15%.

Today’s announcement follows statements by Chinese authorities on Thursday that restrictions in the country’s banking and financial sector would soon be eased, as Chinese leader Xi Jinping met with US President Trump as part of Trump’s Asia visit.

Guo Shuqing, Chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission, flagged potential changes to foreign ownership laws at last month’s National People’s Congress in Beijing, noting that the market share of foreign banks had been falling which wasn’t good for competition.

It marks another step in the gradual integration of China’s economy into global markets. In June, MSCI said it planned to add 222 China A Large Cap stocks to its Emerging Markets Indexstarting next year, which is likely to drive capital inflows from international institutional investors.