
United States President Donald Trump jets into Argentina on Thursday for a G20 summit, keen to do battle with China on trade and sharpening his rhetoric against Russia over Ukraine. The weekend summit is confronted with increasingly dire warnings, by the International Monetary Fund among others, of the potential harm faced by the world economy from Trump's trade wars.

Argentina has launched a massive security operation to try to ensure a calm meeting of the leaders of the G20 bloc of nations in Buenos Aires, calling a national bank holiday on Friday and shutting down the city’s main business district.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday indicated he favours imposing import tariffs to protect the US auto industry, which was rocked by this week's announcement of job cuts at General Motors. In two tweets, the president said that extending tariffs already in place for foreign-built small trucks to the car sector would help domestic manufacturers.

Foreign Office minister for the Americas, Sir Alan Duncan praised as historic the UK/Argentina agreement on a second commerical flight between the Falklands and the region.

A no-deal Brexit could send the pound plunging and trigger a worse recession than the financial crisis, the Bank of England has warned. It said the UK economy could shrink by 8% in the immediate aftermath if there was no transition period, while house prices could fall by almost a third. The Bank of England also warned the pound could fall by a quarter.

Brazil has withdrawn its offer to host a large U.N. conference on climate change next year, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday, leading environmental groups to question the government's commitment to reducing carbon emissions.

Argentina and China are aiming to close a deal within days for the construction of the country's fourth nuclear power plant, a multi-billion dollar project that would cement Beijing’s deepening influence in a key regional U.S. ally.

Days after the Libertadores Cup fiasco that proved the city's security authorities inability to escort just one bus, Canadian journalist John Kirton was robbed off his belongings Tuesday in downtown Buenos Aires, as he was finalising details for his coverage of the G-20 Summit.

Mexico's central bank cut its economic growth forecast for 2019 on Wednesday, citing uncertainty over the policies that president-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador will pursue. In its quarterly report on the state of Latin America's second-largest economy, after Brazil, the Bank of Mexico predicted growth of 1.7 to 2.7% next year, down from 1.8 to 2.8% in its previous forecast.

By Christine Lagarde - As G20 leaders gather in Argentina, the global economy faces a critical juncture. We have had a good stretch of solid growth by historical standards, but now we are facing a period where significant risks are materializing and darker clouds are looming.