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Their company's success helped build a nation.
The company is such a big part of Korea's economy.
But who are the family behind one of the world's tech giants?
Major corporate empire that we now know today.
Samsung.
Inheritance Samsung from the BBC World Service explores the real-life dramas of the Lee family and their company Samsung.
There's a succession-style drama underneath of all this.
Inheritance Samsung, coming soon, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
A $20 billion insurance shield to jumpstart the Strait of Hormuz.
Even if, through what Trump is proposing, they are able to sort of relieve some of the financial pressure, it doesn't relieve the safety risk.
It's World Business Report from the BBC World Service.
I'm Vishala Sripathma.
On the way, the billion-dollar scheme aimed at restarting shipping routes.
We'll ask if it's enough to get crews back to work.
Plus, the murky world of kidnap and ransoms and the people living through it.
After that major IEA announcement earlier, releasing a record amount of oil to steady global supplies, there's another big development tonight aimed at getting energy moving again.
Now insurance giant Chubb has joined forces with the US International Development Finance Corporation on a 20 billion reinsurance scheme to coast commercial ships back through the Strait of Hormuz.
It offers war risk cover for hulls, machinery and cargo, with the DFC acting as a financial buck stop and other US insurers also playing a role.
Now it's all designed to restart the tankers that have been avoiding the strait since the conflict with Iran shut down traffic.
And as ever, the real test is whether crews feel safe enough to sail.
The DFC is working with the US Central Command on that.
But it's the second major push on Wednesday to get global energy flows moving again.
Well, earlier I caught up with the BBC's North America business correspondent, Michelle Fleury.
If you go back to last week, President Trump early on said that he wanted to try and ensure that the Strait of Hormuz would keep moving through, that commercial shipping could move through.
But what's happened is that obviously with the conflict going on, boats don't think it's safe.
And And so they're not going through.
And in fact, that view was obviously confirmed with three attacks on boats.
And so what Donald Trump has suggested is that the US could provide some sort of reinsurance, essentially a backstop for insurance, to try and help overcome some of the issues that has arisen because of the war with Iran.
One of the things we've seen is that insurance costs have gone through the roof.
So in normal times, if you are an oil tanker going through the Strait of Hormuz, you would have something like ship insurance, cargo insurance, crew insurance, maybe even third party insurance for things like if there was an environmental disaster.
But the problem is, in the event of a conflict or a war, you get all of these contracts typically sort of thrown out and you get repricing going on.
If you can't sort of reroute, then you get repricing.
And that's what has happened.
And it has made policies so expensive that many ships can't afford them or are unwilling to pay that price.
And that is where Donald Trump is hoping to step in, teaming up with the insurance giant Shub and this government agency, the US International Development Finance Corporation.
And is this in practice easy to implement?
Well, it's incredibly complicated, in part because, as I mentioned, there are typically multiple policies that shipping companies have in place.
And what is being talked about here is only one, and that is essentially to cover the ship.
There is talk about whether or not they might expand that or widen the coverage, but at this point it is only that.
The other thing to point out is that in times of conflict, you have special sort of war policies.
And those cover not just sort of a blanket period of time, but each specific journey.
And those are available through Lloyds of London, but they are just a lot more expensive.
And so even if, through what Trump is proposing, they are able to sort of relieve some of the financial pressure,
It doesn't relieve the safety risk.
There were, as we know, on Wednesday, three attacks on tankers and there is that personal danger.
And so captains and crews may say great, you've got insurance, but we don't feel comfortable crewing and captaining these ships.
So Michelle Fleury there, our North America business correspondent.
Our markets guest is Susan Schmidt from Capital Resources in Chicago.
Hi, Susan.
Hello.
So it's interesting today, we've had lots of developments.
Do you think this tie up is enough to move the dial to get tankers moving again, do you think?
Well, investors don't seem to think it is based on the reaction and the price of oil.
And so there are a lot of concerns on putting your equipment into the Strait of Hormuz, how that would work and the details around the insurance and the DCF plan that backstop for Chubb Insurance going to these ships still haven't been made exceptionally clear.
Investors are skeptical.
As a result, we've still seen the price of oil remain elevated.
People are concerned that that supply may not come back online and those ships may not be moving through very soon.
So something that might perhaps have more of an impact is that announcement that by the International Energy Agency so 32 members of the IAA, including the US and the UK and lots of other rich countries agreeing to release 400 million barrels
That's quite significant, but you're saying that oil markets didn't respond in the way that perhaps you'd expect.
So another thing today that was announced that is very significant.
So 400 million, that's the largest release they've ever declared.
And that is meant to be a huge release for the market.
We think 20 million barrels of oil go through the Strait of Hormuz every day.
That's 20 days worth of supply.
But we saw the price of oil drop.
Ease slightly on the announcement and then again go back to levels that are still well elevated over where they were pre-Iran conflict.
We're not seeing the market believe that this is going to be enough to take care of the crisis.
And there's still a lot of skepticism as to when this massive crisis supply chain shift can come back, so that these tankers and the Straits of Hormuz and general global circulation of oil supply can get back in line and be able to deliver what's needed.
So the drawdown of the oil stockpiles is one way governments can try and reassert some control over energy prices.
But what other levers can those empower, Paul?
It's a question I put to Krista Freeland, the former Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister of Canada.
Not just the volatility of oil prices, but the fact that they have jumped so much is a concern for governments.
You have people now starting to talk very seriously about the danger of stagflation.
And so this action, which is a really, really big move, is an effort to try to give the market some predictability and try to keep the price from getting too high.
Right.
So energy prices feed into inflation and the cost of living.
Effectively, if energy prices go up, so do most things.
What exactly can governments and interventions like these make a difference in really for households facing potentially higher fuel and food bills?
Well, look, releasing oil from the strategic reserves is a very strong action.
It is something that can bring the prices down, can bring the price of energy, specifically the price of gas.
It can bring that down.
That is a powerful and important tool.
One of the challenges, though— with a high energy price is the fear that we get of stagflation, so that you'll have an economy slowing down even as inflation is high.
And that is one of the most challenging macro environments for policymakers to deal with.
If you're dealing just with a straight recession, as we did at the beginning of the COVID pandemic, then central banks have a very powerful tool.
They can lower interest rates, and that gives people relief.
It helps the economy to keep going.
But if you have an economic slowdown, which is something that high energy prices can create, but at the same time, consumers being hit by high energy prices, which causes inflation, that tool is not, so available to central banks.
We've heard from the UK finance minister that the energy price cap, a mechanism used to sort of cap bills here in the UK, will remain at its current levels despite energy prices rising.
Do you think we'll see similar acts by other governments?
You know, I think governments are going to be working very, very hard to try to shield their people, to try to shield their consumers.
The challenge there though, is and this is really a consequence of this being a third big shock in less than 20 years is the fiscal capacity of a lot of governments is really, really limited.
And in contrast, for example, with COVID, which was a time of very low interest rates, we have governments that have limited fiscal capacity and we have a high interest rate environment, potentially one which will go higher if inflation rises.
So that makes it hard for governments to be spending the money effectively that they will want to spend may need to spend to shield consumers.
That was Krista Freeland, the former Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister of Canada.
Well, the travel industry has had to hold its breath, with the Middle East being a major transport hub for airlines.
Now the war is costing the region's travel and tourism sector at least 600 million a day, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council.
The WTTC says the losses are driven by a sharp drop in international visitor spending as widespread air travel disruption continues.
Well, earlier I spoke to its CEO, Gloria Goera.
The Middle East was one of the fastest growing regions in terms of international spending in the world.
Although the region represents 5 of the global international arrivals, they handle 14 of the global international transit and traffic.
And the fact that we don't have passengers traveling to the region, or is minimum now, Of course, that's a significant impact.
So an example, Dubai, for instance, Dubai Airport has been growing significantly.
They have done a wonderful job.
It's the largest airport in the world in terms of international travelers.
They manage around 261,000 passengers daily.
So just imagine that those passengers are not connecting.
They're not going to that very important global hub.
And of course, there's a big disruption.
Similar because of Doha, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and the others.
So that's a significant impact.
And in our forecast we were estimating the international visitors spent to have an additional growth this year which we were thinking that it was going to be a little bit over 207 billion.
And that's why our numbers say that is $600 million daily.
As you said there, it's a big transport hub, the Middle East.
Lots of flights fly through the Middle East to connect to Asia or Europe.
And we've seen airlines like British Airways, like Etihad, like Emirates are having to reschedule flights, having to cancel flights and effectively rearrange their schedule for the next couple of weeks.
What impact is this having in terms of day-to-day business?
Clearly that's a cost.
They're going to have to refund passengers, for example.
But what does this mean for business models in tourism, whether it be hotels, whether it be package holidays or airlines?
We see an impact in everything from the passengers not connecting, so we're not connecting.
The global south, as an example, or the east to the west is being impacted due to these global hops being impacted, of course,
And then on top of that is the travellers, the travellers to the Middle East as well.
These are hotel rooms that are not being occupied.
These are restaurants that they don't have the same amount of guests and visitors.
These are, of course, SMEs that are being impacted in the region, but not only in the Middle East because, as I say, the impact is significant.
I heard of people wanting to travel, for instance, from Australia to Europe, and they are struggling to find connectivity, or from Europe.
India as an example, also coming to Europe, they are having a challenge to connect.
So the impact is not in the Middle East.
The 600 million that we mentioned is daily in the Middle East.
But then, of course, there's a domino effect and the impact in other parts of the world.
With tourists that are booked to come on holiday in the next few weeks?
Are you finding that they're cancelling or are they waiting to see what happens?
We are seeing interesting results.
For instance Turkey, our members in Turkey, the hotels, the tour operators, they're telling us that they have seen an increase in bookings.
As an example,
We are seeing also some shifts to some other destinations, but also we're seeing, in the case of the Middle East, some people waiting, waiting to see when this is going to end because, according to the news and what we heard from the Trump administration is that Hopefully this is not going to last too long.
So a lot of people are waiting like, for instance, for bookings in May and summer, and even Eastern people are waiting to see what's going to happen.
We have not seen a lot of cancellations for like next month or the next several months.
Of course, for this month, yes, everything is being canceled or rerouted.
But I guess it depends on where those travellers are coming from.
And just one last question.
In your view, from speaking to people in your industry, to businesses, to individuals, are they betting on this war ending by the Easter holidays?
Well, nobody knows.
We are hoping that this will end before the Easter holidays, right?
That's what we're hoping because that's what we keep hearing from the news.
Now, I have to say the crisis has been managed quite well by the sector.
So because of that, we believe we're going to be recovering really fast.
Travel and tourism is the most resilient sector.
People will always travel.
Gloria Guevara there on the impact the war is having on the tourism sector.
Well, of course, rising oil prices tend to lead to higher inflation.
But in the US, consumers are also dealing with higher cost of imports, partly as a result of tariffs introduced by President Trump.
Let's hear now from some American shoppers in Gainesville in Florida.
I'm a single mom of two boys.
My grocery bill is ridiculously higher than it was.
I don't necessarily like track it, but I'm not happy.
I'm absolutely not happy.
I haven't seen any prices falling, except gas a little bit, but that happens seasonally traditionally.
But the Democrats caused this massive inflation and the massive gas prices which I feel led to massive inflation.
We have seen the prices go up.
Instead of eating out as much, we cook more at home.
My husband has a successful handyman business, so we had means to be able to to eat, which I know a lot of other people don't.
Okay, so some shoppers there in Florida.
We had some US inflation figures out a bit earlier on, with annual consumer inflation unchanged at 24.
Our markets guest Susan Schmidt is still with us.
Susan, inflation figures at the moment holding steady, but presumably predictions are going to kind of edge a little bit upwards.
Well yes, data that was released today shows relates to February.
It does look as if inflation is holding steady, which is a positive
Unfortunately, that data is no longer relevant.
So investors are looking past this, really just washing their hands of today's report, despite it being positive, because now we don't know what will happen with the price of oil.
That's a big portion of inflation and your consumer price index, the data reported today.
That's what could cause a problem.
As we see that spike, then also we could see price spikes overall.
Sure, Susan.
And of course it'll be interesting what this means for the Federal Reserve when it's down to making that all-important decision about interest rates.
You're with World Business Report from the BBC World Service.
Their company's success helped build a nation.
The company is such a big part of Korea's economy.
But who are the family behind one of the world's tech giants?
The major corporate empire that we now know today.
Samsung.
Inheritance Samsung from the BBC World Service explores the real-life dramas of the Lee family and their company Samsung.
There's a succession-style drama underneath of all this. inheritance Samsung.
Coming soon, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
To Santiago now, where the inauguration today of José Antonio Kast as president.
Now the sound there of the draping of the presidential sash from the ceremony in the National Congress.
Well, the right-wing leader now running Chile is expected to do a deal with the US over critical minerals in the coming days, at the risk of souring relations with its biggest customer, China.
Professor Patricio Navia is Professor of Economics at NYU.
He explained to me why the new president was able to clinch a tightly contested election.
Since democracy was restored in Chile in 1990, the US has been Chile's most strategic trade and political partner.
Yet, for the past 15 years, China has been Chile's most important trade partner.
At this point, Chile sells more minerals, mostly copper, to China than to the United States.
So Paz wants to strengthen relations with the United States, but he's going to have to be very careful to do that without alienating China, precisely because China is Chile's most important trade partner at this point.
How do people feel about their new president in Chile?
Well, Chileans voted for Kass mostly because they were not very happy with the direction of the country.
They thought the country was on the wrong track, and thus they voted for an opposition candidate.
Kass didn't really do that well in the first round vote.
He won in the runoff because the alternative was a member of the Communist Party.
So most Chileans see Kast as the lesser of two evils.
Kast will have to deliver on some of his promises and show that he can be the president for all Chileans in order for Chileans to start believing in him.
He mostly won because the alternative was perceived as a worse option by most Chileans.
And so what are they hoping that he will achieve if he was the sort of better of two options?
So the president's cast agenda is very straightforward.
It's not simple to implement, but it's a straightforward agenda.
He's going to have to deal with rising levels of crime and the perception of insecurity, which is Chile's most important concern at this point.
He will also need to deal with undocumented immigration, which has increased drastically.
Now 10% of Chile's population is comprised of immigrants.
20 years ago, it was only 1%.
So immigration is a big problem in Chile.
And third, he's going to have to jumpstart the economy.
The economy hasn't been growing much for the past few years.
And most Chileans associate economic growth with employment creation and the expansion of opportunities.
So a tall order there.
Do you think he'll be able to achieve those things?
Because that sounds like an ambitious list.
Yes, it is an ambitious list.
Part of this will not depend on him.
Paz is going to have to see what happens in world markets.
Chile is very integrated into world markets.
If the economy of the world is doing well, then Chile will sell more copper, more wine, more lithium some of the things that Chile sells.
So the growth of Chile will depend to a large extent on what happens in the world.
But CAS is also going to have to work eliminating some red tape in order for the domestic economy to grow much stronger.
In terms of immigration and crime, the challenge is a bit more difficult, because getting rid of immigrants is not an easy thing to do.
It's difficult.
So he's going to have to find some type of a compromise to legalize some of the undocumented immigrants who now live in Chile and to foster the self-deportation of others, something that seems unlikely.
And in terms of crime Well, changes.
Strengthening the police and doing much more to prevent crime is going to produce results, but only in the long run, not in the short run.
That was Professor Patricio Navia, Professor of Economics at New York University.
Now, we're going to end the programme looking at the business of ransoms.
Now, the UN estimates that tens of thousands of people every year are being kidnapped for ransom.
Precise data is hard to come by because it's massively underreported, especially in West Africa, where in some regions it's become a major criminal industry.
Ed Butler has been looking into this and hearing from one of the region's victims.
The sound there of African villagers being beaten.
This was a video taken last year by a criminal gang in northern Nigeria in order to persuade relatives or lawmakers to part with their cash.
They told my wife, if you don't want us to kill your husband, bring money.
They used to beat us when they want to negotiate with our people.
Tell them you need money. or else they will kill you.
Those are the words of one kidnapped victim, Harayoya, who was taken with his daughter last year.
A ransom was paid.
Mariam was also taken in a separate incident, when gunmen stopped the train that she was travelling on.
More than scared.
More than scared because we were thinking it's a hand of time for us.
Maybe, probably we will not see our families again.
Some 20,000 Nigerians are estimated to have been kidnapped in this way over the last six years.
It's a growing criminal crisis, fuelled by Islamist violence in the north.
Now though, most experts say it's become a free-for-all amongst all kinds of criminal gangs, making Nigeria a global hotspot.
It kind of has spread first to the border with Benin, spreading also into Ghana.
So we have seen a spread basically everywhere.
That's Flora Berger, a researcher at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime.
Basically the original, let's say Nigerian bandits who started doing that.
They have started recruiting younger members of their community in other countries, which basically facilitates the kidnapping of, In the case of northern Ghana.
A lot of the concern, I suppose, around northern Ghana is to do with what's going on in Burkina Faso, to the north right now, with an Islamist uprising with JNIM, a well-known al-Qaeda affiliate.
Is there any sense that this kidnapping spree is associated with the rise of Islamist violence?
To date, there is no evidence proving that the two phenomenon are linked.
But we know from our other work that when JNIM infiltrates a new community, a new territory, one of the first thing they do is kidnap local leaders that can influence their community, or people who have specific intelligence information.
So the kidnapping is a key part of the expansion strategy.
This is a livestock market in eastern Ghana.
And this is Ibrahim.
He's a livestock herder who often trades here.
Last year, his life was turned upside down when kidnappers came knocking on his door.
The day that they came to him, they came around 12 midnight.
He's sleeping and they wake him up and then they tie their hands at the back.
And he's so, so afraid.
He's so, so afraid on that day.
The kidnappers revealed their demands.
200,000 Ghanaian CDs or about $20,000.
Ibrahim said he could only afford a fraction of that.
He's not a wealthy man.
And then he told them that he can't afford that money.
And then they asked him, how much will you give us?
And they told him that he will give them 5,000 CDs.
They said no.
They told him that he should give them 15,000 Ghana CDs.
If he didn't afford that money, they should kill him.
That report was from Ed Butler and you can hear more by searching for Business Daily, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
Well, it's almost the end of World Business Report.
If you want to read more on the Iran war, you can head to our live page, where we have all the latest updates from our reporters around the world.
The latest post reports on the Oman Civil Defence and Ambulance Authority responding to Pfizer to several fuel storage tankers in the port of Salah.
That's it for world business report.
Thanks for listening.
