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A win for small businesses in India, as the country's postal service resumes sending parcels to the US.
But it isn't without an added cost.
It's World Business Express from the BBC World Service.
I'm Hannah Mullane.
Also, Donald Trump agrees a $20 billion currency swap with Argentina's central bank.
But will it help have a mille at the midterm congressional elections?
And how many hours do you work in a day?
The Greek government will soon vote on a new law that could see employees working 13 hours a day.
Hello.
We are starting in India, a country hit hard by US tariffs and for small businesses, there's another block in the road.
This breaking news is from India and India has suspended most postal services to the United States.
India is to suspend postal service to US from the 25th of August after Trump tariff moves.
The Indian Postal Service to the US was suspended in August after customs rules changed and small packages could no longer enter America duty-free.
Last year, more than a billion small parcels were sent between India and the US.
After months of no post, today India is resuming the service.
The BBC's Archana Shukla reports from Mumbai.
So the India Post has come up with a press statement saying that they're starting from today.
They'll be taking the duties up front here while people go to the postal services to book their parcels.
They will have to pay the duty up front, which can then be sent back to the US, and this would also help in quickly sending the parcels, and even doorstep delivery in the United States will be much quicker, and the customs clearance will also be much quicker.
And this must be really good news for business, because this is a system that's going to really impact the small and medium sized businesses that send things to the US.
Absolutely because, you know, for most small businesses in India, Indian Postal Service comes up as an affordable alternative to many private businesses courier services.
So most of them, especially like small exporters artisans, online sellers let's say, those who sell handcrafted jewellery or some designers who you know ship wedding outfits, etc.
For all of them, and even companies that sell, let's say, handmade decor on platforms like Etsy or Shopify, Indian Postal Services actually comes up as a much affordable service.
It's the festive season ongoing.
Diwali is just around the corner and post that the wedding season will come up.
These small parcels may seem like nothing, but about 136 billion such small parcels were in fact delivered from India to the US in 2024.
So it's not a small business we're talking about.
Great for those small businesses that they're able to send those parcels again, but they are still going to have to pay this new fee, which is much more than what they're used to paying.
It absolutely is, and that will somewhere impact some bit of demand for products.
But resumption of services at least brings them back on the business.
And tariffs are something that most small businesses are now taking up on their chin.
Archana Shukla reporting from Mumbai.
Let's cross to Washington DC, where the US has agreed a $20 billion currency swap with Argentina.
President Trump met with his Argentine counterpart at the White House and didn't shy away from throwing his support behind Javier Millet ahead of the midterm congressional elections in Argentina.
But Mr Trump also suggested any continued American support for Argentina could be subject to Millet's victory.
If the president doesn't win, I know the person that he'd be running against.
I believe extremely far left and a philosophy that got Argentina into this problem in the first place.
So we would not be generous with Argentina if that happened.
If he loses, we are not going to be generous with Argentina.
We think he's going to win.
And if he does win, we're going to be very helpful.
And if he doesn't win, we're not going to waste our time, because you have somebody whose philosophy has no chance of making Argentina great again.
I'm with this man because his philosophy is correct.
And if he wins, we're staying with him.
And if he doesn't win, we're gone.
But will this big financial support make a difference?
Here's our South America correspondent, Ione Wells.
Whether or not that really makes a difference, though, to Henry Argentine's, I'm not so sure.
I think Hull suggests that Javier Millet's popularity has dipped in recent months.
Firstly, because there are suggestions that people are tiring of some of his austerity measures, the sharp cuts that he's implemented.
But also suggestions too, that people are not happy with the fact there have been various corruption scandals that have rocked his party.
Indeed, after this meeting between President Trump and President Milley, the peso actually fell, suggesting that investors aren't also convinced that this support package will necessarily make a huge difference, especially because Trump has seemingly hinged it on whether or not Javier Milley can gain more political support.
The BBC South America correspondent, Ione Wells there.
On Tuesday we had the French Prime Minister proposing a new budget and suspending those controversial pension reforms.
Russ Mould is Investment Director at AJ Bell and is with us in the studio.
Russ, how have markets responded today?
A degree of relief, I think, hoping for some political stability.
The French CAC 40 headline stock index is up 2%.
Perhaps most importantly for Monsieur Cornu, the Prime Minister, French government borrowing costs as measured by the 10-year bond, that's down five hundredths of 1.
3.36%.
It's a long way below the sort of summer highs that we saw.
But that is partly because he's talking about higher taxes, spending cuts.
He's still got to get those through.
But at the moment at least, the bond market, the borrowing costs, are fairly pleased to see that France is still talking a tough game.
Now it's a matter of whether he can play one or not.
Yeah, some big promises there.
And the luxury brand LVMH also reporting results today, which gave French markets a boost.
Yeah, it's a big stock on the Paris boost.
That's a huge boost, particularly with the shares up 12, albeit after a very steep fall over the last couple of years.
Basically, the company's third quarter sales were better than expected.
Online retail operations separated well.
Perfume and cosmetics were very strong.
Perhaps most importantly of all, they did give some hints that the Chinese consumer was coming back, both at home and as a tourist abroad, and that gave a lift to the wider luxury sector.
So Moncler of Italy, Burberry of the UK, Hermes of France, all of their shares up 5 6, 7 today.
Yeah, definitely suggesting more spending power from China.
But China have also come out with some consumer data today.
So what does that tell us?
Yeah, some consumer price inflation data.
Still overall quite weak on a headline basis suggesting that the Chinese economy is still struggling.
You still have real estate busts.
You still have difficulty in getting consumers to really be very positive about a mixed economic outlook.
But overall, the rate of decline was less bad.
And once you strip out some volatile elements.
There was actually some signs of increases in some stage there as well, which maybe hints that possibly China is finally feeling the benefit of some fiscal and some monetary stimulus.
Yes, because China is also supporting that, isn't it?
With subsidies, trying to get consumers to spend more.
What kind of impact does that have?
It's pulling all sorts of different levers on welfare payments, on interest rates, and it's doing And also government policies to try and push back on this involution concept of.
Lots of manufacturing to stimulate growth, but that's backfired because there's been too much supply, so prices have gone down.
So now it's much more focusing on infrastructure, technology and employing people in those key areas to try and stimulate growth and wages in a different way.
Rosmould, Investment Director at AJ Bell, thank you for joining us.
So how long is your working day?
In Greece, it may soon be up to 13 hours.
Parliament is voting on a bill allowing private sector staff to work up to an extra five hours a day.
That's if both the employee and employer agree.
While labour unions have called mass strikes and have been protesting ahead of the vote.
We are here for our own lives, to state that working time is not a commodity, that we will not work from dawn to dusk to increase the profits of industries, that we're human beings, we have rights, we have lives, we have families, we have children.
We are once again repeating to the government that we are not robots, we are human beings.
We can't exhaust ourselves.
We need personal time for our lives and our families.
Well, Greece is already facing high debt, rising inflation and lower wages, much more than the European Union in general.
And the centre-right government says that longer hours will be optional and capped at 48 hours a week.
Overtime pay will be better compensated with a 40% bonus.
That brings us to a close for this edition of World Business Express with me, Hannah Mullane.
Thank you so much for listening.
If you'd like more business news, you can head to our website, bbc.com forward slash news.
Thanks so much for listening.
