Mehmet Bogday says his jaw dropped when he saw his electricity bill — it was higher than the rent he pays for his Istanbul restaurant selling traditional Turkish wraps, and more than double what he paid a month ago.

"This is unsustainable," said Bogday, who owns the Asmali Mescit Durumcusu restaurant. "If it continues this way, we will have to lay off staff. If it continues this way, we won't be able to make this work. We'll either downsize, or close and go sit at home."

Prime Minister Najib Miqati said Friday that a new law for the ports, including the port of Beirut, is being prepared.

He added, in a ceremony at the Grand Serail, that Beirut's port must be rebuilt for it to attract optimal investments.

The Cabinet on Thursday approved the 2022 state budget during a session at the Baabda Palace.

Speaking at a press conference after the session, Prime Minister Najib Miqati said the budget’s revenues are expected to be LBP 39,000 billion and its expenditure is expected to be LBP 47,000 billion.

Twitter's shares jumped in early trading Thursday after it posted strong revenue growth last year and announced a $4 billion share buyback program. That's despite losing money in 2021 and falling short of Wall Street's expectations for user growth in the final quarter of the year.

Revenue increased 37%, to $5.08 billion, compared with 2020. But it reported a net loss of $221 million for the year largely tied to the settlement of a shareholder lawsuit.

U.S. markets were mixed ahead of the opening bell Thursday as investors awaited data on U.S. inflation and employment.

Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial were up a slight 0.2%, while futures for the S&P 500 declined by 0.1%.

Tesla is recalling nearly 579,000 vehicles in the U.S. because a "Boombox" function can play sounds over an external speaker and obscure audible warnings for pedestrians.

The recall is the fourth made public in the last two weeks as U.S. safety regulators increase scrutiny of the nation's largest electric vehicle maker. In two of the recalls, Tesla made decisions that violate federal motor vehicle safety standards, while the others are software errors.

Budvar, the Czech brewer that has been in a long legal dispute with U.S. company Anheuser-Busch over use of the "Budweiser" brand, has registered a record output for the second straight pandemic year.

Budejovicky Budvar NP, a 126-year-old state-owned brewery, said its output rose 4.6% to 1.8 million hectoliters (47.8 million gallons) in 2021, according to preliminary results released on Thursday.

The foreign ministers of Australia and Lithuania agreed Wednesday to step up cooperation on strategic challenges, in particular pressures from China.

Lithuania's Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis and his Australian counterpart Marise Payne met Wednesday at Parliament House.

The European Union announced a $48 billion plan Tuesday to become a major microchip producer to try to curb its dependency on Asian markets for the component that powers everything from cars to hospital ventilators and game consoles.

At a time when natural gas shortages and reliance on Russia for energy shows the political risks of economic dependency, the 27-nation bloc is moving to boost its economic independence in the critical semiconductor sector with its Chips Act.

Thailand on Tuesday moved one step closer toward being the first Asian nation to decriminalize marijuana, after its health minister signed a measure officially dropping cannabis from a list of controlled drugs.

The delisting will mean all parts of cannabis, including flowers and seeds, are allowed to be used in Thailand. However, extracted content will remain illegal if it contains more than 0.2% of the psychoactive ingredient that produces a "high" — tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC.