Fears over US QE3 hit global sentiment; Six things wrong with Italy; Stanford University raises $1.2b; Fall of the blade runner

1 Fears over US QE3 hit global sentiment (Juliette Garside in The Guardian) Fears that the US will hit the brakes on its QE3 stimulus measures have cast a pall over global markets, threatening the new year rally that took many share indices to four-year highs.

Leading stocks in London, which have been enjoying their best prices since October 2007, were pushed 1.62% lower, with the FTSE 100 closing nearly 104 points down at 6292. Having touched its highest level since September 2008 on Wednesday, Tokyo dropped 1.4%. Wall Street exchanges opened lower and continued to fall, extending the previous session's steep declines, which pushed the Standard & Poor index of 500 leading companies to its biggest slump in three months.

The current round of asset buying, aimed at keeping long-term interest rates low in order to stimulate borrowing, was launched in September with a promise that it would be sustained until the labour market improved substantially. With the Fed spending $85bn a month buying securities, and its balance sheet now at $3.078tn, many officials are concerned about the costs and there are signs the open-ended purchasing programme could be curtailed.  

2 Six things wrong with Italy (Lizzy Davies in The Guardian) The Economy: The country is now in its longest recession in 20 years, the economy having contracted for the last six consecutive quarters and languished in more than a decade of almost non-existent growth. Unemployment is at more than 11%; for under-25s, it is more than 36%. Italy has the second highest ratio of sovereign debt to GDP in the EU.

Treatment of women: Two years after hundreds of thousands of Italian women took to the streets to protest against Berlusconi's bunga bunga politics, they still have a fight on their hands. Held back by ingrained cultural attitudes, inadequate public services and political under-representation, they may have better educational qualifications than their male counterparts but they are significantly less likely to be in paid work. The justice system: Slow-moving, hugely bloated and sometimes alarmingly politicised, Italy's justice system needs fixing. 

Crime, corruption: If there is one industry in Italy that has not suffered from the economic crisis, it is organised crime. It is a sector that booms year in, year out. With three significant mafia organisations – the 'Ndrangheta, the Camorra and the Sicilian mafia – the country remains a hub of organised illicit activity, even if the nature of that activity is changing with the times. Long gone are the days when the scourge was confined to the south; mafiosi now operate throughout the country and beyond. 

Politics: Italy has had more national elections and more governments than any other big European power since the second world war. Only one government has lasted the full five-year term since 1945. In this election, the number of different possible outcomes and permutations is daunting even for the most dedicated student of Italian politics. Apathy and disenchantment are rife. North-south divide: In 1861, the year of Italy's birth, unification pioneer Massimo d'Azeglio declared: "We have made Italy; now we must make Italians." To what extent this task been accomplished remains, more than 150 years later, unclear. The disparity between wealthy north and poorer south is one of the country's most impervious and worrying problems.

3 Stanford University raises $1.2b (Straits Times) Stanford University has set a new record for college fund-raising, becoming the first school to collect more than US$1 billion in a single year, according to a report released on Wednesday. For the eighth straight year, Stanford ranked first in the Council for Aid to Education's annual college fund-raising survey, which shows that elite institutions continue to grab a disproportionate share of donor dollars.

In the 2012 fiscal year, roughly 3,500 US colleges and universities raised US$31 billion, 2.3% more than the previous year. The record was set in 2008 when schools took in US$31.6 billion before fund-raising dropped during the height of the financial crisis.

Topping the list was Stanford at US$1.035 billion, followed by Harvard University at US$650 million, Yale University at US$544 million, the University of Southern California at US$492 million and Columbia University at US$490 million. The top 10 fund-raising colleges collected US$5.3 billion, or 17%, of the US$31 billion, even though they represent only 0.3% of the 3,500 accredited, non-profit schools included in the survey.

4 Fall of the blade runner (Khaleej Times) In Oscar Pistorius’ case, acquittal, if it ever comes, will never be synonymous with ‘not guilty’. The reputation of the 26-year-old ‘blade runner’, hitherto exalted as a hero in the world of sports, has already been compromised in the eyes of the public. 

The judicial system is based on circumstantial evidence, and when the latter is even slightly insufficient, objectively allotting blame to any party is a slippery slope. No example better encapsulates this point than the seven-year trial of O.J. Simpson, after which he was acquitted by the criminal court. But later, a civil court found a preponderance of evidence against Simpson and charged him for murder and battery.

But regardless of the verdict of Pistorius’ trial, which can take up to years, he is history as a Paralympian. Another idol from the world of sports has fallen unceremoniously.