It has now given a six-month reprieve to holders of bearer passbooks, which, although generally used by unsophisticated savers, are also an easy means of transferring money illicitly.

ECONOMIST: Savings accounts in Italy

Their successful completion of the docking mission at 12:47 pm local time on Sunday means China is fully capable of transferring humans and cargo to an orbiter in space much like the Americans, only the Americans have abandoned further work in this area beyond the current International Space Station expedition which ends next month.

FORBES: China's Space Age Grows Up As U.S. Space Race Winds Down

The legal system in Spain has a problem with the underlying legal structure of a UK pension scheme, which means that it is not possible to complete the legal process of transferring a property into it.

BBC: Ask the expert: Pensions and property

That means transferring the state-level habits of government up to Washington and moving some powers exercised in Washington back to the states.

ECONOMIST: A praline kind of party