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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Economy & business fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about economy & business. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

7,096 published reviews in this topic

dpaEconomy & business

Wichtige Akteure der Coronakrise sind wirtschaftlich eng miteinander verflochten.

Publisher’s rating: Eine Vielzahl dieser Behauptungen über angebliche Verbindungen zwischen Pharmafirmen, Versicherungskonzernen, Bill Gates, George Soros und der Weltgesundheitsorganisation ist falsch.

The review examined a Facebook post that presented supposed connections among economic actors during the coronavirus crisis as a hidden web of influence. It describes the post as combining claims about pharmaceutical companies, insurers, prominent investors and public figures, and notes that versions of it had circulated for over a year. The post’s appeal to information supposedly available online did not establish that its asserted relationships were true; the review checked specific ownership and affiliation claims against the information it reports. Several central claims about corporate ownership were contradicted by the review. It states that GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) did not own Pfizer: Pfizer was largely held by institutional investors, while GSK’s share ownership was widely distributed. BlackRock was an investor in both companies, not the manager of GSK’s finances. The review also distinguishes the companies’ actual collaboration—a consumer-healthcare joint venture announced in 2019—from the post’s claims about ownership and vaccines. It says that venture concerned everyday consumer products, not vaccines or medicines. The review also checked claims involving Soros, Winterthur, Wuhan and Microsoft. It reports that Winterthur had belonged to AXA since 2007, not Soros, and that it had not built a Wuhan laboratory. The Wuhan Institute of Virology belonged to the Chinese Academy of Sciences; the review says the institute’s laboratory originated in cooperation between the French and Chinese governments, with France supplying safety technology. It further states that Microsoft was not owned by Bill Gates and that Gates was not BlackRock’s largest shareholder. These findings address particular alleged links rather than establishing that economic actors have no connections at all.

Boatos.orgEconomy & business

Essas são as novas cédulas. Quero ver os Ladrões que escondem dinheiro em malas como vão provar a origem do dinheiro.

Publisher’s rating: Falso

The claim accompanied a video said to show new Brazilian real banknotes that would help expose corrupt politicians hiding money. The review reproduces the wording about “Ladrões que escondem dinheiro em malas” and says the posts claimed the notes would be distributed to banks to end corruption. It concludes that the video did not show new banknotes and that the Central Bank had no plans to replace the existing designs. The review identifies the objects in the video as folders related to real banknotes, intended for collectors and people who study banknotes, rather than newly issued currency. It points to a video by the YouTube channel Sem Limites as showing those products. The article also reports that Agência Lupa debunked the rumor and quotes its account of a Central Bank representative saying there were no plans to change the notes and that the video showed a collector product. The review’s reasoning addresses both parts of the claim: it distinguishes the video’s actual subject from new currency, and rejects the alleged plan to use a currency change to catch corrupt people. It adds that changing the notes would be costly and would not, in its view, stop corruption.