Good morning! Gisèle Pelicot’s daughter filed rape case against Dominique Pelicot and releases book, big law firms are next target of Trump’s anti-DEI agenda, and P&L responsibility is critical—but it can come too late.

– Never too late? Seventy-one percent of women leaders have held P&L (or profit and loss) responsibility at some point in their careers, according to a new survey by the leadership advisory firm Spencer Stuart. The issue is, many women are getting that responsibility too late for it to have a meaningful impact on their career trajectory.

P&L responsibility is a key qualifier for most senior leadership roles including CEO, demonstrating the ability to drive revenue, manage budget and headcount, and own a business unit. Non-P&L roles—in operations or human resources, for example—are a less traditional trajectory to the very top. Spencer Stuart defines P&L roles as coming with broad exposure to the business, more visibility, and more risk.

In a survey of 2,300 senior women executives, those who moved into P&L roles within the first five years of their career (a quarter of those overall who had P&L experience) were more likely to say they proactively planned or managed their careers. They reported higher satisfaction with their work climate and were more likely to say that conditions for women at work continue to progress.

Cassandra Frangos, a board and CEO adviser at Spencer Stuart, advises women to seek out P&L responsibility within the first seven to 10 years of their careers—far earlier than many do. “When women don’t select these roles, or aren’t offered them early on, they risk being categorized as a narrow expert who may not be agile enough to take on a different discipline later in their career,” she says. “As opposed to someone who has shown range across multiple parts of a business, like sales or finance, and has a track record of delivering solid financial results.”

Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com

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For three weeks straight, Marina Budiman became roughly $350 million richer each day.

By mid-March the president commissioner of Indonesia’s biggest data center operator sat atop a $7.5 billion fortune after her company’s shares repeatedly soared by the daily limit, making her the nation’s wealthiest woman, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Then the stock of DCI Indonesia crashed. In just three days, Budiman’s net worth fell by half, adding yet another boom-and-bust stock run to Indonesia’s sizable tally.

All told, Budiman and fellow billionaires and DCI controlling shareholders — Otto Toto Sugiri and Han Arming Hanafia — saw their combined fortunes soar by over $17 billion before they plummeted. At Tuesday’s close, the shares had given up more than half the gains since the rally began in mid-February.

Wild price swings in stocks are a common and increasingly problematic feature of Indonesia’s equity market. Dozens of firms have moved by 1,000% or more in recent years, their shares seemingly unshackled from the underlying financials. DCI closed on Tuesday with a market value of close to $17 billion, compared to last year’s revenue of $112 million and $49 million profit. The company trades at 416 times earnings, the highest relative to a group of peers tracked by Bloomberg.

Partly to blame are the large number of companies whose shares are thinly traded. Budiman, Sugiri, Hanafia and a fourth large owner, billionaire tycoon Anthoni Salim, hold 78% of DCI’s shares. Of the 2.4 billion outstanding, 80,400 shares changed hands by midday Wednesday in Jakarta compared with millions at companies in Indonesia of a similar size. 

DCI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

DCI’s price swings “are largely a function of its tight free float,” said Mohit Mirpuri, a fund manager at SGMC Capital Pte in Singapore. “Bid-offer spreads are narrow, so any substantial positioning can move the stock significantly,” Mirpuri said.

DCI was the worst performer as Indonesia’s benchmark stock index plunged on Tuesday and triggered a 30-minute suspension. Traders attributed the overall decline to factors including concerns over President Prabowo Subianto’s populist measures, forced liquidations and uncertainties over the finance ministry’s leadership. 

“The selloff has been a bolt from the blue in many ways — the suddenness has caught the market by surprise,” said Nirgunan Tiruchelvam, an analyst at Aletheia Capital in Singapore.

Before the reversal in recent days, DCI may have benefited from investors betting that demand for data centers will continue to grow and help drive foreign investment. For example, Oracle Corp. is in discussions with Indonesia’s government to establish a cloud services center in the country, Bloomberg News reported Friday.

Budiman, 63, helped co-found DCI over a decade ago. Sugiri, 71, and Hanafia are also co-founders. 

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German lawmakers gave the green light on Tuesday for a colossal spending boost for defence and infrastructure pushed by chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz amid deep fears in Europe over the future strength of the transatlantic alliance.

The unprecedented fiscal package — dubbed “XXL-sized” and a cash “bazooka” by German media — could pave the way for more than one trillion euros in spending over the next decade in Europe’s top economy.

The historic parliament vote signalled a radical departure for a country famously reluctant to take on large state debt — or to spend heavily on the armed forces, given its dark World War II history.

Merz, who is expected to become Germany’s next chancellor after his CDU/CSU alliance won last month’s elections, argued that dramatic steps are needed at a time of geopolitical turmoil sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

European countries have been further unsettled by US President Donald Trump’s outreach to Russia and signals of an uncertain commitment to NATO and Europe’s defence.

Speaking to parliament, Merz cited Russia’s “war of aggression against Europe” and said the funding boost would spell “the first major step towards a new European defence community”.

Merz’s centre-right alliance and their likely future coalition partners, the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) of outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz, have hammered out the package over recent weeks.

The plan would exempt defence spending above one percent of GDP from Germany’s strict debt rules and set up a 500-billion-euro ($545-billion) fund for infrastructure investments over 12 years.

In the short term, Berlin looked set to soon approve an additional three billion euros in military aid for Ukraine.

‘New era’

After heated debate in parliament — where the plan was opposed by the far right, far left and a small liberal party — it cleared the two-thirds majority needed and passed by a margin of 513 to 207 votes.

It still requires approval by the upper house on Friday, but the likely future governing partners have voiced confidence it will also clear the final hurdle.

Merz, 69, had urged lawmakers to approve the measures at a time when Trump’s contacts with Russia and hostility towards Ukraine have shaken Europe.

He argued that Russia’s war “is a war against Europe and not just a war against the territorial integrity of Ukraine,” citing cyber- and arson attacks as well as disinformation campaigns blamed on Moscow.

Merz said strong relations with the United States remained “indispensable” but that Europe needed to do more to ensure its own security and Germany should play a leading role.

The spending boost is “nothing less than the first major step towards a new European defence community” that could include non-EU members like Britain and Norway, he added.

Defence Minister Boris Pistorius from the SPD justified the mega-spending by saying that “we are facing a new era for Europe, for Germany, for NATO and for future generations”.

He argued that boosting defence on the continent would strengthen the transatlantic alliance “and place it on two legs, namely North America and Europe”.

‘Peace in Europe’

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen hailed Berlin’s move as “excellent news, because it sends a very clear message also to Europe that Germany is determined to invest massively in defence”.

NATO chief Mark Rutte wrote on X that “this sends a powerful message of leadership and commitment to our shared security”.

And French President Emmanuel Macron on a visit to Berlin congratulated Scholz “on the historic vote of the Bundestag which is good news for Germany and good news for Europe”.

Germany’s two big-tent parties — which hope to form a government by late April — rushed the package through the outgoing parliament with support from the Greens, who had demanded several key amendments.

The ecologist party had negotiated that 100 billion of the infrastructure spending be earmarked for climate-protection measures.

In the next parliament, the far-right and Moscow-friendly Alternative for Germany (AfD) and the far-left Die Linke — which both opposed the plans — would have had the numbers needed to block the package.

Before the vote, Bernd Baumann of the AfD accused Merz of ignoring the will of voters by seeking to push the vote through the outgoing parliament.

Baumann charged that Merz “wants to buy himself the chancellorship from the SPD and the Greens, like in a banana republic”.

Lars Klingbeil of the SPD said that the new spending aimed to “maintain peace in Europe” — but also to “invest in advancing the economy and strengthening social cohesion” and therefore to help counter “division and polarisation”.

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