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Good morning from the Financial Times. Today is Tuesday, January 18th,

and this is your FT News Briefing.

UK inflation numbers are out this week. China is changing the way it lends to Africa,

and the FT's Hannah Murphy has been looking into Facebook's plans for its metaverse.

The company's patent application suggests it might go after a lot more data.

Data that perhaps it's never collected before, and that might be your eye movements,

your pupil movements, your nose wrinkles, your scrunchier forehead.

I'm Joanna Gau, in for Mark Filipino, and here's the news you need to start your day.

Inflation in the UK is expected to rise to a 30-year high. Tomorrow we'll see data from December,

and a Reuters poll's forecasting inflation at 5.2%. Economists point to higher energy costs,

stronger demand for most goods and services, and continued supply chain disruption.

Now, bearing in mind the economic forecasts are especially uncertain during the pandemic,

most experts predict inflation will peak in April. That's prompting expectations that the

Bank of England will increase its key interest rate several times this year.

We've been hearing a lot about Facebook's plans to build a metaverse.

The company even renamed itself meta, but how exactly is it going to make money from this

avatar-filled virtual universe? The FT's Hannah Murphy search for clues in a number of patent

applications that met as filed. She said many of them were for technologies aimed at collecting data

they've never collected before. And that might be your eye movements, your pupil movements,

if your nose wrinkles, if you scrunch your forehead, in order to power its metaverse.

...