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In the Silicon Valley arms race to lure the top talent with the best benefits, Facebook and Apple are adding egg freezing for female employees. The two companies may be the first to pay for the procedure for women who choose it to delay child bearing.

The addition of egg freezing to the benefits plan comes as tech companies face mounting pressure to hire more women. And it's a perk that some women may find attractive.

Brigitte Adams started a community forum called Eggsurance, where women can share information about the procedure. Adams paid for the procedure herself. "I froze my eggs at 39," she says, "and there was nothing out there that was specific to egg freezing."

The American Society of Reproductive Medicine only lifted the experimental label from egg freezing two years ago. Adams, a marketing executive at a tech start up, says the addition of coverage for the procedure definitely would give extra weight to a job offer.

Freezing Eggs To Make Babies Later Moves Toward Mainstream

No Longer Experimental, Egg Freezing May Appeal To More Women

"I would equate it to reimbursement for an MBA program," she says, "or adoption assistance, or, you know — it's not the be-all and end-all, but it's definitely a nice perk."

And an expensive one — the benefit covers $20,000 worth of procedures, typically two rounds of egg retrieval. Then again, rich Silicon Valley companies are notorious for high-end benefits that can include gourmet food, dry cleaning, and massages.

Cali Williams Yost, who consults with companies about work/life balance, says covering the cost egg freezing as an elective procedure could help keep some good women employees. (The benefit also is available to employees' spouses.)

"By offering to pay for women to freeze their eggs, I think Silicon Valley is responding to what some of the young, talented women in their workforce want," she says.

But, Williams Yost says enabling female employees in particular to delay having children isn't all that's needed: At some point those workers will have children, and also will need the right benefits then.

"They are going to need the direct supports, the flexibility, the care-giving" she says, "leaves and benefits that actually help them combine work and life. Egg-freezing is a great small piece of a much bigger puzzle."

Facebook told NPR that its offering this benefit because employees were asking for it. In a statement, Apple also said it wanted to make certain its women employees could "do the best work of their lives." Both companies have paid parental leave policies and on-site healthcare. Facebook also subsidizes day care costs.

But Marcy Darnovsky, Executive Director at the Center for Genetics and Society, says that expanding benefits to cover egg freezing could put pressure on women to delay childbearing so that their employer can get more hours out of them. Darnovsky is an advocate for the responsible use of reproductive technologies.

"When you're in a situation of your employer offering you a choice," she says, "you really have to be careful that you're distinguishing between something that's an expanded option and something that's actually subtle or even explicit pressure to do what your employer wants you to do."

But, Darnovsky believes there is also a virtue in egg freezing because it does give women more choices and control over their lives.

Egg freezing is no guarantee of having a child, though. Studies indicate that women who have three rounds of egg retrieval at around $10,000 per round have a slightly more than 30 percent chance of giving birth if they are 25 or younger when the eggs are frozen. The closer women get to forty, the lower the likelihood of success. If women limit themselves to the two rounds of egg retrieval covered by the new benefits, that also will reduce the odds.

Eggsurance forum founder Briggitt Adams froze her eggs when she was 39. She says that she didn't do it for career reasons, but to give herself as many options as she could given the circumstances of her life, and that that's why many women she knows did the procedure.

"We're doing it maybe because our life didn't take the course we expected it to, she says, "and we're older and we want to have children and, hey, there's this new technology that may help us do that."

Adams is currently single and she says freezing her eggs has made it easier for her to look for the right partner without feeling as much pressure from her biological clock.

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I've been traveling to Hong Kong since 1997, when the former British colony returned to Chinese rule. Reporting on the pro-democracy protests in recent weeks, I've been struck by a change in the people here. Many are no longer willing to give their full names when talking about politics and the current protests.

A couple of nights ago I was interviewing a real estate agent in a pinstripe suit on an elevated walkway as police battled and pepper-sprayed demonstrators in the distance.

The man, 27, wasn't a protester, but supported the pro-democracy movement and explained why. When I asked him for his name, he only offered his surname, Wu. I asked him why he didn't want to be identified.

"The speech freedom is just fading out," he said. "I was very confident in Hong Kong 10 years ago, but things change very quick. Everything is getting worse. I have to protect myself at this moment."

Then I asked if I had interviewed him 10 years ago about politics, would he have given me his full name then?

"Maybe," he said. "Maybe, yes."

In the protest tent camp below, I ran across a man named Abe, who was helping to build desks from scrap wood. The main camp stretches across Harcourt Road amid the glass-and-steel towers of Hong Kong's Admiralty district. Using the highway's concrete divider, protesters have built an open-air study hall so students can keep up with their homework.

"I have no experience in carpentry," said Abe, who is Hong Kong-Canadian. "A lot of this is just volunteerism. I see people picking up garbage and I just volunteer."

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When I asked Abe for his full name, he also declined. He is in marketing and travels to China, where he works with manufacturers.

"I like to go to China and they will put me on a watch list," he said. "A few of the outspoken and more famous leaders in the Democrat party or other parties aren't allowed to go back to China."

Abe may be overly cautious, but he said many people feel the same way.

"I think as Hong Kong is having more economic ties with China, a lot of people are employing self-censorship," Abe said. "That's the bottom line. A lot of people are self-censoring."

Maya Wang, a researcher for the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, says under British colonial rule, Hong Kongers tended to speak their minds.

"I think freedom of expression and freedom of the press were freedoms that were taken for granted in Hong Kong," says Wang, who lives here. "It was just part of daily life."

When Hong Kong returned to China, Beijing promised the territory could keep its way of life for 50 years, but Wang says free speech and a free press are under threat. She cites the case of billionaire Jimmy Lai, the owner of Apple Daily newspaper and a huge, pro-democracy supporter.

A car rammed into Lai's home last year and someone left a meat cleaver and an axe outside his front gate. This week, crowds surrounded Apple Daily offices at times and tried to block the newspaper's delivery. The Wall Street Journal noted that the demonstrators came on charter buses, pitched identical new tents at the scene and appeared to be a rent-a-mob.

The case of journalist Kevin Lau is more frightening. A hired assailant nearly hacked him to death this year with a meat cleaver.

Lau is a Beijing critic and the highly respected former editor of Ming Pao, a daily newspaper that has heavily covered the pro-democracy movement. Lau insists he was attacked for his journalism.

"These two incidents against Jimmy Lai and Kevin Lau are very chilling ... to the Hong Kong people," says Wang, the human rights researcher. "If you have lots of money and you speak on democracy, you could be subjected to these kinds of attacks. What happens to the small, ordinary people who have neither the money nor the fame to protect them?"

The answer: They're more careful about what they say and more reluctant to give their full names – just like people across the border in mainland China.

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Hong Kong

China National Radio

With oil around $85 a barrel and tumbling to its lowest levels in several years, here's the upside: Gasoline prices are down, the U.S. is feeling less dependent on foreign crude, and serious economic pressure is growing on oil producers such as Iran and Russia.

Here's the downside: The low demand for oil reflects a fragile global economy that's vulnerable to additional shocks, like falling stock markets around the world.

Oil is still a uniquely influential commodity. Whenever prices move sharply in either direction, they unleash ripples around the globe that are both economic and political.

"We've had a three-year period of very stable oil prices," Michael Levi of the Council on Foreign Relations told NPR's All Things Considered. "Three years is a long time. People were starting to believe that this was permanent. And they were wrong. So the big news is that volatility is back, that big swings are what we should expect."

With the prices down around 25 percent since hitting $112 a barrel in June, here's a roundup of the impact worldwide:

Political Turmoil, Falling Prices: Something strange is happening. Three key oil producers (Iraq, Libya and Nigeria) are mired in domestic turbulence, and Iran's oil exports have been dramatically reduced by international sanctions.

In years past, trouble in these countries might have instigated panic in the oil market, driving up prices dramatically. But today, there's plenty of oil to go around for several reasons. Production in the United States is surging, Saudi Arabia and other OPEC countries have continued to pump at high levels, and overall global demand is weak.

While these conditions may not last, they do reflect what's been the steady loss of clout among big oil producers, particularly those in the Middle East.

The U.S. is producing more of its own oil and is buying the remainder from a wide range of mostly stable countries. The leading foreign supplier is Canada. Middle Eastern nations account for just three of the top 10 exporters to the U.S., and they account for around 10 percent of U.S. oil needs.

Russia's Lukoil launched this oil field in western Siberia on Oct. 8. Russia is heavily dependent on its oil exports and is now facing financial problems as world oil prices drop sharply. The country is also facing Western economic sanctions. Olesya Astakhova /Reuters/Landov hide caption

itoggle caption Olesya Astakhova /Reuters/Landov

Russia And Iran: From the U.S. perspective, one of the benefits of falling oil prices is the pressure they place on Russia and Iran. Both countries are heavily dependent on oil exports at high prices. They face the double whammy of Western sanctions that are also biting.

Russia needs an oil price of $100 a barrel and Iran needs around $130 a barrel to balance their budgets, according to The Economist.

The financial hurt these countries are facing could have political implications.

Russia is at odds with the West over its annexation of Crimea and its ongoing role in Ukraine's turmoil. Russian President Vladimir Putin has consistently opted for confrontation, but the price for that position is getting steeper. Putin pushed back against a request for higher government spending this week, citing reduced government revenue from energy production.

"You know that energy prices have fallen as well as for some of our other traditional products," Putin said. "Due to that, would we not, on the contrary, reconsider the budget toward reducing some spending?"

Iran, meanwhile, is negotiating on its nuclear program with the international community and is also waging a proxy war with Saudi Arabia for power and influence throughout the Middle East.

This is one likely reason the Saudis have been willing to pump oil at high levels even though that's contributing to low prices. The Saudis publicly cite a business motive, saying they want to maintain their current share of the oil market. But the Saudis are also well aware that low prices mean less money for archrival Iran.

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Oil wells near McKittrick, Calif., one of the places where hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is on the rise. The U.S. became the world's largest oil producer this year, surpassing Saudi Arabia and pumping some 11 million barrels a day. David McNew/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption David McNew/Getty Images

Oil wells near McKittrick, Calif., one of the places where hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is on the rise. The U.S. became the world's largest oil producer this year, surpassing Saudi Arabia and pumping some 11 million barrels a day.

David McNew/Getty Images

U.S. Production: Despite soft demand, U.S. oil production is rising again this year due primarily to hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The U.S., which became the world's largest natural gas producer in 2010, is now the world's largest oil producer this year, surpassing Saudi Arabia this year and pumping around 11 million barrels a day.

The average U.S. gas price is $3.17 a gallon this week, down around 15 percent since June, according to GasBuddy.com. The lower price at the pump effectively serves as a stimulus for consumers that can encourage increased spending to stimulate the economy.

"It's quite possible that Christmas shopping will be much better this year because consumers will be spending less for gasoline," economist Philip Verleger told NPR's Morning Edition.

While lower energy prices benefit most of the country, they could deliver a blow to oil-producing states like Texas, Oklahoma and North Dakota. If prices go down and stay down for an extended period, energy companies could cut back on production and investment.

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'A Global Bathtub': Rethinking The U.S. Oil Export Ban

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The 1973 Arab Oil Embargo: The Old Rules No Longer Apply

The Global Economy: Lower gas prices are a small consolation if accompanied by a sluggish world economy, and that's what many economists are forecasting. In Europe and Asia, most of the major economies have low or slow growth compared with recent years.

China and India, which were gulping down imported oil as their economies raced ahead, have both seen slowdowns. The lower oil prices will help keep their manufacturing and transportation costs down, but that alone is not enough if the rest of the world is less interested in buying their exports.

Of course, oil prices could reverse direction swiftly and dramatically, as they have many times in the past. Small shifts in world oil production, currently around 92 million barrels a day, often lead to major swings in prices. If, for example, Saudi Arabia chose to cut production, or the fighting in Iraq shut down its oil fields, prices could head north in a hurry, according to analysts.

Greg Myre is the international editor of NPR.org. You can follow him @gregmyre1.

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Mexico's banking regulator has slapped a nearly 30 million peso ($2.2 million) fine on the Citigroup subsidiary Banamex, for failing to provide sufficient accounting controls. The regulator said the lack of oversight allowed the Mexican firm Oceanografia to allegedly dupe the bank out of $400 million.

Banamex had lent the money to Oceanografia, an oil services firm contracted by the state petroleum monopoly, PEMEX, based on invoices that turned out to be fake.

Oceanografia has not been charged with any wrongdoing but is under investigation. The company's CEO and controlling shareholder, Amado Yanez Osuna, had been under house arrest for nearly two months. He faces bank fraud charges in Mexico but was released earlier this summer after posting $6.2 million bond.

Citigroup fired 12 Banamex employees after discovering the alleged fraud, which also led to the resignation of several high-level employees, including Chief Executive Javier Arrigunaga, according to The Wall Street Journal.

But the Mexican newspaper Reforma points out that the fine represents less than half a percent of Banamex's earnings during the first half of this year.

For its part, Banamex says it has paid the fine and has reinforced its internal accounting controls.

However, earlier this week Citigroup announced it had discovered a $15 million fraud. According to Reuters, the money was used by a bank-operated security company originally set up to protect Banamex board members from personal attacks, including kidnapping. But Citigroup said the security company also used the funds to offer protection services to some of Mexico's wealthiest families.

Banamex's troubles don't seem to be limited to Mexico. Reuters also reports that a source says "Banamex USA is facing a U.S. criminal investigation involving possible violations of money-laundering laws."

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Citigroup

Mexico