Couple of Questions re Cap Labs

[City Builder]

Hi,

I wanted to refresh my mind on what is new in Cap Labs so I went back to the home page to take a look at some new features and what not and came up with a couple of questions. Quotes from the home pages in Italics, mine in bold.

New Retail Strategy
Now you can pursue the new retail strategy of setting up a chain of retail stores, which will give you a significant advantage over competitors’ individual retail stores. For example, you may set up a chain of Leather Stores in prime shopping areas to increase your chain’s recognition and thus drive more demands to your stores.

Is setting up a chain of retail stores any different than just placing multiple stores of the same type? Is there something else involved in setting up a chain of retail stores?
Does the AI not setup multiple same type retail stores in the same city to also get the bonus?

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Multiple Screen Resolutions
The game supports multiple screen resolutions, including:
o 1024x768 (full screen mode and window mode)
o 1280x960 (window mode only)
o 1280x1024 (full screen mode only)
o 1920x1080 (full screen mode only)

Would you please add in 1600x900 as either a window or full screen mode please. I'd really like to see the game in anything other than 1024x768 on my monitors native resolution of 1600x900. Viewing the game at the old 1024x768 is probably why I still feel that the graphics are so dated in the game since I'm seeing them in such low resolution.

Will you be adding more resolutions before release?

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Boom-and-bust Cycle
Bubbles in the stock market and property market may develop if the central bank maintains a loose monetary policy with ample money supply and a low interest rate.
...
High GDP growth and a low unemployment rate will reinforce optimism and investors’ risk appetite will increase, leading to price rallies in the stock and property market, which will in turn fuel inflation.

What actually causes the bank to lower or raise the interest rates? Is there some sort of trigger from the player or AI players actions in the game, or is it randomly chosen when the bank changes interest rates?

Does the amount of businesses that the player or the AI setup have any influence in the game over the unemployment rate in the city?