RIYADH / Reuters Saudi Arabian utility developer ACWA Power expects to submit tenders for projects this year worth $4.5 billion in Saudi Arabia and will also target projects in Morocco and the United Arab Emirates, its chief executive said. ACWA Power CEO Paddy Padmanathan also confirmed the developer of electricity and water projects in the Middle East, Africa and Southeast …

BEIRUT / Reuters Lebanon said it had signed its first offshore oil and gas exploration and production agreements for two blocks, including a block disputed by neighbouring Israel. Lebanon’s energy minister said the dispute with Israel would not stop Lebanon benefiting from potential undersea reserves in the contentious Block 9, while consortium operator Total said it would not drill the …

Bloomberg While many oil producers are stepping back from their retail operations, Royal Dutch Shell Plc is doubling down. Shell, which has about 44,000 filling stations around the world, opened its first one in Mexico last year, the start of $1 billion in investments over the next decade. Shell also is ramping up spending in China, India, Indonesia and Russia, …

Bloomberg Asia pushed past the rest of the world last year to become the biggest buyer of America’s crude oil — and it’s poised to do it again in 2018. Just two years after Washington ended its crude-export ban, the continent soaked up 37 percent of the oil the US sent abroad in 2017, up from about 9 percent in …

Bloomberg Europe is suddenly the hot market for hedge-fund investment. After years of being overlooked, the continent is attracting capital from investors who want to take advantage of a recovering economy as the last effects of the euro-zone debt crisis disappear. Buyers are also piling in to diversify portfolios swelled by the stock-market boom — which after this week’s correction …

Bloomberg A selloff in the market for speculative-grade corporate bonds accelerated amid turmoil in the stock market, handing investors their worst weekly loss since the oil slump two years ago. The bonds lost 1.5 percent on the week, the worst performance since February 2016, Bloomberg Barclays index data show. The average spread on high-yield bonds — or the premium investors …

Bloomberg The Bank of Italy expects the nation’s economy to expand in 2018 at the same pace as last year since monetary policy “is working” and the ongoing reduction of economic slack has strengthened confidence, Governor Ignazio Visco said. The central bank expects Italy’s gross domestic product will expand about 1.5 percent this year and should remain above 1 percent …

Bloomberg Mexico’s central bank raised its key interest rate as expected for a second straight meeting and signalled it will prioritise the peso’s inflation implications rather than moves by the Federal Reserve for its future decisions. Banco de Mexico’s board voted unanimously to lift borrowing costs a quarter point to 7.5 percent, a move forecast by 23 of 26 economists …

DUBAI / Reuters Sharp swings in global financial markets in the past few days are not worrying since economic growth is strong but reforms are still needed to avert future crises, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund said on Sunday. Christine Lagarde, speaking at a conference on global business and social trends in Dubai, said economies were also …

Bloomberg The European Central Bank has woken up to the risks digital currencies can pose to policy makers’ bread-and-butter business: the economy. “If you increasingly have bridges between the virtual world and the real world and then there is a collapse in this virtual world, it could drain liquidity from the real world,” Executive Board member Yves Mersch said in …