Bloomberg Japan’s biggest lender is planning to raise funds from individual investors to help smaller companies and hospitals tackle the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. intends to issue sustainability bonds totalling as much as 150 billion yen ($1.42 billion) in September, after receiving requests from retail investors, according to Isamu Murofushi, a spokesman. The pandemic is boosting ...

Bloomberg Singapore’s large pool of fiscal reserves is proving to be a boon for the nation’s currency. The city state’s dollar advanced to its highest level in six months last week — erasing its pandemic-driven losses — after the government unveiled another stimulus package, financed in part by unused expenditure from earlier budgets. With the total for pledged pandemic aid ...

Bloomberg The Philippine peso advanced closer towards the psychologically significant level of 48 per dollar after central bank Governor Benjamin Diokno said the market was free to determine its level. Asia’s best-performing currency this year advanced to as strong as 48.62 on Monday after Diokno told Bloomberg Television: “If that’s where the market is going, we can’t do anything about ...

Bloomberg Indonesia’s bond and currency markets, risk benchmarks that tend to move in tandem, are diverging in signs that the nation’s pandemic response is deterring global funds. The rupiah is the worst-performing Asian currency this quarter while the nation’s benchmark sovereign bond is outperforming peers. The two markets are usually aligned due to heavy foreign debt holdings. That dynamic started ...

Bloomberg Credit Suisse Group AG faces a criminal probe for helping more than 2,600 Belgian clients to hide untaxed earnings in Swiss accounts, L’Echo reported. The inquiry into Swiss lender concerns money laundering and acting as an illegal financial intermediary, the newspaper said, citing a spokesman for Belgium’s Federal Prosecutor’s office. Prosecutors obtained the bank details of unidentified Belgian clients ...

Bloomberg People’s Bank of China (PBOC) Governor Yi Gang urged banks to support smaller companies through innovations in financial services and products. The current economic situation is “complex and severe,” Yi told a seminar in the eastern city of Hefei, according to a statement posted on the central bank’s website. The governor said banks should adapt financial services and products, ...

Bloomberg European stocks climbed to a one-week high and equity futures rose amid a thaw in US and China relations and hopes of wider access to new coronavirus treatments. The rally in the Europe Stoxx 600 Index was broad based, with all 19 industries posting gains. BT Group advanced after Sky News reported that the board is on alert for ...

Bloomberg Indian stocks climbed along with Asian equities, with the benchmark index forming a pattern that some analysts read as a sign of more gains to come. The S&P BSE Sensex climbed 0.6% to 38,673.41 as of 10:17 am in Mumbai, making a ‘golden cross’ — a bullish indicator when the 50-day moving average rises above the 200-day line. The ...

Bloomberg South Africa’s main stock index advances for a second day, rising 1.3% by 9:46 am in Johannesburg, as improved risk appetite among investors spurs gains for 104 of the 150 listed companies. Naspers Ltd. contributed the most to the rising benchmark index, climbing 2.5% to the highest in more than a week after assurances from White House officials that ...

Bloomberg Shares of Hong Kong-based companies climbed, with a gauge reaching its highest in five months, after local media reported the number of new coronavirus cases fell to single digits for the first time since July. The MSCI Hong Kong Index rise 2% as of 4:22 pm The city was expected to report nine new infections on Monday, the South ...