Bloomberg India cannot rule out a pause in its fiscal consolidation plan in the year through March, a key government adviser said, setting the government’s tone ahead of Thursday’s budget. “Setting overly ambitious targets for consolidation—especially in a pre-election year—based on optimistic forecasts that carry a high risk of not being realised will not garner credibility,” Chief Economic Adviser Arvind ...

Bloomberg Tencent Holdings Ltd. is leading the acquisition of 14 percent of billionaire Wang Jianlin’s Wanda Commercial Properties Co. for $5.4 billion, a deal that will begin the target company’s retreat from real estate development. Online mall JD.com Inc., Sunac China Holdings Ltd. and Suning Commerce Group Co.—a retailer backed by e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.— will also take ...

Bloomberg The sun never sets on China’s trade and infrastructure ambitions. With the addition of the Arctic and Latin America, Chinese President Xi Jinping’s signature Belt and Road Initiative has become truly global. Only the US, its neighbour Canada and ally Japan have yet to be included in the plan, which seeks to build or upgrade a network of highways, ...

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Theresa May is fighting on multiple fronts as critics inside her governing Conservative Party threaten to upend her plans for Brexit and even her premiership. May’s party is split over how to leave the European Union as time runs out for finalizing the UK’s policy. Opponents of retaining EU trade rules after a divorce want her ...

Bloomberg Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will travel to Tokyo for his country’s first joint summit with Japan and South Korea since 2015, the clearest sign yet of improving ties between the three neighbours. The meeting was announced by China and Japan, as Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono concluded a two-day visit aimed at repairing his country’s strained relationship with China. ...

Bloomberg Germany’s Social Democratic leader said he needs concessions from Chancellor Angela Merkel to sell party members on staying in her government, raising the stakes as negotiators seek to finish a coalition pact within a week. Party leaders aren’t just discussing SPD policy demands on labor, health care and migration as they seek to end the political deadlock in Europe’s ...

Bloomberg Sauli Niinisto was re-elected as Finland’s president without recourse to a runoff — a first since the post has been settled by popular vote. Niinisto won a second term by a landslide, receiving the backing of roughly 63 percent of eligible voters and more than half of the ballots cast in every area of the 100-year-old nation. “Finland is ...

Bloomberg Cypriots will return to the ballot box on February 4 to choose a leader who can oversee the Mediterranean island’s economic recovery nearly six years after the country came close to financial collapse. Incumbent President Nicos Anastasiades, 71, will face Stavros Malas in the runoff after taking 35.5 percent of the vote compared with 30.3 percent for Malas, an ...

Last week, before news broke about the hacking of Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck Inc., I conducted a little Twitter poll. The results were enlightening, and somewhat disheartening. At the end of last week, someone stole 523 million NEM coins, worth around $500 million, from Coincheck. It took about eight hours for the exchange to even notice that its wallet had ...

Brexit’s pending arrival has some companies pulling out. Hong Kong investors are going the other way. With the purchase of London’s iconic Cheesegrater building and the city’s Walkie Talkie skyscraper, investors from Hong Kong were the single biggest buyers of office property last year, accounting for 44 percent of total funds spent. It’s not just the weaker pound, but also ...