Banking

Bloomberg European Central Bank (ECB) President Christine Lagarde called the prospect of an interest-rate increase next year unlikely, but said she’d quickly take action to combat elevated inflation should it become necessary. “When the conditions of our forward guidance are satisfied, we will not hesitate to act,” Lagarde told Reuters in a webcast interview. Her remarks come just days after ...

Bloomberg Westpac Banking Corp agreed to pay A$113 million ($80.6 million) in penalties after the Australian regulator alleged the lender had widespread compliance failures that included charging dead people. The case includes a claim that Westpac charged more than A$10 million ($7.01 million) in fees for financial advice to over 11,000 deceased customers over a 10-year period, according to a ...

Bloomberg UniCredit SpA’s German operations are set to take about half group’s planned job cuts as the firm seeks to boost profitability at the underperforming unit. Chief Executive Officer Andrea Orcel plans to eliminate about 1,500 positions at subsidiary HVB as part of his new strategy that’s slated to be unveiled next week, people familiar with the matter said. Those ...

Bloomberg UBS Group AG’s London headquarters will be bought by Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) and LaSalle Investment Management for about 1.25 billion pounds ($1.7 billion). The silver building’s current owners Hong Kong-based CK Asset Holdings Ltd started initial discussions with a handful of potential buyers earlier this year, Bloomberg reported at the time. NPS, working with LaSalle, was the ...

Bloomberg The European Central Bank (EBC) is weighing curbs on the riskiest part of banks’ lending to indebted companies amid fears of a potential blow-up in the market. Officials on the ECB’s supervisory board have discussed capping newly originated highly-leveraged transactions at a certain share of individual banks’ balance sheets, the people said, asking not to be identified as the ...

Bloomberg Credit Suisse Group AG is reviewing banker pay to better align compensation with shareholder interests, after a tumultuous year in which the firm was buffeted by the Archegos Capital Management and Greensill Capital crises. The Swiss lender should give senior-ranking employees more of their remuneration in shares, with long deferral periods and the ability to take back compensation that’s ...

Bloomberg India’s central bank could start tightening monetary policy from next fiscal year as consumer prices rise, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. “Inflation is going to determine what the RBI does over the course of next year,” Santanu Sengupta, senior India economist at Goldman said in an interview with Juliette Saly and Rishaad Salamat on Bloomberg TV. “Input cost ...

Bloomberg Canada’s biggest banks shelled out 18% more for bonuses, unleashing the biggest increase in data going back nine years as the firms battled for talent to take advantage of a boom time in capital markets. The country’s six largest lenders set aside $14.9 billion for performance-based compensation in their 2021 fiscal year. The increase trounced the 6.3% average for ...

Bloomberg An unstoppable ascent in the renminbi is signalling Beijing’s growing ease with gradually freeing up one of the world’s most tightly-managed currencies. Since the renminbi hit a six-year high on a trade-weighted basis on November 17, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has set the currency’s daily reference rate at only mildly weaker-than-expected levels. The central bank also has ...

Bloomberg A gauge of short-term funding costs in the euro area tumbled to a record low amid a cash glut that has exacerbated the hunt for collateral before the year-end. Three-month Euribor — a benchmark based on the average rate that large banks in the region can theoretically borrow from one another — falls by 1.1 basis points, the most ...