Banking

Bloomberg The Bank of Japan’s (BOJ) upcoming policy assessment is likely to signal a pause in the bank’s buying of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) as long as stocks stay buoyant, according to a key author of the BOJ’s ramped up asset-purchase plan to fight the pandemic. “The BOJ is likely to make a more comprehensive judgment on the amount and frequency ...

Bloomberg Standard Chartered Plc is preparing further job cuts as the emerging markets lender continues a restructuring that was postponed by the onset of the pandemic. The London-headquartered bank is expected to cut several hundred staff next month across its global businesses, with the reductions focused on more junior employees, according to people familiar with the matter. The bank has ...

Bloomberg Resurgent coronavirus outbreaks will vex central bankers on five continents this week as they weigh the threat of more damage to growth against the hope that mass vaccinations will reopen economies. Institutions meeting from Tokyo to Frankfurt to Ottawa are pondering the prospect of another lost quarter amid renewed lockdowns to contain the pandemic. Most are likely to maintain ...

Bloomberg Some of the world’s biggest banks are urging a US judge not to immediately terminate Libor after a group of borrowers filed suit claiming the benchmark was the work of a “price-fixing cartel.” Defendants in the case, including JPMorgan Chase & Co., Credit Suisse Group AG and Deutsche Bank AG, said in a November filing that an injunction abruptly ...

Bloomberg Morgan Stanley strategists have dropped their expectations of near-term weakening in the dollar amid a regime shift in US rates propelled partly by prospects for meaningful fiscal expansion. “It’s no longer attractive to be positioned for a weaker dollar from here given the uncertainties around the fiscal policy outlook, the monetary policy outlook, and the growth and inflation outlook,” ...

Bloomberg The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is open to examining any proposal to set up a bad bank, Governor Shaktikanta Das said, days after the authority forecast a surge in soured assets. “If any proposal comes we are open to examining it and issuing the regulatory guidelines but it’s for the government and the private sector players to really ...

Bloomberg As HSBC Holdings pins its future on China, Europe’s largest bank is grooming a set of well-connected bankers to navigate its fraught relationship with Beijing in the long run. David Liao and Mark Yunfeng Wang, heads of Asia Pacific global banking and its China operations, respectively, are among a handful of contenders in the running to steer HSBC’s expansion ...

Bloomberg Brazil’s central bank said inflation pressures could persist in the beginning of the year, eventually leading to an interest rate hike, after a report showed consumer prices surged in December by the most since 2003. While reaffirming that a record-low rate of 2% is adequate for now, Monetary Policy Director Bruno Serra said Brazil shouldn’t have such a level ...

Bloomberg There are growing signs that Beijing is keen to slow the ascent in China’s currency after it surged to the highest level since mid-2018 against the dollar. The People’s Bank of China set its fixing at 6.4604 per dollar, 0.06% weaker than the average estimate in a Bloomberg survey. The move came after policy makers sent a string of ...

Bloomberg India’s central bank expects banks’ bad-loan ratios to almost double this year and warned that soaring markets and a weakened economy threaten financial stability. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) forecasts non-performing assets will rise to 13.5% of total advances by the end of September from 7.5% a year ago, according to its semiannual Financial Stability Report. If the ...