Banking

Bloomberg Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, topped $34,000, just weeks after passing another major milestone. The currency gained as much as 7.8% to $34,182.75, before slipping to about $33,970 in Singapore. It advanced almost 50% in December, when it breached $20,000 for the first time. The latest gains top an eye-popping rally for the controversial digital asset in 2020, which ...

Bloomberg Sweden’s government will start exploring the feasibility of having the country move to a digital currency, marking another step into the unknown for the world’s most cashless society. Per Bolund, financial markets minister, said a review is expected to be completed by the end of November in 2022. Anna Kinberg Batra, a former chairwoman of the parliament’s finance committee, ...

Bloomberg Hungary left its monetary policy unchanged despite a slowdown in inflation and a rally in the forint, warning of continued risks to global investor sentiment amid a resurgence in coronavirus. The central bank kept the rate offered on required reserves at 0.6% and the overnight deposit rate at minus 0.05%, as forecast by all economists in a Bloomberg survey. ...

Bloomberg Spain’s Unicaja Banco SA agreed to buy rival Liberbank SA in an all-share deal, adding to a flurry of deal-making in the nation’s finance industry. Unicaja will pay 1 new share for every 2.7705 of Liberbank shares, issuing as much as 1.08 billion euros of stock to fund the purchase, according to a statement. Unicaja shareholders will have 59.5% ...

Bloomberg 2020 was a year the entire world changed, but one thing held steady in an elite corner of Wall Street: Goldman Sachs Group Inc. ended up on top. Goldman was the world’s top adviser on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) for the fourth consecutive year in 2020, and was the only bank with more than 30% of market share, according to ...

Bloomberg Switzerland’s central bank spent 11 billion francs ($12.5 billion) on interventions in the third quarter, adding to an already-high tally that got the country labelled a currency manipulator by the US. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) acquired foreign currencies worth more than 100 billion francs win the first nine months of the year — the biggest sum since 2012 ...

Bloomberg Poland’s central bank is analysing the impact of potential interest-rate cuts that could take place in the first quarter of 2021, Governor Adam Glapinski said. While the current, record-low reference rate of 0.1% is “appropriate and best suits the situation,” the central bank may reduce it further, the Governor said in an excerpt of an interview published on the ...

Bloomberg China’s regulators will impose caps on banks’ lending to the real estate sector for the first time, in their latest efforts to prevent systematic risks after a series of property curbs in recent years did little to damp buyer enthusiasm. Under the new mechanism, loans to developers will be capped at 40% for the nation’s largest state-owned lenders while ...

Bloomberg Commerzbank AG will set aside 610 million euros ($745 million) in the fourth quarter to cover restructuring costs after reaching an agreement with the works council on planned job cuts. The amount will cover the elimination of 2,300 positions between 2021 and 2024, part of a restructuring plan announced last year, according to a statement from the bank. Commerzbank ...

Bloomberg Bank of Montreal’s (BMO) capital-markets division grabbed the top spot for Canadian equity sales in 2020, leading the ranking for the first time in a decade as the coronavirus pandemic pushed companies to stockpile cash. BMO Capital Markets advised on 52 equity and equity-linked issues with a total value of C$3.76 billion ($2.95 billion). Overall, Canada saw 488 issues ...