Bloomberg India will inject 482 billion rupees ($6.8 billion) into government-controlled lenders to help them meet tighter regulatory requirements and to boost credit growth. The fund infusion will ensure that capital ratios for all state-run lenders are above the regulatory requirement and will help Allahabad Bank and Corporation Bank exit a so-called Prompt Corrective Action plan, Rajeev Kumar, secretary at ...
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PBOC makes first use of tool to boost bank capital
Bloomberg China’s central bank announced the first of a new kind of market operation which aims to encourage financial institutions to issue perpetual bonds to boost their capital. The People’s Bank of China swapped 1.5 billion yuan ($223 million) of 1-year central bank bills for perpetual bonds with a coupon of 2.45 percent, according to a statement on its website ...
Read More »Danske thrown out of Estonia after nation drawn into laundering probe
Bloomberg It’s not every day that a bank gets thrown out of a country. But, Estonia took the extraordinary step of telling Danske Bank A/S to get out. Within two hours, Danske did the country’s financial watchdog one better: the harassed Danish lender annou- nced a retreat from the entire Baltic region as well as Russia. It’s the latest dramatic ...
Read More »Deutsche Bank plans to rebuild S Africa staff
Bloomberg Deutsche Bank AG plans to start rebuilding its South African workforce just months after scaling back staff and cutting costs as part of a global restructuring. “The hiring we’re currently pursuing is geared towards enhancing the areas where we have global and local strengths, such as fixed income,†South Africa Chief Executive Officer Muneer Ismail said in an interview. ...
Read More »Euro-area slowdown: ECB lays groundwork for response
Bloomberg Some of the European Central Bank’s heavy hitters are laying the groundwork for action. The top economist and the market chief at the Frankfurt-based institution have already signalled they’re discussing options in case the current euro-area slowdown worsens, and the vice president echoed that on Tuesday. There have been similar hints from Francois Villeroy de Galhau, who is the ...
Read More »Greece submits plan to revive ailing banks
Bloomberg Greece’s government submitted to the European Commission a plan to help the country’s banks speed up their bad-loan disposals, in a bid to restore confidence in the battered sector, according to two people familiar with the matter. Greek banks are grappling with 88.6 billion euros ($100 billion) of bad loans, a legacy of the country’s financial crisis. That constrains ...
Read More »HSBC bracing for riskier times after Q4 profit miss
Bloomberg HSBC Holdings Plc is bracing for riskier times after missing fourth-quarter earnings estimates, warning that political tensions in its key markets have made the prognosis for 2019 far less predictable. Chief Executive Officer John Flint has vowed to keep a keener eye on costs while avoiding additional payouts to shareholders, after a disappointing quarter capped his first year in ...
Read More »$76 billion fund gives contrarian call for Indonesia interest rate cuts
Bloomberg Indonesia’s central bank should signal interest-rate cuts to draw more foreign money into the nation’s bonds, according to a top emerging markets asset manager. The current-account deficit will remain manageable and Bank Indonesia has room to reverse some of the rate hikes it implemented last year, Anil Kumar, who helps manage about $76 billion of funds at Ashmore Plc, ...
Read More »Japanese M&A spree a boon for foreign banks
Bloomberg Japan Inc.’s record acquisition spree is proving to be better news for overseas investment banks than for their home-grown rivals. Foreign firms led by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grabbed the first three places in Japan’s merger advisory rankings last year, handling deals worth a combined 44.6 trillion yen ($403 billion), according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Nomura Holdings Inc, ...
Read More »Modi gets $4bn cash from India’s RBI before polls
Bloomberg India’s central bank approved an early transfer of a part of its profit to the government, which is desperate for cash to fund populist pledges ahead of a national election. The Reserve Bank of India’s board, approved 280 billion rupees ($4 billion) as interim dividend, according to a statement. This is the second straight year that the RBI has ...
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