Banking

Bank Indonesia says key interest rate near peak

Bloomberg Bank Indonesia Governor Perry Warjiyo signalled central bank may hold the key rate, saying the benchmark interest rate has “almost reached its peak” after an aggressive hiking cycle helped stabilise the nation’s currency. While the bank’s monetary policy stance remains “pre-emptive and ahead of the curve,” a more favorable outlook for US interest rate will allow Indonesia to rely ...

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BOJ likely to cut inflation forecast on cheaper crude

Bloomberg The Bank of Japan (BOJ) is almost certain to cut its inflation forecast for the fiscal year starting in April given the sharp fall in oil prices, according to people familiar with the matter. The government’s decision to make pre-school education free adds to the case for the downgrade, which will be delivered at the end of the next ...

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Trading business improved from 2018’s rough end: Citi

Bloomberg Citigroup Inc offered some hope that the worst is over for its bond-trading business after the toughest quarter for that unit in seven years. The lender’s shares jumped almost 4 percent, the most in the S&P 500 Index, after Chief Financial Officer John Gerspach said the trading environment was starting to improve this month. The brighter outlook came after ...

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Banks win break on trading-desk capital

Bloomberg Big investment banks scored a victory in their campaign to soften global rules, as regulators reduced the capital hit from new trading-book standards by nearly half. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision said its final market-risk standards will drive up banks’ trading-book capital requirements by a weighted average of about 22 percent from current levels. That’s down from the ...

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‘Fed may not raise rates as much as projected’

Bloomberg Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Richard Clarida left open the possibility the US central bank will raise interest rates in 2019 fewer than the two times projected by policy makers at their last meeting. “A lot has really happened since the first week of December,” Clarida said in an interview on Fox Business Network. “Some of the global growth data ...

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EIB sued over $69mn biomass loan

Bloomberg The European Investment Bank (EIB) is being sued in the region’s second-highest court over a Spanish loan that climate lawyers contend will damage the environment. The suit is being brought by the not-for-profit environmental advocacy group ClientEarth, which wants European Union judges to determine whether the EIB breached its own renewable energy-financing criteria. The London-based group said it’s the ...

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India’s subdued inflation signals RBI policy U-turn

Bloomberg India’s headline inflation edging towards the lower-end of the central bank’s target band has opened the door to interest-rate cuts in coming months. While rate swaps show investors are pricing no change in the benchmark repurchase rate for the next 12 months, the Reserve Bank of India may be forced to jettison its hawkish stance adopted five months ago ...

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Caution is the watchword for world’s top central banks

Bloomberg Central banks enter the new year under pressure from investors to rethink just how aggressive they can be hiking interest rates. A slowdown in the world economy, the trade war and skittish financial markets are forcing policy makers including Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to express fresh caution about their scope for tightening monetary policy. The People’s Bank of ...

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Danske growth machine at risk over laundering case

Bloomberg Danske Bank A/S’s money-laundering scandal threatens to undermine its growth engine. The lender’s Nordic banking operation, which encom- passes Norway, Sweden and Finland, was the only core unit of five to report higher profit in the third quarter. But now, some customers in the biggest Nordic economy may be reconsidering their loyalty to the bank, according to Berit Behring, ...

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South Africa must pursue flexible policy, says ANC

Bloomberg South Africa’s ruling African National Congress said the reserve bank must consider the impact of monetary policy on economic growth when it targets inflation, re-emphasising the flexible mandate the government gave the central bank almost a decade ago. “The ANC believes that the South African Reserve Bank must pursue a flexible monetary policy regime, aligned with the objectives of ...

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