Banking

  Bloomberg Lulalend will unveil South Africa’s newest digital bank, Lula, by March after it secured $35 million to expand its business. Lulalend, a startup founded in 2014, will partner with Nigerian lender Access Bank to establish Lula. The neobank will offer a bespoke suite of products that address the challenges faced by small and medium-sized enterprises in managing their ...

  Bloomberg For the fifth straight quarter, European banks are set to match or beat Wall Street rivals after a debt trading surge last year saw revenues surge by almost 30%. Six of the region’s top investment banks — led by Barclays Plc and Deutsche Bank AG — are expected to show an average 29% increase in bond and currency ...

  Bloomberg Zopa Ltd. has completed a funding round of £75 million ($92 million) and is on the lookout for deals as early as this quarter. The raise from existing investors “cements” the UK fintech’s status as a unicorn with a valuation of $1 billion, the bank said on Thursday. Zopa, backed by investors including Softbank’s Vision Fund and Northzone, ...

  Bloomberg Credit Suisse Group AG plans to shift an asset management business that helps buyout firms raise funds to its First Boston spinout as the firm works to reshape its investment bank after losses. Internal discussions are taking place on moving the Private Funds Group, co-headed by David Klein in the US and Michael Murphy in London, to First ...

  Bloomberg Europe’s largest banks kicked off earnings season with pledges to return more than $12 billion to shareholders, following an interest rate bonanza that’s bolstering lenders from Milan to Stockholm. UBS Group AG Chief Executive Officer Ralph Hamers vowed to return more than $6.7 billion to shareholders this year, after income from lending to wealthy clients surged in the ...

  Bloomberg Citigroup Inc is hiring Cyril Besseddik from JPMorgan Chase & Co. to lead coverage of health-care companies in Europe, the Middle East and Africa for its investment bank. Besseddik is set to join Citigroup’s banking, capital markets advisory group in May and will be based in London, according to an internal memo seen by Bloomberg News. He was ...

  Bloomberg PayPal Holdings Inc. said it will cut 2,000 staffers as it contends with a macroeconomic slowdown that’s weighed on the firm’s business in recent quarters. The cuts, which will affect about 7% of employees, will take place in the coming weeks, Chief Executive Officer Dan Schulman told employees. “While we have made substantial progress in right-sizing our cost ...

  Bloomberg Kenya surprised most analysts by keeping its benchmark interest rate unchanged for the first time since July, as it sees inflation declining in the near term. The monetary policy committee held the rate at 8.75%, Governor Patrick Njoroge said in an emailed statement. Only two of five economists in a Bloomberg survey expected the rate to remain unchanged. ...

  Bloomberg Brazil’s central bank will likely hold its interest rate steady for the fourth straight meeting as inflation expectations rise further above target and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva questions the institution’s goals. All 32 economists in a Bloomberg survey expect board members to keep the benchmark Selic rate unchanged at 13.75%, when the central bank wraps up ...

  Bloomberg Europe could boost bank lending by as much as €4.5 trillion ($4.9 trillion) by lightening the industry’s regulatory burden, according to a study commissioned by the region’s banking lobby. That increase of almost 30% would stem from bringing demands for European banks’ capital reserves and related costs more in line with those of US competitors, consultant Oliver Wyman ...