Banking

Bloomberg Interest rate decisions across Africa in the next two weeks are likely to confirm the continent’s biggest economies have mostly ceased a wave of easing that’s been going since last year. Factors from sticky inflation to rising crude prices may persuade central bankers to freeze borrowing costs. Institutions in Nigeria, South Africa, Angola, Kenya and Mauritius will probably keep ...

Bloomberg For years, Swiss private banks largely resisted the temptation to merge with rivals. Often run by proud families, few wanted to let go of their independence or dilute their legacies. While local giants UBS Group AG and Credit Suisse Group AG went through painful reorganisations, smaller banks had time to continue with business as usual, even winning over disaffected ...

Bloomberg Wells Fargo & Co.’s new public finance chief Stratford Shields is shaking up the department by dismissing senior bankers in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles and bringing in colleagues from his former employer, Morgan Stanley. Fifteen employees from its public finance department were removed, retired or quit as the bank shifted its strategy, according to a person familiar ...

Bloomberg The Bank of Korea (BoK) stayed the course amid rising uncertainty, leaving its benchmark interest rate unchanged in a unanim-ous decision. The central bank is balancing concerns including record household debt and recent weak domestic economic data with external risks such as rising US interest rates and global emerging-market instability. Governor Lee Ju-yeol described uncertainties as high, and as ...

Bloomberg Kenya plans to overhaul legislation governing its financial sector by creating new agencies that regulate the cost of credit and protect consumers, according to a draft law on the Treasury’s website. The Financial Markets Conduct Bill seeks to “promote a fair, non-discriminatory marketplace for access to credit, to provide for the establishment of uniform practices and standards in relation ...

Bloomberg Nigerian central bank Governor Godwin Emefiele’s tight monetary-policy stance and system of multiple exchange rates may have paid off through slowing inflation and a stable naira, and he’s not about to change that soon. The MPC has kept its benchmark interest rate at a record 14 percent since July 2016 despite calls to lower rates to support economic growth. ...

Bloomberg European Union finance ministers gave the green light to an overhaul of the bloc’s banking laws, paving the way for long-planned steps towards closer integration of the euro area’s financial system. The update, first proposed in late 2016, incorporates capital and liquidity standards set by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. It also sets new requirements for loss-absorbing liabilities ...

Bloomberg HSBC Holdings Plc is continuing a hiring spree for its equities business in the Asia-Pacific region, recruiting executives from firms including Deutsche Bank AG and Citigroup Inc., according to people familiar with the matter. HSBC has hired Deutsche Bank’s Isabella Kwok as a managing director for Asian equity sales with a China focus, the people said, asking not to ...

Bloomberg Global central bankers made a concerted call for their independence from politics to be safeguarded, arguing government interference in mone-tary policy risked propelling inflation. With Turkey engulfed by a currency crisis partly driven by political efforts to influence interest rates, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told a conference in Stockholm that he and counterparts shouldn’t take their independence for ...

Bloomberg The Philippine central bank cut the ratio of funds that lenders must hold as reserves, in line with a strategy outlined by Governor Nestor Espenilla to reform financial markets. The reserve requirement ratio was lowered by 1 percentage point to 18 percent, effective from June 1, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas said in a statement. The move, the second reduction ...