Banking

Bloomberg Pakistan’s central bank unexpectedly left its benchmark interest rate unchanged after a second currency devaluation in four months. The target policy rate will stay at 6 percent, the State Bank of Pakistan said in a statement. The move was predicted by only three of 22 economists in a Bloomberg survey with rest expecting a hike. The central bank unexpectedly ...

Bloomberg John Thain, a former chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch, is expected to join Deutsche Bank AG’s supervisory board in May, according to a person with knowledge of the German lender’s plans. News of the board’s shakeup follows speculation that Deutsche Bank is seeking to replace Chief Executive Officer John Cryan. The CEO, who has been trying to restructure ...

Bloomberg Mario Draghi has six months left to prepare a retreat from ultra-loose monetary policy, and he has a ready-made roadmap on hand. The US Federal Reserve’s experience of halting quantitative easing, raising interest rates and starting to shrink its balance sheet provides both a blueprint and a cautionary tale for the European Central Bank president. It’s an easy example ...

Bloomberg Saudi Arabia’s second-biggest bank is betting that government efforts to develop the entertainment industry, boost home-ownership and open up the role of women in the economy will fuel growth this year. The kingdom is undergoing an economic overhaul driven by crown prince Mohammed bin Salman that includes removing restrictions on cinemas, concerts and women driving and working. It also ...

Bloomberg HSBC Holdings Plc agreed to pay $100 million to settle an antitrust lawsuit by over-the-counter investors, including the city of Baltimore and Yale University, who claimed they were harmed when they bought securities tied to rigged Libor. The proposed settlement by the London-based bank follows similar agreements the investor group reached with Barclays Plc, Citigroup Inc., and most recently ...

Bloomberg The Bank of Japan is finding out just how hard it is to be stealthy — when everyone is looking right at you. The central bank looks set to end this fiscal year well behind on its target for Japanese government bond purchases. But having inadvertently sparked a yen rally in January, a repeat of this “stealth taper” of ...

Bloomberg Barclays Plc agreed to pay $2 billion to settle a probe into how it sold the sort of mortgage bonds that fueled the financial crisis, securing a penalty less than half of what US authorities originally demanded. The British lender was the only bank to push back against the size of the settlement demanded by the Justice Department, prompting ...

Bloomberg Egypt’s central bank cut interest rates for the second time in six weeks after inflation slowed into its target range, shrugging off rising US rates as it unwinds record-high borrowing costs. The monetary policy committee led by Governor Tarek Amer lowered the overnight deposit rate by 100 basis points to 16.75 percent. The move was predicted by all eight ...

Bloomberg Nordea Bank AB will start pricing debt products to reflect threats to data as the scandal engulfing Facebook Inc. redefines corporate risk. Mathias Leijon, co-head of corporate and investment banking at Nordea in Stockholm, says his team has been thinking “a lot about this” risk, with a key question emerging as, “How do you include the cost associated with ...

Bloomberg A recent spike in funding costs is happening at the worst time for Australia’s big banks, as intense public scrutiny crimps their ability to pass on increases to customers. The banks are fighting to defend their reputations in the face of an inquiry into misconduct and mistreatment of customers. Two weeks into hearings in front of a Royal Commission, ...