Banking

Bloomberg Stocks in Hong Kong and China led gains in Asian equity markets as rising money market rates on the mainland boosted sentiment on lenders. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index added 0.1 percent to 160.62 as of 4:19 p.m. in Hong Kong, after posting its biggest weekly gain in five weeks. The Philippines market is closed for a holiday. The ...

Bloomberg Thomas Jordan might have had the quietest August since he became Swiss National Bank president five years ago. Considered the haven of all havens by foreign exchange traders, the franc typically shoots up against other currencies whenever investors get anxious. This year, with no Greek debt crisis and the prospect that euro-area bond purchases might soon be wound down, ...

Bloomberg Foreigners looking to buy Asia’s best bonds will probably have to wait. Reserve Bank of India’s Governor Urjit Patel is unlikely to raise the quota on debt after inflows surged and muddied policy choices. He can’t allow runaway currency gains because exports are only just recovering from a slump, so he’s buying up the dollars pouring in. This injects ...

Bloomberg Mario Draghi’s message in Jackson Hole recently may not have been dramatic as three years ago but was clear nonetheless: the European Central Bank will go extremely slow about removing its monetary stimulus. While the ECB president startled investors in 2014 by laying the groundwork for quantitative easing, his published remarks at the Federal Reserve symposium in Wyoming included ...

Bloomberg Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said the recent pace of growth in the world’s third-largest economy is probably unsustainable and pledged to continue with very accommodative monetary policy “for some time” because the BOJ is far from inflation target. “I think 4 percent growth is excellent but we don’t think 4 percent growth can be sustained. Around 2 ...

Bloomberg Royal Bank of Canada is taking care of business at home. Royal Bank, the first Canadian lender to report fiscal third-quarter results, saw a jump in profit from its domestic banking operations amid signs that the nation’s economy is accelerating. An improving outlook prompted Canada’s central bank to raise interest rates last month, and economists predict at least one ...

Bloomberg African Rainbow Capital Ltd.’s banking partner is close to getting a license that it wants to use to challenge the dominance of South Africa’s biggest lenders. The Commonwealth Bank of Australia has said it will sell 10 percent of Tyme, a Johannesburg-based lender that allows customers to access funds through their mobile phones, to billionaire Patrice Motsepe’s African Rainbow ...

Bloomberg Few companies have come to symbolise China’s global ambitions quite like HNA Group Co. In just three years, the private conglomerate has invested at least $45 billion around the world. How did HNA pay for it all? That question is gaining new urgency as Beijing moves to curb debt-fueled overseas investments that could ultimately pose risks to the nation’s ...

Reuters Nigeria’s central bank said it is setting up two financial instruments to provide liquidity support to its non-interest paying lenders. It is a push by Nigeria, home to the largest Muslim population in sub-Saharan Africa, to establish itself as the African hub for Islamic finance, which follows religious principles such as bans on interest and gambling. The central bank ...

Bloomberg The Gupta family are selling their assets in South Africa to little-known companies as their access to banking facilities dries up and allegations intensify that they used their friendship with President Jacob Zuma to wield undue influence over his administration. On Wednesday they announced the sale of a coal business to a Swiss company that has no history in ...