Banking

Bloomberg Falling research prices under MiFID II are leaving asset managers with a problem: the risk of being accused of taking inducements for cheap analysis. The European Union’s regulatory overhaul will force buyside firms to justify the price they pay for analysis once its cost is unbundled from other services such as trading commissions. With banks in the midst of ...

Bloomberg With a blanket ban on initial coin offerings, China has sidestepped an issue plaguing regulators worldwide: are such tokens securities? A cross between crowdfunding and an initial public offering, ICOs—which have raised at least $1.25 billion globally so far —are the sale of tokens based on the blockchain, the technology underlying bitcoin. While they at least ostensibly promise the ...

Bloomberg A record rally in the offshore yuan is rekindling hope for the Dim Sum bond market. With China’s currency defying North Korea tensions to be Asia’s top performer over the past month, that bodes well for yuan-denominated debt sold in Hong Kong, according to BOC International Holdings Ltd. The Dim Sum market has been under pressure since 2015, when ...

Bloomberg The outlook for Oman’s banking sector was cut to negative by Moody’s Investors Service to reflect a reduction in the government’s ability to support the country’s banks, weaker economic growth and tightening liquidity. “We expect a softening in Oman’s operating environment, with fiscal consolidation amid prolonged oil price weakness weighing on economic growth,” Moody’s analyst Mik Kabeya said. “This ...

Bloomberg Nobody doubts America will make good on its debts. Yet if Congress fails to lift the debt ceiling in time, what’s known as a “technical” default— one that merely delays interest and principal payments— would be on deck for the $14.1 trillion Treasury market, presenting a potentially dizzying array of complications. Bond-market industry groups aren’t waiting to see how ...

Bloomberg China’s central bank said initial coin offerings are illegal and asked all related fundraising activity to be halted immediately, issuing the strongest regulatory challenge so far to the burgeoning market for digital token sales. The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) said on its website that it had completed investigations into ICOs, and will strictly punish offerings in the future ...

Bloomberg UniCredit SpA Chief Executive Officer Jean Pierre Mustier is willing to invest more money in Turkish venture Yapi & Kredi Bankasi AS as he sees the presence in central and eastern Europe as “a growth engine” for Italy’s biggest bank. “ Yapi Kredi is growing and so growth means that there is an organic capital generation,” Mustier told Bloomberg ...

Bloomberg The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has asked banks in the city for details of their loans to HNA Group Co. and Dalian Wanda Group Co., according to people familiar with the matter. Lenders were required to submit a survey to the city’s de facto central bank providing information such as total credit extended and outstanding loans to the ...

Bloomberg Mario Draghi won’t miss the opportunity to mention the euro’s recent appreciation as he prepares to reconfigure the euro area’s stimulus settings, economists say. The European Central Bank president will express concern about the currency’s strength, a Bloomberg survey shows. While he declined to address the exchange rate last month at his appearance in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, 67 percent ...

Bloomberg Now that worries Italian banks will suffer a meltdown have subsided, lenders need to persuade investors they can make money. Both optimistic buyers and more skeptical investors, gathered on the shores of Lake Como for the annual Ambrosetti Forum, agree that momentum for bank shares will depend mainly on an acceleration of economic growth and higher interest rates, while ...