Banking

Bloomberg Citigroup Inc. is expanding its digital-banking channels in Asia as the bank seeks to boost its base of affluent customers in the region by at least 10 percent this year. The New York-based firm is accelerating the deployment of technologies that allow customers to get advice from wealth managers and make transactions through its Internet and mobile platforms, according ...

Bloomberg Banco Santander SA agreed to buy Banco Popular Espanol SA for a nominal 1 euro ($1.13) after European regulators determined that the troubled lender was likely to fail and ordered it to be sold. Santander will raise about 7 billion euros through a rights offer to bolster Popular’s balance sheet, it said in a regulatory filing on Wednesday. The ...

Bloomberg India kept interest rates unchanged as expected, as the central bank shrugged off slowing growth and vowed to continue to assess whether a drop in inflation to a record low in the $2 trillion economy was transitory. The Reserve Bank of India, led by Urjit Patel, kept its benchmark repurchase rate at 6.25 percent while maintaining its neutral stance, ...

Bloomberg Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) blamed an internal data-processing error for inaccurate customer-account balances amid a flurry of claims on social media over unauthorized withdrawals and missing funds. Some deposit accounts don’t reflect their correct balances because the processing error had caused past transactions to be either debited or credited twice, the third-largest Philippine lender by assets said ...

Bloomberg Qatar National Bank QPSC, the biggest lender in the Middle East, is trading at the cheapest relative to emerging-market peers since 2013 as a regional political storm engulfs its home country. That doesn’t mean analysts are suggesting it’s a good time to buy the stock. The Doha-based bank is trading at close to nine times its expected earnings, the ...

Bloomberg For 30 years, an army of UBS Group AG traders packed the football-field-sized floors of a building in the City of London’s largest office project. Now teams of laborers in high-visibility jackets are busily transforming the property for a different type of worker. Broadgate, a 32-acre (13-hectare) complex built to accommodate the banks and law firms that mushroomed out ...

Bloomberg Qatari banks, already stretched by financing demands of the $200 billion 2022 World Cup, took a head-on blow from its neighbours’ abrupt decision to cut economic and diplomatic ties. At risk are the foreign deposits-especially from the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council-that have helped sustain institutions like Qatar National Bank QPSC, the region’s largest by assets, and Doha Bank QSC. ...

DOHA / Reuters The Qatari currency came under pressure on Tuesday as Gulf commercial banks began to hold off on dealing with Qatari banks because of the diplomatic rift in the region, banking sources said. Some Saudi Arabian, UAE and Bahraini banks were delaying business with Qatari banks, such as letters of credit, after their governments cut diplomatic ties and ...

COLOMBO / Reuters Some Sri Lankan banks stopped buying Qatar Riyal on Tuesday, saying their counterpart banks in Singapore advised them not to accept the currency a day after the Arab world’s biggest powers cut ties with Qatar. Dealers at four local private banks said they have stopped buying Qatar Riyal. “Our counter-party in Singapore has asked us not to ...

Bloomberg The Bank of Israel has a new message for the market: Don’t assume it will follow the US path on interest rates. Investors and economists long speculated that the Bank of Israel, anxious about a strengthening local currency, would keep rates on hold until the US Federal Reserve had raised its lending rate a few times. As the rate ...