Banking

  Bloomberg The European Central Bank is about to find out how attractive its offer to pay lenders to lend really is. Starting tomorrow, euro-area banks can bid for a four-year loan from the ECB at an interest rate that begins at zero and could ultimately be negative. The net take-up, after institutions repay their borrowings from an earlier and ...

  AFP France’s biggest insurer Axa has lowered its earnings target for the next few years and is seeking to cut costs as low interest rates take their toll on the industry’s profits. Axa, which is to unveil its new strategic plan Tuesday, said it now eyed an average annual increase in underlying earnings per share of between 3 and ...

  Bloomberg China’s central bank said it has met with onshore lenders to discuss allowing them to trade in the offshore yuan market, a move that would accelerate convergence between the country’s two exchange rates. As the country increasingly opens up its currency market, Chinese commercial banks have a growing need for better integration between the onshore and offshore markets, ...

  Bloomberg Scandinavia’s biggest bank said it has more than enough capital to meet regulatory requirements following a report it may need to turn to markets to fill an alleged shortfall. Nordea Bank AB said on Tuesday it had a common equity Tier 1 capital ratio of 16.7 percent in March, exceeding the 15.6 percent requirement set by the Financial ...

  Bloomberg Brookfield Asset Management Inc. is in talks with State Bank of India, the country’s largest lender, about forming a joint venture to invest in stressed Indian assets, people with knowledge of the matter said. Brookfield, Canada’s largest alternative asset manager, has discussed investing about 70 billion rupees (US$1 billion) in the venture while SBI and its associate banks ...

  Bloomberg The Bank of England allotted less to banks in the second of its extra liquidity operations being held to assure sufficient funding around Britain’s referendum on European Union membership. Banks sought just 370 million pounds (US$546 million), compared with 2.46 billion pounds at the previous extra indexed long-term repo operation on June 14, according to the central bank. ...

  Bloomberg On Friday morning London time — when the result of a UK referendum will show whether the nation has chosen to leave the European Union — the Bank of Japan and the Swiss National Bank’s Singapore desk could already be selling yen and francs. They and their peers are also primed to pump liquidity into banks fearful of ...

  Bloomberg It’s not quite Brexit. But just two days before the UK goes to the polls, a throng of German academics, politicians and ordinary citizens are pinning their hopes on a different breakaway. Germany’s highest court will deliver judgments today in five separate cases seeking to stop the country from participating in a controversial bond-buying plan that underpinned European ...

  Bloomberg Pent-up demand for dollars may push Nigeria’s naira at least 20 percent weaker when the central bank allows the currency of Africa’s biggest economy to float freely, said analysts including Renaissance Capital Ltd. and the head of Ecobank Transnational Inc. Demand for foreign currency has built up to about US$3 billion since capital controls were imposed 15 months ...

  Bloomberg Denmark’s government and regulator are looking into tougher laws including the option of imposing harsher penalties on banks after repeated breaches by Nordea Bank AB suggested the existing framework is too weak. Business Minister Troels Lund Poulsen met with the head of the Financial Supervisory Authority, Jesper Berg, discuss measures that could be enforced. The talks followed news ...