Banking

  AFP India is committed to protecting state banks suffering from mounting bad loans after they reported almost $2.7 billion in losses in the last two quarters, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Monday. The banks are struggling under a mountain of soured loans, prompting central bank governor Raghuram Rajan to set a 2017 deadline for them to clean up ...

  Bloomberg Policy makers should move beyond short-term budget and inflation targets that leave their economies exposed to longer-term debt bubbles like the ones hindering growth since the 2008 financial crisis, Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz said. Central banks with inflation targets like Canada’s are finding that the benefits gained from short-term stability can create dangers in the background ...

  BLOOMBERG Ghana is considering raising money through private bank loans, abandoning plans to sell as much as $1 billion of Eurobonds on concern its inability to raise targeted budget revenue may spark an investor selloff. With-lower-than-expected oil prices, the government can’t raise all the revenue needed to meet the budget gap, the Ministry of Finance said in a statement ...

  Bloomberg The level of inflation Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Nabiullina just deemed ‘ unacceptable’ is looking better by the day. So much so that its failure to accelerate in May could force the central bank’s hand to ease policy for the first time in almost a year when it reviews interest rates this week. Price growth was unchanged ...

  Bloomberg The Philippine central bank is expanding its cyber-security unit, placing banks and money changers under tighter scrutiny, and will start to regulate digital currencies to ward off laundering and technology crimes. Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas will tighten its oversight of foreign-exchange dealers and remittance companies in the next two to three months, Deputy Governor Nestor Espenilla told a ...

  Bloomberg The U.S. and China have made progress on their exchange-rate debate over the years while the Asian nation’s ability to control excess capacity will be central for expanding its economy, Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew said on Sunday in Beijing. Lew, speaking to students at Tsinghua University, said China’s government is moving in the right direction on its ...

  Bloomberg The United Arab Emirates’ currency peg is here to stay, the central bank governor said, after contracts used to bet on a devaluation rose to the highest since March. Policy makers don’t see pressure on the dirham and the U.A.E. is committed to its longstanding peg to the dollar, HE Mubarak Rashed Al Mansoori told reporters in Abu ...

  Bloomberg Carlos Dominguez, who is set to become finance secretary in the Philippines, said the incoming government of President-elect Rodrigo Duterte is willing to initially lose revenue through income-tax cuts to help boost economic growth and reduce poverty. Lower income levies will be part of a tax reform bill submitted to lawmakers by September, Dominguez, 70, said in an ...

  Bloomberg The European Central Bank’s ultra-loose monetary policy has helped boost growth and inflation in the euro area, according to research by the Bank of Spain assessing the impact of quantitative easing in the 19-nation bloc. The ECB’s actions would have added about 1.4 percentage points to the bloc’s total output and lifted prices by about 1.2 points respectively ...

  Paris / AFP The German and French central banks issued downbeat growth forecasts, as the EU Commission came under pressure to bring Paris in line over excessive deficits. The Bundesbank said the powerhouse German economy would expand by 1.7 percent this year, slowing to 1.4 percent in 2017. This was a downgrade of previous forecasts of 1.8 percent and ...