International News

  AFP China launched the world’s first quantum satellite on Tuesday, state media reported, in an effort to harness the power of particle physics to build an “unhackable” system of encrypted communications. The launch took place at 1:40 am in the southwestern Gobi Desert, the official Xinhua news service said, and comes as the US, Japan and others also seek ...

  Bloomberg Chinese authorities are planning not to impose an aggregate quota on trading via the Shenzhen-Hong Kong stock exchange link, according to two people familiar with the matter. Daily trading will still be subject to a cap, the people said. Officials are also considering removing the overall limit for equity trades through Hong Kong’s existing link with Shanghai, one ...

  Bloomberg Indonesia’s tax amnesty could boost industrywide car sales in the country by a fifth as people spend their newly declared wealth on big-ticket items, according to the local unit of Honda Motor Co. “The car ownership ratio in Indonesia is relatively low and there’s enough room for producers to sell more,” Jonfis Fandy, head of sales and marketing ...

  Bloomberg Indonesia will cap Wednesday’s Independence Day celebrations by scuttling as many as 71 impounded foreign vessels —mostly Vietnamese but also a handful of Chinese —to signal its determination to protect its sovereignty over lucrative fishing grounds in the South China Sea. The destruction of the boats comes amid simmering regional tensions over territorial disputes in the water. Former ...

  Washington / Bloomberg Treasuries are falling behind corporate bonds in a reversal from last year, as the US economy shows signs of improvement and oil prices stabilize following a rout. Investors are willing to accept as little as 216 basis points of extra yield to buy company debt instead of Treasuries, the smallest spread in more than a year, ...

  Berlin / Bloomberg The 1.6 billion-euro ($1.8 billion) Merkur offshore wind project in the German North Sea reached financial close with funding from European and US investors. Switzerland-based Partners Group Holding AG invested 250 million euros for 50 percent of the project, according to a statement on Friday. InfraRed Capital Partners Ltd.’s Infrastructure Fund III committed took a 25 ...

  Bloomberg The ruble advanced the most in emerging markets and the cost of insuring Russian debt against default dropped as calls for an easing of tensions in Crimea allowed investors to focus on the rally in oil. The currency climbed 0.7 percent as Germany said it’s suggesting ways to address a renewed confrontation between Russia and Ukraine. The advance ...

  Bloomberg Speculators are the most bearish on the pound since records began as they await data that will give the clearest picture yet of the effects of Britain’s decision to leave the European Union. Sterling touched a one-month low versus the dollar before reports this week on July inflation, retail sales and jobless claims, which are forecast to show ...

  Bloomberg General Atlantic LLC, the US private equity firm that already invested more than 1 billion reais ($318 million) in Brazil this year, plans to keep buying stakes in companies that “are not cheap” even amid the country’s worst economic crisis in a century. General Atlantic is among the few international buyout funds daring to buy Brazilian firms amid ...

  AFP Japan’s economy stagnated in the second quarter, data showed Monday, falling below expectations and rekindling worries about the government’s faltering bid to stoke a recovery. Growth in the world’s third largest economy was flat at 0.0 percent quarter-on-quarter, missing economists’ predictions for a 0.2 percent expansion in the April-June period as weak exports and a fall in business ...