International News

Bloomberg Russia’s ruble retreated for a second day on falling crude prices, while ING Groep NV said the drop would be steeper without demand from companies converting export revenue to pay a 1 trillion ruble ($14.5 billion) monthly tax bill. The currency fell 0.3 percent against the dollar to 68.9410 by 11:32 a.m. in Moscow, extending Wednesday’s 1.8 percent decline …

Bloomberg As Britain ponders its future in the European Union, investors are betting an amount almost the size of Iceland’s economy on the pound falling to levels last seen in the 1980s. At least 11 billion pounds ($15.5 billion) has been wagered this year on options that would profit if sterling fell to or below $1.3502, a 4 percent drop …

Bloomberg Barack Obama became the first U.S. president to visit Argentina in more than a decade as his counterpart, Mauricio Macri, seeks a rapprochement with the international community following a decade of financial and diplomatic isolation. Obama, arriving from an historic state visit to Cuba, met with Macri and is scheduled to attend a business forum in Buenos Aires before …

Bloomberg Puerto Rico gained another week to file a proposed rate charge to the island’s energy commission, a fee that would back debt used to restructure about $9 billion owed by its main electric utility. Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority creditors agreed to give officials until March 30 to submit their petition to implement a new customer fee, called a …

Bloomberg TransCanada Corp. is working with JPMorgan Chase & Co. to find buyers for more than $7 billion in assets to help finance its acquisition of Columbia Pipeline Group Inc., people with knowledge of the matter said. The people asked not to be identified because the information is private. Assets for sale include a portfolio of U.S. Northeast merchant power …

Sao Paulo / Reuters Brazil’s currency led losses in Latin American markets on concerns that a political crisis threatening President Dilma Rousseff may drag on longer than expected, while the central bank moved to weaken the real for a third straight day. Latin American currencies weakened as traders reconsidered their bets on U.S. monetary policy after Federal Reserve policymakers encouraged …

Bloomberg After a disastrous 2015, Brazilian stocks and bonds are posting the biggest gains among global peers this year. Speculation that President Dilma Rousseff could soon be ousted, ending a political stalemate that has paralyzed the country, is fueling the rally. Yet, whoever steps into Rousseff’s shoes would face daunting challenges, from closing a crippling budget deficit to pulling Latin …

Singapore / Bloomberg Singapore said it will adopt an expansionary fiscal budget to boost growth, reducing pressure on the central bank to provide more support for the economy weeks before its next policy decision. Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat, presenting his first budget to Parliament, pledged support for companies that are facing labour constraints and a faltering global outlook, promised …

Taipei / Bloomberg Taiwan cut its benchmark rate for a third consecutive quarter as an export slump showed no signs of recovering and has begun weighing on the labor market. The central bank lowered the benchmark discount rate by another 12.5 basis points to 1.5 percent, it said in a statement Thursday in Taipei. Twenty-five of 26 economists surveyed by …

TOKYO / Reuters Some Japanese firms, facing the possibility of negative interest rates on their deposits, would consider stuffing their cash in a safe rather than pay to keep it in the bank, a Reuters poll found, in what would be an unintended and unwelcome side-effect to the country’s new monetary policy. While the bulk of companies in the Reuters …