Abu Dhabi / WAM Astronomers and astronomy lovers are preparing to observe a meteor shower that occurs every year on December 14. Mohammed Shawkat Odeh, Director of the International Astronomical Centre and Member of the International Meteorological Organisation, said that the “twin meteorite” was named because it appears to have originated from a fictitious point in the “twin group,” where ...
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Sharjah keen to enhance economic ties with Kenya
Sharjah / WAM Expo Centre Sharjah held discussions with a number of government officials and representatives of economic sectors in Kenya, where they reviewed ways to enhance the participation of Kenyan institutions, companies, investors, and businesspeople in the global specialised exhibitions that the centre organises throughout the year. These discussions were held during the centre’s participation in the trade mission ...
Read More »LNG traders in US face a new reality: Expansion exhaustion
Bloomberg Welcome to the new world market for natural gas, where computers never sleep and, apparently, neither do traders. With US liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports set to surge by almost 80 percent in 2019, traders in America face a new reality: expansion exhaustion. As more and more inte- rnational players participate in US gas markets, the price of market ...
Read More »Alberta output-cut mandate may be driving oil prices up
Bloomberg Alberta’s plan to boost crude prices through mandatory production cuts is working a little too well. Just over a week after Premier Rachel Notley announced that oil producers will be required to curtail output by 8.7 percent, the price of heavy Canadian crude has more than do- ubled, in some ca-ses rendering Wes-tern Canadian Sel- ect too expensive to ...
Read More »Angola seeks to jumpstart oil exploration
Bloomberg Angola’s state-run oil and gas company is ramping up efforts to lure foreign investors and halt a decline in crude output. Once Africa’s biggest oil producer, output has tumbled in recent years due to under-investment in new projects and natural declines at aging fields. If it fails to halt this decline it will put severe strain on an economy ...
Read More »SoftBank Vision Fund, Alibaba lead $1.1bn Tokopedia round
Bloomberg SoftBank Vision Fund and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. led a $1.1 billion investment in PT Tokopedia, a financing round that will help Indonesia’s biggest online marketplace venture beyond e-commerce into new areas such as air tickets and insurance. The company was valued at more than $7 billion after the funding, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked ...
Read More »Trouble for Huawei spells opportunity for Samsung over 5G
Bloomberg Growing security concerns surrounding Huawei Technologies Co. may help Samsung Electronics Co. challenge the Chinese behemoth in the market for fifth-generation wireless communications, an executive at the South Korean giant said. While Samsung remains the world’s biggest smartphone and semiconductor maker, Huawei dominates networking by a large margin. But its market position is under threat as one country after ...
Read More »China default-risk jumps to 2005 high
Bloomberg Default risk for Chinese companies has climbed to the highest in 13 years as Beijing seeks to rein in its post-crisis construction boom, according to Moody’s Analytics. The research group’s measure of expected default frequency has risen above early-warning levels for about 25 percent of corporate borrowers. Moody’s Analytics, a separate entity from the ratings agency, uses the gauge ...
Read More »Korea’s minimum wage hikes loom over hurdle to jobs
Bloomberg President Moon Jae-in’s income-led growth campaign will harm South Korea’s economy next year by weakening job creation, according to a majority of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. More than three-quarters of the 30 experts polled forecast employment growth will slow as the government pushes ahead with an 11 percent hike in the minimum wage, adding to the 16 percent increase ...
Read More »Brexit anxiety grips UK businesses
Bloomberg UK companies are fretting over the prospect of a no-deal departure from the European Union, with the government on the brink of collapse and Brexit negotiations likely delayed into the new year. Facing defeat on her Brexit accord, Prime Minister Theresa May this week postponed a vote on the plan. The delay in the Brexit vote means British businesses ...
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