CAIRO / Reuters The International Monetary Fund said it had reached a staff-level agreement with Egypt on a second loan instalment that would make available about $1.25 billion. The IMF approved a $12-billion, three-year loan programme to Egypt in November and paid out $2.75 billion of the first $4 billion tranche of the loan. An IMF team was in Cairo ...
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India’s 2030 all-electric car target ambitious: IEA
Bloomberg India’s potential plan to sell only electric cars by the end of next decade would require nearly eight times the global stock of such vehicles, according to the International Energy Agency. The country would need to sell more than 10 million electric cars in 2030, compared with the almost 1.3 million on the road worldwide in 2015, the agency ...
Read More »India panel pushes commercial use of first GM food crop
Bloomberg An Indian environment ministry panel recommended to the government that it allow cultivation of a genetically-modified mustard variety, taking it closer to becoming the country’s first GM food crop for commercial production. The federal government will make a final decision in this regard, said Amita Prasad, an additional secretary with the environment ministry and chairman of the Genetic Engineering ...
Read More »China’s bonds decline for seventh week
Bloomberg China’s 10-year government bonds fell for a seventh week, building on the longest run of declines since 2013, amid concerns the nation’s deleveraging campaign will drive borrowing costs up further. The yield on 10-year sovereign debt climbed eight basis points this week to close Friday at 3.65 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the longest streak since ...
Read More »Fintech firm backed by China movie stars plans IPO
Bloomberg QuantGroup, a financial technology company backed by Chinese movie stars, is planning a US initial public offering that could raise about $200 million, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The Beijing-based firm has asked banks to pitch for a role on the potential offering, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. ...
Read More »China’s rag trade sees south Asian invasion at Canton trade fair
Bloomberg At Area 15.1 of the sprawling Canton Fair in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, exhibitors from India, Pakistan and Turkey touted their wares to global buyers last week. Their presence at the gathering synonymous with China’s rise as the world’s manufacturing powerhouse illustrates the nation’s shift from sweatshops producing cheap jeans and towels toward branded goods with better ...
Read More »Anthem ends battle for Cigna after court deals blow to pact
Bloomberg Anthem Inc.’s nearly two-year effort to buy rival insurer Cigna Corp. is officially dead. Anthem said that it won’t appeal a Delaware judge’s ruling late that Cigna can walk away from the $48 billion health insurance merger. That leaves the companies to fight over who’s to blame for the deal’s collapse. “The only surprise here is that it took ...
Read More »Sprint, SoftBank in informal deal talks with T-Mobile
Bloomberg Sprint Corp. has started preliminary conversations to merge with T-Mobile US Inc., the latest attempt to consolidate in a market watched closely by US regulators, according to people familiar with the matter. Executives of both SoftBank Group Corp., Sprint’s largest shareholder, and Sprint itself have had informal contact with T-Mobile owner Deutsche Telekom AG about a transaction, said the ...
Read More »Home Capital warns of ‘knock-on effects’ if it fails
Bloomberg Home Capital Group Inc. said it’s seeking new sources of funding to counter a run on deposits and warned a failure of the Canadian lender would have “significant knock-on effects†in the mortgage market. The struggling lender has “breathing room†to stabilize finances and pursue options following an C$1.8 billion ($1.3 billion) plunge in deposits and a 60 percent ...
Read More »UAE dirham continues to appreciate in Q1
ABU DHABI / WAM The UAE dirham has continued to appreciate in Q1 2017 for the twelfth consecutive quarter, according to Central Bank of the UAE statistics. With a few exceptions, the dirham appreciated against most of the UAE’s main trade partners. From the import side, the weighted dirham’s appreciation against its top-nine non-dollarised import partners, which claim 48.5 percent ...
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