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Emirates Business The Gulf Petrochemicals and Chemicals Association (GPCA) celebrated its 10th anniversary last week, marking a decade of networking, thought leadership and advocacy for the downstream hydrocarbons industry in the Arabian Gulf. Since the inception of the association in 2006, the GCC’s petrochemical capacity has more than doubled from 65.8 million tons, to 142.5 million tons in 2015. The ...

Bloomberg Watching the development of India, there’s often an assumption the country will follow China’s path. For commodity exports, China “is not the only game in town,” Australia’s resources minister Josh Frydenberg said in a speech last month, citing forecasts of India’s burgeoning demand for power, steel, and coal. Here’s one area where the two countries could scarcely be more ...

Bloomberg Just as Moody’s Investors Service warns of the strain on China’s finances of debt among state-owned enterprises, the companies are loading up on record overseas loans to buy assets around the world. China National Chemical Corp., or ChemChina, got $50 billion in such financing for its $43 billion purchase of Swiss pesticides producer Syngenta AG, including $35 billion that’s ...

Bloomberg Commodity demand will rebound and reverse a plunge in prices as Asia’s middle class swells and as India and China seek to raise energy imports, according to Australia’s resources minister. Gluts have been the major factor in the collapse in prices and they will ease with population growth and continued urbanization across the Asian region, Resources and Energy Minister ...

Bloomberg Indonesia’s rupiah rose for a 13th day in its longest rally in six years even after a senior minister expressed concern at the pace of gains. The currency advanced 0.6 percent to 13,052 a dollar as of 10:39 a.m. in Jakarta, according to prices from local banks. It touched 12,978 earlier, the strongest since April 30, 2015. The rupiah’s ...

Bloomberg Suzuki Motor Corp. plans to sell 200 billion yen ($1.8 billion) of convertible bonds and cancel most of the stock it bought back from Volkswagen AG last year, as the Japanese automaker expands in India following a failed alliance. Suzuki will sell the bonds primarily to fund the 185 billion rupee ($2.8 billion) factory it’s building in India’s western ...

Bloomberg China’s foreign-exchange reserves fell at a slower pace last month as the nation’s financial markets stabilized and policy makers took more steps toward shoring up growth. The world’s largest currency hoard dropped by $28.6 billion to $3.2 trillion in February, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement on Monday. That was the smallest decline since June and ...

Bloomberg Mark Carney’s scope to sidestep “Brexit” is dwindling. With a referendum on Britain’s European Union membership looming, the Bank of England governor has spent months trying to skirt the highly charged debate. An appearance before lawmakers this week may throw him right in, as happened in the buildup to the Scottish independence vote when his comments were hijacked by ...

London / Bloomberg Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne is under pressure to reverse his plans to liberalize the U.K.’s Sunday trading laws, with 23 Conservative members of Parliament saying they’re ready to vote against the government. In the Enterprise Bill, due to be debated by the House of Commons on Tuesday and Wednesday, local councils in England and Wales ...

MUNICH / Bloomberg BMW AG, which became the world’s largest maker of luxury cars by focusing on Autobahn thrills, is shifting gears to automated driving as urbanization and changing attitudes toward cars redefine transportation. “In the future, ‘Sheer Driving Pleasure’ will also be defined as liberating drivers through automation,” BMW said on Monday in a statement as it celebrated turning ...