News

Tokyo / DPA The Japanese government has decided to offer a yen loan of about 10 billion about $88,829,700) to support construction of a gigantic solar power plant with a large-capacity storage battery system in Egypt. Egypt is expected to hold a public tender open only to Japanese companies with advanced battery technology. The government hopes this will give the ...

Islamabad / AFP Pakistan has authorised the import of an expensive Hepatitis-C drug from the United States to improve treatment for the estimated eight million people carrying the blood infection, officials said on Monday. Hailed by experts as a game-changer, Sovaldi, which has been on the market since 2013, costs around $1,000 per pill in the US or $84,000 for ...

Beijing / Bloomberg China will halt the implementation of a drug-coding system that’s developed and operated by Alibaba Health Information Technology Ltd. to identify counterfeit medicines. China Food & Drug Administration suspended the new electronic coding system as it made draft amendments to existing rules, allowing the use of other methods to build a system that tracks medicines back to ...

Bloomberg With Jeb Bush’s departure from the presidential race on Saturday, a mighty fundraising army scattered. The question the troops face: pick another side or retreat? Bobbie Kilberg chose quickly. A top Republican fundraiser in Virginia, she got the news of Bush’s withdrawal Saturday night over text messages at a dinner. By the next morning, she was giving interviews about ...

Bloomberg The co-founder and former chief executive officer of Devon Energy Corp. has signed on to shape energy policy for Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination. Larry Nichols will lead Rubio’s energy steering committee. Nichols, who cut a $50,000 check to the super PAC supporting Rubio in December, also will host a Feb. 26 ...

Washington / AFP Tens of millions of additional cars in the US alone could be recalled over Takata’s potentially defective airbags, which have been linked to several deaths, the US auto safety regulator said on Monday. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a statement that it continues to investigate the dangers in Takata’s airbags equipped with ammonium nitrate-based ...

Bloomberg Jamaica is showing signs of revival after a lost decade of economic contraction and increase in poverty rates. In an election on Thursday, voters must decide whether they can stand several more years of the austerity the government says has underpinned the country’s recent turnaround. Since restructuring $9 billion of debt in 2013, the administration of Prime Minister Portia ...

Rio De Janeiro / Bloomberg Brazil’s economy faces a prolonged rout with no recovery in sight, as political uncertainty weighs on investor confidence and structural reforms show no sign of gaining traction, according to fund manager and former central bank chief Arminio Fraga. Even if President Dilma Rousseff survives attempts to remove her from office, she will be too weak ...

Bloomberg Egypt’s central bank will consider floating the country’s currency when foreign reserves are almost double their current level, the bank’s governor said in a televised interview. Tarek Amer’s comments on al-Qahira Wel-Nas were his clearest signal yet that the central bank has no intention of devaluing the Egyptian pound at present, despite growing analyst predictions that such a move ...

Bloomberg The People’s Bank of China should have explained the change in its reporting of foreign-exchange holdings to avoid market speculation on its motives, according to Mizuho Securities Asia Ltd. “The PBOC changed the category of the position of forex purchases in its monthly report in January,” a move that “immediately raised market concerns about possible concealment or manipulation of ...