Bloomberg A month can be a long time in economics. Since the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) last policy decision on May 2, market bets on an interest-rate cut by the end of this year have doubled. While that chance is still only about 20 percent, swaps traders see Australia as one of just two developed economies where cuts are …

Bloomberg In the era of negative interest rates, Japan’s second-largest bank finds itself having to run just to stand still. Takeshi Kunibe, who took over as chief executive officer at Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. (SMFG) in April, has set a new net-income target of about 700 billion yen ($6.3 billion) in the year ending March 2020. That’s roughly the …

WAM/ Reuters Etihad Airways announced that it will suspend all flights to and from Qatar until further notice, joining other regional carriers in a similar move amid a diplomatic spat between Qatar and some of its Gulf neigbhours. The move came after Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain severed their ties with Qatar on Monday, accusing it …