Hong Kong / AFP Standard Chartered has announced on Tuesday first quarter profits slumped 64 percent year-on-year as revenue for the period also plunged, following a turbulent 2015 in which the troubled bank announced it would axe thousands of jobs. The Asia-focussed bank said profits for the first three months fell to $539 million from $1.49 billion in the same …

  New York / AFP Goldman Sachs has officially launched an online bank targetting households and small businesses as it expands from its Wall Street base and aims for the masses. The online-only GS Bank permits consumers to open an account for as little as $1, a big shift for a financial powerhouse that has built itself around serving billionaires and …

  Tokyo / Reuters Japanese government bonds (JGBs) stayed firm on Tuesday, with prices of superlong JGBs rallying after strong results of the Bank of Japan’s (BOJ’s) buying operations. The central bank offered to buy 450 billion yen ($4.06 billion) of JGBs in the 5- to 10-year zone, 220 billion yen of JGBs in the 10- to 25-year zone and …