Eighteen banks coordinating to calibrate a market-driven rate — cynics could be forgiven for thinking that another Libor-rigging scandal is around the corner in China. Perversely, such an outcome would be a good sign for its financial system. Over the weekend, the People’s Bank of China made the loan prime rate, which banks offer to their best clients, the new ...

Negative mortgage rates in Denmark; sub-zero yields on 10-year corporate bonds from Nestle SA; A 100-year Austria bond trading at more than twice its face value; Record low yields on 30-year Treasuries — For fund managers trying to navigate the fixed-income universe, the bond market’s reaction to the prospect of a recession makes life more treacherous every day. Investors see ...

All major miners agree that copper has a bright future. The trouble is how to get at it. Take BHP Group, set to be the world’s biggest producer this year after Freeport-McMoRan Inc. sold down its stake in Indonesia’s Grasberg mine. Costs at BHP’s massive Escondida pit in Chile, which accounts for about one in 20 tons of copper mined ...