Bloomberg Zema, a 94 year-old retailer of toys and appliances in Brazil’s interior, has become an unlikely thorn in the side of state-controlled oil behemoth Petroleo Brasileiro SA. This year Zema, which also runs gas stations, got its first fuel import license and joined a fast-growing group of new players that managed to, at least temporarily, squeeze Petrobras out of ...

Bloomberg North Korea’s saber-rattling is at last being felt in its southern neighbour’s bullet-proof bond market. Foreign investors have started to look for the exits, selling a net $415 million worth of Korean notes last week, only the second weekly outflow since November, according to the nation’s Financial Supervisory Service. That’s a precipitous drop from the $4.3 billion of net ...

Bloomberg Singapore’s government will support technology startups by doing business with them rather than having them rely on grants as the city-state pushes ahead with a plan to become a high-tech hub, a top minister said. The government wants to fuel private-sector innovation, especially among small and medium-sized firms, in a bid to create a digitally integrated economy, Vivian Balakrishnan, ...