Bloomberg Widespread school closures amid the pandemic will likely reduce students’ future productivity and wages, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said, estimating the present value of prospective lost earnings at $1.25 trillion for developing Asia. The region’s students, who on average have lost nearly one-third of the academic year to school closures, could see a 2.4% decline in their future ...

Bloomberg Zomato Ltd, an Indian food delivery startup backed by Jack Ma’s Ant Group Co, has filed an initial prospectus with Indian market regulator for an initial public offering that could raise as much as 82.5 billion rupees ($1.1 billion). The company plans to issue new shares to raise a maximum 75 billion rupees, while its major shareholder Info Edge ...

Bloomberg India’s most valuable steelmaker is cutting output to step up supplies of medical-grade oxygen as the country grapples with a devastating shortage of the life-saving gas amid surging coronavirus infections. JSW Steel Ltd said it is reducing output to augment liquid medical oxygen supply to more than 900 tons a day by April-end, and more than 20,000 tons for ...

Bloomberg In the race to vaccinate citizens against Covid-19, Japan should be a front-runner. It has nearly universal healthcare coverage and pharmaceutical prowess, not to mention a pending national election, a large elderly population and the looming Olympics to motivate political leaders to move fast. Yet it has the dubious distinction of being among the worst performers when it comes ...

Bloomberg Maruti Suzuki India Ltd’s profit narrowed and earnings trailed estimates as a resurgent Covid-19 outbreak hit consumer demand in Asia’s third-largest economy. Net income fell 9.3% to 11.7 billion rupees ($157 million) in the three months ended on March 31, the unit of Japan’s Suzuki Motor Corp said in a statement. That’s less than the average analyst estimate of ...

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing an official investigation into whether he or his party broke election law by failing to declare the funding of works to refurbish his government residence. The Electoral Commission, which regulates political donations, announced the inquiry amid questions over whether Johnson took an undeclared loan from a political donor to cover the costs ...

Bloomberg Somalia’s leader said he’s prepared to hold elections, after a controversial plan to extend his mandate without a vote drew international condemnation and stoked violence in the Horn of Africa nation. President Mohamed Abdullahi, also known as Farmajo, called for urgent talks on the return to a September 17 agreement between the federal and regional governments to hold an ...

Bloomberg Finland’s ruling coalition came to an agreement on spending plans, averting a collapse of the Nordic nation’s Social Democrat-led government by a thin margin. The five-party cabinet patched up its differences, forging a common vision of how Finland’s recovery from the pandemic should take place, PM Sanna Marin said. The broad outlines of the deal are now agreed, and ...

Bloomberg For months, developed economies have hoarded Covid-19 vaccines and the raw materials needed to make them. Now, they’re being forced to act as an explosive outbreak in India raises the risk of new virus mutations that could threaten the wider world. Under mounting criticism for dominating vaccine resources, the US said that it will help India by sending items ...

Bloomberg French President Emmanuel Macron’s government was expected to unveil a new anti-terrorism draft bill on Wednesday, just days after the fatal stabbing of a police officer by an extremist. The bill aims to identify suspects before they carry out an attack, and will turn temporary measures into permanent ones. That could include extending a collaboration with telecom companies to ...