ABU DHABI / EMIRATES BUSINESS The Emirates Securities Market Index has decreased by -0.47% to close at 4393.78 points. Accordingly the Market Capitalization has lost AED 3.38 billion attaining AED 712.73 billion. A total of 398.31 Million Shares were traded with a total value of AED 447.32 million during the trading session of 2016-03-28 through 5102 transactions. The number of companies which ...

Tokyo / Reuters Driving interest rates below zero, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) has turned a comatose government bond market into an enormous free-for-all, complicating the central bank’s own efforts to kick-start growth and end deflation. The $9 trillion market for Japanese Government Bonds (JGBs) had been all but paralysed since the BOJ began a massive monetary easing three years ...

Bloomberg Bank of Korea (BOK) released names of four board member candidates to replace members whose terms end on April 20 The BOK recommended Lee Il Houng, head of Korea Institute for International Economic Policy. Finance Ministry recommended Cho Dong Chul, chief economist for state-run Korea Development Institute. Financial Services Commission recommended Standing Commissioner Koh Seung Beom. The Korea Chamber ...

Rabat / Reuters Moroccan lender BMCE Bank of Africa’s net profit rose 1 percent to 1.95 billion dirham ($201.76 million) in 2015 as strong growth in banking activities offset non-recurrent charges and higher bad loans. Consolidated net banking income rose 3 percent to 11.8 billion dirhams in the same period, it said in a statement on Monday. Banking income was ...

Amman / AP Jordan will get a cheap $100 million loan to help create 100,000 jobs for Syrian refugees and its own citizens, the World Bank president has announced. The long-term loan, almost interest free, is part of an attempt by the international community to improve conditions for refugees in overburdened regional host countries, including Jordan and Lebanon. More than ...

WASHINGTON \ AP Consumer spending and home construction are helping sustain modest U.S. economic growth despite problems caused by a strong dollar, low oil prices and an excess of business stockpiles. The economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, grew at a 1.4 percent annual rate in the October-December period, the government said. That was better than the 1 ...

MUSCAT \ Reuters Oman will encourage households to generate electricity with solar panels and feed it into the national grid, Qais al-Zakwani, executive director of the Authority for Electricity Regulation, said on Monday. The policy could put Oman in the forefront of Middle East nations promoting widespread use of solar power. Its finances severely damaged by low oil prices, the ...

Seoul / AFP A South Korean constructor that jointly won a $20 billion housing deal with Saudi Arabia said on Monday it was confident the project would go ahead despite the impact of slumping oil prices on the Gulf nation’s coffers. Under the deal, for which a memorandum of understanding was signed in Seoul last week, a three-party consortium will ...

Calif / AP Canadians are no longer flocking to California’s sunny Coachella Valley to buy homes since their currency has weakened, and many are putting properties they own up for sale, real estate experts said. The move coincides with a decline in the Canadian dollar since oil prices have plummeted, the Desert Sun newspaper reported on Sunday (http://desert.sn/1RCkkPj ). After ...

Bloomberg Real estate Web portals Leju Holdings Ltd. and SouFun Holdings Ltd. are standing out among U.S.-traded Chinese stocks, rebounding as government stimulus and a recovering property market improves the outlook for growth. Leju has surged 44 percent over the past month in the best performance on the Bloomberg China-US Equity Index, which gained 4.6 percent during the same period. ...