Reuters Kuwait’s National Real Estate Company (NREC) plans to issue a $500 million sukuk early next year to help fund new projects and to refinance existing debt, its chief financial officer said on Monday. The company is about to obtain a credit rating from Standard & Poor’s and will then seek to appoint banks to arrange the planned Islamic …

  Bloomberg The trading arms of Royal Dutch Shell Plc and BP Plc enjoyed their best year ever in 2015, helping push the combined gross margins of oil merchants to a six-year high, according to a closely watched report. Oil traders last year “stormed ahead, thanks to low, volatile spot prices that created cash-and-carry opportunities,” consultancy Oliver Wyman said in …

  Bloomberg Ousted Tata Group Chairman Cyrus Mistry accused directors at India’s largest conglomerate of wrongfully dismissing him and warned that the tea-to-software giant may face 1.18 trillion rupees ($18 billion) in writedowns because of five unprofitable businesses he inherited. Mistry, who had been Tata’s chairman for almost four years, was abruptly removed from his role on Monday for non …

  Bloomberg Posco, South Korea’s largest steelmaker, posted the largest quarterly profit since 2013 as a property and infrastructure boom in China boosts global prices, lifting earnings at Asian mills. Net income, excluding minority interests, was 539.3 billion won ($476 million) in the three months through September, after a 550 billion won loss a year earlier, the Pohang-based company said …

  Bloomberg Australia’s headline inflation accelerated last quarter, sending the currency up half a US cent and prompting money markets to pare bets on an interest-rate cut. Quarterly headline CPI increased 0.7%, exceeding the 0.5% median estimate in a survey of economists Trimmed mean CPI rose 0.4%, matching forecasts Annual headline CPI advanced 1.3%, beating a predicted 1.1% gain Annual …

  AFP Iran on Wednesday urged more Asian companies to invest in the country, saying the lifting of nuclear-linked sanctions had opened vast opportunities for foreign capital. Central bank governor Valiollah Seif told a business seminar in Singapore that reforms put in place since President Hassan Rouhani took office in 2013 helped restore economic stability while the lifting of the …

  Bloomberg Indian importers of pulses are renegotiating contracts with suppliers after global prices of lentils and yellow peas dropped by as much as 30 percent on bumper global harvests. Contracts of as much as 500,000 tons of lentils and yellow peas worth about $350 million were renegotiated in the past two months, said Sudhakar Tomar, managing director of Dubai-based …

  Bloomberg Volkswagen AG and drivers suing the company in the US over its diesel-cheating scandal won final approval of their $14.7 billion settlement to resolve what’s likely to be the largest portion of VW’s civil liability worldwide. The accord requires VW to buy back cars with 2.0-liter diesel engines armed with so-called defeat devices used to beat emissions tests. …

  Bloomberg Coca-Cola Co., the world’s largest soft-drink company, posted third-quarter earnings that beat analysts’ estimates, helped by new beverages like sports drinks and sales of smaller, more-profitable package sizes. Profit was 49 cents a share, excluding some items, the Atlanta-based company said in a statement on Wednesday. Analysts estimated 48 cents, on average. And while sales fell 6.9 percent …

  AFP European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker said he looked to Belgium on Wednesday to overcome internal disputes and seal a landmark EU-Canada trade deal. Belgium’s federal and regional leaders meanwhile held a short new round of talks in Brussels in a bid to break the deadlock on the eve of a still hoped-for signing summit with Canadian Prime Minister …