Europe’s leaders are engaged in a high-stakes standoff with Italy, trying to coerce the populist government to drop its budget-busting spending plan. But how far can they go? Can they risk pushing Italy out of the currency union? Judging from the exposures of French and German banks, they have a strong incentive to seek a compromise. Looking at what banks ...

Pity Philip Hammond, the UK’s chancellor proposed a budget amid political chaos, faltering public services, simmering anger, and, in the background, the specter of Brexit. Also: He’s supposed to simultaneously cut taxes, end austerity and reduce debt. It’s an impossible task. And this budget — the last before Brexit — will be a premonition of bigger debates to come. Start ...

Despite efforts by the Trump administration to turn it, a supertanker is bearing down on drivers, oil majors, and even Amazon.com Inc. We are 14 months away from a shake-up in the global oil market lacking the drama of, say, Iranian sanctions. It involves a UN-mandated crackdown on air pollution from ships. Still awake? Good, because this could mean some ...

Long-simmering discord between the Indian central bank and the government is turning into a very public brawl. The timing couldn’t be more awful for markets. In a hard-hitting speech on central-bank independence, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Deputy Governor Viral Acharya startled his audience by invoking Argentina of 2010. Back then, the Argentinian central bank chief quit after being coerced ...

If governments, companies and markets needed any further reminders that their operating environment is changing, they got it last week. Despite weakening economic momentum and volatile financial markets, a second systemically important central bank, the European Central Bank (ECB), reiterated its intention to stop using large liquidity injections to support economic activity and asset prices. The change in this ‘global ...

Bloomberg US stocks reversed early losses as investors shook off disappointing earnings from General Electric and tech shares reversed a sell-off despite fresh data raised conc-ern about the strength of the housing market. Treasuries fell and the dollar rose. The S&P 500 Index climbed, although its drop from a September record still hovers near 10 percent, putting it on the ...

Bloomberg Italian bonds dropped as disappointing economic growth and a tepid debt sale damped investor enthusiasm. The securities snapped a three-day rally after the nation’s growth stagnated in the third quarter and sale prices for 10-year debt at the Treasury auction were below market levels. The weaker average sale price reflected fragile investor sentiment after rating agencies cut their view ...

Bloomberg The ultimate guarantor of job security for presidential whipping boy Jerome Powell may lie not in Washington, but on Wall Street. President Donald Trump could confront a huge blow back from the financial markets — with stocks, bonds and the dollar all going down — if he made a serious move to oust the Federal Reserve chairman, market professionals ...

Bloomberg The South African Reserve Bank sees higher interest rates in the next two years to help contain accelerating inflation. The central bank’s quarterly projection model forecasts a benchmark rate of 7.7 percent by the end of 2020 compared to 6.5 percent currently, it said in its six-monthly Monetary Policy Review released in Pretoria, the capital. While policy will remain ...

Bloomberg BNP Paribas SA joined Deutsche Bank AG in reporting steep third-quarter declines at its debt-trading business, complicating Chief Executive Officer Jean-Laurent Bonnafe’s plans to meet 2020 profit and growth targets. The French bank posted a sixth consecutive quarterly contraction in revenue from buying and selling bonds, currencies and commodities, while gains from equities trading were also lower than analysts ...