Emirates Business The expansion of Saudi Arabia’s non-oil private sector picked up speed in July, as highlighted by the strongest improvement in business conditions since last November. Output growth was particularly sharp, while new orders also increased at a faster pace. The improvement in demand was broad-based across domestic and international markets – exports rose for the first time ...

  Bloomberg Oil halted its slide below $40 a barrel as weekly industry data showed U.S. crude inventories declined, easing a supply glut that’s at the highest seasonal level in at least two decades. Futures added 0.2 percent in New York after slipping 5 percent the previous two sessions. Inventories slid by 1.34 million barrels and gasoline stockpiles fell, the ...

  Bloomberg Egyptian officials are holding talks in Cairo with the International Monetary Fund over a loan to help finance the government’s economic program. Egypt is seeking $12 billion over three years. The most-populous Arab country has had a tumultuous relationship with the IMF since the 2011 uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak, turning down two initial loan accords. Some of ...

  Reuters Saudi Arabia’s government is discussing a proposal to take over construction conglomerate Saudi Oger, owned by the family of former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri, a Lebanese newspaper reported on Wednesday. Oger has been hit hard by a slowdown in the Saudi construction sector due to low oil prices and state spending cuts, and wage payments to thousands ...

  Reuters Libya’s National Oil Corporation, which hopes to more than quadruple the country’s oil output by the end of this year, remains wary that promises to reopen blockaded ports could be broken, the NOC chief in Tripoli told Reuters. Libya’s U.N.-backed government has signed a deal with an armed brigade controlling the major Ras Lanuf and Es Sider oil ...

  Bloomberg The long-feared Chinese hard landing has become a reality in rustbelt Liaoning. The northeastern province, ground zero in China’s multi- year slowdown, saw its economy contract 1 percent in the first half of 2016 as factories splutter and the coal industry groans under the weight of overcapacity. But the hardship remains localized, with regional data for the first ...

  Bloomberg Indian stocks dropped the most in a month amid losses in emerging-market equities and as investors turned cautious before lawmakers began debating the unified sales tax bill. The S&P BSE Sensex tumbled 1 percent at the close in a fourth day of losses, the longest losing run in seven weeks. A gauge of mid-cap stocks had its steepest ...

Bloomberg Not for the first time, a long-awaited plan by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has fallen flat with investors. The Topix slumped 1.6 percent on Tuesday after Abe returned to the fiscal-stimulus lever with a 28 trillion yen ($277 billion) spending-and-lending package to sooth concern that his Abenomics program isn’t working. It dropped another 2.2 percent on Wednesday. The ...

  Bloomberg China’s futures exchange is planning to relax the restrictions on stock-index contracts that sparked a 99 percent plunge in trading and heightened concern over the government’s intervention in markets, according to people familiar with the matter. The bourse is considering allowing non-hedging accounts to open 100 new positions a day on a single contract, the people said. Currently, ...

  Bloomberg The US Air Force declared its version of Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-35 ready if needed for limited combat operations, a milestone for the $379 billion program that’s the Pentagon’s costliest. The service’s announcement that the combat jet has an “initial operational capability” reflects progress after early years marked by development setbacks and rising costs. But the F-35 is ...