The cross-country demonstrations currently taking place in Vietnam to protest massive fish die-offs along the central Vietnamese coast are truly remarkable. Not only were demonstrations at this scale unheard of even five years ago, but they beg the question of why thousands of demonstrators as far off as Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City are subjecting themselves to the ...

  Dalton Lin SPECIAL TO EMIRATES BUSINESS Taiwan’s new president, Tsai Ing-wen, finally delivered her keenly anticipated and closely watched inaugural speech on May 20. China had made it clear ever since Tsai’s election that if she hoped for the peaceful and cooperative cross-strait relations over the past eight years to continue, she needed to come to terms with the ...

  BLOOMBERG Commodities slid, led by metals, while U.S. stocks fluctuated as investors awaited more clarity on the timing of the Federal Reserve’s next increase in interest rates and the outlook for inflation. The yen strengthened. Oil fell for a fourth day after Iran said again that it won’t countenance freezing output until its production is back at pre-sanctions levels, ...

  Bloomberg Cracks in the foundation of the bull market in U.S. stocks are quickly spreading. The Wall Street deal-making machine that powered 2015 to one of the biggest years ever for mergers and acquisitions has slowed, and that means the pop to stock prices that investors could count on from corporate transactions has been reduced. While there are still ...

  Dubai / Reuters Stock markets in the Gulf trod separate paths on Monday, with Saudi Arabia’s market lagging while the two main markets in the United Arab Emirates held on to small gains. Riyadh’s index was down 1.2 percent after an hour of trade amid a sell-off in petrochemical shares after oil prices weakened. Brent oil was down 0.9 ...

  Dubai / Bloomberg Dubai investor Selim Fendi plans to open Monaco’s first gold refinery in early 2017 to meet demand from local and global jewelers looking to make sure they aren’t using metal from conflict areas. Aurum Monaco SAM will produce up to 1 metric ton of gold a month in its first year, with capacity to boost that ...

  Bloomberg Nigerian policy makers may be about to loosen their stranglehold on the nation’s currency. The central bank of Africa’s biggest economy will decide on Tuesday on whether to adjust borrowing as evidence mounts of a looming recession. Barclays Plc, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Renaissance Capital Ltd. are among banks predicting it will also introduce a de facto ...

  Reuters Jordan’s central bank said that it had auctioned its first-ever sale of Islamic bonds, or sukuk, a five-year 75 million dinars ($105.9 million) deal to help finance purchases by state utility firm National Electric Power Company. The sukuk, which used a cost-plus-profit arrangement known as murabaha, attracted 205 million dinars worth of bids paying a 3.5 percent profit ...

  Bloomberg UniCredit SpA Chief Executive Officer Federico Ghizzoni may resign as soon as on Tuesday amid investors’ demands for a change in management, people with knowledge of the situation said. The bank’s board will meet tomorrow and may authorise its nomination committee to begin the search for a new CEO, said one person, asking not to be identified because ...

  JAKARTA / Reuters Ares Capital Corp., the publicly traded lender managed by alternative investment firm Ares Management LP, will acquire American Capital Ltd. in a deal valued at around $3.4 billion. Ares Capital will pay $14.95 a share in cash and stock for Bethesda, Maryland-based American Capital, the companies said in a statement Monday. The deal excludes American Capital ...