February, 2021

• 13 February

  RBI’s currency strategy is drawing more hot money

  

  Bloomberg The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) strategy to shift some of its currency intervention to the forwards market is adding to its problems. Its balancing act to keep the rupee stable amid heavy foreign inflows while also keeping excess liquidity in check is flooding the market with more foreign funds, prompting a vicious cycle of interventions. The RBI’s outstanding ...

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• 13 February

  Citi reduces Corbat’s pay to $19m for 2020

  Bloomberg Citigroup Inc. reduced the compensation of outgoing Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Michael Corbat by 21% to $19 million for 2020, a year in which regulators sanctioned the lender over its internal controls. Corbat, who is ceding CEO job to Jane Fraser, was granted stock awards totaling about $12.3 million; a cash bonus of $5.3 million and a $1.5 million salary, ...

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• 13 February

  Life without Google

  

  Bloomberg Imagine a world without Google, the search engine so pervasive it’s the starting point for more than five billion queries a day. That’s the reality facing Australia, where the tech giant is threatening to unplug its homepage in a standoff with the government. Google opposes a planned law that would force the company and Facebook Inc. to pay Australian ...

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• 13 February

  Video-sharing app Kuaishou hits $159b valuation

  

  Bloomberg Kuaishou Technology, the operator of China’s most popular short-video service after ByteDance Ltd.’s Douyin, jumped 161% in its Hong Kong debut after a $5.4 billion initial public offering that attracted hundreds of billions of dollars of orders. The shares closed at HK$300 after rising to as high as HK$345, compared with the IPO price of HK$115, valuing the Tencent ...

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• 13 February

  Jet-powered flying taxi startup to develop hubs across Florida

  

  Bloomberg The world’s first all-electric vertical takeoff passenger jet could start operations from boutique hubs across Florida in coming years. German startup Lilium GmbH has struck a deal to build a network of at least 10 so-called vertiports with Spanish infrastructure giant Ferrovial SE, the companies said. Ferrovial owns 25% of London’s Heathrow Airport and manages three other terminals in ...

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• 13 February

  ByteDance in talks to sell its Indian TikTok assets

  

  Bloomberg ByteDance Ltd. is said to be exploring a sale of the India operations of TikTok to rival unicorn Glance, in an attempt to resuscitate the once-thriving short video sharing app that’s been banned indefinitely in the South Asian nation. The discussions have been initiated by Japan’s SoftBank group conglomerate. SoftBank is a backer of Glance’s parent InMobi as well ...

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• 13 February

  Porsche budgets $1.1bn on digitisation for its cars

  

  Bloomberg Porsche AG is increasing spending to bolster the digital products and services supplementing its luxury sports cars to lure more tech-savvy customers, particularly in China. The German manufacturer now invests 900 million euros ($1.1 billion) a year on digitisation compared with 800 million euros previously, Chief Financial Officer Lutz Meschke said. The Stuttgart-based company also puts about 150 million ...

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• 13 February

  Facebook helped identify Capitol rioters in US

  Bloomberg Facebook Inc. has been “helping” law enforcement identify people who posted photos of themselves at the January 6 riots at the US Capitol, “even after the attack was over,” said Monika Bickert, the company’s head of global policy management. Bickert said Facebook removed posts from several militant groups in the lead-up to the violent event and continued to remove ...

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• 11 February

  Arab League congratulates UAE for Hope probe’s arrival to Mars

  

  CAIRO/ WAM Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary-General of the Arab League, congratulated the UAE for the successful entry of the Hope Probe into the orbit of Mars, stressing that this success is the outcome of an investment in knowledge and an academic and scientific renaissance, which was reinforced and supported by the government over many decades. In his statement issued on ...

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• 11 February

  Adnoc awards Japan’s Cosmo offshore oil exploration rights

  

  ABU DHABI/ WAM The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) announced on Wednesday the signing of an exploration concession agreement, awarding the exploration rights for Abu Dhabi’s Offshore Block 4 to Cosmo E&P Albahriya Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japan’s Cosmo Energy Holdings Co, Ltd (Cosmo). The award has been approved by Abu Dhabi’s newly formed Supreme Council for Financial ...

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