February, 2020

• 22 February

  Big data won’t save you from the coronavirus

  

  How often do you see a piece of economic or financial information revised upward by 45%? And how reliable would you regard a data set that’s subject to such adjustments? This is the problem confronting epidemiologists trying to make sense of the novel coronavirus spreading from China’s Hubei province. On February 13, the tally there surged by 45% — or ...

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• 22 February

  At last, Italy tries a $5.3bn bank deal

  

  Italian banks embarking on a round of consolidation was always a matter of when, not if. Meager profitability, a fragmented industry and a desperate need for investment are obvious ingredients for M&A. Lenders have rid themselves of most of the bad loans that crippled Italy’s banks after the financial crisis, so dealmaking should be unhindered. Intesa Sanpaolo SpA’s surprise $5.3 ...

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• 22 February

  SoftBank’s fund wheeze is setting off new alarms

  SoftBank Group Corp. became vulnerable to activist attack by Elliott Management Corp. because of the harmful noise generated by the Japanese technology investor’s giant Vision Fund. That noise just won’t die down. A report appeared in the Financial Times that Vision Fund head Rajeev Misra is looking to raise a multi-billion dollar fund to buy listed stocks. The blueprint was ...

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• 22 February

  Walmart Inc must prove misstep isn’t bad stumble

  Walmart Inc. has been battling to take on Amazon.com Inc., but it was weakness in old-fashioned categories of retailing, not whizzy tech, that undermined its holiday performance and prompted it to come up short of expectations for this year. And that pressure’s not going away anytime soon, considering the continued onslaught from rivals that excel at back-to-basics shopkeeping, such as ...

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• 22 February

  Trump’s India trip: Full stadium and mostly empty promises

  

  If there’s one thing everyone knows about President Donald Trump, it’s that he loves a captive audience — the larger and more enthusiastic, the better. This is one of the many things he has in common with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi. On February 24, both of them will have a chance to indulge their shared passion. Trump is to ...

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• 22 February

  China bankruptcies won’t save dollar bondholders

  

  Who says China’s vast bureaucratic machine is too busy fighting the coronavirus to do anything else? The country is finally speeding up its creaky bankruptcy process after two years of record defaults. Within one day of filing paperwork, a Beijing court has accepted a creditor’s application to start the restructuring process for Peking University Founder Group — a state-linked conglomerate ...

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• 22 February

  IMF, Argentina re-engage in crucial test of resolve

  

  Concluding a week-long visit to Argentina to collect data and meet economic officials, the International Monetary Fund staff (IMF) mission issued a statement notable for what it says and what it doesn’t. It marks the beginning of yet another round of more formal consultations and highlights one of the most complex, if not the most complex, country cases to face ...

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• 22 February

  ECB’s Lane expects euro-area economic rebound from virus

  

  Bloomberg The European Central Bank (ECB) expects the euro-area economy to bounce back from the coronavirus outbreak, Chief Economist Philip Lane said, playing down concerns that the region could slip into a downturn that requires another interest-rate cut. Speaking in an interview with Bloomberg TV in New York, Lane acknowledged that the full impact of the disease remains unknown, and ...

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• 22 February

  Fed’s Brainard calls for new strategy to reach inflation goal

  

  Bloomberg Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard called for the adoption of new strategies by the central bank to achieve its 2% inflation goal and fight off future recessions. The Fed should seek above-target price gains to make up for past inflation shortfalls and should cap Treasury debt yields if it’s forced to lower short-term rates as far as they can ...

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• 22 February

  Canada’s RBC planning to start direct-to-consumer bank in US

  

  Bloomberg Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) plans to start a new “direct-to-consumer” business in the US to increase deposits and ultimately broaden out its offerings to a more mainstream clientele. The expansion is likely to come at the end of 2020 or early next year, and will be focused initially on higher-net-worth customers, Chief Executive Officer David McKay said during ...

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