January, 2020

• 1 January

  Nigeria’s Buhari reiterates he won’t seek third term

  Bloomberg Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari reaffirmed he will leave office in 2023, addressing concerns he wants to change the constitution to seek a third term. Buhari, 77, won a second four-year mandate in March, the last he’s permitted under the constitution of Africa’s largest oil producer. With speculation already mounting over who the ruling All Progressives Council and opposition People’s ...

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• 1 January

  Australia scrambles to reach fire victims

  

  Bloomberg Australia scrambled military helicopters and ships on Wednesday to help thousands of people cut off by wildfires raging across the southeast as the death toll from the national crisis continued to climb. Some 4,000 holiday-makers and locals remain stranded in the remote township of Mallacoota in Victoria state after a bushfire tore through the community, forcing people to shelter ...

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• 1 January

  Fed wins year-end repo battle, but war to curb rates drags on

  

  Bloomberg The Federal Reserve may have succeeded in thwarting major year-end turmoil in funding markets, but 2020 is likely to bring a whole new set of concerns. The US central bank has been injecting liquidity into markets through repurchase-agreement operations since mid-September in a bid to keep control of short-end rates. Earlier this month the Fed ramped up its offerings ...

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• 1 January

  Lagarde’s colleague at ECB offers her German lessons

  

  Bloomberg European Central Bank (ECB) President Christine Lagarde’s promise to learn German has prompted some suggestions on what her first important word should be — including from a German colleague. In response to an informal Twitter poll, incoming Executive Board member Isabel Schnabel suggested Lagarde should start with “Vertrauen,” or “trust.” Schnabel didn’t elaborate on her word choice in the ...

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• 1 January

  Taiwan dollar strengthens past 30 in 18 months

  

  Bloomberg The Taiwan dollar strengthened past 30 versus the greenback for the first time in 18 months. The currency rose as much as 0.6% to 29.965 per dollar on and closed at 30.106 in Taipei. The Taiwan dollar has climbed about 3.4% in the second half as the best performer among the world’s major currencies. Taiwan’s financial markets were expected ...

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• 1 January

  Will keep monetary policy flexible: PBOC

  

  Bloomberg China’s central bank said it’ll keep monetary policy flexible and work to lower funding costs for businesses as the economy still faces strong headwinds. The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) will work to ensure the transmission of monetary policy and use market-focused reform mechanisms to lower the real interest rate for loans, according to a quarterly report. It will ...

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• 1 January

  Year-end euro rally sees cross currency swaps hit record

  

  Bloomberg The battered euro is finishing the year strongly and setting up the case for better performance next year. The common currency rose to its strongest level versus the dollar since August and cross-currency basis swaps — a measure of demand for funding purposes — climbed to the highest on record, Bloomberg Generic Prices show. While both moves mirrored a ...

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• 1 January

  China ramps up credit support to aid growth

  Bloomberg China’s central bank will increase the supply of cheap funding to banks by cutting the amount of cash they need to hold as reserves, a move aimed at putting a floor under economic growth in 2020. The required reserve ratio for commercial lenders will be lowered by 50 basis points from Jan. 6, unleashing about 800 billion yuan ($115 ...

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• 1 January

  Japan to seek talks with Lebanon over fugitive Ghosn

  

  Bloomberg Japan is expected to speak with Lebanon through diplomatic channels about Carlos Ghosn fleeing Tokyo for the Middle East country, according to a senior Japanese government official. The comment on Wednesday would mark some of the earliest indications about how Tokyo plans to respond after the former head of Nissan Motor Co and Renault SA snuck out Japan where ...

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• 1 January

  India plans to spend $1.5tn on infrastructure to spur growth

  

  Bloomberg India outlined the contours of a $1.5 trillion plan to build infrastructure over the next five years to shore up economic growth. The programme will include existing projects in the energy, road and railway sectors in the pipeline, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told reporters. Private companies will account for 22%-25% of the investments, with the federal government and states ...

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