December, 2019

• 22 December

  UAE, Oman ink deal to enhance trade, economic cooperation

  

  DUBAI / WAM The UAE federal export credit company, Etihad Credit Insurance (ECI), signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), with the Export Credit Guarantee Agency of Oman (Credit Oman), to enhance trade and economic cooperation between the two countries. The signing took place during the 10th AMAN UNION General Assembly, held in Muscat. The MoU was signed by Massimo Falcioni, ...

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• 22 December

  Hedayah, UNOCT to expand cooperation

  

  ABU DHABI / WAM Hedayah, the International Centre of Excellence for Countering Violent Extremism (CVE), signed a memorandum of understanding on the margins of the Civil Society Workshop, with the United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism (UNOCT). According to a statement released by the centre, the memorandum will further expand the reach of programmes to prevent radicalisation leading to violent extremism ...

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• 22 December

  Modi defends anti-Muslim law as toll grows in India protests

  

  Bloomberg Prime Minister Narendra Modi has staunchly defended India’s contentious new religion-based citizenship law in an address to a mass rally in the capital New Delhi, while elsewhere in the country the death toll from violent protests against the legislation crept higher. He asked voters to thank the parliament for pushing through the law last week and accused opposition parties ...

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• 22 December

  South Africa labour group has debt plan for struggling Eskom

  

  Bloomberg South Africa’s biggest labour group is proposing that more than half the debt of state-owned Eskom Holding SOC Ltd be put into a special purpose vehicle to help save the utility and avoid job cuts. The Congress of South African Trade Unions urged the government strike a deal with the Public Investment Corp, Africa’s biggest money manager, to help ...

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• 22 December

  PG&E creditors sweeten deal for California fire victims in new proposal

  

  Bloomberg PG&E Corp creditors, seeking to salvage their bid to take control of the bankrupt utility’s restructuring, sweetened their offer to wildfire victims and made new proposals aimed at winning over California Governor Gavin Newsom. In a letter to Newsom, the creditor group said they are prepared to pay the victims $13.5 billion in cash upfront instead of using stock ...

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• 22 December

  Oil’s 2019 milestones tell decade’s story of energy abundance

  

  Bloomberg Global oil markets notched up a number of milestones this year that echoed the story of the past decade: the world has shifted from an era of supply tightness to plenty. What distinguished the developments of 2019 was not just how big they were but often how little impact they had. From the world’s biggest-ever initial public offering to ...

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• 22 December

  Going 100% green will pay for itself in seven years

  

  Bloomberg A Stanford University professor whose research helped underpin the US Democrats’ Green New Deal says phasing out fossil fuels and running the entire world on clean energy would pay for itself in under seven years. It would cost $73 trillion to revamp power grids, transportation, manufacturing and other systems to run on wind, solar and hydro power, including enough ...

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• 22 December

  RBI experiments with policy to ease India’s interest rates

  

  Bloomberg From a 35-basis point interest rate cut to embracing a Federal Reserve-style ‘Operation Twist’, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das is pushing the boundaries of conventional central bank policy making to improve rate transmission and spur credit to the economy. The central bank announced it will buy longer-dated debt and simultaneously sell shorter maturity notes in a ...

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• 22 December

  Indian banks may ask customers, depositors to list their religion

  

  Bloomberg Indian banks may ask depositors and customers to list their religion, The Times of India reported. The information may be required after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) made changes to a banking law that allows selected non-residents to open bank accounts and own property, the report said. Amendments to the Foreign Exchange Management Regulations will let immigrant Hindus, ...

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• 22 December

  UK extends economy’s male millennium

  

  Bloomberg Just weeks after Christine Lagarde became the euro zone’s first female central bank chief, neighbouring Britain has chosen to stick with what it’s only ever known for economic policy: men in charge. This month’s decision to install Andrew Bailey as Bank of England (BOE) governor, along with Sajid Javid’s reappointment as chancellor of the exchequer, extend an exclusively male ...

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