October, 2019

• 7 October

  Tunisia poll shows split parliament

  

  Bloomberg Tunisia counted votes from the parliamentary elections, as an exit poll suggested a moderate radical party will get the most ballots while falling short of the majority needed to form a government. Polling by local firm Sigma Conseil showed Ennahda winning with 17.5% of votes, with Heart of Tunisia — the party of jailed TV mogul Nabil Karoui — ...

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• 7 October

  Kosovo ‘election winner’ hints tough Serbia stance

  Bloomberg The winner of Kosovo’s snap election struck a defiant tone towards Serbia, foreshadowing more of the acrimony that has kept the two neighbours from clearing a key hurdle on their path to membership in the European Union. Albin Kurti, whose Self-Determination Movement won, said that in talks with Belgrade his new government would focus on a historic “debt that ...

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• 7 October

  Brexit prospects fade as talks stall, EU signals pessimism

  

  Bloomberg Prospects of a Brexit deal faded after talks between the two sides stalled and European leaders cast doubt on reaching an agreement in time for the October 31 deadline. French President Emmanuel Macron and Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar both signalled they want progress by Friday, adding to a sense that time is running out for the two sides ...

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• 7 October

  HSBC to cut up to 10,000 jobs in cost-cutting drive, says FT

  

  Bloomberg HSBC Holdings Plc may eliminate as many as 10,000 jobs as part of a cost-cutting drive, according to a Financial Times report that signalled Europe may bear the brunt of the initiative. The plan would result in a substantial reduction in HSBC’s workforce of about 238,000, the FT said, citing two people briefed on the matter. The bank, one ...

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• 7 October

  EU stocks to gain from Brexit deal: JPMorgan

  

  Bloomberg Euro-area stocks would stand to gain more from a Brexit deal by the end of this month than UK shares, JPMorgan Cazenove strategists said. While such a scenario would be bullish for domestic British companies, a strengthening of the pound would take away much of the upside for UK equities, strategists led by Mislav Matejka wrote in a note. ...

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• 7 October

  German banks pass ‘rates pain’ to retail clients

  

  Bloomberg A growing number of German banks are passing on negative interest rates to their retail customers as the costs become too high to bear on their own. Berliner Volksbank, the country’s second-largest cooperative lender, started to apply a minus 0.5% rate on deposits exceeding 100,000 euros ($110,000) in its first charge for retail clients. The move may encourage other ...

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• 7 October

  Goldman says it’s early to call end to equity bulls

  

  Bloomberg It’s too early to bid farewell to the decade-long equity bull market as stocks are still providing healthy returns for investors, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. “Even with low profit growth the corporate sector has a high free-cash-flow yield and the dividend yield (plus buybacks) ought to still provide a reasonable relative return,” Peter Oppenheimer, Goldman’s chief global ...

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• 7 October

  Greece sees 2.8% economic growth in 2020

  Bloomberg Greece’s government is forecasting 2.8% economic growth in 2020, which it says puts it on track to meet a budget target agreed with creditors while still enacting tax relief measures. The creditors, however, have warned that the cost of polices to which Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s government has committed will create a shortfall of up to 900 million euros ...

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• 7 October

  Facebook skeptics offer derivatives to bet on Libra delays

  

  Bloomberg Facebook Inc’s proposed cryptocurrency has faced such overwhelming scorn since it was announced in June that an exchange is facilitating bets on whether the social-media company can come close to meeting its target launch date. CoinFLEX, a crypto-futures exchange that launched earlier this year, is offering derivatives that pay out based on the likelihood Libra will be operational by ...

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• 7 October

  India’s Oyo raises $1.5b at $10b valuation

  

  Bloomberg Oyo Hotels and Homes is raising $1.5 billion from founder Ritesh Agarwal, SoftBank Group Corp and other investors as the India lodging startup expands into foreign markets such as the US and Europe. Agarwal, 25, will spend $700 million to buy new shares in the company as part of a previously reported $2 billion plan to triple his ownership ...

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