August, 2019

• 18 August

  UK’s inverted yield curve is nothing like America’s

  Inverted yield curves are the hot topic of the summer, especially as UK gilts have followed US treasuries by offering more interest on two-year maturities than you’ll get on 10-year notes. When the sovereign bond world is flipped on its head like this it’s often seen as an indicator of looming recession as investors scramble for the relative safety of ...

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• 18 August

  Trump is not crazy to want to buy Greenland

  

  Former Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen called US President Donald Trump’s reported idea of buying Greenland, a self-governed Danish territory, an out-of-season April’s Fool joke. Trump’s idea may be outlandish (and impossible) but that doesn’t mean there’s no benefit in thinking about reviving the market in sovereign territories, which once made America great. Besides acquiring Louisiana from France, Florida ...

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• 18 August

  Touch-screens in cars don’t make us safer

  

  Two years ago, 10 sailors died when the US Navy’s guided missile destroyer USS John S. McCain collided with a chemical tanker off Singapore. An investigation has determined that insufficient training and inadequate operating procedures were to blame, and both factors were related to a new touch-screen-based helm control system. The Navy has decided to revert its destroyers back to ...

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• 18 August

  How Asian nations can protect their crazy riches

  

  With support for globalisation and free trade declining in much of the world, Asia has a historic chance to break out of its traditional role as a capital exporter to the West and to instead redirect flows to improve its own economies and financial industries. According to some estimates, the region’s pool of wealth at $110 trillion exceeds those of ...

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• 18 August

  Investors should hold their stocks, says Invesco’s Levitt

  

  Bloomberg Investors should stick with their stocks despite the sell-off this week because it would be harder to time the market and get back in, according to Brian Levitt, global market strategist for North America at Invesco. US equities suffered one of the deepest sell-offs of the year as mounting signs of a global economic slowdown stoked fears of a ...

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• 18 August

  Facebook’s Libra in focus as American group visits Bern

  

  Bloomberg Facebook Inc’s Libra cryptocurrency will be discussed as a delegation of American lawmakers visits Switzerland in the coming days. The group of six will hold a meeting with the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner Adrian Lobsiger, NZZ am Sonntag reports, citing his spokesman. It will be led by Democrat Maxine Waters, who has previously spoken critically about ...

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• 18 August

  HK official warns of ‘economic typhoon’

  Bloomberg Protest-battered Hong Kong should also brace itself for an “economic typhoon” caused by the US-China trade war and recent political unrest in the city, Financial Secretary Paul Chan wrote in a blog post on Sunday. The warning from the city’s top budget official came after Hong Kong slashed its 2019 growth forecast to as little as zero, down from ...

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• 18 August

  Bank Indonesia keeps rupiah bears at bay as EM risks rise

  

  Bloomberg Indonesia’s rupiah has braved headwinds both at home and abroad to escape largely unscathed in the recent emerging-market (EM) sell-off, and the nation’s central bank is largely to thank for that. Bank Indonesia’s repeated interventions to maintain currency stability have helped soothe investor nerves, with the rupiah’s 0.8% loss this quarter making for the second-best performance among Asian EM ...

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• 18 August

  KCB group first half profit surges to 5%

  

  Bloomberg KCB Group Ltd. first-half profit jumped 5% as the East African nation’s largest lender earned more interest income from investing in government securities and providing business loans. Net income in the six months through June was 12.7 billion shilling ($123 million), Chief Finance Officer Lawrence Kimathi told investors. That matched estimates by African Alliance Securities Kenya. Net interest income ...

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• 18 August

  JPMorgan picks tariff stocks, trims S&P’s 2020 estimate

  

  Bloomberg JPMorgan Chase & Co. has cut its 2020 earnings estimates for US stocks based on the projected impact of incoming tariffs and pinpointed companies that could be particularly affected by the levies. “Tariffs remain the largest source of risk for equities,” strategists led by Dubravko Lakos-Bujas wrote in a note. The bank is reducing its 2020 earnings estimate for ...

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