April, 2018

• 3 April

  Subprime new-car buyers going missing from US showrooms

  

  Bloomberg The American consumers who were stretching themselves to buy or lease a new car are starting to go missing from showrooms. Rising interest rates and new-vehicle prices are squeezing shoppers with shaky credit and tight budgets out of the market. In the first two months of this year, sales were flat among the highest-rated borrowers, while deliveries to those ...

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• 3 April

  Trump muddles Syria policy with vow to exit ‘very soon’

  

  Bloomberg President Donald Trump says the US will withdraw troops from Syria “very soon.” He’s also vowed to counter Iran’s influence throughout the Middle East. Doing both at the same time may be impossible. Trump’s off-the-cuff aside at a rally in Ohio last week — “We’re knocking the hell out of IS. We’ll be coming out of Syria, like, very ...

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• 3 April

  Russia, Assad give ultimatum to rebels northeast of Damascus

  

  BEIRUT / Reuters Syrian rebels in a besieged area northeast of Damascus have been told they must accept state rule or leave, a rebel group said on Tuesday, as the government and its Russian ally seek to wipe out the last pockets of opposition territory near the capital. The ultimatum to the rebels of eastern Qalamoun was served to civilians ...

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• 3 April

  China ‘appreciates’ N Korea’s efforts on denuclearisation

  BEIJING / Reuters China appreciates North Korea’s “important efforts” to ease tension on the Korean peninsula, senior Chinese diplomat Wang Yi told the North’s foreign minister on Tuesday, hours after he called on all sides to stay focussed on talks. China has traditionally been secretive North Korea’s closest ally, though ties had been frayed by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s ...

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• 3 April

  Yemen, UN chief urge peace talks with Houthis

  

  GENEVA / Reuters United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the warring sides in Yemen on Tuesday to reach a political settlement to end a four-year-old conflict that has left 22 million people in urgent need of aid. Yemeni Foreign Minister Abdel-Malek al-Mekhlafi echoed the call for a return to the negotiating table and said that his internationally-recognised government was working ...

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• 3 April

  Extradition of ex-Catalan president sought

  

  BERLIN / Reuters German prosecutors filed a request to a regional court on Tuesday for the extradition of former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont to Spain, where he faces charges of rebellion over the region’s campaign for independence. Puigdemont has been held in a detention centre in the northern German town of Neumuenster for just over a week after he was ...

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• 3 April

  Britain seeks ‘proportionate’ response to Russia

  LONDON / Reuters Britain is looking for a “proportionate way” to respond to the threat posed by Russia, a spokesman for Prime Minister Theresa May said on Tuesday, after a retired Russian army official said the poisoning of a former spy could start a new world war. “We need to respond in a proportionate way to this aggressive behaviour from ...

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• 3 April

  Netanyahu scraps African migrant relocation deal

  JERUSALEM / Reuters Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday he was cancelling an agreement with the UN refugee agency to relocate thousands of African migrants, bowing to right-wing pressure to scrap the deal. Hours after announcing the arrangement, which also would have given thousands of other migrants the right to stay in Israel, Netanyahu posted on his Facebook ...

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• 3 April

  US stocks would bear the brunt of trade war

  

  Trade-related topics that had been a sleeper have become a front-burner issue for investors. Equity prices and Treasury yields plunged on March 23 after the US announcement of a 25 percent tariff on up to $60 billion of Chinese exports. Over that weekend, both sides expressed interest in reconciling differences and markets reversed path when they opened March 26. If ...

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• 3 April

  Give China’s chipmakers a reason to care

  

  Just as the market’s love for the FANG stocks turns to angst, the US government is looking to ban Chinese investments in its technologies. That’s a bigger problem for the country’s expensive chipmakers than their would-be Asian acquirers. Semiconductors and 5G wireless communications are among areas that would be placed off-limits under plans to invoke a law reserved for national ...

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