July, 2017

• 15 July

  China releases legal scholar Xu Zhiyong after 4 years in Jail

  Bloomberg China freed the most prominent dissident jailed under President Xi Jinping, drawing further attention to the country’s human-rights record amid an international outcry over the death of Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo. Xu Zhiyong, 44, founder of the New Citizens’ Movement, was released on Saturday after completing a four-year prison sentence for gathering a crowd to disturb the public order, ...

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• 15 July

  First signs of oil rebalance seen showing in New York

  

  Bloomberg New York gasoline traders have figured out something the rest of the oil world is dying to know how to do: balance the market. Mid-Atlantic gasoline supplies are now more than 5 million barrels lower than year-ago levels, an impressive decline considering stockpiles in the region swelled to 42.3 million in February — the highest level in government records ...

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• 15 July

  Kuwait sees oil inventories falling as OPEC keeps cutting

  

  Bloomberg Crude oil inventories will decline at a faster pace worldwide in the second half of the year as demand increases and OPEC members comply better with a global agreement to cut output, Kuwait’s OPEC Governor Haitham al-Ghais said. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and other major producers including Russia agreed in May to extend their supply-cuts deal through ...

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• 15 July

  Renewables not a threat to US grid: Study

  

  Bloomberg Wind and solar power don’t pose a significant threat to the reliability of the US power grid, Energy Department staff members said in a draft report, contradicting statements by their leader Rick Perry. “The power system is more reliable today due to better planning, market discipline, and better operating rules and standards,” according to a July draft of the ...

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• 15 July

  Chinese wind power giant wants to be app store of energy world

  

  Bloomberg Envision Energy, one of world’s largest wind turbine manufacturers, has bigger ambitions. Chief Executive Officer Lei Zhang laid out a vision for a global “ecosystem” of energy in which solar and wind farms, power plants, utilities, big electricity customers and all of the application and software developers that support them are connected to each other on a single, digital ...

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• 15 July

  US seeks One57 condo cash in Nigerian oil corruption case

  

  Bloomberg The US is seeking to recover $144 million in assets, including proceeds from a luxury condominium on Manhattan’s Billionaires’ Row in New York, which prosecutors claim were spoils from bribes paid for Nigerian oil contracts. The Justice Department, in a lawsuit filed in Houston, said two Nigerian businessmen made corrupt payments to a Nigerian official who oversaw the country’s ...

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• 15 July

  Asia’s biggest buyout sees GIC-backed firm get $11.6bn

  

  Bloomberg A Chinese consortium agreed to pay S$16 billion ($11.6 billion) for Global Logistic Properties Ltd., the warehouse operator backed by Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, in Asia’s biggest buyout. GLP accepted the takeover offer from a management-backed group that includes private equity firms Hillhouse Capital Management and Hopu Investment Management. The group, which also includes founder Ming Mei’s SMG, Bank ...

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• 15 July

  Infosys raises sales forecast despite stagnant IT spending

  

  Bloomberg Infosys Ltd. raised its annual revenue outlook after eking out a 1 percent rise in quarterly net income, as newer digital services helped it bag contracts despite shrinking client budgets. Asia’s second-largest outsourcer of IT services forecast a 7.1 to 9.1 percent climb in revenue for the year ending March 2018 on a US dollar basis. That beat analyst ...

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• 15 July

  Hottest commodity in China may start to cool before long

  

  Bloomberg These are great times for China’s gargantuan steel industry as product prices soar to multi-year highs, mills’ profits swell and speculators stake out record positions in futures markets in the country that makes half of global supply. They could be over soon. While demand in Asia’s top economy has remained strong, “as the property market cools and investment growth ...

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• 15 July

  India mulls backing foreign investment in supermarkets

  Bloomberg India is considering a proposal to lift a cap on investment by foreign retailers in local supermarkets, according to people with the knowledge of the matter. A meeting led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi may decide on a proposal to allow 100 percent investment by retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Carrefour SA if they agree to sell ...

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