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Bloomberg Olaf Scholz took over as chancellor of Germany and is under immediate pressure to tackle a brutal Covid-19 outbreak and a raft of geopolitical challenges including tensions with Russia. The Social Democrat was sworn in, ending Angela Merkel’s 16-year tenure and becoming the country’s ninth chancellor since World War II. The 63-year-old, Merkel’s vice chancellor for the past four ...

Bloomberg The omicron variant of the coronavirus appears to have spread across South Africa’s northern border with Zimbabwe reporting record daily cases and its highest ever test positivity rate.

Bloomberg China cut the amount of cash most banks must hold in reserve, acting to counter the economic slowdown in a move that puts the central bank on a different policy path than many of its peers. The People’s Bank of China will reduce the reserve requirement ratio by 0.5 percentage point for most banks on December 15, releasing 1.2 ...

Bloomberg Indonesia’s central bank bought 58 trillion rupiah ($4 billion) of government bonds, the first transaction in its latest round of debt monetisation. Bank Indonesia purchased 14.5 trillion rupiah each of four series of notes due in five to eight years via a private placement, the finance ministry’s debt management office said. Future bond-buying by the central bank will be ...

Bloomberg Zimbabwe’s central bank is exploring the use of a digital currency rather than allowing cryptocurrencies as legal tender, according to the nation’s central bank Governor John Mangudya. “As a central bank we don’t believe in cryptocurrencies,” said Mangudya in an interview with publisher Trevor Ncube broadcast. “We believe in central bank digital currency which is basically trying to say ...

Bloomberg Australia’s central bank is likely to highlight the interval between building economic momentum and faster price gains as well as renewed risks from a new coronavirus variant in its final meeting of the year. All 27 economists surveyed see the Reserve Bank holding its cash rate at a record-low 0.1%. On the policy outlook, markets see rate liftoff in ...

Bloomberg The European Central Bank (ECB) said its supervision arm will focus its scrutiny in the coming three years on risks that lenders face from a potential spike in bad loans and their search for higher returns. Several early indicators point to a possible deterioration in credit quality, senior ECB officials said in a blog post. The rate at which ...

Bloomberg Citigroup Inc has chosen preferred bidders for its consumer assets in several Asian markets as the U.S. lender presses ahead with its plans to divest numerous units across the region. The US lender picked Bank of Ayudhya Pcl as the leading suitor to buy its retail assets in Thailand, the people said, asking not to be identified because the ...

Bloomberg BNP Paribas SA expects the record fundraising spree in India to continue next year, aided by robust foreign inflows into initial public offerings and as more companies seeking to expand plan to sell shares. “I expect 2022 to continue to be a record year for fund raising,” Ganeshan Murugaiyan, head of corporate coverage and advisory at BNP Paribas in ...

Bloomberg For all the warnings earlier this year that China Evergrande Group’s debt crisis would become the country’s Lehman moment, the developer’s landmark payment failure is barely registering in local financial markets. The CSI 300 Index of stocks on Wednesday climbed to a six-week high, while Chinese junk dollar bonds rose 2 cents on the dollar, according to traders. The ...