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Bloomberg China plans to target economic growth of around 6% in 2020, at the low end of this year’s range of 6% to 6.5%, Reuters reported, citing policy sources. To cushion a sharper slowdown, the state also plans to spend more on infrastructure by allowing local governments to issue more special bonds next year, Reuters said. The proposed target to ...

Bloomberg China’s ambassador threatened Germany with retaliation if it excludes Huawei Technologies Co as a supplier of 5G wireless equipment, citing the millions of vehicles German carmakers sell in China. Resistance against Huawei is growing among lawmakers in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s governing coalition, who have challenged her China policy with a bill that would impose a broad ban on “untrustworthy” ...

Bloomberg Japan Post Holdings Co is set to release a final report on missold insurance as early as December 18, and the findings will show more cases than an interim probe uncovered, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported. After speaking to more than 120,000 clients, a special investigation committee composed of external lawyers found 9,000 incidents of insurance sales at post offices ...

Bloomberg California Governor Gavin Newsom rejected PG&E Corp’s proposed restructuring plan, dealing a major blow to the power giant as it tries to exit the biggest utility bankruptcy in US history. Newsom said in a letter to PG&E Chief Executive Officer Bill Johnson that the utility’s restructuring plan falls “woefully short” of the state’s requirements. The governor said any reorganisation ...

Bloomberg The Democratic Republic of Congo will proceed with a smaller version of the Inga III hydropower project and expand the facility over time, President Felix Tshisekedi said. The Inga III dam, which will begin as a 4,800 megawatt plant, will have its capacity increased to 7,500 megawatts and 11,000 megawatts eventually, Tshisekedi told lawmakers in his first state of ...

Bloomberg State Grid Corp of China is nearing an agreement to acquire a 49% stake in Oman’s state-owned transmission company in the first major privatisation by the Middle East’s largest non-OPEC oil producer, people with knowledge of the matter said. The Beijing-based company will acquire the stake in a deal that values Oman Electricity Transmission Co at about $2 billion, ...

When even Indonesia starts talking about relaxing deficit rules, you know government spending is back in vogue as a remedy for faltering economic growth. The country has more reason than most to be wary of backsliding on its commitment to budget discipline. Its deficit ceiling is an important piece of the economic and political architecture that emerged from the Asian ...

Is China about to embark on a fresh bout of stimulus? Some people in the metals market seem to think so. Prices of benchmark 62% iron ore in Singapore have been booming, jumping 5.3% on December 9 and closing more than 21% up on their level a month earlier. There seems to be real activity behind that movement: Rolling three-month ...

Prosus NV’s latest bid to acquire food delivery specialist Just Eat Plc was still little more than an appetizer. The Amsterdam-based technology investment firm raised its offer a measly 4.2% to 740 pence-per-share, while lowering the acceptance threshold to 50%. It had little alternative but to increase the value of its proposal: the recent recovery in shares of counterbidder Takeaway.com ...

Sterling has punched up to new highs for the year on the back of a comprehensive election victory for Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party. With the parliamentary handbrake on Johnson’s Brexit deal now released — and the trouncing of Jeremy Corbyn’s high-taxing, business-baiting Labour Party delivered with great force — we should see sustained pound gains. Nevertheless, as I outlined earlier, ...