The Gulf Time Newspaper One of the finest business newspapers in the UAE brought to you by our professional writers and editors.

  It takes around 35 years for a median-income household to buy a 90-square-meter (970 square foot) apartment in Hong Kong. So, by 2052 in other words. That makes the former British colony the world’s least affordable city, according to Oxford Economics. Now, with Chinese buyers forking out ever-higher amounts for land sold by the government and outbidding domestic stalwarts, ...

  It’s a new year, and for many investors that means it’s time to rebalance that old portfolio. Portfolio rebalancing is one of the most cherished wisdoms in investing. The markets can whipsaw investments in a portfolio over time, and rebalancing brings it back into, well, balance. Rebalancing is also a backdoor way to buy low and sell high because ...

  Kabul / / DPA Slowly, slowly the portrait of a girl takes shape on the crumbling, mud brick wall, the round, smiling face of a young girl wearing a head scarf in shades of red, green and white. The girl’s name is Mursal and she’s 12 years old. A couple of years ago she survived a serious attack on ...

  DPA A bridge reflected in the water below. A young man standing on a rocky ledge. Maximilian Muench took both photos. He published them on his Instagram page. What’s not to like there? At first glance they might look like ambitious holiday snaps, but in fact Muench was paid for them by the government of a German state, Saxony, ...

  Bloomberg China’s central bank said it provided a “temporary liquidity facility” to some major commercial banks for 28 days to help ease a cash crunch before the Lunar New Year holiday. The operation provides more effective liquidity transmission before the week-long break, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement. The PBOC said the new lending facility will ...

  Bloomberg Lloyds Banking Group Plc, Britain’s largest mortgage lender, is set to pick Frankfurt as its base to maintain access to the European Union’s single market following Brexit, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The UK bank will choose to convert its German branch into a subsidiary and plans to apply for an extension to its ...

  Bloomberg Some of India’s biggest lenders are asking the central bank to ease debt-management rules as they try to restructure about Rs87,000 crore ($13 billion) owed by Essar Steel Ltd. and Bhushan Steel Ltd., according to people with knowledge of the matter. Lenders including State Bank of India (SBI) and ICICI Bank Ltd. are aiming to restructure the debt ...

  Bloomberg HSBC Holdings Plc is sharpening divisions within its investment-banking bonus pool this year, giving more lucrative awards to top performers while slashing compensation for those ranked at the bottom, people familiar with the moves said. The bank is also cutting 100 senior staff at the managing director and director level across both the banking and trading units, reductions ...

  Reuters JPMorgan Chase & Co agreed to pay $55 million to settle a US Justice Department lawsuit accusing it of discriminating against minority borrowers by allowing mortgage brokers to charge them more for home loans, a person familiar with the matter said. The US Justice Department complaint, filed in Manhattan federal court, accused the bank of willfully violating the ...

  Bloomberg The push to bring self-driving cars to American roads got a significant boost when the nation’s chief auto safety regulator essentially cleared Tesla Motors Inc.’s Autopilot system of fault in a fatal 2016 crash. The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found that the owner of a Tesla Motors Inc. Model S sedan that drove itself into the ...