Brazil impeachment commission votes on president Rousseff fate

Brazil / AfP An impeachment commission was due to vote on the fate of Brazilian President DilmaRousseff ahead of a vote by the lower house of Congress to decide whether she should go to trial. Bad-tempered debate, interrupted by heckling and chanting, kicked off in the commission in Brasilia while security forces mounted a huge operation outside to separate rival ...

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After protests, French PM vows to help youth get jobs

Paris / AFP French Prime Minister Manuel Valls unveiled measures on Monday to help young people find work, aiming to quell weeks of protests against the government’s proposed reforms to labour laws. Young people have been at the forefront of mass demonstrations against the reforms over the past month, which the government argues are aimed at making France’s rigid labour ...

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Standard Chartered seeks to sell $4.4 billion of Asian assets

Bloomberg Standard Chartered Plc is seeking to sell at least $4.4 billion of assets in Asia, people with knowledge of the matter said, as the lender pares its balance sheet after booking record impairments. The London-based bank is speaking with potential buyers for about $1.4 billion of stressed loans made to Indian firms including GMR Infrastructure Ltd., according to the ...

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RBI chief builds record reserves to strengthen Asia’s worst currency

Bloomberg Reserve Bank of India(RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan is going all out to build up the nation’s foreign-exchange reserves as he seeks to augment the rupee’s defenses. The stockpile grew to an unprecedented $359.76 billion in the week to April 1, Reserve Bank of India data showed. The reserves surged as Governor Raghuram Rajan bought dollars to take advantage of ...

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BOJ’s backfire hangs over central bankers as IMF meetings start

Bloomberg The world’s central bankers, already hitting limits of their effectiveness on growth and inflation, are now contending with another risk: that additional stimulus could produce lackluster results and undercut investor confidence. The Bank of Japan’s decision in January to take interest rates negative has sent bond yields tumbling, while doing little to curb a surging yen that’s squeezing the ...

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‘Loan demand rising as developing countries face headwinds’

Washington / Reuters The World Bank said on Monday it expects its nonmarket rate lending to top $43 billion in the current fiscal year as developing countries face economic headwinds, bringing its total for the past four years to more than $150 billion. The multilateral lender said its International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and International Development Association (IDA) ...

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Brokers call for India to probe claims of unfair exchange access

New Delhi / Bloomberg A panel advising India’s markets regulator found evidence that high-frequency traders gained unfair access to the nation’s biggest stock exchange, prompting two of the country’s largest brokerage associations to call for a formal investigation. The National Stock Exchange of India Ltd. “violated norms of fair access,” according to a copy of the panel’s internal report seen ...

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China’s economic slowdown to hit East Asia development

Singapore / AFP China’s economic slowdown will hit growth in developing East Asia and the Pacific from this year until at least 2018, the World Bank said on Monday, warning of volatile global markets and urging caution. Regional growth is forecast to slow from 6.5 percent in 2015 to 6.3 percent this year and 6.2 percent in 2017 and 2018, ...

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BlackRock joins $46bn Japan pullout

Tokyo / Bloomberg For global equity investors and Shinzo Abe, it’s splitsville. Starting in the first days of 2016, foreign traders have been pulling out of Tokyo’s stock market for 13 straight weeks, the longest stretch since 1998. Overseas investors dumped $46 billion of shares as economic reports deteriorated, stimulus from the Bank of Japan backfired and the yen’s surge ...

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Malaysia suspends Sharia-compliant plane

Kuala Lumpur / AFP Malaysia’s first Islamic-compliant airline has been suspended for three months after it failed to adhere to aviation regulations, a senior official said on Monday, as the government announced a safety audit of the carrier. “Rayani Air has been suspended for three months,” Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, director-general of the Department of Civil Aviation, said. “They contravened civil ...

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