ICAP, the world’s biggest interdealer broker, reported a good start to its financial year, helped by active and volatile markets, when posting a better than expected five percent drop in full-year pretax profit. Concerns about Greece and other peripheral European sovereign debt and a 750 million euro rescue package have led to wide swings in…
Japan’s Nikkei average fell 2.2 percent to a 10-week closing low on May 17 as the euro’s tumble to a four-year trough chilled investor sentiment and fanned worries that the eurozone’s fiscal woes could slow global economic growth. Exporters such as Canon Inc were hit as the yen advanced, while trading houses were hurt by…
Donor countries have pledged a record $4.25bn over the next four years for the Global Environment Facility, the world’s largest public green fund that helps developing countries tackle climate change. The commitments by 30 donor countries during a session in Paris is a 52 percent increase in new resources for the facility. GEF Chief Executive…
Annualised inflation in Ghana fell to 11.66 percent in April from 13.32 percent in March, the statistics office has announced, a greater than expected drop that offers hope for further rate cuts later this year. The drop is the 10th consecutive fall, takes inflation to its lowest level since December 2007 and is another step…
US market watchdogs and six major exchanges have agreed that new safeguards were needed to curb trading when markets are plunging, including circuit breakers for individual stocks, a source familiar with regulators’ talks said on May 10. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro, the leaders of major stock and option exchanges, and broker-dealer watchdog,…
The European Central Bank will buy eurozone government bonds to help support fractured markets, abandoning firm resistance to full-scale asset purchases in light of Greece’s debt crisis. The ECB said in a statement that the step, dubbed the ‘nuclear option’ by many economists, was justified because of government promises to meet strict budget targets and…
With all the cash for gold advertising you see these days, offering you a quick payment for your gold, you would think selling gold would be a pretty simple process. Well if you want to get anywhere near what your gold is actually worth it takes a bit more than just picking the first gold…
Freddie Mac, the second-largest provider of US residential mortgage funds, has asked for an additional $10.6bn in federal aid after it lost $8bn in the first quarter. The company warned it would continue to need billions more in government funds because the housing market remains fragile. The loss was $6.7bn before a $1.3bn dividend payment…
Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati, a key reformer in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy, is leaving office in what could be a major blow to a crackdown on graft and tax evasion. Indrawati, 47, was named managing director of the World Bank Group, a sign of the growing clout of emerging economies but also reflecting…
The Bank of Japan has said it needs to do more to foster economic growth and renewed its commitment to ultra-loose monetary policy even as it forecast consumer prices would start rising again sooner than earlier thought. As expected, the central bank refrained from new action at its policy meeting and kept its benchmark rate…
