FOREX FLASH March 23, 2010 RATES FORCE JAPANESE TO LOOK ABROAD Japanese households are choosing to send their savings overseas at the fastest pace since 2007 as they seek out higher yielding assets. With benchmark interest rates only 0.1 per cent in the Asian country, investors are choosing to buy Chinese stocks and Brazilian bonds to gain exposure to high-yielding [...]
Google shuts its Chinese website in censorship dispute March 22, 2010 GOOGLE has sensationally closed its Chinese search engine in a row over censorship. The move could have global ramifications, exacerbating already strained relations between China and the US. Secretary of state Hillary Clinton waded into the debate earlier this year after a series of cyber-attacks on Google said to originate from government buildings. In turn, [...]
Shell snaps up Arrow in £2.1bn deal March 22, 2010 ROYAL Dutch Shell is on the brink of gaining a lucrative foothold in the energy supply chain to China after a £2.1bn bid for Australia’s Arrow Energy was accepted. Shell’s joint bid with PetroChina is now awaiting the green light from Australian regulators after it was unanimously recommended to Arrow shareholders. The firms do not [...]
Rio Tinto clinches West African mining deal March 19, 2010 MINING heavyweight Rio Tinto has signed up for a joint iron ore venture in West Africa with state owned metals group Chinalco. The Anglo-Australian miner is putting its 95 per cent stake in the Simandou project in Guinea into the mix with Chinalco then paying $1.35bn (£891m) for a 47 per cent interest in the [...]
A big success in any language March 18, 2010 OF all the things you might expect to see in a language-teaching classroom, a piano is perhaps not high on the list. But that’s one of the most noticeable objects in Yalan Chuang’s office in King’s Cross, where she teaches businesspeople Chinese. “It is a very musical language, some words are spoken like a soprano [...]
Placing of shares makes G4S look less secure as markets enjoy a strong day March 17, 2010 SHARES in security services group G4S were the biggest fallers in the leading index for the second day running, even as the market closed near a 21 month high on renewed economic optimism and a spate of takeover news. Hot on the heels of a disappointing 2010 forecast, G4S was hit by news of the [...]
Nomura elects first foreigner to board March 17, 2010 Nomura has appointed its first foreigner to the board, as part of a change in management structure aimed at supporting its global expansion. Former Lehman Brothers executive Jasjit “Jesse” Bhattal will be the first foreigner to take up a place on the bank’s 10-strong executive management board. As of 1 April, Bhattal, who was born [...]
CITY VIEWS: DO YOU EXPECT THE CHINESE BOOM TO CONTINUE? March 17, 2010 MIKE MOLONEY | TRADING CENTRAL “China is going to be the next superpower. In the 1900s, it was England and then it was followed by New York. Now, it’s China’s turn. They have the market and a huge population for the boom to continue.” CHARLES HOBB | ROYAL BANK OF CANADA “The Chinese economy is [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING March 16, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES EX-EMPLOYEE SUES SOCGEN FOR џ12M Societe Genrale, France’s second-largest bank, is being sued for more than џ12.5m (£11.3m) by its former head of European fixed income after his contract was terminated at the start of the credit crunch. The High Court heard yesterday that Raphael Geys, its London-based former managing director of European [...]
YUAN CHANGE DEPENDS ON US RECOVERY March 16, 2010 LAST weekend Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao dismissed any possibility of an immediate yuan revaluation, noting: “I understand that some countries want to increase their exports, but I don’t understand the practice of depreciating their currency and forcing others to appreciate theirs in order to accomplish this. I think this is a type of trade protectionism.” [...]