China’s insatiable demand for energy to power its economy has made it a serious contender in the fight for control over vast energy resources in its thinly populated and impoverished western backyard.
Lying on some of the world’s biggest oil and gas reserves, strategically placed Central Asia has for centuries been at the heart of a fierce tug-of-war between Russia and the West.
HSBC, Europe’s biggest bank, said a theft of data by a former employee affected up to 24,000 Swiss client accounts, dealing a hefty blow to the reputation of its private bank.
Switzerland’s financial regulator FINMA was investigating the theft, it said on Thursday, while a source close to the UK’s Financial Services Authority, the bank’s lead regulator, said the FSA was “aware” of the situation.
London-based oil major BP has agreed to buy Brazilian, Azeri and Gulf of Mexico assets from Devon Energy for $7 billion, as the U.S. producer refocuses on onshore U.S. fields.
The companies said on Thursday that BP has also agreed to sell Devon a 50 percent stake in its Kirby oil sands interests in Alberta, Canada, for $500 million and that the two companies would form a venture to develop Kirby.
Russia is considering inviting state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp to develop oil and gas fields in Russia, the government said on Thursday, ahead of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s visit to India.
ONGC has already agreed to cooperate with oil-to-telecoms group Sistema, which controls assets in the Russian republic of Bashkortostan, and may also gain access to lucrative oil and gas projects in Russia’s far north, the government said.
Food prices moderated slightly while fuel price inflation accelerated in late February adding pressure on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to raise rates at its April policy review.
India’s wholesale price inflation (WPI) is already at 8.56 percent in January, just above the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) end-March projection of 8.5 percent.
The food price index rose 17.81 percent in the 12 months to Feb. 27, marginally lower than an annual rise of 17.87 percent in the previous week.
The recent government decision to raise fuel prices has also stoked inflation. The fuel price index rose 11.38 percent in the 12 months to Feb. 27, shooting up from an annual rise of 9.59 percent in the previous week.
The rupee hit its highest in nearly two months, boosted by stronger regional peers and expectations of robust dollar inflows related to a share sale.
The partially convertible rupee ended at 45.375/385 per dollar, slightly off 45.345 hit late in the session, which was the highest since Jan. 11. It had closed at 45.6250/6350 on Tuesday.
There seems to be further appreciation on the cards. First support will be 45.2600 tomorrow, if that’s taken out then 44.80,” a trader at a foreign bank, who did not wish to be named, said.
Dealers said they expect a good response to the follow-on share sale in state-run NMDC, India’s largest iron ore producer, which runs from March 10 to 12.
They said custodian banks were seen selling dollars to participate in the share sale and this move brought the rupee to around 45.42.
They later sold dollars on expectations that local shares would advance further.
Foreign fund flows play a crucial role in determining the direction for the local sharemarket and also for the rupee. Since the middle of February, foreigners have purchased a net $2.6 billion worth of shares.
Most members of the World Trade Organization are years behind in providing data about farm subsidies, essential to see whether they are sticking to agreements, an internal WTO document shows.
The document, prepared by the WTO secretariat for a meeting on Wednesday of its agriculture committee, which monitors adherence to agreements, shows that 81 of 153 members have so far not provided data for 2004 or earlier.
Around one in two sovereign wealth funds invest in private equity, real estate and infrastructure assets to seek a diversified source of returns, a report showed on Wednesday.
The report from Preqin, alternative assets research firm, also showed that assets managed by the world’s sovereign wealth funds rose 9 percent to $3.51 trillion and more than a quarter of total SWF assets are held by funds in Abu Dhabi, Norway and China.
Preqin said 55 percent of the funds are known to invest in private equity, 51 percent in real estate and 47 percent in infrastructure. More than a third of them invest in hedge funds.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Wednesday he believed Britain would maintain its coveted top credit rating and announced a pay freeze for senior civil servants and military officers to help tame a record deficit.
Setting out his economic plans weeks before an election, Brown said recovery remained fragile and that to change course now would risk plunging Britain back into recession. He drew on his experience last year when he chaired the group of 20 leading and developing nations during the global financial crisis.
His message contrasted with that of opposition Conservative leader David Cameron who is campaigning on a “time for change” slogan and wants to make a quicker start on cutting a deficit forecast to exceed 12 percent of GDP this year.
Daimler, the world’s leading truckmaker, expects commercial vehicle markets in developed countries to rebound only slowly while major growth comes in emerging markets, a top official said.
Daimler Trucks Chief Executive Andreas Renschler told reporters he expected all the group’s truck units to be profitable this year.
Amid tough competition from Chinese rivals, Daimler’s share of the global truck market fell to 11 percent last year from 15.2 percent in 2008, the company said on Wednesday.
