By Reuters Staff
1 Min Read
BUDAPEST, April 29 (Reuters) - Hungary expects to reach 4 million COVID-19 inoculations on Friday, Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s chief of staff said on Thursday, adding that this meant a further round of easing measures announced earlier could be implemented.
The measures include pushing back an 11 p.m. curfew to midnight, allowing indoor dining in restaurants and the reopening of zoos, museums, cinemas and libraries, Gergely Gulyas told an online briefing. (Reporting by Gergely Szakacs and Anita Komuves; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
4 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - The Bank of England is likely to ease its foot off the stimulus pedal and reduce its pace of bond purchases next week as Britain’s economy appears to be bouncing back sharply from its COVID pandemic slump.
FILE PHOTO: A person is silhouetted as he walks past The Bank of England, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London, Britain, November 5, 2020. REUTERS/John Sibley
Retailers and restaurants are reopening, retail sales exceeded pre-pandemic volumes in March and purchasing managers’ indexes in April hit their highest since 2013 as a rapid vaccination programme helped reduce a devastating flood of COVID-19 cases at the start of the year to a trickle.
By Reuters Staff
1 Min Read
BRUSSELS, April 28 (Reuters) - EU antitrust regulators on Wednesday fined Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Credit Agricole and Credit Suisse a total of 28.5 million euros ($34.4 million) for taking part in a bond cartel.
Deutsche Bank was not penalised because it alerted the cartel to the European Commission.
The EU competition watchdog said the cartel was operated in the European secondary trading market related to supra-sovereign, sovereign and agency (SSA) bonds denominated in U.S. dollars.
$1 = 0.8284 euros Reporting by Foo Yun Chee
By Reuters Staff
1 Min Read
JAKARTA, April 28 (Reuters) - Indonesia’s biggest lender by assets, Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI), is targetting an up to 18% profit rise in 2021 as an economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic bolsters demand for loans, its chief executive told Reuters.
BRI’s profits dropped 45.8% on a yearly basis to 18.66 trillion rupiah ($1.29 billion) in 2020.
This year, BRI aims for net income to rise to 20 trillion to 22 trillion rupiah, President Director Sunarso said in an interview, setting a target for 7% annual loan growth and non-performing loan (NPL) levels at 3%.
Reporting by Tabita Diela Editing by Ed Davies
3 Min Read
SYDNEY, April 28 (Reuters) - The Australian dollar slipped on Wednesday after surprisingly soft inflation data argued for super loose policy for years to come, though surging commodity prices helped limit losses.
The Aussie fell 0.3% to $0.7740 and away from resistance at $0.7815. Support comes in around $0.7735 and $0.7695.
The New Zealand dollar followed with a dip to $0.7195 , having failed to sustain a five-week top of $0.7243 touched on Monday. Support lies around $0.7150/60.
Australian consumer prices rose just 0.6% in the first quarter, when analysts had looked for 0.9%.
Even more startling was a slowdown in a key trimmed mean measure of inflation to a record low of 1.1%, far away from the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) target band of 2-3%.