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Even banks that aren’t part of the merger bonanza can expect to see positive effects from a wave of consolidation. Dreamstime
After a relatively dormant 2020, Wall Street expects a surge of bank mergers this year.
The economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic dampened much of the expected merger activity for 2020 even as it served to intensify the rationale for why banks should combine. Last year, amid the worry over low interest rates and potentially ballooning loan losses, banks were busy navigating through their own issues and less interested in acquiring banks that could potentially bring their own set of problems. But with many of the worst-case scenarios for the economy thankfully avoided, banks are coming out of the crisis feeling a renewed pressure to become more efficient.
World Bank: Investigate Cambodia’s Micro-Loans
Coerced Land Sales Linked to Predatory Lending 5 January by
Human Rights Watch
The World Bank Group should investigate alleged coerced land sales and other rights abuses linked to predatory lending and over-indebtedness in the micro-loan sector, Human Rights Watch said today. These longstanding problems have worsened during the economic crisis resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic.
An external report in March 2020, the Microfinance Index of Market Outreach and Saturation (MIMOSA), based on data provided by the World Bank World Bank
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International donors to Cambodia’s micro-loan sector should not be feeding a system that is abusing the rights of highly indebted borrowers struggling during a public health and economic crisis,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “
Day of the Cryptocurrency Is Here
An outlier since 2009, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are now taking center stage
Commentary
The age of digital currency has arrived. Unfortunately, it’s less of a brave new world than it is an uncertain one, marked by political upheaval and economic excesses.
Anyone not living under a rock knows that the world today is very different and far less stable than it was even a year ago.
Of course, on the flip side, these times are also marked by transformative innovations. In fact, cryptocurrency and its blockchain technology are, without doubt, two of the most powerful technological innovations to come about since at least the invention of the internet.