BEIJING (AP) — Asian stock prices surged for a second day Thursday after the Federal Reserve announced its first interest rate hike since 2008 and China promised support for its real estate and internet industries. Hong Kong’s benchmark jumped 5.8% and Tokyo gained 3%. Shanghai, Seoul and Sydney advanced more than 1%. Oil prices gained…
MADRID (Reuters) -Zara owner Inditex reported on Wednesday its net profit more than doubled in 2021 to 3.2 billion euros ($3.51 billion) after its sales almost recovered from the pandemic as many countries eased the restrictions imposed to fight coronavirus. Most of Inditex’s 6,657 stores worldwide were reopened from mid-2021 and the world’s biggest fashion…
(Reuters) -The Ever Forward container ship is currently grounded in the Chesapeake Bay near Baltimore, according to the U.S. Coast Guard, nearly a year after another ship run by the same company blocked the Suez Canal for six days. The container ship is operated by Evergreen Marine Corp Taiwan Ltd, the same Taiwanese transportation company…
TAIPEI (Reuters) -Taiwan’s Foxconn, the world’s largest contract electronics maker which counts technology giants such as Apple Inc among its major clients, reported a fourth-quarter profit on Wednesday that slightly beat market estimates. Foxconn reported a net profit of T$44.4 billion ($1.55 billion) for October-December, down 3.4% compared with the year ago period. That compared…
By Naveen Thukral SINGAPORE (Reuters) – A surge in wheat and corn prices is boosting demand for low-grade rice in animal rations across Asia, pushing up prices of the world’s most important staple at a time when global food inflation is already hovering near record highs. Global crop importers are scrambling for supplies after Russia’s…
By Saqib Iqbal Ahmed NEW YORK (Reuters) – Days before Thanksgiving, Kris Sidial, a co-founder at volatility arbitrage fund The Ambrus Group, told investors the firm was betting that extreme price moves in some volatility-tracking exchange traded notes were likely to get worse. The firm bought deep out-of-the-money call options on the iPath Series B…
BEIJING (Reuters) -China’s new home prices stalled in February after eking out a small gain a month earlier, official data on Wednesday showed, pointing to still fragile demand despite a gradual easing in property curbs by authorities to boost buying sentiment. Average new home prices in China’s 70 major cities were flat at 0.00% month-on-month,…
By Nidhi Verma and Rajendra Jadhav NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India is boosting fertiliser imports from nations including Canada and Israel to ensure sufficient supplies for the coming summer sowing season after the disruption of shipments caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. India is a leading importer of fertilisers for its huge agriculture sector, which…
By Marc Jones LONDON (Reuters) – The economic cost of Russia’s assault on Ukraine was fully exposed on Wednesday as Vladimir Putin’s sanctions-ravaged government teetered on the brink of its first international debt default since the Bolshevik revolution. Moscow was due to pay $117 million in interest on two dollar-denominated sovereign bonds it had sold…
By Tetsushi Kajimoto TOKYO (Reuters) -Japan’s top firms are set to offer pay rises of around 2% or more as annual labour talks wrap up on Wednesday, a boost from last year’s razor-thin increase that is still unlikely to kick-start demand in the moribund economy. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has piled pressure on profitable firms…
