TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s economy shrank at a worse than expected annual rate of 1% in the first quarter, as rising prices and COVID-19 restrictions sapped spending and investment, according to data released Wednesday. Japan’s real gross domestic product, or GDP, the sum of the value of a nation’s products and services, contracted 0.2% in…
TOKYO (Reuters) – Toyota Motor Corp is using well water at its factories to avoid the impact of an industrial water supply disruption in central Japan, a spokesperson said on Wednesday. A leakage at a water facility in the Aichi prefecture has disrupted industrial water supply, affecting more than 130 business establishments, local government officials…
SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Shanghai authorities issued a new ‘white’ list containing 864 financial institutions, allowing them to resume work, three sources with direct knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday. The move is part of the financial hub’s plan to reopen broadly and allow normal life to resume after a nearly two-month-long lockdown that halted…
By Tom Westbrook SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Asia’s stockmarkets struggled to carry recent gains into a fourth straight session on Wednesday and the U.S. dollar steadied, as nagging doubts about inflation and the drag from rate rises crept back in to the global growth outlook. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan gave up earlier…
By Dan Burns (Reuters) -Chicago Federal Reserve Bank President Charles Evans on Tuesday said he supports moving to a shallower rate-hike path by July or September to allow the Fed time to assess inflation and the job market as it pushes borrowing costs up to neutral, and likely beyond. “I think front-loading is important to…
By Daniel Leussink and Tetsushi Kajimoto TOKYO (Reuters) -Japan’s economy shrank for the first time in two quarters in the first three months of the year as COVID-19 curbs hit the service sector and surging commodity prices created new pressures, raising concerns about a protracted downturn. The decline presents a challenge to Prime Minister Fumio…
By Isabel Kua SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Oil prices rose more than $1 a barrel in early Asian trade on Wednesday on hopes of demand recovery in China as the country gradually eases some of its strict COVID-19 containment measures. Brent crude futures were up $1.15, or 1.0%, at $113.08 a barrel at 0042 GMT, while…
By David Milliken and William Schomberg LONDON (Reuters) -Britain’s jobless rate hit a 48-year low in the first three months of 2022 and employers paid bigger bonuses to keep or attract staff, according to data that added to bets by investors on further Bank of England interest rate hikes. Core earnings for most workers fell…
By Dan Burns (Reuters) – Chicago Federal Reserve Bank President Charles Evans on Tuesday said he supports an initial burst of monetary policy tightening, and then a more “measured” pace of rate hikes to allow time to assess inflation and the impact of higher borrowing costs on the job market. “I think front-loading is important…
By Svea Herbst-Bayliss BOSTON (Reuters) – Proxy advisory firm Glass Lewis on Tuesday recommended McDonald’s Corp investors vote for the company’s directors, dealing a setback to billionaire investor Carl Icahn’s efforts to replace two directors. “The Dissident (Icahn) has failed to make a sufficiently compelling case to warrant the boardroom changes it is seeking here,”…
