By Ayenat Mersie NAIROBI (Reuters) – Over recent months, sets of sturdy, brightly-branded battery swapping stations have cropped up around Kenya’s capital Nairobi, allowing electric motorcyclists to exchange their low battery for a fully-charged one. It is a sign of an electric motorcyle revolution starting to unfold in Kenya where combustion-engine motorbikes are a cheaper…
By Alexander Marrow MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia’s dominant lender Sberbank will be forced to close its office in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) early next year, First Deputy Chairman Alexander Vedyakhin said on Monday, blaming sanctions pressure. Sweeping Western sanctions targeted Russia’s financial system after Moscow sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb….
(Reuters) – U.S. retail sales rose 7.6% between Nov. 1 and Dec. 24, which encompasses a majority of the holiday season, as steep discounts lured deal-hungry consumers, a Mastercard report showed on Monday. The increase is higher than the 7.1% growth Mastercard had forecast in September, when it anticipated consumers would pull purchases to October…
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese shares ended higher on Monday, underpinned by Wall Street’s strength in the previous session, with heavyweight technology and energy stocks leading the gains, while a drop in banks and insurers weighed on the market. The Nikkei share average rose 0.65% to close at 26,405.87, while the broader Topix edged up 0.24%…
BEIJING (Reuters) – Shipments of smartphones within China in October fell 27.2% year on year to 23.78 million handsets, a report from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology said on Monday. Over January to October smartphone shipments fell 22% from the same period last year to 215 million units. (Reporting by Beijing newsroom;…
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) has fined China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) 87.6 million yuan ($12.6 million) for abusing a “dominant market position”, the watchdog said on its website on Monday. SAMR launched an antitrust investigation into the Chinese academic database in May. ($1 = 6.9601 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting…
MOSCOW (Reuters) – The Russian rouble edged higher against the dollar on Monday, recovering some ground after its largest weekly slump since early July on fears over the impact of oil and gas sanctions on Russia’s export revenue. The rouble lost about 8% last week and is down 12.5% this month after an oil embargo…
By Leika Kihara TOKYO (Reuters) -Bank of Japan (BOJ) Governor Haruhiko Kuroda on Monday brushed aside the chance of a near-term exit from ultra-loose monetary policy but voiced hope that intensifying labour shortages will prod firms to raise wages. Kuroda said the BOJ’s decision last week to widen the allowance band around its yield target…
TOKYO (Reuters) – Bank of Japan (BOJ) Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said on Monday the central bank’s decision last week to widen the allowance band around its yield target was “absolutely not a first step” towards an exit from ultra-loose monetary policy. “Under our yield curve control policy, we will maintain monetary policy accommodative to sustainably…
SEOUL (Reuters) – Samsung Electronics plans to increase chip production capacity at its largest semiconductor plant next year, despite forecasts of an economic slowdown, a South Korean newspaper reported late on Sunday. The move contrasts with the scaling back of investment by rival chipmakers amid falling demand and a glut of chips. Analysts have said…
