Thailand plans to raise government borrowing by about 8% in the fiscal year starting October to aid economic growth, Bloomberg News reported. About 1.1 trillion baht ($33 billion), or 41% of the total $78 billion, will be fresh borrowing to mainly finance the budget deficit, while the rest has been earmarked for refinancing and restructuring of existing debt. The Public Debt Management Office held a meeting with bond traders and fund managers on Monday in Bangkok.
Read more
A U.S. court ruling that placed into bankruptcy units associated with Indian education technology company Byju’s took an official in the firm’s home country by surprise, Bloomberg News reported. The decision, made at a Tuesday hearing in Delaware, will lead to involuntary chapter 11 bankruptcy of units including Neuron Fuel Inc., Epic! Creations Inc. and Tangible Play Inc., court papers showed. The order was made as a default judgment after the units failed to share requested information with creditors.
Read more
Thailand expects less than 40 million people to sign up for its flagship digital wallet handout scheme, with the first phase set to be distributed to 14.5 million vulnerable people from Sept. 25, a finance ministry official said on Monday, Reuters reported. The government has planned to give away 450 billion baht ($13.6 billion) to 45 million people under its stimulus programme, which will see 10,000 baht ($300) transferred to each person who registers to spend in their localities within six months.
Read more
Chinese authorities have banned the accounting firm PwC for six months and fined it over 400 million yuan ($56.4 million) over its involvement in the audit of collapsed property developer Evergrande, the Associated Press reported. The punishment is the heaviest yet for international accounting firms operating in China. PwC will be banned from signing off on any financial results in the country for six months. Already, it has been losing clients.
Read more
New bank lending in China jumped less than expected in August after hitting a 15-year low in July, as the central bank keeps policy accommodative and pledges to roll out more supportive measures to bolster a fragile economic recovery, Reuters reported. Chinese banks extended 900 billion yuan ($126.86 billion) in new yuan loans in August, up 246% from July but short of analyst expectations, data released by the People's Bank of China showed on Friday.
Read more

India Inflation Rose Slightly in August

Inflation in India ticked up a little in August, likely keeping policymakers at the country’s central bank on their toes as they plot whether to cut interest rates in the coming months, the Wall Street Journal reported. The consumer price index increased 3.65% on year in August, compared with 3.6% in the prior month, Indian government figures showed on Thursday. That compared with economists’ expectations of 3.5% from a FactSet poll. July’s level was the lowest since August 2019, before the pandemic and more recent geopolitical pressures.
Read more
China has for years had one of the lowest retirement ages among major economies. Men started life’s next chapter at age 60, while women did so as early as 50. But now, China’s next generation will have to work longer, the Wall Street Journal reported. To address looming pension-system shortfalls and economic strains, Beijing on Friday moved to gradually raise the statutory retirement age to 63 for men and 55 for blue-collar women. The retirement age for other women will increase to 58 from 55.
Read more
Russian hacker groups briefly disrupted Taiwanese financial platforms including the stock exchange and lender Mega Financial Holding Co.’s website, exposing the vulnerability of the island to foreign cyberattacks, Bloomberg News reported. Two groups that go by the handles “NoName057” and “RipperSec” on Telegram swamped targeted websites with a so-called Distributed Denial of Service attack, which caused unstable connection issues for the platforms Thursday afternoon, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said Friday.
Read more
Hui Ka Yan, the chairman of China Evergrande Group - the company at the centre of the country's property sector crisis - has been moved to a special detention centre in Shenzhen, Reuters reported. Hui, 65, has not been seen in public since he was taken away by Chinese authorities a year ago and his current whereabouts have not been previously reported. After China's securities regulator found Evergrande's flagship unit had inflated earnings and committed securities fraud, Hui was fined $6.6 million in March and barred from the securities market for life.
Read more