China's home prices fell at the slowest pace in 17 months in November, with the crisis-hit property market showing signs of stabilising in some major cities amid government efforts to revive the real estate sector, Reuters reported. New home prices were down 0.1% in November from a month earlier, the slowest decline since June last year, according to Reuters calculations based on National Bureau of Statistics data on Monday. Prices dropped 0.5% in October from a month earlier. In annual terms, new home prices fell 5.7% after a 5.9% drop the previous month.

Pakistan cut its benchmark interest rate to the lowest in more than two years as easing inflation provides room for the central bank to boost growth, Bloomberg News reported. The State Bank of Pakistan lowered the target rate by 200 basis points to 13%, the central bank said in a statement Monday. All the 41 economists surveyed by Bloomberg predicted the move, with 26 forecasting the exact measure. Interest rate has dropped to the lowest since April 2022.

Japan’s biggest bank apologized Monday for the alleged theft by an employee of more than 1 billion yen ($6.6 million) from customers’ safe deposit boxes, the Associated Press reported. The bank, formally known as Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc., said Monday that it was investigating and that verified thefts from about 20 of the 60 clients thought to have been affected amounted to 300 million yen (nearly $2 million). Compensation was being worked out, it said.

Sri Lanka gained extensive support from private creditors to restructure its international bonds, a key step for the country to exit an extended default, Bloomberg News reported. Investors representing close to 98% of the country’s $12.6 billion in dollar bonds are expected to agree to swap their securities for new notes, the government said, citing preliminary results of its consent solicitation for the exchange. Once confirmed with official results on Dec. 16, the widespread support would mean that the debt restructuring should be completed before year-end.

Chinese leaders met this week to plot economic policy for the coming year, sketching out plans to raise government spending and relax Beijing’s monetary policy to encourage more investment and consumer spending, the Associated Press reported. Leaders of the ruling Communist Party wrapped up their two-day Central Economic Work Conference on Thursday with praise for President Xi Jinping's guidance and a pledge to “enrich and refine the policy toolbox” and defuse risks facing the world's second-largest economy.

Indonesia said it intervened aggressively in the market to curb the rupiah’s decline as the currency weakened past the key psychological level of 16,000 against the dollar, Bloomberg News reported. “We entered the market with a quite bold triple intervention,” Edi Susianto, executive director for monetary and asset securities management at Bank Indonesia said in text message Friday. Authorities entered the spot, domestic non-deliverable forward and government bond markets to maintain market confidence, he said. The rupiah dropped 0.5% to 16,002 per dollar on Friday.

China’s top leaders on Thursday pledged more stimulus measures to shore up the country’s economy, building on steps they have taken in recent months to bolster growth, the New York Times reported. At an annual gathering of the Chinese Communist Party and the cabinet, led by the country’s top leader, Xi Jinping, officials agreed that the government should allow a bigger budget deficit, borrow more and cut interest rates, the state television broadcaster said on Thursday.

China is poised to roll out an expansion of its nationwide private pension system as the world’s second-largest economy faces a rapidly aging population and its public pension fund is running dry, the Wall Street Journal reported. Workers covered by the nation’s basic pension insurance system can voluntarily open private pension accounts and deposit up to 12,000 yuan, equivalent to about $1,650, a year into the accounts, five governing bodies, including the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, said in a joint statement yesterday.