New Zealand’s central bank expects inflation to continue to slow but said it needs more time to be certain. Good progress is being made in bringing inflation back to the Reserve Bank’s 1-3% target band, chief economist Paul Conway said in a speech Wednesday in Wellington. Increasing spare capacity in the economy and declining inflation expectations are likely to further reduce price pressures, while “sticky” domestic costs are also expected to eventually abate. “These processes could occur more quickly or slowly than currently projected,” he said.

Fortis Healthcare, Apollo Hospitals, Medanta and Max Healthcare are among half-a-dozen companies that have shown preliminary interest in acquiring Jaypee Healthcare, the last of the Jaiprakash Group's priced assets to be admitted into bankruptcy, the Economic Times reported. On Friday, the Allahabad bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) gave an oral order to admit Jaypee Healthcare for corporate insolvency and resolution process on a petition filed by JC Flowers Asset Reconstruction Company. A written order is yet to be uploaded by the tribunal on its website.

China's securities regulator said on Tuesday it will strengthen regulation of all financial activities and prevent and resolve risks, in a move to improve and reform financial markets amid a wobbly economic recovery, Reuters reported. The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) said in a statement it will maintain a "zero-tolerance" stance on illegal activities in the capital market. "Preventing and defusing financial risks, especially preventing systemic financial risks, is the fundamental task of financial work," the CSRC said in a statement.

China's latest property support measures have boosted transactions in its biggest cities, but activity in smaller localities is struggling to get off the ground, pointing to more pain ahead for most of the country's real estate market, Reuters reported. On May 17, China cut minimum mortgage rates and downpayments and instructed municipalities to buy unsold apartments to turn them into social housing, sparking dozens of announcements from cities easing policies under the new guidelines.

Thailand’s central bank governor pushed back further against a government suggestion to raise the monetary authority’s inflation target, spelling out the risks of such a move to Southeast Asia’s second-largest economy, Bloomberg News reported. Any push to tweak the inflation target may unanchor expectations and result in quickening price gains — and in turn, higher borrowing costs, Governor Sethaput Suthiwartnarueput said in an interview with Bloomberg Television’s Haslinda Amin in Bangkok on Tuesday.

The Reserve Bank of Australia continued to warn about ongoing inflation risks at its policy meeting on Tuesday, leaving open the potential for a further interest-rate increase if price pressures remain stubbornly high over coming months, the Wall Street Journal reported. As expected, the board of the RBA chose to keep the official cash rate steady at 4.35%, where it has sat since November. “Inflation is easing but has been doing so more slowly than previously expected and it remains high,” the RBA’s policy-setting board said in a statement.

India’s inflation continues to be sticky, making it premature for the central bank to discuss a change in its monetary policy stance, Reserve Bank Governor Shaktikanta Das said Tuesday, Bloomberg News reported. Even though core inflation reached a historical low, food prices remain high due to supply-side factors, Das said at an event by ET NOW television in Mumbai. “This last mile of disinflation journey is proving very sticky, arduous and very slow,” he said, adding the central bank will remain watchful.

Property investment in China fell 10.1% in the first five months of 2024 from a year earlier, after dropping 9.8% in January-April, even as policymakers doubled down on efforts to support the ailing sector and shore up consumer confidence, Reuters reported. Property sales by floor area in January-May fell 20.3% from a year earlier, compared with a 20.2% slump in January-April, National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data showed on Monday. New construction starts measured by floor area fell 24.2% on year, after a 24.6% drop in the first four months.

China’s central bank left a key interest rate steady for the tenth straight month, displaying caution on monetary easing given abundant liquidity and the pressure to prevent the yuan from weakening further, Bloomberg News reported. The People’s Bank of China kept the rate on one-year policy loans, the so-called medium-term lending facility, steady at 2.5% on Monday, in line with the forecast in a Bloomberg survey. It withdrew a net 55 billion yuan ($7.6 billion) from the banking system to avoid excessive liquidity.

China ramped up warning against bond bulls via state-media reports as a debt-buying frenzy re-emerged, Bloomberg News reported. Funds investing in bonds will find it difficult to sustain the returns, which have exceeded 10% in some cases so far this year, the People’s Bank of China-backed Financial News said in a report Saturday. If yields rise, long-duration bonds will “face larger risks of a retreat in capital gains,” the report said, citing unidentified people close to regulators.