Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Tuesday that the annual budget this week will levy more taxes on real estate, which he termed as a non-productive sector, Reuters reported. The South Asian nation of 220 million people is facing a balance of payment crisis with foreign reserves falling below $10 billion, hardly enough for 45 days of imports, a widening current account and historical fiscal deficit. A fiscal consolidated budget to meet targets given by International Monetary Fund (IMF) will be presented on Friday.

Turkey aims to cap annual increases in home rentals at 25% as a surge in inflation pressures the government a year ahead of scheduled elections, Bloomberg News reported. Anger is deepening over soaring rents, which online marketplace sahibinden.com said rose an average 147% in Istanbul for new tenants who signed deals in May. Landlords are attempting to evict occupants and sign up new ones at much higher prices, with the number of lawsuits launched against tenants doubling, Sozcu newspaper reported in April.

The Philippines will likely follow its interest-rate increase last month with at least two more hikes to curb inflation, according to the central bank’s incoming governor, Bloomberg News reported. “It’s almost a sure thing to everyone that we will raise in June,” Felipe Medalla, a board member of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas who is set to take over from Benjamin Diokno as governor on July 1, said in an interview Tuesday. There is a “90% chance there’s another one in August.

When Japan’s leader released his economic vision Tuesday, he left out an important date. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida deleted a pledge from earlier government statements calling for Japan’s budget to be balanced by 2025. And he declined to give a date by which Japan would do something to lower its government debt, while promising to significantly increase military spending, the Wall Street Journal reported. It is a bold stance, given that the debt tops ¥1.1 quadrillion or $8.3 trillion at current rates, more than twice the size of the economy.

China's sputtering economy has a lot riding on its consumers, who are just now emerging from lockdowns in Shanghai and other big cities. But those hopes are running up against the likes of Wu Lei, a soccer coach in Beijing who has put off buying a new mobile phone, Bloomberg News reported. "I've lost the lion's share of my income since Beijing called a stop to after-school sports clubs in April," said Wu, a 37-year-old with two daughters. The five-week-long near-shutdown of the Chinese capital under China's stringent COVID-19 measures was eased on Monday.

Sri Lanka will need $5 billion over the next six months to ensure basic living standards, and is renegotiating the terms of a yuan-denominated swap worth $1.5 billion with China so as to fund essential imports, the prime minister said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The island nation's worst economic crisis in seven decades led to a shortage of foreign exchange that stalled imports of essential items such as fuel, medicine and fertiliser, provoking devaluation, street protests and a change of government.

The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has dismissed the petition of Wave Mega City Center (WMCC) Private Limited that had approached the tribunal under section 10 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code to initiate the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process (CIRP), the Economic Times of India reported. The tribunal had completed the argument and reserved the order on October 26, 2021. “The tribunal has just pronounced the order. We evaluate the order and will approach the appropriate court for the next course of action.

Australia’s central bank is poised to implement back-to-back interest-rate increases for the first time in 12 years on Tuesday, economists and traders predict, with the key debate centering on the size of the move, Bloomberg News reported. Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Philip Lowe and his board will raise the cash rate by 25 basis points to 0.60%, according to 15 of 29 economists surveyed by Bloomberg. Three analysts see a half-point rise, while the remaining 11, as well as money markets, forecast a larger 40-basis-point hike.

Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said on Monday the central bank's top priority was to support the economy, stressing an unwavering commitment to maintaining "powerful" monetary stimulus, Reuters reported. Unlike its U.S. and European counterparts, the BOJ does not face a trade-off between the need to tame inflation and support the economy, as Japan's inflation remains modest and driven by temporary factors such as rising raw material costs, Kuroda said.

Beijing residents eagerly indulged in a privilege that they had not enjoyed in weeks: dining inside a restaurant, the New York Times reported. The Chinese capital relaxed pandemic rules at midnight on Monday, including a ban on dining in, after a partial lockdown that lasted more than a month. Although the closures were not as strict as in Shanghai, the authorities in Beijing had suspended some public transportation, forced some people to quarantine, and enforced work-from-home in much of the city.