Hong Kong dipped into its foreign-exchange reserves for the first time in three years to defend its longstanding dollar peg, acting to shore up the local currency against a surging greenback, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Chinese territory’s de facto central bank, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, on Thursday said it had acted twice to stop the local currency trading beyond the weak end of its permitted range of 7.75 to 7.85 Hong Kong dollars per U.S. dollar. The monetary authority said it had sold U.S.

Ranil Wickremesinghe, a veteran lawmaker and former premier, has been named Sri Lanka’s next prime minister days after the last incumbent, the brother of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, resigned in the face of escalating anger with the deepening economic crisis, Bloomberg News reported. The president’s media unit confirmed the appointment Thursday in a text message. No other details were immediately available. The announcement may bring a modicum of stability to the country, which is on the verge of bankruptcy and needs a government to lead bailout talks with the International Monetary Fund.

Sri Lanka’s central bank chief imposed more capital controls and threatened to resign if politicians fail to return stability to the nation in the grip of its worst economic crisis since independence, Bloomberg News reported. “I took on this responsibility with expectations that political stability will be established,” Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe said at a briefing in Colombo Wednesday. “It’s been more than a month with no progress.

State-controlled carrier Garuda Indonesia has asked a Jakarta court to extend for the third time its deadline to complete its debt-restructuring process, its CEO said, as the verification of claims is still unfinished, Reuters reported. Garuda proposed a 30-day extension time to verify claims and finalise negotiation with the creditors, CEO Irfan Setiaputra said during a creditors meeting at the Central Jakarta Commercial Court on Tuesday.

The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has ordered the initiation of insolvency proceedings against Birla Tyres Ltd. in a case filed by multi-business chemicals firm SRF Ltd., an operational creditor of the BK Birla group firm, The Hindu reported. A two-member Kolkata bench of the NCLT has also appointed Seikh Abdul Salam as Interim Resolution Professional (IRP) to run the operations of the company after suspending the board and also declared a moratorium as per the procedures of the Insolvency & Bankruptcy Board (IBC).

An abrupt halt of Russian gas exports could see economies in emerging Europe, central Asia and north Africa slide back to pre-pandemic GDP levels, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) warned on Tuesday, Reuters reported. Many countries in the EBRD's region of operation, which covers some 40 economies stretching from Mongolia to Slovenia and Tunisia, depend on Russian gas and a sudden ceasing of supplies would lower output per capita by 2.3% this year and 2% in 2023, according to the lender's latest report.

For years, as Japan tried to boost its chronically weak economic growth, it pursued what its central bank saw as a magic formula: stronger inflation and a weaker yen, the New York Times reported. It didn’t quite work as intended. Inflation never met the government’s modest target, despite rock-bottom interest rates and heaps of fiscal stimulus. Workers’ wages stagnated, and growth remained anemic. Now, Japan is suddenly getting what it wished for — just not in the way it had hoped.

China's central bank said on Monday it would step up support for the slowing economy, while closely watching domestic inflation and monitoring policy adjustments by developed economies, Reuters reported. The People's Bank of China (PBOC) will keep liquidity reasonably ample, prioritise stability and take steps to boost confidence, the bank said in its first-quarter monetary policy implementation report.

China's new yuan loans are expected to have dropped in April after a rebound in March as credit demand weakened, a Reuters poll showed, even as the central bank keeps policy accommodative to support the slowing economy, Reuters reported. The Chinese economy has taken a hit as authorities raced to stop the spread of record COVID-19 cases, which have led to a full or partial lockdown in dozens of Chinese cities, including a city-wide shutdown in the commercial hub of Shanghai in April.