Headlines

Ecuador has reached a new staff-level agreement with the IMF that could result in $1.5 billion in new disbursements this year following promises by President Guillermo Lasso's government to cut spending, the finance minister said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. The South American nation last year struck a $6.5 billion deal with the multilateral lender to help revive an economy that for years struggled under low oil prices and was further weakened by a brutal coronavirus outbreak.

EasyJet Plc rejected an unsolicited takeover approach and said it plans to raise more than $2 billion, giving the U.K. airline a buffer to see it through a return to leisure travel, Bloomberg News reported. The shares fell as much as 14%. The preliminary offer was conditional, all-stock and had a low premium, EasyJet said Thursday in a statement. It was rejected unanimously by the board and has been withdrawn. Instead, the discount airline will sell 1.2 billion pounds ($1.65 billion) of stock through a rights offering and raise an added $400 million in debt.

Turkish lenders are resisting demands from the banking regulator to curb growth in consumer credit, which authorities blame for fueling inflation and the current-account deficit, Bloomberg News reported. The executives of top Turkish banks faced off against Mehmet Ali Akben, head of the banking regulator, last Thursday, according to the minutes of their meeting, a copy of which was seen by Bloomberg.

European power companies could be burdened with debt and face credit rating downgrades if they fail to take action to reach climate neutrality by the middle of the century, a new study says, Bloomberg News reported. The European Union plans to reach net zero emissions by 2050 as part of efforts to curb global temperature rises and mitigate climate change. As power generation is the largest single source of carbon dioxide emissions, curbing pollution from the sector is crucially important to achieving the bloc’s climate targets.

Irish inflation hit a 10-year high in August, driven by a rise in the cost of transport, housing, restaurants and hotels, the Irish Times reported. Central Statistics Office (CSO) data shows consumer prices rose 2.8 per cent in the 12 months to the end of August, the sharpest level of price growth seen since November 2011. The latest figures come amid a series of warnings about rising costs for businesses in several sectors. The acceleration in prices is connected to the resumption of economic activity after lockdown, supply chain blockages, higher oil prices and Brexit.

Chinese regulators are probing Haitong Securities over allegations of misconduct in the brokerage house's investment banking business, dealing another blow to the scandal-plagued company amid tightening scrutiny of financial intermediaries, Nikkei Asia reported. Haitong received a notice from the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) disclosing the probe, which targets the broker's role in the financial reporting fraud case of Aurora Optoelectronics, the company said Wednesday in a filing.

The pandemic and a shortage of members in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has slowed insolvency resolution by over 45% with cases taking nearly 593 days during the June quarter, latest data showed, the Times of India reported. As of March-end, it took 408 days from the insolvency commencement date to the approval of the resolution. A thrust of the law was to provide for a time-bound resolution — ideally within 180 days, which could be extended by another 90 days.

UniCredit and Italy’s Treasury are set to extend discussions over the sale of state-owned bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena beyond an exclusivity deadline on Wednesday, Reuters reported. Italy’s second-largest bank agreed at the end of July to start exclusive talks to evaluate buying “selected parts” of Monte dei Paschi (MPS), which is 64% owned by the Treasury following a 2017 bailout. The two parties agreed to guidelines for an accord at the time stating a deal must leave UniCredit’s capital reserves unaffected and boost its earnings per share by at least 10%.

Japan's economy grew an annualised clip of 1.9% in the second quarter, better than the initial estimate of a 1.3% gain, revised government data showed, confirming a gradual recovery from the COVID-induced slump, Reuters reported. The revised figure for gross domestic product (GDP) released by the Cabinet Office on Wednesday compared with economists' median forecast for a 1.6% annualised growth in a Reuters poll. On a quarter-on-quarter basis GDP expanded 0.5% in the April-June quarter, also better than the initial reading of 0.3% and compared with a median forecast for a 0.4% rise.

German industrial production increased in July after three consecutive months of declines that have reflected supply chain problems, official data showed on Tuesday, the Associated Press reported. Overall production increased by 1% compared with the previous month, the Economy Ministry said. In June, it had dropped 1%. There were bigger increases in the production of cars and car parts, which was up 1.9%, and machinery, which rose 6.9%.