Headlines

The National Asset Management Agency (Nama) expects to return a surplus of €3.5 billion to the exchequer by the time it completes its work in 2020 or 2021, The Irish Times reported. An update from the agency on Thursday shows it has generated €44 billion from its operations since it was established in 2009, largely from asset and loan sales as well as rental receipts from properties controlled by debtors and receivers. Some €3.3 billion in cash was generated last year, according to Nama. Its remaining portfolio of assets had a carrying value of €2.3 billion at the end of last year.

Turkey’s currency has sustained a fresh blow in a grim 2019 debut marked by rising concerns over the global economy and angst that improving inflation data could prompt the central bank to prematurely reduce interest rates, the Financial Times reported. The lira has tumbled 4 per cent against the US dollar over the past two trading days, according to Refinitiv data. Thursday’s drop left it at TL5.5 to the buck, having closed last year at TL5.2877. It has not faced such a sharp two-day decline since the wake of the currency crisis in August 2018.

For years, no matter what was happening elsewhere, global companies bet billions upon billions of dollars that China’s consumers would keep spending money. Now, just when the world economy could use their financial firepower, they are holding back, worried about the country’s slowing growth, a trade war with the United States and rising amounts of personal debt, the International New York Times reported. Zhao Zheng, 26, is among the cost-conscious consumers. On Thursday, Mr.

Japanese shares slumped at the open on Friday as markets in Japan came back online after a holiday during which a profit warning from Apple sparked a global equities sell-off and fuelled concerns over slowing Chinese growth, the Financial Times reported. The Topix, in its first day of trading for the year, fell as much as 3.2 per cent in early trading with resources stocks down 4 per cent and the technology segment off 3.5 per cent.

Another Chinese peer-to-peer lender told investors on Wednesday it wouldn’t be able to pay them back, highlighting risks to the nation’s broader financial system as rising defaults and tougher regulations hit the $176 billion industry, Bloomberg News reported. Hangzhou-based Xinhehui told investors at a meeting that it won’t be able to make repayments on a total of 2.26 billion yuan ($330 million) of products issued to them, according to attendees and videos seen by Bloomberg News. More than 17,000 individual investors are affected.

Noor Bank PJSC, which provided a $100 million loan to the collapsed Abraaj Group, won the right to swap the debt for stakes in some of the Dubai-based buyout firm’s funds, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Privately-held Noor Bank won approval from a court in the Cayman Islands, where Abraaj is undergoing a supervised restructuring, to take ownership of stakes in the funds that were pledged against the loan, the people said, asking not to be identified because the process is private, Bloomberg News reported.

All Jet Airways India Ltd. ever needed was 1 rupee, or just 1.4 U.S. cents, for providing hot meals and cold towels. Since even that modest goal has proven elusive, India’s longest-surviving private airline now needs bankers with spine to keep flying. It’s been clear for some time that Jet, falling behind even on pilots’ wages, was going to skip a debt payment soon. Now that a default on bank loans has finally happened, let’s spend a minute on the brutal economics of the missing rupee, a Bloomberg View reported.

Euro zone manufacturing activity barely expanded at the end of 2018 in a broad-based slowdown, according to a survey which showed scant signs for optimism as the new year begins, Reuters reported. The disappointing survey comes just after the European Central Bank ended its 2.6 trillion euro asset purchasing scheme and is likely to make uncomfortable reading for policymakers.

Ireland is likely to issue an increasing number of authorisations for financial groups seeking to move operations to Dublin from London ahead of Britain’s March 29 departure from the EU, as worries grow about a no-deal Brexit, the Financial Times reported. Dublin wants to become a hub for previously UK-based institutions to service EU clients and the shift by financial services companies has been accompanied by similar moves by groups in sectors such as pharmaceuticals and the law.

Eurozone supervisors have appointed temporary administrators to troubled Italian lender Banca Carige after a majority of its board members resigned on Wednesday. The European Central Bank announced the decision to appoint three temporary administrators and a surveillance committee to replace Banca Carige’s board of directors and “take charge” of the lender, after executives quit and the mid-sized bank missed a deadline to shore up its financial health, the Financial Times reported.