Headlines

Nigeria’s central bank on Tuesday hiked its key lending rate four months after lowering it, as Africa’s largest economy navigates a perilous combination of record inflation and the worst growth in 17 years, The Wall Street Journal reported. Governor Godwin Emefiele said the bank would lift the rate to 12%, up 1 percentage point. That is meant to curb inflation, which rose to a three-year high of 11.4%, last month: “The balance of risk should be tilted toward price stability,” he said.

Canadian gold miner Rubicon Minerals Corp said there was significant doubt about its ability to continue as a going concern after it breached a loan covenant, Reuters reported. Rubicon, which suffered a major setback in January when it had to cut the gold reserve estimate for its Phoenix mine in Ontario by 86 percent, said it continues to evaluate strategic options and that it was in talks with lenders.

Poland risks breaching EU fiscal deficit rules in 2017 as the new populist government steps up public spending to pay for childcare handouts and promised tax cuts, the OECD has warned, the Financial Times reported. The EU’s sixth-largest economy is forecast to break rules mandating a fiscal deficit below 3 per cent of gross domestic product next year unless it backs down on the spending promises or finds a way to increase tax revenues rapidly.

The Royal Bank of Scotland said on Tuesday that it had made a final payment of 1.19 billion pounds, or about $1.7 billion, to the British government, fulfilling a condition of its bailout package that gave the government priority for dividend payments, the International New York Times DealBook blog reported. The British government owns about 73 percent of R.B.S. after having injected £45 billion into the bank during the financial crisis. As part of that bailout, the government received a so-called dividend access share, which gave it “enhanced rights” for dividends paid by the bank.

The Central Bank has issued a robust defence of its contentious home loan caps, saying commercial banks and mortgage brokers are unable on their own to uphold “prudent” credit standards, the Irish Times reported. The loan caps will neither add to nor relieve the shortage of new homes, the Central Bank said. It added the rules would contribute to a shift in housing demand and supply towards rental accommodation.

Oil-rich Gulf governments will be forced to rely on debt markets as their fiscal deficits rise to $270bn amid an extended period of low oil prices over the next two years, Moody’s has said, the Financial Times reported. The ratings agency, which has already downgraded Bahrain and Oman, will decide at the end of May whether to adjust down the high ratings of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Kuwait, which are on a par with countries such as France and South Korea.

Canadian junior oil and gas producer Terra Energy Corp said it shut down production, ceased operations and announced the resignation of directors and officers on Monday, after its lender, Canadian Western Bank, demanded full repayment of its debt, Reuters reported. Terra, which was producing around 3,600 barrels of oil equivalent per day from its operations in western Alberta and north-eastern British Columbia, said that at current low oil prices the cost of operating was more than its revenue.

The number of Russians living below the poverty line rose to the highest levels in nearly a decade in 2015, as the oil-dependent economy suffered a second year of recession, data showed Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported. Years of high crude oil prices had pushed Russian’s living standards up, but a recent sharp drop in prices has left Russia’s economy stuck in a recession despite government claims that the worst is over.

Confronted with a plunge in its stock markets last year, China’s central bank swiftly reached out to the United States Federal Reserve, asking it to share its playbook from dealing with Wall Street’s “Black Monday” crash of 1987, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story.

A British vote to leave the European Union could cost the economy £100 billion (€1.28bn) and 950,000 jobs by 2020, according to research commissioned by employers’ group the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), the Irish Times reported. The CBI said “Brexit” would deliver a serious shock to the British economy, regardless of any trade deals the country could negotiate with its former European partners.