Headlines

A care home operator which once ranked among the largest in Britain is being put up for sale in a move expected to fetch about £300m, SkyNews reported. Four Seasons Health Care Group has appointed CBRE, the property agent, to oversee an auction in the coming months. The process will be launched after a protracted period in which Four Seasons was reshaped and slimmed-down through a string of asset sales. While far smaller than it was before the pandemic, the company still employs more than 4,000 people and operates more than 45 freehold care homes.

Japan’s consumer inflation picked up in May, adding to market expectations for interest rate increases from the Bank of Japan, the Wall Street Journal reported. Overall consumer prices in May rose 2.8% compared with the same period a year earlier, due mainly to higher electricity bills, compared with the 2.5% increase in April, government data showed Friday. Many analysts and traders expect the Japanese central bank to raise its interest-rate target this year, with inflation staying above the bank’s 2% target for more than two years.

U.K. shoppers returned to retailers by more than expected in May, with sales recovering from the wet weather in the prior month, data showed Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported. Retail sales volumes rose 2.9% on month in May, flipping the 1.8% fall in April, according to the Office for National Statistics. Clothing retailers and furniture stores especially improved sales in the month, following April’s poor weather, the ONS said. Last month was the warmest May on record, while the month before that was the wettest April since 2012, U.K. weather agency the Met Office said.

The head of the Securities and Exchange Commission is encouraging the UK and others to shorten the settlement time for currency trading to better align their markets with those in Asia and North America, Bloomberg News reported. The UK is debating a transition to next-day settlement, known as T+1, for securities transactions, with its Treasury calling for the shift by the end of 2027. But SEC Chair Gary Gensler is nudging the UK to go bigger by adding more asset classes for shorter settlement. The US, Canada, Mexico and other countries already pressed ahead.

Norway’s central bank held its key policy rate at 4.5% and reiterated guidance that the rate is likely to stay at that level for some time, as high wage growth is expected to keep inflation elevated, the Wall Street Journal reported. The central bank said on Thursday that while inflation has cooled, it remains above target, while surveys suggest that wages might rise more rapidly than previously anticipated. Policymakers worried that a cut in the key rate could cause inflation to remain above their target for longer than they would like.

Indonesia’s central bank stood pat at its June policy meeting as expected, aiming to keep inflation in check as well as to maintain the rupiah’s stability, the Wall Street Journal reported. Bank Indonesia on Thursday kept its benchmark seven-day reverse repo rate at 6.25%. The central bank also held its overnight deposit facility rate at 5.50% and its lending facility rate at 7.0%. The decision is consistent with the bank’s pre-emptive, forward-looking stance to ensure inflation remains under control and to strengthen the rupiah, Bank Indonesia Gov.

Canadian retail sales likely dropped last month, nearly wiping out all of April’s gains and highlighting weakness in consumer spending that will keep more Bank of Canada rate cuts on the table this year, Bloomberg News reported. Receipts for retailers fell 0.6% in May, the biggest monthly decline since January, according to an advance estimate from Statistics Canada released Friday. April’s increase — the only gain in retail sales so far this year — was primarily driven by gasoline stations and fuel vendors, which likely benefited from higher prices. In volume terms, retail sales rose 0.5%.

An Ontario court has approved a sales process and stalking-horse bid for Red Lobster Canada, which is operating under court protection from creditors, CBC.ca reported. The move comes after a U.S. court approved the sales process for the company which launched chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings last month. Court filings made on June 11 say the steps are meant to "preserve" Red Lobster's business in Canada and the employment of the company's 2,000 workers stationed at 27 restaurants across the country.

The Bank of England held interest rates on Thursday at their highest level since 2008 even as inflation in Britain slowed to 2 percent in May, an important milestone, the New York Times reported. Policymakers kept rates at 5.25 percent, where they have been for 10 months. The officials said that high rates were working and cooling the labor market, reducing price pressures, but they added that monetary policy would need to stay restrictive until they were sure the risk of inflation overshooting their target had dissipated.

Brazil’s central bank held its key interest rate in a unanimous vote, fueling a rally in the real as it signaled borrowing costs will be steady for a prolongued period to battle rising inflation estimates, Bloomberg News reported. Policymakers kept the benchmark Selic unchanged at 10.5% late on Wednesday, as expected by nearly all economists in a Bloomberg survey. They paused an easing cycle that had lowered rates by 3.25 percentage points. The Brazilian real gained as much as 0.9% against the dollar on Thursday morning, leading global gains.