Headlines

A numbered company is petitioning the B.C. Supreme Court to force Skeena Sawmills and its affiliated entities into bankruptcy, The Interior News reported. According to a Sept. 8 court filing, 1392752 B.C. Ltd., seeks to appoint a receiver and manager of all properties associated with Skeena Sawmills, Skeena Bioenergy and ROC Holdings to sell them and distribute the proceedings. Alvarez & Marsal Canada was named as a potential receiver.

China's central bank said on Thursday it would cut the amount of cash that banks must hold as reserves for the second time this year to boost liquidity and support the country's economic recovery, Reuters reported. The People's Bank of China (PBOC) said it would cut the reserve requirement ratio (RRR) for all banks, except those that have implemented a 5% reserve ratio, by 25 basis points from Sept. 15. The reduction follows a 25-bps cut for all banks in March and comes as the world's second-biggest economy is struggling to sustain a post-pandemic recovery.

China is carrying out a massive anticorruption purge across its healthcare sector, in an effort to bring down medical costs and revive the country’s flagging economy, the Wall Street Journal reported. Communist Party enforcers have steamrolled through hospitals and medical institutions across China, detaining more than 190 hospital party chiefs, directors and deputy directors—incumbent and former—so far this year, according to a Wall Street Journal review of government disclosures.

Laurentian Bank of Canada ended its strategic review without finding a buyer and plans to carry on as an independent firm with a slimmer management team. The company’s shares plunged, Bloomberg News reported. The Canadian bank announced in July it was examining its options. It hired JPMorgan Chase & Co. to run the process and considered a number of possibilities, including a sale of the whole bank or parts of it. Instead, it will try to ramp up its current strategy, which includes growth in commercial lending and technology upgrades.

The European Central Bank raised interest rates by a quarter percentage point to a record high but signaled that eurozone borrowing costs may have peaked, sending the euro tumbling, the Wall Street Journal reported. In a split decision, ECB officials raised the bank’s deposit rate to 4%, the 10th increase in a row and a vertiginous rise from below zero last year. At a news conference, ECB President Christine Lagarde signaled that Thursday’s rate increase might be the last, although she didn’t rule out further hikes if economic data disappoint.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said that a windfall tax on banks’ profits, which has worried investors, could be tweaked as long as the state receives the same expected inflow, Bloomberg News reported. “If we will need to amend the tax on banks, we will do it as long as the inflows will be unchanged,” Meloni told RAI1 television, adding that the value of expected receipts is just under €3 billion ($3.2 billion). Meloni commented on the tax on a popular TV show after the European Central Bank warned of potential negative side effects from the controversial levy.

Argentina's central bank (BCRA) board members decided to hold the benchmark interest rate steady at 118% at a meeting on Thursday, a source familiar with the matter said, despite the country's inflation rate hitting an over 30-year high in August, Reuters reported. August inflation data published on Wednesday showed annual inflation running at over 124%, with the monthly rate at 12.4%, its highest level since 1991, deepening a cost-of-living crisis ahead of the presidential elections scheduled for October.

Singapore’s approach to crypto became more conservative after the collapse of FTX but the island remains crypto friendly overall, said Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao, chief executive of the Binance digital-asset exchange, Bloomberg News reported. The Hong Kong crypto regime that took effect mid-year only allows a limited number of tokens for trading by retail investors, he said Thursday via video link at the Token2049 conference in Singapore. Tighter regulations generally have prompted many traditional financial institutions to hold back on offering cash to crypto services and vice versa, he added.

Singapore’s central bank imposed nine-year prohibition orders on Su Zhu and Kyle Davies for transgressions at their collapsed crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, Bloomberg News reported. The orders from the city-state’s financial watchdog took effect Wednesday and ban both men from any regulated activity, according to a Monetary Authority of Singapore statement on Thursday. Zhu and Davies are also prohibited from managing, being directors of, or becoming substantial shareholders of any capital market services company under the Securities and Futures Act, the statement showed.

Employers hired almost 65,000 more workers in August, many more than expected, improving the prospects that the economy will avoid a hard landing but also raising the possibility the Reserve Bank may hike interest rates again, the Guardian reported. The unemployment rate last month was 3.7%, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday. Economists had forecast the economy would add 25,000 jobs in August, which would have left the jobless rate at July’s reported level of 3.7%. Of the 64,900 extra jobs recorded in August, all but 2,800 of them were part-time roles.