Headlines

The Bank of England on Wednesday told regulators to move fast to toughen rules for funds used by Britain's pension industry which nearly collapsed last year after former Prime Minister Liz's Truss's "mini-budget," Reuters reported. The BoE said Britain's banking system was not at risk from the kind of turmoil that has beset some banks in the United States and Switzerland's Credit Suisse. But the BoE's Financial Policy Committee called on the Pensions Regulator to act "as soon as possible" to mitigate the risks posed by liability-driven investment (LDI) funds.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's party has presented a bill in parliament to separate retail and investment banks in a move that, if approved, would force a radical overhaul of the country's banking sector, Reuters reported. The proposal by the Brothers of Italy (FdI) party comes in the wake of the collapse of U.S. tech lender Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and the emergency takeover of Credit Suisse by banking rival UBS, which raised fears of systemic stress that could lead to more bank failures.

The opening months of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year drove an increase in oil and natural-gas prices that brought a windfall for Moscow. Those days are over, the Wall Street Journal reported. As the war continues into its second year and Western sanctions bite harder, Russia’s government revenue is being squeezed and its economy has shifted to a lower-growth trajectory, likely for the long term. The country’s biggest exports, gas and oil, have lost major customers. Government finances are strained. The ruble is down over 20% since November against the dollar.

Brazilian bank lending fell for the second consecutive month in February, according to data from the central bank published on Wednesday, adding to concerns about a potential credit crunch amid high borrowing costs, Reuters reported. Outstanding loans slipped 0.1% in February from the previous month to 5.319 trillion reais ($1.03 trillion), pushing 12-month growth down to 12.6% from 13.8% in the previous month. The performance was driven by a 0.7% decline in corporate credit, while there was a 0.4% increase in household loans.

Default-stricken Zambia published figures on Wednesday showing that its total public debt stock climbed to $32.8 billion, including interest arrears at the end of last year, of which $18.6 billion was external, Reuters reported. At the end of June 2022 its total debt including interest arrears was $32.5 billion, with $17.5 billion external. Zambia has been looking to restructure its debt after becoming the first African country to default during the COVID-19 pandemic in late 2020.

The Czech central bank sought to correct investors’ expectations about when it may start easing monetary policy, calling bets on summer rate cuts “premature.” The koruna gained, Bloomberg News. The bank held the benchmark rate at 7% on Wednesday, where it has been since new leadership halted rapid hikes last summer. Policy makers also maintained a commitment to prevent major currency swings, which has helped the koruna outperform its regional peers in the past year.

Japan's JOLED, a company formed in a 2015 merger of the organic light-emitting diode (OLED) businesses of Panasonic and Sony, said on Monday that it had filed for bankruptcy protection at the Tokyo District Court, Nikkei Asia reported. JOLED has total liabilities of 33.7 billion yen ($257 million). JOLED's troubles are part of the long decline of Japan's display industry, which has undergone repeated realignments to try to compete with South Korean and Chinese rivals.

French authorities on Tuesday searched the Paris offices of five banks, including Societe Generale, BNP Paribas and HSBC, on suspicion of fiscal fraud, part of a broad European probe into the dodging of dividend tax payments, Reuters reported. Societe Generale confirmed the searches, declining further comment. The other banks concerned did not immediately reply to requests for comment. The French prosecutors' actions are the latest to hit global banks over the dividend tax fraud scheme as similar investigations have been conducted in Germany and other European countries.

U.S. prosecutors on Tuesday unveiled a new indictment against Sam Bankman-Fried, accusing the founder of now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange of conspiring to pay a $40 million bribe to Chinese government officials, Reuters reported. The new bribery conspiracy charge adds the pressure on the 31-year-old former billionaire, who now faces a 13-count indictment over the November collapse of FTX.