Headlines

Mexico’s central bank accelerated the pace of its interest rate increases Thursday, delivering the country’s biggest ever hike and signaling willingness to keep boosting rates at the same pace if needed, Bloomberg News reported. The board of Banxico, as the bank is known, unanimously voted to raise its key rate by 75 basis points to 7.75%, as expected by all 27 economists in a Bloomberg survey.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Friday that during a planned visit to Washington next month he would propose to his U.S. counterpart Joe Biden that they craft a joint anti-inflationary plan to tackle surging prices, Reuters reported. Mexico's leftist president did not set out details of what such a plan could entail, but he pointed to three measures his administration had taken to keep down the price of household staples like foodstuffs and fuels.

Brazil's central bank is aiming for inflation in 2023 "around" the 3.25% target but less than 4%, its chief, Roberto Campos Neto, said on Thursday, as policymakers hike interest rates to cool surging consumer prices in Latin America's largest economy, Reuters reported. When it raised its key interest rate to 13.25% last week and penciled in another hike for August, the central bank said it was looking to ensure inflation next year converged "around the target" rather than "to its target." "Around is less than 4%, just to make that very clear," Campos Neto said in an online news conference.

The resolution professional (RP) in the Anil Ambani insolvency case has sought an urgent hearing at the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on the grounds that it had been more than a year since he submitted his report on the merits of a lawsuit brought by State Bank of India for recovery of ₹1,200 crore loans from the industrialist, but his report has not been taken up, the Economic Times of India reported.

The German government on Friday offered to buy the insolvent MV Werften's Rostock shipyard for an undisclosed sum to turn it into a navy arsenal, a defence source said, in a move to top up the navy's capacities for repairing and servicing war ships, Reuters reported. Germany, in response Russia's invasion of Ukraine, has been scrambling to bring its military back in shape after decades of attrition following the Cold War.

Profits at China's industrial firms shrank at a slower pace in May following a big slump in April, due to the resumption of activity in major manufacturing hubs, but COVID-19 curbs still weighed on factory production and squeezed factory margins, Reuters reported. Profits fell 6.5% from a year earlier, less than the 8.5% decline in April, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Monday.

Mexico's troubled payroll lender Credito Real said in filing to the Mexican stock exchange late Wednesday that it was aware of claims of a filing of an involuntary chapter 11 bankruptcy petition, which it would fight once the petition was served, Reuters reported. "The company believes the Involuntary Petition is improper and was filed as a litigation tactic in the U.S. by certain alleged minority creditors to gain leverage in negotiations with the company," Credito Real said. Read more.

Sri Lanka’s debt-laden economy has “collapsed” after months of shortages of food, fuel and electricity, the prime minister told lawmakers Wednesday in comments that underscored the country’s dire situation as it seeks help from international lenders, the Associated Press reported. Ranil Wickremesinghe told Parliament the South Asian nation faces “a far more serious situation” than the shortages alone, and he warned of “a possible fall to rock bottom.” “Our economy has completely collapsed,” he said.

The Insolvency Law Committee has recommended against giving any special dispensation to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) from the moratorium clause under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), the Economic Times of India reported. According to the rules, once a company is admitted into insolvency under the code, a blanket moratorium kicks in barring regulators from initiating any fresh proceedings against the company.