Brazil: football chief under fire again
Brazilian soccer boss Ricardo Teixeira is under the microscope again amid reports that the country’s federal police have opened an investigation into allegations of corruption against him.
The chief of Brazil’s soccer federation for 22 years and the head of the local organizing committee of the country’s efforts to stage the World Cup in 2014, Teixeira is no stranger to controversy. Continue reading »
Saudi Basic Industries Corp, the world’s largest chemical producer by market value, posted a record net profit in the third quarter on the back of increased sales and reduced funding costs.
The company, 70 per cent which is owned by the Saudi government, posted a 54 per cent surge in net profit year-on-year of SR8.2bn ($2.2bn) in the three months ended September 30th, it said in a statement on Monday. Continue reading »
Hungary: how low can growth go?
It’s tough being an economic pundit in Hungary these days.
Peter Oszko, finance minister in the Socialist government ousted 18 months ago, says he speaks on Magyar economic affairs almost every week, but these days declines requests to send presentations in advance.
“Anything written a week ago is no longer valid by the time of the conference. We have to react to new things every day,” he says. Continue reading »
India F1: a chance on the big stage
At the end of this month, India will attempt to do what China did with the 2008 Beijing Olympics: relaunch itself onto the global stage with a truly international sporting event – the inaugural Indian Grand Prix.
Just as China used the Olympics to show the world that it had arrived as an economic powerhouse – that opening ceremony was jaw-dropping – India is hoping, after the embarrassments of last year’s scandal-plagued Commonwealth Games, that Formula 1 can provide some serious sparkle. Continue reading »
Hungary: dicing with downgrade
Hungary’s future is getting murky once again and not all of its woes can be blamed on the eurozone’s debt crisis – its own policies are definitely part of the problem.
Its growth forecasts are being slashed, it is likely to be downgraded by at least one of ratings agencies in the coming weeks and its currency is being badmouthed. Not good. Continue reading »
Dubai tourism: mixed fortunes
Judging opportunities in Dubai’s tourism market is a tricky business these days.
Tourist numbers are rising, underpinned by 50 per cent annual increases in Chinese visitors who want to grab luxury goods and snaps next to the world’s tallest tower, Burj Khalifa. The Arab uprisings have given the industry another fillip as tourists avoid hotspots such as Egypt, Tunisia and Bahrain.
But more than 2.5m extra tourists will have to arrive annually over the next five years to meet a whopping 60 per cent increase in the number of rooms bequeathed by the emirate’s over-ambitious boom days. Continue reading »
IHG: building a hotel for the Chinese
Walmart is hemorrhaging senior executives, Best Buy is wondering what went wrong, and Barbie had to shut up shop and leave town: is it time to rethink the future of the Western brand in China?
Keith Barr, greater China CEO of InterContinental Hotels Group, thinks the balance of power between Western brands and Chinese consumers may be at a tipping point. Continue reading »
Jetstar looks for closer ties with Vietnam Airlines
Jetstar, the low-cost arm of Australian flag carrier Qantas, has had a turbulent time in Vietnam, afflicted variously by a police investigation into senior executives and disputes over payments for fuel and the use of its brand, which have culminated in the need for a cash injection.
But things could be looking up: Jetstar is in advanced talks that would see it tie up with state-owned monolith Vietnam Airlines, according to three people familiar with the situation. Continue reading »
Philippines bondholders battle retro-tax
"Don’t be too creative"
Today is not a good day for some holders of Philippine domestic bonds. When owners of the first zero-coupon bond sold by the government ten years ago redeem the debt paper today, they will receive only 80 per cent of expected 25bn peso interest on the bond rather than the 100 per cent they were promised back then.
Disappointed is a mild way of describing how the bondholders feel. On October 7, with 11 days to go before the bond matured, the Philippine bureau of internal revenue issued a ruling that imposed a 20 per cent tax on the accumulated interest on the bond. When the bonds were sold 10 years ago, the tax authorities said they were exempt from that kind of tax. Continue reading »
New York headlines
* China economy grows at slowest pace in 2 years
* G4S buys rival ISS in £5.2bn deal
* BP to end payments to oil spill fund early
* Bumi puts off $2bn deal to acquire miner Continue reading »
India: TCS leaves door open for rivals
A small slip may have symbolic significance. Indian IT giant Tata Consultancy Services missed analysts’ expectations, leading some to call rival Infosys the future market leader.
TCS opened on Tuesday down 7.5 per cent, ahead of the Bombay Stock Exchange’s benchmark Sensex index, which opened down 1.4 per cent. The dip came after TCS announced that profits after tax for the quarter ending in September had grown 6.1 per cent year-on-year, just under expectations, and was down 4.7 per cent from last quarter. Continue reading »
Further reading: EM pork
Tuesday’s top picks from the beyondbrics team: Lex on Citi’s EM push and Walmart’s regulatory problem in China; Turkey’s threatened prospects; Russia’s army and its demographic problem; and India’s Diwali bonus culture – should it be scrapped? Continue reading »
China: slowing, but slowly
Sure enough, the markets didn’t like the number. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng fell 4.2 per cent, while the China Enterprises Index fell 5.2 per cent. The Shanghai Composite dropped 2.3 per cent, while the renminbi has now fallen 0.5 per cent in the spot market against the dollar in a week.
China’s 9.1 per cent growth figure might be slower than last quarter, but it isn’t exactly slow. Continue reading »
EM markets: falling back
After the brief rally, the fall. Emerging equity markets tumbled on Tuesday, led by Asian stocks as Chinese GDP figures failed to impress. The Hang Seng closed down 4.23 per cent, Korea’s Kospi fell 1.41 per cent, and after a 9-day rising streak the MSCI emerging markets index fell 2.3 per cent. Continue reading »
Did BlackBerry’s Crumble save lives?
The BlackBerry Crumble may have saved lives: that’s the positive spin.
A report in the National newspaper of Abu Dhabi says traffic accidents fell by 20 per cent in Dubai during the outage and by 40 per cent in Abu Dhabi – which the National claims has been “directly linked to the three-day disruption in BlackBerry services”. Continue reading »
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