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WSE gets tough with New Connect
The Warsaw Stock Exchange is tightening the screws on its often-unruly younger sibling, the New Connect alternative market for small companies, by halting trading in 14 companies that failed to file their quarterly reports on time.
The earliest the 14 can return to the trading floor is Thursday – if they get their paperwork in no later than the end of Tuesday. Continue reading »
By Erik Berglof of the EBRD
The latest forecasts show that central Asia and the Caucasus are again the fastest-growing economies in the former Communist countries of eastern Europe and the ex-Soviet Union.
Yet, given the low level of income and relatively high population growth of these countries, the numbers are disappointing. On closer inspection growth is also narrow, mainly stemming from natural resources and remittances from citizens working abroad; countries less endowed with resources are doing worse. Economic reforms are mostly stuck, as are, with a few exceptions, political reform. Continue reading »
RenCap: Russia the next Greece
Russia the next Greece? It sounds like a long shot. But Russia the next Greece as the subject of a report from an investment bank that specialises in marketing Russian assets? That sounds like a shot in the foot. But it is precisely what Ivan Tchakarov of Moscow-based Renaissance Capital published on Tuesday. And he has solid arguments to support his self-destructive thesis. Continue reading »
Russia’s markets: the Kudrin card
As Russia’s economy slows, one name comes up more and more in conversations – that of Alexei Kudrin, the former finance minister who either resigned or was sacked, depending on whom you talk to, in September 2011.
Kudrin has an unrivalled reputation for economic management, earned in more than a decade in office, before he fell foul of a rivalry with Dmitry Medvedev. Medvedev, who was president at the time and is now prime minister, accepted Kudrin’s resignation after Kudrin publicly said he wouldn’t work with Medvedev. Continue reading »
Turkey-Azerbaijan: ties that bind
The Azeri dialect of Turkish may sound strange to Turkish ears but it is perfectly intelligible and the increasing economic and political cooperation between the two states represents as much a common culture as the geographical imperative that makes Turkey the perfect export route for Azerbaijan’s sizeable reserves of oil and gas reserves. Continue reading »
Russia: grain farmers pray for rain
After an abnormally cold winter it’s a relief for Muscovites to be out basking in the unusually hot May sunshine. But a thousand miles away in the grain belt of southern Russia, farmers are already praying for rain.
Russia is traditionally one of the world’s top three wheat suppliers, but its vast agricultural lands are highly vulnerable to extreme weather. The southern federal district bordering the the Black Sea coast is Russia’s biggest grain producing and exporting region and the results of the harvest have major implications for global food markets. Continue reading »
Slovenia: Fitch casts a cloud
Unlike much of Catholic Europe, Slovenia opts out of celebrating Whitsun as a public holiday – which is perhaps just as well since the pressure remains on the government of Alenka Bratušek to attend to her country’s economic woes.
The latest turn of the screw has come from credit agency Fitch, which cut Slovenia’s sovereign rating to BBB+ from A-, with negative outlook. Continue reading »
Russia GDP cheers investors
Russian equities started the week strongly with a 0.7 per cent rise in the dollar-based RTS index boosted by solid global markets and relief at the latest domestic economic data.
As reported on Friday, Russia’s gross domestic product expanded by 1.6 per cent in the first quarter of 2013 as economic growth slowed for the fifth quarter in a row. That wasn’t great, of course, but it was better than the economy ministry’s forecasts. Continue reading »
Emerging consumers take a breather
From Bangkok to Rio, a new-found desire for keeping up with the Joneses among hundreds of millions of people has been helping to keep the world afloat.
But the emerging consumers of Asia, eastern Europe and Latin America are all showing signs of slowing their scramble for clothes, white goods, cars and so on. Daniel Martin at Capital Economics reckons many of them have had to change down a gear for the foreseeable future. The problem is, you guessed it, debt. Continue reading »
[snap] Turkey gets second investment grade
Moody’s on Thursday raised Turkey’s government bond rating by one notch from Ba1 to Baa3, making it the second rating agency to award the country with an investment grade.
Fitch gave Turkey investment grade last November while Standard & Poor’s lifted its rating from BB to BB+, or one step short of investment grade, in March. Continue reading »
Think potholes in NY are bad? You haven’t been to Hungary
I read the news today, Oh boy
200 hundred holes in roads in Hungary,
Unlike Blackburn, these holes are not so small,
They’ve had to map them all,
Enough to drive Generali up the wall.(Apologies to Lennon & McCartney. ) Continue reading »
Czech miner NWR raked over the coals
By Nicholas Watson of bne
When the new chairman of Czech coal miner New World Resources warned back in February that the first part of 2013 was going to be challenging, few probably envisaged it would be quite as bad as this. But on May 16, NWR revealed that it made another record loss in the first quarter and said it would take a series of measures worth €100m to bolster its finances. Continue reading »
Poland: Cistercian monks go to market
Jesus never came across as a big fan of markets – as he showed when he chased the moneychangers from the Temple – but now a group of Polish monks is looking to enter, albeit indirectly, into Mammon’s unholy precincts by floating on the Warsaw Stock Exchange.
A company called Produkty Klasztorne (Monastery Products), which pays Cistercian monks a licensing fee to use their trademark, recipes, and raw materials, is listing on the exchange’s smaller companies’ alternative market.
Serbia: more rate cuts possible after 50 basis-point reduction
Serbia’s first interest rate cut in 17 months is more dramatic than expected as the central bank looks to encourage a sluggish economy and bets that a recent inflation spike is temporary. But consumer price growth may still come in at double digits for 2013.
The National Bank of Serbia (NBS) this week cut its repo rate by 50 basis points to 11.25 per cent, more than the 25-point reduction forecast by a Bloomberg survey and other analysts. Continue reading »
Czech GDP: it gets worse
The Czech Republic is in a terrible downturn that shows no sign of coming to an end with new flash GDP data showing a first quarter annual contraction of 1.9 per cent, much worse than analysts had predicted and the Czech economy’s worst performance since the depths of the first wave of the crisis in 2009. Continue reading »
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