Last news

China intends to increase the retail price of gasoline and diesel this week in response to rising international oil prices. Gasoline and diesel prices will go up by 250 yuan (US$37) per ton and 240 yuan (US$36) per ton, respectively.Some analysts bel...

The Federal Reserve places great store in consumer spending as a barometer of how hot the economy is running. US consumer spending dropped in December, providing evidence that the Fed’s series of interest rate increases are cooling the economy.On Fri...

High inflation and fears over a global recession have led to softening worldwide demand for smartphones, shipments of which have declined to a low not seen since 2013. Global smartphone shipments plunged in the fourth quarter of 2022, usually a...

Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, continued its recent climb as opportunistic investors continued to bet that the Federal Reserve will ease its pace of interest rate increases or stop them altogether.The price of the digital currency rose...

The UK’s Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) survey for January showed the sharpest drop in business activity since COVID lockdowns two years ago, as the combination of high interest rates and low consumer demand dampened activity.The PMI reading fell to...

Home sales in the US are on a major decline. December marked the 11th straight monthly fall in sales of existing homes, the longest streak since 1999.Driven by the US Federal Reserve’s fastest interest rate-hiking cycle since the 1980s, the US housin...

Dutch central bank chief Klaas Knot, a Governing Council member of the European Central Bank (ECB), has said the central bank will carry on with half-point interest-rate increases at the next two meetings.In a recent interview, Knot said the time to...

Inflation is slowing in Canada, leading to hopes that an expected increase in interest rates next week may be the last one for some time.The consumer price index rose 6.3% in December from a year ago, down from 6.9% in November. The 0.6% month-to-mon...

Microsoft Corporation intends to cut thousands of jobs, with some of the roles eliminated expected to come from key divisions like human resources and engineering.The layoffs would underscore a worrying trend among US technology firms. Amazon and Met...

The Bank of Japan (BoJ) this week kept ultra-low interest rates intact, upsetting market projections that it would respond to rising inflationary pressure by erasing its stimulus program. The central bank also announced it would continue to cap bond...

The price of everyday goods in Argentina has almost doubled in the last year as its annual inflation rate reached its highest level in over three decades.Official data reveals that consumer prices leapt by 94.8% in the 12 months to the end of Decembe...

China’s exports plunged this past December at the fastest rate since 2020. Imports also cooled, a warning sign that the country’s road to post-pandemic recovery will not be an easy one.Exports in the world’s second-largest economy dwindled 9.9% year-...

In a sign of increasing scrutiny of the crypto market, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) this week charged two prominent crypto firms, Genesis Global Capital and Gemini, for selling unregistered securities to investors through Gemini's...

Egypt, the most populous country in the Arab world, has had a brutal year. The Egyptian pound recently softened by more than 13% to a new low of 32 to the US dollar. Since March 2022, the pound has lost half of its value against the greenback as the...

The World Bank has warned in an annual report that the global economy will come “perilously close” to a recession this year. On the back of weak economic growth in the world’s top three economies – the US, Europe and China – the World Bank has cut it...