Chinese fintech could help revive Hong Kong market 2 Sep 2016 Web groups like Alibaba snubbed the territory to float Stateside. A new breed of financial upstarts with few global peers may find Hong Kong more welcoming. A few multi-billion-dollar listings would cut the bourse's reliance on stodgy financial and property giants.
Mukesh Ambani’s telco insurgency threatens returns 1 Sep 2016 India's richest man is launching his new superfast mobile network with free voice calls, $45 handsets, and more goodies. The aggressive strategy may worry rivals like Bharti and Vodafone. Shareholders in Ambani’s own Reliance Industries will also fret about the $20 bln bet.
Pushy policy can help green finance to grow 1 Sep 2016 Green finance is high on the agenda at the G20. Policymakers see it as a way to fund much-needed infrastructure. Investors are also starting to pay more attention to environmental issues. Though big challenges remain, the top-down effort gives green finance a fighting chance.
China is wrong venue for an SDR revival 1 Sep 2016 Beijing wants to revive interest in Special Drawing Rights, the IMF quasi-currency it is about to join. The World Bank will sell $2 bln of SDR debt in China to help. Global investors badly need an alternative to the dollar but China's rickety bond market is a poor place to start.
BHP gives legal eagles lesson in accountability 31 Aug 2016 The mining giant is nixing CEO Andrew Mackenzie's bonus after last year's fatal Samarco dam collapse, days after its lawyers sidestepped blaming management. Withholding compensation is easier and may also be a faster way to persuade executives to pay attention to safety risks.
Bad finance: Japan Inc’s problem treasury shares 31 Aug 2016 Canon, Fujifilm and other blue-chips own lots of their own stock. Unnoticed, that can add phantom billions to valuations. Treasury shares can also bias bosses towards equity-heavy acquisitions or other deals that dilute shareholders. They should be cancelled, not held in limbo.
Cornerstones send HK stocks to trading graveyard 31 Aug 2016 Chinese state firms are relying on friendly investors to list in Hong Kong. The practice leads to unrealistic pricing and immobile shares. The city's stocks are already thinly traded; cornerstone-heavy IPOs make the problem far worse. No wonder bankers are fed up.
China’s interbank market may spread financial flu 30 Aug 2016 The repo market could transmit stresses from weak lenders to the wider financial system before authorities can intervene, a new report argues. Wacky products funding long-term projects with short-term money could fail, sparking a credit crunch.
Tokyo’s analysts outperform on a bad metric 30 Aug 2016 Sell-side researchers everywhere are under pressure to be kind to companies. Yet Japan stands out for the uniformity of opinions, a Breakingviews analysis shows. More than half of big stocks in the country don't have a single negative rating. No wonder short-sellers are circling.
Twin engines power BYD in electric car race 29 Aug 2016 The Chinese group's vehicle sales surged in the first half. Government subsidies are fueling growth and BYD's in-house battery unit give it an edge over local rivals. A rare dividend payment reveals the confidence of boss Wang Chuanfu even as competition intensifies.
China’s blue-sky fix does more harm than good 29 Aug 2016 A seat at the global leadership table comes with a big dose of criticism. A vision of blue skies and friendly allies for the G20 meeting shows that the People's Republic needs thicker skin. Solving problems requires facing them honestly and not further distorting market reality.
India’s Welspun is in a tangle of its own making 26 Aug 2016 The Indian firm's shares have nearly halved since customer Target alleged Welspun passed off cheap sheets as Egyptian cotton. Markets tend to assume the worst. Fuzzy language and absence of the CEO amplify the problem. Welspun is failing at the basics of crisis communications.
Xiaomi looks increasingly like yesterday’s unicorn 26 Aug 2016 The Chinese smartphone maker was briefly the world's most valuable startup. But sales are down, rivals are circling, and now it is diluting its online-sales model. Lower growth and less attractive economics make it hard to justify a valuation anywhere near Xiaomi's $45 bln peak.
China’s big banks enjoy calm before the storm 26 Aug 2016 Net profits at CCB and BoCom are stable, as are bad-loan ratios: a pleasant surprise given the wider backdrop. This partly reflects a growing gulf in asset quality between large banks and their smaller peers. The giants are probably also putting off recognising bad debts.
Emerging market fans get South Africa wake-up call 25 Aug 2016 The rand has slumped since Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan was ordered to report to a special police unit. Falling stocks and bonds are a timely reality check for money managers who have been lured back to emerging markets. An indiscriminate hunt for yield generally ends badly.
PPP flop hammers home China’s crowding out crisis 25 Aug 2016 Public-private partnerships on projects worth $285 bln were supposed to help cut costs and ease local government debt. Yet over 90 percent of funding is coming from state firms, a new report has found. It hammers home the extent to which state capital is crowding out the private sector.
Hong Kong’s cornerstone problem goes postal 25 Aug 2016 Postal Savings Bank of China may sell as much as 80 pct of its $8 bln share offering to cornerstone investors. One unlikely ally, a big state shipbuilder, is already down for $2 bln. This is fresh evidence, on an epic scale, of how Hong Kong's IPO crown is thoroughly undeserved.
Glencore’s risk-taking culture dies hard 24 Aug 2016 The world’s third-largest mining group deserves credit for selling assets, cutting debt and managing costs, but confidence in its strategy remains fragile. A $395 million coal hedging loss isn’t encouraging. Glencore is facing a trade-off between growth and security.
Beauty of selfie-app IPO is only skin deep 24 Aug 2016 Millions of young Chinese use Meitu to airbrush pictures, whitening their skin or applying virtual makeup. But the company is basically a small smartphone business made up to look like a big Internet player. A $700 mln Hong Kong IPO should be seen through a sceptical lens.
Singapore eyes last trick in the book to win IPOs 24 Aug 2016 The city-state is moving closer to introducing dual-class shares. A growing sense of desperation about a moribund market for new listings has reduced opposition to such a move. The risks of giving up the high ground on shareholder democracy are likely to outweigh any rewards.