The Italian government has agreed to cough up 2 billion euros ($2.5 billion) in order to bail out Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena (MPS), the world’s oldest bank and the nation’s third largest bank by assets, reported Reuters on Tuesday, with the bank believed to be holding on to some 25 billion euros in government bonds.
If the European Union had its way, it could soon have the legal authority to rewrite the national budgets of its 27 sovereign member states, particularly for eurozone countries that fail to meet its stipulated debt and deficit targets.
European leaders will meet later this week for a two-day summit to try to resolve a crisis that has spread across the Europe since early 2010.
Despite the economic slowdown in China and its key trading markets such as the eurozone and the United States, China’s trade ministry says it has seen some “satisfying” indications of a trade rebound, after it posted a massive $31.5 billion trade deficit in February.
At a press briefing in Beijing today, spokesman for the Commerce Ministry Shen Danyang said preliminary trade data for June was “pretty good” and has “kept the pace seen in May” when trade shipments were more than double what analysts had forecasted.
Government officials across China have been selling off their luxury cars in order to boost their local revenues, reported the Financial Times on Monday, as the nation’s economic slowdown continues to affect the municipal-level budgets of local authorities.
According to FT, the trend began sometime last year when cities such as Changzhou and Nanchang began auctioning off their Audis and BMWs in exchange for locally produced cars.
Tax evasion is costing the European Union around 1 trillion euros ($1.25 trillion) every year, claimed a draft statement from the European Commission that was obtained by Reuters on Monday, with regulators set to introduce multiple steps designed to curb rampant tax fraud across the region.
After the Fed declared that it ‘stands ready’ to protect the US economy from the eurozone debt crisis, all eyes will turn to the EU Summit later this week. The G20 meeting failed to deliver any insights but EU leaders have promised bolder actions to fight the debt crisis, including the possibility of a debt redemption fund.
Related News: Fed Stands Ready to Act If European Aftershocks Reach the US
The recent appointment of John Griffith-Jones, the senior partner of KPMG, as chairman-designate of the Financial Conduct Authority in the U.K. is troubling. Rather than properly investigating the causes of the banking and financial crisis, dealing with the culprits, and instituting fundamental reforms, the U.K. government’s appears set to just bury the truth and paper over the cracks in the hope of a recovery.
Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, one of the largest funds in the world, is seeking a $5 billion quota to invest in China’s capital market.
According to the Xinhua news agency, Qatari investment officials are seeking an investment quota five times the current cap of $1 billion, and will invest the funds mostly in China’s equity markets and initial public offerings, with some investment in fixed-income assets.
Disgraced former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi could attempt to run for office again, reported The Telegraph on Sunday, after the media tycoon was quoted to have said that he was ready to once again “take charge” of the Italian government.
Two major BRIC countries, Brazil and China, have announced that they will swap as much as $30 billion in their respective currencies, a move that symbolises deeper economic cooperation and closer ties between the two emerging markets.
The currency swap, worth 60 billion reais or 190 billion yuan, was at the centre of a wide-ranging trade agreements aimed at boosting investment and trade flows for the coming decade.
The announcement was made yesterday by the Brazilian finance minister Guido Mantega on the sidelines of the UN Rio+20 Summit.
