In 1976, Bangladeshi banker and economist Muhammad Yunus embarked on a revolutionary idea designed to help lift people out of poverty. The Grameen Bank project came into operation in 1983 with the following objectives:
Credit card giant American Express (Amex) has agreed to pay $85 million to around 250,000 consumers for violating consumer protection laws in marketing, billing and debt collection practices, reported the New York Times on Monday, with the financial institution also expected to pay up to $27.5 million in fines to regulators.
The 2008 Financial Crisis will cost an estimated $15 trillion in losses to the global economy through to 2018, said Standard & Poor’s former chief credit officer Mark Adelson to the Wall Street Journal on Monday, who also blamed high leverage and strong risk appetites among the major financial firms as the “immediate causes of the crisis”.
Tunisia’s central bank governor Chadli Ayari has urged Western economies to make good on their promise to provide financial aid to Arab Spring states, reported Reuters on Monday, as Middle Eastern states also prepare to raise the issue during the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) annual meeting in Tokyo later this month.
Speaking on the sidelines of an Arab central bankers’ conference in Kuwait, Ayari told reporters that several Arab economies were now struggling to cope during this major political transition.
According to a report by the OECD, the U.S. spends more on healthcare than any other country in the world. Yet the country also only has the eighth-lowest life expectancy in the OECD, while Japan who spends about $2,878 per person — about $5,000 less than the U.S. — has the highest life expectancy among developed nations.
Iraq plans to spend close to $500 billion over the next eighteen years on energy-related projects and industries, said Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Hussain al-Shahristani on Sunday, in the hopes of generating around 250,000 jobs for its citizens and around $6 trillion in revenues by 2030.
Speaking during an investment conference for British businessmen in Baghdad, al-Shahristani said that around $80 billion of the sum would be provided by the private sector, while the rest of the cash would be generated through government borrowing and oil revenues.
The Russian government is set to spend up to 600 billion roubles ($19.23 billion) on hosting the 2018 Football Cup, predicted the country’s Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko on Sunday, with the sum being almost twice the amount projected by then-Prime Minister Vladimir Putin when Russia won the rights to host the tournament in December 2010.
These are not the final numbers,” Mutko said, during a joint conference with the president of the global football governing body (FIFA), Sepp Blatter, on Sunday.
The Spanish government will borrow up to 207.2 billion euros ($266.5 billion) next year in order to cover the cost of bailing out its banks, power system and other eurozone partners, said its Budget Ministry on Sunday, after a stress test revealed last week that the banking industry could require as much as 59.3 billion euros in additional capital in order to survive.
Those who manipulate the London Interbank Offered Rate could and should face criminal prosecution, said the Financial Services Authority today. The ‘broken’ Libor system will also get a ‘complete overhaul’ through tougher regulation.
Martin Wheatley, managing director of the FSA told the BBC’s Today programme on Friday morning that bankers guilty of fixing Libor could be imprisoned in the future.
Earnings from merger and acquisitions and debt and equity capital markets have dropped to an 8-year low, falling to levels not seen since the collapse of Lehman Brothers.
Banks generated just $50.1 billion in fees in the year to date, 16 percent lower than the first nine months in 2011.
According to data from Thomson Reuters, the second quarter of 2012 was also the slowest quarter for investment banking since the first quarter of 2009, while European income for the first nine months fell to their lowest levels since 2002.
