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News in Brief
S&P raises outlook for
Sri Lanka debt
AlP, Colombo
International credit rating agency Standard and Poor's has raised the outlook on its rating for Sri Lanka's debt to "stable" from "negative" following a 2.6-billion-dollar IMF bailout package.
The move to a stable outlook reflects the improving state of the government's finances and means the risk of a further downgrade of the main credit rating is diminished.
The agency kept Sri Lanka's rating at "B", which is five notches below investment grade despite an improvement in the island's foreign reserves.
"The ratings could be raised if government policies lead to a sustainable boost in tax revenues and reduced fiscal imbalances," S&P said in a statement received here lateTuesday.
Sri Lanka's foreign reserves, which fell to an eight-year low of 1.3 billion dollars in March, have climbed to 3.2 billion dollars, boosted by inflows for bonds, the central bank governor Nivard Cabraal said Tuesday.
In July, the IMF approved a 20-month 2.6-billion-dollar loan and immediately released 322 million dollars to help avert a balance of payments crisis in the island that is just recovering from a 37-year war with ethnicTamil rebels.
Sri Lanka plans to sell bonds worth 500 million dollars to overseas investors next month to offset projected spending needed to rebuild infrastructure and homes in the war-torn north and east.
Sarkozy forces bankers to limit bonuses
AFP, Paris
President Nicolas Sarkozy forced French bankers to accept new rules limiting bonuses paid to traders on Tuesday and vowed to take his campaign for greater market regulation to next month's G20 summit.
Sarkozy summoned financial executives to the Elysee Palace to warn them that the government, having loaned billions to banks to see them through the credit crunch, would not accept a return to a culture of unregulated payouts.
"We will not work with banks who do not apply these rules," Sarkozy told reporters after what was his seventh banking summit since the crisis began, warning: "I want banks who do not play by the rules to be punished."
The head of the French banking federation confirmed that its members had agreed to new restrictions, under which a two-third chunk of traders’ bonuses would be suspended to take into account bank results.
"One third of the delayed portion will be paid in shares in the business for which traders work and, in particular, a penalty system will be put in place," Sarkozy explained on the steps of the Elysee.
"If performance is not up to scratch over the period, the delayed portion of the bonus will not be paid. No bonuses without penalties."
Singapore factory output rises 12.4pc in July
AFP, Singapore
Singapore's manufacturing output rose 12.4 percent on-year in July, its fastest pace in over 12 months, lifted by surging pharmaceuticals production, the government said Wednesday.
Last month's double-digit increase was a sharp improvement from the 9.0 percent drop recorded in June and far exceeded a Dow Jones Newswires poll of analysts' forecasts for an average decline of 1.0 percent.
On a month-on-month seasonally adjusted basis, manufacturing expanded 23X) percent, the Economic Development Board (EDB) said.
The highly volatile biomedical industry, which includes pharmaceuticals, was the star performer, with production up 125.4 percent in July from a year ago.
Pharmaceutical output alone surged an annual 139.2 percent in July.
The sector's performance helped negate declines in other sectors, as electronics output fell 5.6 percent on-year, chemicals dipped 2.3 percent, precision engineering sank 16.6 percent and transport engineering fell 10.2 percent, the EDB said.
Gazprom profits fall 61 pc on higher costs
Al P, Moscow
Russian energy giant Gazprom, the world's largest gas firm, Wednesday said its net profit fell 61 percent in the first quarter to 110.2 billion rubles (3.5 billion dollars) due to higher expenses.
It said three months to March sales of gas increased 14 percent from the same period a year earlier as higher prices across the world compensated for drastic falls in export volumes.
At the same time, operating expenses and financial charges rose sharply as the cost of purchased gas soared 174 percent, reflecting an increase in prices for gas from Central Asia.