Author: Steven Sahiounie

LONDON — Turbulence across the banking sector has prompted the question of whether we are teetering on the edge of another financial crash, 2008-style. But a banking crisis today would look very different from 15 years ago thanks to social media, online banking, and huge shifts in regulation. This is “the first bank crisis of the Twitter generation,” Paul Donovan, chief economist at UBS Global Wealth Management, told CNBC earlier this month, in reference to the collapse of Credit Suisse. Shares of Credit Suisse dropped on March 14 after “material weaknesses” were found in its financial reporting. The news started a tumultuous five days for the lender,…

First Citizens Bank & Trust Co will buy Silicon Valley Bank’s deposits and loans, the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said Monday, just over two weeks after the biggest U.S. banking collapse since Lehman Brothers. The deal includes the purchase of approximately $72 billion of SVB assets at a discount of $16.5 billion, but around $90 billion in securities and other assets will remain “in receivership for disposition by the FDIC.” “In addition, the FDIC received equity appreciation rights in First Citizens BancShares, Inc., Raleigh, North Carolina, common stock with a potential value of up to $500 million,” the FDIC said in a…

Saudi National Bank Chairman Ammar al-Khudairy resigned his post on Monday, days after his comments exacerbated the share collapse of troubled bank Credit Suisse. He will be replaced by SNB Managing Director and Group CEO Mohammed al-Ghamdi, with former deputy Talal Ahmed al-Khereiji now the new SNB acting CEO, according to a SNB statement to the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul). Al-Khudairy is stepping down “due to personal reasons,” the bank said. Al-Khudairy’s resignation comes within days of his mid-March comments to Bloomberg that SNB was unlikely to increase its stake in Credit Suisse, at a time when the European lender battled a crisis…

More international capital is likely to flee from Western markets to Asia, according to experts The unfolding banking crisis in the US and Europe, which has shattered investor confidence in the Western financial system, could highlight China as a “relative safe haven,” economists at Citi said in a note seen by CNBC. The Chinese economy could see accelerated expansion this year, giving the country a “hedge” for growth while economies in the US and Europe face heightened risk of financial disruption, according to the note. “We have long been discussing our view that China can be a major growth hedge this year…

Almost four in 10 people have to use credit cards to cover the rising prices of essentials, says Nationwide The deepening cost-of-living crisis has pushed up bills in the UK, with households now spending 12% more on essentials than they were a year ago, Nationwide reports. According to the monthly analysis by Britain’s biggest building society, spending on utility bills jumped by around a third (34%) last month in annual terms. Spending on mortgage payments surged by 17%, while rent payments were up by 11%. The report also showed that spending on loans and insurance rose by 8% and 7%,…

Business groups, labor unions and others are sounding off against state GOP efforts to bar public pensions from making environmentally and socially conscious investments. A growing wave of public pension administrators, business groups and labor unions are sending a message to Republicans looking to curb so-called “woke” investing: our money, our choice. Regulatory efforts to stop money from going to funds that consider environmental, social and governance issues, commonly known as ESG investing, have typically targeted big Wall Street asset managers. Now, public pensions are increasingly caught in the crosshairs and with them the retirement funds of teachers, librarians, firefighters…

Disney said in a statement that the tentative deal also included “industry-leading” benefits in health insurance coverage and tuition reimbursement. ORLANDO, Fla. — Unions for service workers at Walt Disney World reached a tentative deal with the company on Thursday that would raise the starting minimum wage from $15 to $18 an hour by the end of the year in a pact that could set the basement for starting pay throughout central Florida’s sprawling tourism industry. Disney World service workers who are in the six unions that make up the Service Trades Council Union coalition planned to vote next Wednesday…

Cryptocurrency exchange Yellow Card has grown to be the largest centralized exchange in Africa since its launch in 2019, with $1.75 billion in transactions facilitated so far. Chris Maurice and Justin Poiroux are the co-founders of Yellow Card, who launched the platform from their dorm room in Auburn, Alabama, in 2019. Yellow Card offers an experience similar to Block’s Cash App, allowing users to buy cryptocurrencies using fiat currencies, which they can then send across a border. However, in contrast to centralized exchanges like Coinbase, where many customers store their tokens for an extended period of time hoping that their…

Ukraine will begin talks to enter the bloc by June, a move beneficial to the US, Aleksandar Vucic has claimed With a battlefield victory “impossible,” Ukraine will begin negotiations to enter the EU this summer, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic told a local media outlet on Sunday. Ukraine will join a group of EU countries under the “direct influence” of the US, he stated. “Ukraine will not easily win in the military sense, it is almost impossible,” Vucic told Serbian broadcaster RTV Pink. Faced with this realization, he continued, “decisions will be made” in Brussels and Kiev around June “about the immediate start of negotiations and [Ukraine’s] entry into…

Just 13 nations still officially recognize the island, though many more including the US engage with its government Honduras has ended diplomatic relations with Taiwan after decades of engagement with the contested island territory, the country’s Foreign Ministry announced on Sunday. The move comes less than two weeks after President Xiomara Castro revealed that Tegucigalpa would establish relations with Beijing. “The government of Honduras recognizes the existence of just one China in the world, and the government of the People’s Republic of China is the only legitimate government that represents all of China,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on…