Author: Steven Sahiounie

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…

The Republican frontrunner also says the “deep state” stepped up its attacks against him when he promised to end the conflict in Ukraine Former President Donald Trump told his supporters on Saturday that President Joe Biden is turning the US into a “banana republic,” and promised to throw the “repulsive political class the hell out of office” if re-elected next year. Trump, who is reportedly facing arrest over campaign finance charges in New York, held his first campaign rally ahead of the 2024 election in Waco, Texas, on Saturday. Speaking to a crowd of several thousand people, Trump reiterated his long-held belief that the charges against…

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that at Belarus’ request Russia will deploy its tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, like the United States has long been doing on the territories of its allied countries The French foreign ministry has called on Russia to revise its agreement with Belarus on the deployment of nuclear weapons as having a destabilizing character. “France attaches great significance to the commitment to the January 3, 2022 statement on the inadmissibility of a nuclear war and an arms race, which was approved by both [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and all the heads of state and…