China’s middle-class consumers are fanning a new craze as they adapt to tougher economic times: a rush to buy soon-to-expire food and drink at deep discounts. According to public records, 119 businesses specialising in items approaching their expiry dates have been registered within the past 12 months, compared with 92 over the previous decade. Such
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EDF is trying to alter a key subsidy contract to avoid missing out on billions of pounds in guaranteed revenue after the Covid-19 pandemic caused further delays to Hinkley Point C, the first new nuclear power station under construction in the UK in almost 30 years. The French utility is in negotiations with the British
Mattel is stocking up in anticipation of higher demand for Jurassic World action figures and Hot Wheels cars this holiday season, citing a 20 per cent increase in second-quarter revenues as evidence that inflation has not deterred parents from spending on toys. The California-based company behind Barbie dolls and Thomas & Friends trains reported its
Italy’s debt sold off on Thursday after prime minister Mario Draghi resigned and the European Central Bank sharply raised interest rates in its effort to tame blistering inflation. The yield on Italy’s 10-year government bond rose as much as 0.27 percentage points to almost 3.7 per cent as Draghi’s national unity coalition unravelled and the
Prescott Valley, Arizona-based nonprofit charter school operator Park View School filed for bankruptcy protection July 21 following years of financial mismanagement and a federal enforcement action targeting a fraudulent municipal bond offering. Bond holders have a lien on the school, which listed $9.4 million in liabilities and $9.7 million in assets, according to court documents.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled Puerto Rico must pay $400 million eminent domain claims in its bankruptcy, despite the Oversight Board’s arguments to the contrary. The ruling will not affect the amount bondholders are legally owed but will affect how much money the Puerto Rico government has to make the
Municipals were weaker on the long end of the curve, largely ignoring the U.S. Treasury rally where yields fell double-digits Thursday, while outflows from municipal bond mutual funds returned. Equities made gains. Triple-A yields were cut up to three basis points while UST saw yields fall 12 to 16 basis points 10-years and in. Muni
Former President Donald Trump Jonathan Ernst | Reuters A former special New York prosecutor who quit a criminal investigation of ex-President Donald Trump after his boss declined to lodge charges at the time said that if Trump “had been Joe Blow from Kokomo, we would have indicted without a big debate.” “I believe that Donald
Pennsylvania has revamped its law governing public-private partnerships in the wake of a court decision that struck down a high-profile P3 bridge program. The new law voids the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s ability to impose tolls to pay for the $2.5 billion Major Bridge P3 Initiative. It also reduces the department’s ability to impose user
The owner of the UK’s largest steelworks, Tata Group, has threatened to shut down operations if the government does not agree in the next year to provide £1.5bn of subsidies to help it reduce carbon emissions. Tata Steel UK runs the Port Talbot plant and employs nearly 8,000 people across all its operations. As one
Christine Lagarde proclaimed a “rather historical moment” on Thursday after the European Central Bank’s rate-setters unanimously agreed to create a bond-buying tool the ECB president hopes will stop higher interest rates from sparking a new eurozone debt meltdown. By giving itself the power to buy unlimited amounts of the bonds of any country that it
Brendan Wallace, co-founder and managing partner of Fifth Wall in their Manhattan office. Source: CNBC Fifth Wall, a venture capital firm focused on real estate technology, is tripling down on its bet that climate tech will become an integral driver in the real estate space. It just announced commitments of half a billion dollars to
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell recently sold more than $1 million of municipal bonds issued by various entities across the U.S. as tough new ethics rules took effect for central bank officials in the wake of a trading scandal last year. The 22 separate transactions on June 30, with a total value ranging from about
A rise in interest rates since last year will mean heftier-than-expected charges on electricity bills for Oklahoma ratepayers in the wake of the first of four state-sanctioned utility securitizations related to 2021’s Winter Storm Uri. The $761.6 million taxable bond sale through the Oklahoma Development Finance Authority closed on Wednesday, just days after a state
Though the fortunes of state pension plans made a 180-degree turn as the stock market fell this year, only a handful appear to be at risk of insolvency over the next few decades. “Most public plans are fragile, not distressed,” said Anthony Randazzo, executive director of Equable, a bipartisan non-profit that works with public retirement
Riders are not returning to New York City’s public transportation system as fast as expected and this may place the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in a difficult financial position as federal funds dry up, according to a report. Even as the drop in riders has left revenue well below pre-pandemic levels of 2019, the MTA has
The European Central Bank has raised interest rates by half a percentage point, pledging to prevent surging borrowing costs from sparking a eurozone debt crisis amid political turmoil in Italy and the resignation of prime minister Mario Draghi. It was the first ECB rate rise for more than a decade and twice the size of
The evolution of a historic home informs its present in myriad ways. Claremont Country Estate, classified as a New Zealand historic building, was built in 1890 for George Hampton Rhodes, a member of a prominent family that had extensive land holdings in Canterbury. Among their varied professions were livestock ranching, investment, manufacturing, shipping and politics.
All municipal bond insurers wrapped $18.306 billion in the first half of 2022, a decrease from the $20.842 billion of deals done in the first six months of 2021, according to Refinitiv data, but the overall insured market rate was 8.8%, higher than the 8.4% for the first half of 2021. The figures align with the
Everyone in the UK, it seems, is angry about their pay. Rail strikes are set to escalate over the summer. Bus drivers, refuse collectors and baggage handlers have staged walkouts across the country; more than 100,000 postal workers at the Royal Mail Group have voted to follow suit. In the public sector, unions representing teachers
The Puerto Rico Oversight Board said it opposes a just-enacted law that walks back some pro-employer rules put in place five years ago and demanded the governor suspend enforcement of it, arguing it will harm economic growth and island revenues. Gov. Pedro Pierluisi rejected the board’s request to publicly announce suspension of Act 41’s enforcement,