Despite apparent success, trouble spots range from growing corporate debt to sluggish job creation Chaitanya Kalbag, Contributing writer As Prime Minister Narendra Modi celebrates his third anniversary in power on May 26, India’s economy seems to be firing on all cylinders. The country’s stock markets rose to record highs earlier in May. Exports have been…
Optimism is good, but let’s not be foolhardy. Chaitanya Kalbag It is good that we are feeling bucked up at the beginning OF 2018. Major economies expect growth in tandem for the first time since the global financial crisis of 2008. World trade is seen growing at a decent clip after two slow years. Commodity prices…
27 May 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 27 (Reuters) – In June 1976, after a year in hiding, George Fernandes was arrested on Charges of waging war against the state and paraded in manacles before the cameras. The firebrand chairman of India’s Socialist Party was accused of being a…
2 June 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 2 (Reuters) – India’s Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha put up a spirited defence of his “investor-friendly” budget on Tuesday and said he was not unduly worried about inflation so long as the economy grew strongly. In an interview with Reuters Television a…
3 June 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 3 (Reuters) – India’s fiscal targets for the current year are not just a “hope and a prayer” even if there is a trade-off between growth and Inflation, the government’s chief economic adviser said on Wednesday. Shankar Acharya told Reuters he did…
28 July 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 28, Reuter – Philippine President Corazon Aquino, secure in power near the end of a coup-free year, is trying to get tough with her problems. “The president feels she has to use some form of brass knuckles now where she was all sweetness…
17 June 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 17 (Reuters) – India’s Finance Secretary Vijay Kelkar said on Thursday the economy was on a high growth path and was expected to grow at over six percent in 1999/2000 (April-March). “The economy is now on a higher growth path. In 1999/2000,…
27 August 1991 Reuters News English (c) 1991 Reuters Limited TOKYO, Reuters – India hopes to receive substantial financial aid from a consortium of donors next month, Finance Secretary Sriranga Shukla said on Tuesday. Shukla, in Tokyo for talks ahead of the September 19-20 meeting in Paris, said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World…
13 April 1992 Reuters News English (c) 1992 Reuters Limited TOKYO, Reuters – India intends to ask the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for more contingency funds, although foreign reserves are at a very comfortable level, Finance Minister Manmohan Singh said. Singh, who has spearheaded a series of sweeping reforms that have turned India’s socialist economic…
22 April 1993 Reuters News English (c) 1993 Reuters Limited TOKYO, April 22, Reuters – One of the architects of India’s radical economic reforms said on Thursday the changes sweeping the country were irreversible despite recent religious and political strife. “Now there is no doubt about the permanence and irreversibility of reform. You cannot re-erect…
19 March 2002 Reuters News English (c) 2002 Reuters Limited BANGKOK, March 19 (Reuters) – The head of Thailand’s stock exchange, one of the best performers in Asia so far this year, said on Tuesday he expected market capitalisation to rise 50 percent thanks to new issues and higher share prices. Stock Exchange of Thailand…
20 March 2002 Reuters News English (c) 2002 Reuters Limited BANGKOK, March 20 (Reuters) – Thailand will see growth of at least three percent this year and more if the U.S. economy picks up faster than expected, Thai Finance Minister Somkid Jatusripitak forecast on Wednesday. Somkid told Reuters in an interview the government of Prime…
20 March 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, March 20 (Reuter) – Democracy has taken root in most African countries but needs nurturing, Commonwealth Secretary-General Chief Emeka Anyaoku said on Thursday. He told Reuters in an interview that, with serious strife persisting in such countries as Rwanda, Zaire and Sudan, the…
24 November 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Nov 24 (Reuters) – The collapse of Yamaichi Securities could signal the end of the worst of Japan’s “post-bubble” economic adjustment, Asian Development Bank (ADB) President Mitsuo Sato said on Monday. “I think we need to go through that kind of challenge in…
8 December 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Dec 8 (Reuters) – Global investors cannot afford to ignore India, but Indian companies need to prove that they can compete in developed markets, Fred Steingraber, chief executive officer of A.T. Kearney Inc., said on Monday. “I don’t think anybody is prepared to…
9 December 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Dec 9 (Reuters) – India will accelerate its drive to increase electricity generation and is looking for huge funds to meet the nation’s power deficit, Power Minister Yoginder Alagh said on Tuesday. “Between now and March it will be faster and not slower,”…
21 May 1987 The San Francisco Chronicle Manila President Corazon Aquino’s ambitious plan to distribute land to more than half the country’s peasants is in danger of falling victim to the Philippines’ return to full legislative democracy. Pressure has been mounting on Aquino to use her sweeping legislative powers and sign the Accelerated Land Reform…
1 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 1- The head of Philippine National Oil Co said the proposed privatisation of Petron Corp, a fully owned subsidiary, would rob the government of a valuable and profit-making asset and suggested reconsideration of what he termed a strategically unwise move. “Petron is PNOC’s…
1 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 1 – Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) chairman Jose Romero said he would visit Brussels later this month to lobby against a proposed 100 pct European Community (EC) levy on vegetable oil imports. “I intend to visit Brussels and talk to whoever is…
2 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 2, Reuter – The Philippine economy’s impressive growth in this year’s first quarter suggests the government’s ambitious economic targets are within reach, Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez said today. “I don’t see anything on the horizon that should cut (growth) short,” Fernandez said…
3 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 3, Reuter – The latest draft of the Philippines’ ambitious land reform program delays final land distribution until 1997, details options for compensating landowners, and holds out imprisonment for violators. Teodoro Benigno, spokesman for President Corazon Aquino, told reporters a cabinet meeting today…
3 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 3, Reuter – Japan will expand its assistance to the Philippines and encourage Manila to increase its exports, the head of a Japanese economic mission said today. Former foreign minister Saburo Okita told a news conference the aid would be in line with…
8 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 8, Reuter – The closure last month of the Manila Banking Corporation, one of the Philippines‘ nine largest banks, highlights the weaknesses still plaguing the country’s financial institutions, bankers and analysts said today. Manila Bank was declared insolvent by the Central Bank of…
8 June 1987 The Toronto Star Copyright (c) 1987 The Toronto Star MANILA — The government is aiming at GNP growth of between 6 and 6.5 per cent for the whole of this year. The first-quarter figure was the best in three years. GNP grew a modest 1.5 per cent last year after contracting more…
11 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 11 – Proposed land reforms that would limit all holdings in the Philippines to seven hectares are likely to scare away private entrepreneurs, said Deogracias Vistan, president of the state-owned Land Bank of the Philippines. The government should carefully study minimum land needs…
11 June 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, June 11 – Philippine Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez said he welcomed a compromise reached by Finance Secretary Jaime Ongpin and the Philippines’ bank creditors over Manila’s demand for improved debt repayment terms. “If he (Ongpin) has come to an agreement I accept that…
20 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 20 – The speedy and cordial conclusion of a 13.2 billion dollar debt rescheduling package by Philippine officials and bank creditors apparently was intended to pre-empt the country’s new Congress which convenes on July 27, bankers and economists polled by Reuters said. Omar Cruz,…
21 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 21 – The Philippines’ foreign debt was 28.58 billion dollars at the end of March, up from 28.25 billion at the end of 1986 and 26.35 billion a year earlier, Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez said. In a report to President Corazon Aquino on…
22 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 22, Reuter – Held out as a radical step that would end decades of war and poverty in the Philippine countryside, President Corazon Aquino’s land reform program was instead greeted by a chorus of criticism. Today‘s presidential order, the 229th since Aquino came…
23 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 23 – A row over the proposed privatisation of Petron Corp, a fully-owned subsidiary of the Philippine National Oil Co (PNOC), intensified as the Committee on Privatisation (COP) said overwhelming arguments favour the sale. PNOC’s board of directors last month opposed Petron’s sale,…
23 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 23, Reuter – Protests by both landowners and poor farmworkers mounted today over the Philippines’ land reform program, while the country’s new Congress threatened to review all decrees signed by President Corazon Aquino. Hours after Aquino signed the land reforms into law yesterday,…
27 July 1987 English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 27, Reuter – President Corazon Aquino lashed out at the Philippines’ creditor banks today, charging they coerced her government into signing an unfavorable debt pact, and vowed to fight enemies of both the right and the left. In a State of the Nation speech, one…
7 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 7, Reuter – The growing call in the Philippines for a repudiation of some of the country’s 28.4 Billion dollar foreign debt was strongly attacked today by the finance minister and the leader of an influential business group. Finance Secretary Jaime Ongpin told reporters…
18 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 18 – Foreign companies will be allowed to list their stock on the two stock exchanges In Manila in a move expected to attract foreign investors, Securities and Exchange (SEC) Commissioner Monico Jacob told Reuters. Jacob said the decision followed an Inquiry by…
20 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 20 – Last week’s 20 pct rise in the prices of petrol, diesel and fuel oil in the Philippines is likely to cause a small increase in inflation, analysts told Reuters. Omar Cruz, a senior economist at the independent Center for Research and…
25 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 25, Reuter – A major coalition of Philippine landowners today labelled President Corazon Aquino’s land reforms “communistic” and said violence might erupt if the program was pushed through. “This is a polarisation of classes,” Eduardo Hernandez, chairman of the Council of Agricultural Producers,…
19 October 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Oct 19, Reuter – Philippine President Corazon Aquino can expect a volley of anxious questions about her government’s economic direction when she faces members of 13 major business groups on Tuesday, analysts said. It will be her first economic speech since she came close…
9 November 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Nov 9 – Any fall in commodity prices resulting from the crash in world stock markets could badly affect the Philippines, Central Bank governor Jose Fernandez said. “Probably far more important than exchange rates and interest rates are commodity prices,” he told reporters. ‘Because then…
Chaitanya Kalbag, Reuters MANILA, Dec 1 – Short-term interest rates have shot up in the Philippines as the peso has come under increasing pressure and the central bank has been forced to intervene heavily to defend the local currency, bankers said. Bankers’ Association of the Philippines (BAP) figures show the central bank was a net seller…
14 December 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Dec 14, Reuter – Spurred by shrinking markets and the spectre of global recession, the leaders of South-East Asia were poised on Monday to end two decades of sluggish economic growth with a ringing resolve to boost collective action. In a draft communique dominated…
Chaitanya Kalbag MANILA, Dec 15 – Japanese Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita marked his first foreign trip by vowing to improve access to Japan for imports from South-East Asia and by formally announcing a two billion dollar package aimed at boosting the private sector and economic cooperation in the region. “With a view to contributing to…