1 UK may lose 9,000 bank jobs (Jill Treanor in The
Guardian) Big banks in the City could shift at least 9,000 roles out of the UK
as a result of Brexit, according to a tally of job warnings since the EU
referendum.
Deutsche Bank is leading the threatened exodus,
according to research by Reuters, while the two financial centres making the
most gains from London’s loss are Frankfurt and Dublin. Last month Deutsche
warned that up to 4,000 UK jobs – nearly half its UK workforce – could move to
Frankfurt and other EU centres.
US bank JP Morgan is preparing to move up to 1,000
bankers out of the City to Dublin, Frankfurt and Luxembourg. Goldman Sachs,
despite continuing to build a new headquarters in London, has said it would
need more people in Madrid, Milan, Paris and other cities in the EU.
The triggering of article 50 by Theresa May in March
sparked a wave of announcements, because only two years are permitted for the
Brexit negotiations. A report on Monday called for a transition period for
banks and other financial firms, in order to adapt their business models to a
departure from the EU.
The Bank of England has told financial firms to
provide it with details of their Brexit plans by 14 July and to be ready for
all possible outcomes, including a hard Brexit. Estimates of the impact of
Brexit on financial jobs vary, although the highest is for 232,000 across the
entire UK.
2 Bahrain reserves tumble (Gulf News) Bahrain’s
foreign-currency reserves tumbled 11 per cent in February, extending a decline
that has fuelled speculation that the island kingdom would either tap international
bond markets soon or seek financial support from other Gulf Arab monarchies.
Net foreign assets dropped to 645.2 million dinars
($1.7 billion), from the 725.9 million dinars in January, according to central
bank data. Overall, they’re down 71 per cent from a peak of 2.24 billion dinars
in November 2014.
Bahrain has been more vulnerable to slumping oil
prices and regional political instability than richer Gulf Cooperation Council
states. The drop in reserves comes nearly a month after the International
Monetary Fund warned that Bahrain needs to make significant spending cuts to
restore stability to its budget and improve investor confidence.
Bahraini assets, however, have weathered the
pressure of the country’s financial troubles, largely because investors expect
Saudi Arabia to extend aid if needed. The cost of insuring Bahrain’s debt,
measured by credit default swaps, dropped for seven straight months through
April, the longest streak since 2012.
Bahraini authorities increased spending in response
to the global recession in 2009 and civil unrest two years later as sectarian
tensions escalated in the Gulf island nation. When oil prices tumbled, the
budget deficit soared, reaching almost 18 per cent of gross domestic product
last year. The oil price the government needs to balance its budget remains
over $100 a barrel, the highest in the GCC, according to IMF estimates.
3 Facebook fights fake news (BBC) Facebook has
broadened its campaign to raise awareness about fake news, by publishing
adverts in the UK press. The ads carry a list of 10 things to look out for when
deciding if a story is genuine. They include checking the article date and
website address, as well as making sure it isn't intended as satire.
Facebook is under fresh political pressure to tackle
fake news in the run up to the UK general election. Meanwhile, a BBC Panorama
investigation has found the social network played a decisive role in both the
US election and Britain's EU referendum last year.
The platform said it had already removed "tens
of thousands" of fake Facebook accounts and that systems were now
monitoring the repeated posting of the same content or a sharp increase in
messaging. Accounts displaying this activity are then flagged, it added. Facebook
is also decreasing the ranking of stories that people tend to read but not
share.
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