2024-02-20 11:38

Feb 20 (Reuters) - Canadian food and pharmacy retailer Loblaw Companies (L.TO) , opens new tab said on Tuesday it expects to invest over C$2 billion ($1.48 billion) this year to create more than 7,500 jobs. While the investment is in line with last year's, the retailer plans to create roughly 1,500 more jobs in 2024. Loblaw plans to use the investment to improve its store network by renovating more than 700 stores and building more than 40 others. The retail chain in November beat third-quarter profit estimates on steady demand for essentials amid surging food prices in the country. ($1 = 1.3479 Canadian dollars) https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/canadian-retailer-loblaw-expects-invest-15-bln-create-7500-jobs-2024-02-20/

2024-02-20 11:31

Polish farmers block most border traffic They are angry about cheap competition from Ukraine Kyiv says protests risk damaging its war effort Ukrainian hauliers start counter-demonstration at border OKOPY, Poland, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Protests by Polish farmers sparked anger in neighbouring Ukraine on Tuesday, as Kyiv called on the European Commission to take robust action after demonstrators blockaded the border and opened railway carriages to let grain spill out. Warsaw has been a staunch supporter of Kyiv in its fight to repel a full-scale Russian invasion launched in 2022, but protests from farmers complaining of unfair competition have strained ties that were already on edge after truckers blocked border crossings around the turn of the year. Tuesday's protests from farmers marked an escalation from previous demonstrations, with a near-total blockade of all Ukrainian border crossings and disruption at ports and on roads nationwide. Television footage showed protesters at the Medyka border crossing opening railway carriages to allow grain to pour onto the tracks. "The scattering of Ukrainian grain on the railroad tracks is another political provocation aimed at dividing our nations," Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said in a post on X. Ukrainian Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said Kyiv has informed the European Commission of the actions of Polish protesters at the Ukrainian border and expected a robust response. Agriculture Minister Mykola Solskyi said the grain was headed to Germany and would not have entered the Polish market. Farmers across Europe have been demonstrating over a range of grievances, including constraints placed on them by European Union measures to tackle climate change, and what they say is unfair competition from abroad, particularly Ukraine, after an EU decision in 2022 to waive duties on Ukrainian food imports. Protesters' tractors carried banners that read: "With grain flowing from Ukraine, Polish farmers will go bankrupt". An organiser of the protest at Doruhusk crossing, Marcin Wielgosz, said buses would be allowed to cross once an hour on Tuesday, but no truck would pass from 0800 to 1800 local time. "In my opinion, the border should be closed. Procedures and systems should be clarified and then maybe it could reopen but not with the rules that we have now. Because right now you can bring whatever you want, however much you want... into Poland," he told Reuters. COUNTER PROTEST Kyiv says its agricultural exports through eastern Europe have not damaged EU markets. Exasperated by the Polish protests, Ukrainian hauliers began their own round-the-clock counter-demonstration at three crossings. Their protest is planned to last till March 15. Images circulated by media outlets showed Ukrainian trucks at the border bearing banners with slogans such as "Ukraine loses - Poland loses" and "The blockade of Ukraine is a betrayal of European values". Poland's new pro-European government has supported the farmers' demands, trying to balance this with its strongly pro-Ukrainian stance. Deputy Agriculture Minister Michal Kolodziejczak told private broadcaster Polsat News that talks with Ukraine on limiting imports would continue on Wednesday. "Today the ball is in Ukraine's court," he said. "Either they want to come to an agreement with us, or we will have to introduce further restrictions." Ukraine says the blockades are affecting its defence capability and helping Russia's aims. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday the situation at the border demonstrated "the erosion of solidarity on a daily basis". https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/polish-farmers-step-up-protests-with-total-blockade-ukrainian-border-2024-02-20/

2024-02-20 11:08

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - U.S. banking regulators have been asking regional lenders whether they faced any fallout from the problems at New York Community Bancorp , several sources said, in a sign that worries about the health of the sector persist. Two banking executives, a legal source and an industry source, said banks had calls with regulators. Those included the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, as well as state banking bodies, the day of and shortly after NYCB posted disappointing earnings and cut its dividend on Jan. 31, sources said. The conversations included regulators inquiring about liquidity at the banks and whether they had seen any impact on deposit flows or worries from customers, the bankers said. The executives said they had not seen any unusual activity, with one describing it as an exercise to confirm what regulators already knew. The conversations are an indication of how concerned regulators remain about smaller banks, after the failure of Silicon Valley Bank (SIVBV.UL) and other mid-size banks last year sparked fears about the health of regional lenders. NYCB posted a surprise loss in late January and a $552 million provision for credit losses, with the major share of the provisions allocated to its commercial real estate (CRE) portfolio. Small banks account for nearly 70% of all CRE loans outstanding, according to research from Apollo. Pressure on CRE loans have increased with vacancies in several office buildings continuing since the pandemic. Valley National Bancorp , Axos Bank, WaFd (WAFD.O) , opens new tab and Bank OZK (OZK.O) , opens new tab are some of the other lenders that have a high CRE concentration, according to real estate data provider Trepp. WaFd Bank said its CRE concentration level was "clearly something the regulators focused on in our recent merger application of Luther Burbank Savings," adding that it received approval of the acquisition on Jan. 30. "Valley has been a relationship commercial real estate lender that has been consistently regulated by the OCC for many decades," Ira Robbins, CEO of Valley National Bank, said in a statement to Reuters. "We remain comfortable with our diverse and granular commercial real estate portfolio. As always, we value and benefit from regular dialogue with our regulators." The other banks did not respond to email requests seeking comment. Spokespeople for the FDIC and OCC declined to comment. Some of the regulatory conversations included questioning the banks about their liquidity and capital positions and ruling out any likely imminent areas of stress, said the legal source who works with regional banks. The source described those conversations as triggered after NYCB's earnings, adding that the heightened monitoring includes conversations around every area of operation to ensure that banks are resilient. NYCB stock has lost over 50% of its value since January and was down by over 3% in trade on Tuesday. https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/nycb-stock-rout-prompts-us-bank-regulators-conduct-health-checks-2024-02-20/

2024-02-20 11:07

LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Hedge funds favoured Asian emerging markets in the week to Feb. 15, piling into company stocks in China, Korea, Taiwan, and India, in moves that came just before China slashed its benchmark mortgage rate, Goldman Sachs research showed. In a note published Friday and shared with Reuters late on Monday, Goldman Sachs said Asia was the most net bought region by hedge funds tracked by its prime brokerage - meaning buyers outweighed sellers. China's central bank on Tuesday announced its biggest ever reduction in the benchmark mortgage rate, lowering the five-year loan prime rate to 3.95% from 4.20%. China's ailing property sector remains a key drag on the economy and market sentiment. New home prices saw their worst declines in nine years in 2023, while the stock market (.SSEC) , opens new tab is languishing since hitting five-year lows on February 5. Andy Maynard, head of equities at investment bank China Renaissance, said the rate cut was very positive for the market. "Overall, positive, showing the commitment and stature from both policy makers and central banks in terms of support and stability to the market and inject a measure of support," said Maynard. "This follows on from very good consumer and retail numbers over the Chinese New Year period," he said. The hedge fund trades were made up almost entirely of long positions - bets that an asset price will rise - and the region was net bought for the fourth straight week, said Goldman Sachs. China, Korea, Taiwan, and India were net bought on the week, all led by long buys. This outweighed modest net selling of company stocks based in Thailand, said the bank. Hedge funds favoured most stock sectors but trades focused on buying health care company shares and those that sold consumer products. Info tech and industrial companies in Asia were net sold, said Goldman Sachs. https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/hedge-flow-hedge-funds-double-down-china-ahead-rate-cut-goldman-says-2024-02-20/

2024-02-20 11:06

A look at the day ahead in U.S. and global markets from Mike Dolan Wall St returns from its long weekend to a mix of interest rate cut doubts, retailer updates and the biggest U.S. corporate deal of the year - while China's latest monetary easing was brushed off by markets overseas. With the Federal Reserve releasing minutes of its January policy meeting on Wednesday, the rates market has been dragged kicking and screaming back closer to where the Fed had originally indicated at the end of last year. After sparky new year consumer and producer price readings last week, two and 10-year Treasury yields hit their highest for 2024 on Friday and Fed futures pricing now has little more than 90 basis points of cuts in the mix for the year. That's now within range of the 75bps of 2024 cuts indicated by Fed policymakers in December. Don't fight the Fed? The inflation backdrop won't have been helped by the latest jump in oil prices , which hit their highest in more than three months on Tuesday and crude is now back positive year-on-year for the first time since October. Iran-aligned Houthis continued attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, with at least four more vessels hit by drone and missile strikes since Friday. One of them, British-registered and Lebanese-managed Rubymar cargo vessel in the Gulf of Aden, was in danger of sinking, according to Houthis -- raising stakes in their campaign to hit shipping in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza. Canada releases its January inflation numbers into that scenario later too. The cloudier inflation picture also comes alongside poor U.S. retail and industrial soundings for last month. WalMart and Home Depot results later on Tuesday may give a reality check on the former and to what extent freezing January weather distorted sales data. But bracing for two and 20-year debt auctions on Wednesday, Treasury yields slipped back a touch from the year's highs ahead of Tuesday's open - with China's latest monetary easing greeting the new week. China's central bank surprised many with the size of the 25bp cut to mortgage references rates earlier, even though fragile markets remained slightly underwhelmed by the authorities' efforts to stimulate credit and revive the ailing property market. The blue-chip CSI300 index (.CSI300) , opens new tab notched a sixth straight daily gain - broken by the lunar new year holiday - but its advance on Tuesday was a paltry 0.2%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng benchmark (.HSI) , opens new tab did a little better and rose 0.6%. Despite the rate cut, the offshore yuan appreciated slightly - though it was laced once again with suspicion of state-back buying. The dollar (.DXY) , opens new tab was more mixed elsewhere - a touch higher on the yen but lower on the euro . On the other hand, China optimists cling to more upbeat lending and tourism data that show signs of domestic demand re-emerging. But a potential crackdown in the financial sector will keep markets on edge. China's top financial watchdogs vowed to ensure the sector adheres to 'Communist Party values' and serves the economy while avoiding "excessive" and "reckless" risks, the party's official newspaper said on Tuesday. Back on Wall St, S&P500 futures were in the red ahead of Tuesday open but the long-weekend also brought the biggest corporate merger of the year. Warren Buffett-backed U.S. consumer bank Capital One plans to acquire U.S. credit card issuer Discover Financial Services (DFS.N) , opens new tab in an all-stock transaction valued at $35.3 billion to create a global payments giant. The deal, which is expected to receive intense antitrust scrutiny, would form the sixth-largest U.S. bank by assets and a credit card behemoth that would compete with rivals JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N) , opens new tab and Citigroup (C.N) , opens new tab. Discover Financial's share price was up more than 10% premarket. The other buzz of the coming week will be Nvidia's (NVDA.O) , opens new tab hotly-awaited results on Wednesday -- as the artificial intelligence chip boom sees investors scramble for all things AI-related. Nvidia shares, up about 50% this year, could swing by about 11% in either direction, according to data from options analytics service ORATS. That's the largest expected move options traders have priced in ahead of Nvidia's earnings over the last three years and well above the stock's actual average earnings move of 6.7% over that period, ORATS reckoned. With Nvidia's market capitalization at $1.8 trillion, a move of that size would make for a potential swing in market value of about $200 billion. That would be greater than the market capitalization of chipmaker Intel (INTC.O) , opens new tab and larger than the respective market values of about 90% of S&P 500 constituents. In Europe, Barclays shares (BARC.L) , opens new tab surged 7% as the British bank laid out a three-year plan to revive its flagging stock price, including axing 2 billion pounds of costs, returning 10 billion pounds ($12.6 billion) to shareholders and investing in its high-returning UK bank. Key diary items that may provide direction to U.S. markets later on Tuesday: * Canada Jan inflation, US Jan leading indicators, Philadelphia Fed's Feb service sector business survey * U.S. corp earnings: Walmart, Home Depot, Palo Alto Networks, Allegion, Medtronic, Public Storage, Caesars Entertainment, Celanese, International Flavors and Fragrances, Realty Income, CoStar, Keysight Tech, Chesapeake Energy, Diamondback Energy, CentrePoint Energy, Evonix * U.S. Treasury sells 3-, 6-, 12-month bills https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/global-markets-view-usa-2024-02-20/

2024-02-20 10:59

LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Bank of England Deputy Governor Ben Broadbent said interest rate cuts during 2024 were possible but the timing was dependent on an unclear outlook for inflation. The BoE's most recent forecast for inflation to fall "certainly doesn't rule out a policy easing at some point this year," Broadbent said in an annual report to parliament's Treasury Committee published on Tuesday. "In my view that is the more likely direction in which Bank Rate is likely to move," he said. "But even if that proves to be the case, the timing of any adjustment can only depend on the actual evolution of the economic data." https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/boe-might-cut-interest-rates-this-year-broadbent-says-2024-02-20/