FRANKFURT AM MAIN: Germany’s two biggest lenders Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank said Thursday they had called off talks on a possible merger, dashing Berlin’s hopes of creating a financial “national champion”. “After thorough analysis, we have concluded that this transaction would not have created sufficient benefits” to justify the risks
HONG KONG: Asian markets stuttered Thursday after New York equities retreated from record highs, with weak economic data around the world offsetting a forecast-beating earnings season. While the mood on trading floors remains broadly positive after a blockbuster start to the year, there are lingering concerns that growth in most
WASHINGTON: For sale: a giant, ornery bird that killed its last owner. The creature called a cassowary – boasting long, dagger-like claws, standing as tall as a tallish person and sporting a truly foul disposition – will be auctioned tomorrow, two weeks after slashing to death 75-year-old exotic animal lover
YANGON (Myanmar): Myanmar police have arrested one American and two locals after photos on Facebook led them to a huge plantation of towering marijuana plants near Mandalay. Pictures of the fields of weed started circulating on the platform last week – a rare sight online in a country where police
DUBAI (United Arab Emirates): An Emirati woman opened her eyes and regained consciousness after spending 27 years in a coma induced by a serious brain injury, her family said Wednesday. Munira Omar was 32 when she was injured in a road traffic accident in 1991 after picking up her son
HPAKANT (Myanmar): Myanmar recovery teams battled treacherous conditions Wednesday to pull a fourth body from the sludge left by a mudslide that buried more than 50 jade miners – the latest fatal accident in a notoriously dangerous but highly-lucrative industry. Dozens die each year in landslides caused by jade mining,
BEIJING: China launched on Thursday a staunch defence of its Belt and Road global infrastructure project as it opened a summit with a pledge to ease concerns about debt linked to its signature foreign policy. President Xi Jinping’s pet project is a reboot of the ancient Silk Road to connect
TOKYO: Japan will fail to hit its two percent inflation target even by 2022, the central bank predicted on Thursday as it also revised down its estimate for growth in the world’s third-largest economy. In its closely watched quarterly report, the Bank of Japan forecast inflation of 1.6 percent in
OSLO: Troubled low-cost airline Norwegian said Thursday its net losses deepened in the first quarter of the year as the grounding of its Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft could cost it $58 million. The net loss swelled to 1.48 billion kroner ($171 million, 154 million euros) from 46 million kroner
BERLIN: Robots and computers threaten 14 percent of existing jobs over the next 20 years, so countries must retrain workers for a transformed labour market, the OECD warned Thursday. In a report published in Berlin, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) estimates that in addition to the destruction