World

SINGAPORE: Southeast Asian fintech platform Grab Financial Group announced on Monday (May 23) that it will be launching a new brand - GrabFin - for its digital payments, insurance, lending and wealth management offerings, as well as an investment product for Singapore-based Grab users. GrabFin offers Grab users a "single entry point" to payment, investment and insurance services on its app, said the ride-hailing giant in a media release. "GrabFin also represents Grab’s commitment to empower Southeast Asia with greater financial access," it added. The release also said that the brand will offer everyday financial services that are simple to activate, which are "fractionalised" so that more people can access them and flexible to allow consumers to choose how they use the products with no ...

LONDON : The United States announced a record-sized release of emergency crude oil reserves in March without consulting partners in the International Energy Agency, leaving them scrambling to match with releases of their own, according to two sources familiar with the matter. Unilateral action by Washington to address global supply or price issues risks undermining the U.S. relationship with the IEA, the world's energy watchdog that normally oversees international releases from emergency stockpiles, and could raise questions about the continued relevance of the group. The Paris-based IEA, which groups together 31 mostly industrialized countries, was established after the 1973 oil price shock to ensure continuous energy supplies to its members in the event of an embargo, war, or devastati...

MUMBAI: India's huge diamond-polishing industry has furloughed around 250,000 of its roughly two million workers because of sanctions on Russia hitting supplies, a trade union said Thursday (May 19). The South Asian nation cuts and polishes 90 per cent of the world's diamonds, with Russian diamond miners such as Alrosa traditionally accounting for 30 to 40 per cent of India's imported rough gems. "This problem has started ever since the Russia-Ukraine war began," Ramesh Zilariya, president of the Diamond Workers' Union Gujarat, told AFP. "Western countries like the United States and Europe have stopped accepting Russian diamonds that have been polished in India," he said. Workers were furloughed this month in the western state of Gujarat, the main hub of the industry, Zilariya added, a...

IMPACT ON SINGAPORE HOUSEHOLDS, BUSINESSES With the Federal Reserve set to hike rates a few more times this year, this will continue to put upward pressure on interest rates in Singapore in the short- and medium-term, said Mr Christopher Wong, Southeast Asia portfolio strategist at Fidelity International. These higher interest rates may be felt by Singapore households and businesses. “Households may be impacted by the rising cost of mortgage and other loans on top of the general rise in cost of living that they are currently already facing,” he said. The ongoing upward trajectory for US interest rates is likely to drive further upside for domestic rates in the coming months, and that may translate to higher cost of debt for both households and businesses, added IG's Mr Yeap. But he sa...

BEIJING: The UN rights envoy on Saturday (May 28) said her contentious visit to China was "not an investigation", and insisted she had unsupervised access during meetings in Xinjiang, where Beijing is accused of widespread human rights abuses. Michelle Bachelet's long-planned trip this week has taken her to the far-western region, where Beijing is accused of the detention of over a million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities, forced sterilisation of women and coerced labour. The United States has labelled China's actions in Xinjiang a "genocide" and "crimes against humanity", allegations vehemently denied by Beijing which says its security crackdown was a necessary response to extremism. Bachelet has come under fire from rights groups and Uyghurs overseas, who say she has stumbled into ...

DETROIT : Assisted driving systems installed in Tesla Inc, Hyundai Motor Co and Subaru Corp vehicles failed to avoid head-on collisions in testing done by AAA, though Tesla's Autopilot system did slow the vehicle to a walking speed before striking an oncoming, foam model of a car. The AAA, a U.S. consumer and travel services organization, said the tests illustrate how current assisted driving and automated braking systems fall short of true autonomous driving, and require drivers to stay in control of vehicles. A fast-growing number of new vehicles are equipped with Automated Driver Assistance Systems, or AS, that partially automate functions such as steering, staying in a lane and braking. Tesla's Autopilot is one of the best-known such systems, but most major automakers offer similar t...

While he missed out on a medal in 2017, Loh would secure a silver two years later, losing to Malaysia's Lee Zii Jia in the final. "I've gotten bronze and silver in the individual event, but have never gotten gold before. Naturally, that is my goal, my target," he said. "It's been a long time since we last won a men's singles gold ... It definitely means a lot to me." The last time Singapore won the men's singles at the SEA Games was in 1983 on home soil, courtesy of Wong Shoon Keat. 'I DEFINITELY NEED TO IMPROVE' It has been an extremely packed 2022 for Loh, having competed in six tournaments in as many months. His most recent came in the Thomas Cup - where the Singapore men's team put up fell to three defeats - 1-4 to defending champions Indonesia, 2-3 to South Korea and 2-3 to Thail...

In this article TWTR Elon Musk, Founder and Chief Engineer of SpaceX, speaks during the Satellite 2020 Conference in Washington, DC, United States on March 9, 2020. Yasin Ozturk | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images The following is a selection from Big Technology, a newsletter by Alex Kantrowitz. To get it in your inbox each week, you can sign up here. Barring a messy, last-minute divorce, Elon Musk is on track to own Twitter (and yes, mea culpa). The mercurial, brilliant entrepreneur offloaded around $8.5 billion of Tesla stock this week as he prepared to pay for his $44 billion side project. And soon, he'll be free to change the service as he pleases. Musk hasn't yet presented a comprehensive plan for Twitter — he may never — but he's proposed several significant changes worth evaluating. M...

In this article AMP Luis Alvarez | Digitalvision | Getty Images In my long career of recruiting experienced financial advisors, I've seen how different economic cycles have impacted retention and attrition. In times of uncertainty, advisors crave stability and want to work with a firm with the financial foundation to weather the storm. Alternatively, when the economy is roaring, they might be drawn to bigger payouts and more flexibility. Today's environment isn't as clear-cut. There's heightened volatility stoked by troubling geopolitical tensions, but unemployment sits at only 3.6%. Investors have amassed huge gains from the stock market in recent years, but inflation is cutting into those returns in a way not seen for the last 40 years. At the same time, some health experts warn the ne...

SAO PAULO :Senior Brazilian economy ministry official Caio Mario Paes de Andrade will be the next chief executive of state-run oil company Petrobras, the government said on Monday, replacing a predecessor who served less than two months in the job. Paes de Andrade will take over from outgoing CEO Jose Mauro Coelho, picked to lead Brazil's leading oil company in early April, becoming its fourth chief executive in the past two years. The shakeup is President Jair Bolsonaro's latest bid to influence Petrobras' fuel pricing policy as he seeks to boost his re-election prospects amid galloping energy-driven inflation, according to analysts. The mines and energy ministry said in a statement announcing the leadership shakeup that Brazil is facing extreme volatility in the oil and gas market. It...