Briefs

French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered their countries back into lockdown on Oct 28, as a massive second wave of Covid-19 infections threatened to overwhelm Europe before the winter season.

World stock markets went into a dive in response to the news that Europe’s biggest economies were imposing nationwide restrictions almost as severe as the ones that drove the global economy this year into its deepest recession in generations.

“The virus is circulating at a speed that not even the most pessimistic forecasts had anticipated,” Macron said in a televised address. “Like all our neighbours, we are submerged by the sudden acceleration of the virus.”

“We are all in the same position: Overrun by a second wave which we know will be harder, more deadly than the first,” he said. “I have decided that we need to return to the lockdown which stopped the virus.”

Under the new French measures which came into force on Oct 30, people will be required to stay in their homes except to buy essential goods, seek medical attention or exercise for up to one hour a day. They will be permitted to go to work if their employer deems it impossible for them to do the job from home. Schools will stay open.

Germany will shut its bars, restaurants and theatres from Nov 2 to Nov 30 under measures agreed between Merkel and heads of regional governments. Schools will stay open and shops will be allowed to operate with strict limits on access.

“We need to take action now,” Merkel said. “Our health system can still cope with this challenge today, but at this speed of infections it will reach the limits of its capacity within weeks.”

France has surged above 36,000 new cases a day. Germany, which was less hard-hit than its European neighbours early this year, has seen an exponential rise in cases.

In the US, a new wave of infections has been setting records as the country heads to the polls on Nov 3. President Donald Trump has played down the virus and shows no sign of cancelling public rallies where his supporters often refuse to wear masks or keep a safe distance. — Reuters

Former KTL Global CEO charged for cheating and false trading

Wilson Tan Kheng Yeow, the former CEO of mainboard-listed KTL Global, has been slapped with two charges of cheating the company’s own subsidiary of some $1.5 million. He also faces a third charge of false trading of KTL Global shares.

The alleged offences were carried out between 2014 and 2015. Wilson Tan is said to have deceived the subsidiary, KTL Offshore, by representing that a $1.5 million remittance to an associate company was for working capital needs.

Instead, he allegedly took $500,000 from that amount to fund the trading of KTL Global shares, whose executive chairman and founder is his father, Tan Tock Han.

The former CEO also allegedly deceived KTL Offshore by saying that a sum of $1 million was to be transferred to KTL Offshore Hong Kong to buy machinery for a China-based joint venture.

However, the money was sent to Infinity Global Consultancy, an entity solely owned by one Tang Boon Hai.

Wilson Tan resigned from the CEO role in October 2017 after the Commercial Affairs Department and the Monetary Authority of Singapore commenced probes on him.

A former OCBC Securities trading representative Tan Chun Yong was also charged at the hearing, held at the Singapore State Courts on Oct 29.

He allegedly traded KTL Global shares using six accounts with the aim of creating a false or misleading appearance of active trading.

Chun Yong, who made the trades on the instructions of Infinity Global Consultancy’s Tang, faces six charges of unauthorised trading. He also faced an additional charge of helping with false trading.

Media reports indicated that Wilson Tan was offered bail of $100,000 while Chun Yong was offered a $35,000 bail. The cases will be mentioned in court again on Nov 26 and Nov 19 respectively

Investigations into Tang’s case are ongoing.

HSBC to revamp business model as lower interest rates hit profit

HSBC Holdings on Oct 27 signalled it would embark on a pandemic-induced overhaul of its business model, seeking to flip its main source of income from interest rate to fee-based businesses.

Reporting a 35% tumble in quarterly profit, Europe’s largest bank also accelerated plans to shrink in size and targeted deeper cost cuts. It also said it will resume conservative dividend payments when able.

The planned business model changes mark one of the biggest shifts in strategy to date from HSBC, which has long touted its ability to generate interest income from its more than US$1.5 trillion ($2.4 trillion) in customer deposits.

But with interest rates worldwide now rock bottom and even turning negative, the bank is struggling to charge more for loans to borrowers than it pays out to depositors and it warned net interest income would remain under pressure.

Earlier this year, the bank announced it would merge its wealth and personal banking business in a bid to cross-sell more lucrative products across a wider section of its huge customer base.

Now the bank is signalling it may go further and start charging for much more basic products such as standard current accounts that customers in some markets such as Britain expect to be free.

It will also look at how it can bring in more fee income from corporate customers, having done well helping clients raise money through bond and equity financing during the Covid-19 crisis.

“We will have to look at charging for basic banking services in some markets, because a large number of our customers in this environment will be losing us money,” chief financial officer Ewen Stevenson told Reuters.

Underscoring its challenges, the bank’s third-quarter revenue fell to US$11.9 billion, down 11% from a year earlier.

Its 35% slide in pretax profit to US$3.1 billion beat a consensus estimate of US$2.07 billion as HSBC flagged an easing in bad loan provisions, to be at the lower end of the US$8 billion to US$13 billion range it set out earlier this year.

“There are encouraging signs that the credit assumptions we have got are holding up, the government support we are seeing for the corporate sector has bought them time,” Stevenson told investors on a conference call.

HSBC, which in common with other British lenders stopped paying dividends earlier this year at the request of regulators, said it would communicate a revised dividend policy in February.

Analysts and investors fear the lender could cut payouts in the long run. “When we start paying distributions again, we’ll start conservatively and build from there,” Stevenson said on the conference call. — Reuters