Brazil's Lula urges Mercosur to deepen ties with Asia
"Our participation in global value chains will benefit from closer ties with Japan, China, South Korea, India, Vietnam and Indonesia," Lula said during a speech at the Mercosur summit in Buenos Aires.
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USA Today
39 minutes ago
- USA Today
Russia pounds Kyiv with largest drone attack, hours after Trump-Putin call
KYIV, July 4 (Reuters) - Russia pummelled Kyiv with the largest drone attack of the war, killing one person, injuring at least 23 and damaging buildings across the capital hours after President Donald Trump spoke to Russia's Vladimir Putin, officials said on Friday. Air raid sirens, the whine of kamikaze drones and booming detonations reverberated from early evening until dawn as Russia launched what Ukraine's Air Force said was a total of 539 drones and 11 missiles. Families huddled in underground metro stations for shelter and acrid smoke hung over the city centre. Kyiv's military administration chief said on Friday afternoon a body had been found in the wreckage of one of the strike sites. Outside a high-rise apartment block damaged by a drone, residents stood around surveying the scene as the clean-up job began. Some cried. Others looked on silently. "I woke up to the sound of explosions, first the Shahed drones started buzzing, and then the explosions began," said 40-year-old resident Maria Hilchenko. "Then people started screaming outside. The explosions from the Shaheds kept coming." Shahed drones are an Iranian design, a variant of which is now manufactured in Russia. More: Trump, Putin hold call after US pauses some weapons transfers to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called the attack "deliberately massive and cynical", noting the first sirens blared as news came in of Putin and Trump's call. Later on Friday Zelenskiy spoke to Trump and the pair agreed to work on increasing Kyiv's capability to "defend the sky". He added they discussed joint defence production, as well as joint purchases and investments. The U.S. has paused some deliveries of missiles amid concerns about low stockpiles. Kyiv officials said the attack damaged about 40 apartment blocks, passenger railway infrastructure, five schools and kindergartens, cafes and many cars in six of Kyiv's 10 districts. Poland said the consular section of its embassy was damaged in central Kyiv, adding that staff were unharmed. More: Russian use of chemical weapons against Ukraine 'widespread', Dutch defense minister says Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said a Chinese component had been found in one of the Shahed drones attacking Kyiv, adding it had been found shortly after China's consulate in the southern city of Odesa suffered minor damage in a separate strike. "What an irony," Sybiha wrote on X. Russian airstrikes on Kyiv have intensified in recent weeks and included some of the deadliest assaults of the war on the city of three million people. Russia's Defence Ministry said drone factories, a military airfield and an oil refinery were among targets it struck in Kyiv with what it called high-precision weapons. Ukraine did not give details of any militarily valuable targets. CALL FOR SANCTIONS Trump said that the call with President Putin on Thursday resulted in no progress at all on efforts to end the war, and the Kremlin reiterated that Moscow would keep pushing to solve the conflict's "root causes". The decision by Washington to halt some shipments of critical weapons to Ukraine prompted warnings by Kyiv that the move would weaken its ability to defend against intensifying airstrikes and battlefield advances. Germany said it is in talks on buying Patriot air defence systems to bridge the gap. On Friday, Zelenskiy called for increased pressure on Moscow to change its "dumb, destructive behavior". More: Russia continues record-setting aerial attacks, US cuts off arms shipments to Ukraine "For every such strike against people and human life, they must feel appropriate sanctions and other blows to their economy, their revenues, and their infrastructure," he said. Ukraine's Air Force said it destroyed 478 of the air weapons Russia launched overnight. Airstrikes were recorded in eight locations, with nine missiles and 63 drones, it added. Social media videos showed people running to seek shelter, firefighters fighting blazes in the dark and ruined buildings with windows and facades blown out. Both sides deny targeting civilians in the war that Russia launched with its full-scale invasion in February 2022. Thousands of civilians have been killed in the conflict, the vast majority of them Ukrainian. Many more soldiers are believed to have been killed on the front line, but neither side releases military casualty figures. Late on Thursday, Russian shelling killed five people in and near the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine said. (Reporting by Olena Harmash, Pavel Polityuk, Max Hunder, Valentyn Ogirenko, Sergiy Karazy and Frank Jack Daniel; Writing by Ronald Popeski, Lidia Kelly and Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Stephen Coates, Raju Gopalakrishnan, Alexandra Hudson and Sharon Singleton)
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Exclusive-Russia's VTB to gain billions of roubles if interest rates come down, CFO says
By Elena Fabrichnaya ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) -Every 1% cut in central bank interest rates gives Russia's VTB Bank an extra 20 billion roubles ($250 million) in net profit, CFO Dmitry Pyanov told Reuters, which benefits the government as the state-owned lender plans to distribute 50% of its profits via dividends - half of it to the state. Russia's benchmark interest rate remains extremely high at 20%, discouraging borrowers and hurting banks' loan books. While the central bank cut the rate last month from a more than 20-year-high of 21%, pressure is growing on it to bring rates down faster, with government officials and business leaders fretting over the risks of a recession. Among Russian banks VTB has the highest proportion of loans on floating rates, so high official rates raise the risk it faces of more defaults or debt restructuring moves, which in turn can push up its capital requirements, while lower rates stand to benefit the bank's bottom line. "VTB Bank is a main beneficiary of the key rate cut," Pyanov told Reuters on Thursday at a financial forum in St Petersburg. "We suffer most of all during a period of its increase and will realise positive interest rate risk when the rate decreases." "A one percentage point rate cut gives us 20 billion roubles of net profit." President Vladimir Putin in June ordered that VTB's dividend payments be used to finance United Shipbuilding Corporation, which has been under VTB's management since 2023, and has state contracts in the defence sector. The state owns more than 60% of VTB. High interest rates have indeed stalled investment and encouraged companies and consumers to hold money on deposit. Corporate and consumer lending is slowing and the central bank has noted a deterioration in credit quality, although it says the situation is not yet critical. A survey of participants at a financial congress in St Petersburg this week pinpointed the key risk factors as corporate credit concerns and interest rate risks for banks. Pyanov said he did not expect a banking crisis and saw no banks in need of a bailout. DIVIDENDS PLAY KEY ROLE Dividends from state companies are a major source of revenues for Russia's budget, which is operating at a deficit of 1.5% of GDP as Moscow diverts vast sums to the defence sector for its conflict in Ukraine and grapples with reduced energy revenues from lower oil prices this year and a strong rouble. Shareholders of top lender Sberbank approved a $10 billion dividend payout this week. VTB surprised the market in April by announcing its first dividend since the start of the conflict in Ukraine, having slumped to a $7.7 billion sanctions-induced loss in 2022. The total payout of 275.75 billion roubles comes on the back of record profits in 2024 and though a decline is expected this year, profits could once again surpass 500 billion roubles, Pyanov said. Depending on capital adequacy rules that the central bank may adjust, Pyanov said VTB would work hard to keep dividend payments at 50% of net profit for the years to come. Pyanov also noted how the departure of Western capital and the emergence of retail investors as a dominant force in the Russian stock market since the start of the conflict in Ukraine had influenced VTB. Dividends are now key to maintaining shareholder value in Russia, he said. "With such a dominant retail investor, everyone wants dividends," Pyanov said. ($1 = 79.0000 roubles)
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Global equity funds attract biggest weekly inflows in eight months
(Reuters) -Global equity funds attracted strong inflows in the week to July 2, as U.S. stocks hit record highs, with investors brushing off trade tensions and chasing gains in AI-linked sectors. Investors bought global equity funds worth a net $43.15 billion during the week, registering their largest weekly net purchase since November 13, 2024, data from LSEG Lipper showed. While markets remain buoyant, analysts said that equities could face a sharp reversal if the trade tensions potentially flare up again. Micron Technology's, upbeat fourth-quarter sales forecasts, alongside Nvidia's rally to a record high reinforced investor confidence in AI-linked tech stocks during the week. U.S. equity funds attracted a hefty $31.6 billion worth of inflows, the highest for a week since November 13, 2024. European and Asian funds pulled in $9.31 billion and $552 million worth of net investments. Investors also added a net $3.72 billion into sectoral funds as they snapped up industrial, technology and financial sector funds worth a net $1.26 billion, $1.2 billion and $760 million, respectively. Weekly inflows into global bond funds amounted to a net $15.84 billion, with strong demand extending into an 11th consecutive week. Euro-denominated bond funds net inflows rose to a three-week high of $4.89 billion. Corporate and short-term bond funds also attracted significant inflows of $4.33 billion and $1.73 billion, respectively. Money market funds, meanwhile, had approximately $57.46 billion worth of net purchases following three weeks of net sales. Among commodity funds, gold and precious metal funds were popular for a sixth successive week, with about $564 million in net inflows. But investors ditched a net $163 million worth of energy sector funds. In emerging markets, inflows into equity funds reached a net $2.58 billion, the largest since October 2024. In contrast, divestments from bond funds totalled a net $3.09 billion, data for a combined 29,745 funds showed. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
