trending Market Intelligence /marketintelligence/en/news-insights/trending/JewofXTxjmG3VD5E1kDuKA2 content esgSubNav
In This List

StanChart to review 8,000 accounts; UniCredit lines up chairman candidates

Podcast

Street Talk Episode 87

Blog

A New Dawn for European Bank M&A Top 5 Trends

Blog

Insight Weekly: US banks' loan growth; record share buybacks; utility M&A outlook

Blog

Banking Essentials Newsletter 2021: December Edition


StanChart to review 8,000 accounts; UniCredit lines up chairman candidates

* The ECB is prepared to cut interest rates deeper into negative territory after unveiling a stimulus package last week, as it remains committed to lifting inflation, according to Executive Board member Philip Lane. He added that the ECB is "confident" that the projected bond purchase volumes would be consistent with the current limits of the asset purchase program "for an extended period of time."

* Benoît Coeuré, a member of the ECB's executive board, said Facebook Inc.'s Libra will have to hurdle a "very high" bar to obtain regulatory approval and operate in the EU. Meanwhile, Finance Ministers Bruno Le Maire of France and Olaf Scholz of Germany threw their support behind the ECB's plans to launch a public digital currency as an alternative to Libra.

UK AND IRELAND

* U.K. Financial Conduct Authority head Andrew Bailey warned that EU rules that stop its traders using London stock exchanges to trade EU shares risk damaging equity markets if they are not reversed. Bailey said the FCA was ready to talk to EU regulators ahead of any changes brought on by a no-deal Brexit but that a decision on how to proceed was required.

* Standard Chartered PLC is conducting an internal review of approximately 8,000 customer accounts at its private bank following a discovery that it cannot explain the sources of wealth for some of its clients, Bloomberg News reported. According to a previously unreported Dubai regulatory review conducted in 2017, the U.K.-based lender lacked current addresses and phone numbers for some customers and lacked information on how these and other clients built up their wealth, sources told the news agency.

* Metro Bank PLC has begun preparing to scale down its corporate lending activities and shift its lending focus toward residential property, The Sunday Times reported. The U.K. lender has done away with charging some commercial clients early termination fees, allowing them to pay off their loans ahead of time in a bid to trim its exposure to corporate lending.

* RSA Insurance Group PLC unit RSA Ireland named Kevin Thompson chief executive, replacing Ken Norgrove, who is set to become CEO of RSA Group's Scandinavian business, Codan/Trygg-Hansa.

* U.K.-based interdealer broker TP Icap PLC was fined $13 million by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission on charges of making false statements and not supervising its voice brokers, Financial News reported.

* Royal London Asset Management Ltd. became the first London Stock Exchange Group PLC shareholder to reject Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd.'s takeover bid, Financial News reported. RLAM has approximately 1% shareholding in LSE.

* Deutsche Bank AG has lowered the probability that the U.K. will exit the EU on Oct. 31 without a deal to 35% from 50%, Reuters wrote. The move came after British lawmakers approved a law that could force Prime Minister Boris Johnson to delay the process if he is unable to clinch a deal with the bloc. Meanwhile, the U.K. will not seek an extension to the transition period beyond December 2020 if the country is able to strike a divorce deal with the EU, Reuters wrote, citing a spokesman for Johnson.

GERMANY, SWITZERLAND AND AUSTRIA

* German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz told Bild that he has instructed lenders not to pass on negative interest rates to millions of savers after the ECB slashed deposit rates to a record low, Reuters wrote.

* Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen Girozentrale, struggling with low interest rates, high expenses for digitization, tighter regulations by state supervisors and intense competitive pressure, will launch a cost-cutting program encompassing a "noticeable workforce reduction" and a streamlining of its business units to less than 20 from 40, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung cited the bank's chairman of the board Herbert Hans Grüntker as saying.

* Bank J. Safra Sarasin AG is suing its insurer, U.S.-based American International Group Inc., after the latter refused to pay hundreds of millions in damages arising from cum-ex dividend deals gone wrong, Handelsblatt wrote.

* Deutsche Börse AG is expanding its portfolio with a newly created division called Qontigo which combines the exchange's STOXX and DAX indices businesses with analytics tools of recently acquired financial intelligence firm Axioma, Inc. in order to provide comprehensive investment information.

* Czech and Slovak investment company Arca Capital is set to acquire a 9.9% stake in Austrian lender Wiener Privatbank SE, E15 reported. The transaction price was not disclosed, but the value of the stake is estimated at over €3 million.

FRANCE AND BENELUX

* BNP Paribas SA issued a public apology following a personal Facebook post by one of its employees about the protests in Hong Kong, Bloomberg wrote. The unidentified employee made remarks about a pro-Beijing group singing China's national anthem, a source told Bloomberg.

* Belgium-based Delen Private Bank NV is set to take over its Dutch counterpart Nobel Vermogensbeheer, De Tijd reported. The firm is based in Amsterdam and manages €260 million in assets. The sale price has not been disclosed.

SPAIN AND PORTUGAL

* Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa rubber-stamped a plan for state-run bank Caixa Geral de Depósitos SA to sell its stake in Cape Verde's Banco Comercial do Atlântico SA but expressed concern that the sale would weaken Portuguese presence in the African nation's financial system, Lusa news agency reported. The sale is part of a restructuring plan for CGD that also stipulated the sale of other foreign operations including units in Spain, South Africa and Brazil.

* Three Portuguese trade unions representing workers at Millennium BCP said the bank had agreed its 2018 salary increase terms, opening the door for this year's wage negotiations, Lusa news agency wrote. For this year, unions are demanding an increase of 2.38% compared with the bank's offer of 0.6%.

ITALY AND GREECE

* Italian insurance group Generali is offering to repurchase up to €1 billion aggregate principal amount of three series of its subordinated notes. The transaction is expected to allow Generali to decrease external financial debt by about €250 million, cut interest costs in future years and attain a more balanced maturity profile while optimizing its regulatory capital structure.

* Claudio Costamagna, former head of Cassa depositi e prestiti SpA, is among candidates to be the new chairman of UniCredit SpA, MF wrote. Other candidates include Vittorio Grilli, Alberto Cribiore, Lucrezia Reichlin and Massimo Tononi.

* UniCredit issued a €1.25 billion 10-year subordinated Tier 2 bond, carrying a 2% coupon and callable after five years. The notes were sold at an issue price of 99.783%.

* Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA received offers for the €350 million real estate portfolio it put up for sale, with interest from international firms including Blackstone, Varde and Apollo, MF reported.

NORDIC COUNTRIES

* Swedbank AB (publ) said its board has opted to meet the request of the Swedish Economic Crime Authority to waive its attorney-client privilege with Erling Grimstad, the lawyer who prepared the bank's internal reports relating to money laundering allegations and its internal controls. The board also appointed Ingrid Harbo as its permanent chief compliance officer. Reuters also covered.

* Danish tax authorities are demanding that Nordea Bank Abp repay 900 million kroner in connection to a dividend tax refund case involving Canada's Health Care of Ontario Pension Plan, Reuters wrote. Tax authorities alleges that HOOPP received dividend tax rebates that it was not authorized to collect between 2011 and 2014. Danske Bank A/S and Sweden's Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB are also suspected of incorrect tax payments, Dagens Industri noted.

* Swiss asset management firm Unigestion SA opened a branch in Copenhagen which will be headed by Per Lawӕtz Hansen, Finews wrote.

* Jesper Bak, a significant shareholder in Totalbanken A/S, has rescinded plans to take part in a new round of capital raising by the Danish lender. Totalbanken aims to use the upcoming funding round to strengthen its capital base, according to FinansWatch.

EASTERN EUROPE

* The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague rejected the Russian state's request to reconsider its earlier jurisdiction and liability decisions issued in a more than $1 billion dispute involving Ukraine's JSC CB PrivatBank.

* A Ukrainian court seized the headquarters of State Development Corp. VEB.RF's local unit PSC Prominvestbank and other real estate owned by the lender at the request of the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office, Interfax Ukraine reported. Ukrainian prosecutors believe that Prominvestbank officials have been involved in activities aimed at reducing the lender's liquidity and depreciating its shares.

* Kazakh financial group Kaspi.kz plans to complete an IPO in London in 2019, comprising a sale of the company's existing shares in the form of global depository receipts, Reuters reported. The group, which includes JSC Kaspi Bank, is seeking a valuation of about $5 billion, with a minimum offering size in the range of $500 million to $600 million, a source familiar with the deal told the newswire.

* Austrian prosecutors found no reason to officially investigate the offshore activities of Troika Dialog, a Russian investment bank reportedly involved in a money laundering scheme dubbed the Troika Laundromat, RBC said. The scheme allegedly helped launder billions through Europe between 2006 and 2013.

* Poland-based Idea Bank SA allowed a private equity fund earlier selected to run a limited due diligence at the lender to launch an extended version of the process, Parkiet reported. The financially troubled bank is looking for an investor and also recently launched steps to reduce its workforce and streamline its branch network.

IN OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD

Asia-Pacific: ADB head may quit soon; Moody's downgrades Hong Kong outlook

Middle East & Africa: StanChart to meet with Dubai regulators; CGD to sell stake in Cape Verde unit

Latin America: IMF may stall funding to Argentina; SoftBank to double stake in Banco Inter

North America: GSEs' cap structure revised; HBT Financial files for IPO; 2 NY CUs to merge

Global Insurance: PG&E settles $11B of claims; Progressive profit down; Dorian, Faxai losses

NOW FEATURED ON S&P GLOBAL MARKET INTELLIGENCE

Brexit is an expensive but manageable annoyance for the insurance industry: One broker called Brexit uncertainty "incredibly unhelpful", and a rating analyst noted that the separation could be "somewhat traumatic" but many point to the industry's preparedness and general resilience as positives.

EU green investment classification set for global rollout, UN group says: The CEO of a UN investor network sat down with S&P Global Market Intelligence at a sustainable finance conference in Paris to talk about trends in investor engagement and shareholder proposals.

Amid blockade, Qatari banks face new regulations that may expose vulnerabilities: With the economic boycott hitting loan books, some lenders will have to bulk up capital to comply with Basel IV while also preparing for VAT at a rate of 5% — and the recent introduction of IFRS 9 has highlighted some of the problems they may face.

Deza Mones, Arno Maierbrugger, Meike Wijers, Gerard O'Dwyer, Beata Fojcik, Yael Schrage, Stephanie Salti, Sophie Davies and Helen Popper contributed to this report.

The Daily Dose has an editorial deadline of 7 a.m. London time. Some external links may require a subscription. Links are current as of publication time, and we are not responsible if those links are unavailable later.

This S&P Global Market Intelligence news article may contain information about credit ratings issued by S&P Global Ratings. Descriptions in this news article were not prepared by S&P Global Ratings.