Economy

• Wednesday, October 17th 2012 - 04:51 UTC

  Citigroup CEO who steered the bank through the crisis resigns immediate effect

  

  Citigroup chief executive Vikram Pandit has surprised Wall Street by resigning with immediate effect. Mr Pandit is being replaced by Michael Corbat, who was previously the bank's chief for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

• Wednesday, October 17th 2012 - 04:43 UTC

  Santander desists from purchase of 316 branches from Royal Bank of Scotland

  

  Royal Bank of Scotland's proposed sale of 316 branches and other interests to Santander has collapsed. The Spanish bank pulled the plug on the sale, saying that the already-delayed deal could not be completed by the revised deadline.

• Wednesday, October 17th 2012 - 04:29 UTC

  Argentina minister blasts credit rating agencies for putting out “terrorist reports”

  

  Argentine Economy Minister Hernán Lorenzino ratified Wednesday’s down payment of the “Bonar X” dollar-bond for 200 million dollars and blasted credit rating agencies which along with speculators “set terrorist reports in order to make some profit out of it.”

• Tuesday, October 16th 2012 - 07:53 UTC

  Uruguayan government and supermarkets agree to keep 2012 inflation below 10%

  

  Uruguayan supermarkets pledged to help the government of President Jose Mujica to keep inflation below 10% at the end of the year even when in the first nine months of the year it reached 8.64%.

• Tuesday, October 16th 2012 - 07:42 UTC

  Paraguay confident it can recover the Chilean beef market as it has with Russia

  

  Paraguay expects a significant upsurge in beef sales this year, despite the reported outbreaks of foot and mouth disease, because of the strong demand from Russia, according to local analysts.

• Tuesday, October 16th 2012 - 07:29 UTC

  Soros suggests that if Germany does not lead, it should leave the Euro

  

  The European Union could be destroyed by the “nightmare” Euro crisis, and Germany needs to take the responsibility to save the common currency, billionaire fund manager George Soros said on Monday.

• Tuesday, October 16th 2012 - 00:07 UTC

  Brazil insists in criticizing US monetary policy, but “we are prepared”

  

  Brazil’s central bank president Alexandre Tombini refuted on Monday arguments that the US expansionist monetary policy do not harm emerging countries such as Brazil.

• Monday, October 15th 2012 - 22:17 UTC

  Spain has lost a million people since January 2011 because of the recession

  

  Condemned by recession, almost a million persons have left Spain since January last year according to a report from the country’s National Statistics Institute, INE, which also points out that the trend has intensified in the first nine months of this year.

• Monday, October 15th 2012 - 18:54 UTC

  “Angry Indec” video game to make Argentine more furious about prices

  

  An Argentine video game allows players to compare the prices used by the National Statistics and Census Institute, Indec, to measure inflation with those consumers say they pay, a pastime that has caused angry reactions among players when they see the gap.

• Monday, October 15th 2012 - 18:48 UTC

  Bernanke replies to Brazil and IMF on rich countries monetary easing controversy

  

  Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has defended the central bank's measures to bolster the US economy. Brazil has said US monetary easing to keep interest rates low and weaken the dollar has hurt emerging economies. And IMF chief Christine Lagarde warned on Sunday of consequent asset bubbles developing in emerging nations.