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This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly, on January 10, 2022 - January 16, 2022. (Photo by Suhaimi Yusuf/The Edge) - A + A AS a technocrat, Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Aziz knows fiscal reforms are painfully overdue. He felt the financial strain firsthand as the government’s cash needs skyrocketed in the past two years due to the necessary spending to save lives and livelihoods hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. The ex-investment banker also knows Malaysia — whose direct debt burden will cross the RM1 trillion threshold this year — needs debt to be more productive in order to expand the economic pie and sustain growth towards the desired high-income status. As it is, interest payments on direct government debt alone take away more than RM18 out of every RM100 the government earns. This and the fact that RM49 out of every RM100 earned goes to paying civil servants’ salaries and public pension obligations are clear signs that the … [Read more...] about Cover Story: Making the right but unpopular moves

This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly, on January 10, 2022 - January 16, 2022. The government has discussed flood mitigation plans and will have to come up with a long-term solution (Photo by Mohamad Shahril/The Edge) - A + A Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Aziz looks none the worse for wear after two years in the political hot seat of overseeing the country’s finances. The former investment banker knows tough measures need to be made fast but admits that changes to the status quo will not be easy to push through. Below are excerpts from his interview with The Edge’s Cindy Yeap and Esther Lee. The Edge: It’s been only two months since the tabling of Budget 2022 but so many things have happened that it looks like you need to redo the budget or table a supplementary budget. Zafrul : Every year, there is a supplementary budget but, yes, only just now I told the cabinet that we have to relook and reprioritise to make … [Read more...] about Cover Story: Ensuring fiscal sustainability

(CNN Business) The next-generation of wireless technology is now even faster for 5G users in some parts of the country. Telecom companies have rolled out 5G networks to various locations across the United States over the last few years, delivering an experience that's arguably only a notch above what 4G offers. But on Wednesday, Verizon ( VZ ) and AT&T ( T ) turned on their C-band 5G networks -- an important set of radio frequencies that will supercharge the internet as we know it. "The impact will be that users will likely consume more data, the connection will be more robust and most likely we may see new types of applications emerging," said Dimitris Mavrakis, senior director at market research firm ABI Research. "5G is also positioned toward enterprise services, so this upgrade may push both carriers' plans to address this domain even further." International airlines suspend some US flights over 5G uncertainty If … [Read more...] about What is C-band 5G? Verizon and AT&T are flipping on the switch in the US

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin The last time the Federal Reserve tried to taper its money-printing ways, the S&P 500 dropped 20% in 11 weeks. I’m not sure if the sequel is going to be any kinder to “America’s ticker,” the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) SPY . It’s time to prepare. The best time to sell speculative, profitless positions was last week. The second-best time is probably now, with Jay Powell set to stop his bond buying and start raising rates in the next couple of months. I know many dividend investors are feeling smug, and rightly so. We made a bunch of money from Powell’s printing, and now our dividend darlings appear set to attract “basic” investors from the land of crypto and tech. But not all dividend payers are safe today. Some are anything but, and will be washed out alongside the speculative junk. (We’ll name two of these dangerous dividends below.) But first, a toast. Powell Has Been Good to Us One day we may raise a … [Read more...] about 2 Dangerous Dividends That’ll Be Wiped Out In ’22

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Nova Credit cofounders: CTO Loek Janssen, COO Nicky Goulimis and CEO Misha Esipov. The startup ... [+] standardizes information from international credit reporting bureaus so that U.S. lenders and landlords can serve immigrants who lack a U.S. credit record. Photo credit: Nova Credit Reported by Jeff Kauflin, Tom Anderson, Michael del Castillo, Antoine Gara, Sarah Hansen, Jonathan Ponciano and Kristin Stoller. Some of the private fintech companies on this year’s Fintech 50 list have grown so large they rival public companies. Stripe is now worth $22.5 billion and Credit Karma, $4 billion. But the industry keeps attracting new entrepreneurs and novel ideas—there are 20 companies on our fourth edition of the Fintech 50 that have never appeared on our list. That includes businesses like Nova Credit, which standardizes information from credit reporting bureaus in India, Mexico and other … [Read more...] about Fintech 50 2019: The Newcomers

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Osama Bedier, founder and CEO of Poynt, a fintech startup that makes point-of-sale credit card ... [+] readers that third-party developers can build apps on top of. Photo credit: Poynt In 2018, while cryptocurrencies aiming to disrupt central banks suffered a stunning bear market, many fintech firms trying to make the traditional payments system work better thrived. Global funding for payments companies jumped from $8 billion in 2017 to $12 billion last year, according to Accenture . And that doesn’t even count the Chinese payments and financial services giant Ant Financial’s $14 billion funding round. In the U.S., the payments category ate up 15% of all financial technology funding deals, more than any other segment of fintech, reports CB Insights . So it’s no surprise that we had more payments companies on this year’s Fintech 50 list than we’ve ever had in our four years of running it. They run … [Read more...] about The Future Of Payments: Fintech 50 2019

Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Almost every personal finance company on Forbes’ 2019 Fintech 50 list is betting on the insights of behavioral finance to take their company to the next level. List returnees Lemonade and Acorns have been doing this successfully for years. Our three newcomers on the list (Chime, Even and Root Insurance) are doing this with the goal of helping the under-served save more. And all of them allow you to save, invest or insure conveniently and quickly from your cellphone. Here are seven of the country’s most promising personal finance and insurance companies: CEO of Acorns Noah Kerner speaks during the 2018 Yahoo Finance All Markets Summit at The Times ... [+] Center on September 20, 2018, in New York City. (Photo by John Lamparski/Getty Images) Getty Acorns Irvine, California For $1 a month, the micro-investing mobile app rounds up each debit or credit card purchase to nearest dollar, investing extra … [Read more...] about The Future Of Personal Finance: Fintech 50 2019

Paul Handley (AFP) PREMIUM Washington, United States   ● Thu, January 20, 2022 US President Joe Biden warned Russia Wednesday that it will pay a stiff price for a full-blown invasion of Ukraine, but sowed confusion by suggesting a "minor" incursion would prompt much less pushback from the West. Biden said he did not believe that President Vladimir Putin wants a war, but said the Russian leader has created a situation that is proving extremely difficult to defuse -- and that could easily "get out of hand" in the region. "My guess is he will move in. He has to do something," Biden said during a press conference marking his first year in office. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,000/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 … [Read more...] about Biden warns of ‘disaster for Russia’ if they invade Ukraine