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Thai PM makes resort island first visit, seeks tourism boost

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Thai PM makes resort island first visit, seeks tourism boost

Thailand’s new Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin visited the resort island of Phuket on Friday, a first official trip to underline plans to shore-up economic recovery by bolstering tourism, a key driver of growth.

Thailand’s economy expanded 1.8% year-on-year in the April-June period and 0.2% on the quarter, slowing sharply from the previous three months as its key exports sector slumped on weak global demand.

The state planning agency has since cut its growth projection to a 2.5% to 3.0% range from 2.7% to 3.7%.

Tourism remains a bright spot, however, with the government aiming to reach about 29 million foreign visitors this year, nearly three-quarters of the record number received in pre-pandemic 2019, who spent 1.91 trillion baht ($54.40 billion).

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Nearly 11 million of those were from China that year.

“Right now only 30% of Chinese tourists have returned,” Srettha, a property mogul, told reporters.

“Chinese tourists are an important part. China is slowing, they don’t encourage outbound tourism, so we need to make it easier for people to come to our country,” he said, suggesting loosening visa requirements.

Political newcomer Srettha was president of a real estate firm just a few months ago and became prime minister on Tuesday after winning with ease in a parliamentary vote.

He must put together a cabinet from a crowded 11-party alliance that includes bitter rivals of his Pheu Thai Party, which will lead its fifth government in two decades. Three of those were topped by coups or courts.

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Srettha on X, formerly Twitter, said he aims to boost tourism income next year to 3.3 trillion baht ($93.99 billion)

He also said his government would look at long-term plans to expand airport infrastructure in popular destinations like Bangkok, Phuket and Chiang Mai.

He has met airport operators in Bangkok and Phuket and was due to meet with tourism business operators and visit some tourism sites in Phangnga and in Phuket, which draws about a quarter or Thailand’s annual visitors.

Srettha said he expects his cabinet to be finalised over the next week. The government will then have to deliver policy objectives to a joint session of parliament before starting work, likely in late September.

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NY Fed survey finds general expectations of higher inflation

NY Fed survey finds general expectations of higher inflation

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NY Fed survey finds general expectations of higher inflation

Americans last month braced for generally higher inflation pressures over the next few years and accelerating home price increases, according to a report released on Monday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The bank said in its latest Survey of Consumer Expectations that respondents project inflation a year from now at 3.3% from March’s 3%, while inflation three years from now is seen moderating to an expected 2.8% rise from the prior month’s 2.9%. Five-year ahead inflation was seen at 2.8%, versus March’s 2.6%.

The Fed’s inflation target is 2% and the personal consumption expenditures price index, the central bank’s preferred inflation gauge, stood at a 2.7% year-over-year rise in March, up from 2.5% in February.

In the survey, respondents also reported expecting high price pressures a year from now across all measured categories, including rent, food, gasoline and medical costs. The expected rise in home prices a year from now rose to its highest level since July 2022, at a 3.3% increase from the 3% that had prevailed for the prior seven months.

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While the report found respondents expecting smaller future earnings and income gains it found a projection that future spending would rise. It also found households more worried about their personal financial situations even as they were more upbeat about their access to credit. The survey also found mixed views over the job market, with the lowest level of respondents saying they could get a job if they lost one since April 2021.

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Anglo American rejects BHP’s revised $42.7-billion buyout proposal

Anglo American rejects BHP’s revised $42.7-billion buyout proposal

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Anglo American rejects BHP's revised $42.7-billion buyout proposal

Anglo American (AAL.L), opens new tab rejected a raised takeover offer of 34 billion pounds ($42.67 billion) from BHP Group (BHP.AX), opens new tab on Monday, saying the world’s largest listed miner “continues to significantly undervalue” the company.

The London-listed miner had already rebuffed BHP’s initial $39 billion all-share takeover proposal, made on April 25, dismissing it as opportunistic and saying it would dilute the upside value for its shareholders relative to BHP’s.

“The latest proposal from BHP again fails to recognise the value inherent in Anglo American,” chairman Stuart Chambers said on Monday.

The new offer, made on May 7, was 10% higher than BHP’s first, or a 15% increase in the merger exchange ratio that would lift Anglo American shareholders’ aggregate ownership in the combined group to 16.6% from 14.8% in the earlier proposal.

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“We are disappointed that this second proposal has been rejected,” BHP’s CEO Mike Henry said in a statement.

“BHP continues to believe that a combination of the two businesses would deliver significant value for all shareholders,” the statement added.

The revised bid is still contingent on Anglo selling its shares in iron ore and platinum assets in South Africa, a structure Anglo says is unattractive.

Anglo’s share price reversed earlier losses to trade up 1.3% 27.73 pounds by 1411 GMT. 

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Wall Street coasts to the finish line of another winning week

Wall Street coasts to the finish line of another winning week

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Wall Street coasts to the finish line of another winning week

 U.S. stocks coasted to the close of another winning week on Friday.

The S&P 500 rose 8.60 points, or 0.2%, to 5,222.68 to finish a third straight winning week following its mostly miserable April. It had been on pace for a bigger gain in the morning, but that mostly disappeared following a discouraging report on U.S. consumer sentiment.

The S&P 500 has climbed back within 0.6% of its record on revived hopes that the Federal Reserve may deliver cuts to interest rates this year. A flood of stronger-than-expected reports on profits from big U.S. companies has also helped support the market.

Gen Digital jumped 15.3% after reporting better profit for the first three months of 2024 than analysts expected. The cyber safety company, whose brands include Norton and LifeLock, also authorized a program to buy back up to $3 billion of its stock. It joined a lengthening list of companies announcing big such programs, which helps goose per-share earnings for investors.

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Novavax nearly doubled and shot 98.7% higher after announcing a deal with Sanofi that could be worth more than $1.2 billion. The agreement includes a license to co-commercialize Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine worldwide, with some exceptions. Novavax also reported a slightly smaller loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

It said the strengthening of the U.S. dollar’s value against other currencies is slicing into its business, along with slowing traffic growth across the industry. That helped overshadow its own announcement of a program to buy back up to $2 billion of its stock.

In the bond market, Treasury yields rose following the discouraging preliminary report from the University of Michigan.

It suggested sentiment among U.S. consumers is weakening by much more than economists expected, and the drop was large enough to be “statistically significant and brings sentiment to its lowest reading in about six months,” according to Joanne Hsu, director of the survey of consumers.

Potentially even more discouraging is that U.S. consumers were forecasting inflation of 3.5% in the upcoming year, up from their forecast of 3.2% a month earlier. If such expectations spiral higher, the fear is that it could lead to a vicious cycle that worsens inflation.

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It highlights how some companies have recently been describing increasing struggles among their customers, particularly their lower-income ones.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.50% from 4.46% late Thursday. But the movement was still relatively modest compared with its drop from 4.70% late last month.

Markets may remain on hold until Wednesday’s highly anticipated update on U.S. inflation at the consumer level, according to rates strategists at Bank of America. Traders are still largely penciling in one or two cuts to interest rates by the Federal Reserve this year, according to data from CME Group.

“Right now, the market is in a good mood thanks to a decent earnings season and a Fed that has a high bar to hiking,” according to Brian Jacobsen, chief economist at Annex Wealth Management. “That mood can change quickly.”

Last week, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell helped pull yields lower after saying the central bank remains closer to cutting its main interest rate than hiking it, despite a string of stubbornly high readings on inflation this year. The Fed has been keeping its main interest rate at the highest level in more than two decades in hopes of getting high inflation fully under control.

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A cooler-than-expected jobs report at the end of last week, meanwhile, suggested the U.S. economy could pull off the tricky balancing act of staying solid enough to avoid a bad recession but not so strong that it worsens inflation.

In stock markets abroad, London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.6% after the government reported the U.K. economy bounced back to growth at the start of the year. The performance was better than expected, and it snapped two straight quarters where the economy shrank.

In Japan, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.4% after a report showed strong auto exports whittled down the nation’s trade deficit and it racked up solid returns on overseas investments.

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