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Box Movements
Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – Container cargo volumes at Sri Lanka’s Colombo port fell in July although still higher so far this year compared with the same period in 2010, with a noticeable downturn in transhipment traffic. The total number of containers fell 2. 6 percent in July 2011 to 354,054 TEUs (twenty-foot foot equivalent […]
Asset Quality
Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – RAM Ratings Lanka has confirmed Sampath Bank’s long- and short-term financial institution ratings at AA and P1 with the long-term rating carrying a stable outlook. We also derive comfort from the Bank’s healthy internal capital-generation rate of 20.38% as at end-Dec 2010, which stands the best among its similar-rated peers. […]
Bank Link
Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s National Development Bank said it was in talks with DBS of Singapore to strengthen its investment banking operations. NDB said a memorandum of understanding with DBS will e signed today. DBS started in 1968 as the Development Bank of Singapore but is now a financial services group with […]
Sri Lanka lures youth for skills gap in booming tourist trade
Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka is to launch a campaign to educate youth of opportunities in the booming tourist industry where a skilled labour shortage looms with an influx of visitors after the end of a war. Last year 950 million people visited globally countries that were not native to them, he said, […]
NASA bus-sized satellite to crash-land this week
WASHINGTON, September 21, 2011 (AFP) – What goes up must come down. But where? That’s the big question when it comes to a 20-year-old NASA satellite the size of a tour bus which is careening toward Earth and set to crash-land later this week. The US Department of Defense and NASA are tracking the six-ton […]
India says poverty begins below 50 cents a day
NEW DELHI, September 21, 2011 (AFP) – India’s economic planning body has said any villager earning more than 50 cents a day is not poor and should not qualify for government welfare — a figure condemned by experts. Those with a daily income of 25 rupees (50 cents) in villages and 32 rupees (65 cents) […]
IMF warns global economy in danger zone
WASHINGTON, September 20, 2011 (AFP) – The global economy has entered “a dangerous new phase,” with a recovery that is much weaker than was predicted just months ago, the International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday. Emerging market economies that have been the recovery’s driving force, such as China and India, will not escape unscathed from the […]
Sri Lanka accepts more cash through auction
Sept 20, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s central bank accepted 20 billion rupees at 7. 08 percent from banks at an open market auction Tuesday as excess reserve in the island’s banks continued to decline amid forex sales to defend a dollar peg. Sri Lanka has a policy corridor of 7. 0 to drain excess […]
Sri Lanka stocks end down 0.7-pct
Sept 20, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lankan stocks closed down Tuesday with a sharp increase in the price of an insurer control of which changed hands recently and continued trading in shares that had drawn speculators, brokers said. The main All Share Price Index fell 0.72 percent (49.23 points) to 6,821.69, while the more liquid […]
Sri Lanka tea plantations seen making losses
Sept 20, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lankan tea crops and prices have fallen below those of last year imposing losses on plantations whose costs also went up with a recent wage hike, a broker has said. The ‘Uva’ quality season when teas grown on the eastern slopes of the island’s central hills yield their best […]