Deutsche Bank on Sunday (July 7) said it plans to cut 18,000 jobs in a sweeping, 7.4 billion euro overhaul designed to turn around Germany’s struggling flagship lender.

The plan represents a major retreat from trading by Deutsche Bank, which for years had tried to compete as a major force on Wall Street.

The bank will scrap its global equities business and scale back its investment bank. It expects a 2.8 billion euro ($3.1 billion) net loss in the second quarter as a result of restructuring charges.

Beyond the expected cutbacks to equities, Deutsche said it would also axe some of its fixed income operations, an area traditionally regarded as one of the bank’s strengths.

It will create a new unit to wind-down unwanted assets, with a value of 74 billion euros of risk-weighted assets.

Chief Executive Officer Christian Sewing flagged an extensive restructuring in May when he promised shareholders “tough cutbacks” to the investment bank. The pledge came after Deutsche failed to agree a merger with rival Commerzbank.

“We have started the most fundamental transformation of the Deutsche Bank for decade,” Joerg Eigendorf, Deutsche Bank head of communications told reporters on Sunday. “A new era starts for the Deutsche Bank. A new era, in which we aim to lead Deutsche Bank back onto the path of success for our clients, for our staff and of course for our shareholders,” he added.

Media reports had suggested that Deutsche Bank could cut as many as 20,000 jobs more than one in five of its 91,500 employees.

The bank did not disclose a geographic breakdown of the job cuts. The equities business is focused largely in New York and London.

A person with direct knowledge of the matter said job cuts would be distributed around the world, including in Germany.

The bank’s supervisory board met on Sunday to agree the proposed changes, one of the biggest announcements of job cuts at a major investment bank since 2011 when HSBC said it would axe 30,000 jobs.

(Source: Reuters)

American plane manufacturer Boeing has been hit with a class-action lawsuit lodged by more than 400 pilots over what they say is the company’s cover-up of design flaws in its 737 Max planes.

According to the suit, Boeing engaged in an “unprecedented cover-up of the known design flaws of the MAX, which predictably resulted in the crashes of two MAX aircraft and subsequent grounding of all MAX aircraft worldwide,” the Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC) reported Saturday.

Court documents the network obtained show that pilots, who were impacted by the decision to ground the aircraft, “suffer and continue to suffer significant lost wages, among other economic and non-economic damages.”

The original plaintiff is identified as “pilot X” because of the plaintiff’s “fear of reprisal from Boeing and discrimination from Boeing customers.”

The complainant lodged the statement of claim on Friday, seeking millions in damages for colleagues and Boeing customers.

The hearing for the case is scheduled to be held in a court in Chicago on October 21, according to ABC.

More than 300 Boeing 737 MAX planes were grounded globally following the two deadly crashes that left 346 people dead.

An Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX en route from Addis Ababa to the Kenyan capital of Nairobi crashed a few minutes after take-off on March 10, killing all 157 people, mostly foreign nationals, on board.

A 737 MAX passenger jet crashed five months earlier on October 29, 2018 into the Java Sea in Indonesia, killing 189 people.

The American company last month acknowledged that it had to correct flaws in its 737 MAX flight simulator software used to train pilots.

However, it did not say when it first realized there was a problem, and whether it notified regulators of the matter.

Source: Presstv

The first Russia-Africa summit this fall will hopefully increase Russian business presence on the continent, the Cameroonian ambassador to Russia, Mahamat Paba Sale, said on Thursday. “We count on this enterprise because, thanks to this event, Russian enterprises that are already present on our continent will further deepen their presence. They will be more interested in the African continent,” he said at a reception at the Russian Foreign Ministry dedicated to Africa Day.

The summit will be held in the Russian resort of Sochi in October. The diplomat said he expected it to be widely covered in Russian media, which will bring African countries back into spotlight.

Russia and Cameroon share a 55-year history of diplomatic ties. As part of their cooperation program, Russia gave free university education to 35 Cameroonians in 2017-2018.

“Students in other countries cannot receive such serious training in such favorable conditions. Therefore, we would like to thank Russia in particular for this,” the ambassador said.

Russia and Cameroon will hold a high-level inter-parliamentary meeting in 2019. The diplomat said there would be time to discuss a wide range of issues at this year’s events.

Source: Urdupoint

Vietnamese and Cameroonian authorities have begun talks to resolve the managerial crisis at Nexttel, the brand name of Viettel Cameroon, ITweb reported. It is a joint venture by Viettel Global Investment Joint Stock Company, a subsidiary of Vietnamese military telecoms company Viettel, and local shareholder Bestcam. The crisis stems from disagreements in the management of the company by the Vietnamese and Cameroonian stakeholders.

Vietnamese shareholders have denied allegations by their Cameroonian counterparts that they had flouted Cameroonian business laws, including the OHADA law. El Hadji Baba Danpullo, chair at Bestcam, has accused the general manager of Viettel Cameroon “of running Nexttel like his private business”. He said the Vietnamese were recruiting their counterparts at the expense of unemployed Cameroonians.

The dispute also concerns issues such as signatures for financial transactions, engagement of foreign partners, purchase of telecoms hardware, and transfers of technology, amongst other things. The Nexttel crisis has resulted in several litigations in local courts between conflicting parties and has pitted Viettel Global against Bestcam. They owned 70 percent and 30 percent stakes respectively at the onset of Viettel Cameroon in 2014.

The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam, special envoy of the Prime Minister of Vietnam, Nguyen Quoc Cuong, has held talks with the Prime Minister of Cameroon, Joseph Dion Ngute in Yaounde. The main focus of their audience lasting over 80 minutes was to seek a lasting solution to the Nexttel crisis, involving parties of both countries.

Source: Telecompaper

China’s state media says the country does not want to engage in a trade war with the United States as it will have no winner, but Beijing is not afraid to do so.

The remarks were made in a commentary which is due to be published on Monday by the ruling Communist Party’s People’s Daily, but whose text was carried by the official Xinhua news agency the night before.

It also said China’s door to talks with the US about their trade dispute is always open, but China will not yield on important issues of principle and will never brush aside its priorities.

In similar comments on Friday, Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He had noted that cooperation is the only right choice for China and the United States, but China will not compromise on major issues of principle.

Cooperation is the only right choice for the two sides, but it has to be based on principles, said the vice premier in a group interview with Chinese media after the conclusion of the 11th round of high-level economic and trade consultations between the two sides in Washington.

The comments come after China and the US failed to reach a deal to end their months-long trade dispute.

People with knowledge of the talks between the two sides said on Friday that US President Donald Trump has reportedly given China a one-month ultimatum to seal a trade deal or face tariffs on all its exports to the United States.

China-US negotiations broke down last week after Chinese representatives reportedly backtracked on promises to address issues like theft of intellectual property, after which the US announced an increase of Chinese tariffs from 10 percent to 25 percent on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports. 

Trump has urged China to either sign the deal now or it will be forced to sign a far worse agreement in future. However, China says it won’t make concessions on issues of principle.

China strongly opposes US tariff hikes, which are harmful not only to China and the United States, but to the world at large, and China will have to take necessary countermeasures, the Chinese vice premier said Friday.

‘US will suffer‘

One of Trump’s top economic advisers has acknowledged the president was wrong to suggest that China would pay tariffs on its exports to the US.

Larry Kudlow, who heads the National Economic Council, accepted it was US businesses that paid the import tax from Chinese goods.

He told Fox News that he believed “both sides will suffer” from the escalating trade dispute.

Trump’s view, however, is at odds with his top economic advisor’s. On Sunday, Trump weighed in on the state of trade negotiations with China, saying the US was “right where we want to be” — namely, on the cusp of taking in massive tariffs from China.

On Twitter, he said of China, “they LOVE ripping off America!” He also refloated a plan from Friday to redirect money generated by tariffs to buy up American agricultural products and “distribute the food to starving people” around the world — a suggestion that has already drawn skepticism.

Source: Presstv

Jean Tchoffo, Secretary General of the Cameroonian economy ministry, presided on May 8 in Yaoundé over the presentation of a report on the trade impact of the bilateral Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between Cameroon and the United Kingdom.

According to the official, the validation of this study is the first step before the actual start of negotiations, which may have to be concluded by 2021. These will include a review of the legal text of the Cameroon-European Union (EU) Partnership, with a view to its possible transposition into a bilateral Cameroon-United Kingdom post-Brexit EPA.

The British government informed Cameroon of its ambition since February 12, 2018. And after two informal meetings, President Biya finally authorized the opening of formal negotiations on 29 August 2018. However, Paul Biya conditioned the start of these negotiations on the completion of a study that will provide an overview and outlook of trade, economic and financial relations between Cameroon and the United Kingdom. It is also a question of assessing the possible impacts of this agreement on Cameroon’s economy and finances.

The Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a party to the EU-Cameroon EPA. However, the British people decided on 27 March 2017, in a referendum, to leave the Union. As a result, the United Kingdom should in principle lose the benefit of trade agreements between the EU and its partners around the world. In order not to disrupt trade with its partners after leaving the Union, the United Kingdom is engaged in negotiations of new trade agreements and treaties with all its major trading partners.

Source: Business in Cameroon

Cameroon’s economic growth is expected to rise to 4.2 percent this year, compared to 4 percent in 2018, thanks to increased oil production, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a statement on Friday.

The chief of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) on Wednesday urged Cameroon to ratify the African Continental Free trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement.

The agreement is the tool that is going to help Cameroon overcome “the storms” of the global economic environment, ECA Executive Secretary Vera Songwe said at the opening of the National AfCFTA Information and Sensitization Forum co-organized by ECA and the Government of Cameroon in partnership with the European Union in the capital, Yaounde.

“We are really hoping that Cameroon ratifies this AfCFTA because I think there is no doubt that our country and many others on the continent needs additional investment. With the AfCFTA you get investments that you need to be able to revamp your economy and more importantly create jobs,” said Songwe, who is also a Cameroonian.

Cameroon was among the first African countries to sign the agreement last year but it’s still laying the groundwork for the entry into force of the AfCFTA.

“If we are able to ratify this AfCFTA, Cameroon will start having value addition. We will be able to process our cotton and sell to Ethiopia. I think the big story of the continental free trade agreement is that value addition, which essentially means that value and quality of the goods and the resources that are put into making the goods, stay on the continent,” she added.

Twenty-two African nations have already ratified the agreement, the minimum threshold expected to approve the deal among the 55 members of the African Union.

Source: Xinhuanet

Iran has delivered as many as 30 hybrid vehicles to Senegal to be used in the country’s taxi fleet.

The ceremony for handing over the taxicabs was held at the Blaise Diagne International Airport in western Senegal. It was joined by Senegal’s Minister of Air Transport and Development of Airport Infrastructures, Maimouna Ndoye Seck.

The project for making the vehicles was leveraged by the Bank of Africa pan-African banking conglomerate.

Iran Khodro

The vehicles are of the Samand LX make manufactured by Iran’s biggest carmaker Iran Khodro (IKCO).

Last month, it was reported that Iran Khodro had exported a first consignment of its Dena Plus cars to Senegal to be used in the African country’s police fleet.

The report said the exports would take place through IKCO’s joint venture company with the Senegalese government, known as SenIran. Senegal also re-exports the company’s cars to Guinea and Nigeria.

IKCO also exports vehicles to Russia, Syria, Turkey, Iraq, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Egypt, Algeria, and Bulgaria.

Presstv