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SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Australia has entered its first recession since 1991 after the economy shrank 7 percent in the second quarter, official figures showed Wednesday, as the country reels from the coronavirus pandemic. The Australian Bureau of Statistics said it was the fastest quarterly contraction on record and ends a three-decade run of economic growth that was undented even by the global financial crisis. The bureau’s head of national accounts, Michael Smedes, said the […]
(Eagle News) — The Philippine economy contracted by a record-16.5 percent in the second quarter, from April to June, officially plunging the country into a technical recession. A technical recession takes place when there are two successive quarters of negative gross domestic product caused mainly by an isolated event. This is distinct from a recession, which is defined as two consecutive quarters of negative GDP due to an underlying economic problem. During the first quarter, Philippine […]
SINGAPORE, Singapore (AFP) — Singapore plunged into recession in the second quarter as growth fell 41.2 percent quarter-on-quarter with the trade-dependent economy hammered by the coronavirus, preliminary data showed Tuesday. Year-on-year, the economy shrank 12.6 percent between April and June, according to the data from the trade ministry, as strict curbs were imposed to fight the virus. It marks the second consecutive quarter of contraction, meaning that the city state — which has one of the […]
by Kyoko HASEGAWA Agence France Presse TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japan dived into its first recession since 2015, according to official data Monday, with the world’s third-largest economy shrinking by 0.9 percent in the first quarter as it wrestles with the fallout from the coronavirus. The drop in gross domestic product followed a 1.9-percent decline in the fourth quarter of 2019 as a tax hike and typhoons hit Japan hard — even before […]
by Beiyi SEOW Agence France Presse BEIJING, China (AFP) — China’s economy contracted for the first time in around three decades in the first quarter as the coronavirus crisis brought the country to a standstill, according to an AFP poll of economists. The world’s second-largest economy tanked in the first three months of the year as factories closed, consumers were compelled to stay home and the virus spread to other countries. Analysts from 14 […]
by Dave Clark with AFP bureaus World powers scrambled on Thursday to build a global response to the human tragedy and once-in-a-century economic collapse caused by the coronavirus epidemic, as the worldwide death toll topped 90,000. In a locked-down New York, the UN Security Council was to meet on the pandemic for the first time. And, by video conference, EU finance ministers are wrangling over how to bail out their worst hit members Italy […]
by Susan NJANJI and Sofia CHRISTENSEN Agence France Presse JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AFP) — The World Bank warned Thursday that sub-Saharan Africa could slip into its first recession in a quarter of century because of the coronavirus pandemic on the world’s most impoverished continent. “We project that economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa will decline from 2.4 percent in 2019 to -2.1 to -5.1 percent in 2020, the first recession in the region in 25 […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — France is facing its deepest recession since the end of World War II because of the widespread lockdown to stem the coronavirus crisis, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire warned Monday. “The worst growth figure in France since 1945 was -2.2 percent in 2009, after the financial crisis of 2008. We will probably be very far beyond -2.2 percent” this year, Le Maire told a Senate panel. That figure was subsequently […]
SINGAPORE (AFP) — Singapore’s central bank eased monetary policy Monday as the city-state, seen as a bellwether for the health of global trade, heads for a deep recession due to the coronavirus pandemic. The easing echoes moves made by other countries and comes after data last week showed the city-state suffered its sharpest contraction in the first quarter since the global financial crisis. The Monetary Authority of Singapore said it had flattened the slope of […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The coronavirus pandemic has driven the global economy into a downturn that will require massive funding to help developing nations, IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva said Friday. “It is clear that we have entered a recession” that will be worse than in 2009 following the global financial crisis, she said in an online press briefing. With the worldwide economic “sudden stop,” Georgieva said the fund’s estimate “for the overall financial needs […]
by Roland JACKSON LONDON, United Kingdom (AFP) — Global stock and oil markets plunged Wednesday, as vast stimulus measures failed to offset heightened concerns that the worsening coronavirus outbreak will tip the world into a deep downturn, dealers said. In European stock market trading, Frankfurt, London, and Paris tanked around five percent in morning deals, after similar dizzying losses across Asia. Before the market open in Paris, French regulators banned for one-month short-selling, or the […]
LISBON Portugal (AFP) — UN chief Antonio Guterres on Sunday urged governments to work together to stop the coronavirus pandemic from plunging the global economy into recession. “No country can face it alone,” the secretary-general wrote in an opinion article in the Publico daily. “More than ever, governments must cooperate to revitalize economies, expand public investment, promote trade and ensure that people and communities affected by the disease are supported,” he said. The virus was […]
