China State Railway Group reports that 3.68 billion passengers used China's rail transportation services in 2023, which was a record number. Additionally, the amount of freight carried by rail hit a record-breaking 3.91 billion tons. According to the corporation, total revenue from rail transportation increased by 39% to 964.1 billion yuan ($135.8 billion) in the previous year, as reported by...

According to Michael Barr, the Fed's deputy chairman for financial supervision, the U.S. Federal Reserve does not intend to prolong the emergency lending program (Bank Term Funding Program, BTFP), which was started in 2023 to strengthen the banking sector following the failure of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), reports MarketWatch. Barr stated that the program will come to an end on March 11 when its...

Bitcoin hit 21-month highs on the afternoon of January 8 and continued to rise overnight on January 9, trading above $47,000 for the first time since April 2022. According to Bloomberg, Bitcoin crossed the $47,000 mark on the afternoon of January 8th for the first time since April 2022. The agency notes that the first and largest cryptocurrency by capitalization increased by 6.2 percent during...

The amount of IPOs in India fell by 16% in 2023, totaling roughly $6.8 billion. According to experts cited in the Nikkei Asia edition, the number of companies that went public rose to 57 from 40 the previous year. Simultaneously, the proportion of Indian first public offers (IPOs) in the worldwide initial public offering volume hit a record 5.98%, nearly tripling in the last two years. In...

Amidst the anticipation of a potential interest rate decrease by the Federal Reserve (Fed) in 2024, investors were assessing corporate news as the U.S. stock market started the final week of the year with a positive outlook. According to CME FedWatch, traders anticipate that there is an 82% chance that the Fed will lower rates by at least 25 basis points in March. The growth of the PCE Core...

The International Energy Agency (IEA) projects that global coal consumption might reach a record 8.54 billion tons in 2023, an increase of 1.4%. According to the organization's most recent assessment, there will be a discernible decrease in the demand for coal by the end of this year in all major nations, with the United States and the European Union experiencing the biggest drops at 21% and 24%,...

U.S. mortgage rates dropped below the 7% annualized rate for the seventh consecutive week. The state mortgage agency Freddie Mac said that the average annual rate on 30-year loans was 6.95% on Thursday, down from 7.03% one week earlier. The rate was 6.31% a year ago. APRs on fifteen-year loans currently average 6.38%, up from 5.54% a year ago and 6.29% a week ago. Freddie Mac uses information...

Chinese leaders decided on the budget deficit for 2024, writes Reuters citing three sources. The country's GDP will be shorted by 3%, as opposed to 3.8% this year, as reported. The IMF projects that China's nominal GDP will reach approximately $17.7 trillion by 2023. The modest shift in China's budget deficit for the upcoming year, as reported by experts surveyed by Reuters, indicates that the...

Uranium prices in the US topped $82 per pound for the first time since January 2008, Trading Economics writes. The price increase comes from the fact that rising supply threats coincided with uranium's high demand. The US House of Representatives passed a bill prohibiting the purchase of Russian enriched uranium on December 12. Due to this, there are now more supply concerns from other nations,...