Global food prices rose 4.3 per cent in January from December 2020 levels, reaching the highest level since July 2014, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said. The organisation said the prices have been rising for the eighth consecutive month. The growth is primarily due to strong increases in price indices for sugar, cereals and vegetable oils, the FAO explained. Prices of meat and...

US pharmaceutical company Pfizer has published its results for the fourth quarter and full year 2020. Revenues in the fourth quarter were $11.7bn, up 12% year-on-year, and profits were $2.4bn, up 15%.  For the full year 2020, the company's revenue was up just 2% to $41.9bn and net profit was up 16% to $12.5bn compared to 2019. Pfizer has also given a forecast for the current year in...

European oil prices hit a new yearly high, comfortably above the $58 per barrel level. According to Reuters, European oil prices have surpassed $58 a barrel for the first time since the second decade of February 2020. Quotes for Russia's Urals reached $58.6 a barrel, while North Sea Brent rose to $58.3 a barrel.  The value of the nearest futures for Brent oil reached $58.05 per barrel. The...

The US Federal Open Market Committee refrained from changing the rate at the end of its first meeting of the year. The last time the rate was changed was in March 2020, when it was urgently cut to 0-0.25%. Recall that the rate forecasts updated in December did not suggest an increase until at least the end of 2023. In a statement on Wednesday, the regulator separately noted that the pace of...

The number of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the world in the second half of last year increased by 18% compared with the first half, reaching 26.2 thousand. The total amount of M&A grew even more: by 94%, to more than $2 trillion. This data was published by PwC in its new report. The number of mega-deals worth more than $5bn also rose sharply - there were 57 mega-deals worth $688bn in the...

Former US Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, whom President-elect Joe Biden is set to appoint as Treasury Secretary, warned about the risks of a longer and more painful recession. This will happen if the Congress fails to approve additional support measures and calls to take "sweeping action" to stimulate an economic recovery. The Wall Street Journal reports that Yellen will address the Senate...

Strategists at Swiss bank UBS warned investors about the risks of devaluation of cryptocurrencies, writes Bloomberg with reference to a message, which employees of the division of UBS Global Wealth Management, engaged in private capital management, sent to clients in response to inquiries about the advisability of buying bitcoins. The bank's experts said that in the long run, digital assets could...

China's exports for 2020 rose 3.6% from 2019 to a record $2.59 trillion, despite the pandemic, while Chinese imports fell 1.1%, to $2.06 trillion, Chinese customs data showed. Exports were up just 0.5% in 2019 after climbing 9.9% in 2018. Imports then shrank 2.8 percent versus a 15.8 percent increase in 2019. China's 2020 trade balance increased to $535 billion, the highest since 2015. "Export...

Food prices rose for the seventh consecutive month to a three-year high by December 2020, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said. Prices of dairy products and vegetable oils rose the most, the organisation added. "For 2020 as a whole, the average value of this (food price) index, which monitors monthly variations in the world prices of the most traded food commodities, reached its...