Finance Tart

It appears the world’s third largest economy is cooling after official figures revealed Chinese annual GDP slowed from 11.9% in the first quarter to 10.3% in the March to June period, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said today.
The reading was marginally lower than the 10.5% expected by analysts.
China’s economy has been growing at [...]

Figures today revealed Chinese exports grew by 43.9% in June compared with a year earlier.
The figure, which exceeded expectations, comes after China overtook Germany as the world’s biggest exporter earlier this year. Germany had held the top spot since 2003.
Meanwhile, imports increased by 34.1% year-on-year in June.
As a result, China posted a trade [...]

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has today elected to lift interest rates from 4.25% to 4.5%, as widely expected.
Australia was the first economy to raise rates from a 50-year low as the economic downturn eased. Other major economies opted for lower interest rates to boost their economies.
Furthermore, it is one of the few [...]

The assumption that downsizing from the family home as old age approaches can help fund a comfortable retirement has been challenged by Standard Life.
The insurer has recently conducted an “extensive analysis” of the UK property market to calculate how much retirement income downsizing can generate, and is warning those whose retirement dreams are dependent on [...]

City watchdog, the Financial Services Authority (FSA), has today announced banks will face stricter stress testing to ensure they can survive a further 4 years of falling economic growth and a 13.3% unemployment rate.
Stress tests were introduced following the financial crisis to ensure that banks had sufficient capital to allow them to continue operating through [...]