SoftBank raises $4.8 billion from T-Mobile block trade, term sheet shows
SYDNEY, June 17 (Reuters) - Japan's SoftBank (9984.T), opens new tab has raised $4.8 billion from a sale of 21.5 million T-Mobile (TMUS.O), opens new tab shares at $224 each, according to a term sheet reviewed by Reuters.
The shares were offered in a price range of $224 to $228 each, the term sheet said, a discount to T-Mobile's closing price on Monday of $230.99.
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Reuters
26 minutes ago
- Reuters
Breakingviews - Beijing has more at stake in Iran besides just oil
HONG KONG, June 17 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Beijing has far more at stake in Iran besides just oil. China has not only benefited from importing heavily discounted Iranian crude, it has inched up its strategic infrastructure investments into the country since the duo signed a $400 billion pact in 2021. If the regime in Tehran is severely weakened or changes, China also will lose a key diplomatic lever in the Middle East. Despite Washington's efforts to use sanctions to curb oil exports from Iran, it has become an increasingly important supplier to China. Crude shipments to the People's Republic from Malaysia, a major trans-shipment hub, have tripled to 70 million tonnes last year from 2021, according to data from the Chinese Customs – third after Russia and Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Iran's strategic location makes it a crucial cog in President Xi Jinping's signature Belt and Road policy to enhance his country's physical and economic connectivity with the world. As of 2023, China accounted for 3% of Iran's $6 billion worth of foreign direct investments. That pales in comparison to, say, Russia's 27% contribution, but China is ramping up its support in other ways: Iran has turned to the People's Republic for "thousands of tons of ballistic-missile ingredients", for instance, to build its military prowess, the Wall Street Journal reported, opens new tab in June, citing sources. The trio also conducts regular joint naval drills together. The escalating conflict threatens to undermine Beijing's nascent ambitions in Gulf politics too. Just two years ago, Chinese diplomats hailed a 'new paradigm, opens new tab' for resolving friction in the Middle East after they brokered a deal to restore diplomatic ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia. War also throws up a fresh test of China's diplomatic ties further afield too. Iran joined the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in 2023. However, India, a founding member, on Saturday issued a rare public rebuttal, opens new tab of the SCO's statement denouncing Israel's attacks, underscoring a potential rift between Xi and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has fostered closer ties with Israel. The danger for China is this could be a moment that ultimately erodes its ambition to project power in the region and one that gives rise to rival infrastructure projects, such as the ambitious India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, aimed at diluting Beijing's influence. For now, it appears the reshaping of the Middle East may not work in its favour.
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Building our way out of social housing unaffordability may no longer be possible
Few would deny that social and affordable housing is in short supply in Australia. The 'social' part of this refers to homes rented out by public housing departments and not-for-profit community housing providers to very low-income Australians, usually at 25% of the tenant's income. But, as highlighted by Guardian Australia, the growing class of 'affordable rental housing' is less clearly defined. In general terms, it is a product that targets the growing population of low-to-moderate-income workers earning above the rock bottom income eligibility thresholds for a social tenancy, but who are hard-pressed to find a suitable home in the private market. The main problem this product seeks to solve is that our private rental sector has been 'going upmarket' for decades. That is, generating fewer and fewer homes affordable to people in the lowest two-fifths of the income spectrum – including those in the second income quintile, ineligible for social housing. Census-based evidence shows that, as a result, Australia's national shortfall of affordable and available private rental dwellings for renters in the second income quintile almost doubled in the 15 years to 2021 – up from 87,000 dwellings to 152,000 dwellings. The problem has been exacerbated by a quarter of a century of negligible social housing growth, even as need for such accommodation has shot up thanks to rising population and inequality. Thus, as a share of our national housing stock, social housing has declined from more than 6% in the 1990s to barely 4% today. State and territory governments have been rationing remaining tenancies ever more tightly as a result, more or less restricting these to households reliant on social security payments. This is why the low-income workers essential to the operation of the modern urban economy nowadays have next to no chance of a public or community housing tenancy. It is also one reason that Australian governments have taken a growing interest in enabling an 'affordable rental housing' product that could make it possible for people in this situation to live reasonably near their work. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email At a big picture level, this is a problem that, according to conventional wisdom, can be tackled by expanding overall housing supply. But it is doubtful that 'building our way out of housing unaffordability' is even possible. And, without major complementary actions, it is unimaginable that such a strategy could significantly moderate market rents in the short-to-medium-term future. At least in the meantime, there is a case for governments to enable affordable rental housing construction as well as invest in expanding social housing. They can do this in one of two ways. The first is by directly subsidising housebuilding – such as under federal programs, including the Housing Australia Future Fund (Haff), which promises 20,000 new affordable rental homes by 2029. The second approach is the deployment of land-use planning or tax powers to require or incentivise private providers to include affordable rental units within market-price housing developments. The New South Wales and Victorian state governments, for example, have recently introduced or beefed up 'density bonus' schemes allowing developers to build higher and bigger, provided that projects include units renting at below-market prices. Using tax powers, the federal government has adopted a similar approach for Build to Rent projects. Under schemes of this type, affordable rents are typically defined relative to comparable market rents – often capped at 75-80% of local norms. When operated in high price areas like Sydney's Bondi, such a formula of course produces rents that sound outrageous outside that local context. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion Such homes might possibly assist the junior teachers, nurses and police officers so beloved of ministerial media statements, and there is an arguable case for policymaker attention to such housing needs. But this model is liable to produce rents far out of reach for low-income essential workers. And such units are, anyway, often required to be made available for only 10-15 years. But while it would be hard to justify directly funding 'affordable housing' of this kind, such homes are, in fact, generally produced through planning or tax concessions that represent only indirect government support. It is to be hoped that, on equity grounds, the directly subsidised affordable rental housing to be generated under the Haff and other ongoing federal programs will be subsidised sufficiently to produce units genuinely affordable to the low-income worker (or second income quintile) cohort. Equally, equity considerations dictate that the bulk of government financial support for social and affordable housing should be devoted to the former. It is only through expanding our minimal remaining stock of deeply subsidised housing that we can similarly expand access to secure and affordable homes for the most disadvantaged Australians. The bigger picture here is that, despite the expanded social and affordable housing investment committed under the Albanese government, Australia is still spending nowhere near enough to decisively reverse decades of neglect in this area. The case for phasing down private landlord tax breaks, with the resulting additional revenue redirected to expanding such investment, remains compelling. Hal Pawson is a professor of housing research and policy at the University of NSW and associate director of the UNSW City Futures Research Centre. He is the lead author of the Australian Homelessness Monitor series
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Emerging market local currency debt could end decade-long drought as dollar wanes
LONDON, June 17 (Reuters) - A weakening U.S. dollar is lifting a long-neglected asset class - emerging market local currency debt - after a more than decade-long drought. Emerging market local-currency bond funds saw a new record of inflows in the week to Wednesday, according to EPFR data, notching eight straight weeks of inflows. The nascent flows remain small - and the uncertainty of tariffs, war and other global turmoil are stemming some flows. But investors expect they will continue, giving a boost to local debt markets in large emerging markets from Brazil and Mexico to Indonesia and India. "Many of the big emerging markets tell us about all the foreign buying of debt, and that is starting to pick up across some countries," said Jonny Goulden, head of emerging market fixed income strategy at JPMorgan. "This could be a potential turning point." Yields on the JPMorgan GBI Emerging Market local currency index are at their lowest since 2022 - partly a sign of flows of international cash. Emerging market local currency government bonds have enjoyed returns of more than 10% since the start of the year - more than double the around 4% delivered by the hard-currency peers, according to JPMorgan indexes. The weaker U.S. dollar, and questions over the years-long U.S. exceptionalism trade - when investors parked cash in booming assets of the world's largest economy - is nudging international investors to look elsewhere for bigger returns. The greenback slipped to its lowest level in more than three years last week. Slower global growth - and lower interest rates across the developed world - are adding to the hunt for yields. "The dollar is going to be much, much weaker. Bond yields or interest rates will fall - so there is a search for yield," said Luca Paolini, chief strategist at Pictet Asset Management. Emerging market bonds look set to be one of the main beneficiaries of that momentum, he said. The dynamics combined are helping to end the foreign investor flight from emerging markets' local currency bonds that Goulden said has lasted for some 14 years. In that time, JPMorgan estimates, the asset class has more than doubled from roughly $6 trillion to $13 trillion, with mainly local investors, and some global bond funds, buying. David Hauner, head of global emerging markets fixed income strategy at Bank of America, said that after years of a dollar bull market, and the U.S. exceptionalism trade, allocations to emerging markets were "absolutely rock bottom" - and had much space to grow. "This has been completely neglected for a long period of time, and now, people have to diversify," he said, adding he expected small but steady flows - and double-digit returns on local currency at the end of the year in dollar terms. The money is part of the closely watched global effort on the part of some international investors to diversify away from U.S. dollar holdings, and U.S. assets, after years of outsized returns that lured the bulk of the world's cash. "So far this year to date, local currency has performed very well," said Carlos de Sousa, portfolio manager at Vontobel. "That's a really direct, automatic effect" from the drop in the dollar. The fact that most emerging market central banks are broadly on a rate cutting trajectory - even as the outlook for the U.S. Federal Reserve's actions remain more mixed - is also adding to momentum. Phoenix Kalen, global head of emerging markets research at Societe Generale, called it "a rare moment of goldilocks for local assets." Local currency bonds, Kalen said, offer "compelling value," including in the Philippines, Czech Republic, Hungary, South Africa, Turkey, Brazil and Colombia. The current shift, Goulden, Hauner and others say, has not come close to reversing the years of outflows, and Hauner said it was more a "trickle" so far than a flood. But even small flows can have an outsized impact. "EM as an asset class is much smaller. So if you take out 1% from the U.S., that is basically the equivalent of 20% in emerging markets. So the impact of this flow could be quite meaningful," Bank of America's Hauner said.
