Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. is close to securing a $935 million loan to back its purchase of air cargo specialist World Freight Co. , according to people familiar with the matter, the latest in a recent spate of acquisition financings in Asia. The investment firm signed the loan documents last week, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private matters. The loan will be effe...
Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. is close to securing a $935 million loan to back its purchase of air cargo specialist World Freight Co. , according to people familiar with the matter, the latest in a recent spate of acquisition financings in Asia. The investment firm signed the loan documents last week, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private matters. The loan will be effective once Brookfield’s purchase of World Freight from its previous owners, EQT AB and PAI Partners , is completed, the people said. The lending facility carries a five-year tenor and is covenant-lite, the people said, giving the borrower greater flexibility through fewer ongoing performance requirements. MUFG, Barclays and HSBC are arranging and underwriting the loan, the people added. Representatives for Brookfield and PAI declined to comment, while EQT said it isn’t “able to comment on market speculation.” World Freight didn’t respond to a request for comment. The loan deal is part of a flurry of acquisition funding across Asia Pacific, particularly in Australia. In March, US buyout giant Bain Capital LP secured a A$430 million ($312 million) loan for its purchase of the Australian wealth management unit of Perpetual Ltd ., while Macquarie Asset Management Pty -led group is seeking a A$4.95 billion facility to finance its purchase of Qube Holdings Ltd . Despite the recent activity, the overall market remains sluggish as the Middle East conflict has raised concerns about energy supplies and global economy growth . Acquisition buyout loans in Asia Pacific excluding Japan so far this year are down nearly 61% from the year-earlier period to $4.95 billion, according to Bloomberg-compiled data. Formed in 2004, World Freight invests in general sales and services agencies specializing in air cargo. Its more than 300 portfolio companies operate across 80 countries and manage over 3 million tons of cargo capacity annually for airline partners, according to its website .
Gri-spb/iStock via Getty Images By James Smith , Developed Markets Economist, UK We just aren't convinced by the UK's first quarter growth performance. GDP rose by 0.6%, up from 0.2% in the fourth quarter of 2025. It follows a now-familiar pattern; since 2022, UK growth figures have come in much stronger in the first three months of the year than the rest. Growth has averaged 0.6% in Q1 over that ...
Gri-spb/iStock via Getty Images By James Smith , Developed Markets Economist, UK We just aren't convinced by the UK's first quarter growth performance. GDP rose by 0.6%, up from 0.2% in the fourth quarter of 2025. It follows a now-familiar pattern; since 2022, UK growth figures have come in much stronger in the first three months of the year than the rest. Growth has averaged 0.6% in Q1 over that period, a sharp contrast to Q3, where the economy has typically flatlined. Why? It’s hard to say exactly what’s happening. But it seems that something’s not quite right with the way the data is being seasonally adjusted, a legacy we suspect of higher inflation and the timing of annual price hikes. To its credit, the Office for National Statistics has confirmed today it has made some changes to previous years and is keeping its methods under review. UK GDP has become very seasonal Source: Macrobond, ING That’s not to say the UK economy didn’t grow at all in Q1. Surveys point to an underlying trend closer to 0.2-0.3%, which certainly isn’t terrible. Notwithstanding those seasonal issues, retail spending looks solid. The purchasing managers' indices had a decent start to the quarter, too. We’re keeping a keen eye on IT, which contributed 0.3pp of the 1.2% year-on-year growth we saw in March, despite only having a 6% weight in GDP. That has been consistently the case and might point to some tailwinds from AI. We know, for instance, that the UK is at the forefront of Europe’s efforts to build data centre capacity, though the evidence is mixed on exactly how much this is boosting Britain’s economy. A surge in industrial-related construction in the first half of 2025 has since reversed. And when we look at import data, Britain hasn’t seen the surge in computer-related equipment that the US has experienced. One to watch this year. Speaking of construction, this is another area that seems to have had a more stable first quarter after a horrendous end to 2025. Private housebuilding h...
Welcome to the Thursday issue of India Edition; I’m Menaka Doshi . Each week, I bring you a ringside view of the billionaires, businesses and policy decisions behind India’s rise as an emerging economic powerhouse. You can subscribe here , and share feedback with me here . This week: Mango nostalgia, when Xi met Trump and a big bet on coal gasification. Mouth-Watering Opportunity Mumbai’s searing ...
Welcome to the Thursday issue of India Edition; I’m Menaka Doshi . Each week, I bring you a ringside view of the billionaires, businesses and policy decisions behind India’s rise as an emerging economic powerhouse. You can subscribe here , and share feedback with me here . This week: Mango nostalgia, when Xi met Trump and a big bet on coal gasification. Mouth-Watering Opportunity Mumbai’s searing heat has sent me down memory lane to school summer vacations replete with mango feasts and sticky fingers. We’d sit cross-legged on the floor, vying for spots under the cool breeze of a ceiling fan. The typical aamras, or mango puree, production line was a child-adult-child formation. One of us kids would knead the mangoes to soften their pulp before passing it on to an adult who’d gently squeeze the nectar into a giant vessel. The skin and kernel then passed to the child at the end of the line to scrape off the last remaining pulp using the sharp edge of another vessel. All that hard work was rewarded by a big lunch and repeat servings of the morning’s labor. As I reminisce, Mumbai-based Kay Bee Exports has a 100,000-mango consignment en route to the US, where such nostalgia is driving diaspora customers to buy Indian mangoes at over four times the price of Mexican ones. Memories, aspirational values and widening distribution have seen sales “zoom up,” Kaushal Khakhar, the founder’s son and company CEO, tells me. The US is now India’s second-largest export market for mangoes and Kay Bee is its largest supplier. The company’s March-to-July season runs something like this – harvest the fruit on a Monday, pack on Tuesday, irradiate on Wednesday and fly the boxes out that night to land in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and a dozen other American cities by Friday, reaching over 100 Indian grocery stores in time for weekend sales that make up 70% of the business. Sometimes Kay Bee hires students with rented U-hauls to reach towns where direct imports are tough. Kesar and Alphons...
alexsl Stock index futures rose Thursday as investors awaited updates on U.S.-China diplomatic talks. S&P 500 futures ( SPX ) gained 0.23% to 7,461.25, Nasdaq 100 futures ( US100:IND ) added 0.22% to 29,431.97, and Dow futures ( INDU ) advanced 0.33% to 49,859.59. U.S. President Donald Trump met Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday morning, launching a high-stakes summit expected to sp...
alexsl Stock index futures rose Thursday as investors awaited updates on U.S.-China diplomatic talks. S&P 500 futures ( SPX ) gained 0.23% to 7,461.25, Nasdaq 100 futures ( US100:IND ) added 0.22% to 29,431.97, and Dow futures ( INDU ) advanced 0.33% to 49,859.59. U.S. President Donald Trump met Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday morning, launching a high-stakes summit expected to span two days and focus on trade, tariffs, Taiwan, and Iran. U.S. Treasury yields were little changed. The 10-year Treasury yield ( US10Y ) edged up 0.2 basis points to 4.47%, while the 2-year Treasury yield ( US2Y ) dipped 0.6 basis points to 3.99%. The 30-year Treasury yield ( US30Y ) slipped 0.1 basis points to 5.04%. On the economic calendar, initial jobless claims, retail sales, import and export prices, and the Fed balance sheet are due. Federal Reserve speakers on tap include Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmid, New York Fed President John Williams, and Fed Governor Michael Barr. Top gainers in premarket trading included Cisco Systems ( CSCO ) +19.76%, Hewlett Packard Enterprise ( HPE ) +5.55%, and Xylem ( XYL ) +2.93%. Decliners included Crown Castle ( CCI ) -2.42%, Erie Indemnity ( ERIE ) -2.00%, and Texas Pacific Land ( TPL ) -1.94%. More on markets Kevin Warsh Gets Confirmed For Fed Chairman - Reactions For Dow Jones, Nasdaq And S&P 500 Making Sense Of The Market Rally Headline Inflation Cooled In April, But Core Pressures Picked Up At a glance: stocks gapping down premarket At a glance: stocks gapping up premarket
Last year, when we talked to Martin Wolf, the global order seemed like it was being upended after President Trump unveiled his sweeping tariffs against nearly every US trading partner. A lot has happened since then. Today we speak with Wolf, the chief economics commentator for the Financial Times, about all this chaos and why, so far, it seems disconnected from the logic of the market. There is, h...
Last year, when we talked to Martin Wolf, the global order seemed like it was being upended after President Trump unveiled his sweeping tariffs against nearly every US trading partner. A lot has happened since then. Today we speak with Wolf, the chief economics commentator for the Financial Times, about all this chaos and why, so far, it seems disconnected from the logic of the market. There is, he says, a great deal of ruin in the world economy, but growth remains a constant fact of life. Why is that? There's no straightforward answer, but to begin understanding how we got here, Wolf takes us to the early 20th century and paints us a picture of the world after the two World Wars. We also talk about the "terrifying" power that the US wields over the globe, how a fragmented Europe is navigating anxious relationships with both the US and China, the Faustian bargain AI represents, and much more. (Source: Bloomberg)