Google to offer checking accounts next year Updated 13 November 2019 Follow @arabnews
SAN JOSE, California: Alphabet Inc’s Google will offer personal checking accounts from sometime next year in partnership with Citigroup Inc.and a small credit union at Stanford University, a person familiar with Google’s plans said on Wednesday.The details of the project, named Cache, were first reported by the Wall Street Journal and follow moves by tech heavyweights Apple Inc.and Facebook Inc.into the financial industry this year.Facebook’s plan to launch its Libra cryptocurrency has met with skepticism from regulators, worried about the risk of money laundering and the security of transactions and user data.But there are also broader concerns about how the big tech companies’ will use their massive digital influence in other areas of business and economic infrastructure.“Our approach is going to be to partner deeply with banks and the financial system,” Caesar Sengupta, general manager and vice president of payments at Google, told the Journal in an interview.“It may be the slightly longer path, but it’s more sustainable,” Sengupta was quoted as saying.Asked about Google’s plans, US Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat on the Senate panel that oversees banking, said he was “a tech guy,” but that he had some reservations.Warner told CNBC in an interview on Wednesday his concern was that tech giants like Facebook or Google were entering new fields before there were some regulatory rules of the road in place.“I think there ought to be very strict scrutiny,” he added.On Tuesday, Facebook launched a unified payment service through which users across its platforms can make payments without exiting the app, named Facebook Pay, which is separate from its Libra project.The Google Pay service by the search giant is already popular in countries like India, where it has over 67 million monthly users and is used to pay for everything from groceries to Uber rides.Oil recoups losses as OPEC, US Fed see robust economy US-China trade deal will help remove ‘dark cloud’ over oil, says Barkindo Updated 14 November 2019 Reuters November 14, 2019 00:09
LONDON: Oil prices reversed early losses on Wednesday after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) said it saw no signs of global recession and rival US shale oil production could grow by much less than expected in 2020.
Also supporting prices were comments by US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who said the US economy would see a “sustained expansion” with the full impact of recent interest rate cuts still to be felt.
Brent crude futures stood roughly flat at around $62 per barrel by 1450 GMT, having fallen by over 1 percent earlier in the day.US West Texas Intermediate crude was at $56 per barrel, up 20 cents or 0.4 percent.
“The baseline outlook remains favorable,” Powell said.
OPEC Secretary-General Mohammad Barkindo said global economic fundamentals remained strong and that he was still confident that the US and China would reach a trade deal.
“It will almost remove that dark cloud that had engulfed the global economy,” Barkindo said, adding it was too early to discuss the output policy of OPEC’s December meeting.HIGH LIGHT US oil production likely to grow by just 0.3-0.4 million barrels per day next year — or less than half of previous expectations.
The prospects for ‘US crude exports had turned bleak after shipping rates jumped last month.’
He also said some US companies were now saying US oil production would grow by just 0.3-0.4 million barrels per day next year — or less than half of previous expectations — reducing the risk of an oil glut next year.
US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday Washington and Beijing were close to finalizing a trade deal, but he fell short of providing a date or venue for the signing ceremony.
“The expectations of an inventory build in the US and uncertainty over the OPEC+ strategy on output cuts and US/China trade deal are weighing on oil prices,” said analysts at ING, including the head of commodity strategy Warren Patterson.
In the US, crude oil inventories were forecast to have risen for a third straight week last week, while refined products inventories likely declined, a preliminary Reuters poll showed on Tuesday.
ANZ analysts said the prospects for US crude exports had turned bleak after shipping rates jumped last month..
