Business news with words billion+capital. 60 or more news.

BEIJING (Reuters) - China on Monday announced a $20 billion capital injection into China Development Bank, one of the country's three policy lenders, as part of a long-planned transformation of the state-owned company into a commercial bank.

Philippine merchandise imports rose 9.6 percent year-on-year to US$5.1 billion in October due largely to the sharp rise in oil imports and capital goods, the National Statistics Office said Friday.

Kishore Biyani-promoted Future Capital Holdings has received the regulatory go-ahead from Sebi for its initial public offer, estimated to raise between Rs 400-500 crore (Rs 4-5 billion).

Shares of Sallie Mae continued to slide yesterday after the nation's largest student lender announced it will seek up to $2.5 billion of additional capital to shore up its beleaguered balance sheet. The Virginia-based company said in public...

Goldman Sachs took the knife to its Wall Street rivals yesterday, predicting that the credit crunch would force Citigroup to slash its dividend by 40 per cent. At the same time it emerged that Merrill Lynch was preparing to cut 1,600 jobs from its trading desks. William Tanona, a leading Goldman Sachs analyst, said that Citigroup, the world’s largest bank, would have to cut its payout to shareholders to preserve its capital position and write off $18 billion ($£9 billion) of assets in the fourth quarter, compared with earlier estimates of $11 billion. Goldman said that Citigroup would need fresh capital of between $5 billion and $10 billion in addition to a recent $7.5 billion commitment from the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. Under that deal, the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund is protected from a possible dividend cut, as it bought Citigroup bonds convertible into stock. The bonds, which will vest into a 5 per cent shareholding on conversion, pay an annual coupon of 11 per cent, compared with the existing dividend yield for shareholders of 7.3 per cent. Citigroup$’s largest shareholders include Capital Research & Management, with 4.6 per cent, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who controls 3.97 per cent, and Barclays Global Investors, with 3.76 per cent. Mr Tanona said that he had raised his loss estimates for Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan and forecast that, combined with Citigroup, the three will have chalked up $33.6 billion of writedowns in the fourth quarter. Goldman said it now forecast that Merrill and JPMorgan would record increased writedowns of $11.5 billion and $3.4 billion respectively $– up from $6 billion and $1.7 billion. Most of the writedowns are linked to the banks$’ exposure to collateralised debt obligations, special debt instruments that were invested in risky assets, such as US sub-prime mortgages. Mr Tanona said: “We still believe it will be a couple of quarters before the current credit crisis is fully digested by the markets.”

CITIGROUP Inc, the biggest US bank, may cut its dividend by 40 percent to preserve capital and write down more fixed income securities than it has told investors to expect, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. The New York bank may write off US$18.7 billion in collateralized debt obligations such as subprime mortgages, up from its November 4 estimate of as much as US$11 billion, Goldman's William F. Tanona wrote in a note on Wednesday. Citigroup, which paid out 54 cents each quarter this year, will have to raise US$6.2 billion in extra capital to reach its target, they wrote. "It will be a couple of quarters before the current credit crisis is fully digested by the markets," wrote Tanona, who has a "sell" rating on the stock. "Given the magnitude of the writedowns we assume and Citi's remaining exposure, we believe the firm has a serious need to preserve or raise additional capital." Chief Executive Officer Charles O. "Chuck" Prince III

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Citigroup Inc (C.N) may need to slash its dividend 40 percent to preserve capital, and with Merrill Lynch & Co (MER.N) and JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) may write off $33.6 billion of debt this quarter as the global credit crunch deepens, a Goldman Sachs & Co analyst said.

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Swiss bank UBS said Thursday that it will ask shareholders to approve its plan to raise capital at a meeting scheduled for Feb. 27. UBS said earlier in December that two strategic investors -- one of which is the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation -- intend to subscribe for 13 billion Swiss francs of mandatory convertible notes. The subscription is intended to strengthen the firm's capital base. Shares in UBS rose 2.1% in Swiss trading.

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Merrill Lynch may write off between $4 billion and $7 billion this quarter, according to a note from CIBC World Markets analyst Meredith Whitney following the U.S. firm's capital boost on Monday. She previously estimated write-downs of $6 billion. "Merrill Lynch accomplished the first step in what we expect to be a several step process with this capital raise. Next step should be further asset disposals and purging of its balance sheet. But we believe the most disruptive step of true structural reorganization/right sizing will dominate the bulk of 2008," she told clients.

Quintiles tapped Bain Capital and 3i Group as new investors under a recapitalization deal valued at over $3 billion for the health-care services company.

UNITED Rentals Inc has agreed to accept a US$100 million breakup fee from Cerberus Capital Management LP, ending a six week battle over whether Cerberus could call off a US$4 billion acquisition of the largest US equipment-rental company. United Rentals rose 4.4 percent in New York trading after a 17 percent decline on December 21, when a Delaware Chancery Court judge ruled that private-equity firm Cerberus had the right to break off the takeover, Bloomberg News reported. United Rentals said it would not appeal and Cerberus said it would pay the fee. Cerberus agreed in July to pay US$34.50 per share for United Rentals' stock and backed out in November. Judge William B. Chandler III ruled last week that United Rentals should have known Cerberus had a right to pull out if it paid the US$100 million fee. "The decision out of Delaware was very clear," said Carl Tobias, a professor with the University of Richmond.

Cerberus Capital Management L.P. agreed Monday to pay United Rentals Inc. a US$100 million (euro69.4 million) breakup fee for dropping its US$4 billion (euro2.78 billion) purchase of the equipment-rental company.

THE Agricultural Bank of China will launch its long-expected restructuring plan soon, the central bank governor said yesterday. The restructuring plan will be decided soon to elevate the bank into a strong and internationally competitive bank, Zhou Xiaochuan, the governor of the People's Bank of China, said yesterday at a financial forum in Beijing. Zhou said China's financial institutions should actively be engaged in the development of the agricultural sector, which is ABC's main focus. He added that the restructuring will start next year. Central Huijin Investment Co, which recently merged with China Investment Corp, will be involved in the restructuring of China Development Bank and ABC, said Lou Jiwei, chairman of the CIC, the country's sovereign wealth fund, at the forum. Deputy Finance Minister Li Yong was reported as saying earlier that one-third of the CIC's US$200 billion start-up capital, or US$66 billion, will be injected into China Development Bank and ABC for

CHINA'S military enterprises are encouraged to conduct group listings and are expected to raise between 50 billion yuan (US$6.75 billion) and 60 billion yuan from public share sales by the end of 2010, a senior official said. The majority of these enterprises will complete their reform to turn into shareholding companies in five years, which paves the way to trade shares publicly, said Wu Fenglai, head of the Reform Department under China's Commission of Science Technology and Industry for National Defense. In his article published yesterday in the China Securities Journal, Wu noted that military enterprises, except wholly state-owned ones, welcome foreign investment. Depending on their influence in national security, the country's military enterprises are divided into wholly state-owned, state-controlled and state-invested. "Most of China's military enterprises are allowed to source funds from the capital market and foreign investors," said Wu. China issued a new

CHINA Investment Corp, the US$200 billion fund that last week invested US$5 billion in Morgan Stanley, has denied it bought a stake in the Australia & New Zealand Banking Group, Bloomberg News reported today. "We didn't buy any stake," Lou Jiwei, chairman of Beijing-based China Investment, said at a press event without elaborating. He also denied buying a stake in China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. The central government is loosening restrictions on overseas investment to counter inflows from a record trade surplus that has driven up local stock and property prices. Investing more money abroad will help cool the world's fastest-growing major economy and diversify risk for China's more than US$1.4 trillion of foreign-exchange reserves, the world's largest. Lou said on November 29 that CIC "wants to be a stabilizing force in the international capital markets." He cited a "recent example" in which a similar fund invested in a financial firm that had

KAZAKHSTAN is seeking to more than double its stake in the Eni SpA-led Kashagan oil project as compensation for delays and cost overruns. The Central Asian country's government is seeking to raise its stake to 16.8 percent, Dinara Shaimardanova, an aide to Energy Minister Sauat Mynbayev, told Bloomberg News by phone yesterday from the Kazakh capital, Astana. The state now holds 8.3 percent. The government has disputed a second delay to the start of production at Kashagan, the world's biggest oil discovery in 30 years, and an increase in costs that it says have more than doubled the price for developing and running the field to US$136 billion. Kazakhstan and the group of companies led by Eni extended talks on the dispute until January 15 as Exxon Mobil Corp opposes the increase of the Kazakh stake, Shaimardanova said on Monday. Eni, Exxon, Total SA and Royal Dutch Shell Plc all hold 18.5 percent of Kashagan, while ConocoPhillips has 9.3 percent. KazMunaiGaz National Co,

INVESTOR William Ackman raised his stake in Target Corp, the second-biggest discount chain in the United States, and held talks with management on increasing the stock price. Ackman controls 10 percent of the company, up from 9.6 percent earlier this year, his Pershing Square Capital Management LP said on Monday in a regulatory filing, according to Bloomberg News. Pershing is seeking share repurchases and the sale of Target's credit-card loans, as well as "some kind of real estate transaction," a person familiar with the firm's plans said, declining to elaborate. Target has said it's evaluating whether to sell its US$7 billion credit-card portfolio and will make a decision in the first three months of 2008. Target's shares have declined 18 percent since Ackman amassed his stake in July. Pershing's holdings include stock and options to buy the shares. With swap contracts, Ackman has an "economic" interest in Target of almost 12.6 percent, up from 10.2 percent

United Rentals Inc. agreed to accept a $100 million breakup fee from Cerberus Capital Management LP, ending a six-week battle over whether Cerberus could call off a $4 billion acquisition of the largest US equipment-rental company. United Rentals...

Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain yesterday made his first significant move to address the firm's ongoing subprime woes by accepting a $6.2 billion cash infusion and selling a majority stake in its middle-market lending arm to GE Capital. The bid for...

CHINA Pacific Insurance (Group) Co Ltd shares fell back slightly in afternoon trade on the Shanghai Stock Exchange after this morning's stellar debut. The shares opened at a premium of 70 percent to their IPO price and sold as high as 51.97 yuan (US$7.09) before settling back to finish the day at 48.17 yuan -- 60.57 percent above the issue price of 30 yuan. The company issued one billion A shares on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, making it the third insurer listed on the Chinese mainland after its larger rivals China Life and Ping An Insurance. China has urged its largest financial firms to sell stock domestically to give mainland investors more choices. The A shares account for 12.99 percent of China Pacific's expanded share capital and the money raised through the domestic listing will be used to replenish capital to help expand the business, its prospectus said. Shenzhen-based Ping An, the nation's second-biggest insurer, raised US$5 billion in February in the world's