The initiative pushes for the systematic inclusion of clauses in new public and commercial lending

International News via Reuters:

A number of wealthy creditor nations and multilateral lenders have launched an initiative that aims to give sovereign borrowers breathing space on debt payments in the event of a climate or humanitarian crisis, Spain said on Tuesday.

The Debt Suspension Clause Alliance was launched during a U.N. conference in Seville – a once in a decade meeting aimed at furthering development finance goals and guidelines.

The initiative pushes for the systematic inclusion of clauses in new public and commercial lending that allow for a temporary suspension of debt payments in the face of extraordinary events, such as natural disasters, food crises or health emergencies.

“The logic behind these clauses is simple but powerful: to create immediate fiscal space in times of greatest need, allowing countries to focus their resources on response and recovery without risking their solvency or ability to meet social spending,” said economy minister Carlos Cuerpo.

Speaking on the sidelines of the conference, Spain’s Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares told Reuters that the suspension clause for debt repayments could also cover war.

The governments of Canada, France and Britain were among the co-leaders of the initiative together with multilateral banks, including the Inter-American Development Bank, the European Investment Bank, the African Development Bank, the Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean and the Asian Development Bank.

Deutsche Bank has become the first private institution to join the initiative, Cuerpo later told a press conference in Seville, without giving details on what this would mean in practice for Germany’s largest bank.

“What we want is to… advance in standardizing the different concepts within these clauses, expand their application, and also be able to broaden their ability to open up more fiscal space when it would be needed going forward,” Cuerpo said.

Deutsche Bank declined to provide additional details.

A number of multilateral lenders have already added such clauses in their lending – including inserting them retroactively in some existing loans.

The Inter-American Development Bank said in the statement on Tuesday that adding climate-resilient debt clauses in sovereign loans had extended $3.2 billion in protection across several countries. It said it would expand this to more nations and broaden its scope.

The European Investment Bank last year made climate-resilient debt clauses available to 70 developing countries.

The World Bank – one of the biggest multilateral development lenders – has also broadened the scope of its Climate Resilient Debt Clauses for the most vulnerable countries in recent years.

Reporting by David Latona in Seville and Karin Strohecker in London, additional reporting by Virginia Furness in London and Tom Sims in Frankfurt, editing by Ros Russell

“Investors are looking at options” in a climate characterised by uncertainty and unpredictability

International News via Reuters:

There is no prospect of a major challenge to the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency of choice any time soon, central bankers gathered for an annual conference in the Portuguese resort of Sintra said on Tuesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s unpredictable economic, trade and security policies have spurred questions over whether the U.S. currency, which accounts for 58% of the world’s reserves, can remain at the centre of the global monetary system.

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde, who has argued the euro could over time become an alternative to the dollar if Europe’s currency zone enacted necessary reforms, said 2025 could in future be viewed as “pivotal” in this respect.

“(But) for a major change to occur it will take a lot of time and a lot of effort,” she told a panel with her U.S., British, Japanese and Korean counterparts.

She noted that “investors are looking at options” in a climate characterised by uncertainty and unpredictability and that there was evidence that the euro was benefiting from that.

“It’s not going to happen just like that overnight. It never did historically,” she said. “But there is clearly something that has been broken. Whether it is fixable, or whether it is going to continue to be broken – I think the jury’s out.”

Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda also noted that any significant change would depend on structural reforms.

“It’s to a certain extent up to what areas like Europe or China will do in terms of improving the efficiency or convenience of their currencies,” he said, citing as an example the efforts at capital market integration in the euro zone.

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said any change to the dollar’s status was a long way off.

“I don’t see … a sort of a major shift at the moment,” he said, arguing that any reserve currency had to offer a supply of safe assets into the market that can be used for purposes of collateral and security.

Bank of Korea Governor Rhee Chang-yong said the prospect of a long-term shift of the dollar sentiment was a subject of discussion for some even as they retained their dollar holdings.

“It looks like people are talking about it. But at this moment they keep the dollar share while increasing their hedging ratio,” he told the panel.

Lagarde told a recent audience in Berlin that there was an opening for a “global euro moment”, if it earned it.

She said Europe would need to build a deeper, more liquid capital market, bolster its legal foundations and underpin its commitment to open trade with security capabilities.

While the dollar’s current share of international reserves is the lowest it has been in decades, its 58% tally is still well above the euro’s 20% share.

Writing by Mark John. Editing by Mark Potter

The slowdown comes after a record number of corporate agitators made demands

International News via Reuters:

Activist investors who push companies for operational changes and management shake-ups waged fewer campaigns during the first half of 2025 as tariffs, wars and U.S. President Donald Trump’s unpredictable policies made them more cautious, new data show.

The pace of investor demands, aimed at pushing up a company’s share price, fell 12% to 129 campaigns launched during the first six months of 2025, compared with 147 a year ago, according to numbers compiled by investment bank Barclays.

“The environment was shaped by mixed economic signals, fears about wars and geopolitical tensions and the instability created by future tariffs and trade wars,” said Jim Rossman, global head of shareholder advisory at Barclays. “And taken together that is creating an environment of caution.”

The slowdown comes after a record number of corporate agitators made demands last year and the pace of campaigns jumped by 17% in the first three months of this year.

Elliott Investment Management, among the world’s most powerful corporate activists, pressed for changes at six companies, including BP and Hewlett Packard Enterprise, roughly half the number of campaigns it launched a year ago. But it deployed $8.8 billion in assets, the most of any activist this year.

Also so-called first-timers who were becoming more comfortable employing activist tactics last year stepped to the sidelines late in the first half.

During the second quarter when stock markets gyrated as Trump threatened harsher tariffs only to reverse course before suggesting them again, campaigns launched by first-timers dropped 27% from the first quarter of this year, the data show.

But the slowdown does not hint at a pause in activity or suggest activist investors are going soft, Rossman said.

Corporate agitators, including Mantle Ridge, Ancora Holdings and Jana Partners have, as a group, forced bigger changes at companies in the first half of this year than a year ago, the data show.

Settlements between activist investors and companies jumped 32% to 37 in the first half of 2025 and left activists with 86 board seats, marking a 16% increase. They won seats, often a measure of success for activists, at companies ranging from industrial gases maker Air Products and Chemicals to food processing company Lamb Weston.

“As a group activists are having a strong year, winning settlements and board seats and managing to engage with a number of companies privately,” Rossman said.

Most activists continue to focus their attention on companies in the United States with 60 campaigns launched, down from 61 a year earlier. There were 37 campaigns in Japan, down from 51 a year ago. Activity in Europe declined by 17% to 24 campaigns launched in the first half compared with a year ago.

Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Stephen Coates