France's SocGen to shut 600 branches by 2025 by merging retail networks

 

PARIS (Reuters) - France's Societe Generale said on Monday it expected to close 600 branches in France by 2025 with the converging of its two retail banking networks Societe Generale and Credit du Nord.

France's third-greatest recorded moneylender said blending the two organizations would spare in excess of 350 million euros ($424 million) in expenses in 2024 and almost 450 million euros in 2025.

"The organization will consequently change from around 2,100 branches toward the finish of 2020 to around 1,500 toward the finish of 2025," it said.

The bank likewise said its online bank Boursorama was focusing on 4.5 million customers in 2025 from 2.5 million of every 2020.

"Having won in excess of 2 million clients in five years, Boursorama means to proceed with its ventures pointed toward onboarding new clients throughout the following not many years," SocGen said.

Boursorama is required to post an aggregate loss of around 230 million euros until 2023, the moneylender added.

The online unit anticipates an overall gain of 100 million euros in 2023 and 200 million euros in 2025.

SocGen Chief Executive Frederic Oudea has quickened activities to upgrade the bank to support its productivity.

The bank put its value and credit organized items organizations under survey prior in the year after by and large tasks were hit by market instability and profit scratch-offs due to the Covid emergency.

SocGen has likewise left lately regions where it needed scale, selling units and exercises in eastern and focal European nations, for example, Poland, Bulgaria and Albania.

G7 unity under stress as it wrestles with Iran, Amazon fires and trade

Current Affairs

G7 leaders close their summit on Monday with discussion of world problems including the fires ravaging the Amazon rainforest, but overshadowed by President Donald Trump's trade wars and questions over the group's unity.
The summit in Biarritz, a high-end surfers' paradise in southwestern France, saw a dramatic shift of focus Saturday when Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif flew in to discuss the diplomatic deadlock on Tehran's disputed nuclear programme.
Zarif's presence had not been expected and it represented a gamble by French host Emmanuel Macron who is seeking to soothe spiralling tensions between Iran and the United States.
The Iranian top diplomat didn't meet Trump, French diplomats said, but the presence of the two men in the same place at least sparked hopes of a detente. Just this July, the US government imposed heavy sanctions seeking to hamper Zarif's travel, and effectively banning him from the United States.
"Road ahead is difficult. But worth trying," the US-educated Zarif tweeted after meeting Macron and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, as well as British and German representatives.
French officials said Trump, who has imposed crippling sanctions on the Iranian economy over its nuclear programme, had been aware of the arrival.

 The sources suggested that the secretive visit had also been discussed during an impromptu two-hour lunch between the US president and Macron on Saturday."We work with full transparency with the Americans," one diplomat told reporters on condition of anonymity, despite US media reports that the White House had been taken by surprise...Read More

British insurer Aviva overhauls UK biz, plans to cut 1,800 jobs globally

Company News

British insurer Aviva will change the structure of its UK business and cut costs across the firm, with the loss of 1,800 jobs, it said on Thursday.
Aviva said it would make cost cuts of 300 million pounds ($380.22 million) over three years, in a statement ahead of its first investor day under new Chief Executive Maurice Tulloch.
The cost base in 2018 was four billion pounds, an Aviva spokeswoman said.
Following the departure of Andy Briggs, head of the life and general insurer's UK business and a contender for the top job, Aviva said it would review its UK life and general insurance businesses.
Its UK digital business, housed in a former garage in the City's tech district, will be incorporated into the general insurance business, Aviva said.
Angela Darlington has been appointed interim Chief Executive Officer of UK life and Colm Holmes CEO of general insurance across the group, including Britain.
"Today is the first step in our plan to make Aviva simpler, more competitive and more commercial," Tulloch said in the statement. "Reducing Aviva's costs is essential."
Aviva employs 30,000 people and its international markets include Canada, France, Ireland and Asia.

 Aviva said trading to date had been in line with 2018 and reiterated its commitment to a progressive dividend policy.

How will Trump's trade war end? The US-UK war of 1812 may have the answer

International News
President Donald Trump’s escalating trade war against China has drawn plenty of historical parallels.
The Chinese like to invoke the 19th-century Opium Wars and the national humiliation that followed.
In the U.S. the comparison is increasingly to the Cold War against the Soviet Union, or the 1980s trade wars against Japan.

Ask Douglas Irwin, author of “Clashing Over Commerce: A History of U.S. Trade Policy,” however, and he argues the most accurate comparison from an American perspective is the War of 1812.
That conflict was born out of a trade war (a British embargo of France) and fought at least partly as a trade war (a British blockade of America). It also yielded another trade war.

Once the war was won, it prompted calls for a decoupling from a British economy with which America’s was deeply integrated, Irwin said. And like the current calls related to China, that was based on a bigger existential question for the U.S.

“We wanted to reduce our dependence on Britain, which was viewed as an enemy power,’’ said Irwin, a professor at Dartmouth.

Higher Stakes

In response, Washington began imposing higher tariffs on British goods to protect what it declared to be strategic U.S. industries.


 That action grew into manufacturers’ calls for protection from cheap British imports that would become a feature of political debate through the 19th century...Read More

Kerala's tourism footfall in 2018 at half its population: Minister

Economy & Policy:

Kerala collected Rs 36,528.01 crore as revenues from tourism last year: an increase of Rs 2,874.33 crore over last year.

Over 16.7 million tourists, both domestic and foreign, visited Kerala in 2018, compared to 15.76 million the previous year, recording an increase of 5.93 per cent.
Of the total footfalls, 1.09 million were foreign tourists. The share of revenue from foreign visitors touched Rs 8,764.46 crore. There was also a spurt in arrival of domestic tourists to the southern state. United Kingdom (UK) accounted for the largest number of foreign visitors, at 200,000, followed by the United States, France, Germany and Saudi Arabia. The number of visitors from other European countries such as Sweden and Italy also rose during the period.

In the first quarter of calender year 2018, tourist arrivals to the state recorded a 12.3 per cent growth of foreign visitors and a 20 per cent rise of domestic tourists.
The Nipah outbreak in May and the floods in August affected arrivals.
“The number of tourists who visited Kerala in 2018 touched almost half the state’s population. This impressive growth has been achieved against the century’s most severe deluge,” said Kerala's tourism minister Kadakampally Surendran.

"It was through hard work and determination of the Tourism Department, tourism trade and the coordinated efforts of other government departments that the state had been able to achieve this impressive growth,” said Secretary of Kerala Tourism department Rani George.

 Tourism Director Shri P Bala Kiran said tourist arrivals in the state last year had been both inspiring.