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RIYADH — The chairman of Saudi National Bank (SNB), the main shareholder of troubled lender Credit Suisse which was bought out this month, has resigned, a statement said on Monday.

The Saudi bank's board of directors "accepted the resignation" of Ammar Al Khudairy "due to personal reasons", said the statement published on the Saudi stock exchange.

Credit Suisse's shares plummeted on March 15 after Al Khudairy said the Saudi bank would not raise its stake from 9.8 per cent due to regulatory constraints.

The following day, Credit Suisse rallied on the stock market after grabbing a $54 billion central bank lifeline in a bid to restore investor confidence.

But fears about the health of the broader financial sector led to its takeover by domestic rival UBS on March 19.

In the aftermath of his comments, Al Khudairy tried to minimise what he described as a "panic". 

"If you look at how the entire banking sector has dropped, unfortunately, a lot of people were just looking for excuses," he told CNBC television.

"It's panic, a little bit of panic. I believe completely unwarranted, whether it be for Credit Suisse or for the entire market."

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Saudi National Bank's $1.5 billion investment in Credit Suisse was made at the behest of the kingdom's de facto ruler, Mohammed Bin Salman.

It said that some officials at the Saudi sovereign wealth fund thought the move "was too risky... raising legal issues and the potential for large future losses".

'Multiple failures' 

In an interview with AFP following Al Khudairy's comments, Saudi Finance Minister Mohammed Al Jadaan did not comment on specific financial institutions but said "multiple failures" including on the regulatory front had fuelled troubles in the banking sector — "whether it is supervisory, whether it is management, whether it is concentration, whether it is mismatch of asset liability".

He added that he did not believe those risks applied to Saudi Arabia. 

"Just focusing on Saudi, you will go back to history, and you will hear a lot of comments that the two regulators in Saudi Arabia are quite conservative. And that's what we then benefit from in a situation of distress," he said. 

A media report on Sunday said the Swiss financial regulator Finma was probing how to hold bosses at Credit Suisse to account following its emergency takeover by UBS. 

"We are not a penal authority but we are exploring the corresponding possibilities," Finma chair Marlene Amstad was quoted as saying in an interview with NZZ am Sonntag weekly. 

Saeed Mohammed Al Ghamdi, who had been serving as Saudi National Bank's CEO, will replace Al Khudairy as chair, Monday's statement said. 

Talal Ahmed Al Khereiji has been appointed acting CEO, it said.

NEW YORK — Elon Musk has put the current value of Twitter at $20 billion, less than half the $44 billion he paid for the social media platform just five months ago, according to an internal e-mail seen by American news media.

The e-mail to employees referred to a new stock compensation programme in the San Francisco-based company and the allocation of shares to employees of X Holdings, Twitter's umbrella company since Musk purchased it in late October.

The compensation plan values the platform at $20 billion, slightly more than Snapchat's parent company Snap ($18.2 billion) or Pinterest ($18.7 billion), both of which are publicly traded, unlike Twitter. 

Musk, who is also the chief executive of Tesla Inc. and aerospace group SpaceX, said that Twitter would allow its employees to cash in shares every six months. 

A query from AFP emailed to Twitter's communications department generated an automatic response in the form of a poop emoji.

In the internal email, Musk describes the brutal contraction in Twitter's value. He says the platform faced such grave financial difficulties that at one point it was on the verge of bankruptcy.

"Twitter was trending to lose ~$3B/year," Musk said in a message posted Saturday on the platform.

He cited a revenue drop of $1.5 billion a year and a debt-servicing burden of the same amount — leaving it with "only 4 months of money".

Musk, Twitter's majority shareholder, added simply: "Extremely dire situation".

But he then said that "It looks like we will break even" in the second quarter of the year, with advertisers — many of whom fled the platform after the mercurial billionaire bought it — now beginning to return.

Since taking control, Musk has sharply cut the group's payroll from 7,500 employees to fewer than 2,000.

He said in the email that he sees a "clear but difficult path" to a valuation of $250 billion, without specifying how long that might take.

However, in another setback for the company, fragments of Twitter's source code were published on the development platform GitHub, the latter told AFP on Sunday, confirming a report by The New York Times.

GitHub removed the files from its site at Twitter's request, but their brief exposure could allow hackers to identify flaws in Twitter's original software.

AMMAN — Arab Jordan Investment Bank (AJIB) and Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) entered into an agreement on Sunday for the acquisition of Standard Chartered’s business in the Kingdom, following the Central Bank of Jordan's approval, according to a statement from AJIB.  

Under the agreement, the Corporate, Commercial & Institutional Banking, and Consumer, Private & Business Banking businesses of Standard Chartered in Jordan will be migrated to AJIB. Additionally, all SCB Jordan’s employees will be transferred to AJIB. The two banks will work closely in the coming months to provide a seamless transition for its their clients and staff.

According to Sunil Kaushal, the regional chief executive officer of Standard Chartered Bank in Africa & the Middle East, the agreement with AJIB for the sale of the bank’s business in Jordan is aligned with its global strategy to deliver efficiencies, reduce complexities and redirect resources within the AME region to areas with the greatest potential to drive scale, grow and better support clients. 

“Our agreement with AJIB will allow us to accelerate our strategy and leverage on their record of previous acquisitions to meet the financial needs of our clients. We will work closely with AJIB to service the needs of our global clients in Jordan. While we will be selling our local business, we will continue to facilitate and be a bridge for international capital flows into Jordan,” Sunil said. 

Commenting on the agreement, Hani Al Qadi, chairman of the board of directors of Arab Jordan investment Bank, said: “We are pleased to sign this agreement today and to have been selected by Standard Chartered Bank as the preferred buyer. Standard Chartered Bank is a leading regional and international bank with more than 160 years of experience, and has been present in Jordan for more than 98 years." 

"We are also pleased to announce that this agreement has already been approved by the regulatory authorities. We look forward to working closely with Standard Chartered’s team over the coming few months towards achieving a successful conclusion to this transaction without any impact on clients and employees.”

This purchase falls within AJIB’s strategy to grow its banking business market share in Jordan, which continues to expand following the bank’s series of landmark acquisitions of HSBC's banking business in Jordan in 2014, and the National Bank of Kuwait’s banking business in Jordan in 2022. Signing this agreement further enhances AJIB’s presence in the Jordanian banking sector, according to the statement. 

BRUSSELS — The European Union and Germany on Saturday said they had struck a deal after a dispute over the planned phaseout by 2035 of the sale of cars using fossil fuels.

A landmark deal to prohibit new sales of fossil fuel cars from 2035 is key to the bloc’s ambitious plan to become a “climate-neutral” economy by 2050, with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

But in an unprecedented move earlier this month, leading car producer Germany blocked the agreement at the last minute after it had already been approved under the traditional EU legislative process.

Berlin demanded that Brussels provide assurances the law would allow the sales of new cars with combustion engines that run on synthetic fuels, the focus of the breakthrough announced on Saturday.

“We have found an agreement with Germany on the future use of efuels in cars,” EU environment commissioner Frans Timmermans said on Twitter. 

“We will work now on getting the CO2-standards for cars regulation adopted as soon as possible.”

German Transport Minister Volker Wissing said on Twitter that vehicles with combustion engines could continue to be registered after 2035 if they only use fuels that are neutral in their CO2 emissions.

Weeks-long negotiations between the European Commission and Germany to break the impasse centred on Berlin’s desire for a stronger commitment on synthetic fuels than that presented in the initial text.

The synthetic fuels Germany wanted an exemption for are still under development and produced using low-carbon electricity. The technology is unproven, but German manufacturers hope it will lead to the extended use of combustion engines.

Environmental NGOs have disputed the value of synthetic fuels in the automotive sector’s transition towards clean energy sources, saying they are too expensive, polluting and energy-intensive.

Some industry experts have expressed doubt over whether vehicles powered by synthetic fuels can compete in a market against electric cars that are expected to become cheaper over time.

Audi boss Markus Duesmann told the Der Spiegel weekly that synthetic fuels “will not play an important role in the medium-term future of passenger cars”, even if they prove to be helpful in the green transition.

Domestic politics at play 

Some observers saw domestic political calculations behind Germany’s initial move to block the deal, which ruffled the feathers of some of Berlin’s EU partners.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats form a coalition government with the Greens and the liberal FDP Party, which initiated the move.

The FDP, which has lost five regional elections in a row, is struggling in national polling and hoped to gain the support of voters hostile to a ban on combustion engines.

Scholz was seen as acting to maintain the unity of the coalition by aligning with the FDP position against the Greens.

Fellow major car manufacturer Italy, Poland and Hungary joined Germany in a small alliance against the combustion engine ban.

The EU aims to reduce CO2 emissions from new vehicles to zero, with the planned combustion engine plan effectively imposing electric vehicles from the middle of the next decade.

The industry has anticipated the new EU rules by massively investing in electric vehicles in recent years.

BEIJING — A massive new gas pipeline to China could help reduce Russia's reliance on European buyers, but analysts say the project reveals a growing imbalance between the longtime strategic allies.

Beijing emerged as an economic lifeline for Moscow last year, especially through energy purchases, after Western sanctions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine cut off crucial trade links.

Moscow is confident that the new pipeline — Power of Siberia 2 — is going ahead, but Beijing has so far avoided an explicit commitment.

Analysts say the lagging response shows an imbalance favouring Beijing in energy deals between the two countries — as well as China's wariness of over-reliance on Russia for fuel.

China is "in no rush to sign anything unless the proposal is favourable and is shaped on China's terms", researcher Marina Shagina at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in Berlin told AFP.

The project was discussed during Chinese President Xi Jinping's summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Moscow this week.

Putin said after talks with Xi that "all agreements have been reached" on the Power of Siberia 2 project.

But their joint statement only said the two sides will work on pushing forward "research and consultation" on the pipeline.

The Chinese foreign ministry did not respond to a request for more details.

Power of Siberia 2 could facilitate the transport of 50 billion cubic metres of gas to China annually, roughly on par with the total capacity of the controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline from Russia to Germany.

A senior Russian official suggested last year that it could strategically replace Nord Stream 2.

'Russia is desperate' 

Previously the world's largest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG), Russia's gas exports plummeted in 2022 after a flurry of Western sanctions over the Ukraine war.

As Europe looked for other suppliers, Moscow turned to alternative buyers including China, with which it is already linked by the first Power of Siberia pipeline.

In 2022, China overtook Germany to become the top buyer of Russian energy. It has paid a total of $12.2 billion for coal, gas and oil from Russia so far this year, according to the Helsinki-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air.

Russian gas deliveries to China through the existing Power of Siberia pipeline reached a record 15.5 billion cubic meters last year.

But sales to Asia pale in comparison with the 155 billion cubic metres of gas Russia exported to Europe prior to the Ukraine war.

"Russia is desperate to send as much gas as possible eastwards as Europe strives to reduce its dependence on Russian gas," said Philip Andrews-Speed, a senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore's Energy Studies Institute.

And a potential Power of Siberia 2 gas deal would consolidate China as a long-term market, said Jaime Concha, a gas market expert at industry analysis firm Energy Intelligence. 

Russia's existing pipeline infrastructure "was mostly structured to cater to the European market", Concha told AFP.

Building up an equivalent network in Asia would be costly and time-consuming, he said, "which shows how few alternatives Russia has".

'Lessons from Europe' 

China, meanwhile, has sought to ensure a diverse set of energy suppliers.

It has signed a flurry of long-term gas deals around the world in recent years, including a $60 billion, 27-year agreement with Qatar in November.

"Chinese policymakers also observe the lessons from Europe of overreliance on Russian energy imports," said Yan Qin, lead carbon analyst at Refinitiv.

With a strengthened position in energy negotiations with Russia, "China emerged as the winner from the war in Ukraine", IISS researcher Shagina told AFP.

"Beijing capitalised on Moscow's international isolation and ramped up its purchases of heavily discounted Russian oil, gas and coal."

At the same time, China has felt the bite from the turmoil in global energy markets.

The war in Ukraine has pushed thermal coal prices at China's Qinhuangdao port "almost as high as Europe", Qin said, while rising LNG prices have hit gas power plants and industrial users.

Ultimately, she said, the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline could "enhance China's gas imports capacity greatly and potentially reduce China's LNG imports demand".

SAN FRANCISCO — Google on Tuesday invited people in the United States and Britain to test its AI chatbot, known as Bard, as it continues on its gradual path to catch up with Microsoft-backed ChatGPT.

Bard, ChatGPT and other similar artificial intelligence apps churn out essays, poems or computing code on command and have taken the world by storm as the biggest new thing in tech since the advent of the iPhone.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai told staff that after testing Bard with 80,000 Google employees, the chatbot would be tested with the public in the United States and Britain as a "first step" before going out to more countries in other languages.

"As more people start to use Bard and test its capabilities, they'll surprise us," Pichai said in a memo to staff seen by AFP.

"Things will go wrong. But the user feedback is critical to improving the product and the underlying technology," added Pichai, who had faced some criticism within the company for rushing to catch up with Microsoft.

In the launch, people wishing to play with Bard can sign up on a waiting list at bard.google.com website, distinctly separate from the tech giant's search engine.

"We've learned a lot so far by testing Bard, and the next critical step in improving it is to get feedback from more people," Google vice presidents Sissie Hsiao and Eli Collins said in a blog post.

As exciting as chatbots can be, they have their faults, Hsiao and Collins cautioned.

'Constantly learning' 

Google has so far proceeded more carefully in its rollout of generative AI to consumers, in contrast to Microsoft's choice to swiftly make the products available despite reports of problems.

ChatGPT's OpenAI is backed by Microsoft, which earlier this year said it would finance the research company to the tune of billions of dollars.

Asked by AFP how its product was different from ChatGPT, Bard said that unlike its Microsoft-backed rival it was "able to access and process information from the real world through Google Search and keep my response consistent with search results."

The bot also underlined that it was still "under development, while ChatGPT has been released to the public. This means that I am constantly learning and improving, while ChatGPT is likely to remain relatively unchanged".

OpenAI recently released a long-awaited update of its AI technology that it said would be safer and more accurate than its predecessor.

Much of the new model's firepower, known as GPT-4, is now available to the general public via ChatGPT Plus, OpenAI's paid subscription plan and on an AI-powered version of Microsoft's Bing search engine.

Microsoft has said that its quick adoption of generative AI has seen usage of its Bing search engine increase in recent weeks, but it is still a clear underdog to Google, which captures about 85 per cent of the global search engine market.

WASHINGTON — The US banking sector is "stabilising" after the recent failures of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Signature Bank rattled the industry, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will tell a summit on Tuesday, according to prepared remarks.

The collapses caused a crisis of confidence, with many customers of similarly sized banks withdrawing their money and depositing it in larger institutions — considered too big for the government not to bail them out if they faced failure.

But "outflows from regional banks have stabilised" following authorities' moves to shore up confidence and stem contagion, according to Yellen's remarks.

"Our intervention was necessary to protect the broader US banking system," she will say in a speech to the American Bankers Association's (ABA) meeting in Washington.

"And similar actions could be warranted if smaller institutions suffer deposit runs that pose the risk of contagion," she adds.

For now, the banking industry remains resilient despite recent upheaval, said ABA Chief Executive Rob Nichols at the event.

"The overall banking industry remains strong, resilient, well-capitalised, liquid and serves customers and communities extremely well," he added, noting that authorities took swift action to prevent a bad situation from spreading.

After SVB's collapse, the Treasury, Federal Reserve (Fed) and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation set out plans to ensure its customers would be able to access their deposits. A similar exception was announced for Signature Bank.

The Fed also introduced a new lending tool for banks in an effort to prevent a repeat of SVB's quick demise, and has since launched a drive with other major central banks to improve banks' access to liquidity.

Reducing risk 

"I believe that our actions reduced the risk of further bank failures," according to Yellen's remarks.

She maintains that the US banking system remains sound.

But there are fears over which lender could be the next domino to fall, with 11 US banks announcing last week they would deposit $30 billion into First Republic amid worries surrounding the bank.

A coalition of midsized US banks has also asked federal regulators to guarantee all of their customers' deposits for two years, a move that would help to halt an "exodus of deposits" from smaller banks, Bloomberg reported Saturday.

Financial authorities have been scrambling to ease fears while worries of contagion spread to Europe, as Switzerland's second biggest bank Credit Suisse came under pressure.

Rival UBS has since agreed to take over Credit Suisse in a government-brokered deal after days of market upheaval.

While US and European markets picked up on Monday, analysts say investors remain wary.

But Yellen, in her speech, is set to try to reassure bankers of the Treasury Department's commitment to safeguarding the "health and competitiveness" of the community and regional banking institutions.

"You should rest assured that we will remain vigilant," according to her speech.

LONDON — Global bank shares took another beating on Monday despite a UBS takeover of embattled Swiss rival Credit Suisse and actions by financial authorities aimed at calming investors fearing a broader crisis.

UBS agreed to take over Credit Suisse for $3 billion Swiss francs ($3.25 billion) in a government-brokered deal over the weekend following days of market upheaval over the health of the banking sector.

Hours later, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) and other major central banks announced a coordinated effort to improve banks' access to liquidity.

While shares in UBS and other banks sank on Monday, the broader stock markets fluctuated, with Asia closing in the red while European indices rose after opening lower as investors pore over details of the deal.

The Credit Suisse deal "may have some effect in reducing anxiety levels in financial markets, but it may only be short-lived, with traders left wondering which bank could be next to hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons", said Tim Waterer, analyst at Kohle Capital Markets.

Shares in Credit Suisse and lenders worldwide had already sunk last week over concerns of contagion to the rest of the sector from the failure of US regional banks.

The Swiss bank had already been shaken by other scandals, including its exposure to the 2021 collapses of investment firms Archegos and Greensill.

One concern from Sunday's deal was the effect it could have on the high-risk debt market as holders of such bonds at Credit Suisse, known as AT1, will lose $17.3 billion after authorities required that they be written off.

AT1 bonds, which offer high returns but also carry high risks, were created following the 2008 global financial crisis to put the burden of losses on investors instead of taxpayers.

"Sentiment vis-a-vis the AT1 bond asset class will likely remain weak following last night's deal," said Stephen Innes, managing partner at SPI Asset Management.

Shares in UBS were down more than 4 per cent after falling as much as 12 per cent earlier in the day. Credit Suisse shares were down almost 60 per cent and stood around the deal's 0.76 franc share price.

Authorities sought to reassure the markets.

The European Central Bank on Monday described the continent's financial system as "resilient" with sufficient liquidity.

EU Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said the reaction of "monetary authorities has been strong and rapid".

Oil down 

Oil prices tumbled on fears the fallout would slow the global economy, which was already struggling to avoid recession as inflation remains elevated.

"If banks face tighter regulation and pressure to further improve their capital ratios, it could suggest that many consumers and businesses will find it harder to borrow money and that could feed into weaker economic activity," Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, noted on Monday.

Gold, seen as a safe store of value in times of economic turmoil, topped $2,000 per ounce for the first time in more than a year Monday before paring down gains.

It was the highest level since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine just over one year ago.

"How much further gold can gain will largely be determined by how many more financial institutions have to be bailed out or fail in the coming days," noted Rupert Rowling, analyst at trading group Kinesis.

Fed focus 

The market volatility came ahead of the Fed's policy meeting this week, with speculation mounting that it will pause its interest rate hikes to provide some stability to markets.

The more dovish Fed outlook weighed on the dollar.

The collapse this month of US regional lenders Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and Silvergate sparked fears of contagion as worried customers withdrew cash.

It led US authorities last week to promise support for other lenders and depositors, while Wall Street titans including JP Morgan, Bank of America and Citigroup pledged to inject $30 billion into under-pressure lender First Republic Bank.

"Investors are likely keeping a look over their shoulder for the next disaster in a high-interest rate [and inflationary] environment, so at best we might see markets recover some of last week's losses," said analyst Matt Simpson at City Index.