Reuters

By Yantoultra Ngui

SINGAPORE (Reuters) -Singapore's second-largest bank Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp (OCBC) posted on Friday a better-than-expected 5% rise in first-quarter profit and forecast its net interest margin at the higher end of a 2.20% to 2.25% range for the full year.

Net interest margin, a key profitability gauge for banks, declined slightly to 2.27% during the quarter from 2.30% a year earlier.

OCBC had provided the... (continue reading...)

By Katya Golubkova

TOKYO (Reuters) - Oil prices rose on Friday, continuing upwards trend on the signs of improving economy in China and as negotiations to halt hostilities in the stand-off between Israel and Hamas yielded no results.

Brent futures rose 37 cents, or 0.4%, to $84.24 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude grew 41 cents, or 0.5%, to $79.64 at 0003 GMT.

In the previous session, oil prices edged... (continue reading...)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bipartisan group of lawmakers unveiled a bill late Wednesday that would make it easier for the Biden administration to impose export controls on AI models, in a bid to safeguard the prized U.S. technology against foreign bad actors.

The bill, sponsored by House Republicans Michael McCaul, John Molenaar, Max Wise and Democrat Raja Krishnamoorthi, would also give the Commerce Department express authority to bar Americans from... (continue reading...)

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's consumer spending kept shrinking for a 13th straight month in March, government data showed on Friday, creating challenges for policymakers seeking to engineer self-sustaining economic growth and normalise monetary policy.

Household spending fell 1.2% in March from a year earlier, the data showed, against economists' median forecast for a 2.4% drop and following a 0.5% decline in February.

On a seasonally... (continue reading...)

(Reuters) - Russian anti-aircraft units intercepted a drone south of Moscow and there were no injuries or damage from falling debris, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said early on Friday.

Sobyanin, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said the drone, headed for Moscow, was downed in Podolsk district, just south of the capital. Emergency crews and specialists were on the scene.

The governor of Bryansk region, which borders Ukraine, said... (continue reading...)