LONDON: UK unemployment increased in the three months to the end of June while wages grew at record annual pace, official data showed Tuesday, as the economy struggles with high inflation.

BEIJING: China stopped publishing data on its rising youth unemployment rate on Tuesday, as it released a raft of disappointing figures that stoked concerns over the state of the world’s second largest economy.

TOKYO, Aug 15 (KUNA) -- Japan's economy expanded at an annualized pace of 6.0 percent in the April-June period, up for the third consecutive quarter, buoyed by robust exports, government data showed Tuesday.

BEIJING: Shares in Chinese property giant Country Garden plunged on Monday after it missed bond payments and warned of billions of dollars in losses, deepening fears about the countr y’s heavily indebted real estate sector.

MUSCAT: Oman recorded a budget surplus of 656 million Omani rials ($1.7 billion) in the first six months of 2023 on the back of higher oil revenue, according to Oman’s ministry of finance.

MOSCOW: The Russian ruble slid past 100 against the dollar Monday, its lowest level since March 23, 2022 — weeks after Moscow unleashed full-scale hostilities in Ukraine. 

KUWAIT, Aug 14 (KUNA) -- Kuwait International Bank (KIB) made almost KD 6 million of net profit, as well as an 88-percent growth, attributable to shareholders, said the lender's chair With earnings per share (EPS) standing at 2.87 fils, KIB Chairman Sheikh Mohammad Jarrah Al-Sabah has revealed, in a statement, the Bank's financial results for the first half of the year, ending on June 30, 2023.

WASHINGTON: If he had it to do over, he would probably choose another name: A year on, Joe Biden is struggling to sell Americans on the benefits of the Inflation Reduction Act.

KUWAIT: “The debate is really about: Do we need to do another rate increase, or not?” That is the question on everyone’s mind as markets anticipate the next move by the Federal Reserve, and those are also the exact words to come out of New York Fed President John Williams’ mouth in an interview with the New York Times.