10 things you need to know in markets today, November 23

Reuters/Stefano
Rellandini

Good morning! Here’s what you need to know on Friday.

1. Nissan aims to nominate a new chairman within a month or two,
hopefully before its next board meeting slated for around
December 20, a source familiar with the matter said, after the
automaker ousted Carlos Ghosn as chairman on
Thursday. The nomination will be done by the
Japanese automaker’s newly created advisory committee that
includes the company’s three independent directors.

2. Meanwhile, Japanese prosecutors are likely to build a new
criminal case against Ghosn for understating his remuneration by
3 billion yen ($27.0 million) over three years from fiscal 2015,
the Asahi newspaper reported on Friday. Ghosn
and former Nissan Representative Director Greg Kelly are
currently being investigated in a case of alleged conspiracy to
understate Ghosn’s remuneration by about half the 10 billion yen
he earned at Nissan over five years from fiscal 2010.

3. Oil prices slumped to 2018 lows on Friday in thin but volatile
trading, pulled down by concerns of an emerging global supply
overhang amid a bleak economic outlook. Even an
expectation that the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting
Countries (OPEC) producer group will start withholding supply in
2019 to rein in any glut provided little support, traders said.

4. Trade talks between the United States and China should be
equal and mutually beneficial, Chinese Vice Commerce Minister
Wang Shouwen said on Friday, adding that he hoped the two
countries can find ways to manage their differences through
dialogue. Wang, speaking at a press conference in
Beijing, said he hoped both sides could move in the same
direction and find ways to resolve their problems. Officials from
both countries are in close contact under guidance from their
leaders, he added.

5. Countries belonging to the G20 group of the world’s biggest
economies applied 40 new trade restrictive measures between
mid-May and mid-October, covering around $481 billion of trade,
the World Trade Organization said on Thursday. “The
report’s findings should be of serious concern for G20
governments and the whole international community,” WTO
Director-General Roberto Azevedo said in the statement.

6. Chinese industrial data could be about to deteriorate further,
at least in the near-term. Macquarie Bank’s
forward-looking indicator on Chinese industrial activity “fell
significantly in November,” pointing to the likelihood of a
similar move in upcoming PMI data.

7. President Donald Trump has suggested “the world” is actually
to blame for the death of dissident journalist Jamal
Khashoggi.  
The president also
says the Saudi crown prince
at the centre of
the global scandal probably regrets the incident more than Trump
does.

8. The US is asking its key allies to shun China’s tech-giant
Huawei.  The US is highly
concerned about Huawei’s close ties to the Chinese
government.   

9. Italy’s EU Affairs Minister Paolo Savona is considering
resigning over the government’s decision to challenge European
Union budget rules, daily Corriere Della Sera said.
The newspaper cited an unnamed League minister as its source.

10. Two policemen have been killed and one security guard has
been injured after gunmen opened fire at the Chinese consulate in
the Pakistani city of Karachi, according to local
officials. 
“We have two cops brought dead
and security guard injured due to blast impact,” Seemin Jamali, a
doctor at the Jinnah Hospital in Karachi, told Reuters Friday.