Connect with us
  • tg

Stock Markets

Community West Bancshares stock retains Overweight rating despite Q2 loss

letizo News

Published

on

On Wednesday, Piper Sandler adjusted the price target for Community West Bancshares (NASDAQ:CWBC), increasing it from $22.00 to $24.00, while maintaining an Overweight rating on the stock. This revision follows the company’s second-quarter financial results for 2024.

Community West Bancshares reported a loss of $0.33 per share for the second quarter of 2024. However, Piper Sandler’s analysis suggests a core earnings per share (EPS) of $0.40 when excluding merger-related charges and a provision related to the Current Expected Credit Losses (CECL) standard.

The firm’s initial EPS estimate of $0.11 had already taken into account a CECL provision to align with the consensus among other analysts. Without this provision, the anticipated runrate EPS was $0.63, but the actual results significantly missed this target due to a lower-than-expected net interest margin (NIM).

The reported NIM for Community West Bancshares increased by 23 basis points, reaching 3.65%. This figure fell short of Piper Sandler’s expectation of a 4.49% margin and was also below the consensus of 4.43% among other analysts.

The discrepancy between the expected and actual NIM contributed to a shortfall of $0.27 in net interest income (NII) compared to the firm’s forecast.

This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C.

Stock Markets

Bank regulator gives BlackRock new deadline on bank stakes, Bloomberg reports

letizo News

Published

on

(Reuters) – The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation gave a fresh deadline of Feb. 10 to BlackRock (NYSE:) to resolve an issue regarding oversight into the firm’s stock in banks, Bloomberg News reported on Sunday, citing three people with knowledge of the matter.

Continue Reading

Stock Markets

Israel to use withheld Palestinian tax income to pay electric co debt

letizo News

Published

on

By Steven Scheer

JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israel plans to use tax revenue it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority to pay the PA’s nearly 2 billion ($544 million) debt to state-run Israel Electric Co (IEC), Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday.

Israel collects tax on goods that pass through Israel into the occupied West Bank on behalf of the PA and transfers the revenue to Ramallah under a longstanding arrangement between the two sides.

Since the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, triggered the war in Gaza, Smotrich has withheld sums totalling 800 million shekels earmarked for administration expenses in Gaza.

Those frozen funds are held in Norway and, he said at Sunday’s cabinet meeting, would instead be used to pay debt owed to the IEC of 1.9 billion shekels.

“The procedure was implemented after several anti-Israeli actions and included Norway’s unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state,” Smotrich told cabinet ministers.

“The PA’s debt to IEC resulted in high loans and interest rates, as well as damage to IEC’s credit, which were ultimately rolled over to the citizens of Israel.”

The Palestinian Finance Ministry said it had agreed for Norway to release a portion of funds from an account held since last January with 1.5 billion shekels, calling money in the account “a punitive measure linked to the government’s financial support for Gaza”.

The ministry said as part of the deal, 767 million shekels of the Norwegian-held funds will pay Israeli fuel companies for weekly fuel purchases over the coming months. A similar amount will be used to settle electricity-related debts owed by Palestinian distribution companies to IEC.

Smotrich has been opposed to sending funds to the PA, which uses the money to pay public sector wages. He accuses the PA of supporting the Oct. 7 attack in Israel led by the Islamist movement Hamas, which controlled Gaza. The PA is currently paying 50-60% of salaries.

Israel also deducts funds equal to the total amount of so-called martyr payments, which the PA pays to families of militants and civilians killed or imprisoned by Israeli authorities.

The Palestinian finance ministry said 2.1 billion shekels remain withheld by Israel, bringing the total withheld funds to over 3.6 billion shekels as of 2024.

Israel, it said, began deducting an average of 275 million shekels monthly from its tax revenues in October 2023, equivalent to the government’s monthly allocations for Gaza.

“This has exacerbated the financial crisis, as the government continues to transfer these allocations directly to the accounts of public servants in Gaza,” the ministry said.

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: An Israeli power distribution plant is seen in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank January 22, 2020. REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma/File Photo

It added it was working with international partners to secure the release of these funds as soon as possible.

($1 = 3.6763 shekels)

Continue Reading

Stock Markets

Romanian protesters demand cancelled presidential election should go ahead

letizo News

Published

on

BUCHAREST (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of Romanians angered by the cancellation of a presidential election marched through Bucharest on Sunday to demand that the ballot should go ahead and that outgoing centrist President Klaus Iohannis should resign.

In a move that polarised voters, Romania’s top court voided the presidential election on Dec. 6, two days before the second round.

The cancellation came after state documents showed frontrunner Calin Georgescu, a critic of NATO, had benefited from an unfair social media campaign likely to have been orchestrated by Russia, accusations Moscow has denied.

The court ordered that the election be re-run in its entirety. The pro-European coalition government has yet to approve a calendar for the election, although party leaders agreed to hold the two rounds on May 4 and May 18.

Iohannis, whose term expired on Dec. 21, will stay on until his successor is elected.

On Sunday, tens of thousands of protesters, including left-wingers and those angered by the way the way the election was cancelled, joined the protest organised by the opposition hard-right Alliance for Uniting Romanians (AUR), Romania’s second-largest party.

“We ask for a return to democracy by resuming the election with the second round,” AUR leader George Simion told reporters.

Organizers said 100,000 people were at the protest, but riot police along the march estimated the numbers at around 20,000. Protesters waved flags and shouted “Freedom” and “Bring back the second round.”

“Our right to vote was broken,” said Bogdan Danila, a 43-year-old truck driver. “In addition, Iohannis was in power for ten years and did nothing for the people, while parties betrayed us, they are all corrupt. We want something else.”

Some protesters carried portraits of Georgescu or Christian Orthodox icons while street vendors sold flags and vuvuzelas.

“Authorities must say why they cancelled the election, we want to see the evidence,” said Cornelia, 57, an economist wrapped in a Romanian flag who declined to give her last name.

© Reuters. Protesters wave Romanian national flags during a demonstration organised by Romania's far-right party Alliance for Uniting Romanians (AUR), urging the government to re-run a presidential election, in Bucharest, Romania, January 12, 2025. REUTERS/Andreea Campeanu

“At this rate we won’t be voting anymore, they will impose a leader like in the old days.”

It remains unclear whether Georgescu, who opposes Romanian support for Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, will be allowed to run for president again.

Continue Reading

Trending

©2021-2024 Letizo All Rights Reserved