WASHINGTON: The White House said on Monday that President Barack Obama would nominate economist Kathryn Dominguez to fill one of two vacant slots on the board of the Federal Reserve. Dominguez is a professor of public policy and economics at the University of Michigan, with a strong interest in global financial markets and foreign exchange issues. She has worked as a researcher at the Fed, the International Monetary Fund, and the Bank for International Settlements, and is currently also attached to the National Bureau of Economic Research. She received her doctorate in economics from Yale University.

Sun slumps 16pc

MUMBAI: Sun Pharmaceutical Industries shares slumped 16 per cent on Tuesday, heading towards their biggest ever fall in a day, after the drugmaker’s warning that 2016 sales would be flat at best due to costs related to remediation work at its plants. Analysts estimate a roughly eight to 10 per cent hit to profit for the year as Sun Pharma struggles to fix manufacturing problems at one of its own key plants and those of Ranbaxy Laboratories, the troubled rival it bought last year. Sun Pharma said late Monday it was trying to expedite the resolution of at least one of Ranbaxy’s plants, which are barred from exporting to its largest market, the United States, over manufacturing quality issues.

Spring to buy planes

SHANGHAI: Chinese budget carrier Spring Airlines said it plans to buy 21 Airbus A320 planes for 12.45 billion yuan ($2.04 billion), citing growth in both international and domestic air travel. The Shanghai-listed company intends to fund the purchase in part through a private placement of shares to raise 4.5 billion yuan, according to a statement to the exchange late Monday. The single-aisle A320 has a list price of $97 million, according to Airbus.

Novartis income falls

ZURICH: Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis reported $4.1 billion (3.8 billion euros) in income for the first half of the year, down 20 per cent, due largely to a stronger dollar. The Basel-based firm said its net sales over the last six months had fallen six per cent to $24.6 billion, but grew four per cent in local currencies. Novartis, the world’s largest pharmaceutical company in terms of sales, said in a statement that its outlook for its core business remained unchanged, with 2015 sales expected to grow in the mid-single digits.

HDFC profit dips

MUMBAI: HDFC Bank Ltd, India’s second-biggest private sector lender by assets, reported a smaller-than-expected increase in first-quarter profit due to higher provisions for bad loans. Indian banks have been hobbled by a surge in bad loans in the past three years as slower economic expansion hurt the ability of companies to service debt. Mumbai-based HDFC Bank said net profit rose 20.7 per cent to INR 26.96 billion ($423 million) for its fiscal first quarter to June 30, from INR 22.33 billion reported a year earlier. Gross non-performing loans as a percentage of total loans rose to 0.95 per cent from 0.93 per cent in the March quarter, although they were lower than the 1.07 per cent reported in the year-ago quarter. Provisions for bad loans rose 30 per cent from a year earlier, to INR 5.58 billion.

Vattenfall write-down

STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s Vattenfall announced a massive 36.3 billion krona write-down on Tuesday tied to looming closures of two nuclear reactors and slumping lignite activity in Germany. Vattenfall said second quarter losses skyrocketed to 25 billion krona, while revenue fell 1.3 per cent to 36.1 billion krona. “Very low electricity prices... are putting pressure on margins for conventional generation from gas, coal, hydro and nuclear power facilities,” Vattenfall President Magnus Hall said.