In Brief
October industrial output shrinks by 4.5 pct y/y Greece’s industrial output contracted for the sixth consecutive month, falling 4.5 percent year-on-year in October, hurt by weaker manufacturing, the National Statistics Service said yesterday. In the year to October, Greece’s industrial output contracted 2.4 percent compared to the same period a year ago, the National Statistics Service said. Weaker industrial output this year is reflected in slower economic growth. Greece’s economy, about 2.5 percent of the eurozone, decelerated to a 3.1 percent annual expansion clip in the third quarter. Last year it grew 4.0 percent. «The contraction of industrial output continued at an intensified pace in the last quarter of the year, reflecting mainly a considerable drop in manufacturing and output in sectors related to construction and consumer durables,» said Nicholas Magginas, economist at National Bank. «The drop is expected to continue until the start of next year at least, as latest economic indicators have showed.» (Reuters) Coke bottler to sell 500 mln euros of bonds Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Co, the world’s second-largest bottler of Coke beverages, plans to sell 500 million euros ($649 million) of five-year bonds, according to a banker involved in the sale. The notes will be priced to yield 450 basis points more than the benchmark mid-swap rate, said the banker, who declined to be identified because the deal isn’t complete. Coca-Cola HBC Finance BV will issue the debt, the banker said. Credit Suisse Group AG, HSBC Holdings Plc and ING Groep NV will manage the sale for the Athens-based company, the banker said. (Bloomberg) IMF plan Serbia will feel little benefit from a standby deal with the International Monetary Fund and the non-EU member state will not cure its exchange rate problems by adopting the euro, a top economist said. «The record is that, in general, countries that have entered into IMF standby arrangements of the kind that Serbia has agreed to have not gotten much benefit,» said Joseph Stiglitz, the 2001 Nobel Prize winner for Economics. Serbia has agreed a $516 million deal with the IMF, due for approval on December 19. (Reuters) Bank loss Piraeus Bank Egypt, a unit of Greece’s Piraeus Bank SA, said it posted a nine-month loss of 6 million Egyptian pounds ($1.1 million). The lender, which made a profit of 721,314 pounds in the year-earlier period, did not give a reason for the loss, according to a statement posted on the Egyptian Exchange’s website. (Bloomberg) Leased aircraft Jet Airways Ltd, India’s biggest domestic carrier, plans to lease five aircraft to Gulf Air Co and Turkish Airlines Inc to cut costs. Jet will lease two Airbus SAS A330 aircraft to Gulf Air for four months, the carrier said in a statement to the Bombay Stock Exchange yesterday. Three Boeing 777 planes will be leased to Turkish Airlines for six months, it said. The aircraft became available after Jet cut some routes and undertook other cost-saving measures. Jet Airways is postponing deliveries of wide-bodied planes by at least a year and will ground some aircraft in the short term, Chief Executive Wolfgang Prock-Schauer said October 27 after the carrier posted its biggest quarterly loss in more than three years as an economic slowdown cut demand for air travel. (Bloomberg)
