Business

The US has paused its promised multi-billion-pound investment into British tech over trade disagreements, marking a serious setback in US-UK relations. The £31bn “tech prosperity deal”, hailed by Keir Starmer as “a generational stepchange in our relationship with the US” when it was announced during Donald Trump’s state visit, has been put on ice by Washington. As part of the ...

A Dhaka court has ordered to remove a disputed batch of Nestle KitKat chocolate from local market until resolution of a pending case. The directive came from Pure Food Court of Dhaka on Monday, following a petition filed by Kamrul Hasan, a Safe Food Inspector with Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC). Kamrul confirmed that the court instructed the withdrawal of ...

Metro Rail users now will be able to recharge their cards from the comfort of their home using Nagad wallet. The passengers can recharge their cards through the link available on the Dhaka Transport Coordination Authority (DTCA) website. At present, two types of cards are used in the Metro Rail system – Rapid Pass and MRT Pass. Commuters can recharge ...

Several car-sharing companies are considering launching or expanding in London, with the imminent closure of Zipcar’s UK operation leaving a large gap in the market in one of Europe’s biggest cities. Free2Move, owned by the carmaker Stellantis, said it was “closely monitoring the London market”, and “actively assessing” options for its services. It already operates fleets in cities including Berlin, ...

Bangladesh Jewellers’ Association (BAJUS) has announced an increase in gold prices, with the rate per bhori rising by up to Tk 3,453. Under the new rates, the price of 22-carat gold stands at Tk 2,15,597 per bhori, 21-carat at Tk 2,05,800, 18-carat at Tk 176,395 and traditional gold at Tk 146,838 per bhori. The new prices, effective from Sunday, have ...

After soaring for nearly two years, cocoa prices dropped sharply in 2025. However, chocolate, in demand ahead of the festive holiday season, has seen prices rise. AFP examines the reasons for the divergence and the current state of the cocoa market. – West Africa at heart – Ivory Coast and Ghana are the world’s biggest suppliers of pods — the ...

Country’s foreign exchange reserves currently stand at US$31.89 billion, according to data released by Bangladesh Bank on Wednesday. However, when calculated under the International Monetary Fund’s BPM6 (Balance of Payments and International Investment Position Manual) methodology, the country’s reserves amount to $27.22 billion, the central bank said.

Finance Adviser Dr Salehuddin Ahmed has underscored the urgent need to curb VAT leakage. At a seminar on Wednesday, he said, “Bangladesh’s economic progress depends fundamentally on its ability to mobilise domestic resources rather than relying excessively on foreign loans and grants.” Adviser Dr Salehuddin said, “There is no doubt about the need for VAT. In many countries, VAT contributes ...

The “premium” that the UK pays to borrow money compared with its international peers may be coming to an end as markets grow more confident about the government’s plans, a thinktank has suggested. The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) said that the chancellor Rachel Reeves’s announcement in the autumn budget that she would be more than doubling the UK’s ...

Bangladesh Bank (BB) on Tuesday bought $202 million from 13 commercial banks to stabilise the foreign exchange market and support remittance and export inflows, the central bank said. With this transaction, total dollar purchases through multiple auctions in the current fiscal year have reached $2.51 billion. The purchase was conducted via a Multiple Price Auction, with the exchange rate ranging ...