Money

In the two-month period up to January 9, 122,000 vehicle owners submitted their license plates, making for a significant loss of state revenues amounting to some 50-60 million euros, given that these are mostly vehicles with big engines and therefore high road taxes.

Romanian demonstrators welcomed the government's decision to scrap an emergency ordinance party decriminalizing abuse of office.

However, they added protests would continue until the ordinance was repealed.

On Saturday evening, Prime Minister Sorin Grindeanu said authorities had heard and seen "many options" and did not "want to divide Romania".

Senior bank officials point to a decline in deposits last month, which puts an end to the rising trajectory recorded in 2016. At the end of last year deposits had climbed by 4.3 billion euros from a year earlier to reach 121.4 billion.

Demand for gold rose in 2016 to a three-year high, aided by keen investment appetite for the precious metal, the World Gold Council said in a report on Feb. 3.

Total demand for gold, whose twin drivers are jewelry and investment buying, advanced two percent to 4,309 tons compared with 2015, the London-based industry body WGC said in a report.

BELGRADE - Despite media representing protests against US President Donald Trump as grassroots spontaneous uprisings, there is actually a significant amount of money being spent on special interest groups to keep the disruptions happening, Sputnik reports.

Turkey's annual inflation hit 9.2 percent in January from the previous month's 8.53 percent, making it the highest inflation rate in a year amid a decline in the Turkish Lira and a rise in food prices. 

The consumer price index rose by 2.46 percent in January, according to data released by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜİK) on Feb. 3. 

The European Central Bank lowered the cap on emergency liquidity assistance (ELA) Greek banks draw from the domestic central bank by 200 million euros to 46.3 billion euros, the Bank of Greece said on Thursday.

The move reflected improving liquidity conditions and the stabilization of private sector deposit flows, it said.

The ELA ceiling is valid up to February 15.

Flickr/ Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung

BELGRADE - George Soros's hedge fund was one of the biggest losers of 2016, as the Hungarian-born billionaire's misplaced investments turned into a $1 billion loss for his clients, according to a report by hedge fund investor LCH Investments, cited by Bloomberg.

The heavy atmosphere on the Greek bond market was severely aggravated on Tuesday not only by the German Finance Ministry's statement in favor of the International Monetary Fund's participation in the Greek program, but also by SYRIZA MP Nikos Xydakis's reference to a return to the drachma.

Moody's warned in a report published on Monday about the serious consequences the delay in the second bailout review will have on the implementation of plans for the reduction of bad loans, on banks meeting their profit targets and on their liquidity.