News Briefs (12-11-2020)

Asian stocks mixed

Stock markets in Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines declined by up to 1% on Wednesday, as this week's burst of market optimism about progress on coronavirus vaccines faded. Investors switched to discounted losers from coronavirus winners on Tuesday, fuelling a rally in travel and energy shares, after drugmakers Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE showed a 90% success rate in preventing infection during trials. "While some concerns remain with respect to the safety and distribution of any viable COVID-19 vaccines, it appears that investors have largely adopted a wait-and-see attitude at this point," said Jingyi Pan, a Singapore-based market strategist with financial services firm IG. — Reuters

Amazon accuses Future of insider trading as it seeks to block Reliance deal

NEW DELHI, Nov 11 : Amazon.com Inc has asked India's market regulator to investigate Future Retail Ltd for insider trading, a letter seen by Reuters showed, as it seeks to prevent its business partner from becoming part of rival Reliance's empire. The U.S. giant has been pressing the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to review Reliance's August deal to buy retail, logistics and other assets from Future Group for $3.4 billion including debt. Amazon argues it had a 2019 agreement with Future which prevented the Indian group's retail assets from being sold to certain parties including Reliance Industries Ltd, which is led by Asia's richest man, Mukesh Ambani. The Nov. 8 letter to SEBI alleges Future Retail disclosed to Reliance price sensitive details of an injunction granted by a Singapore arbitrator to block the deal.— Reuters