Bulgaria had a government debt-to-GDP ratio of 21.2% at the end of the first quarter of 2019, the second lowest in the European Union, after Estonia, the bloc's statistical office Eurostat said. Romania's debt-to-GDP ratio of 34.1% was the sixth lowest among 28 EU member states at the end of March. Among EU-28 Greece posted the highest government debt-to-GDP ratio of 181.9%. On a quarterly comparison basis, Slovenia and Bulgaria were among the EU member states with the highest decreases in their debt-to-GDP ratios, by 2.3 and 1.4 percentage points, respectively.

The decline in the volume of bad and restructured loans continued in June, and in the last year the amount decreased by BGN 1.6 billion to just over BGN 5 billion. The decrease was most visible in mortgages and corporate loans - 26% on an annual basis. Thus, the share of bad debts fell from 12.4% of all loans last year to 8.9% at the end of June 2019, data from the Bulgarian National Bank (BNB) show. Meanwhile, lending in Bulgaria grew by just over 6% on an annual basis, bringing the total volume of loans up to BGN 56.3 billion. According to the BNB, the volume of corporate loans rose by nearly BGN 1.5 billion in the last year to a total amount BGN 33.5 billion at the end of the half-year. The biggest increase is in the newly granted loans for over 5 years - by BGN 2.2 billion, or 10.4% more than a year earlier.

Coal-fired power plant ContourGlobal Maritza East 3 innitiated an action before an arbitration court for EUR 10 mln, with the possibility of increasing the amount claimed, against National Electric Company (NEK) for failing to pay the purification installation for sulfur dioxide and oxides of nitrogen emitted in the production of electricity, built by ContourGlobal. This was explained by the CEO of NEK Petar Iliev after the company mentioned the arbitration procedure in the analysis of the impact of the regulatory decisions on the current price of electricity over the years on its financial situation. In the analysis, Iliev notes that two consecutive regulatory periods, NEK wants the cost of this investment of BGN 65 million to be reflected in the availability price of ContourGlobal Maritza East 3, determined by the Energy and Water Regulatory Commission (EWRC). However, this has not been done yet, but is part of NEK's negotiated commitments in its April 2015 agreement with ContourGlobal to reduce this availability price in its long-term contract for mandatory buying-in electricity from the coal-fired power station.

Four public companies managed to accumulate over BGN 56 million by increasing their capital through issuing new shares on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange. Some of them used cash from their own reserves, others issued new shares or converted bonds into shares. Thus, they have secured financing for investments - in new projects, for the construction of production facilities or for retrofitting and modernization. The largest is the issue of Bravo Property Fund REIT - the newest special purpose vehicle for securitization of real estate, which became public at the end of April. Its size amounts to 36 million new shares, each of which has a nominal and issue value of BGN 1. At the end of the procedure the capital of the company increased to BGN 36.7 million. Investors supported the plans of Holding Nov Vek JSC with BGN 20.2 million after the sale of 1.5 million ordinary, dematerialized, freely transferable voting shares with a nominal value of BGN 1 and an issue value of BGN 13.50 each.

Two candidates have submitted bids for the tender of Fund Manager of Financial Instruments in Bulgaria for the management of BGN 35.6 million for start-up companies. The candidates are the Vitosha Venture Partners union and the Farpath Venture Fund union, and it is expected that they will be supplemented by private capital of at least 10%. The companies have submitted in-time tenders under the procedure for awarding a public procurement contract with the subject "Implementation of a financial instrument Fund for acceleration and initial financing II", announced the Fund of Funds. The state-owned company explained that it was supported by funds under the Operational Program "Innovation and Competitiveness" 2014-2020, co-financed with funds from the European Regional Development Fund. By its very nature, the instrument is an acceleration program that provides equity financing to start-ups at an early stage of their development, combined with a portfolio that focuses on more advanced startups. Within the program, approved applicants have access to business leaders who share their experience and contacts and give practical guidance on the development of individual projects. It is expected that through the selected fund manager at least 76 enterprises will be financed, with investments in each one ranging from BGN 30 thousand to BGN 2 million.

Bulgaria's Darik Radio has increased its capital by BGN 650,000 to BGN 6.45 million via a new share issue. All 650,000 newly-issued shares were subscribed for by private investor Radosvet Radev. The company's shareholders approved the decision for the capital increase at a meeting on July 8. Earlier this year, Darik Radio increased its capital by BGN 300,000. Darik Radio generated consolidated revenue of BGN 5 million in 2018 and posted a net loss of BGN 641,000.

Revenues from BTV Media Group rose in the second quarter. Group earnings continue to grow at enormous rates. This shows data from the Central European Media Entertprises (CME), the parent company of the Bulgarian media group, in which the largest shareholder after the acquisition of Time Warner, is the US telecom giant AT & T. Total revenue of the BTV Media Group for the period, excluding the currency factor, was USD 22.6 million, 3.5% less than a year earlier. For the six months, revenues amounted to USD 41.9 million, down 2.2% year-over-year. Operating profit continued to grow. After rising by over 120% in the first quarter, the profit is now USD 7.9 million, a 40% increase over a year earlier. For the six months, the BTV Media Group has a profit of just over USD 14 million, or 62.8% up from 2018. However, the revenue of BTV Media Group grows if the exchange rate changes are seen. In this case, the turnover increased by 2.5% for the quarter and 4.5% for the six months on an annual basis. Profit increased by 47.2% for the three and 72.4% for the six months.

UBS announced a net profit of $1.4 billion for the second quarter of 2019. This compared to a net profit of 1.28 billion Swiss francs ($1.29 billion) in the second quarter of 2018. The Swiss-lender announced that this is the highest second-quarter net profit since 2010. The profit boost comes in despite declines in both its investment bank and wealth management divisions. UBS, however, saw a decline in its global wealth management business compared to a year ago. The bank reported an operating profit of $886 million compared to over $1 billion in the second quarter of 2018. Profits in its investment bank division also fell from a year ago. It registered an operating profit of $440 million in the second quarter for this year compared to $571 million a year ago. Market expectations point to an interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve later this month. The central bank had embarked on a normalization path in 2015, after the global and sovereign debt crises. However, recent data has shown worsening economic conditions in the U.S.

Microsoft Corp. agreed to invest $1 billion in a partnership with research group OpenAI, gaining a prominent cloud-computing customer from the artificial intelligence field. OpenAI, co-founded by Elon Musk and other wealthy Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, will use Microsoft’s Azure cloud services to train and run the group’s AI software. The two will also jointly develop supercomputing technology, and Microsoft will be OpenAI’s preferred partner to commercialize its creations, the companies said in a statement on Monday. OpenAI started in 2015 with much fanfare. Industry luminaries including Musk and Peter Thiel committed at least $1 billion to the nonprofit to build AI that could match or improve on the technology being developed by tech giants such as Google, Facebook Inc. and Microsoft. However, Musk said he left OpenAI’s board last year over disagreements about some of the group’s plans. More recently, OpenAI started a for-profit arm to help it raise more money. The $1 billion investment goes to the for-profit arm, OpenAI LP, but the partnership is between Microsoft and the whole entity, OpenAI said.

Pakistan is planning a wave of new wind and solar plants that will expand its clean energy capacity to about fifth of its total. The South Asian nation plans to increase its renewables by more than four times by adding as much as 7 gigawatts to bring its total to 8-9 gigawatts by 2025, said Nadeem Babar, head of Pakistan’s energy task force. The new energy policy that targets lifting the country’s total generation capacity by 40% to 42-43 gigawatts is expected to be approved within a month, he said. The shift to clean generation comes after Pakistan has nearly bridged a power deficit by adding 10 gigawatts of capacity in the past six years to ease long, unannounced blackouts in major cities. Most of that capacity was coal and natural gas fired plants that were financed by China as part of its Belt and Road Initiative. As Pakistan has beefed up power generation its grid has come under increasing pressure and many transmission lines are already operating at full capacity. To alleviate congestion the country is working with the World Bank to identify the best locations to site new renewable generation.