FirstFT: Former Mastercard chief nominated as World Bank president

Joe Biden has nominated former Mastercard chief executive Ajay Banga as World Bank president, picking a Wall Street veteran raised in India to oversee the institution’s biggest mission change in a generation.

Banga’s nomination, a week after sitting president David Malpass abruptly resigned, comes as the US and other shareholder nations seek to expand the bank’s development remit to include the fight against global warming.

The US president said Banga had a grasp of the challenges facing developing countries and “critical experience” in mobilising private money to “tackle the most urgent challenges of our time, including climate change”. 

While the US, the bank’s largest shareholder, has traditionally chosen the World Bank president, it requires backing by other member countries. China, Japan, Germany, France and the UK are also main shareholders.

The nomination of the 63-year-old, who once described himself as a “totally made in India guy”, may help win the support of developing nations, some of which are uneasy about a shift in the bank’s focus from poverty to climate change.

Five more stories in the news

1. Chinese bank executive in line to take the helm at PBoC Zhu Hexin, one of China’s most senior commercial bankers, is among the frontrunners to take over as the governor of the central bank as Beijing prepares to overhaul the leadership of its most important financial regulatory institutions next month.

2. Alibaba ekes out sales growth Alibaba achieved sales growth of 2 per cent in the final quarter of last year, despite zero-Covid lockdowns paralysing much of China during the period. The Chinese ecommerce giant reported adjusted net income rose 12 per cent from a year earlier to Rmb50bn ($7.2bn) on the back of Rmb248bn of revenue, above analysts’ estimates.

3. Hong Kong woos family offices Hong Kong will host an “invitation only” meeting for some of the world’s richest family offices next month, as the city battles Singapore to attract private wealth and resuscitate its pandemic-battered economy. The Wealth for Good in Hong Kong event in late March will target representatives of some of the world’s richest families, according to three people with knowledge of the situation.

4. Sam Bankman-Fried hit with further criminal charges US prosecutors have widened their criminal case against Sam Bankman-Fried, adding new charges and detailing a “series of systems and schemes” through which they allege the FTX founder siphoned off billions of dollars from customer deposits. The updated indictment added charges including securities fraud and conspiracy to commit bank fraud.

5. Hacker group targets thousands of networks A mysterious and unidentified group of hackers dubbed the Nevada Group has sought to paralyse the computer networks of almost 5,000 victims across the US and Europe, in one of the most widespread ransomware attacks on record. Authorities have yet to identify the perpetrators, suspected to be from Russia and China.

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The days ahead

Japan inflation data Consumer Price Index data for January will be released today. See how your country compares on rising prices with our global inflation tracker.

Malaysia national budget Prime minister Anwar Ibrahim is set to unveil the national budget today, with the goal of addressing slowing growth and rising cost of living. (The Straits Times)

Apec meetings continue in California The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation will hold its Economic Committee Meeting and its Finance and Central Bank Deputies’ meetings in Palm Springs, California this weekend. (Apec)

What else we’re reading

China tries to play peacemaker in Ukraine war China’s peace plan for Ukraine, which is timed to coincide with the first anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion, is the most ambitious gambit in Beijing’s uneasy balancing act to present itself as one of the few large powers that is not aligned in the conflict and therefore best placed to broker a resolution.

The insular decision-making that led to Putin’s invasion The FT spoke to longtime confidants of Vladimir Putin as well as people involved in Moscow’s war effort for this account of how the Russian president blundered his way into the invasion of Ukraine — and then intensified his efforts rather than admit his mistake. Since the war began, Putin has become even more isolated, consulting only a small circle of advisers.

• ‘As long as it takes’: US president Joe Biden’s impassioned speech in Poland vowing to stand by Ukraine may not play as well at home, writes Felicia Schwartz.

Adani’s ties with Modi spur scrutiny of overseas deals Gautam Adani, who has longstanding ties with Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, has in recent years clinched deals in countries from Myanmar to Israel as part of an ambitious overseas expansion. Following a short seller’s allegations of fraud at the Adani Group, which the Indian conglomerate has denied, the opposition in India is now scrutinising Modi.

Wall Street set to lose out as China secures grip on IPO pipeline Bankers and lawyers say China’s new rules on proposed offshore listings, which are set to take effect at the end of March, will favour Hong Kong and domestic Chinese markets over Wall Street. The cost of that lost business is likely to be measured in billions of dollars.

Opinion: The case against rewriting Roald Dahl Should you edit the work of dead authors, even if you have the legal right over their books, when it is impossible to gain the author’s consent to these changes? What are the consequences of a more censorial culture? Is it even necessary? Nilanjana Roy asks as she examines the new editions of some of Dahl’s most popular books.

Take a break from the news

David Bowie’s vast collection of personal items — including flamboyant Ziggy Stardust costumes, handwritten lyrics and the Stylophone used in “Space Oddity” — has been donated to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.