• Indonesian Businessman Buys 70% Stake in Football Club Inter Milan

    Indonesian media tycoon Erick Thohir bought a 70 percent stake in football club Inter Milan of Italy. Thohir, one of the richest businessmen in Indonesia and who already holds large stakes in Philadelphia 76 (NBA) and DC United (Major League Soccer), paid about 300 million euro to obtain the 70 percent stake in the three-time European Champions League winner. The deal, which took months to finalize, was announced by Inter Milan president Massimo Moratti. Foreign ownership of football clubs has been a recent phenomenon in Europe.

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  • Indonesian Government Sets Limits to Plantation Sizes of 11 Commodities

    The Indonesian government has limited the surface area of plantations that can be owned by a company or by a group of companies that have one shared management. This new regulatory framework, stipulated in Permentan No 98/Permentan/OT.140/9/2013 with regard to plantation estates' licensing guidelines, is applied to 11 commodities: tea, sugarcane, oil palm, coconut, cotton, rubber, coffee, cacao, cashew nuts, pepper as well as cloves. The new law has been approved by the minister of Justice and Human Rights Amir Syamsudin.

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  • Company Profile of Debt-Ridden Bumi Resources: Indonesian Coal Miner

    Indonesia Investments updated the company profile of Bumi Resources, a leading Indonesian natural resources group focused primarily on coal mining. The company is Indonesia's largest coal miner by production volume and the world's largest thermal coal exporter. However, due to weak global demand and weak corporate management, the company is at risk of default in the near future due to maturity of its debts. Moody’s has downgraded Bumi’s corporate rating from Caa1 to Ca.

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  • Sovereign Credit Rating of Indonesia held at BBB-/stable outlook

    The Rating and Investment Information Inc (R&I), a rating agency from Japan, kept Indonesia’s Sovereign Credit Rating at BBB- with a stable outlook. In their press release, R&I stated that the four key factors behind the decision are: (a) Indonesia’s capacity to achieve sustainable economic growth in the long term (at around six percent per year); (b) conservative fiscal management (causing a marginal fiscal deficit); (c) a sound banking sector; and (d) a low level of government debt.

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