Key Events Around the Globe: March 16

Prices of China’s new homes remained in contraction in February, official data showed on Monday, indicating the troubled property sector is still far from recovery. Home prices fell 0.3% compared with the previous month, moderating from the 0.4% drop in January, according to Reuters calculations based on data released by the National Bureau of Statistics. On an annual basis, prices dropped 3.2%, after sinking 3.1% in January.

Britain unveils jobs drive for young people to tackle high unemployment Britain will invest an additional 1 billion pounds ($1.3 billion) to unlock jobs for young people, the government will say on Monday, part of a drive to reduce the high numbers of 16- to 24-year olds not in education, employment or training.

Britain’s youth unemployment has reached a 10-year high, according to figures released last month, outpacing other European nations and posing tough questions for the governing Labour Party over its decision to raise the minimum wage.

The total number of corporate bankruptcies in Germany rose to its highest level in more than a decade last year, according to data published by the federal statistics office on Friday. Local courts registered 24,064 corporate insolvency filings, 10.3% more than in the previous year, according to the figures. Germany’s anaemic economic growth last year, after two years of recession, contributed to the rise in bankruptcies.

U.S. job openings increased in January, but hiring was lackluster, consistent with a stable labor market. Job openings, a measure of labor demand, rose by 396,000 to 6.946 million by the last day of January, the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics said in its Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or JOLTS report, on Friday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 6.70 million unfilled jobs. The job openings rate increased to 4.2% from 4.0% in December.

The BLS revised JOLTS data for 2025, which showed downward revisions for nearly every month, with the exception of December. The annual average job openings level was 7.1 million, a decline of 571,000 from 2024. The annual average job openings rate was 4.3% compared to 4.6% in 2024.