Finance news you need to know today

THE numbers have been crunched on the true cost of Brexit to the British economy, and it’s not pretty.

HERE are ten things making news in business and finance around the world today.

1. SYDNEY — The Australian dollar has risen more than half a US and is back above 76 US cents. At 6.33am, the local unit was trading at 76.05 US cents, up from 75.48 cents on Tuesday.

2. SYDNEY — The Australian market looks set to open lower after the major US indexes notched their worst day in about a month as economic data spawned concern about growth. At 6.45am, the share price index was down 29 points at 5,471.

3. BERLIN — Brexit is expected to reduce Britain’s economic growth by 0.3 percentage points this year and 1.2 points in 2017, a study by Germany’s DIW economic institute found, according to the Handelsblatt newspaper.

4. LONDON — As Britain’s construction industry reels from its sharpest downturn for seven years, it is companies that operate under longer-term contracts and have less exposure to London that are better weathering market uncertainty caused by the Brexit vote.

5. WASHINGTON — American consumers turned in another strong month of spending in June despite a decline in spending on cars.

6. FRANKFURT — Volkswagen AG and its former chief executive have asked a US federal judge in California to dismiss lawsuits filed by American investors accusing the German automaker of deception involving its cheating on diesel emissions tests.

7. CINCINNATI — Procter & Gamble have reported quarterly profit, topping Wall Street expectations as it worked on slashing costs and pruning its product line-up to offset slower growth.

8. NEW YORK — Pfizer Inc (PFE) has reported second-quarter net income of $US2.02 billion ($A2.68 billion).

9. WASHINGTON — Mortgage giant Freddie Mac reported net income of $US1 billion ($A1.33 billion) for the second quarter, down from the same period of 2015.

10. FRANKFURT — Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse have been dropped from a European blue-chip stock index in another sign of the woes hitting the financial sector in Europe.