03.10.10
Posted in .com, Free blog Tips, hot news, online, world of money tagged All, markets, money, news, reviews at 2:30 pm by carydalton
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Citigroup Inc. shares rallied almost 7% Tuesday on speculation about mergers and acquisitions in the U.S. banking industry and after a bullish research note came out on the bank.
Barclays PLC is considering another major acquisition in the United States, and is hunting for a retail bank that would give it more deposits and extend the presence of its Barclays Capital unit in the country, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter.
Bull-market birthday
As the bull market notches its first year anniversary, the News Hub panel weighs in on whether investors can still make money and how the market will react when the interest rates inevitably adjust.
The bank, in response to potential changes in banking regulation, has designated an internal team to assess possible targets, the newspaper added no teletrack payday loans.
Citigroup is “back from the brink and back in business,” research firm CreditSights wrote in a report released late Monday evening.
“Citi is still a work in progress,” the research firm said, but the bank’s debt and equity should benefit from its branch-light configuration, international consumer exposure, improving liquidity and the fact that the stock “is just plain cheap.”
Citi climbed 6.7% to $3.80 in afternoon action on Tuesday. More than 630 million shares were traded.
Citigroup shares rally on M&A speculation
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03.06.10
Posted in .com, hot news, money, top, world of money tagged All, blogs, events, money, opinion at 3:12 pm by carydalton
LONDON (MarketWatch) — Anglo-Swiss mining firm Xstrata gained ground on Friday after a deal to sell its Prodeco assets in Columbia to shareholder Glencore, a move that helped the metals sector to advance in the British stock market.
Xstrata shares climbed 2.5% after it said Glencore International will exercise its option to acquire its Prodeco coal operations in Columbia.
Under the option agreement, Glencore, which holds more than 34% of Xstrata, will pay Xstrata at least $2.25 billion in cash upon completion of the sale.
“Glencore’s decision to exercise its option provides Xstrata’s shareholders with a robust cash return on the initial purchase price and provides additional financial flexibility as Xstrata’s capital expenditure program ramps up to deliver 50% volume growth by 2014,” said Xstrata CEO Mick Davis.
Analysts at MF Global noted: “Prodeco was Glencore’s asset contribution during the [Xstrata] rights issue last year, when the metals trader did not have the cash to participate.”
They believe that the deal will take Xstrata’s net debt/EBITDA ratio back below 1 times which “should allow the group to spend more on capital expenditure or even mergers and acquisitions.”
They added: “investors in that context could focus on Lonmin once more, of which Xstrata already owns 24.65%.” Platinum miner Lonmin rose 1.8%.
Overall, the FTSE 100 index rose 0.4% to 5,550.99 on Friday and other European shares also advanced. U.S. stock futures were pointing to mild gains ahead of key jobs data due out later. See Europe Markets. Read more on jobs.
“News flow from Japan is overshadowing the final trading session of the week, though we expect that will change in a few hours when the U.S. employment report for February is published,” said Kenneth Broux, economist at Lloyds Corporate Markets.
On Friday, there was speculation that Japan will ease monetary policy through April in order to push down short-term rates. The BOJ’s policy board is expected to discuss such steps at a two-day meeting starting March 16, Japanese business daily Nikkei reported cash advance. Read more on BOJ.
Banks were higher in London trading, with Standard Chartered shares up 2.4% and HSBC Holdings up 1%.
Still, shares of advertising giant WPP / declined 0.7%. Its fiscal-year net profit was broadly flat at 437.7 million pounds, compared to 439.1 million pounds a year ago. Sales rose 16.1 to 8.68 billion pounds.
WPP said that 2010 should be a more stable year although “there is no marked growth as yet.”
Shares of British American Tobacco declined 0.4% to 2,309 pence.
It was downgraded to neutral from outperform at Credit Suisse with the broker saying it sees limited upside to its new target price of 2,350p following a recent strong performance for the firm’s shares. It raised 2010 and 2011 earnings per share forecasts for the firm by 4%, mainly to reflect recent sterling weakness.
“At current levels, we would favor Imperial Tobacco and Philip Morris International , which should also deliver robust earnings growth in 2010 as pricing - the industry’s main P&L lever - remains good,” the broker said.
Outside the top index, United Business Media shares jumped 10%.
The media firm posted 2009 profit after tax of 81.8 million pounds, from 82.7 million pounds last year and also resolved its “decade-long dialogue” with the U.K. tax authorities following the sale of its regional newspapers business in 1998.
“We have agreed to make a payment of 46.5 million pounds in settlement of this and a number of other tax issues. This, together with the resolution of a number of other tax matters, has resulted in a release of 135.2 million pounds of our previous tax creditor,” the firm said.
Michael Page International shares fell 1.7%.
The recruitment firm’s 2009 net profit fell to 12.4 million pounds, from 97.3 million pounds recorded at the same point last year. Revenue declined to 716.7 million pounds, from 972.8 million pounds last year.
London Markets: British shares up as miners, banks rise
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02.24.10
Posted in business, money, online, shortly, world of money tagged All, business, financial, life, world at 7:12 am by carydalton
The wobbly state of the housing market was made clear on Tuesday with the release of data showing that home prices managed a modest increase in December even as many more Americans owed more on their properties than they were worth.
The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index of home prices in 20 metropolitan areas rose 0.3 percent in December on a seasonally adjusted basis, with most of the cities improving from November.
It was the seventh consecutive month that the index showed rising prices, a welcome respite after several years of wrenching declines. But another 600,000 households slipped underwater during the fourth quarter, with their homes valued at less than their mortgages, according to the data firm First American CoreLogic, a real estate research company.
The total number of households with negative equity is now 11.3 million, or 24 percent of all residential properties with mortgages, up from 23 percent in the third quarter, First American said.
Negative equity is a major concern among policy makers because it can compel disillusioned borrowers to forsake their properties, contributing to the foreclosure problem. The breaking point for homeowners, research shows, is when negative equity reaches about 25 percent.
Five million people are now at or beyond that point, First American estimates, up from 4.5 million in the third quarter.
The research firm recalibrated its data in the third quarter, which means earlier negative equity numbers are not comparable. But it said that the number of severely underwater borrowers was growing even faster than it expected a few weeks ago.
“Home prices in the worst areas — Florida, Nevada and Arizona — fell more than we had expected, increasing the amount of negative equity,” a First American senior economist, Sam Khater, said.
First American’s home price index, released last week, fell for both December and the fourth quarter. That contrasted with the improving Case-Shiller numbers.
The two firms measure different groups of homeowners using different methodologies. The disparate results indicate how difficult it is at the moment to get a fix on the housing market.
There is a widespread feeling among analysts that the market is being kept afloat by the government’s emergency measures, especially the tax credit for buyers. The market’s true level will become apparent only after the tax credit ends in the spring — assuming it is not renewed as it was in the fall payday loans.
Prices in the West Coast cities tracked by Case-Shiller, including Los Angeles, Phoenix and San Diego, increased the most in December. Laggards were Chicago, New York and Tampa, Fla.
“The recovery has slowed since the summer months, but it has not completely fallen apart,” Maureen Maitland, S.& P.’s vice president for index services, said. “We’re in a bit of a flat period.”
Las Vegas, the worst hit of all the major housing markets, managed its second consecutive monthly gain. “Vegas was so battered there is now a tiny bit of hope,” Ms. Maitland said. “You can only fall so much.”
In the case of Las Vegas, that was apparently a drop of 57 percent from its peak. Seven of 10 homeowners with mortgages in Nevada owe more on their properties than they are worth, according to the First American data. In Arizona and Florida, about half the owners are underwater.
Further price declines could give many of these owners the impetus to walk away. If interest rates rise and the tax credit is not renewed, another slump is expected. Nationally, prices are already about where they were in summer 2003. Further declines could add up to a lost decade for housing prices.
Joshua Shapiro, chief United States economist for MFR Inc., said he expected the market to drop after the tax credit expired. At that point, he said, “more of the true fundamentals will come through on pricing.”
In the spring, the seasonal adjustment factors will tend to weigh on Case-Shiller prices, rather than bolster them as they do now. Without the adjustments, most of the cities in the index fell in December. The composite dropped 0.2 percent for the second consecutive month.
On an annual basis, the 20-city index was down 3.1 percent. That figure has improved consistently for a year. Only three cities — Detroit, Tampa and Las Vegas — are still showing double-digit annual declines.
The quarterly return for the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index of national home prices, which incorporates data from a broader slice of the country, was also released on Tuesday. That index fell 2.5 percent in the fourth quarter compared with the same period in 2008.
Despite a Price Gain in December, Signs of Worry on Housing
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02.23.10
Posted in All, hot news, money, news, top tagged All, blogs, life, marketing, political at 1:48 pm by carydalton
Filed at 2:06 a.m. ET
* Forecasts lower beer consumption in many regions in 2010
* Price increases set to be less than in 2009
* 2009 operating profit 2.095 bln euros vs forecast 2.10 bln
(Adds details, background)
BRUSSELS, Feb 23 (Reuters) - Heineken NV , the world’s third-largest brewer, forecast lower beer consumption in many regions, limited price increases and few cost benefits this year after reporting 2009 results broadly in line with expectations.
Heineken, like other brewers, suffered from recession-conscious consumers drinking less beer in 2009 but succeeded in pushing through price increases.
“The global economic environment will continue to lead to lower beer consumption and down-trading in a number of regions in 2010,” Heineken said in a statement on Tuesday.
The Dutch company, whose chief brands are Heineken and Amstel, Europe’s No.1 and No.3 beers, said it was committed to maintaining or increasing prices and would continue to pass on excise duty rises to consumers.
However, it said that price increases would not be as steep this year as they were in 2009.
The likely fall in raw material costs per hectolitre due to a temporary decline in the price of brewing barley would be offset by higher energy costs, rising advertising rates and increased marketing costs.
It would continue to drive through its three-year total cost management plan, which yielded 155 million euros in savings to operating income its first year in 2009 easy fast payday loans.
Heineken said that earnings before interest, tax (EBIT), and one-offs rose by 14 percent on a like-for-like basis to 2.095 billion euros ($2.85 billion) in 2009. The average forecast in a Reuters poll of 14 analysts was 2.10 billion euros.
That came despite a 5.4 percent fall in underlying consolidated beer volumes. A 4.5 percent improvement in pricing and sales mix translated into a 0.2 percent drop in revenue. Cost cutting then explained the profit increase.
World No.2 SABMiller said last month that its underlying beer volumes were flat in the last three months of 2009 as consumer demand in emerging markets offset declines in Europe, North America and South Africa.
Heineken’s pain has been greater than its peers given that some 70 percent of the Dutch brewer’s operating profit comes from the more sluggish European and North American markets.
Heineken bought Scottish & Newcastle with Carlsberg for 7.8 billion pounds ($12.06 billion) in 2008, chiefly getting the British assets.
However, it is set to boost its emerging market presence to 40 percent by buying the beer business of Mexico’s FEMSA. [ID:nLDE60A0DL]
Carlsberg also reports 2009 results on Tuesday. ($1=.7340 euros) ($1=.6469 pounds)
Heineken Sees Difficult 2010
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02.15.10
Posted in All, Free blog Tips, economic, hot news, news tagged All, business, money, politics, reviews at 1:42 am by carydalton
ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Rain, low clouds and predicted high winds Sunday grounded searchers seeking the body of a ConocoPhillips Alaska employee missing and presumed dead in an avalanche that killed the head of the company.
The avalanche at around noon Saturday on the Kenai Peninsula buried Jim Bowles, 57, head of ConocoPhillips Alaska, and Alan Gage, 39, part of the company’s capital projects team in Anchorage. Gage remains missing.
“The weather is not cooperating and it’s not conducive to search,” said Megan Peters, a spokeswoman for the Alaska State Troopers.
The men were in a party of 12 snowmobilers in the Grandview wilderness area, part of the Chugach National Forest, between the tiny communities of Moose Pass and Portage.
Bowles was buried for about 45 minutes before companions using avalanche beacons dug him out. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Gage apparently was not wearing an avalanche beacon, troopers said.
Troopers and U.S. Forest Service personnel rode snowmobiles 15 miles to reach the scene. The railroad brought in Girdwood Fire Department personnel and a trooper helicopter flew in from Anchorage.
Ridgetop winds Saturday averaged 10 to 20 mph and mountain temperatures were in the mid-20s to low 30s. Conditions deteriorated overnight, with two inches of new snow falling at Turnagain Pass, about 15 miles north of Grandview.
Ridgetop winds Sunday ramped up, averaging 30 mph with gusts to 40. A strong low pressure area in the Gulf of Alaska was expected to bring gale to storm force easterly winds, rain at sea level, and up to 12 inches of new snow at higher elevations.
The Chugach National Forest Avalanche Information Center said the avalanche danger rose to “considerable” with pockets of “high” hazard as the storm progressed.
“We pretty much hit the tipping point the last few days, and this next storm will just add more stress to a snowpack with significant buried weak layers,” said forecaster Lisa Portune on the center’s Web site free credit scores.
Forecaster Carl Skustad said the snowmobile party was in moderate terrain, with probably a 35 to 40 degree slope. However, with the weak snow layer underneath, that can be enough for snow to let loose, he said.
Emergency officials said a search would resume when weather improved and avalanche danger subsided.
Bowles joined Conoco in 1974. He was named head of Alaska operations, overseeing about 900 employees since in late 2004. Jim Mulva, ConocoPhillips chairman and chief executive officer, said in a statement Sunday that Bowles presided over developments that ensured the company’s place and standing in Alaska.
“On behalf of everyone at ConocoPhillips, including those who had the privilege to know and work with these two gentlemen and those who did not, I want to extend our sincere condolences to the Bowles family and our heartfelt best wishes to the Gage family and make sure they know the high regard in which we hold Jim and Alan, both as co-workers and as friends.”
Gov. Sean Parnell issued a statement saying he and his wife, Sandy, were saddened by Bowles’ death and lauded his work in Alaska.
“Jim brought so much to our state: his love of the great outdoors, his leadership of ConocoPhillips Alaska, and his dedication to making Alaska a better place for all of us to call home,” Parnell said.
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said Bowles was a great partner in the responsible development of Alaska’s natural resources.
A third man was caught in another avalanche and killed Saturday near Eagle River on Anchorage’s north side.
William Brasher Schorr, 60, was skiing alone near the top of a ridge while a friend waited near the bottom for his arrival. A witness saw the slide begin from his home. Schorr’s body was recovered about 45 minutes later.
Weather halts Alaska search for avalanche victim
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02.13.10
Posted in All, economic, hot news, news, top tagged All, campaign, life, opinion, personal at 11:12 pm by carydalton
The global coal industry is in the midst of a permanent structural shift in the form of the emerging dominance of the Asia-Pacific region.
China and India are at the heart of the transformation, firmly placed as the world's No. 1 and No. 3 biggest coal producing nations, respectively. (The U.S. is No. 2.)
And demand in the world's two most populous nations is growing rapidly.
India's imports of thermal coal, used in power generation, rose 60% in 2009 to 57 million tons. China shifted to a net importer last year to the tune of 70 million tons of thermal coal, despite large domestic resources of the black rock.
Both countries are also experiencing a spike in demand for metallurgical coal, a main ingredient of steel, as their economies continue to mushroom.
At the end of January, Peabody Energy (NYSE:BTU - News) said it is expanding a mine in Australia at a cost of $70 million to boost capacity by 1 million tons within several years to meet growing demand for metallurgical, or met coal, used by steel companies in China, India and other Asian nations.
"China and India have permanently changed the seaborne metallurgical and thermal coal market landscape," CEO Gregory Boyce said. Peabody enjoyed a 37% increase in Australian coal shipments in the second half of 2009.
Alpha Natural Resources (NYSE:ANR - News) said it sees much strength in the metallurgical markets in 2010. It raised its metallurgical shipment guidance by about 1 million tons, to 11 million to 13 million tons for this year.
Meanwhile back in the U.S., the enormous stockpiles of coal racked up by utilities during the depths of the recession are starting to shrink after extremely cold weather in December and January.
According to U.S. utilities, which use coal to generate nearly half of America's electricity, roughly 50 to 60 gigawatts of coal will go offline over the next 10 years or so.
The U.S. will need to replace that energy, and renewables such as solar, wind, small hydro, modern biomass, geothermal and biofuels are one of the paths to take to fill that void.
1. Business
IBD's Energy-Other group includes any energy source that is not oil or natural gas. The group's 800-pound gorilla is coal.
Coal mining, especially underground, is a capital- and labor-intensive business. It is also a very high fixed-cost business.
Electricity demand has been the primary value driver for thermal and steam coal for a long time, with steel being the other big driving force.
In 2009, the U.S. produced 1.08 billion tons of coal, mined primarily from four major coal basins with smaller ones spread across the country. The four are the northern and central Appalachian basins, the Illinois basin and northern Wyoming's Powder River Basin.
Peabody is the largest U.S. coal miner, producing 215 million tons last year. It is the only U.S.-based company in the group with international mining operations, in this case Australia.
Arch Coal (NYSE:ACI - News) is the second-largest company in the group; Alpha Natural Resources moved into the No. 3 slot with last year's acquisition of Foundation Coal for $1.4 billion in stock. Consol Energy (NYSE:CNX - News) and Massey Energy (NYSE:MEE - News) are fourth and fifth, respectively.
The U.S. is capable of generating roughly 1,000 gigawatts of electricity per year. Coal generates some 325 gigawatts, natural gas kicks in 400 and nuclear makes up another 100, according to Brian Gamble, an analyst at Simmons & Co. The rest, he says, is split between hydropower, solar, wind, geothermal and biomass.
"The segment of the U.S. power grid that is made up of renewables is quite small," Gamble said. "It is a growing market, albeit from a small base, but we don't expect solar, wind or any other renewable to gain significant market share for some time."
The group includes several solar companies, including Chinese firms like Trina Solar (NYSE:TSL - News) and Suntech Power (NYSE:STP - News).
First Solar (NMS:FSLR) is the largest U.S.-based solar company by market share. Other American firms include Real Goods Solar (NMS:RSOL), GT Solar International (NMS:SOLR) and SunPower (NMS:SPWRA).
While multinationals such as GE (NYSE:GE - News) and Siemens (NYSE:SI - News) have made a strong push into wind power, those diversified industrial giants are listed in other stock groups. In the Energy-Other group, Danish company Vestas Wind Systems (OTCBB:VWDRY.ob - News) is the largest wind-power company.
Ormat Technologies (NYSE:ORA - News) and U.S. Geothermal (AMEX:HTM.a - News) operate plants of geothermal energy, power generated from heat stored in the Earth payday advance.
Name Of The Game: It's simple: produce and supply coal, wind, solar, hydropower and other renewables to fulfill the world's energy needs, which are expected to grow rapidly over the next 20 to 30 years, says Michael Dudas, an analyst with Jefferies & Co.
2. Market
U.S. utilities are the biggest customers for coal producers and renewable energy alike.
Steel makers are the next biggest consumers of coal.
The entire coal market, which is dominated by the publicly traded miners and small mom-and-pops, is estimated at roughly north of $52 billion. The U.S. is expected to produce 1.07 billion tons of coal this year, with public coal companies churning out more than half that output.
The renewables market is a bit tougher to size as the adoption of these alternative energies is still in early phases. But rough estimates for the global wind and solar market is roughly $100 billion, with 70% of that produced by wind. The U.S. wind market is roughly $20 billion, according to Simmons' estimates.
3. Climate
The biggest issue facing the coal industry is permits being held up by the Environmental Protection Agency that are needed to continue producing coal. Environmentalists contend coal mining is destroying landscapes where these basins are located.
"The problem here is that we are going to experience energy usage growth of 50% over the next 25 years, and we can't do it without coal, which is one of the cheapest forms of energy," Dudas said.
Coal stockpiles rose last year as demand fell. Businesses were forced to close and shutter production, while consumers used less heat to save on their energy bills, Dudas says.
"Coal producers will have to manage their output and in some cases shut mining operations down until the stockpiles begin to decline, which has already begun," he said.
Last week, U.S. industry executives from the wind, solar, hydropower, geothermal and biomass sectors pushed for a federal renewable energy standard, which would set a percentage of how much energy must come from renewable sources in the U.S.
The group wants an extension of tax incentives and said stimulus funds powered most renewable expansion last year. President Barack Obama has urged Congress to set a national standard that would require 25% renewable power by 2025.
A federal standard, which they say will foster economic growth and create jobs, could spur these industries at a time when China is moving swiftly into alternative energy production.
4. Technology
Most technological advances in this industry group have occurred in renewables.
For example, ethanol producers, such as BioFuel Energy (NMS:BIOF) and Pacific Ethanol (NMS:PEIX), use corn oil extraction technologies to produce the biofuel.
Companies such as Hy-Drive Technologies provide natural gas or hydrogen-generating systems for diesel and commercial fleets.
And FuelCell Energy (NMS:FCEL) makes stationary fuel cells, which electrochemically produce electricity directly from hydrocarbon fuels for commercial, industrial, utility and government customers.
Solar power companies have to be tech-savvy to generate electricity from sunlight. This can be direct as with photovoltaics, or indirect as with concentrating solar power, where the sun's energy is focused to boil water, then used to generate power.
5. Outlook
Over the next decade, coal plant retirements will take roughly 50 to 60 gigawatts of coal generation offline.
The U.S. will need to replace that lost energy, and renewables are the answer, Gamble says.
"It will take a mix to fill the void, and there will be a shift, but renewables won't fill that need overnight," he said. "In order to make this happen, there will have to be additional infrastructure built, which becomes an expensive proposition no matter how you slice it."
Nuclear, natural gas and renewable energy can each fill part of that role, but additional coal assets must be built in the meantime.
Upside: The world has unquenchable thirst for energy as emerging economies continue their rapid growth and populations in developed nations continue to swell. That demand should fuel business for traditional sources like coal as well as renewables.
Risks: Another recession could further sap demand for coal, which could increase stockpiles and restrain mining operations. Also, tougher regulation in the U.S. would make starting new projects difficult.
A Renewed Sense Of Energy
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02.09.10
Posted in All, Free blog Tips, economic, money, top tagged All, blogs, financial, people, world at 5:35 pm by carydalton
LINCOLNSHIRE, Ill. – Zebra Technologies Corp. made a profit in the fourth quarter, free of the one-time expenses that left it with a loss a year ago.
The company, which makes bar code and plastic card printers, also offered a first-quarter forecast above Wall Street expectations.
Its shares rose 7 cents to $27.41 in midday trading.
Zebra earned $17.6 million, or 30 cents per share, in the three months ended Dec. 31. It lost $117.4 million, or $1.88 per share, a year ago, when the company booked hefty charges related to restructuring and the falling value of its assets.
Zebra said the latest results included 3 cents per share in restructuring costs.
Revenue slipped 4 percent to $222.5 million from $232.6 million a year ago best payday advance.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, who typically exclude one-time costs, expected lower earnings of 25 cents per share and lower revenue of $206.6 million.
Full-year earnings came to $47.1 million, or 79 cents per share, compared with a loss of $38.4 million, or 60 cents per share, in 2008. Revenue fell to $803.6 million from $976.7 million.
Zebra said it expects a first-quarter profit of 25 cents to 32 cents per share, including 2 cents worth of restructuring charges. It expects sales of between $217 million and $230 million.
Analysts expected 26 cents per share and $203.7 million.
Zebra posts 4Q profit of $17.6 million
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02.07.10
Posted in Free blog Tips, money, online, shortly, top tagged All, life, money, opinion, personal at 3:00 am by carydalton
SHORTLY after Sept. 11, 2001, a soon-to-be familiar figure appeared in the news media. He was a young Muslim who wanted nothing more than to strap on a belt laden with explosives and blow himself up in an area crowded with infidels. He thought his reward would be eternity in paradise with 72 virgins.
But was he truly the face of Islamic terrorism? Eli Berman, a professor of economics at the University of California, San Diego, says otherwise in “Radical, Religious, and Violent: The New Economics of Terrorism” (M.I.T. Press, 300 pages).
“The pious Jihadist, programmed with an ideology of hate to be a human guided missile, or dreaming of virgins in heaven, makes for compelling news broadcasts and emotional sound bites, but in concept does not stand up to scrutiny,” he says.
Professor Berman has written an engaging book that brings new insight to an extremely polarizing subject. He argues that many terrorists are actually more rational than we might like to think. And that, of course, is a chilling notion.
The author is neither a pacifist nor an apologist for terrorists. He says, however, that if we stop looking at them as cartoon characters, we may do a better job of deterring them. In his view, we need to understand the economic forces that govern their behavior.
Professor Berman says that some of the most effective and resilient groups with terrorist links are in some ways economic clubs, run by “radical altruists.” He puts Hamas, Hezbollah and the Taliban (the United States has tied all three to terrorism) in this category. Some of these militant soldiers of Islam may sometimes commit atrocities. But Professor Berman contends that they genuinely want to help their members. They raise money from foreign governments — or, in the case of the Taliban, by selling opium — and provide social services and jobs to adherents.
The author notes that in South Lebanon, Hezbollah operates two private hospitals and a number of schools. It collects garbage, provides water and even manages an electricity grid. He says the Taliban operate 13 “guerilla law courts” in Afghanistan where locals can have disputes resolved.
Granted, the Taliban’s underground judicial system may not be as expensive to operate as a hospital or a garbage pickup service, but it has the same effect of forging a tighter bond of between the operation and its constituents.
However, Professor Berman writes, radical Islamic groups extract sacrifices from their members that have economic consequences. Families are encouraged to have lots of children, and the women are less likely to get jobs and have money to spend.
Professor Berman says that these organizations also prefer that their members send their children to Islamic schools, whose graduates are less likely to obtain jobs that pay them enough money to explore the market and its temptations cashadvance. Indeed, he says, these are some of the ways that radical believers ensure that their followers remain loyal.
Now there have been many so-called terrorist groups. But most of them don’t last because the authorities find someone who will give them information, which short-circuits the activities of the groups.
Professor Berman points out that Israeli security forces had little trouble shutting down the Jewish Underground, a less tightly organized group linked to terrorist acts, because its members were more willing to become informants than many of their Islamic peers. Al Qaeda does not offer social services, he says, and it has had more trouble historically with disloyal members.
So what does Professor Berman think should be done to put terrorists out of business? He says we need to do more to stop their revenue streams. He recommends that we discourage gulf states from contributing money to Hamas and cut off the Taliban’s inflows of cash from illegal activities.
In Professor Berman’s opinion, the United States needs to compete by offering the same kind of social services in Iraq and Afghanistan, though he concedes that terrorist groups will do everything to stop such efforts. He says aid providers must be protected — and he concedes that this will be expensive. But he points out that we are already spending billions of dollars on domestic security.
“In the long run,” Professor Berman writes, “those constructive approaches may well be cost-effective for the United States and other developed countries that are subject to international terrorism, because they are potentially sustainable.” In other words, they could be good investments.
Professor Berman is shrewd enough not to repeat the left-wing fallacy that terrorism itself is a product of economic deprivation. He seems reluctant, however, to explore why Islam is such a breeding ground for these practices.
He says the rise of militant Islam is just another wave of religious extremism, the likes of which have occurred throughout history. As he points out, the peace-loving Mennonites belong to a branch of Christianity that was once considered radical and dangerous.
Then again, today’s terrorists may soon get their hands on a nuclear device. Would Mennonites of old have detonated it? We don’t know. But Professor Berman’s “radical altruists” might.
Off the Shelf: Terrorism and the Pocketbook
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01.31.10
Posted in All, economic, money, online, top tagged All, blogs, markets, newsreports, opinion at 7:48 am by carydalton
LONDON – As captain of England’s national team, John Terry is used to appearing in the sports pages. But on Saturday, his picture was splashed across the front pages of Britain’s newspapers, and not because of his skill on the field.
A High Court judge lifted a court order Friday that had prevented the media from reporting allegations about Terry’s private life — a so-called “super injunction” which barred publication that any order even existed.
The court order related to a story about the 29-year-old Terry, who is married with two children, and his ties with another woman whom the judge did not name.
After the injunction was lifted, it wasn’t just the country’s famously racy tabloids that published page after page about the football (soccer) star — some of Britain’s more conservative broadsheet newspapers followed the story as well for its long-term impact on the country’s strict media laws.
Ambi Sitham, a media lawyer, called High Court judge Michael Tugendhat’s decision “hugely significant,” and said while those with legitimate privacy concerns would continue to be protected, people trying to escape scrutiny for other reasons won’t find relief in the courts.
“It’s a big red flag for high-profile people, who are increasingly using privacy law to keep sordid details out of the press,” she said.
In December, a similar injunction barred journalists in Britain from publishing material about Tiger Woods, even blocking the media from revealing the details of the order itself. Woods has since confessed to marital infidelities, lost millions as sponsorship deals evaporated, taken an unspecified amount of time off from professional golf and disappeared from public view.
Terry, whose past bad boy antics have been frequently chronicled by the press, never had the saintly reputation of Woods. Still, he is one of the sport’s highest-paid stars playing the world’s most popular game for one of the most renowned clubs — Chelsea — in the English Premier League, the world’s wealthiest.
Britain doesn’t have a formal privacy law, but is a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights. That guarantees the right to respect for privacy and family life, and this clause has been used repeatedly by celebrities to fight media exposes.
The position of England captain is highly prestigious in Britain — David Beckham was the team’s previous leader. Terry had been working on his image after a series of damaging incidents and last year was named “Dad of the Year” by a condiments company.
The injunction was granted Jan. 22 after Terry learned that a newspaper was about to publish a story about his private life.
Tugendhat, however, said Terry appeared more concerned about the effect that publication of the allegations might have on his public image rather than his private life, saying the “claim is essentially a business matter.”
Terry — who is identified as LNS in the judgment — has several sponsorship deals on top of his reported weekly salary of 170,000 pounds ($275,000; euro197,000) with Chelsea.
“I have reached the view that it is likely that the nub of LNS’s complaint in this case is the protection of reputation, and not of any other aspect of LNS’s private life,” the judgment says payday loan in advance. “The real basis for the concern of LNS is likely to be the impact of any adverse publicity upon the business of earning sponsorship and similar income.”
The judge did say the woman in question was “a famous person” but not from the sporting world — and not as famous as Terry. British papers on Saturday reported that the woman was a model who already had a son with one of Terry’s former teammates, a player who may also be chosen for England’s World Cup team.
His team, Chelsea, has called the situation “a personal matter” and said they would give Terry and his family “all the support they need in dealing with it.”
Much speculation Saturday focused on how the allegations could affect Terry’s position on the England team and its run at the World Cup this summer in South Africa. Coach Fabio Capello has instilled a strict disciplinary code within the squad, and could pull the captaincy from Terry if he thought his off-field behavior might affect the team.
“The daily headlines will continue to question his fitness to lead. In Fleet Street parlance, this story has legs and will run and run,” sports columnist Henry Winter wrote in the Daily Telegraph. “If it seems that Terry’s conduct and continued ownership of the captain’s armband affects morale going into a World Cup, then Capello has no choice. Terry should go.”
Terry has played for Chelsea his entire career. The Blues fended off an attempt by Manchester City to sign him last year by giving him a pay rise that reportedly made him the highest-paid player in the Premier League.
Appointed Chelsea captain in 2004, he has won two Premier League titles, three FA Cups and two League Cups in the most successful period in the club’s history.
He was first choice in central defense for England at the 2004 European Championship and 2006 World Cup, after which he was named national team captain when Beckham relinquished the role.
But allegations of off-field transgressions have followed him throughout his career. He was fined by Chelsea after he and three teammates drunkenly abused American guests at a hotel the day after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Terry has also been ejected from nightclubs and newspapers have accused him of infidelities several times.
But Terry has retained the England captaincy, even after the country’s failure to reach the 2008 European Championship, and appeared in advertisements for Samsung and sportswear manufacturer Umbro.
Despite speculation that he might hide out after all the bad publicity, Terry started in his team’s game Saturday. He was booed by fans but scored the winning goal in Chelsea’s 2-1 victory over Burnley, keeping his team on top of the Premier League.
“He is a fantastic player,” Chelsea coach Carlo Ancelotti said after the game. “That is his private life. He is about work. We don’t have to say nothing because he is very professional.”
___
Associated Press sports writer Stuart Condie contributed to this report from London.
UK court lifts media ban on soccer star’s life
Hot News: Toyota to Issue a Fix for Recalled Cars
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01.30.10
Posted in All, hot news, news, shortly, top tagged All, money, news, people, world at 12:05 am by carydalton
NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Chevron Corp (CVX.N), the second-largest U.S. oil company, posted a 37 percent drop in quarterly profit, missing analyst forecasts, as steep refinery losses offset gains from higher oil prices and production.
Global refining margins have suffered in recent months as rising crude oil prices have driven up costs even as the weak economy has shrunk demand for gasoline and diesel fuel.
That refinery weakness overshadowed a steep 9 percent rise in oil and gas output in the quarter from new and expanded projects, which lifted proved reserves by 1.1 billion barrels.
"It's like trying to run at 40 miles per hour in a boat while dragging an anchor," said James Halloran, energy advisor at Financial America Securities in Cleveland.
The company will be spending heavily off the coast of Western Australia this year, with $3.5 billion of its $21.6 billion capital spending budget going toward construction of its massive natural gas operations there.
Chevron signed off on the $37 billion Gorgon liquefied natural gas project in September, after hiring a contractor to design the Wheatstone project nearby only weeks earlier.
Chevron's fourth-quarter net profit fell to $3.07 billion, or $1.53 per share, from $4.9 billion, or $2.44 per share, in the same quarter a year before.
That fell far short of analysts' average forecast of $1.70 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S, largely because of the steeper-than-expected $613 million loss from refining, marketing and transportation.
Chief Executive John Watson, on his first call with analysts since getting the job, said it was "quite premature" to talk of closing refineries, but he would seek cost cuts and aim for a 10 percent-plus downstream return through the cycle.
Chevron will merge its chemicals arm with the rest of the downstream business, and retain a spending bias that will shift its focus over time to exploration and production, he added quick pay day loan.
"We have favored upstream investment for more than the last decade. That has been a pattern I think you will see going forward," Watson said on the conference call.
After outperforming on oil and gas output in 2009, Chevron is looking for modest production growth of about 1 percent this year, to 2.73 million barrels of oil equivalent (boe) per day.
Production at Chevron was 2.78 million boe per day in the fourth quarter, including 135,000 bpd associated with the ramp-up at Agbami in Nigeria, which commenced operations in the third quarter of 2008, and expansion at Tengiz in Kazakhstan.
Overall revenue rose nearly 12 percent to $48 billion.
Chevron said earlier in January that fourth-quarter profit would be hit by the slump in its refining business, which saw margins fall to the lowest levels of the year.
The company's business lost in the quarter versus a year-ago profit of $2.1 billion.
Earlier this week, ConocoPhillips (COP.N) posted better-than-expected earnings as the firmer oil prices offset its weak refinery performance.
Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) reports results on Monday.
At Thursday's close, Chevron shares had shed 4.5 percent since the start of 2010, against a 3.6 percent decline in the Chicago Board Options Exchange index of oil companies (.OIX).
The stock fell 0.6 percent to $72.82 on Friday, while the Standard & Poor's Energy index (.GSPE) was flat.
(Reporting by Matt Daily in New York and Braden Reddall in San Francisco, editing by Dave Zimmerman and Gunna Dickson)
Chevron Q4 profit tumbles, misses Wall St view
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01.28.10
Posted in .com, All, money, news, online tagged All, events, marketing, markets, political at 11:00 am by carydalton
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) — Bank of China said Thursday it may sell additional shares in Hong Kong even as it moves ahead with a 40 billion yuan ($5.9 billion) convertible bond sale, moves designed to ensure it meets capital adequacy ratios.
Asian Shares Mostly Up After Fed Announcement
Asian markets rise after a modest rise on Wall Street, and the Fed’s more upbeat assessment on the economy. Dow Jones Newswires’ Leslie Shaffer reports.
Bank of China said in statement filed with stock market regulators in Hong Kong that the fund raising is designed to help the bank maintain a capital adequacy ratio of at least 11.5% in 2010 and 2011.
The bank was the most aggressive in terms of issuing new loans last year, responding to Beijing’s order to help prop up the economy.
In total, Chinese banks extended 9.6 trillion yuan in 2009, nearly double levels from a year earlier.
Beijing has targeted an additional 7 car loans for people with bad credit.5 trillion yuan in new lending this year, stoking concerns that the institutions will need to raise funds to ensure they stay within regulatory requirements.
Bank of China said in a statement on Thursday that the timing of the Hong Kong equity sales would depend on market conditions, regulatory approvals and other factors.
The bank’s capital adequacy ratio may have slipped to below 11% at the end of December, down from 11.6% at the end of September, according to a report by Dow Jones Newswires Thursday, which cited unidentified analysts.
China Merchants Securities research estimates Bank of China will need to raise about 60 billion yuan in addition to the planed 40 billion yuan convertible bond to maintain an 11.5% capital adequacy ratio, the report said.
Bank of China may issue more HK-listed stock
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01.25.10
Posted in All, Free blog Tips, money, online, top tagged All, blogs, finance, marketing, money at 5:12 pm by carydalton
WASHINGTON – The top Senate Democrat wants to make it more difficult to run up the deficit with new tax cuts or expansions of federal benefit programs.
Majority Leader Harry Reid’s plan would make it difficult to again extend emergency unemployment benefits or health insurance subsides for laid off workers. It would also make it harder to render new assistance for state Medicaid payments.
The Nevada Democrat is pressing the plan to get legislation passed permitting the government to continue to borrow money to finance its operations no fax cash loans. Under the pay-as-you-go concept, program cuts or revenue increases would be needed to cover the cost of any new policies or programs. If not, across-the-board spending cuts would kick in.
Top Senate Democrat lays out deficit curbs
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01.23.10
Posted in .com, economic, money, news, top tagged All, events, money, opinion, work at 1:29 am by carydalton
ELYRIA, Ohio – A combative President Barack Obama exhorted Congress Friday to pass a new job-creation bill, taking a populist appeal to America’s recession-racked Rust Belt in hopes of recapturing the energy of his campaign and moving his presidency beyond this week’s blows.
Obama weaved angry us-against-them rhetoric throughout the day, telling a town hall audience that he “will never stop fighting” for an economy that works for the hard-working, not just those already well off.
“This isn’t about me. This is about you,” Obama shouted in a rousing defense of his presidency and not-so-subtle slaps at his critics. “I think that I win when you win. That’s how I think about it.”
He said a jobs bill emerging in Congress must include tax breaks for small business hiring and for people trying to make their homes more energy efficient — two proposals he wasn’t able to get into a bill the House passed last month. And he used the word “fight” or some variation of it well over a dozen times. The House-passed $174 billion stimulus package faces a stern test in the Senate, in part because it is financed with deficit spending.
With the town hall meeting, tours of a factory and classroom, an impromptu diner stop and even the lack of a necktie, Obama’s day had the feel of one from his campaign. Followed by campaign videographers, he grinned, bantered and joked through the snowy scenery, a far cry from his more somber demeanor of late.
The upset win by Republican Scott Brown in a special Massachusetts Senate election this week — a victory spurred in large part by an anti-establishment sentiment — badly stung the White House and prompted awareness that neither Obama’s agenda nor the electoral prospects for fellow Democrats this fall can be taken for granted.
So in his at the town hall meeting at Lorain County Community College near Cleveland, the president assailed Washington and Wall Street alike, hoping to connect with public’s frustration and position himself as the solution — not the problem.
He strongly defended unpopular actions he has taken to bail out banks and insurers and to rescue automakers from collapse. Such measures have not gone over well in many quarters, derided as expanding government and swelling the deficit while many on Main Street still walk unemployment lines.
Obama said propping up the financial industry was as much about regular Americans as wealthy bankers. “If the financial system had gone down, it would have taken the entire economy and millions more families and businesses with it,” he argued on line pay day loans.
Similarly, allowing GM and Chrysler to go under might have satisfied calls to force businesses to reap the consequences of bad decisions.
But he also said, “Hundreds of thousands of Americans would have been hurt, not just at those companies, but at auto suppliers and other companies and dealers here in Michigan — here in Ohio — up in Michigan and all across this country.”
Obama made a repeated point of criticizing Washington, too — saying that one can get a “pretty warped view of things” from inside the capital city, targeting special interest power and mocking the popular parlor game of handicapping his presidency.
“Is he weakened? Oh, how is he going to survive this?” he joked. “That’s what they do.”
He sought to demonstrate understanding for the economic uncertainty that lingers in many American homes and businesses despite some economic improvements.
“Folks have seen jobs you thought would last forever disappear. You’ve seen plants close and businesses shut down,” Obama said.
He promised to help. “I won’t stop fighting for you,” he said. “I’ll take my lumps.”
He acknowledged “we got a little bit of a buzz saw” on health care overhaul. But he said his pursuit of sweeping overhaul was — and still is — the right thing to do even amid war and economic crisis. “I am not going to walk away just because it’s hard.”
The choice of Ohio was no accident.
It has unemployment slightly higher than the national average, with the state reporting before Obama landed in Cleveland that its rate had ticked upward in December, to 10.9 percent from 10.6 percent the month before. The national rate was 10 percent in December.
Ohio is also a political must-win — a state Obama won in 2008 and probably must win again if he is to get a second White House term.
Across the street from the community college were groups of anti-Obama protesters.
“He’s done a lot, but they are all negative things,” said Ray Angell, 65, of Twinsburg, Ohio, a conservative active in the anti-tax Tea Party movement, mentioning the stimulus package and climate change proposals.
___
Associated Press writer Thomas J. Sheeran contributed to this story.
Defiant Obama urges Congress to pass jobs bill
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