Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou named Sean Chen as premier, choosing an official who oversaw the island
Solve your money worries and apply for a faxless payday loan today!
Greece and its private investors are close to a deal that will significantly reduce the country’s debt and pave the way for it to receive a much-needed euro130 billion bailout.
Negotiators for the investors announced the tentative agreement Saturday and said it could become final next week.
Under the agreement, the investors would take a hit of more than 60 percent on the euro206 billion of Greek debt they own.
Here’s how it would work: private investors would receive new bonds whose face value is half of the existing bonds. The new bonds would have a longer maturity and pay an average interest rate of slightly less than 4 percent (compared with an estimated 5 percent on the existing bonds).
Without the deal, which would reduce Greece’s debt load by at least euro120 billion, the private investors’ bonds would likely become worthless. Many of these investors also hold debt from other eurozone countries, which could also lose value in the event of a Greek default.
The agreement taking shape is a key step before Greece can get a second, euro130 billion bailout from its European Union partners and the International Monetary Fund, although there are other issues involved before Greece can get that aid. This would be Greece’s second bailout. The EU and the IMF signed off on a euro110 billion aid package for Greece in May 2010, most of which has already been disbursed.
Greece faces a euro14.5 billion bond repayment on March 20, which it cannot afford without additional help.
Private investors hold roughly two-thirds of Greece’s debt, which has reached an unsustainable level _ nearly 200 percent of the country’s economic output. By restructuring the debt held by private investors, Greece and its EU partners are hoping to bring that ratio closer to 120 percent by the end of this decade.
In return for the first bailout, Greece’s public creditors _ the International Monetary Fund, the European Union and the European Central Bank _ have unprecedented powers over Greek spending. However, austerity alone will not fix Greece’s problem. The country must also find ways boost its economic output, which at the moment is shrinking.
If no debt-exchange deal is reached with private creditors and Greece is forced to default, it would very likely spook Europe’s _ and possibly the world’s _ financial markets. It could even lead Greece to withdraw from the euro.
The banks, insurance companies and other private holders of Greek bonds are being represented by Charles Dallara, managing director of the Washington-based Institute of International Finance, and Jean Lemierre, senior adviser to the chairman of the French bank BNP Paribas.
The main creditor negotiators will leave Greece on Sunday and will remain in close consultation with Greek and other authorities.
Therefore, the best way for you on how to get free credit reports online is to go to the AnnualCreditReport.com; this is the official web site.
President Barack Obama, offering an election-year prescription to spur the economy, said the wealthiest Americans should pay more taxes in the name of fairness, to bring down the deficit and ensure those trying to make ends meet don
The body of a woman wearing a life vest was recovered by Italian coast guard divers Saturday from a narrow underwater corridor of the capsized cruise ship Costa Concordia, raising the death toll to 12 in the week-old accident that has sent some light fuel spilling into the Mediterranean off Tuscany.
Coast Guard Cmdr. Cosimo Nicastro told The Associated Press that the victim was found during a particularly risky inspection of an evacuation staging point at the ship’s rear.
“The corridor was very narrow, and the divers’ lines risked snagging” on objects in the passageway, Nicastro said. To permit the coast guard divers to get into the area, Italian navy divers had preceded them, setting off charges to blast holes for easier entrance and exit, he said.
The woman’s nationality and identity were not immediately known.
Before the corpse was found, 21 people were listed as missing. One of the women on the list is a Peruvian crew member, the others are passengers.
Three bodies were found in the waters near the ship in the first hours after the accident’ since then the rest of the victims have all been found inside the Concordia, apparently unable to get off the ship during a chaotic evacuation via lifeboats and later by helicopters. Some survivors jumped off and swam to safety.
The Concordia hit a reef and ran aground on Jan. 14, while passengers dined, about two hours after the ship had set sail from the port of Civitavecchia on the Tyrrhenian Sea. Costa Crociere has said the captain had deviated without permission from the vessels in an apparent maneuver to sail close to Giglio, a Tuscan island, to impress passengers aboard.
Search and rescue efforts for survivors and bodies have meant that an operation to remove heavy fuel in the Concordia’s tanks hasn’t yet begun, although specialized equipment has been standing by for days.
On Saturday, light fuel, apparently from machinery aboard the capsized Costa Concordia, was detected near the ship.
But Nicastro said there was no indication that any of the nearly 500,000 gallons (2,200 metric tons) of heavy fuel oil has leaked from the ship’s double-bottomed tanks. He said the leaked substance appears to be diesel, which is used to fuel rescue boats and dinghies and as a lubricant for ship machinery.
There are 185 tons of diesel and lubricants on board the crippled vessel, which is lying on its side just outside Giglio’s port. Nicastro described the light fuel’s presence in the sea as “very light, very superficial” and appearing to be under control.
Although attention has been concentrated on the heavy fuel oil in the tanks, “we must not forget that on that ship there are oils, solvents, detergents, everything that a city of 4,000 people needs,” Franco Gabrielli, the head of Italy’s civil protection agency, told reporters in Giglio.
Gabrielli, who is leading rescue, search and anti-pollution efforts for the Concordia, was referring to the roughly 3,200 passengers and 1,000 crew who were aboard the cruise liner when it ran into the reef, and then, with sea water rushing into a 70-meter (230-foot) gash in its hull, listed and finally fell onto its side.
Considering all the substances aboard the Concordia, “contamination of the environment, ladies and gentlemen, already occurred” when the cruise liner capsized, Gabrielli told a news conference.
Vessels equipped with machinery to suck out the light fuel oil were in the area, officials told Italian TV.
Earlier on Saturday, crews removed oil-absorbing booms used to prevent environmental damage in case of a leak. Originally white, the booms were grayish.
Divers resumed their search of the wreckage Saturday after data indicated the cruise ship had stabilized in the sea off Tuscany. Italian news reports said that the divers were also trying to locate the captain’s safe, in case it might contain documentation useful to the criminal probe.
The Italian captain, Francesco Schettino, is under house arrest for investigation of alleged manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship before all were evacuated. Schettino insists he helped coordinate the evacuation from Giglio’s docks after leaving the ship when the Concordia lurched to one side.
The search had been suspended Friday after the Concordia shifted, prompting fears the ship could roll off a rocky ledge of sea bed and plunge deeper into the sea. An abrupt shift could also cause a leak in the Concordia’s fuel tanks, polluting the pristine waters around Giglio, part of a seven-island Tuscan archipelago.
U.K. factory output prices unexpectedly fell in December for the first time in 18 months as the cost of petroleum products such as gasoline plunged.
The cost of goods at factory gates declined 0.2 percent from November, the Office for National Statistics said today in London. Annual price growth slowed to 4.8 percent, the least in a year. On the month, economists had forecast a 0.1 percent gain in December, according to the median of 17 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey.
Declines in prices for commodities such as oil may ease inflation pressure in the economy as producers and manufacturers pass lower costs onto consumers. The Bank of England, which maintained its bond-purchase target at 275 billion pounds ($422 billion) yesterday, has forecast that consumer-price growth will ease
Banks will be allowed go below minimum liquidity levels set by global regulators during financial crises to avoid cash-flow difficulties.
(Corrects number of electoral votes in next to last paragraph. For more campaign news, see ELECT)
President Barack Obama called yesterday
U.S. stock futures are falling Thursday as the European debt crisis again becomes the key driver of market sentiment.
Stock markets in London, Germany and France have all declined. The euro has dropped to a 15-month low against the dollar.
The concern in the markets has centered on the state of Europe’s banks following UniCredit’s announcement Wednesday that it was selling new shares at a large 69 percent discount to Tuesday’s closing price.
Banks are an integral part of the debt crisis because they hold government bonds. A default or steep fall in the value of government bonds could inflict heavy losses on banks and choke off credit to the European economy. That’s why regulatory authorities want Europe’s banks to raise their buffers by euro115 billion (149 billion) over the next few months. The worry in the markets is that banks will have to offer sharp discounts to raise the funds.
U.S. economic reports have the potential to shift sentiment. Key releases later Thursday include the Institute for Supply Management’s monthly survey of the services sector as well as indicators on the pace of hiring in the private sector.
The latter may affect market expectations for Friday’s closely-watched nonfarm payrolls data for December. The figures often set the market’s tone for a week or two after their release. The expectation is that the U No teletrak payday loan.S. economy generated around 150,000 jobs during December.
Positive economic news propelled U.S. stocks to a big rally on Tuesday. Those gains held Wednesday as automakers reported strong sales in December.
Less than two hours before trading opens in New York, futures on the Dow Jones industrial average are down 55 points to 12,301. Futures for the broader S&P 500 index have fallen 7 points to 1,266.
European stocks fell, though most indexes remained higher for the year so far. Germany’s DAX was down 0.7 percent at 6,066 while the CAC-40 fell 1 percent to 3,163. The FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was 0.7 percent lower at 5,629.
Earlier in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 index fell 0.8 percent to close at 8,488.71. South Korea’s Kospi index lost 0.1 percent at 1,863.74, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index rose 0.5 percent to 18,813.41. Benchmarks in Singapore and Taiwan were also higher.
Mainland China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite Index lost 1 percent to 2,148.45, its lowest level in almost three years. The Shenzhen Composite Index lost 3.5 percent to 813.99. More than 100 companies plunged to the daily limit of 10 percent.
U.K. shopper numbers fell yesterday as discounting and mild weather failed to entice cost-conscious Britons to spend, according to market researcher Experian Footfall.
Visits to shops and malls fell 0.7 percent on Dec. 27, compared to the Tuesday after Christmas last year, Experian Footfall said by e-mail. Shopper numbers surged 21.5 percent on Boxing Day, Dec. 26, with extended hours helping boost business limited last year by Sunday trading restrictions. The four-day U.K. holiday weekend ended on a Tuesday in both 2010 and 2011.
Stores including Debenhams Plc (DEB), the U.K.
Powered by WordPress