Archive for the 'finance' Category
If the crisis is undermining the morale of French households as a whole, those who are wealthy are not immune, far from it. The TNS Sofres auscultates regular relations of people with a financial wealth than 75,000 euros-the tributaries in the jargon-marketing with their bank. The final component of this study in October with 500 people shows that they live particularly bad crisis make quick cash.
The stock market turmoil of recent months are probably a part of the explanation. Indeed, in the previous survey in May, 55% of wealthy households thought that the decline in the stock market was behind them, and 44% felt that there was no risk of another financial crisis …
Since then, things have changed dramatically.
"The European economic recovery was interrupted." The verdict of the European Commission, which presented on Thursday its autumn forecasts for 2011-2013, is categorical. According to Brussels, all signals of the economy are red. "The sharp drop in confidence hinders investment and consumption, while the slowdown in global growth reduces export and fiscal consolidation to operate emergency weigh on domestic demand." Accordingly, the Institution provides a low growth for the EU in 2012, about 0.6% against 1.9% forecast last spring. In the euro area, GDP is expected to show a slight increase of 0.5%.
The return to growth, albeit slow, is scheduled for 2013 (1.3% in euro area and 1.5% in the EU). Unless additional shock …
The draft budget for 2012 Social Security will be voted on Wednesday by the House, before leaving the Senate. But a detailed examination of the text was to end Friday night. The Assembly amended several key points … until they know the consequences of the revision to 1% of projected growth. Lack of knowledge, "the dice are loaded," protested the Socialist Marisol Touraine. The rapporteur of the text, Yves Bur (UMP), was estimated at 1.5 billion shortfall, the government does not confirm.
Half a solution for excess fees
MEPs adopted an amendment to try to remedy the excess fees excessive. They left until the end of January to physicians, the social security and complementary health for themselves conclude this endless soap opera.Otherwise, the government will impose a solution.
It will offer surgeons, anesthetists and obstetricians to free prices (Area 2) to commit to cap the amount of their passing, 50% above the "tariff Safely." In addition, they shall not apply any overflow at least 30% of their actions. In exchange, Medicare will cover some of the social contributions of these volunteers. Patients, themselves, these exceedances will be reimbursed by the most complementary health – those who refuse their contracts will be taxed more.
But this scheme leaves the side of the road sector 1 physicians who have to comply with the Safely rates, including a thousand surgeons holders of certain diplomas, to whom greater pricing freedom is promised by the government since 2004. That's what unions denounce CSMF doctors and the Bloc.
Washington correspondent
Groupon refused to sell to Google last December for $ 6 billion. From Monday, October 24, the company of Chicago, specializing in online distribution of discount coupons for shopping in local markets, should make its IPO on the basis of a valuation of 10 to 12,000,000,000 dollars . However, it is far from the capitalization of 15 to 20 billion, of which Andrew Mason, founder of the company was still dreaming in June.
Several developments have forced Groupon to be more modest. The first hit all companies eager to use public savings. This is the market collapse in August. Investors, fearing a relapse of major economies in recession, are much more circumspect.The proposed IPO of Groupon had been suspended between August and October.
Even more problematic for Groupon: missteps have troubled his potential investors. On the intervention of regulatory authorities, the firm three years old had to revise up sharply the amount of its actual expenses. She had initially forgot to include online advertising spending to acquire customers. And without the investment of 432 million over six months, she could never show a turnover of 688 million.It is only through this aggressive marketing Groupon also have accumulated more than 115 million subscribers and more than ten-fold increase in sales in one year.
Affected by other accounting blunders – including the inclusion in its sales revenue and then transferred to merchants – the CEO of Groupon, Margo Georgiadis, resigned after only six months on the job easy payday loans. It has not yet been replaced. In addition, Groupon has to convince that his model is viable and that the start-up can stand up to the strong competition rages, especially from Amazon, Google and industry experts as LivingSocial. For now, Groupon is the industry leader – an advantage that distinguishes all Internet companies tempted by the Stock Exchange today.
Sunrise 500-700000000
But stay number one requires a considerable investment.Number of traders attracted by its staff are aware of the experience that customers quickly drawn into their shop with coupons do not necessarily come. To remain attractive to merchants, Groupon and peers rely on the creation of thematic niches (travel, babies, etc.)..
All this explains why Groupon not trying at first to rise from 500 to 700,000,000 dollars. If strong demand materializes, it could go further, or wait a few months and get a higher valuation. Advised by Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse, Groupon could also benefit from investors' appetite for Internet stocks. Of Zynga Facebook, candidates are numerous, but few have passed the time.
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Euro countries, including France and Germany plan to push a few days at least the Euro Summit in Brussels originally scheduled for Oct. 18, according to European sources consistent.
This is to give a little more time to the development of the answer "global" announced this weekend in Berlin by Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel. The European Council President Van Rompuy must specify the new calendar in the day, according to his entourage.
'Global response'
In Berlin, the President and the Chancellor had foreshadowed the shift by promising "sustainable solutions, comprehensive and fast before the end of the month."They also kept to define the contours, which allows to believe that the agreement is to be locked at seventeen if not two, on the key points: the recapitalization of banks and the role of the European stabilization financial, finding economically viable treatment for Greece and modification of European treaties in order to strengthen collective discipline.
Europeans to revise their copy, just three months after concocted, July 21, a plan intended to resolve the crisis in Greece and curb its spread to Italy or Spain. It has not yet been adopted by all Seventeen. The vote of Slovakia, with a coalition divided on the subject may become paralyzing veto and the euro area.
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TF1 and Canal + are about to conclude their negotiations for the recovery of the non-exclusive news channel LCI. The parties are agreed on a price higher than the 5 million euros per year initially proposed by Canal +.
After months of standoff, the two operators have approached. Already on Friday, Frédéric Mitterrand, the Minister of Culture and Communication, has publicly that the government did not favor the passage of the LCI DTT to DTT. A position at which the staff of TF1 was more sensitive than the Higher Audiovisual Council has continued to increase, too, signs of reluctance.
Indeed, it is the regulatory body that should have given its approval to such an operation.The CSA has raised the legal difficulties of such an operation and would not have appreciated the statements of Catherine Nayl, director of information at TF1, the possible disappearance of LCI. Today, Canal + and TF1 prefer calm the game's announcement of the acquisition channels Direct 8 Direct and Star by Canal + and that the record fine imposed by the Competition Authority as part of merger with Canal + GST urged to be more generous towards ICL. It would not be good for the group to be, in addition, responsible for the eventual death of the continuous news channel.
For its part, TF1 has weighed the pros and cons of an economic transition to free when the system always loses 5 million for a budget of 43 million euros. The move to free distribution would have widened the gap in the chain up to fifteen million.Difficult to take a risk in times of crisis.
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The "outstanding contribution to the very high income" will not remain as is. Originally the government planned to implement from 2012 a new levy of 3% of the income exceeding EUR 500,000 per year and revenue per unit. It is this threshold in the draft budget law presented Wednesday. But Sunday, the budget minister, Valérie Pécresse, said she was open to a compromise with legislators, who for several weeks argue for a lower threshold.
In fact, the government is prepared to accept that the tax is triggered from 250,000 euros per unit. The level advocated by the current UMP Presidents of the Assembly and Senate, Bernard Accoyer and Gérard Larcher. "This is a good level of understanding," they say in the entourage of Gilles Carrez, the rapporteur UMP budget to the Assembly. The draft budget law will be amended in October this.And review, the tax will yield € 300 million to the state, instead of 200 million. It will affect 15,000 to 20,000 homes in 5000 to 10,000 against the original.
Specifically, if the amendment passes, the contribution will trip from 250,000 euros in annual revenue for a single and EUR 500 000 for a couple. For now, it is expected that having a child or children shall not be entitled to any share in the calculation of the contribution.
Regular income concerned
Another difference with the Income Tax (IR): the contribution of 3% apply to "income tax reference." This "reference taxable income" includes wages, but also dividends, interest, capital gains and estate securities short, capital income. "This makes the contribution on very high incomes more effective than the creation of an additional 45% of IR.Indeed, the IR is such that capital income would escape taxation at 45% and would remain taxed at 19%, "said Gilles Carrez.
The government hoped that only households with high incomes are regularly taxed. This is to prevent a dealer who sells one year his business pays the contribution. For this, the income taken into account for the outbreak of the tax will be calculated as an average over three years. This will be discussed, Gilles Carrez wanting only the capital gains are smoothed over three years. The contribution should go out when the deficit below 3% rise in GDP, that is to say in 2014. But many outstanding taxes have been made permanent …
It's a real bolt from the French audiovisual landscape. Wednesday morning the competition authority has simply removed the authority granted to Canal + in 2006 to buy its rival TPS. Result, Canal + and its parent Vivendi will re-notify their proposed acquisition of TPS before the competition authority in a one-month periods. In addition, the authority sanctioning Canal + up to 30 million euros.
The reason for this? The Competition Authority considers that Canal + has not complied with several of the 59 commitments made during this operation.These commitments were supposed to ensure that the encrypted string abuses its dominant position in pay TV.
Among the reasons for this heavy penalty, the Competition Authority Canal + accuses of not having available to third party distributors (telecom operators and their channel packages on ADSL) in a timely manner the seven channels mentioned in the commitments. Worse, the Canal + group would deliberately degraded the quality of TPS Star, the only pay channel capable of competing with its own channel Canal +. Finally, the group led by Bertrand Meheut failed to comply with certain commitments regarding relationships with independent channels business cards.Clearly, it takes advantage of its dominant position to impose commercial conditions "opaque and potentially discriminatory"
Gendarme Competition
All of these unfulfilled commitments had been badly negotiated in 2006, on the redemption of GST. Telecom operators, Orange had in mind battled against Canal +. The competition authority had imposed severe conditions, but Canal +, no one has apparently ignored it.
With this decision, the Competition Authority comes on strong. She returns to the operation which allowed Canal + to eliminate competition in the market for pay television. Above all, the competition watchdog the fact at a time when Canal + ready to leverage its position in pay television to attack the free TV market with the acquisition of Direct 8 Direct and Star.
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From our correspondent in Berlin.
The green wave that swept across the Rhine after the disaster atomic Fukushima is a capitulation to the first industry group. The German industrial giant Siemens has given up on Sunday at his activity in the nuclear dead end since it considers the abandonment of the atom civilian in Germany. While Berlin has decided to close the seventeen German nuclear power plants by 2020, Siemens decided to enroll in the federal government's strategy and to strengthen further in the field of renewable energy.
"Chapter nuclear ended for us," said Peter Löscher, CEO of Munich, the weekly Der Spiegel. "We are more involved in the total management of the construction of nuclear power plants or in their financing.In the future, we will continue to deliver conventional parts, such as steam turbines (…), found also in the central gas or coal, "he said.
After the emotion aroused in Germany by the catastrophe of Fukushima, the German government decided in March to immediately stop the older reactors and then condemn others by 2022. "That changed things for us," acknowledged Löscher. Prudent, he was one of the few in Germany in 2010 not to sign an open letter from the heavyweights of the German economy demand a longer duration of use of nuclear power plants. Löscher called a "project of the century" turn energy taken by Germany. And he considers attainable goal to move to a 35% share of renewables in the "mix" German in 2020.Siemens, diverse group in the transport, household appliances or medicine, is already a world-class champion in wind energy.
The decision seems even more logical that Siemens has never been lucky in nuclear energy. In 2009, the Munich group was forced to announce his break with the French nuclear group Areva and sell its stake, amounting to 34% of shares in the subsidiary Areva NP reactor. Sued for breach of its contractual obligations, Siemens was ordered to pay 648 million euros of interest to Areva.Unable to further develop this cooperation because of political opposition on the part of France, Siemens had preferred to turn to Russia and had begun discussions with Rosatom in March 2009, in a context of international nuclear renaissance.
Bill up 10%
Sunday, Löscher also bury the proposed joint venture with the Russian public group in the Rosatom nuclear. "Both groups are still very interested in a partnership. But it will focus on another area, "he added.
The abandonment of the German nuclear announced dealt a severe blow to major energy companies across the Rhine. While their foreign competitors reaping profits, E. ON and RWE, the two main operators of nuclear power, have announced plans for cost savings and layoffs.Germany is now reduced to importing nuclear energy produced under safe conditions, in neighboring Czech Republic. Result: the energy bill has increased by 10% in a few months.
The CAC 40 is unable to bounce back on Monday. The benchmark index of the Paris Stock Exchange, which closed Friday on the day of a severe fall of 3.6% continues this trend. At the opening, he gave up 2.41% to 3072.51 points. The movement is the same in the rest of Europe in London, the FTSE-100 index lost 1.43%, in Frankfurt the Dax was down 2.32% and 2.22% loose up Milan.
The first global economy has fueled fears of a global slowdown by announcing Friday it had no jobs created in August, while analysts expected 70 000 net hires. "The U.S. employment figures for August suggest that the labor market seems to be moint death," said Victor Shum this morning, an analyst at Purvin and Gertz in Singapore.
Following this announcement, Wall Street closed on a sharp drop of more than 2%.U.S. markets will do on Monday with European stock any procedure they will remain closed for Labor Day (Labor Day observed every first Monday of September). "Wall Street remains closed doors, it seems unlikely that operators take the slightest risk," said Chris Weston, an analyst at IG Markets.
Asian stock markets have instead given with a negative pulse of the market in red. Operators in the region have learned that HSBC index of purchasing managers in the Chinese sector services slowed to an unprecedented low in August. Seasonally adjusted and calculated by the Institute Markit, it fell to 50.6 after 53.5 in July.
No other indicator may move the index is also expected on Monday.One highlight of the week will be the release of the Beige Book Fed on Wednesday night, which will be the summary of economic conditions in regions in the United States.
No recession expected in Europe
The side of the euro area, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, has tried to reassure investors. Traveling in Australia, he said that the European economy would experience in the coming months a "moderate growth" without going into recession. "We do not anticipate a recession in Europe. The latest forecasts from the European Commission show that the growth will be at the meeting, although this growth will be moderate, it is true, "he said in Sydney.
The comments of the Head of the EU executive echoed the lowering of forecasts rating agency Standard & Poor's for the European economy last week.The decision to resurface concerns about the health of the area and the problems of sovereign debt. "We do it all, the fight against fiscal problems underlying the strengthening of the governance of the eurozone, the introduction of stricter financial regulation to improve our overall readiness" said José Manuel Barroso.
In morning trading, the euro rising slightly against the dollar at 1.4160 dollar. However, it is dropped in morning trading to a low of three weeks, at 1.4138 dollars against 1.4198 at Friday close in New York.
For their part, oil prices were down in electronic trading in Asia, depressed by the poor figures on employment in the United States.A barrel of "light sweet crude" for delivery in October lost 59 cents to 85 pay day advance.86 dollars per barrel of Brent North Sea crude for October delivery 74 cents to 111.59 dollars.
The bank attack
The President of the French Banking Federation (FBF), François Perol, recognizes the existence of tensions on the refinancing of French banks for their operations in dollars, already noted in a recent analysis by the rating agency Moody's Investors Service. In an interview with Les Echos dated Monday, he notes that if "the euro liquidity is not a problem," "the dollar refinancing is more tense."
Societe Generale lost 5.26% to 21.05 euros (largest decrease in the ACC).The bank is also penalized by the U.S. federal agency oversight of mortgage that has filed a complaint Friday against 17 major international financial institutions which include the French bank, for a total loss of $ 41 billion in bonds linked to subprime.
In its wake, BNP Paribas lost 4.98% to 31.75 euros, Crédit Agricole 3.67% to 5.95 euros and 3.09% at Axa 10.20 euros. Natixis lost 3.87% to 2.60 euros. The aerospace equipment Safran (-2.78% to 26.25 euros) will make its entry into the CAC 40 index, while the bank Natixis is about to leave, said Friday the Scientific Council of the indices of NYSE Euronext. The changes take effect Sept. 19.
Saft takes off
EDF: -2.70% to 20.38 euros
The Italian Minister of Industry, Paolo Romani, said Sunday he would meet Monday Proglio about the power company Edison.
ArcelorMittal: -2.87% to 13.72 euros
Peabody Energy and ArcelorMittal announced Monday it had extended until September 27, the period during which the short bid for $ 5 billion (3.53 billion euros) on the Australian Macarthur Coal.
Zodiac: -1.67% to 54.20 euros
The group said it had completed the acquisition of the American Heath Tecna and have reached an agreement with its banks to raise 300 million euros the amount of an existing credit line.
Schneider Electric: -4.80% to 41.89 euros
The French government intervened with the company to freeze a plan for the removal of one.000 temporary positions, the daily Liberation in its Monday edition, but the group has firmly denied to AFP such a plan.
Saft: 9.81% to 23.96 euros (largest increase in the SBF 120)
The American automotive supplier Johnson Controls will pay $ 145 million (102 million euros) to the French specialist in batteries as part of an amicable agreement ending their joint venture in the automotive industry, announced Friday the two groups in a joint statement.
Alstom: -4.07% to 29.55 euros
The group signed a 66 million euros with Iraq to build a power plant in the province of Nineveh in the north, said the Iraqi Minister of Electricity.
France Telecom: -1.87% to 12.33 euros
TPSA its Polish subsidiary has announced to contest the fine of 128 million euros that inflicted the European Commission.
After market, environment and Dried Assystem unveil their first-half results.
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