All World

Dramatic increases in food prices

Click image for larger graphic easy pay day loans.

The euro on the threshold of $ 1.40

The financial community expected that the European Central Bank (ECB) to get tough. But to consider a rate rise was "possible" in April! Investors, who already played the euro rising against the backdrop of the prospect of European monetary tightening before the Fed (U.S. central bank), have supported stronger click "purchase" of the euro / dollar.

For a rate increase is indeed positive for the relevant currency, as it increases its return to investors. Here is the euro, which makes colors against the dollar would be shunned as relatively less profitable than the euro.

So this Friday morning, the euro is calm there on the foreign exchange market after the storm yesterday. Before the meeting of the ECB meeting yesterday, the euro settled on a strong technical resistance at 1.3860 dollar.Thus, whether the tone of Jean-Claude Trichet was less pronounced than expected, while the euro fell back quickly, he stated his goal is to arm themselves as soon against inflation which puts pressure on the Old Continent and the euro climbed.

The second scenario had taken place, the euro soared, almost touching the psychological barrier of $ 1.40. According to technical analysis, this upward trend should continue, to the point of joining the new resistance at $ 1.43. A level reached in November 2010.

Jean-Claude Trichet has panicked markets. His message was clear: at the first sign, the ECB will react even if the economy of the euro area must suffer. The ECB has no mandate to support growth or to assist countries in difficulty, it must ensure moderate inflation for all inhabitants of the area.

ALSO READ:

"Trichet did not exclude a rate hike in April

The French nuclear industry met Monday at the Elysee

It is not on any official agenda, but a meeting to organize the French nuclear industry will go ahead on Monday at the Elysee. The Minister of Industry, Eric Besson, has indeed confirmed this morning on France 2 reports in the press, announcing today that Nicolas Sarkozy would chair the Council of nuclear policy, which he founded in 2008. "The only thing I can tell you is (this meeting) concerns the organization of the French nuclear industry, what has been called France's nuclear team," said Eric Besson on France 2.

According to La Tribune, a preparatory meeting was already held last Friday, bringing together around one table Lauvergeon, CEO of Areva, Henri Proglio, head of EDF, Gerard Mestrallet, head of GDF Suez Patrick Kron, CEO of Alstom, and Eric Besson Dipuo Elizabeth Peters, Minister of Energy of South Africa.The President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma will indeed soon be visiting Paris to talk about nuclear. The challenge for France is to develop a coherent strategy to deal foreign clients especially not to not repeat the failure of Abu Dhabi in December 2009 when the French had lost a huge contract for nuclear centarles, at least 20 billion deal to Koreans.

The TTY in focus

On Monday, participants should discuss in particular the strategic partnership between EDF and Areva. The decision to bring the two French energy giants was taken at the last council of nuclear policy in late July 2010.According to unidentified sources quoted by La Tribune, the two companies involved do not share the same vision of the progress of the project: Areva, it says that "the agreement is ready in its broad lines" then for EDF, "there are still points of disagreement."

According to Les Echos, the discussion should revolve around one central question: "whether the combination of EDF reactor project at medium power, TDD, developed by Areva and its partner Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Capacity reaches 1100 megawatts Atmea, against 1600 for the EPR.EDF could decide to take part in the cooperation on the TDD, or work on its own medium-power reactor with its Chinese partner CGNPC, or both at once.

Both companies should also discuss their mining strategy, including a possible investment from EDF in the mining division of Areva, whose valuation problem. As for GDF Suez, which wants to grow in importance in the French nuclear industry, the group should also focus on getting its game in the middle of negotiations.

ALSO READ:

"What the report calls on nuclear Roussely

"EPR: the French industry must learn from its failure

"Lauvergeon / Proglio: sentenced to agree

"Mitsubishi Heavy Industries placing on the European Nuclear

France posted a record deficit

The figure is historic. The hole public finances widened to 148.8 billion euros in 2010 against 138 billion a year earlier, said the Budget Ministry on Tuesday. This is not unexpected, as the minister has already spoken Baroin mid-January a similar amount during the presentation of its balance sheet in 2010. The deficit is well below one billion euros from estimates in September and should be a little less than 7.7% of gross domestic product (GDP).

The French budget was the victim of a margin squeeze due to memories of the crisis: spending and increased revenue has not covered their level before 2009. On the one hand, income taxes and related taxes, whatever the rise, have remained low and amounted to 274.9 billion euros (against 237.2 billion in 2009).In detail, tax revenues, the lowest in 2009, jumped 17% last year. Particularly affected during the crisis, the corporate tax has regained some lost ground (57.2%). The VAT revenue rose 7.5% and income taxes of 1.7%.

Expenditures, particularly related to the "great debt" and welfare systems, for their part, increased by 15.9%, reaching 452.7 billion euros in 2010 against 367.1 billion the year before . Involved, social protection expenditure, linked to rising unemployment, but also the Grand borrowing and "investment for the future".This last item of expenditure will still not taken into account when calculating the budget deficit following the European rules payday loan.

Objective 2011 "achievable"

In 2011, tax revenues of the state should continue to increase, and the effect of the "great debt" on public finances will disappear, "said Dominique Barbet, in essence, BNP Paribas. "As a result, the deficit of 148.8 billion euros to 92 billion euros, as the government wants, is feasible," said he."Similarly, the deficit target of 6% GDP could be achieved, especially if growth is close to 2% as required by the government." One hypothesis considered optimistic by economists until the publication by Banque de France on Tuesday morning for a first estimate of economic activity increased in the first quarter of 2011.

The government intends to reduce the public deficit to 4.6% of GDP next year, then to 3% in 2013, the limit set by EU rules. Nicolas Sarkozy intends to introduce a second "golden rule" constitutional deficit.Clearly it is, as already done in Germany, set a limit to the deficit in the constitution.

ALSO READ:

"The French growth accelerating in early 2011

"Deficit: many obstacles to the" golden rule "

SERVICE

"Enjoy the best year rate for your savings with Cortal Consors.

"Online Brokerage: Compare offers from our partners

The job was not enough to convince Wall Street

U.S. stock markets close an uncoordinated, on Wednesday. The Dow Jones gained 0.06% to 12,047.70 and the Nasdaq advance of 0.05% to 2752.65 points, while the S & P 500 lost 0.18% to 1305.28 points. Tuesday for the first time since June 2008, the U.S. index has crossed, close Tuesday, the 12,000 points mark, despite the continued unrest in Egypt.

On the foreign exchange market, the euro retreated against the dollar on Wednesday evening. Around 22:15, the euro bought 1.3806 dollars against 1.3831 dollars late Tuesday.

The better than expected U.S. employment in January

On the macroeconomic front, several indicators were expected in the United States. Job creation in the U.S. private sector were higher than expected in January, according to results of the monthly ADP released Wednesday.In total, 187,000 jobs were created during the first month of the year versus the consensus of 29 analysts polled by Reuters had forecast about 145,000. Moreover, the December figures were revised down to 247,000 against 297,000 originally announced.

Crude oil inventories rose sharply for the third consecutive week in the U.S., according to figures released Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Energy. They amounted to 33.2 million barrels to 28 January, an increase of 2.6 million.

Sanofi-Aventis year close to agreement with Genzyme

Genzyme: -0.29% to 73.36 dollars

The side of values, the merger between Sanofi-Aventis and Genzyme has taken another step forward. On Monday, the two sides reached an agreement in principle on the structure of a rapprochement.And Tuesday, a source familiar with the matter said that Sanofi-Aventis would have fallen for that, its offer to just over $ 70 off certificate of conditional value (CCV).

GlaxoSmithKline: -1.18% to 36.95 dollars

In the same area, the British group GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) announced Wednesday it sold $ 1.7 billion, all of its shares in the American medical diagnostic tests and Quest Diagnostics.

Electronic Arts: 15.81% to 18.09 dollars

Always on the side of values, after closing the American publisher of video games Electronic Arts has quadrupled its net loss during the third quarter of fiscal shifted, to 322 million, exceeding expectations, however. Indeed, excluding special items and reported the number of shares, this amounts to 59 cents beyond the 57 cents expected by analysts.The turnover amounted to participate in its $ 1.41 billion, slightly below expectations, and an increase of 4.75%.In addition, the group announced a share buyback of 600 million over 18 months, "a first for many years," says an analyst.

Western Union: 2.37% to 20.77 dollars

For his part, Western Union has reported for the fourth quarter earnings per share of $ 0.38, $ 0.35 cons expected by the market and $ 0.32 last year.

Aflac: -2.44% to 57.10 dollars

Aflac announced for the fourth quarter earnings per share of $ 1.33, $ 1.35 cons expected by the market and $ 1.18 last year.

Broadcom: -5.59% to 43.80 dollars

Also after market, Broadcom has released the fourth quarter 2010 revenues of $ 1.95 billion, in line with expectations against $ 1.34 billion a year earlier. The adjusted earnings per share rose to $ 0.58 against $ 0.32 last year.For the current quarter, the company targets a turnover of between 1.75 and 1.85 billion dollars against 1.46 billion last year.

Ford: -3.08% to 15.40 dollars

The rating agency Standard and Poor's (SP) announced that it raised its rating of U.S. automaker Ford BB-B + cons, together with a positive outlook, citing continuing economic recovery in the United States.

Google: 0.16% to 612 dollars

World number one search engine on the internet Google has accused his rival, the Bing website, copy the results it offers users what the computer group Microsoft has formally denied.

Also note, major banks and brokerages on Wall Street have made their employees pay record under past year, two years after the great crisis that devastated the area, according to the Wall Street Journal .The 25 largest institutions have paid their employees an unprecedented $ 135 billion dollars in salary and variable compensation. This amount is 5.6% higher than that paid for 2009.

JP Morgan Chase lost 1.05% to 45.45 dollars, Goldman Sachs was down 0.17% to 165.05 dollars and Bank of America was down 0.49% to 14.24 dollars and loose Citigroup 1.02% to 4.85 dollars.

Tunisia: "Democracy is good for investment '

The new governor of Bank of Tunisia launched in Davos, a call to the international investor confidence. Echoing one of the slogans of the protesters that led to regime change, "democracy is good for investment," Mustapha Kamel Nabli said that "the payment system works, as banks and foreign payments and there is no pressure on the exchange rate. "

He did acknowledge that some sectors such as tourism he said, are being "disorganized" because of political changes. Nevertheless he believes that the economic situation is "under control. We do not need any outside help. Our foreign exchange reserves are strong. "Deliberately adopting a technical language, this former academic who went through the World Bank, explained that "the fundamentals (economy) is good, the workforce is educated."

Asked about the country's gold reserves, he said a physical inventory has been made by a team of two internal auditors and two external auditors to the Bank. It appeared that the gold reserves held in the coffers of the institution in Tunis s raised to 5.7 tonnes, combined 1 payday loan lenders.4 that was tabled at the Bank of England. Total reserves are consistent with the actual IMF figures (nearly 6.8 tons).Contrary to rumors that the wife of former President Ben Ali would have won 1.5 tons belonging to the Central Bank, the reserves of the latter are intact.

A former executive of Ernst & Young

Mustapha Kamel Nabli identified himself as an academic, who joined the government after Ben Ali in 1990, broke away in 1995 to emigrate. He is accompanied in Davos two new ministers who have just been appointed. On the one hand, Yassine Brahim who support the Ministry of Infrastructures and Transport and other Sami Zaoui. This was until very recently a part of the auditing firm Ernst & Young in Paris, where it was established 23 years.He is now head of the Department of Computer Technologies and Information.

ALSO READ:

"Tunisia: For employers, the revolution has gone on long enough

In Tunisia, the French companies in limbo

"The Tunisian crisis and its contagion worry tour operators

"SPECIAL – Tunisia, the new deal

Facebook could publish its accounts in 2012

The mystery around the Facebook accounts could be lifted by April 2012. Concordant sources, the online social network will soon have more than 500 shareholders and will be forced by law to publish certain financial information or preparing an IPO.

Already, a memo circulated to potential investors and reported by several media reveals first figures on the website activity. Facebook would have made profits of $ 355 million in the first nine months of 2010, for a turnover of 1.2 billion.

The social network in a half-billion subscribers is currently valued at $ 50 billion after the U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs has invested directly this week 450 million, while offering the opportunity for individual investors to take a stake in Facebook worth 1.5 billion dollars.

This operation attracted the attention of régulateurs.Les much speculation about the intentions of the group led by Mark Zuckerberg, including the fact that he may be trying to circumvent a possible IPO, while a listing on procurement constraints associated corporate transparency.

ALSO READ:

"Rush investors on Facebook

The turnover of over a billion Facebook

The state is still struggling to control their expenditure

This is one of the leitmotifs of government: to bring its public deficit to 3% of GDP in 2013 to contain its debt, France must first reduce spending. Because the other option – massive tax increase – would kill growth. And then the level itself of high public spending (it absorbs 56.6% of national wealth) suggests some leeway.

To achieve its objective, the government has set rules, particularly on government spending, a priori more "controllable". Each year, the total expenditure of the State should not grow faster than inflation, while expenses, excluding charges, debt and retirement of civil servants must remain constant in euros. One way to keep the budgets of ministries whatever surprises on the burden of debt.

On paper, the proposed 2011 budget meets the road map.The state spending rose only 1.3% to 1.5% inflation. Excluding fees and expenses of debt and pensions remained stable at 274.8 billion euros. But in detail, the picture is less rosy. Because the state has always so difficult to control certain budgets.

In May, Francois Fillon announced that the operating expenses (expenses associated with the policies carried out mostly in the office) and non-staff operating costs were reduced 10% by 2013 and 5% in 2011. Yet in its report on the Finance Bill, Philippe Marini, the UMP rapporteur of the Budget in the Senate, said that the operating expenses will decrease by 1% next year, to 58.9 billion. At Bercy, it contends that "the effort should not be calculated from the 2010 level but compared to the natural drift of expenditure.In 2011, they will be 5% lower than they would without the measures taken by the government. " In fact, the executive decided real savings: it reduces the number of contracts and helped cut out the exemptions from payroll taxes (including employment at home). But it also has a subterfuge, by reallocating some costs to other agencies. The State "share" and the financing of vocational training with social agencies for 330 million …

Social benefits and wages of civil servants

Especially, the government did nothing to stop the drift of social benefits. Bercy had planned to curb the rise in the allowance for disabled adults and to prevent the accumulation of individual housing allowance (PLA) with a half-share of family quotient.But, faced with protests, these projects were abandoned.

More surprisingly, the state firm grasp its operating costs. Including its payroll, as pointed Gilles Carrez, the UMP rapporteur of the Budget to the Assembly in its report on the Finance Bill. Despite the non-replacement of retiring in two, staff costs excluding pensions will increase from 700 million in 2011 to $ 82.7 billion. The reason: fewer retirements and skidding all bonuses paid to employees. "But by 2012 the payroll decline", says it does at Bercy.

Furthermore, savings are low on operating expenses in the strict sense, despite the streamlining of procurement, information technology and other charges as part of the general revision of public policies. Next year will be lower than 2% (barely 200 million).Admittedly, 2011 was marked by exceptional operating expenses of $ 400 million, principally for the French presidency of the G20. But the State did not offset by additional cuts. Even if there's progress in ministries and parastatals if (Météo France, museums, etc..) Are better controlled, the state is still far less strict than a business.

G20: assessment of the reforms, after two years of work

1. MACRO ECONOMIC COORDINATION: To be continued …

The G20 has agreed to make concerted fiscal stimulus to London to avoid depression. It was a success. In Toronto, the G20 has endorsed the post-crisis differentiated, giving the green light to the rigor in Europe, without preventing the widening deficits in the United States. But macroeconomic coordination tightly decided in Pittsburgh, with a communication to the G20 economic policies proposed by different countries, and monitoring of targets by the IMF, has remained a dead letter. The United States hopes to rehabilitate, Seoul, through close monitoring of current account imbalances.

2. REFORM OF IMF AND WORLD BANK: Acquired

Emerging markets have gained representation in the IMF and World Bank.The IMF Board approved on November 5 the doubling of the voting rights of China (2.9% to 6.1% of total) and increased voice of India and Brazil inexpensive business card. The United States, France and Britain have agreed to reduce their quota shares. The reform will take effect in late 2012. The IMF will also double its resources to reach 534 billion euros, a decision taken in London G20. Reforming the World Bank endorsed the G20 Toronto, will see emerging and developing win votes 3.13% to 47%. The boss of the Bank, Robert Zoellick, called for 50%.

3.BANKING REGULATION: Basel IIII will be endorsed in Seoul

Ten years to draft prudential standards called Basel II, two years to give birth to Basel III: Angela Merkel does not fail to recall the enormous work done by regulators to increase the quality and quantity of bank capital – 2% to 7% – while creating a liquidity ratio and debt. Two questions remain daunting. First, if Europe has promised to implement these rules, the question remains as regards the United States. Then the debate is raging over whether or not to require from the systemic institutions even more capital. A topic for Seoul and 2011.

4. BONUS HEDGE FUNDS: Better boxes

Bankers overpaid. It was one of the priorities of the G20 in London. On this point, Europe has made great progress.Too even consider European banks who feel disadvantaged relative to their American or Asian. The bonus cap was passed by the European Parliament and the Committee of European Banking Supervisors board for accelerated reform on 1 January 2011. A tax on the bonus was introduced in Paris, London and Frankfurt. The United States themselves are content to "frame" bonuses without taxation. They chose to monitor the activities of hedge funds by limiting the amounts that banks can invest, while Europe has decided to submit them to leave best business card .

5. TAX HAVEN: monitored

The G20 in London marked the departure of the great crusade against tax havens, led by Paris, Berlin and Washington, which in turn sway the strongholds of bank secrecy.Switzerland, Austria, Monaco, Liechtenstein … decided to comply with the OECD standard on exchange of tax information. Result, a year and a half later, the list of uncooperative jurisdictions OECD now has only ten small countries. More than 600 bilateral agreements were signed and the French-Swiss tax treaty enters into force in January. States have also initiated through the Global Forum on transparency of the OECD, a process of peer review of progress, which must be completed by end 2011.

Marseille oil terminals released

Unravels the conflict in the oil sector. So begins the weekend of All Saints, with special emphasis on roads, twelve French refineries were released on Friday, one after the other. Employees of sites Gonfreville, Dunkirk, Lavera, Feyzin, Donges and Grandpuits successively voted today to end the strike, as well as oil terminals in Le Havre and Fos-Lavera.

"All the refineries in the region have returned to work, so it made no sense to continue" warranted a syndicalist CGT Gonfreville. A Donges refinery voted last Friday afternoon, ending the conflict, the CFDT delegate Guiller Dimitri, for his part stressed the "pride" felt by employees who have risen since October 12 against the pension reform. "It's a pride that the government does not take away," he advised.A conflict that has been hovering for several days the threat of fuel shortages and cost a hundred million euros in the Total group.

The oil will again be routed

In particular, the upturn in oil terminal at Fos-Lavera in the Bouches-du-Rhone, which occurred last this afternoon, was crucial for the proper supply service stations. Despite the gradual resumption of work in the refineries in recent days, six were still unable Friday to resume normal production because crude oil transported via oil terminals. Their work will now be able to resume.

Supply side, if the Energy Minister Jean-Louis Borloo announced Thursday the opening of 85% of service stations, even though the situation remained tense in the West, Midwest and the Ile-de- France.Condition of anonymity, a large fuel distributor also said to AFP that the number of service stations in difficulties was more like "a station on three." Thursday night, returning to normal, repeatedly promised, was rather planned for early next week.

»View the map Carbeo service stations out: