news blog from Scarlet

UPDATE 1-Portugal 2012 budget bill sees deep recession

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 15:40:22 -0400

LISBON Oct 17 (Reuters) - Portugal’s recession will deepen next year as the centre-right government adopts severe austerity measures to restore the economy to health under a 78-billion-euro bailout, the draft 2012 budget bill showed on Monday.The draft budget sees the economy contracting 2.8 percent next year, much more than the decline of around 2 percent envisaged when Portugal agreed on its bailout plan with the European Union and IMF in May.The government presented a series of tough austerity measures as part of the 2012 budget on Friday, including cutting year-end and holiday bonuses for civil servants. Unions have promised a general strike in response.Next year is likely to mark the deepest recession since the country returned to democracy in 1974 after decades of dictatorship and compares with a decline of 1.9 percent this year.”We have reached the moment of truth, we have to take profound measures to ensure budget consolidation,” Finance Minister Vitor Gaspar told journalists as he presented the 2012 draft budget.”The situation in Europe and in the euro zone is one of the principal risks to the world economy and Portugal is in the centre of this crisis,”The budget document, which the centre-right government presented to parliament on Monday, sees the 2012 budget deficit at 4.5 percent of gross domestic product compared with 5.9 percent this year — in line with the terms of bailout plan.The budget should be voted in parliament on Nov. 29 but its passage is assured as the centre-right government has a comfortable majority.

GLOBAL MARKETS-Stocks, euro rise on crisis hopes, US data

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:31:40 -0400

* Brent rises toward $113 on optimism over debt crisis* Euro extends gains against dollar after U.S. sales data* Bonds succumb to rising equity markets, retail salesBy Herbert LashNEW YORK, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Global stocks gained and the euro strengthened on Friday on growing optimism that Europe is on track to resolve its festering sovereign debt crisis and after data showed a surprising surge in U.S. retail sales.Group of 20 finance ministers and central bank chiefs began two days of talks in Paris on Friday which investors hope will provide a basis for a draft plan in time for a European Union summit on Oct. 23.The benchmark S&P 500 was on track for back-to-back weekly gains for the first time since early July and gold headed toward its strongest weekly rise in over a month.The euro rose 0.7 percent to $1.3866.”Right now we are trading on hopes of a decisive policy response,” said Jens Nordvig, head of G10 FX strategy at Nomura Securities in New York.To be sure, investors do not expect a comprehensive strategy to Europe’s debt crisis to come out of the meetings. But a report early in the session that said U.S. retail sales grew by 1.1 percent in September, the fastest pace in seven months, boosted investor sentiment on the economy’s prospects.The data, coupled with earnings from Google late Thursday that trounced analysts’ expectations, led investors to shrug off a rating downgrade on Spain by Standard & Poor’s and an unexpected slump in U.S. consumer confidence in October.The data also was expected to help lift forecasts for growth in gross domestic product even though investors said a resolution to Europe’s debt crisis was more important.”The data hasn’t mattered for a couple of months. It matters here and there, but most of what today is, is Europe,” said John Canally, investment strategist for LPL Financial in Boston.”Just getting the details of this plan out there and making the details work is the most important thing,” Canally said.Stocks on Wall Street pared some early gains but shares in Europe rose almost 1 percent.The Dow Jones industrial average was up 110.92 points, or 0.97 percent, at 11,589.05. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was up 13.76 points, or 1.14 percent, at 1,217.42. The Nasdaq Composite Index was up 32.18 points, or 1.23 percent, at 2,652.42.Google shares jumped 5.8 percent to $591.43 after the Internet search giant said robust growth at its mobile business and a strong emerging market lifted its third quarter, allaying worries that a slowing Europe was hurting business.In Europe, the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top regional shares closed up 0.95 percent at 975.52 points, while MSCI’s all-country world equity index gained 1.1 percent.The increased appetite for risk also lifted the price of crude oil more than 3.0 percent and pushed down the U.S. dollar and government debt, usually beneficiaries of bearish news.”The outlook is good and getting better by the day. Risk is back on,” said Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ in New York.Brent crude rose above $114 a barrel, propelled by hopes that European leaders would soon agree on how to curtail the long festering euro zone debt crisis.Early hints that China may loosen credit as inflation cools also boosted gains while investors mostly ignored a preliminary reading of U.S. consumer sentiment that sagged to 57.5 from 59.4 in September, a Thomson Michigan survey showed.November Brent crude rose $3.56 to $114.67 a barrel on the day of its expiry, while U.S. crude was up $2.47 at $86.70 a barrel.U.S. Treasury debt prices fell.The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note was down 13/32 in price to yield 2.23 percent.Spot gold prices rose $16.24 to $1,682.40 an ounce.

Tigers use home run barrage to beat Texas 7-5

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 20:16:26 -0400

The Rangers return to Arlington clinging to a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven series and can clinch a return trip to the World Series with a Game Six win on Saturday.With their top relievers unavailable having worked three straight days, Tigers manager Jim Leyland put Detroit’s fate in the hands of ace Justin Verlander and the hard-throwing right-hander delivered as promised, holding the Rangers in check as the Tiger unleashed a home run barrage.Young, who was scratched from Game Two with a strained stomach muscle, broke out of his slump with his first two hits of the ALCS, a solo homer in the fourth and two-run blast in the sixth that keyed a decisive four-run burst.Ryan Raburn and Alex Avila also contributed solo shots, the four homers establishing a Tigers record for the most in one post-season game.

UPDATE 1-Fluor gets nuclear firm stranded by Ponzi scheme

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 13:45:44 -0400

Oct 13 (Reuters) - Fluor Corp , the largest publicly traded U.S. engineering company, is taking a majority stake in a company with technology that allows nuclear power plants to be made up of many smaller reactors instead of a few big ones.NuScale Power had been backed by Francisco Illarramendi, a hedge fund manager who pleaded guilty earlier this year to running a Ponzi scheme.Fluor bought the shares out of U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission receivership.The $30 million investment in NuScale, which will remain an independent company, is accompanied by a separate agreement that gives Fluor exclusive rights to provide engineering and construction services for future NuScale plants.The nuclear industry is coming to grips with a dramatic change in its outlook following this year’s disaster in Japan. The NuScale deal also comes just a month after Fluor rival Shaw Group sold its stake in nuclear power plant company Westinghouse to Japan’s Toshiba Corp .NuScale’s small modular reactor technology was developed at Oregon State University with Department of Energy funding. A NuScale-design plant could have up to 12 modules producing 540 megawatts — or half that of one Westinghouse reactor.”This combined effort between Fluor and NuScale is another strong signal that small modular reactor technology will be a viable alternative for the next generation of nuclear energy deployment,” Bill Fehrman, chief executive of MidAmerican Energy, said in a statement.MidAmerican, owned by Berkshire Hathaway Inc , is one of 11 North American utilities on the customer advisory board of NuScale, an Oregon company with 70 employees.Fluor has a 60-plus-year history in nuclear power, having been involved in building 20 units in the United States.

China daily crude steel output at 1.93 mln T in late Sept - CISA data

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 04:41:21 -0400

Average daily output of the medium- and large-sized steelmakers also rose 0.6 percent to 1.64 million tonnes during the same period.