| "Cliff" concerns give way to earnings focus Posted: 05 Jan 2013 06:10 AM PST  NEW YORK (Reuters) - Investors' "fiscal cliff" worries are likely to give way to more fundamental concerns, like earnings, as fourth-quarter reports get under way next week. Financial results, which begin after the market closes on Tuesday with aluminum company Alcoa , are expected to be only slightly better than the third-quarter's lackluster results. As a warning sign, analyst current estimates are down sharply from what they were in October. ...
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| Obama says U.S. can't afford more showdowns over debt, deficits Posted: 05 Jan 2013 07:54 AM PST  HONOLULU (Reuters) - Fresh from the long legislative fight to prevent a "fiscal cliff" of tax hikes and spending cuts, President Barack Obama warned on Saturday that the United States could not afford further budget showdowns this year or in the future. Obama, who returned to Hawaii for a family vacation shortly after the House of Representatives passed a compromise bill on Tuesday, said in his weekly radio and Internet address that the new law was just one step toward fixing the country's fiscal and economic problems. ...
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| SAP CEO says China to become as important as U.S.: paper Posted: 05 Jan 2013 06:22 AM PST  FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German business software maker SAP sees potential for one million new customers in China, five times the number it currently has world-wide, German weekly paper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung said. "China will be as important for us as the United States," SAP's co-Chief Executive Jim Hagemann Snabe told the paper, according to an advance extract. Snabe said SAP wants to open the Chinese market by securing a deal with authorities to allow cloud computing services. "We want to find a solution with Chinese authorities this year if possible," Snabe told the paper. ...
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| France won't buy troubled Petroplus refinery: Hollande Posted: 05 Jan 2013 08:15 AM PST  VAL-DE-REUIL, France (Reuters) - France will not take over insolvent Swiss refiner Petroplus' oil refinery in Normandy, but could help the plant financially once a suitable buyer is found, President Francois Hollande said on Saturday. About 500 jobs at the 161,000 barrels-a-day Petit-Couronne refinery are at risk, the latest industrial headache for the Socialist leader who has vowed to stem rising unemployment by the end of the year. "It's difficult to find a serious buyer. ...
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| BASF's Hambrecht to delay comeback until 2014: paper Posted: 05 Jan 2013 04:01 AM PST  FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Juergen Hambrecht, the former chief executive of Germany's BASF, will delay an attempted comeback to the world's largest chemical maker by sales until 2014, he told German weekly Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. Hambrecht, who left the CEO post in 2011, has sought to get a seat on BASF's board of directors, a body known in Germany as the supervisory board. German law prohibits an immediate move from management to the board of directors, demanding that executives undergo a two-year "cooling off" period. "BASF has a very good supervisory board. ...
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| BMW to pare back car discounts in Germany: magazine Posted: 05 Jan 2013 06:13 AM PST  FRANKFURT (Reuters) - BMW will cut back on sales discounts in Germany and focus on maintaining profit margins rather than market share, Chief Executive Norbert Reithofer told German weekly WirtschaftsWoche. "We have decided that this year in Germany we will not defend market share at any price, and that profitability must come first," Reithofer told the magazine. The volume of discounts will therefore be pared back substantially. "We're not just talking 5,000 cars," Reithofer told the magazine. ...
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| Austria plugs regional finance loopholes after scandal Posted: 05 Jan 2013 05:57 AM PST  VIENNA (Reuters) - Austria's finance minister played down the risks to regional finances on Saturday after a Salzburg civil servant gambled hundreds of millions of euros of taxpayers' money on high-risk derivatives. Speaking a day after federal and provincial officials agreed on steps to curb speculative use of public funds, Maria Fekter said in a radio interview that local authorities had already acted to reduce deals that had potential to blow up. ...
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| Portugal does not need debt restructuring: IMF's Lagarde Posted: 05 Jan 2013 03:41 AM PST  LISBON (Reuters) - Any restructuring of Portugal's debt is out of the question and the country's bailout program is progressing well, the head of the International Monetary Fund said on Saturday. IMF chief Christine Lagarde told Portuguese weekly Expresso that she was also confident Portugal would not follow Greece into a spiral of economic recession. The European Union and IMF gave Portugal a 78-billion-euro ($102-billion) bailout in 2011 and the lenders have praised the country for meeting most of their terms. ...
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| Fed officials suggest possible end to asset purchases in 2013 Posted: 04 Jan 2013 05:47 PM PST  SAN DIEGO (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve could halt its asset purchases this year, two top Fed officials suggested on Friday, a view also gaining traction among economists at Wall Street's top financial institutions. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard, a voting member of the Fed's monetary policy panel in 2013, said a drop in the unemployment rate to 7.1 percent would probably constitute the "substantial improvement" in the labor market that the central bank seeks. That's the bar for the Fed's policy-setting committee to halt the current round of asset purchases that it began in September. ...
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| Missoni scion on small plane missing in Venezuela Posted: 05 Jan 2013 07:55 AM PST ROME (AP) — The search resumed Saturday for a small plane that has disappeared off the Venezuelan coast with six people aboard, including Vittorio Missoni, a top executive in Italy's Missoni fashion house, officials said. |
| Merkel highlights economy in German election year Posted: 05 Jan 2013 05:40 AM PST BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel highlighted Germany's economic strength as she kicked off campaigning Saturday for an important state vote that comes months before national elections, and she brushed aside worries about the weakness of her party's coalition partner. |
| Depardieu flies to Russia, may receive passport Posted: 05 Jan 2013 07:43 AM PST MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman says French actor Gerard Depardieu has flown to Sochi, where he is likely to meet with Putin and receive a Russian passport. |
| Target ad campaign puts food in the spotlight Posted: 04 Jan 2013 02:08 PM PST  NEW YORK (AP) — Is Target's grocery aisle ready for its close up?
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| US job market shrugs off fears of 'fiscal cliff' Posted: 04 Jan 2013 02:29 PM PST  WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. job market proved resilient in December despite fears that a budget impasse in Washington would send the economy over the fiscal cliff and trigger growth-killing tax hikes and spending cuts.
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| Stocks gain, pushing the S&P 500 to 5-year high Posted: 04 Jan 2013 02:18 PM PST  NEW YORK (AP) — The Standard & Poor's 500 closed at its highest level in five years Friday after a report showed that hiring held up in December, giving stocks an early lift.
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| Starbucks enters entrenched Vietnam coffee market Posted: 04 Jan 2013 11:46 PM PST  HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Nghiem Ngoc Thuy has been slinging coffees to thirsty Vietnamese for 20 years in her colonial-style villa with peeling shutters, and she and her customers aren't too worried that the imminent arrival of U.S. giant Starbucks will alter their time-tested coffee traditions.
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| Crews prep for recovery of grounded drilling rig Posted: 04 Jan 2013 07:50 PM PST  ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — The assessment of a Shell drilling rig grounded off a remote Alaska island continued Friday, with officials putting more salvagers onboard.
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| FDA: New rules will make food safer Posted: 05 Jan 2013 01:56 AM PST  WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration says its new guidelines would make the food Americans eat safer and help prevent the kinds of foodborne disease outbreaks that sicken or kill thousands of consumers each year.
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