Welcome to today's round-up of business news from The Times: what we're
saying, what they're saying, what you should be thinking
Top stories
The New York Times: The Dow Jones
industrial average rose 3.6 per cent on Tuesday after the US Federal
Reserve injected $200 billion (£99 billion) into the banking system.
Financial Times: Eliot Spitzer, the Governor of New York, sought
to reach an agreement with prosecutors investigating his involvement
with a prostitution ring before making decision on leaving office.
The Times: Every City trader should be forced to take two weeks of
continuous holiday in an effort to prevent
rogue traders operating within British banks, the Financial Services
Authority said.
Comment
Carl Mortished in The Times: Millions
of hectares of farmland are lying fallow in Eastern Europe but tariffs
and protectionism are keeping these countries from bringing more food to the
table.
Lex in Financial Times: Even if mortgage liquidity improves, banks are
unlikely to stop drawing in their horns on lending: the last thing the weak
US economy needs.
Damian Reece in The Daily Telegraph: A
wounded M&S fighting back, led by an executive chairman desperate to
secure his legacy, will make matters even worse for the competition.
Upside
The Times: Cadbury Schweppes said that it had obtained
'definitive' credit agreements of £1.9 billion from a consortium of
banks to allow it to press ahead with its US beverages spin-off.
The Daily Telegraph: The oil price
hit a new record of almost $110 a barrel as the International Energy
Agency said there was little prospect of energy costs falling far.
Financial Times: The Singapore Government's private equity arm agreed
to invest about €1 billion (£760 million; $1.53 billion) in the main
investment vehicle of the Benetton family.
Downside
TheTimes: Ian Kerr, the chief
executive of Egg, the internet bank accused of unfairly withdrawing
credit cards from thousands of responsible customers, has resigned.
The Daily Telegraph: EADS, Europe's
biggest aerospace group, reported an €881 million (£672 million)
operating loss last year, weighed down by losses at Airbus.
The Australian: BHP Billiton expects to lose
about 120,000 tonnes of aluminium production in South Africa this year
from shutdowns resulting from power rationing.
Mergers and shakers
The New York Times: European regulators approved
Google's $3.1 billion (£1.5 billion) acquisition of DoubleClick, a
significant player in the $37 billion online advertising business.
The Independent: Vincent Tchenguiz
launched a A$1.22 billion (£563 million) takeover bid for control of the
infrastructure fund of Challenger, the Australian financial group.
The Times: Bmi, easyJet, Ryanair and Virgin Atlantic called for the dismantling
of the airports operator BAA and the Civil Aviation Authority, which
regulates the country's skies.
Around Asia
The Nikkei: The opposition-controlled upper house rejected the
nomination of Toshiro Muto, the Deputy Governor of the Bank of Japan, to
head the central bank.
Bloomberg: China's retail sales
grew at the fastest rate in nine years as rising incomes encouraged spending
and prices were boosted by inflation at 11-year highs.
Bloomberg: The yen rose from
the lowest in almost a week against the dollar on speculation that Japanese
exporters converted overseas earnings, anticipating further declines in the
greenback.
Look ahead
Financial Times: Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, will
use his first Budget to raise 'green' taxes and increase taxes on
drinking to help to fund the Government's faltering fight against poverty.
The Daily Telegraph: Marks & Spencer directors will meet within weeks
to finalise a pay package for Sir Stuart
Rose amid opposition to his promotion to executive chairman.
The Guardian: Terry Smith, the chief executive of Tullett Prebon, the
money brokers, gave warning that the
current turmoil in the financial markets could take "years not months" to
unwind.
MARKETS
FTSE 100 5,690.40 up 1.1% (Tuesday close)
Dow 12,156.81 up 3.6% (close)
S&P 500 1,320.65 up 3.7% (close)
Nasdaq 2,255.76 up 4% (close)
Nikkei 12,999.84 up 2.7% (latest)
Hang Seng 23,663.23 up 2.9% (latest)
Sterling $2.0094 (latest)
West Texas crude $108.89 down 14 cents (latest)
Gold unchanged at $976.00 (latest)
New York
Reuters: The S&P 500
recorded its best advance since October 2002, while the Dow and Nasdaq rang
up their biggest daily percentage gains since March 2003. Shares of
housebuilders, mortgage-related companies and banks led the way, helping the
market to recover after three days of losses. Shares of Fannie Mae,
the largest US mortgage finance company, advanced 11.1 per cent and Citigroup
gained 9.1 per cent.
Asia
Bloomberg: Asian stocks rose
the most in a month, extending a global rally, after the US Federal Reserve
said that it would pour as much as $200 billion into the financial system. ANZ,
the Australian bank, surged the most in more than ten years, while Mitsubishi
UFJ Financial Group, Japan's leading publicly traded bank, advanced
after the cost to protect the country's corporate debt from default fell
from a record. The MSCI Asia Pacific index was up 2.3 per cent in intraday
trading, while Japan's Nikkei had risen 2.7 per cent.
Paul Larter
paul.larter@thetimes.co.uk
London
Talk that the Indian government was cloe to giving Cairn Energy the go
ahead to build a pipeline from its Rajasthan oil field to the coast helped,
plus suggestions of a bid from ENI at £40 helped the oil group gush 8 per
cent or 223p to £29.89.
The FTSE 100 rallied 61.3 points to 5690.4 as co-ordinated action from the
world’s central banks, including the Bank of England, to inject liquidity
into credit markets helped ease battered nerves.
Cairn’s fellow oil bid target Imperial Energy, which recently
rebuffed a Gazprombank offer to take a major stake, gained 75p to £13.42.
Banks were the main gainers, with Barclays up 21.25p to 437p and HBOS
up 27.5p at 589.5p.
Yell led the fallers, down 7.9p to 176.6p on continuing fears it will
have to renegotiate its bank loans. Its ejection from the blue chips looks
inevitable, along with Taylor Wimpey, up 4.1p at 165.6p, and Rentokil
Initial, off 1.6p at 79.5p.
ENRC, down 27p at 980p, the Kazakhstan ferrochrome and iron ore miner
is set for entry along with Cobham, the aerospace engineer, up 8.5p
at 207.75p, after a later rally on strong results and Tate and Lyle,
up 3.5p at 509p.
New Star Asset Management, off 0.5p at 92.5p, is expected to be among
those dropping from the mid caps down to the FTSE SmallCap index.
Xstrata was down 92p to £37.42 after The Times reported
that Vale of Brazil was close to pulling its bid. Tesco, down 7.5p at
403p, William Morrison, off 2p at 291.5p, and J Sainsbury,
down 0.5p at 339.5p, were afflicted by a Morgan Stanley saying the trio’s
sales would grow far slower than most are forecasting.
Robert Lindsay
robert.lindsay@thetimes.co.uk
AGENDA
INTERIMS
Ascribe
Synairgen
Finsbury Food Group
Powerleague Group
Ultimate Finance
FINALS
BPP Holdings
Chime
Climate Exchange
Costain
French Connection Group
Gibbs & Dandy
Hellenic Carriers
Hikma Pharmaceuticals
Hochschild Mining
Huntsworth
Lookers
Panmure Gordon
Savills
Standard Life
Tikit
Tullow Oil
Work Group
Yule Catto
AGMs
Triad Group
Frontier Mining
Griffin Group
EGMs
Bateman Engineering
Biffa
Thomas Cook Group
ECONOMICS
UK Jan trade (0930 GMT)
UK Budget speech (1230 GMT)
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