Mobile revolution in Myanmar is on the cards, but too slow for many

YANGON (Reuters) – Myanmar is on the cusp of a mobile revolution. Only it’s happening way too slowly for many locals.

Last week the government invited expressions of interest for two mobile phone licenses – a first step towards increasing mobile penetration from its current 5-10 percent to 80 percent in three years. That would lift it off the bottom of the world’s ladder of mobile use and put it on a par with neighbors like Bangladesh.

In the meantime, users are chafing at the pace and price of adding connections.

A year ago the informal technology conference Barcamp Yangon was buzzing with rumours of a SIM card that would cost about $ 6 – or 1 percent of its actual price at the time.

A year on, Barcamp is back but the talk is much less dramatic: whether the state-owned operator might this week release SIM cards costing between around $ 100. That would still be half of what the last tranche sold for, but it still leaves many unhappy.

“The clock is ticking,” says Ravi Chhabra, a local technology entrepreneur. “People are frustrated. There is lots of speculation and this creates anxiety.”

Nobody questions the need for more connections, and foreign operators have salivated at what amounts to one of the last major untapped markets.

President Thein Sein has made it clear that mobile telephony is a cornerstone of his policy, and has also vowed that mobile communications would be cheap – a promise he reiterated to a conference of donors on Saturday.

Still, getting it done is not proving easy.

The notice inviting expressions of interest in two licenses was a welcome sign that things were moving, but IT experts and sources close to the communications ministry said the timing was surprising, given that the revised telecommunications law which would define the nature of any investment had yet to be passed by the parliament.

The government said in an appendix to the notice that a new draft of the law – which had been quietly withdrawn last year after criticism about its contents – had been submitted to parliament and was expected to be passed by June.

“After the law is finished then there should be a clear policy before any expression of interest is sought,” said Zaw Min Oo, secretary general of the Myanmar Computer Federation.

On top of that, the next day Telecommunications Minister Thein Tun, who had overall responsibility for mobile licensing, resigned. No reason has been given, and officials declined to comment.

“BIT OF AN EARTHQUAKE”

Sources close to the ministry say his departure had been rumored for several months, but the timing was unexpected, and raises questions about what might happen next.

“It’s been a bit of an earthquake; now we need to sit back and watch, see which buildings fall down,” said one source close to the ministry who, like others interviewed, declined to be named for fear of jeopardizing business relationships with the ministry and its companies.

Not everyone is concerned. Romain Caillaud, a Yangon-based consultant with Vriens and Partners, says both the notice and the resignation “should accelerate the liberalization and growth of the telecom sector.”

Major foreign telecommunications companies are likely to submit expressions of interest ahead of the deadline of January 25, say experts.

Alessio Polastri, a lawyer who represents several such firms in Myanmar, says whatever delay in the process there has been will benefit the government.

“It’s almost an asset in that initial concerns about political stability have disappeared, so, most likely, not only more telecommunications companies will take part in the tender process but also the winners shall be more confident in committing higher investment,” he said.

More thorny for the government, however, may be assuaging local interests. By inviting expressions of interest for two licenses, the government appeared to be committing itself to offering four licenses – two for foreign companies, and two for local ones: state-owned Myanmar Posts and Telecommunications, or MPT, and Yatanarpon Teleport, an internet service provider which is 51 percent owned by MPT.

Some local businesspeople are questioning the wisdom of this, saying that MPT should not effectively own more than one license.

CHEAP SIM CARDS

Dozens of local IT entrepreneurs last November formed the Myanmar Technologies and Investment Corporation to bid for a license, and are currently lobbying parliament to merge the two local licenses, giving them a better chance of either winning one or setting up with a partner.

“So far the ministries have come back with positive responses and encouraged us,” said Thaung Su Nyein, who is also managing director of local media and IT company Information Matrix. “Even if we don’t get this license we’ve been led to understand we’ll get other business licenses.”

But more pressing is growing public frustration at the lack of progress on the ground.

Last year’s talk of cheaper SIM cards was fuelled partly by MPT’s decision to press ahead with expanding its own network, promising to add 30 million GSM connections by 2016 – financed by allowing contractors building the towers to sell a certain number of SIM cards.

Since then, the rumor mill has been alive with chatter about when new tranches of SIM cards might be available, and how much they might cost. A few weeks before the tech meet up, a previously obscure businessman held a press conference at which he promised SIM cards costing only 5,000 kyat (around $ 6).

While the promise went unfulfilled and the businessman disappeared from view, it started a movement of sorts: stickers appeared demanding 5,000 kyat SIM cards and several people were arrested in small demonstrations, according to exile media.

Those hopes have been dashed, but the shortfall of SIM cards ensures interest in a steady stream of sometimes conflicting reports about another imminent sale. One local media report quoted officials as saying more than 1.5 million SIM cards would be sold on Monday for 100,000 kyat each, or about $ 112.

That would still be out of the reach of most people in Myanmar.

“People want to see faster progress,” said a source close to the ministry. “At least half the country want a phone, and they want it soon.”

(Editing by Daniel Magnowski)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: Mobile revolution in Myanmar is on the cards, but too slow for many
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/mobile-revolution-in-myanmar-is-on-the-cards-but-too-slow-for-many/
Link To Post : Mobile revolution in Myanmar is on the cards, but too slow for many
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Selena Gomez vs. Justin Bieber: Who Sang It Better?

By Alison Schwartz

01/20/2013 at 06:00 PM EST

Selena Gomez and Justin Bieber

Bryan Bedder/Getty; Steve Mack/FilmMagic

Selena Gomez didn't officially comment on the status of her relationship with on-again, off-again beau Justin Bieber at her New York City acoustic concert benefit for UNICEF. She didn't have to: her song choices seemed to do all the talking.

Along with a cover of industry pal Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble," she also performed a rousing rendition of Justin Timberlake's ultimate breakup anthem: "Cry Me a River."

"I’ve kind of been through a lot these past couple of months, and it’s been really interesting and fun at the same time – and weird and sad, but cool," Gomez, 20, told the audience gathered Saturday night before launching into the 2002 pop single. "This song has helped me through a lot, and if anybody knows 'N Sync or, you know, some J.T., you’re gonna know what I’m talking about. But this song definitely speaks to me."

Of course, true Be-liebers know who made the first move: At his November concert in Boston, Bieber, 18, grabbed his acoustic guitar for a stripped-down version of Timberlake's hit, which takes on the feeling of finding out a partner has been cheating. (According to Vulture, he also covered the song in 2008.)

Watch the former couple try their hands at Timberlake's tune, and tell us in the comments below: Who deserves a standing ovation?

• Reporting by GABRIELLE OLYA

Read More..

Flu season fuels debate over paid sick time laws

NEW YORK (AP) — Sniffling, groggy and afraid she had caught the flu, Diana Zavala dragged herself in to work anyway for a day she felt she couldn't afford to miss.

A school speech therapist who works as an independent contractor, she doesn't have paid sick days. So the mother of two reported to work and hoped for the best — and was aching, shivering and coughing by the end of the day. She stayed home the next day, then loaded up on medicine and returned to work.

"It's a balancing act" between physical health and financial well-being, she said.

An unusually early and vigorous flu season is drawing attention to a cause that has scored victories but also hit roadblocks in recent years: mandatory paid sick leave for a third of civilian workers — more than 40 million people — who don't have it.

Supporters and opponents are particularly watching New York City, where lawmakers are weighing a sick leave proposal amid a competitive mayoral race.

Pointing to a flu outbreak that the governor has called a public health emergency, dozens of doctors, nurses, lawmakers and activists — some in surgical masks — rallied Friday on the City Hall steps to call for passage of the measure, which has awaited a City Council vote for nearly three years. Two likely mayoral contenders have also pressed the point.

The flu spike is making people more aware of the argument for sick pay, said Ellen Bravo, executive director of Family Values at Work, which promotes paid sick time initiatives around the country. "There's people who say, 'OK, I get it — you don't want your server coughing on your food,'" she said.

Advocates have cast paid sick time as both a workforce issue akin to parental leave and "living wage" laws, and a public health priority.

But to some business owners, paid sick leave is an impractical and unfair burden for small operations. Critics also say the timing is bad, given the choppy economy and the hardships inflicted by Superstorm Sandy.

Michael Sinensky, an owner of seven bars and restaurants around the city, was against the sick time proposal before Sandy. And after the storm shut down four of his restaurants for days or weeks, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars that his insurers have yet to pay, "we're in survival mode."

"We're at the point, right now, where we cannot afford additional social initiatives," said Sinensky, whose roughly 500 employees switch shifts if they can't work, an arrangement that some restaurateurs say benefits workers because paid sick time wouldn't include tips.

Employees without sick days are more likely to go to work with a contagious illness, send an ill child to school or day care and use hospital emergency rooms for care, according to a 2010 survey by the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center. A 2011 study in the American Journal of Public Health estimated that a lack of sick time helped spread 5 million cases of flu-like illness during the 2009 swine flu outbreak.

To be sure, many employees entitled to sick time go to work ill anyway, out of dedication or at least a desire to project it. But the work-through-it ethic is shifting somewhat amid growing awareness about spreading sickness.

"Right now, where companies' incentives lie is butting right up against this concern over people coming into the workplace, infecting others and bringing productivity of a whole company down," said John A. Challenger, CEO of employer consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

Paid sick day requirements are often popular in polls, but only four places have them: San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and the state of Connecticut. The specific provisions vary.

Milwaukee voters approved a sick time requirement in 2008, but the state Legislature passed a law blocking it. Philadelphia's mayor vetoed a sick leave measure in 2011; lawmakers have since instituted a sick time requirement for businesses with city contracts. Voters rejected a paid sick day measure in Denver in 2011.

In New York, City Councilwoman Gale Brewer's proposal would require up to five paid sick days a year at businesses with at least five employees. It wouldn't include independent contractors, such as Zavala, who supports the idea nonetheless.

The idea boasts such supporters as feminist Gloria Steinem and "Sex and the City" actress Cynthia Nixon, as well as a majority of City Council members and a coalition of unions, women's groups and public health advocates. But it also faces influential opponents, including business groups, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who has virtually complete control over what matters come to a vote.

Quinn, who is expected to run for mayor, said she considers paid sick leave a worthy goal but doesn't think it would be wise to implement it in a sluggish economy. Two of her likely opponents, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Comptroller John Liu, have reiterated calls for paid sick leave in light of the flu season.

While the debate plays out, Emilio Palaguachi is recovering from the flu and looking for a job. The father of four was abruptly fired without explanation earlier this month from his job at a deli after taking a day off to go to a doctor, he said. His former employer couldn't be reached by telephone.

"I needed work," Palaguachi said after Friday's City Hall rally, but "I needed to see the doctor because I'm sick."

___

Associated Press writer Susan Haigh in Hartford, Conn., contributed to this report.

___

Follow Jennifer Peltz at http://twitter.com/jennpeltz

Read More..

Asian shares pause, yen volatile as Bank of Japan meeting eyed

TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares held steady on Monday after surging to multimonth highs last week, while the yen firmed after touching a new low in choppy trade ahead of a Bank of Japan policy meeting this week that is expected to yield bold monetary easing measures.

The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> was steady after earlier easing as much as 0.3 percent. The index closed at a 17-1/2-month high on Friday as upbeat U.S. and Chinese data lifted sentiment.

Australian shares <.axjo> inched up 0.1 percent while South Korean shares <.ks11> recouped earlier losses but remained capped as a stronger local currency hurt exporters.

The focus in Japan was on the BoJ, which starts its two-day policy meeting on Monday under growing political pressure to pursue bolder measures to beat deflation, with speculation ranging from an open-ended commitment to buy assets until a 2 percent inflation target is achieved to simply boosting its asset buying schemes.

Early on Monday, the dollar touched a fresh 2-1/2-year high of 90.25 yen, and the euro rose to a high of 120.27 yen, near its peak since May 2011 of 120.73 hit on Friday.

But the yen clawed back some of its losses against the dollar and the euro. The dollar slipped back to a low of 89.42 yen and was last trading at 89.66 yen, while the euro also fell to a low of 119.08 and last traded at 119.44 yen.

"Profit taking pushed the dollar and the euro down against the yen but short covering lifted them off their lows. Trading is thin and quite volatile. I don't think there will be any clear direction until the BoJ decision," said Yuji Saito, director of foreign exchange at Credit Agricole in Tokyo.

Saito said "sell the fact" behavior could push the dollar down about 1 yen, but a serious disappointment on the BoJ outcome was unlikely.

The correction to the yen's years of excessive strengthening is now spurring adjustments to currencies such as the Korean won. A firmer won weighed on the Korea Composite stock Price Index <.ks11>, held back by exporters, and capping it near levels unchanged from Friday.

"Concern over the weakening yen appears to be playing a large part as the main board (Kospi) continues to underperform compared to Asian peers due to foreign selling," said Kim Joong-won, an analyst at NH Investment & Securities in Seoul.

Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei average <.n225> also slipped 0.9 percent as investors booked profits from the Nikkei's 2.9 percent rally on Friday, its biggest daily gain in 22 months. The Nikkei posted a 10th straight week of gains, its longest since 1987. <.t/>

Many investors largely keep short position on the yen.

"We expect the door for further easing will likely be left open irrespective of the outcome of BoJ policy meeting, either explicitly by the BoJ or implicitly through government's plan to nominate doves to replace the governor and deputy governors," Barclays Capital said in a note to clients.

Friday's data showed while currency speculators slightly cut their bets against the yen in the week to January 15, they remained overwhelmingly negative on the currency.

RISK APPETITE RETURNING

The steady showing in Asia equities followed a rise in global equities late last week when signs Washington may avert a fiscal crisis helped improve sentiment.

Republicans said the House will consider a bill to raise the U.S. debt ceiling enough to allow the country to pay its bills for another three months. The strategy would buy time for the Democratic-controlled Senate to pass a budget plan that shrinks the federal deficit.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> ended Friday at five-year highs on a solid start to the quarterly earnings season. U.S. markets are closed on Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

Oil prices, however, took their cues from a weak consumer sentiment report in the United States, which showed a drop to the lowest in a year in January as a result of the uncertainty surrounding the country's debt crisis. Concerns about demand overshadowed supply disruption fears, reinforced by the Islamist militant attack and hostage-taking at a gas plant in Algeria, a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

U.S. crude futures fell 0.4 percent to $95.21 a barrel while Brent fell 0.3 percent to $111.60 early on Monday.

(Additional reporting by Ian Chua in Sydney and Joyce Lee in Seoul; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)

Read More..

Timeline: Kim Dotcom’s year, from Megaupload to Mega

AUCKLAND (Reuters) – Here are the milestones in the past year for Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom. Dotcom plans to launch on January 20 a new online file storage system, known as Mega.

January 20, 2012 – Seventy armed New Zealand police raid Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom’s mansion outside Auckland, acting on a request from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Dotcom and his colleagues Finn Batato, Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk are served extradition and search warrants, arrested, and taken into custody. As operators of the website, they are charged with online piracy, fraud and money laundering, and their computers and files are seized. Megaupload is closed down. The raid occurs on the same day U.S. lawmakers axe anti-piracy legislation following heavy public opposition.

February 22 – Dotcom is released on bail, but his movements are restricted and he is prohibited from leaving New Zealand. His bail conditions are eventually relaxed to allow him free movement within the country, while the millionaire is given some access to his frozen funds to pay his legal team and living costs.

June 28 – A New Zealand court rules that search warrants used by local police to raid the Dotcom mansion were illegal, and moves by the FBI to copy data from Dotcom’s computers to take offshore were also unlawful. The court’s action is seen by many as weakening the extradition case against Megaupload.

August 16 – U.S. efforts to extradite Dotcom are dealt another blow as a New Zealand court rules that prosecutors must show evidence to support charges of internet piracy and copyright breaches. The judge in the case says withholding evidence from Dotcom would give Washington a significant advantage in the extradition hearing. She also rules that the document used to order his extradition was illegal.

September 27 – New Zealand’s Prime Minister admits that the country’s spy agency illegally carried out surveillance on Dotcom, a resident of the country, despite a law which prohibits monitoring citizens and residents.

October 10 – A U.S. federal judge rules that the U.S. government’s criminal case against Megaupload will proceed, while leaving open the option of dismissing the case at a later date on grounds including the possibility that delays in proceedings have denied Megaupload to its right to due process.

January 20, 2013 – Dotcom is due to launch his new cyberlocker, Mega.co.nz, whose encryption system is designed to offer water-tight privacy protection of user files. The launch comes as Dotcom and his colleagues await their extradition hearing, which has been delayed until August.

(Reporting by Naomi Tajitsu)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: Timeline: Kim Dotcom’s year, from Megaupload to Mega
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/timeline-kim-dotcoms-year-from-megaupload-to-mega/
Link To Post : Timeline: Kim Dotcom’s year, from Megaupload to Mega
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..

Five Things to Know About The Lumineers

By Marisa Laudadio

01/19/2013 at 06:00 PM EST

From left: Wesley Schultz, Neyla Pekarek and Jeremiah Fraites

Alan Poizner/PictureGroup

You already know their hit song "Ho Hey" with its catchy shout-it-out chant that sticks in your head – but what's behind Denver-based band The Lumineers' cool blend of indie rock and Americana?

Here are five things to know about the trio – Wesley Schultz (lead vocals, guitar), 30; Jeremiah Fraites (guitar), 27; and Neyla Pekarek (cello, piano), 26 – who are up for two Grammys (best new artist and best Americana album) and are also performing on Saturday Night Live this week alongside host Jennifer Lawrence.

1. Most people think that 'Ho Hey' – which reached No. 1 on three different charts – is about a romantic relationship, but that's not the whole story.
"The essence of the song was that I was really struggling to make ends meet in the big city when I was living in Brooklyn and working in New York. It was a myth, this idea that you'd go there and get discovered and it would be this great place for music," explains Schultz, who, like Fraites, hails from New Jersey and moved to Denver in recent years, where they met Pekarek.

"It's about a lost love in some ways, but it's also a lost dream. It's funny that a lot of people play it at their weddings because it was written from a different place. But it's kind of a beautiful thing, actually, that people can take something I was feeling really, really down about and turn it into a message of hope."

2. They've only recently been able to quit their day jobs.
"I was working as a busser, a bartender, a barista, a guitar teacher, caterer – a lot of service industry jobs, because it allows you to get away and tour if you need to or take a night off to play," explains Schultz.

"Jer was bussing tables right along beside me. And Neyla was a hostess and a substitute teacher. She'd been offered a full-time teaching position while we were in the midst of touring – and losing a lot of money – and she still stuck with it. Somehow she chose this over that, which is absurd, but we're glad she did!"

3. They named their hit song carefully.
Were they ever concerned people might call it "Hey Ho" in a derogatory way? "Yeah, at some point we laughed about it," says Schultz. "We specifically named it 'Ho Hey' instead of 'Hey Ho' [for that reason]. If people searched for it online, we'd rather it not be something that takes you in that direction."

Do they mind when people get the title wrong? "Oh no, that would be a little pretentious!" says Schultz with a chuckle. "It's kind of a silly name to begin with."

4. That's Schultz's mom on the cover of their debut, self-titled album.
"It's my mom, Judy, as a child, and her mother," he explains. "I'd asked my mom if she had any old photos that I could look through a while back, and I fell in love with it. You know if you set up a child for a picture then can't get out of the frame in time? My mom had a funny take on it: It's our first album, kind of our baby, like this child."

Schultz thanked his mom for all her years of emotional support with some heavy metal when their album went gold. "I had the plaque sent to my mom, because she'd been really supportive of us and believed in us when a lot of people were pretty concerned. And now she's got a platinum one!"

5. Their band name has more than one meaning.
While Schultz and Fraites have been playing music together for more than eight years (previous band names include Free Beer, 6Cheek, and Wesley Jeremiah), they've only been known as The Lumineers for the last four thanks to a mistake.

"We were playing a small club in Jersey City, N.J.," explains Schultz, "and there was a band out there at the time called Lumineers who were slotted for the same time, same day, the next week. The person running the show that night [mistakenly] announced us as The Lumineers."

The name stuck. "It doesn't mean anything literally. It's a made-up word," says Schultz. Another strange coincidence they learned? "It's also the name of a dental veneer company," he adds.

So how are Schultz's teeth? "I have a pretty good smile," he says with a big laugh. "I won 'Best Smile' in high school. It's a pretty big deal."

Read More..

Lilly drug chosen for Alzheimer's prevention study

Researchers have chosen an experimental drug by Eli Lilly & Co. for a large federally funded study testing whether it's possible to prevent Alzheimer's disease in older people at high risk of developing it.

The drug, called solanezumab (sol-ah-NAYZ-uh-mab), is designed to bind to and help clear the sticky deposits that clog patients' brains.

Earlier studies found it did not help people with moderate to severe Alzheimer's but it showed some promise against milder disease. Researchers think it might work better if given before symptoms start.

"The hope is we can catch people before they decline," which can come 10 years or more after plaques first show up in the brain, said Dr. Reisa Sperling, director of the Alzheimer's center at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

She will help lead the new study, which will involve 1,000 people ages 70 to 85 whose brain scans show plaque buildup but who do not yet have any symptoms of dementia. They will get monthly infusions of solanezumab or a dummy drug for three years. The main goal will be slowing the rate of cognitive decline. The study will be done at 50 sites in the U.S. and possibly more in Canada, Australia and Europe, Sperling said.

In October, researchers said combined results from two studies of solanezumab suggested it might modestly slow mental decline, especially in patients with mild disease. Taken separately, the studies missed their main goals of significantly slowing the mind-robbing disease or improving activities of daily living.

Those results were not considered good enough to win the drug approval. So in December, Lilly said it would start another large study of it this year to try to confirm the hopeful results seen patients with mild disease. That is separate from the federal study Sperling will head.

About 35 million people worldwide have dementia, and Alzheimer's is the most common type. In the U.S., about 5 million have Alzheimer's. Current medicines such as Aricept and Namenda just temporarily ease symptoms. There is no known cure.

___

Online:

Alzheimer's info: http://www.alzheimers.gov

Alzheimer's Association: http://www.alz.org

___

Follow Marilynn Marchione's coverage at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

Read More..

Wall Street Week Ahead: Earnings, money flows to push stocks higher

NEW YORK (Reuters) - With earnings momentum on the rise, the S&P 500 seems to have few hurdles ahead as it continues to power higher, its all-time high a not-so-distant goal.

The U.S. equity benchmark closed the week at a fresh five-year high on strong housing and labor market data and a string of earnings that beat lowered expectations.

Sector indexes in transportation <.djt>, banks <.bkx> and housing <.hgx> this week hit historic or multiyear highs as well.

Michael Yoshikami, chief executive at Destination Wealth Management in Walnut Creek, California, said the key earnings to watch for next week will come from cyclical companies. United Technologies reports on Wednesday while Honeywell is due to report Friday.

"Those kind of numbers will tell you the trajectory the economy is taking," Yoshikami said.

Major technology companies also report next week, but the bar for the sector has been lowered even further.

Chipmakers like Advanced Micro Devices , which is due Tuesday, are expected to underperform as PC sales shrink. AMD shares fell more than 10 percent Friday after disappointing results from its larger competitor, Intel . Still, a chipmaker sector index <.sox> posted its highest weekly close since last April.

Following a recent underperformance, an upside surprise from Apple on Wednesday could trigger a return to the stock from many investors who had abandoned ship.

Other major companies reporting next week include Google , IBM , Johnson & Johnson and DuPont on Tuesday, Microsoft and 3M on Thursday and Procter & Gamble on Friday.

CASH POURING IN, HOUSING DATA COULD HELP

Perhaps the strongest support for equities will come from the flow of cash from fixed income funds to stocks.

The recent piling into stock funds -- $11.3 billion in the past two weeks, the most since 2000 -- indicates a riskier approach to investing from retail investors looking for yield.

"From a yield perspective, a lot of stocks still yield a great deal of money and so it is very easy to see why money is pouring into the stock market," said Stephen Massocca, managing director at Wedbush Morgan in San Francisco.

"You are just not going to see people put a lot of money to work in a 10-year Treasury that yields 1.8 percent."

Housing stocks <.hgx>, already at a 5-1/2 year high, could get a further bump next week as investors eye data expected to support the market's perception that housing is the sluggish U.S. economy's bright spot.

Home resales are expected to have risen 0.6 percent in December, data is expected to show on Tuesday. Pending home sales contracts, which lead actual sales by a month or two, hit a 2-1/2 year high in November.

The new home sales report on Friday is expected to show a 2.1 percent increase.

The federal debt ceiling negotiations, a nagging worry for investors, seemed to be stuck on the back burner after House Republicans signaled they might support a short-term extension.

Equity markets, which tumbled in 2011 after the last round of talks pushed the United States close to a default, seem not to care much this time around.

The CBOE volatility index <.vix>, a gauge of market anxiety, closed Friday at its lowest since April 2007.

"I think the market is getting somewhat desensitized from political drama given, this seems to be happening over and over," said Destination Wealth Management's Yoshikami.

"It's something to keep in mind, but I don't think it's what you want to base your investing decisions on."

(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos, additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak and Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

Read More..

Algeria ends desert siege with 23 hostages dead

ALGIERS/IN AMENAS, Algeria (Reuters) - Algerian troops ended a siege by Islamist militants at a gas plant in the Sahara desert where 23 hostages died, with a final assault which killed all the remaining hostage-takers.

Believed to be among the 32 dead militants was their leader, Abdul Rahman al-Nigeri, a Nigerien close to al Qaeda-linked commander Mokhtar Belmokhtar, presumed mastermind of the raid.

An Algerian interior ministry statement on the death toll gave no breakdown of the number of foreigners among hostages killed since the plant was seized before dawn on Wednesday.

Details are only slowly emerging on what happened during the siege, which marked a serious escalation of unrest in northwestern Africa, where French forces are ratcheting up a war against Islamist militants in neighboring Mali.

Algeria's interior ministry said on Saturday that 107 foreign hostages and 685 Algerian hostages had survived, but did not give a detailed breakdown of those who died.

"We feel a deep and growing unease ... we fear that over the next few days we will receive bad news," said Helge Lund, Chief Executive of Norway's Statoil, which ran the plant along with Britain's BP and Algeria's state oil company.

"People we have spoken to describe unbelievable, horrible experiences," he said.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said he feared for the lives of five British citizens unaccounted for at the gas plant near the town of In Amenas, which was also home to expatriate workers from Japanese engineering firm JGC Corp and others.

One American and one British citizen have been confirmed dead. Statoil said five of its workers, all Norwegian nationals, were still missing. Japanese and American workers are also unaccounted for.

The Islamists' attack has tested Algeria's relations with the outside world, exposed the vulnerability of multinational oil operations in the Sahara and pushed Islamist radicalism in northern Africa to center stage.

Some Western governments expressed frustration at not being informed of the Algerian authorities' plans to storm the complex. Algeria, scarred by a civil war with Islamist insurgents in the 1990s which claimed 200,000 lives, had insisted there would be no negotiation in the face of terrorism.

President Barack Obama said on Saturday the United States was seeking from Algerian authorities a fuller understanding of what took place, but said "the blame for this tragedy rests with the terrorists who carried it out."

Official sources had no immediate confirmation of newspaper reports suggesting some of the hostages may have been executed by their captors as the Algerian army closed in for the final assault on Saturday.

One source close to the crisis said 16 foreign hostages were freed, including two Americans and one Portuguese.

BP's chief executive Bob Dudley said on Saturday four of its 18 workers at the site were missing. The remaining 14 were safe.

PLANNED BEFORE FRENCH LANDED IN MALI

The attack on the heavily fortified gas compound was one of the most audacious in recent years and almost certainly planned long before French troops launched a military operation in Mali this month to stem an advance by Islamist fighters.

Hundreds of hostages escaped on Thursday when the army launched a rescue operation, but many hostages were killed.

Before the interior ministry released its provisional death toll, an Algerian security source said eight Algerians and at least seven foreigners were among the victims, including two Japanese, two Britons and a French national. One British citizen was killed when the gunmen seized the hostages on Wednesday.

The U.S. State Department said on Friday one American, Frederick Buttaccio, had died but gave no further details.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said nobody was going to attack the United States and get away with it.

"We have made a commitment that we're going to go after al Qaeda wherever they are and wherever they try to hide," he said during a visit to London. "We have done that obviously in Afghanistan, Pakistan, we've done it in Somalia, in Yemen and we will do it in North Africa as well."

Earlier on Saturday, Algerian special forces found 15 unidentified burned bodies at the plant, a source told Reuters.

Mauritanian news agencies identified the field commander of the group that attacked the plant as Nigeri, a fighter from one of the Arab tribes in Niger who had joined the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) in early-2005.

That group eventually joined up with al Qaeda to become Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). It and allied groups are the targets of the French military operation in Mali.

The news agencies described him as "one of the closest people" to Belmokhtar, who fought in Afghanistan and then in Algeria's civil war of the 1990s. Nigeri was known as a man for "difficult missions", having carried out attacks in Mauritania, Mali and Niger.

NO NEGOTIATION

Britain, Japan and other countries have expressed irritation that the Algerian army assault was ordered without consultation.

But French President Francois Hollande said the Algerian military's response seemed to have been the best option given that negotiation was not possible.

"When you have people taken hostage in such large number by terrorists with such cold determination and ready to kill those hostages - as they did - Algeria has an approach which to me, as I see it, is the most appropriate because there could be no negotiation," Hollande said.

The apparent ease with which the fighters swooped in from the dunes to take control of an important energy facility, which produces some 10 percent of the natural gas on which Algeria depends for its export income, has raised questions over the country's outwardly tough security measures.

Algerian officials said the attackers may have had inside help from among the hundreds of Algerians employed at the site.

Security in the half-dozen countries around the Sahara desert has long been a preoccupation of the West. Smugglers and militants have earned millions in ransom from kidnappings.

The most powerful Islamist groups operating in the Sahara were severely weakened by Algeria's secularist military in the civil war in the 1990s. But in the past two years the regional wing of al Qaeda gained fighters and arms as a result of the civil war in Libya, when arsenals were looted from Muammar Gaddafi's army.

(Additional reporting by Balazs Koranyi in Oslo, Estelle Shirbon and David Alexander in London, Brian Love in Paris; Writing by Giles Elgood and Myra MacDonald)

Read More..

Twitter co-founders move Obvious Corp into spacious new digs

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Evan Williams and Biz Stone, the co-founders of Twitter, have leased three sprawling floors in a historic downtown San Francisco tower for their low-profile start-up incubator, The Obvious Corporation.

Obvious said Friday it leased 75,000 square feet at the busy 760 Market Street location – known as the Phelan Building – in one of the city’s larger commercial real estate deals in recent months.

The downtown space will be able to hold roughly 500 employees and signals ambitions at Obvious, which was re-constituted when Williams and Stone both left Twitter in 2011.

The incubator, with no more than two dozen employees, has mostly stayed out of the press except when it unveiled two new blogging platforms called Medium and Branch last September.

Although still thinly staffed, Obvious’s new space is larger than start-up Pinterest’s recently inked lease in the city.

“We need the right space from which to grow the Medium team and position Obvious to focus on bringing our new ideas to life,” Obvious CEO Williams said in a statement Friday about the new lease.

The company will occupy the seventh, eighth and ninth floors of the triangular building, which wraps around a central courtyard, said Jenny Haeg, a real estate agent who has brokered leases for Square Inc, Dropbox, Airbnb and other large tech startups.

(Reporting by Gerry Shih; Editing by Bob Burgdorfer)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: Twitter co-founders move Obvious Corp into spacious new digs
Url Post: http://www.news.fluser.com/twitter-co-founders-move-obvious-corp-into-spacious-new-digs/
Link To Post : Twitter co-founders move Obvious Corp into spacious new digs
Rating:
100%

based on 99998 ratings.
5 user reviews.
Author: Fluser SeoLink
Thanks for visiting the blog, If any criticism and suggestions please leave a comment

Read More..