KILL THE COMPETITION
Welcome to today's round-up of business news from The Times: what we're saying, what they're saying, from Michael Beh
Friday, September 25, 0730 GMT
Top stories
The Times: JJB Sports, the troubled sportswear retailer, spent £3.7 million ($5.9 million) on goods and services from companies linked to its own directors.
Wall Street Journal: US existing-home sales fell by 2.7 per cent in August after rising for four months.
The Times: Jaguar Land Rover, the car maker, will shut one of its West Midlands factories and curtail its final-salary pension scheme.
Comment
David Wighton in The Times: The earlier-than-expected recovery worries investors because it could bring forward the withdrawal of the various stimulus measures.
Damian Reece in the Daily Telegraph: It will take more than a cheap currency to make Britain business-friendly.
Hamish McRae in The Independent: With a few more disappointments expected before a sustained recovery takes place, this G20 meeting will be seen as a failure.
Upside
The Times: Waitrose, the employee-owned retailer, sealed a deal with Boots, the health retailer, to sell its food as it makes move into the convenience market.
New York Times: The US Air Force began its third effort to award a $35 billion (£22 billion) contract for aerial refueling tankers.
The Times: Nintendo, the video game console maker, cut $50 (£31) from the price of its Wii console, upstaging its rivals at the Tokyo Game Show.
Downside
The Times: Sterling fell to its lowest level against the euro in five months after the Bank of England reiterated concerns about the UK's recovery.
The Independent: The London Stock Exchange cut 133 jobs and may further cut prices to increase its competitiveness.
The Daily Telegraph: Spain is sliding into a full-blown economic depression with little chance of recovery until well into the next decade.
Mergers and shakers
The Times: An employee of Ross Perot's investment company was charged with insider dealing ahead of computer maker Dell's planned takeover of Perot Systems.
New York Times: Twitter will raise $100 million (£63 million) in a deal with venture capital firms that values the microblogging service at $1 billion.
Financial Times: Stephan Wilcke, a former management consultant, will become the Treasury "enforcer" to oversee the government toxic asset insurance scheme.
Around Asia
Wall Street Journal: Japan Airlines asked the Japanese government for its fourth bailout since 2001 but the government's initial response was cautious.
The Times: Nomura, the Japanese investment bank, unveiled surprise plans to raise ¥511 billion (£3.4 billion, $5.6 billion) in a giant global stock sale.
Wall Street Journal: ING Groep, the Dutch bank, agreed to sell its controlling stake in an insurance and wealth management venture to ANZ, the Australian bank.
Look ahead
The Times: Leaders at the G20 summit will discuss winding up the G8 group of industrialised economies; the G20 may supplant the G8 over the next two years.
Reuters: The US Government may extend its Troubled Asset Relief Program bailout fund until October 2010 if the financial system remains fragile.
The Times: The defence industry wants the Government to sign £20 billion ($32 billion) worth of contracts in the next few months to stop them being axed.
MARKETS
FTSE 100 5,079.27 down 1.2% (Thursday close)
Dow 9,707.44 down 0.4% (close)
S&P 500 1,050.78 down 1% (close)
Nasdaq 2,107.61 down 1.1% (close)
Nikkei 10,239.05 down 2.9% (latest)
Hang Seng 20,894.78 down 0.7% (latest)
Currencies
Sterling $1.5939/1.0881 euros (latest)
Euro $1.4649 (latest)
Commodities
Brent crude $65.29 up 47 cents (latest)
West Texas crude $66.27 up 38 cents (latest)
Gold $996.70 down $2.20 (latest)
New York
Bloomberg: US stocks fell as existing homes sales unexpectedly slumped and the Federal Reserve said it will cut two programs meant to bolster credit markets. Home builders fell on poor housing data. DR Horton fell 4.2 per cent and Lennar fell 4.5 per cent. Bank of America fell 3 per cent and Citigroup fell 2 per cent on reports of smaller government relief programs. Copper producer Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold fell 4.2 per cent and AK Steel fell 7 per cent on lower metals prices. Energy giant Chevron fell 0.9 per cent and Occidental Petroleum fell 2.4 percent on lower oil prices. Fast food giant McDonald's rose 1 per cent on an analyst's upgrade. Software seller Red Hat rose 12 per cent on better-than-expected sales.
Asia
Bloomberg: Asian stocks fell in early trade after Nomura Holdings said it will sell new shares and sales of existing homes unexpectedly declined in the US. Nomura, Japan's largest brokerage, had yet to trade though was being bid lower in Tokyo. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, Japan's biggest publicly traded bank, fell 5 per cent. Honda, the car maker, fell 2.5 per cent and rival Toyota fell 2.9 per cent on disappointing US financial data. BHP Billiton, the world's biggest miner, fell 1.8 per cent, rival Rio Tinto fell 2.3 per cent and Inpex, Japan's largest oil explorer, fell 3.5 per cent on lower metal and oil prices. Emeco Holdings, an Australian earthmoving company, fell 14 per cent after ending takeover talks. New Zealand's Fisher & Paykel Appliances fell 11 per cent on a loss forecast. Aiful, Japan's second-largest consumer lender, rose 21 per cent on an analyst's upgrade. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index fell 1.6 per cent to 116.75 in morning trade.
Michael Beh
michaelwbeh@gmail.com
London
The FTSE-100 closed at its lowest level for a week as concerns over the strength of the economic recovery pushed the index below the 5100 level.
The leading index of shares fell 60.10 points to 5079.27, a 1.2 per cent decline, after poor negative housing data in the US sent Wall Street into negative territory.
European markets see-sawed during the day after opening substantially lower before rebounding after US markets opened higher as a result of better-than-expected jobs data. However an unexpected drop in the number of used houses sold in the US in August saw investors quickly turn negative again.
Despite the drop in prices, market observers remained confident that the decline represented a bout of profit taking with the index up 5 per cent in September.
Peter Stiff
Peter.Stiff@the-times.co.uk
