Welcome to today's round-up of business news from The Times: what we're saying, what they're saying, from Michael Beh
Wednesday, November 4, 0730 GMT
Top stories
The Times: General Motors, the US car maker, scrapped plans to sell its Opel and Vauxhall brand to Magna International, the Canadian car-parts maker.
http://tinyurl.com/yzxcjs6
Wall Street Journal: Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett's investment vehicle, agreed to buy the remaining stake in Burlington Northern Santa Fe, the railroad company.
http://tinyurl.com/yj5u7sq
The Times: Royal Bank of Scotland may need more taxpayer funds to nurse the state-controlled lender back to health even after a £33.5 billion ($55 billion) bailout.
http://tinyurl.com/ylahrdr
Comment
David Wighton in The Times: Lloyds got off relatively lightly, but Royal Bank of Scotland, which couldn't escape the insurance scheme, was clobbered.
http://tinyurl.com/yzvphrt
Tracey Corrigan in the Daily Telegraph: Royal Bank of Scotland is selling viable businesses unrelated to its banking problems and so it may take longer to repay the UK taxpayer.
http://tinyurl.com/yjaq5wn
David Prosser in The Independent: Lloyds and RBS have irreconcilable orders: to improve their capital strength while simultaneously lending more.
http://tinyurl.com/yf8dezf
Upside
The Times: Marks & Spencer, the upmarket grocer, will sell branded food at all its stores as it competes with rival Waitrose.
http://tinyurl.com/yl9tp9m
Wall Street Journal: Pensions for top US executives rose an average of 19 per cent last year, with more than 200 increasing by more than 50 per cent.
http://tinyurl.com/yffmq9c
The Times: The US agreed to sell its embassy building in Grosvenor Square, Mayfair, to Qatari Diar, a Qatari sovereign wealth-backed developer.
http://tinyurl.com/yg9u2ec
Downside
Wall Street Journal: HSBC, the UK banking group, will cut 1,700 jobs, mostly from its collections and credit-card operations.
http://tinyurl.com/ygfc56t
The Daily Telegraph: Kraft, the US food giant looking to buy confectioner Cadbury, reported disappointing results and reduced its growth prospects.
http://tinyurl.com/yhut2ne
The Independent: The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee is split as it faces a crucial vote on whether to extend the Bank's quantitative easing policy.
http://tinyurl.com/yg6526g
Mergers and shakers
The Times: Barclays, the global retail and commercial bank, ousted Frits Seegers, its £700,000 ($1.1 million)-a-year chief executive.
http://tinyurl.com/yzm7gyj
New York Times: David Friehling, Bernard Madoff's longtime accountant, admitted in court that he had produced the rubber-stamp audits for the Ponzi scheme.
http://tinyurl.com/yfnajks
The Daily Telegraph: Mel Gibson, the Hollywood actor, sold the British arm of his film distribution business to Len Blavatnik, the Russian-born billionaire.
http://tinyurl.com/yztsvub
Around Asia
The Times: India made a deal worth $6.7 billion (£4 billion) to buy 200 tonnes of gold from the International Monetary Fund.
http://tinyurl.com/ylqdbhr
Wall Street Journal: Morgan Stanley restarted the sale of the US bank's stake in China's first joint-venture investment bank, China International Capital.
http://tinyurl.com/yfdyoeg
The Times: The Reserve Bank of Australia has raised the country's official interest rates for the second time in a month.
http://tinyurl.com/ycfvmkv
Look ahead
New York Times: Nokia Siemens Networks, the No. 2 maker of wireless network equipment, plans to cut 9 per cent of its workforce by the end of next year.
http://tinyurl.com/ylqdbhr
Wall Street Journal: Growth in the European economy faces a "soft patch" early next year, predicts the European Commission.
http://tinyurl.com/yjl7sx8
New York Times: Johnson & Johnson, the drug company, will cut jobs and make other restructuring moves to save up to $900 million (£550 million) next year.
http://tinyurl.com/yfxtljv
MARKETS
FTSE 100 5,037.21 down 1.3% (Tuesday close)
Dow 9,771.91 down 1.2% (close)
S&P 500 1,045.41 up 0.2% (close)
Nasdaq 2,057.32 up 0.4% (close)
Nikkei 9,796.28 down 0.1% (latest)
Hang Seng 21,435.52 up 0.9% (latest)
Currencies
Sterling $1.6416/1.1157 euros (latest)
Euro $1.4713 (latest)
Commodities
Brent crude $77.70 down 41 cents (latest)
West Texas crude $79.30 down 30 cents (latest)
Gold $1082.60 down $2.30 (latest)
New York
Reuters: The S&P 500 and Nasdaq rose slightly but the Dow edged lower on caution before a Federal Reserve statement on the economy. Railroad company Burlington Northern Santa Fe rose 27.5 per cent after Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway agreed to buy it. On the Nasdaq, computer component maker Intel fell 2.7 per cent after the semiconductor sector was downgraded by Morgan Stanley. Tool maker Black & Decker rose 31 per cent after rival Stanley Works agreed to buy the company. Stanley rose 10.1 per cent. Oil company ConocoPhillips rose 1.5 per cent on higher oil prices.
http://tinyurl.com/yzsbq8o
Asia
Bloomberg: Most Asian stocks rose in early trade as gains by metal producers on record-high gold prices overshadowed a downgrade on semiconductor companies. Newcrest Mining, Australia's largest gold producer, rose 3.3 per cent and rival Lihir Gold rose 4.1 per cent. Toyota, the world's largest carmaker, rose 0.8 per cent on reports the company raised its global production plan. Tokyo Electron, the world's second-largest maker of semiconductor equipment, fell 4.1 per cent and Sumco, which makes silicon wafers, fell 2.8 per cent as Morgan Stanley downgraded US semiconductor companies. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 0.3 per cent to 114.61 in morning trade.
http://tinyurl.com/ygd3766
Michael Beh
michaelwbeh@gmail.com
London
Shares in Rolls-Royce were under pressure yesterday amid fears that the enginemaker had yet to see the worst of the recession. The engineer shed 2 per cent after a bearish trading update in which the group, while retaining guidance, cautioned that global economic activity remained depressed.
The FTSE 100 closed down 67.29 points at 5,037.21 after briefly dipping below the 5,000 barrier, as a sell-off of the banking sector sparked declines across the board.
The latest shake-up among the part-nationalised banks was by far the biggest story of the day, and Royal Bank of Scotland was the biggest faller, down 7 per cent, after it confirmed that the Government would increase its stake in the bank to 84 per cent. Lloyds Banking Group was the
biggest riser, climbing 2.7 per cent, after it confirmed that it would raise £13.5 billion in a rights issue and not participate in the Government's asset protection scheme. Miners fell on weaker metal prices, with Lonmin down 2.7 per cent.
Peter Stiff
Peter.Stiff@the-times.co.uk
