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
Monday, February 22, 0730 GMT
Top stories
The Times: Stephen Hester, the head of Royal Bank of Scotland, rejected a £1.6 million ($2.5 million) bonus, putting pressure on the chief of rival Lloyds to do the same.
The Daily Telegraph: EMI, the music publisher, will not sell its Abbey Road studios but is instead in talks to finance a "revitalisation" of the complex.
The Times: Glencore, the Swiss commodities trader, wants to buy back the $2.5 billion (£1.6 billion) Prodeco coalmine owned by Xstrata and is looking for partners.
Comment
Anatole Kaletsky in The Times: The number of retiring baby-boomers, far more than the greed of bankers, is the true fiscal nightmare now facing Britain.
Liam Halligan in The Daily Telegraph: Even cautious establishment figures feel compelled to tell us that unless we make big changes, horrendous outcomes are possible.
William Pesek on Bloomberg: The search for the next Greece is finding its way to an unlikely place: Japan.
Upside
The Times: The UK government is close to a deal for a nuclear manufacturing facility with Sheffield Forgemasters, the engineering firm, and Westinghouse, the reactor maker.
The Daily Telegraph: Diageo, the world's biggest spirits maker, is strengthening relationships with UK retailers to increase supermarket sales.
New York Times: Ski resorts in the US showed steady increases in revenue over the last five years, even as most industries were in a recessionary trough.
Downside
The Times: SR Technics, the maintenance company that oversees the easyJet fleet, will close operations at Stansted airport.
The Times: Last-ditch talks failed to lead to a truce in the dispute at British Airways over the reduction of cabin crew members and strikes are likely.
The Times: JP Morgan, the US investment bank, is scouting for office locations in the City and may back out of its Canary Wharf headquarters development.
Mergers and shakers
The Times: A leading shareholder in VT Group, the support services firm, damned a proposed £233 million ($361 million) dividend intended to tempt investors from a rival offer.
Wall Street Journal: Schlumberger, the oilfield-services company, plans to buy rival Smith International for $11 billion (£7.1 billion).
Financial Times: The German government failed to find a national buyer for a stake in EADS, the defence company.
Around Asia
Wall Street Journal: The long-planned merger between Shinsei Bank and Aozora Bank, two mid-sized Japanese banks, is on the verge of collapse.
Financial Times: Saudi Arabia's oil exports to the US last year sank below one million barrels a day just as China's purchases climbed above that level.
Bloomberg: Sun Hung Kai Properties, the property company, sold 900 homes in Hong Kong for HK$4.2 billion (£350 million, $540 million) over the weekend.
Look ahead
The Times: Dubai World, the struggling state-owned conglomerate, will present its banks with a restructuring proposal for its debts by the end of next month.
Wall Street Journal: General Atomics, the defense supplier, will launch a 12-year program to develop a small commercial nuclear reactor to run on nuclear waste.
The Daily Telegraph: The National Farmers' Union will use its annual conference this week to warn the next government against "knee-jerk" cost cuts.
Unfinished business - last week wrapped up
Last Monday
Economists predicted that the UK Consumer Price Index is likely to hit 4 per cent in the coming months.
HSBC, the global banking group, clashed with shareholders over a proposed pay rise for its executive team.
Tuesday
John Varley and Bob Diamond, bosses of Barclays, the UK bank, opted for the second consecutive year not to receive a bonus.
JP Morgan Chase, the US bank, agreed to buy the non-US parts of RBS Sempra Commodities, the energy-trading business, for $1.7 billion (£1.1 billion).
Wednesday
District councils in Devon joined forces to buy their annual insurance in an attempt to save thousands of pounds.
Hewlett-Packard reported a 25 per cent jump in quarterly profit amid surging computer sales, the latest signal that the tech spending crunch was over.
Thursday
A shock January deficit from a record slump in tax receipts fuelled fears that Britain could slip back into recession.
The Federal Reserve, in its first step to normalise lending, raised the interest rate it charges banks on emergency loans.
Friday
The Teesside Cast Products steelmaking factory closed, leaving 1,600 people out of work.
British Airways cabin crews lost a High Court fight against cuts to the number of staff serving on the flagcarrier's flights.
MARKETS
FTSE 100 5,358.17 up 0.6% (Friday close)
Dow 10,402.35 up 0.1% (close)
S&P 500 1,109.17 up 0.2% (close)
Nasdaq 2,243.87 up 0.1% (close)
Nikkei 10,443.59 up 3.2% (latest)
Hang Seng 20,354.79 up 2.3% (latest)
Currencies
Sterling $1.548/1.1347 euros (latest)
Euro $1.3641 (latest)
Commodities
Brent crude $78.82 up 63 cents (latest)
West Texas crude $80.43 up 62 cents (latest)
Gold $1126.80 up $4.70 (latest)
New York
Reuters: US stocks rose as investors took the Federal Reserve's discount rate increase as evidence the financial system is healing. The Dow ended the week 3 per cent higher and the S&P 500 3.1 per cent higher, the best performance for the two gauges since late November. The Nasdaq rose 2.8 per cent, its best weekly showing since late December. Among banks, Bank of New York Mellon rose 3.5 per cent and Northern Trust rose 4.1 per cent on an analyst's upgrade. Transport company FedEx rose 2.1 per cent and led gains in the industrial sector. Steelmaker US Steel rose 4.6 per cent. Computer maker Dell fell 6.7 per cent a day after the company reported a quarterly gross margin that missed expectations. Oilfield services company Schlumberger fell 2.9 per cent on reports the company is in advanced talks to buy rival Smith International. Smith rose 13 per cent.
Asia
Bloomberg: Asian stocks rose in morning trade, after concern eased that the US Federal Reserve will increase interest rates. BHP Billiton, the world's largest miner, rose 2.5 per cent and rival Rio Tinto rose 2.1 per cent on higher metal and oil prices. Mitsubishi, a commodities trading company, rose 3 per cent in Tokyo. Camera maker Nikon rose 3.7 per cent on an analyst's upgrade. Mitsui OSK Lines, operator of the world's largest merchant fleet, rose 3.4 per cent and STX Pan Ocean, South Korea's biggest bulk carrier, rose 5.8 per cent on higher shipping rates. Suruga Bank, the Japanese lender, rose 8.2 per cent after it said it would buy back more stock than planned. City Developments, the property conglomerate, fell 3.5 per cent in Singapore after the city-state moved to impose a levy on sales of residential properties. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 2.6 per cent to 118.34 in morning trade.
Michael Beh
