The Korea Herald

SEC OKs $8b sale of NYSE parent to ICE

WASHINGTON (AP) ― U.S. regulators have approved the proposed $8 billion sale of the venerable New York Stock Exchange to a much younger futures exchange. The deal is a symbol of how financial markets are being increasingly reshaped by high technology. The Securities and Exchange Commission disclosed Friday that it’s authorized the takeover of the two-centuries-old NYSE’s parent by Atlanta-based IntercontinentalExchange, or ICE. The rival acquiring company, founded in 2000, has expanded rapidly t

Aug. 18, 2013

Swiss central bank fund pays off UBS rescue

ZURICH (AFP) ― The Swiss National Bank said on Friday that a massive loan to rescue UBS bank during the financial crisis had been paid off and UBS could now repurchase its once toxic assets.SNB said its so-called stabilizations fund, or StabFund, had by Thursday completely paid off the last portion of a $25.8 billion loan issued in 2008 to save UBS, which was among the global banks hardest hit by the crisis.The completion of the final payment of 1.2 billion Swiss francs ($1.3 billion) means that

Aug. 18, 2013

Swiss central bank fund pays off UBS rescue

Fed’s Fisher says bond yields rising

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas president Richard Fisher, one of the Fed’s most vocal critics of bond purchases by the central bank, said government bond yields are rising amid recognition the buying will eventually end. The Fed should taper purchases next month if economic reports remain favorable, Fisher said, adding employment is picking up and “the housing market has turned.” U.S. companies “are lean and mean and ready to go” with stronger balance sheets, Fisher said Friday in a television in

Aug. 18, 2013

U.S. builders started work on more homes in July

U.S. developers started work on new homes at a faster pace in July, partly reversing a sharp drop the previous month. The figures suggest that housing construction is maintaining its recovery.The Commerce Department says builders began work last month on houses and apartments at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 896,000. That was up 6 percent from June, though below a recent peak of just over 1 million in March. Construction began on 26 percent more apartments, a volatile category, but 2.2 pe

Aug. 16, 2013

Facebook to challenge PayPal with mobile payment system

NEW YORK (AP) ― Facebook plans to test a mobile payments service that lets users make purchases inside mobile applications using payment information they have added to their account on the social network. Facebook Inc. said Thursday that it is working on a “very small test” and the company says there is no set schedule for making the service available to users. The service would use payment information that shoppers store on Facebook to automatically complete checkout forms of certain mobile app

Aug. 16, 2013

Facebook to challenge PayPal with mobile payment system

Cayman, U.S. reach pact to fight tax evasion

KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) ― The Cayman Islands says it has reached agreement with the United States to provide information on accounts held by American citizens to comply with a sweeping U.S. law designed to combat tax evasion. The British Caribbean territory, considered the world’s sixth largest financial center and a major haven for mutual funds and private equity, said the texts of the new pacts will be made public once an official signing ceremony is held. The Cayman government said the pacts a

Aug. 16, 2013

Uncertainty awaits airline sector if U.S. merger blocked

DALLAS (AP) ― The merger between American Airlines and US Airways was supposed to cap an era of consolidation that helped the airline industry return to profitability. And it would produce a stronger competitor to giants United and Delta. Now a government lawsuit to block the merger has put both of those expectations in doubt. If American cannot grow by merging, it could decide to add flights to better compete with larger rivals. Doing so would likely reduce airfares ― and profit margins ― acros

Aug. 15, 2013

Cisco to cut 4,000 jobs

NEW YORK CITY (AFP) ― Information technology giant Cisco announced Wednesday that it will cut 4,000 jobs, equal to five percent of its workforce.Cisco executives said the cuts were necessitated by a weaker-than-expected economic recovery, with conditions especially disappointing in emerging markets.The “economic recovery is slower and more inconsistent,” chief executive John Chambers told analysts.While the U.S. market has been getting better, that improvement is offset by “softening” in emergin

Aug. 15, 2013

Portugal’s economy grows for first time since 2010 on trade

Portugal’s economy expanded in the second quarter for the first time since 2010 as export growth accelerated. Gross domestic product rose 1.1 percent from the first quarter, when it fell 0.4 percent, the Lisbon-based National Statistics Institute said in a preliminary report Wednesday. That follows ten consecutive quarters of contraction. Economists predicted an increase of 0.1 percent, according to the median of 10 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey. GDP dropped 2 percent from a year earlier,

Aug. 15, 2013

Former workers charged in JPMorgan trading loss

NEW YORK (AP) ― Two former JPMorgan Chase & Co. traders falsified bank records to try to cover up trading losses that were spiraling out of control, prosecutors said Wednesday in a criminal case that raises fresh questions about whether Wall Street learned its lessons from the 2008 financial crisis. Javier Martin-Artajo, 49, and Julien Grout, 35, and their co-conspirators were accused of marking up the market value of an investment portfolio to hide the fact that it was plummeting in value. The

Aug. 15, 2013

Former workers charged in JPMorgan trading loss

Billionaires Paulson, Soros dump gold

Billionaire hedge fund manager John Paulson, who told investors as recently as last month that they should own gold, cut his holdings in the metal by more than half as prices plunged into a bear market. Paulson & Co., the largest investor in the SPDR Gold Trust, the biggest exchange-traded product for the metal, pared its stake to 10.2 million shares in the three months ended June 30 from 21.8 million at the end of the first quarter, according to a government filing Wednesday. The New York-based

Aug. 15, 2013

Eurozone to exit recession as Germany, France rebound

FRANKFURT (AFP) ― The troubled eurozone looks poised to exit its long recession with new data on Wednesday showing that the region‘s two heavyweights, Germany and France, are bouncing back to growth. The German economy, Europe’s biggest, expanded by 0.7 percent in the second quarter of 2013, the federal statistics office Destatis calculated.Analysts had been pencilling in growth of around 0.5 percent for the period from April to June after gross domestic product stagnated in the first quarter.Gr

Aug. 14, 2013

Icahn sets sights on Apple, talks to CEO Tim Cook

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) ― Activist investor Carl Icahn thinks Apple should be doing more to revive its stock price, and wants to help CEO Tim Cook with the resuscitation.Icahn, an outspoken billionaire renowned for pouncing on out-of-favor stocks, signaled he has Apple Inc. in his sights in two short messages posted Tuesday on his Twitter account. Until now, he had been deploying Twitter as a weapon in his attack on Dell Inc.’s proposed sale to a group led by its CEO, Michael Dell.The Twitter posts a

Aug. 14, 2013

U.S. sues to block airline merger

WASHINGTON (AFP) ― The U.S. Justice Department and several states sued Tuesday to block the $11 billion merger between American Airlines and US Airways, saying it would reduce competition and push up fares.Justice officials said US Airways was pushing the merger specifically to reduce competition and boost returns.And they insisted that ― contrary to arguments that the long-gestating merger is key to American’s bankruptcy restructuring program ― both airlines could stand on their own profitably

Aug. 14, 2013

BlackBerry puts itself up for sale

TORONTO (AP) ― BlackBerry will consider selling itself after the long-awaited debut of its new phones failed to turn around the struggling smartphone maker. The company said Monday that its board has formed a special committee to explore “strategic alternatives” in hopes of enhancing the company’s value and boosting adoption of its BlackBerry 10 platform. The company said its options could also include joint ventures, partnerships, or other moves. The Canadian company’s U.S-traded stock closed

Aug. 13, 2013

Japan companies’ quarterly profits more than double

TOKYO (AFP) ― Major Japanese firms wrapped up the latest earnings season on a high note, more than doubling their net profit in the three months to June, a new report showed Monday.Brokerage SMBC Nikko Securities said its review of company financial results showed combined net profits surged about 112 percent from the April-June quarter a year earlier, while operating profit jumped 33 percent among some of Japan Inc.’s biggest names.A pick-up in consumer spending and a sharp decline in the yen,

Aug. 12, 2013

Japan economy up sluggish 2.6 percent for quarter

Japan's economy grew at a slower-than-expected rate of 2.6 percent last quarter, suggesting demand has been slow to pick up despite strong public spending and ultra-lax monetary policies.More than 3.0 percent growth in annual terms had been forecast for the April-June period, after the economy expanded at a 4.1 percent pace in January-March.The GDP figure reflects a 0.6 percent increase from the previous quarter, as the recovery was sustained, despite the weaker than anticipated growth.The data

Aug. 12, 2013

Tumblr founder to get $110m to remain at Yahoo

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) ― Yahoo’s recently completed acquisition of Internet blogging service Tumblr includes a $110 million payment to Tumblr founder David Karp as long as he remains on the job for the next four years. The retention payment disclosed in a regulatory filing Thursday is part of the windfall that Karp and Tumblr investors realized by agreeing to sell the service for $1.1 billion in May. Karp turned 27 last month. He started Tumblr in 2007, a few years after he dropped out of high schoo

Aug. 11, 2013

Tumblr founder to get $110m to remain at Yahoo

China probes drugmaker Sanofi for alleged bribery

BEIJING (AP) ― Chinese authorities have launched an investigation against French drugmaker Sanofi following a news report that accused the company of bribing hundreds of Chinese doctors in 2007. An unnamed whistleblower told the Guangzhou-based, state-owned 21st Century Business Herald that the French company had paid 503 doctors a total of $274,000 to prescribe Sanofi products, disguising the payments as grants for research programs. China’s official Xinhua News Agency said Saturday that the Be

Aug. 11, 2013

U.S. denies Apple request in e-books case

NEW YORK (AP) ― A judge on Friday refused a request by Apple to temporarily suspend her ruling that it violated antitrust laws by conspiring with publishers to raise electronic book prices in 2010, and she said it appeared collusion was continuing even after her findings. U.S. District Judge Denise Cote, ruling from the bench in Manhattan, declined to withdraw the effect of last month’s ruling while Cupertino, California-based Apple Inc. appeals. The judge said she wasn’t ready to rule on the go

Aug. 11, 2013

U.S. denies Apple request in e-books case