April 24, 2024

You are here: Home / Archives for confidence vote

World Stocks Rise as Data Shows U.S. Layoffs Easing

December 16, 2011 by Leave a Comment

BANGKOK (AP) — World stocks rose Friday amid improving U.S. jobs and manufacturing data and the expected approval in Italy of an austerity plan intended to get the country’s finances under control.

Benchmark oil hovered near $94 per barrel while the dollar rose against the euro and the yen.

European shares rose in early trading, following gains in Asia. Britain’s FTSE added 0.3 percent to 5,415.04. Germany’s DAX inched up 0.3 percent to 5,745.07. France’s CAC-40 was steady at 2,997.89. Wall Street also appeared ready to head higher. Dow Jones industrial futures rose 0.4 percent to 11,872 while SP 500 futures gained 0.6 percent to 1,218.80.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index was 0.3 percent higher to close at 8,401.72. South Korea’s Kospi rose 1.2 percent to 1,839.96 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 1.4 percent to 18,285.39. Benchmarks in Singapore, Taiwan and Indonesia also rose.

Mainland China shares ended a six-session losing streak, with the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index gaining 2 percent to close at 2,224.84.

Analysts stopped short of calling the gains a recovery, as trading was light ahead of the holidays. The Hang Seng, snapping a six-day losing streak, was higher on a technical rebound, said Linus Yip, a strategist at First Shanghai Securities in Hong Kong.

“The market dropped for six straight days. Now it may find some excuse for a technical rebound. So the U.S. job figures may be the excuse,” Yip said.

Later Friday, the Italian government will hold a critical confidence vote in the lower house of parliament on a multibillion euro austerity package.

Despite widespread opposition, the plan aimed at persuading bond markets that the country can emerge from the widening European debt crisis is expected to pass. The country now sits on a 1.9 trillion euros ($2.5 trillion) powder keg of debt that could spark a global economic recession if a default occurs.

“While the plan will very likely get the required support from MPs, it will be important to see whether amendments are proposed in terms of spending cuts and implementation schedule, in particular,” Frederik Ducrozet, an economist at Credit Agricole CIB, said in a research note.

Signs emerged that the Chinese central bank may have intervened in the currency market by offering dollars to support the Chinese yuan, which has been weakening in recent sessions. That raised speculation that authorities may plan more market-boosting measures.

The yuan strengthened to a record 6.3294 against the U.S. dollar, but later eased to 6.3446. Weakness in the yuan could raise tensions with countries such as the U.S. that complain it is already undervalued.

Among Japanese stocks, online game firm Gree rose 0.8 percent after Nomura Holdings rated the stock a “buy” on an expected increase in profits, Kyodo News Agency reported. Major automakers fell, including Toyota Motor Corp., down 1.8 percent, and Mazda Motor Corp. dropping 2.2 percent.

Retailers led Australia stocks down. JB Hi-Fi tumbled 14.9 percent after surprising investors with a profit warning late Thursday. Myer Holdings fell 2.6 percent.

Investor sentiment rose after the U.S. government reported that the number of people applying for unemployment benefits dropped sharply last week to 366,000, the fewest since May 2008. That’s a sign that layoffs are easing, a first step toward bringing down the unemployment rate, which currently stands at 8.6 percent.

Traders were also encouraged by a report from the Federal Reserve of New York that its index measuring regional manufacturing jumped to the highest level since May. That was far more than economists were expecting. A similar report from the Philadelphia branch of the Fed also increased more than analysts anticipated.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 0.4 percent to 11,868.81. The Standard Poor’s 500 rose 0.3 percent to 1,215.76. The Nasdaq rose marginally to 2,541.01.

Benchmark oil for January delivery was up 12 cents to $93.99 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell $1.08 to finish at $93.87 per barrel on Nymex on Thursday.

In currency trading, the euro fell to $1.3009 from $1.3011 late Thursday in New York. The dollar rose to 77.94 yen from 77.91 yen.

___

AP Business Writer Elaine Kurtenbach in Shanghai contributed to this report.

___

Follow Pamela Sampson on Twitter at http://twitter.com/pamelasampson

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/12/15/business/AP-World-Markets.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Stocks & Bonds: Anxious Over Jobs and Europe, Wall St. Falls for Week

November 5, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Stocks dipped on Wall Street after sinking in Europe on Friday as the Group of 20 nations ended a summit meeting with seemingly little headway in resolving the debt crisis in the euro zone.

The declines pushed equities markets to cumulative losses for the week, with indexes in the United States shedding about 2 percent or more. The latest jolt came from the meeting in France of G-20 leaders, who wrapped up their talks without commitments of money to prop up Europe’s bailout fund. And in Greece, Prime Minister George A. Papandreou survived a confidence vote early Saturday local time, after calling off a referendum on Greece’s new rescue deal with its international creditors.

While the debt crisis in Europe has unsettled global financial markets for more than a year, analysts were also watching on Friday for any insight the monthly jobs report in the United States could provide on the pace of the nation’s recovery.

But that report from the Labor Department did little to improve sentiment, showing that employers in the United States added 80,000 jobs in October, slightly below economists’ forecasts, compared with 158,000 jobs in September.

The Euro Stoxx 50 index, a barometer of euro zone blue chips, closed down 2.4 percent. The German DAX was down 2.7 percent and the CAC 40 in Paris was down 2.25 percent. The FTSE 100 index in London ended the day 0.3 percent lower.

The Standard Poor’s 500-stock index was down about 0.6 percent, or 7.92 points, at 1,253.23. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 0.5 percent to 11,983.24 and the Nasdaq composite index was down 0.4 percent to 2,686.15.

Financial stocks fell 1.3 percent in the United States, among the worst performing sectors.

Interest rates were lower. The Treasury’s benchmark 10-year note rose 10/32, to 100 25/32, and the yield fell to 2.04 percent from 2.07 percent late Thursday.

As the euro zone crisis has developed, the markets have sometimes swung erratically, building gains one day and wiping them out the next. The three main Wall Street indexes finished last week up more than 3 percent.

But that gain started to be tested on Monday, then fell further when Greece said it would put the terms of its planned bailout to a public vote. Stocks managed to squeeze out some gains on Wednesday and Thursday, but fell flat on Friday.

In addition, a bankruptcy filing this week by MF Global in the United States raised concerns about the exposure of financial institutions in the United States to the debt problems in Europe. And borrowing costs in Europe for the most troubled economies have been rising again to worrying levels.

Guy LeBas, the chief fixed-income strategist for Janney Montgomery Scott, said investors were “watching their backs” for other troubled financial institutions.

One move that emerged from the G-20 meeting, however, was Italy’s decision to have the International Monetary Fund monitor its belt-tightening efforts.

Italian bonds, among the most pressured, have hit yield levels that signify the most expensive 10-year money the country has borrowed since switching to the euro. The rising borrowing costs make it even more difficult to reduce the overall debt load.

On Friday, the yield on 10-year bonds in Italy climbed again to 6.35 percent, up from 6.18 percent.

“Looking ahead, while Greece is front and center now, the core problem for the euro zone is how to mitigate contagion to Italy,” said currency strategists from Brown Brothers Harriman in a research note.

The euro was at $1.3770 on Friday, down from $1.3812 on Thursday.

In addition to Europe and the economic data in the United States, investors have also been scrutinizing corporate reports, which in recent weeks have somewhat steadied the American market.

On Friday, all of the major sectors in the broader market were lower, but some companies seemed resistant to the declines.

Starbucks, for example, posted fiscal fourth quarter earnings that beat estimates, and was the most widely traded stock of the consumer companies, propping them up as a group, which fell less than 1 percent. Its shares rose 6.7 percent, to $44.19.

Genworth Financial was one of the few to rise in the financial sector. Its shares rose $7.19, more than 16 percent, after it reported strong third-quarter earnings.

Liz Alderman contributed reporting.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/05/business/daily-stock-market-activity.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Greek Cabinet Backs Papandreou on Referendum

November 2, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The proposal threatens Greece’s adherence to the terms of a new deal with its foreign lenders and has plunged Europe into a fresh bout of financial turmoil.

But several lawmakers in the governing Socialist Party rejected the plan, raising the possibility that Mr. Papandreou will not survive a no-confidence vote scheduled for Friday that depends on his holding together a razor-thin parliamentary majority.

An emergency cabinet meeting convened by Mr. Papandreou ended at 3 a.m. with the cabinet saying that it unanimously supported the prime minister’s call for a referendum, local news outlets reported. The opposition and some members of his own party, however, were calling for new elections immediately.

Despite the political turmoil provoked by Mr. Papandreou’s call for a referendum, the prime minister appeared to have rallied his troops behind him after the seven-hour cabinet meeting.

The Greek government spokesman, Elias Mossialos, said the government aimed to hold the referendum “as soon as possible” — “on the condition” that Greece had the “basic elements, not the full agreement” of the loan deal with the European Union in place. News reports on Wednesday said the referendum might be brought forward as soon as December.

The political atmosphere remained tense and chaotic, with politicians both in the government and in the opposition maneuvering intensely ahead of the confidence vote.

The leader of the center-right opposition, Antonis Samaras, repeated calls on Wednesday for early elections but did not ask his legislators to resign, as he had hinted he might do, a move that would have immediately led to early elections. The next general election is not due until 2013.

Still, the political instability in Athens seemed likely to delay — and perhaps scuttle — the debt deal that European leaders reached after marathon negotiations in Brussels last week.

Financial markets in Europe rallied on Wednesday after two days of losses that had wiped out the gains since the Brussels deal was announced last week. Some analysts said that Greece was now coming closer to a messy default on its debt, and perhaps a departure from the zone of 17 countries that use the euro as their common currency.

Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, apparently caught off guard by Mr. Papandreou’s call for a referendum and then by the disarray in his party, said they would hold emergency talks on Greece with euro zone leaders on Wednesday. They said they also planned to meet with representatives of the Greek government before a critical meeting of the Group of 20 advanced and emerging economies on Thursday, and they defended the terms of the bailout package as “more necessary than ever today.”

The chairman of the euro zone finance ministers, Jean-Claude Juncker, warned that the plan to hold a referendum endangered an $11 billion loan that Greece is to receive under the bailout deal, and that Greece urgently needed to avoid a default. Mr. Juncker, who is the prime minister of Luxembourg, said Greece could face bankruptcy if it votes no on the bailout.

The big fear is that a decisive turn against the bailout package in Greece could undermine European efforts to enforce deep budget cuts in other heavily indebted European countries, especially Italy, which is mired in its own political crisis and has a far larger economy and much more debt than Greece.

Political analysts and several advisers to Mr. Papandreou said the prime minister had decided to announce a popular referendum on Monday night as his last best hope to shore up his eroded political standing. They said he wanted to put Greece’s fate back in the hands of the Greek people and to force his many opponents — both inside his government and in the opposition — to coalesce around the idea that what is at stake is Greece’s membership in the euro zone.

Mr. Papandreou wanted Greek voters “to take a position, to see the choice before us in its starkness, hoping they will back the lesser of two evils, instead of letting irate reactions in the streets dominate the debate,” said one adviser to the prime minister.

Dimitris Bounias contributed reporting from Athens, and Stephen Castle from Brussels.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/03/world/europe/greek-cabinet-backs-call-for-referendum-on-debt-crisis.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Slovakia Deal Revives Euro Rescue Fund Hopes

October 13, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The changes to the fund need to be approved in all 17 European Union countries that use the euro. Slovakia, a small, former-Communist country of 5.5 million, is the only holdout.

The fall of the coalition government was the price it paid for tying the fund changes to its own survival in a confidence vote in Parliament. Parties in the departing coalition reached an accord on Wednesday with Robert Fico’s opposition party, Smer, allowing the vote to pass through Parliament in exchange for early elections. “There is an agreement,” said a spokesman for Mr. Fico’s party, Erik Tomas. “Smer agrees to support the financial mechanism and the coalition agrees to elections on March 10.”

For some, the episode has illustrated the contrast between Europe’s slow, cumbersome decision making and the ruthless speed of the financial markets. Ultimately, the effort to stave off the debt crisis was almost hijacked by internal political maneuvering in one of the euro zone’s smallest economies.

Before the agreement was reached with Smer, the European Union’s most senior officials appealed to Slovak politicians to stop their squabbling.

“We call upon all parties in the Slovak Parliament to rise above the positioning of short-term politics, and seize the next occasion to ensure a swift adoption of the new agreement,” said a joint statement from José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, and Herman Van Rompuy, the president of the European Council. Slovakia’s new vote to approve changes to the rescue fund known as the European Financial Stability Facility is expected Thursday or Friday.

“The agreement makes it possible that either tomorrow night or at the latest Friday morning the fund and the laws tied to it will be approved,” Mr. Fico said, Reuters reported. The changes to the bailout fund not only expand it but also give it new powers to help strengthen Europe’s vulnerable banks. “If we are held hostage to every parochial problem, then our efficiency is severely impaired,” said one European diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the issue.

The biggest winner is Mr. Fico, a leftist former prime minister, who already had the largest bloc in the Parliament and watched as the fragile four-party coalition keeping him out of power fell upon itself. Opinion surveys show him in the lead if new elections are held. The government crisis was doubly successful for Mr. Fico, breaking the coalition while allowing him to play the role of rescuer and power broker.

Now that it has the support of Mr. Fico’s party, the measure should pass easily.

While on the one hand many Slovaks found the prospect of bailing out richer fellow euro zone members inconceivable, others savored Slovakia’s seat in the inner circle of Europe, and were dismayed over the spectacle of holding up the bailout.

Stephen Castle reported from Brussels, and Nicholas Kulish from Berlin.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/13/world/europe/slovak-deal-revives-hope-for-euro-rescue-fund.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Greek Parliament Passes Critical Confidence Vote

June 21, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The vote was conducted by roll call following several hours of fiery debate that resulted in several opposition lawmakers briefly walking out of Parliament in protest at comments by the deputy prime minister, Theodoros Pangalos, an outspoken Socialist stalwart.

In a sign that Mr. Papandreou had managed to rally Socialist lawmakers following a week of political turmoil, all 155 ruling party M.P.s voted yes, with 143 from the opposition voting against, with two abstentions.

The vote averts early elections and a stalled government that many feared could throw Greece into default on its loans and the rest of the euor zone into a financial panic rivaling the one that followed the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy in 2008.

Now, Mr. Papandreou must face an even bigger challenge when Parliament votes next week on a slate of measures that includes tax hikes, wage cuts and state privatization. The steps were required by the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund before the next segment of aid that Greece needs to meet expenses through the summer is released.

Greece’s new finance minister, Evangelos Venizelos, pledged that Parliament would pass the unpopular austerity measures next week. “The midterm program is a plan for reforming our nation and must be implemented,” the minister said in a reference to the new package of measures Greece must approve to secure its next round of financing from its foreign creditors.

Before the vote, Mr. Papandreou called on Parliament and the people to show responsibility and seize “a critical opportunity to save the country from default.”

He appealed as he had last week to the main conservative opposition party New Democracy for consensus on the austerity measures to be voted on in Parliament next Tuesday. But he seemd to know his entreaties were falling mostly on deaf ears, and he could not resist a dig at the opposition, saying, “Our government had to struggle to clear up after your mistakes.”

He defended the country’s foreign creditors, who have become a lightning rod for popular fury, saying, “They are giving us a helping hand in difficult times.”

But tens of thousands of people gathered outside Parliament, many voicing rage at foreign lenders they see as a kind of occupying power and at a government they blame for Greece’s financial crisis.

“They destroyed the country,” said Terpsichore Theofili, 23, a history student, as she stood in the crowd in Syntagma Square outside Parliament. “They should pay, not us,” she added.

For three weeks, protesters have come together nightly in the square to air their grievances over a crisis that endures despite an earlier round of painful austerity measures. The lingering crisis has left the government struggling to agree on another round of painful cuts to further diminish the country’s bloated public sector and win urgently needed international bailout money.

Many in the crowd wore stickers aimed at Parliament that read, “We won’t leave until they leave.” Most were good to their word, as the crowd thinned out considerably after the vote and after the subways closed down at midnight.

Inside, in the debate leading up to the vote, Antonis Samaras, the leader of New Democracy, the main opposition party, repeated his calls for a renegotiation of the new austerity package. “We will not give consensus to a mistake,” Mr. Samaras said. “We are, however, more than ready to give consensus to the correction of a mistake.” Conservatives briefly walked out, but returned for the vote.

On Tuesday, the Socialist party appeared to rally around Mr. Papandreou following a week of turmoil in which two Socialist members of Parliament gave up their seats in protest at what they saw as the prime minister’s failures of leadership.

In the reshuffle last Friday, Mr. Papandreou replaced the former finance minister, George Papaconstantinou, who has been the face of the government’s negotiations with its international lenders, with Evangelos Venizelos, a Socialist party veteran with the clout to get the party in line behind measures that have often gone against traditional Socialist positions.

But tensions remained inside the party. In Parliamentary debate on Tuesday, a Socialist member of Parliament, Panayiotis Kouroublis, said that his vote on Tuesday would be positive but that it did not constitute unconditional support for the governing party. “I will vote for the government tonight, but that does not mean I’m giving it carte blanche,” he said.

Last week, Mr. Papandreou failed to forge a government of national unity with the New Democracy party, which is center-right and was in power when Greece’s debt ballooned. The party now opposes some of the terms of the austerity measures and has proposed tax cuts in addition to spending cuts.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=182f3a30cd2da0a901894b09f685374b

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: , ,

Wall Street Edges Higher, Helping European Stocks Recover

June 20, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The New York opening helped improve the performance of European shares, which had fallen more than 1 percent earlier in the day.

In early trading, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 51.16 points, or 0.4 percent, at 12,055.52. The Standard Poor’s 500-stock index rose 3.42 points, or 0.3 percent, at 1,274.92. The Nasdaq composite was 2.86 points, or 0.1 percent, higher at 2,619.34.

Banking stocks, which have been declining since February, were among the worst performers after the ministers said Greece would need to introduce harsh austerity measures before it received a 12 billion euro ($17.07 billion) loan tranche.

Moody’s threat that it might cut Italy’s credit ratings intensified fears that the problems of the euro zone’s peripheral countries would spread. Moody’s said it was concerned about Italy’s increased borrowing costs as a result of the Greek crisis.

Italy’s benchmark index dropped 2.4 percent, significantly underperforming markets in countries most affected by the debt issue; Spain’s IBEX 35 was down 1 percent, and Portugal’s PSI 20 was 1.3 percent lower.

Italian banks were among the worst performers, with Banca Popolare di Milano down 6.5 percent. Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, which was also affected by the first day of trading of its rights issue, fell 4.9 percent.

In afternoon trading in Europe, markets were off their lows for the day. the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top shares was down 0.4 percent, recovering some losses in early trading after Euronext opened late after a technical glitch. London’s FTSE 100 was down 0.3 percent, while Frankfurt’s DAX index was 0.2 percent lower. The CAC 40 in Paris was down 0.6 percent.

Investors were also awaiting a confidence vote on Tuesday called for by Greece’s prime minister, George Papandreou, in a bid to push through the reforms.

“They want to make sure Greece is adhering to the package. It is going to be quite a close call if they get the money in time before the country needs funding,” said Richard Batty, global investment strategist at Standard Life Investments, which has £157 billion of assets under management.

Nomura analysts said in a note the market could be ripe for a rally, with a potential upside of 18 percent for the rest of the year if Greece avoided a near-term default and if the recent soft patch of economic data failed to translate into earnings downgrades.

United States stock index futures fell Monday after the delay in emergency loans to Greece and a possible downgrade of Italy’s credit rating.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=416669f0e425b273eea6d2504cdf2412

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: , ,