Buddah Lineage

Japanese banks : Back from the dead "FALLS from grace don’t come any harder than that of Japan’s banks. In the late 1980s they were the biggest financial firms on the planet and picked up everything from California’s banking system to impressionist paintings. A decade later they were a global laughing stock, riddled with the bad debts that helped to cripple Japan’s economy and run by managers famed as world-class procrastinators. After infamy came obscurity. Today most financial types have a view about Goldman Sachs. Few outside Japan bother even to learn the names of Mitsubishi UFJ, Sumitomo Mitsui or Mizuho, Japan’s three biggest banks. Such ignorance is unwise, not just because these firms are back on their feet (see article), but also because their experience holds lessons for both battered Western firms and the giant Chinese banks that are now at the top of the industry’s global league table." :Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to an...

Lenders rake in profits as customers pay for bank crash losses | Business | The Guardian: "Credit card charges are at their highest for 13 years, margins on mortgages are at an all-time high and interest paid on savings is at an all-time low – all helping the major banks to bolster the profitability of their high-street banking businesses. Last week Barclays reported a 39% rise in profits to £989m at its UK retail arm, while the bailed-out Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group are expected to continue the trend of reporting improved profits on the high street when they publish 2010 figures later this week. Robert Law, analyst at Nomura, is forecasting that the UK retail banking arm of RBS will contribute £1.3bn to group profits – up from £229m a year ago – while profits at the high-street arm of Lloyds could reach £4bn, up from £975m a year ago. Both banks are cutting costs by axing jobs." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim co...

Barclays tax protests: Campaigners target bank that made £1bn profit | Mail Online: "Dozens of branches of Barclays were brought to a standstill by anti tax avoidance campaigners at the weekend. The action followed revelations that the bank paid just 1 per cent tax in the UK on profits of more than £11billion. UK Uncut said it occupied around 50 branches – setting up mock libraries and crèches to highlight some of the public services being axed by the Government as it attempts to whittle down the nation’s deficit. Campaigners are angry at Barclays boss Bob Diamond’s defiance over the role of bankers in the economic crisis and at his insistence that the time for remorse was over. Mr Diamond last week admitted to MPs that Barclays paid just £113million in corporation tax during 2009 – around 1 per cent of the £11.6billion in profit it made that year. He also revealed Barclays uses hundreds of offshore subsidiaries in tax havens – including 181 in the Cayman Islands alone –...

Europe plans for Libya evacuation - Europe - Al Jazeera English: "European governments and companies are moving to evacuate citizens living in Libya as violent unrest in the country spreads. France on Monday urged its nationals to return home and began closing French-run schools in the north African country, the European Affairs minister said. Laurent Wauquiez said around 30 French nationals had been taken out of the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, where a tough crackdown on pro-democracy protesters has left possibly hundreds dead. Portugal also said it had sent a military plane to the capital, Tripoli to begin evacuating European Union citizens from strife-torn Libya, as the bloc's foreign ministers meet in Brussels, the Belgian capital, to discuss their response to the crisis. 'We want to see proper protection for foreign nationals in Libya and in particular assistance for them as they are trying to leave the country,' William Hague, Britain's foreign mi...

Mervyn King warns we must not repeat mistakes of Great Depression "The world is at risk of a return to 1930s-style protectionism that would have ruinous consequences for the global economy, the head of the Bank of England warned last night. Governor Mervyn King said a repeat of the policies that exacerbated the Great Depression would sow the seeds of the next financial crisis and recession. He said all the main players were ‘pursuing their own self-interest’ and called for ‘a grand bargain’ to prevent a fresh global disaster. A global currency war has broken out with countries battling to devalue their exchange rates to boost exports and drive economic growth. The U.S. and China, the world’s two biggest economies, are at loggerheads over Beijing’s refusal to let its currency strengthen. Washington claims it gives China an unfair advantage." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to any such text. Copyright remains with the ori...

Mubarak`s assets not frozen in EU: Report: "Egypt's foreign ministry has not requested the European Union to freeze the assets of ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his family members, an EU source said on Friday. The source, who requested anonymity, said the freezing list issued by the foreign ministry only included the assets of former Egyptian officials and ministers, Iran's Press TV said citing an Egyptian daily Al-Masry Al-Youm report. British Foreign Minister William Hague told parliament on Tuesday that they had received a request from the Egyptian government to freeze the assets of several Egyptian ex-officials. This request had also been confirmed by Bernard Valero, the French foreign ministry spokesman. According to the report, a US finance official has claimed that tracking down assets and properties of Mubarak and his family is very difficult. Another official said that only Mubarak's assets in American banks can be detected."

Bernard Madoff claims banks 'chose to ignore con' | This is Money: "Jailed swindler Bernard Madoff has accused banks and hedge funds of being 'complicit' in his elaborate Ponzi scheme that robbed investors of more than $20bn (£12.5bn). Swindle: Bernard Madoff paid clients out of funds from new investors He said firms who had dealings with his investment company 'had to know' that there was something wrong but chose not to examine discrepancies between the regulatory filings and other information. He said 'the attitude was sort of 'If you're doing something wrong, we don't want to know'.' His comments, in an interview with The New York Times, will be seized upon by firms and investors who are trying to sue banks and investment funds who had dealings with Madoff and his $65bn (£40bn) investment scheme." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to any such text. Copyright remains wit...

For Germany's Banks , a Grim Future - NYTimes.com: "Want to buy a money-losing bank with a damaged business model in an overcrowded market? Neither, it seems, do many other people Jack Ewing reports in The New York Times. Germany may have Europe’s largest and most robust economy, but investors are not clamoring for a piece of its banking market. An auction for WestLB, a publicly owned institution in Düsseldorf that was once Germany’s third-largest lender, has attracted just two bidders, a lawyer hired to sell the bank said on Wednesday. The woes of WestLB, which has received $11 billion in taxpayer support since 2009, are symptomatic of a larger problem in the German economy. Many of its biggest banks are still on government life support after making bad lending bets during the bubble years. And with their access to cheap capital long gone, their prospects of becoming profitable again are dubious." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim...

Ivory Coast Banks, Stock Exchange Close Amid Bank Run - Bloomberg: "Ivory Coast’s financial system is grinding to a halt with banks closing and the stock market suspended, sparking a run on the banks left open as the West African nation’s political crisis drags on. Standard Chartered Plc, Citigroup Inc. and BNP Paribas SA have all closed their units in the world’s top cocoa producer because of security fears after a disputed Nov. 28 election left the country with two rival administrations." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to any such text. Copyright remains with the original copyright holder.

Financial watchdogs get new powers | Business | The Guardian: "Investors and consumers will be given greater protection by new financial watchdogs which will have the power to ban retail products and reveal pending enforcement actions against banks and brokers. The tougher regulatory system will come into force late next year when the Financial Services Authority is broken into three new bodies – a consumer champion and two other regulators that will monitor the banking system and insurers. The Consumer Protection and Markets Authority will be renamed the Financial Conduct Authority and have the power to ban products or limit their sale for up to 12 months, Mark Hoban, the financial secretary to the Treasury, told the Financial Times." DISCLAIMER:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to any such text. Copyright remains with the original copyright holder.

King plays down rate-rise rumours as number of jobless nears 2.5 million - Business News, Business - The Independent: "economy faces a 'difficult period' of higher inflation and lower growth than previously expected, the Governor of the Bank of England cautioned yesterday. Mervyn King's warnings came as the latest figures showed an unexpected lengthening in the dole queues, up 44,000 to just under 2.5 million, with youth and long-term unemployment both rising. 'The recovery is unlikely to be smooth,' Mr King said. City economists suggested that the Bank was 'not in a hurry' to raise interest rates, despite the prospect of inflation rising to between 4 and 5 per cent this spring; other experts, though, still expect the base rate to rise in May, from the current 0.5 per cent to 0.75 per cent, pushing tracker and variable rate mortgage bills up with it. Such a move could have a devastating effect on a fragile housing market. DISCLAIMER:Text may be su...

Virgin Media Receives 50,000 Pre-Registrations For TiVo - WSJ.com: "Virgin Media Inc. (VMED) has started a 'soft' roll-out of its new combined television and broadband interactive platform powered by digital-video-recording firm TiVo Inc. (TIVO), and has received 50,000 pre-registrations already, Chief Executive Neil Berkett said Thursday. The U.K.-based group, which reported strong fourth-quarter earnings Thursday, will start the commercial roll-out in the second quarter of 2011, and will move 'more aggressively' in the third and fourth quarters, he told Dow Jones Newswires. Virgin Media will market the product heavily in the second half of the year. The new set-top device--which Virgin Media launched from mid-December under an exclusive U.K. wholesale and licensing arrangement with TiVo--brings together video-on-demand catch-up content, Internet-based applications and games."

Incapacity benefits: Nearly 2 MILLION sickness claimants are fit to work | Mail Online: "two million people who have been living on sickness benefits for years may be perfectly fit to work, official test results show. The first reassessments of those on long-term incapacity benefit found that more than two-thirds of those checked could return to work if they received help. Trial re-tests of claimants in Burnley and Aberdeen found 68.6 per cent did not have a valid claim and were unable to prove they were too ill to take a job."