Reverse Mortgages For Dummies

A simple, easy-to-use guide to reverse mortgages for seniors and their families

Reverse Mortgages For Dummies provides readers with the information they need to determine if a reverse mortgage is right for their situation-and if so, how to go about securing one. The book offers expert advice and detailed information on such topics as property requirements, financing fees, loan amounts, debt limits and payoffs, choosing a counselor, selecting a lender, estimating leftover equity, and more. Covering almost every issue seniors and their families need to understand about reverse mortgages, this friendly guide makes securing a reverse mortgage simple and easy.

Price: $16.99

Click here to buy from Amazon

You can find best life insurance company - the right for you

Many people think seriously about the purchase of life insurance, moving and
more people move actually under the steps to the life insurance purchase.
Why? Life insurance is not required, it can sometimes expensive, and
Frankly, many people simply don't want to think of themes as unpleasant as
End their lives. However, if you recognize buying life insurance
a responsible decision, this is just as important for you as for your
Family, you're going to life insurance from the best life you wish to purchase
Insurance company are. But how do you find the best life insurance
Do?

The most reliable way to find out whether or not the life insurance company of
who you buy your life insurance have is serious and
reliable is to do some research. There are several ways to do research, to find
the best life insurance company. You can each family to talk about members
Friends, employees, etc., to use the same life insurance company. You can
Read information on the life insurance company, such as company
Web sites and talk to an agent. Or you want to examine how high
Company is evaluated by various independent financial rating services.

It's probably safe to say that life insurance all the best companies are
independent financial rating services evaluate the highest. These services provide
You unbiased reviews several life insurance companies. The ratings are based
on the financial strength of the insurance company.

It is important to remember that this financial review services are independent
and affiliate with the life insurance company; therefore no information
provided by the financial review services is not justified by the life insurance
Companies.

By doing some research, you will be able, the best life insurance company
for your needs than the needs of your family.

Visit our website to purchase a car insurance home insurance Orlandoretrieve or get Indiana car insurance.

World Bank fears Europe's crisis could set off deeper global slump than Lehman collapse

"The global economy has entered a dangerous phase. The financial system of the largest economic bloc in the world is threatened by a fiscal and financial crisis that has so far eluded policy-makers’ efforts to contain it," said the bank in its Global Economic Perspectives.

"The possibility of further escalation of the crisis in Europe cannot be ruled out. Should this happen, the ensuing global downturn is likely to be deeper and longer-lasting than the recession of 2008/2009 because countries do not have the fiscal and monetary space to stimulate the global economy. Activity is unlikely to bounce back as quickly."

"An escalation of the crisis would spare no one," said Andrew Burns, the key author. "Developing countries should hope for the best and plan for the worst. If these downside risks materialised there is not much developing countries can do to prevent it. But they can prepare for it."

The report said rich countries had used up their fiscal and monetary shock absorbers after the Lehman crisis. While some poorer states still have the means to cushion the blow, many have already pushed fiscal deficits and credit growth to the limits of safety.

"Developing countries would have much less fiscal space than in 2008 with which to react to a global slowdown. As a result, if financial conditions deteriorate, many of these countries could be forced to cut spending pro-cyclically, thereby exacerbating the cycle."

The bank said there is a risk that turmoil in Europe could interact with the delayed effects of monetary tightening in Asia and Latin America, reinforcing each other in a "downward overshooting of activity".

The bank cut its global forecast from 3.4pc to 2.5pc for 2012, warning that the eurozone has already fallen into recession and is likely to contract by 0.3pc this year. "The possibility of much worse outcomes are real," it said. If Europe’s financial system to seizes up, this could lop a further 4pc off global GDP.

"While contained for the moment, the risk of a much broader freezing up of capital markets and a global crisis similar in magnitude to the Lehman crisis remains. The willingness of markets to finance the deficits and maturing debt of high-income countries cannot be assured. Should more countries find themselves denied such financing, a much wider financial crisis that could engulf private banks and other financial institutions on both sides of the Atlantic cannot be ruled out. The world could be thrown into recession as large or even larger than that of 2008-09."

The consequences would be dire for 30-odd countries with external finance needs above 10pc of GDP. The bank advised these states to "prefinance" their needs while the credit markets are still open, reducing the risk of a sudden crunch. Commodity exporters should brace for a fall in oil and metal prices of almost a quarter.

Emerging markets have already seen a rise in average bond spreads of 117 basis points since last July. Global trade volumes contracted at an 8pc annual rate in the three months to October. Capital flows to developing countries fell to $170bn in the second half of 2011 from $309bn a year earlier.

In a veiled attack on Europe’s austerity policies the bank said "it is not yet clear whether there is an end in sight to the vicious circle whereby budget cuts to restore debt sustainability reduce growth and revenues to the detriment of debt sustainability".

The bank’s "downside scenario" involves a credit freeze in two "larger Euro Area economies". Such an event would cause a further contraction of Euroland’s GDP by 6pc over the next two years. The bank stopped short of modelling what would happen if the eurozone breaks up altogether.

View the original article here

Only Germany can save EMU as contagion turns systemic

 German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned there will be no 'spectacular step' at the EU meeting on Thursday Photo: AP

"We are heading towards fiscal union or break-up," said David Bloom, currency chief at HSBC. "Talk is no longer enough as the fire threatens to leap over the firebreak into Spain and Italy.

"What the market is worried about is Germany's long-term committment to the euro project. If we see unreserved and absolute backing from the political establishment of Germany, that will be a soothing balm."

Chancellor Angela Merkel seemed in little hurry on Tuesday to convey such a message. There will be no "spectacular step" at the Justus Lipsius building on Thursday; just a "controlled process of gradual steps and measures", she said with unflappable calm. Given the simmering wrath from top to bottom of German society, it may be impossible for her to do much more.

Jens Weidmann, the Bundesbank's president, has made her task that much harder by telling the eurosceptic Bild Zeitung that "nothing would destroy the incentives for a solid budget policy more quickly and more permanently than joint liability for national debts. European and especially German taxpayers would have to answer for the entire state debt of Greece. That would be a step toward a transfer union."

Days earlier he shot down proposals for issuance of eurobonds or use of Europe's rescue fund to buy Spanish and Italian bonds on the open market, crucial steps to prevent Italy and Spain being drawn into the maelstrom. "It has a high cost, limited use, and dangerous secondary effects," he said, departing radically from the script of the European Central Bank.

Such scathing words from the Bundesbank tie Dr Merkel's hands, just as she is tied by a Bundestag motion five weeks ago that imposed strict limits on further bailouts. Above her head hangs a Sword of Damocles, a ruling by her consitutional court in September that may curb or even block German participation in the EU's rescue machinery. The further she goes on Thursday – the further she breaches the "no bailout" clause of the Lisbon Treaty – the greater the risk of a negative ruling.

In essence, this is a soul-searching drama within Germany over its own national destiny and place in Europe, echoed in the Netherlands, Finland and even France. Europe's confusion reflects the schizophrenia of its ancient tribal nations, each faced with the fateful choice of crossing the Rubicon to an EU Treasury and joint government or letting the EU project unravel after half a century.

EU leaders would like to confine their summit to the details of debt buy-backs or "selective defaults" for Greece, or cuts in the penal rate on rescue packages, but the crisis is once again a step ahead of politicians. Fear that Italy and Spain may be tipping into double-dip recessions as global growth falters has changed the landscape, threatening the debt dynamics of both countries.

The International Monetary Fund said there is now "serious risk" of eurozone contagion with "large" potential knock-on effects worldwide. "Market participants remain unconvinced that a sustainable solution is at hand," it said.

Suki Mann from Societe Generale caught the mood in a note to clients, asking whether it is "all over". "Eurozone politicians don't – or don't want to – understand that the eurozone as we know it is on the precipice. Greece appears beyond repair, Italy is on the brink, and the chances are that the euro might be no more very soon," he said.

RBS fears that Europe is on the cusp of "system-wide convulsion" after yields on Spanish 10-year bonds reached post-EMU records of 6.34pc this week, and Italian yields topped 6pc. "We believe that Spain has entered the danger zone for yield levels," said Harvender Sian, the bank's credit strategist, who fears the "point-of-no-return" may be 6.5pc. "Given that Spain [and likely soon Italy] has entered this territory, there is a growing risk that a large systemic risk event is plausible in the near term and if not then in a matter of weeks."

The bank has called for a bail-out fund with €2 trillion of full lending power to stabilise the system, even if this risks pushing German debt levels above 110pc of GDP and causing apoplexy in the Bundestag.

The bond fund Pimco has its own idea: throwing Greece, Ireland and Portugal to the wolves, and concentrating €1 trillion in "overwhelming force" to defend Spain and Italy. That major players should utter such thoughts shows how fast events are moving.

For 18 months the EU has treated the serial crises on the EMU margins as liquidity headaches. It hoped that time would slowly lift the distressed debtors off the reefs, while the penal terms of "Ultima Ratio" attached to bailout loans would deter other EMU states from seeking help. "Shock and Awe" rhetoric would do the rest.

The strategy has failed because it did not acknowledge that the deeper crisis is a North-South structural gap that has left half the eurozone with variants of 1930s debt-deflation, a condition that cannot be solved by austerity measures or by any one country alone.

"We are approaching the endgame for this part of the European sovereign crises: the number of cans that now need kicking down the road would challenge the left foot of Lionel Messi," said Gary Jenkins from Evolution Securities. "The chances are that the EU will only take the step of fiscal union or common bond issuance at one minute to midnight on a weekend when it is clear that the system is close to collapse."

The EU has a long history of muddling through existential crises – though none quite as threatening as this – so it may find some way to fudge fiscal union with a formula that assuages German hawks and lawyers. If all else fails, it can still cajole or order the ECB to undertake mass bond purchases and usher in fiscal union by the back door.

But there is a larger question: does Germany really want to pay the costs of monetary union any longer?

View the original article here

Portugal's Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho discovers 'colossal' budget hole

 Pedro Passos Coelho also appeared to caution the European authorities that his government will not tolerate heavy-handed interference in his country 

Yields on two-year Portuguese debt rose to a fresh record of 20.3pc on Monday, reflecting fears by investors that the country would struggle to pull itself out of downward spiral without some form of debt restructuring.

Mr Passos Coelho also appeared to caution the European authorities that his government will not tolerate heavy-handed interference in the country.

"We want to take part in an ambitious European project and make our contribution so Europe can confront its problems in the most ambitious way, but as prime minister I will not stand by and let Europe govern Portugal," he told a party gathering.

There is growing rancor in Lisbon over the term of the €78bn rescue by the EU and the International Monetary Fund, and the sweeping powers of the inspectors as they impose a "structural adjustment" on the economy.

The penal rate of interest charged by the EU is expected to top 5.5pc and risks trapping the country in debt-deflation. At the same time fiscal austerity, without offsetting monetary stimulus or devaluation, may tip the economy into an even deeper downturn.

EU officials are pushing hard for a 100 basis points reduction in rates on rescue loans, hoping to win backing from a reluctant Germany at an EU summit on Thursday.

The revelation of a budget hole in Portugal has echoes of what occurred in Greece in late 2009, when an audit by the new Pasok government exposed a budget deficit twice the level previously declared to the European Commission.

Portugal's government will have to cover the gap with another round of spending cuts, mostly in the civil service and state-owned industries. The sacrosanct Christmas Bonus is already being slashed, effectively cutting salaries.

Portugal is obliged to cut the budget deficit to 5.9pc of GDP this year under its rescue terms. This looks like a Sisyphean task since the deficit was still 8.7pc in the first quarter, and further austerity will have the side-effect of choking tax revenue. The experience of Greece is that the country can find itself chasing its tail, with the deficit remaining stubbornly high in a shrinking economy. Portugal's central bank said the economy will contract a further 1.8pc next year.

"There are limits to cutting: you can't just cut blindly," said Mr Passos Coelho.

View the original article here

Nobel gurus warn Britain on fiscal overkill and Fed on monetary overkill

Professor Edmund Phelps said rich states all need to bring ballooning debts under control, but at a calibrated pace Photo: Alamy

"Britain has jumped on the band-wagon of fiscal tightening in a big way," said Professor Edmund Phelps from New York's Columbia University.

"I have some sympathy with that but I'm not sure it is being implemented as deftly as it should be. If you slam on the brakes too hard you risk throwing the infant through the windscreen," he told The Telegraph at a forum of Nobel laureates on Lake Constance.

Unlike many Left-leaning critics of the Government's policies, Professor Phelps is in the free-market camp and director of Columbia's Centre on Capitalism and Society. He made his name refuting the "Phillips Curve" assumptions of the 1960s that policy-makers could exploit an easy Keynesian trade-off between inflation and unemployment.

His warning echoes arguments made by Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls and may cause some discomfort in Downing Street, especially after CBI data for early August showed the sharpest drop in retail sales for a year.

Professor Phelps said the rich states all need to bring ballooning debts under control, but at a calibrated pace. The US has been too timid. "To do just $100bn of tightening this year is nothing. The US is in a complete mess and it must move to a budget surplus in absolute terms," he said.

He compared the US task with Britain's plight in the late 1940s. "The question is how to pay for the 'war', which is what Keynes worried about, except this time the war was our own housing market."

Like other Nobel laureates in Lindau, he warned against a third blast of quantitative easing (QE) by the Federal Reserve now that US core inflation is creeping back up to 2pc.

"I was a supporter of QE2 to prevent deflation but that potential justification is no longer there. The Fed should remain very watchful and keep its finger on the trigger. If we get a cyclical contraction on top of a slump, it could be serious."

Myron Scholes, who won the Nobel Prize for theories on derivatives, said QE is a misguided attempt to disguise both a bank bailout and dollar devaluation.

"Ben Bernanke knows his pistol is close to blanks. He is trying to weaken the dollar but it is only so long before Japan, Switzerland and others figure out how to retaliate, and if there is QE3 they will start arming themselves," he told the Telegraph.

"The question is how unconventional will Bernanke be. Will he buy equities, or real estate, until the Fed owns everything? The more illiquid assets they buy, the more difficult it will be to unwind.

"I wonder whether Bernanke might not say that 'the Europeans are our friends, and we know that the European Central Bank can't print money to buy bonds because the Germans won't let them. And since the ECB will soon run out of money, we will step in and start buying European government bonds for them'. It is something to think about," he said.

Mr Bernanke hinted at this during a 2002 speech on deflation that is widely view as his policy "road map" for in extremis. Buying EMU bonds would allow the Fed to drive down the dollar and stabilise Europe's debt crisis at the same time.

Professor Scholes said the eurozone has squandered its chance of making the system work. "They had the opportunity from 1997 to 2010 to think about how to make the euro work and create a fiscal union. They did nothing," he said.

"For a common area to work it has to be 'socialised' with common taxation and fiscal transfers. People have to think that Italians are the same as Germans, and can work in each other's country. There has to be a homogeneity of beliefs."

He said the West risks repeating the errors of Japan the longer it refuses to confront the mountain of bad debts and fails to clears the way for a new cycle of growth. "I think it would have been better to get it over right away, even though it would have been a huge shock to the system. We had this heart attack and they keep treating every other part of the body, the hands, the feet, or the ankles," he said.

Mr Scholes, known to many as the guru behind the LTCM hedge fund that came to grief in 1998, said the apparent calm induced by global policy makers and central banks during the bubble created a massive risk free illusion and primed the system for disaster. "If things can be too calm, and volatility too low, people stop worrying. The tiger looked caged, but the cage door was open."

View the original article here

Why cheap term life insurance not always so cheap

You've heard a lot about cheap term life insurance, and you have decided that it is something that you need to start to investigate. This is definitely a step in the right direction. Like so many other tasks in life, you have enabled the Internet to the ball rolling.

You have filled in many online applications for cheap term life insurance, but how the quotes to start again are you recognize that the term life insurance really everything is not what cheap. What is going on?

Health Affairs

A few factors may be higher than to create expected term life insurance costs. First of all the general condition is your health. Get an online offer is one thing, but an actual price policy, after the life insurance company has your medical history is what determines the actual cost of life insurance really.

Very rarely, an individual will receive life insurance without first medical examination. Always a policy through your community that employment is the only time that that this can be done, but in this case your coverage are minimal.

If you need for cheap term life insurance, which will indeed be of monetary value after they're gone, you probably policy supplement, which you get through your work.

Let's take a look at the logic for a moment. If the choice, would life insurance companies as customers only those select whose Gesundheit is excellent. Good health means that you should live longer. If you live long, there is less chance that the insurance company to your death claims expenses to pay off.

In other words, if you survive your cheap term life insurance is the insurance company ahead. The company has collected your premiums, but it had not give any money back to your receiver.

The categorization system

If you are using to determine the actual cost of a policy, life insurance companies a classification system. People with a reason get in General as a "super preferred" and the most affordable premiums get classified. You are those to get the cheap term life insurance. Several other categories exist, and, unfortunately, each category has a progressively higher premium.

Some health conditions that trigger a red flag in the eyes of an insurance undertaking are using tobacco, obesity, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and a history of cancer, stroke, diabetes, heart disease or other chronic disease in the family, will, also if you no signs of these conditions.

If you have symptoms of the above conditions, you should expect that this cheap term life insurance something not be qualified for you.

The above diseases are more likely to cause premature death in one person. Concept of politics, the individual insured dies during the life insurance benefits must pay the insurance company of death. And that's what life insurance companies consider when deciding whether a person for cheap term life insurance qualifies.

Find Cheap term life insurance in the United Kingdom. You will not believe that our low prices.

This article comes with reprint rights. Feel you free to print and distribute as you like. Everything that we is that no changes, that is take this resource text, issues, and that the link above is intact.

You already have too much life! How much can you need?

Did you know that when you apply for life insurance, insurance companies see not only on your health, but also your financial obligations? You know it is that you get the older, the more difficult, are allowed for larger amounts of life insurance. It's not that insurance companies are concerned about you closer to this end date (day, you offense), but are simply that your needs for life insurance, sharply when you get older. For example, a 30-year old has a much higher need for life insurance as a 70 years old. Why? Well simply because more one or more children have a 30-year-old, who are dependent on him or her. The 30-year-old non-working spouse also have, which depends on it for future income. Look it as removing your grandmother (and I wish her a long life), not so much influence on her death your financial good is when your spouse passes away (I wish you a long life to).

Now, what can you do with this information? Now, some people have she ran into situations where they felt needed a certain insurance companies, it applied for and were rejected by the insurance company or received an approval for a much smaller amount. I would venture to guess that the majority of these people got mad and decided, just forget and the guilt of the insurance company for their own mistakes and lack of education. The truth is, if you need a certain amount of life insurance coverage feel really, it can be a way to get it still. How? Simple by providing all of your personal and financial information to the insurance company. For example, if you're 65, application for $1,000,000 life insurance have an income of approximately $ 40,000 and say everything is the insurance company that you want to replace income, you are very likely be rejected or for a much smaller amount (especially if you other coverages) be approved.

The key here, is how it always is, as much information as possible to give the insurance company. In other words, why must you the amount which you are applying are? Some key factors which insurance company are:

What are your short-term liabilities? -Mortgage, final cost, other personal debts, business debt, control...
What is your current income? It is likely to rise in the near future?
Who are your members? -Some examples include: spouse, grandson, business partners, other investors, other members.
Is this insurance for estate planning be used? -In some cases estate taxes must be paid after your death.
Is a trust? If the life insurance policy are part of a trust and payable over a longer period of time as opposed to a flat rate which can make a difference.
Do you have investments? How much? Who are the beneficiaries of the investment? The investments used as collateral for receivables or other obligations? How liquid are the investment of assets?
You are a different policy with which to replace the, which you for apply?

One important thing to note is that people think that the insurance not included only life as a real insurance of insurance are to be perhaps,. Especially since the opportunities for ever are statistically so small with this policy (unless you jump every morning from aircraft). Believe it or not, insurance companies look at this life insurance policy as much as any other. In other words, if you a $250,000 accident only insurance and you have feel can you need a regular life insurance (figures a, no matter die like you), the accident insurance only life you not always a regular life. Your choices are really easy. Either prove that you have the total amount of insurance you request are, or cancel the only life insurance of the accident.

Now, what age? As we mentioned earlier, can have a major impact on the total amount of life insurance your age, you can achieve. Here are some simple factors used by insurance companies. At the age of 25 to 35, the factor is about 32. This means that if your income is US$ 30,000, the maximum amount of life insurance, can have you, is $960,000 ($ 30,000 X 32). Age 36-45, the factor is about 25. The factor of 20 is for age 46 to 55. There is the factor of 10 for ages 56 to 65. And for age 66 and until, the factor is approximately 5. five seems not like much, but that's all you should need if no other factors in addition to income.

Are now, of course, some variations of business to business. If you decide that you need a lot of unusual and you have very unusual circumstances, the insurance company you choose can make a big difference. The same way that some companies may be better for people with cancer history might be better if, for example, some companies are his, your nationals pets or painting is your dependent of a favorite!

Questions, as we say in all of our articles, make sure to questions, questions and more questions. Remember, just because a company said no, does not always mean that they all are. Be good!

Philippe Deray - about the author:
Philippe Deray is President and CEO of MCD financial services and MCD life. Our website address is http://www.mcdlife.com

Company profile
MCD life is a dynamic, successful company, according to the principle that our customers first! Our main task is peace for our customers by offering innovative, value-added products and information, the emphasis on the short- and long-term benefits, benefits of selected companies with high quality assets secured and written guarantees. Our focus is life insurance for individuals and companies that require "large amounts". With many years of experience in the insurance business, we have developed proprietary methods to help individuals and businesses, the amount of affordable life insurance they need. We offer life insurance term insurance, whole, universal and indexed life insurance. We will make this process as easy as possible and get a response as quickly as possible.

Spain grits teeth yet again as austerity deepens

The conservative leader pledged to fight Spain's unemployment curse by shaking up the labour markets. The jobless rate has hit 22.8pc with 5.4m people out of work. The tally is certain to rise further as the economy falls back into recession.

Spain's 10-year bond yields dropped to 5.09pc, far below the 6.5pc stress peak seen last month, even though Mr Rajoy said the government will miss its budget deficit target of 6pc of GDP this year.

Global funds are gobbling up Spanish and Italian debt on bets that lenders will exploit the European Central Bank's offer of three-year credit at 1pc to buy sovereign debt, playing the "carry trade" on the yield spread.

Mr Rajoy evoked the triumph of the mid-1990s when Spain clawed its way back to viability and astonished EU officials by meeting EMU entry terms. But the path was smoothed by a peseta devaluation of 45pc over the preceeding three years.

It may prove harder this time within the euro straight-jacket. "The global economy was much stronger then and they benefitted from devaluation," said Dario Perkins from Lombard Street Research.

"Europe is repeating the same disastrous policy tried in Greece. They have not learned the lesson and it is hard to see how the outcome can be much better in Spain. The banking debts have been hidden and we don't yet know how much this will cost the government."

Mr Rajoy warned of further bank rescues as lenders struggle with €176bn in "troubled" assets. "A second wave of restructuring is inevitable," he said.

The fiscal cuts for 2012 will amount to 1.6pc of GDP, though details are scant. It follows earlier cuts of 1pc in May. Early retirement has been ended. Even saints days have been culled, shifting the holiday to Mondays to end the "bridge" of long weekends.

The package came as Standard & Poor's downgraded the region of Valencia to BBB- after it covered just 59pc of a bond issue. The agency said Valencia has "no clear access" to the capital markets. There is little risk of default on €1.6bn of maturing debt on Thursday, but S&P said the Junta is being kept afloat by money from Madrid.

Days earlier Fitch Ratings issued a downgrade warning for Spain and a clutch of EMU states and warned that a comprehensive solution to Europe's debt crisis may be "technically and politically beyond reach".

The agency said: "Of particular concern is the absence of a credible financial backstop. This requires more active and explicit commitment from the European Central Bank to mitigate the risk of self-fulfilling liquidity crises for potentially illiquid but solvent euro area member states."

The Bank of Spain said bad loans had reached a 17-year high of 7.4pc in October as the damge continues to filter through from the housing crash. The Madrid property consultants RR de Acuna predicts that prices will have to fall another 20pc before the market clears an overhang of one million homes.

View the original article here

Spain in race against time to avert bail-out

Yields on three-month Spanish notes jumped to 5.11pc at a sale on Tuesday, higher than rates paid by Greece last week.

Mr Rajoy's team is scrambling to find ways to shorten the paralysing hiatus until mid-December when the new government is finally able to take charge under Spanish law.

"We have to go beyond strictly legal requirements because the markets are not going to wait," said Miguel Arias Canete head of the Partido Popular's top body.

Close advisers to Mr Rajoy said the party will have to flesh out exactly how it plans to pull the country out of its downward spiral, and perhaps reach an accord with the outgoing socialist to start implementing emergency measures. The country may need €30bn (£26bn) in fresh cuts to reach its 4.4pc deficit target next year.

HSBC said the country is in a race against time to avoid becoming the fourth EMU country to need a bail-out. "The question now is whether the new government is able to reassure markets that it can deliver quickly enough to beat back the market bears and avoid turning to the (EU-IMF) troika," said the bank's strategist Madhur Jha.

HSBC called for "more clarity" on bank policy, labour reforms and budget austerity. "Markets are clearly worried about the Spanish banking sector – bank restructuring and the provisioning of real estate loans on banks balance sheets," he said.

The bank said the double whammy of surging borrowing costs and a slide back into recession together risk inflicting serious damage to Spain's debt-dynamics, pushing public debt above 86pc of GDP over the next three years.

"Spain cannot face this crisis by itself. The sovereign crisis is a eurozone problem and needs a eurozone-wide solution. The last few weeks have shown that the window of opportunity is rapidly closing for Spain and other peripheral countries unless some very concrete decisions are taken at the eurozone level to negate all talk of a euro break-up. With governments dragging their feet, the bulk of support over the next few months will have to come from the ECB."

"What Spain needs is a policy mix similar to that seen in the UK, with the government having a strong medium-term austerity plan in place while the central bank provides the backstop, stimulating the economy through its ultra-easy monetary policy," said the bank.

There is no sign yet that Germany is willing to drop its vehement opposition to any such action by the ECB.

Bundesbank chief Jens Weidmann repeated on Tuesday that the ECB has no legal mandate to act as a lender of last resort, and compared money printing to the deadly temptation of drinking sea water.

"Whoever believes that the current crisis can be overcome by giving up crucial principles of stability orientation, pushing current legislation aside, is wrong," he said.

A growing chorus of critics in Paris, Brussels, Rome and Madrid say Germany is cherry-picking EU law to justify its hardline stance, ignoring the ECB's duty to safeguard "economic cohesion" and the survival of monetary union under Article 3 of the Lisbon Treaty.

Comments this week by Austria's central bank governor Ewald Nowotny point to a varied spectrum of opinion within the ECB. When asked if the bank might resort to printing money to shore up bond markets, he replied "in this simple form, of course not."

Citigroup's Jürgen Michels said the careful wording is the latest sign that "the debate is shifting within the ECB's Governing Council towards a more pro-active stance given the systemic nature of the crisis."

The ECB majority can overrule the German-led bloc of hawks – and has already done so in buying around €120bn of Spanish and Italian bonds - but mass purchases or quantitative easing would risk a high-stakes political showdown with the eurozone's hegemonic power.

View the original article here

Talk of 'nuclear default' sums up Left's anger at EU dictates

"We have an atomic bomb that we can use in the face of the Germans and the French: this atomic bomb is simply that we won't pay," said Pedro Nuno Santos, vice-president of the Socialist Party in the parliament.

"Debt is our only weapon and we must use it to impose better conditions, because recession itself is what is stopping us complying with the (EU-IMF Troika) accord. We should make the legs of the German bankers tremble," he said.

The comments came as Portugal slides deeper into recession, with the economy expected to contract by 3pc next year. Protesters marched through Lisbon on Thursday denouncing plans by the new conservative government to raise the working week to 42 hours. Wages are being cut 16pc for higher paid, and 8pc for lower paid public workers.

The parliament passed a fresh austerity budget earlier this month under the terms of its €78bn loan package from the EU and the International Monetary Fund.

Mr Nuno Santos said Europe's southern states should join forces to resist the austerity dictates and contractionary policies being imposed by the core powers. "It is incomprehensible that the peripheral countries don't do what the French president and the German Chancellor do. They should unite," he said.

Left-leaning parties in Europe are becoming increasingly defiant, accusing the Right of exploiting its grip on the European machinery to force through polices that are in effect dismantling parts of the welfare state or undermine trade union power. Germany's Angela Merkel, France's Nicolas Sarkozy, and Holland's Mark Rutte are all conservatives, and will soon be joined by Spain's Mariano Rajoy.

Francois Hollande, France's Socialist leader and front-runner in the presidential elections, has vowed to renegotiate last week's EU summit deal if elected next May, saying it violates the fiscal sovereignty of the French parliament, imposes perpetual austerity, and fails to offer struggling states any way out of economic crisis. "There must be growth," he said

Oskar Lafontaine, a leader of Germany's Linke (Left) party, said the euro was hurtling towards destruction on current policies. He blamed Germany's system of screwing down wages to undercut other EMU countries – or "wage dumping" – for causing the imbalances behind the eurozone crisis. "A shared currency cannot work without coordination of wage policy. Once wages have diverged as far as they have in recent years, devaluation and revaluation is the only way out."

He accused Merkel and Sarkozy of driving Greece into a downward spiral and now trying to inflict the same "demented" policies on the whole of Europe.

View the original article here

Workers of Europe unite, you've only euro chains to lose

Almost 97pc of the European Union’s population is now governed by conservative or Right-leaning coalitions, or EU-imposed mandarins. All that is left to social democrats is Austria (8.4m), Denmark (5.5m), and Slovenia (2.1m).

The whole machinery of the European Union (EU) system is under the control of the Right, with variants of Rhenish corporatism in the Council, and pre-modern Hayekians at the European Central Bank (ECB). Whether you regard this Hegelian ascendancy as good or bad, it certainly has profound consequences.

For just as former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher protested at Bruges that “we have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them reimposed at a European level”, the Left might equally protest that they have not fought the long, hard struggle for worker rights in their own democracies to see social welfare rolled back by Brussels and Frankfurt.

In Italy, EU viceroy Mario Monti has more or less been ordered to reform the labour code, to break union power by shifting to “firm-level” wage deals and rewrite Article 18 that protects workers against sacking for economic reasons – the issue that led to the assassination of two labour reformers by the Red Brigades since 1998.

No doubt Italy should confront its trade unions if it hopes to compete in the world, but my point is a different one. Who decides such matters? Why would the Italian Left think it desirable to concentrate further power in EU hands when it will without question be used against them? They might win control of Italy. They have no chance of taking control of policy levers in Europe in the foreseeable future, if ever.

David Begg, head of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, said his encounter with the (EU-ECB-IMF) Troika now restructuring Ireland was a sobering experience.

“The man from the IMF was very helpful, but the officials from the EU were neo-liberal ideologues. We had a very fraught meeting, almost a shouting match,” he said. “It would have been better if we had never have joined the euro.”

The consequences of this Rhenish Right ascendancy in EU institutions – not the same as Anglo-Saxon or Burkean “small platoon” conservatism, by the way – was in evidence at the Merkozy summit in Brussels. As the BBC’s Paul Mason put it, the deal has “outlawed expansionary fiscal policy” by enshrining near-zero structural deficits in international law, with constitutional debt brakes, mandatory sanctions and budget commissars for delinquent nations.

The 26 states that went along with this Merkel plan have given up the right to pursue counter-cyclical Keynesian stimulus, and have agreed to do so in perpetuity since it is almost impossible to repeal EU “Acquis”.

Personally, I am not a Keynesian – nor are many Daily Telegraph readers – but this strikes me as a mad commitment to make. For the Left it is surely an unmitigated disaster. They cannot pursue their economic agenda ever again. Fabians feared long ago that such an outcome was built into EMU. They called the euro a “bankers’ ramp”, but somehow their warnings were drowned out in the mass hysteria of monetary union.

Owen Jones at the New Statesman said it is baffling that socialists have been so slow to recognise the threat. “The proposed EU treaty is perhaps the biggest catastrophe to befall the European Left since the Second World War. After this stitch-up, the Left really needs to have a long, hard think about its attitude to the EU as it is currently constructed. There’s still a sense that any criticism of the EU puts you in the same box as swivel-eyed Ukip-ers. It is a travesty that highlighting the EU’s palpable lack of democracy has become a Right wing issue.”

Well, yes, we’re all swivel-eyed now. It should indeed have nothing to do with Right wing or Left wing affiliation. Besides, if you listen closely, angry talk is simmering across Europe, in the ranks of the French socialist party, in Germany‘s Linke, in Italy’s Rifondazione, and Spain’s newly-liberated Socialist Workers Party (PSOE).

Note the outburst last week by Pedro Nuno Santos, socialist vice-president in Portugal’s Assembleia. “We have an atomic bomb that we can use in the face of the Germans and the French: this atomic bomb is simply that we won’t pay. Debt is our only weapon and we must use it to impose better conditions. We should make the legs of the German bankers tremble,” he said.

The sacrosanct 40-hour week is being stretched to 42 hours in Portugal. Manuel Carvalho da Silva, head of the General Confederation of Portuguese Workers, said pay-cuts for public workers under successive austerity packages will amount to 27pc.

This is an “internal devaluation” of epic proportions.

Much has been written in recent weeks of Europe’s swing to the far Right, of the rise of Geert Wilders in Holland, or Marie Le Pen’s Front National in France, or – quite different – the black-shirt Garda Magyar of Hungary’s Jobbik party. The echoes of the 1930s are loud, and will become louder as combined monetary and fiscal contraction entrench depression.

Yet there is another parallel of equal resonance: the election of the Front Populaire in France with Communist support in May 1936, the cathartic rejection of deflation policy. Whether or not Leon Blum privately wanted to leave the Gold Standard – that inter-war replica of Europe’s unemployment union – the logic of his policies forced the outcome. Orthodoxy was overthrown.

The question for today’s Left is whether it is in their interests to keep apologising for an EU monetary regime that has pushed the jobless rate for youth to 49pc in Spain, 45pc in Greece, 30pc in Portugal and Ireland, 29pc in Italy and 24pc in France – yet 8.9pc in undervalued Germany – and that offers no credible way out of the slump for the Southern half.

Comrades across Europe, come over to the eurosceptic side. You have only your euro chains to lose.

View the original article here

The week ahead in business and economics: January 3 - 6 2012

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/markets/8987895/The-week-ahead-in-business-and-economics-January-3-6-2012.html

View the original article here

Questor share Tip: Reed Elsevier is optimistic on 2011

While revenues were more or less unchanged at £ 6 06bn last year, the absence of write-downs - 177 m £ last time - and greatly reduced costs of restructuring saw all year profits Bond 77pc 768 m £ before tax.

At the time, analysts acknowledged the focus of Reed to the conduct of operational performance improvement. Further positive news came from Erik Engstrom, Chief Executive since the end of 2009, saying that the greater part of the Group of the restructuring programme are now completed. However, some analysts were downbeat, citing a worrying decline in the group legal and professional firms.

"The markets of the group be controlled pressure end-cycle on multi-year subscriptions, while Reed would give no indication where he expects legal margins to recover" said Numis. "" we do not consider as dear Reed 12 times earnings, but neither see catalysts in the short-term performance of the price part of the disk. ""

Other concerns came yesterday from Bernstein Research, concerned about the potential performance of science and technology from Elsevier in 2012. They emphasize the pressures encountered by academic institutions around the world: "while the evidence summary of the changes in the funding of academic libraries is still rudimentary, anecdotal evidence suggests that academic and research libraries are still affected by budget additional pieces in 2011." We believe that, overall, Elsevier revenues will increase 1pc in 2pc annually in the best of cases, well below the history at the rate of growth FP6 5MC. »

High-growth areas include enterprise risk, while the Group has accelerated the launch of new exhibits in the high-growth markets and sectors. And with more, Mr Engstrom includes the companies after the arm of Elsevier.

An other potential upside is that the chance of the group could possibly consider the sale of its exhibitions. There is certainly interest.

View the original article here

The FTSE could produce a positive surprise for brave investors in 2012

 Even the most bullish forecasters predict just a modest rise for the benchmark FTSE 100 index in 2012. Photo: GETTY

The domestically focused FTSE 250 fared even worse, falling 12.6pc over the 12 months as austerity measures and crumbling consumer confidence hit hard.

But will investors do any better in 2012? Will the UK's equity markets bounce back this year and compensate beleaguered investors for a dismal 2011?

The background noise is hardly encouraging. As my colleague Ambrose Evans Pritchard eloquently sets out, there is no quick or easy solution to the eurozone crisis - which has the potential to send London's equity markets spiralling back towards their 2009 lows of 3,600.

London managed to detach itself from the eurozone gloom last year. The FTSE performed relatively well, when compared to Germany's DAX which ended the year down more than 15pc and the French CAC which lost almost 18pc over 2011.

But could London really shrug off the exit of a peripheral euro member or even the collapse of the single currency that so many economists and politicians now predict?

Then there is the small matter of China: can the country's apparatchiks really engineer a soft landing for the over-heated economy? The latest economic data suggests it will be difficult to tackle inflation (and the property bubble driving it) without stalling economic growth.

The US could also throw London markets off course. Yes, election years have historically been good for stock markets. And we have seen more positive economics data in recent months, with fewer job losses and tentative signs of recovery in the US housing market, but few would bet on a smooth road to recovery from here.

Closer to home the prospects for the UK economy look bleak. Capital Economics is one of a number of economists that expect the UK to slip back into recession this year as the economy contracts by 0.5pc and unemployment rises above 3m.

It is hardly the best background for a market rally – so perhaps its not surprising that many expect the FTSE 100 to end 2012 even lower than it closed last year.

Even the most bullish forecasters predict just a modest rise for the benchmark FTSE 100 index in 2012. It is hard enough to find a serious commentator who predicts that the FTSE 100 will breach the 6,000 mark, let alone the 7,000-plus forecasts of only a few years ago.

Yet despite all the doom at 5,566.77 the FTSE 100 looks to be trading at historically cheap levels on a variety of measures – not least its dividend yield.

The blue chip index is yielding almost 3.5pc - double the meagre 1.75pc interest that can be earned in a National Savings account. With little prospect of interest rates rising in 2012 surely - argue the bulls - savers will be tempted to switch some of their savings into the market.

Markets have, of course, a record of catching out even the most experienced forecasters. Shortly before the 1929 stock market crash the respected economist, Irving Fisher, predicted: "Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau."

So could the bearish forecaster be left red faced? The FTSE 100 undoubtedly has the potential to surprise on the upside this year – but you'd have to be very brave (and optimistic) to bet on it doing so.

There is however one sure-fire buy signal. Alex, the star of our daily cartoon strip. The investment banker has only been fired twice in his illustrious near-25 year career.

Both departures marked the bottom of the equity market.

View the original article here

Tom Stevenson: Income, not growth, is once again the main driver of returns

I looked for companies, usually small ones, with the potential to increase their earnings quickly and recommended buying them if that growth was not already "in the price".

It was a fairly mechanical process, which involved comparing the valuation of a company's shares with its profits growth to arrive at a measure we called the PEG, standing for Price Earnings Growth. Basically, a low PEG was good, achieved via high growth or a low valuation or a combination of the two.

You don't read much about PEGs these days for the simple reason that while cheap valuations are 10 a penny, high growth is a great deal scarcer.

The growth that we had got used to during the 1980s and 1990s was – to a larger degree than we thought at the time – a product of progressively cheaper money, consequently rising house prices and ever-increasing debt. That world has disappeared and with it, for the time being, the environment in which anyone would think seriously about launching a publication such as Investing for Growth.

The world investors find themselves in today is very different, at least in the developed world. A low-growth environment in which rapidly rising earnings are the exception. It is a world that investors before the 1980s would easily recognise, one in which income, not growth, is the principal driver of returns.

When investors come to expect double-digit capital gains each year, it is unsurprising that they are uninterested in the extra few percentage points of return chipped in by a company's dividend. It's nice to have, no more. But those kinds of super-charged returns have in recent years been rapidly wiped out by similar-sized falls so that the net gain after a so-called "lost decade" has been negligible.

Over very long periods, almost all the gains from investing in the stock market can be attributed to the reinvestment of dividends. We forgot this in the Investing for Growth years.

Something else we forgot during the low volatility years of what has been called the Great Moderation is that dividend income is a great deal more stable and predictable than economic growth, company profits and so share prices. Company bosses will do almost anything to avoid cutting their dividend because they tend to pay for it with their jobs.

Another thing we are going to have to get used to in our low growth but volatile world is persistently low interest rates. This environment of paltry returns from both cash and government bonds is another reason why investors are going to become increasingly attracted to companies able to offer a high and sustainable income.

For as long as inflation is still a problem, equity income also provides one of the few ways of generating a real return in excess of the cost of living.

The generation of that high and sustainable income is furthermore an indication of a company's quality. It is no coincidence that some of the most attractive dividend yields are currently being paid by the big multinational companies that are also most exposed to the places in the world where there is actually still some decent growth, the emerging markets.

Dividend income, unlike that from fixed interest securities like bonds, tends to grow over time. For the past 50 years or so that has meant investors have been prepared to accept a lower ongoing yield. But today many blue-chip companies are paying a higher yield on their shares than their bonds. High and growing income is a powerful combination.

With the developed world's baby boomers edging towards retirement, the demand for income-generating investments can only increase. If I were looking to relaunch that newsletter today, I can't help thinking it would be called Investing for Income.

Tom Stevenson is an investment director at Fidelity Worldwide Investment. The views expressed are his own. He tweets at
@tomstevenson63

View the original article here

Products: Markets are reluctant to sparkling diamond prices

"Diamonds international auction record price in 2010 illustrates the growing trend among the HNWIs in the world to see large diamonds as an investment alternative safe and strong growth," said the report. "The current request at the top of range of the market seems to be in large part of the Russia and the Middle East, but demand from Chinese and other investors in the Asia-Pacific is also growing rapidly," she added.

Diamonds are considered easy means for the transportation of wealth because they are small and precious.

This trend makes sense that a high proportion of the increase in the HNWI between 2007 and 2010 was in the Middle East. The number of super rich in the region increased by 10 4pc, wealth report, said, with only Africa, given the greater growth, 11 1pc for three years.

The number of super rich grew by 8 FP6 in the United States in the period and 6 3pc in Europe.

However, although sharp rises in prices could cause some of the world to think twice about splashes, HNWI there is no doubt that prices are likely to remain high for some time - or even to reach much higher levels.

Supply remains very tight. According to a study of the Canada (RBC) Royal Bank, the world's supply of rough diamonds decreases since 2006, reflecting aging of some larger mines of the world and a lack of significant new production being match up to.

"Partly the scarcity of new projects reflects a surplus of diamonds in the 1990s, which discouraged exploration and the recent financial crisis that saw the recovery of exploration budgets significantly, so that even the majors have been trimming expenses of exploration," said Des Kilalea of RBC. "De Beers, for example, used to pass about 100 m $-150$ m (62 m £-£ 93 m) annually on exploration and development and password now less than a third, with $43.". 3 M in 2010 on the programmes in Angola, Botswana, Canada, India, South Africa, "noted."

The demand for diamonds is likely to continue to strengthen, fueled by the gentrification of Asia and the growing prosperity in the Middle East. Traditional markets such as the United States and the UK will also retrieve.

According to de Beers estimates, there was a significant change in the market of the diamond between 2000 and 2010.

At the turn of the century, the United States market represents sales of diamond jewellery 48pc, but this tomb to 38pc by 2010. India represents a statistically insignificant proportion of sales in 2000 - but by 2010, it absorbed 10pc sales.

RBC expects that China will be on 20pc of the world market over the next five to seven years, until of 11pc in 2010. According to De Beers, the diamond jewelry India demand increased 31pc last year and China increased by 25pc.

Therefore, although there are fears that prices will decline the request, the Outlook for diamond producers examines overall enough sparkling.

Products have flourished across in the last week, as the Greek vote for risky mode active austerity measures.

"The Greek"Yes"vote brought sighs of relief and risk reinvigorated the feeling of the market through various asset classes." The vote had wind of precious of refuge, but has been largely good for industrial metals, said Nick Moore RBS.

Base metals were the big winners, with experts saying that copper and aluminum should see the price increases this year. Copper acquired 3pc after the vote Greek and is now $9 400 tonne.

"Now that the worst of the uncertainty surrounding the Greece has been dispelled, market participants should begin to focus on the fundamentals again."

"Copper has always the fundamental best of all metals, and we see the price remaining well supported," according to Commerzbank analysts.

However, poor manufacturing data of China introduced a break for the rally Friday base metals.

The weakness of the dollar, which makes products cheaper for holders of other currencies, provided support. But figures showing Index (PMI Purchasing Managers China ') for June fell to 52 in may 50.9 dampened optimism earlier in the week.

The price of oil has been volatile since the international agency energy said it would release 60 million barrels of reserves for emergency on the market.

The price of crude oil Brent fell from $ 114 to $ 108 after the move, designed to dampen prices. It thereafter up to $112 and then fell $2 Friday at a little under $ 110 per barrel.

Analysts said the sharp fall in US stocks as major reasons why oil prices ended the week higher.

View the original article here

Protests forced the Bank of the Egypt and the closure of the market

Within a week, which saw investors nervous scramble gold, a hole from traditional bolt in times of uncertainty, Hisham Ramez also told Reuters Central Bank reserves were strong at $36bn, banks were liquids and any capital by foreign investor flight "hot money" would be short-lived.

The Egypt has endured for five days of often violent demonstrations with people on the streets, demanding the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak, which imposes a dusk to dawn curfew and ordered tanks in the streets to restore order.

Ramez said banks close on Sunday, adding: "it is just a precaution until banks are ready to start work on Monday."

He did not comment disorders.

Market stock of the Egypt, which dropped by 16pc in two days after the unrest erupted, is also closed Sunday. The Egyptian pound dropped to bottom of six years.

"It is obvious that the Central Bank was concerned an important Bank panics and foretelling on what they expect to happen in the coming days." It is a close to paralysis, said John Sfakianakis, an economist at the Saudi Fransi-Credit Agricole Bank.

Ramez said that while there might be a short-lived capital flight, the Central Bank and other banks Egyptians were in a position of strength and he was comfortable with reservations.

"All accounts are safe." Liquidity is here. Banks are liquid. Customer accounts are safe. Everything is in order. "We have no problem", he said.

"We're ready." "Our reserves are very strong," he said, adding that the Bank had not intervened, the currency market last week.

We're very comfortable"with reserves, he said.

Asked about the possible risk of capital flight, he said: "perhaps for a short period for foreign investors, for the"hot money", Yes. I think that things will soon be in order. »

View the original article here

Questor share Tip: Wm Morrison offers a fascinating history of growth

Supermarket chain focused on the Yorkshire Morrisons published the results of the exercise last week. Profit before tax in the year to January 30 increased 858 m £ 874 million pounds on sales of £ 16 5bn. Debt fell from 924 m £ 817 million to £.

The company has one of the strongest balance sheets in the sector. Almost 90pc of its properties are free, which means that it is much rich. Last week, the company said that it will return £ billion to shareholders and is committed to increasing its dividend at least 10pc for the next three years.

In addition to solid foundations, history of growth of the retailer seem persuasive. Morrisons supermarket is fourth in the United Kingdom, which is not a great place to be.

However, Dalton Philips, its CEO, energetic, is inciting the plans for growth on several fronts. Morrisons will launch a small chain of convenience stores along the M62 corridor and was purchasing dotcom businesses it seeks to move in internet shopping.

Last week she paid 32 million pounds sterling for a 10pc set in the site Web of New York FreshDirect, an eccentric but probably useful travel. He is also playing with addition of non-food product lines to its lines (including speaking them to George Davies, founder of the next, on the design of a line of clothing).

Remains 7 m UK households without easy access to a Morrisons, which means that there is great potential for new stores.

Morrisons trades on a 2012-2013 coefficient of 9.8 times. This is lower than its rivals. With a market capitalization of £ 7 5.3, it is second retailer listed in the United Kingdom after Tesco.

Surprisingly, it is useful as Marks & Spencer, Dixons and Ocado combined.

Paste the actions in your basket.

View the original article here

Prudential "spectacular" leads FTSE 100

A US Government report showing oil provides an increase in the last week and expectations that the OPEC countries are set to increase production to offset the loss of production in Libya, helped shares in the airline.

International Airlines Group (AIG), the company created from the merger of British Airways and Iberia, develop 4 to 232.6 p. Analysts said good results from Cathay Pacific has also acted as a positive indicator for the whole of the air transport sector.

While it may be good news for those of us Jet for fun in the Sun, he did not help oil producers. BP has fallen 8.75-485 p, as tullow Oil fell 47 percent to £ 14.13 to lead the losers of the FTSE 100.

Tullow fell after he did not meet the expectations of analysts despite an increase in 360pc in profits before tax declaration. The city was expecting profits of approximately 192 m $, but the company succeeded 152 m $.

Analysts also fear that Tullow is still awaiting final approval to start a project of $billion in Uganda. "We are at the stage now where all the main points have been agreed so we are just finalizing the documentation," said Chief Executive Aidan Heavey.

Phil Corbett, an analyst with RBS, said: "there is no precise timetable [to receive the approval of the Government of Uganda] which may be one of the reasons why the sharesfell." They were also disappointed on their results as well. »

Tobacco stocks were under pressure after the Government announced that it will force all retailers to keep cigarettes under the counter in April 2015.

british american tobacco, which makes cigarettes Dunhill and Lucky Strike, was second to bottom place in the FTSE 100, down 70½p at £ 24,36. The company is one of a string of companies to go ex-dividende on Wednesday.

"We are disappointed that Government did not properly into account the views of the tens of thousands of small retailers across the country who are concerned about the shop expensive refits, losing trade to large supermarkets and the black market."especially in a context of economic slowdown "said a spokesman of the bat.

However, Imperial tobacco, which collects a fifth of its revenue, to the United Kingdom saw its shares reach £ 19.78 66 p. The company, which Lambert & Butler, Embassy and John Player among its brands, had come under pressure earlier in the week when rumours of the hard-hitting proposals arrived to light.

Rolls-Royce WINS 19 p 619.5 after the aircraft engine manufacturer and Daimler, the German car manufacturer, announced joint plans to bid MD €3 (£ 2. 7bn) for the German manufacturer of engine and turbo Tognum.

Howard Wheeldon, a strategist at BCG partner, said: "Rolls-Royce is very rich at this time." "We wanted to see an acquisition and it is a logic".

Guy Brown, an Evo Securities analyst, said the agreement would be "further consolidate" Rolls position in the marine and energy markets.

Overall, the index FTSE 100 closed 37.46 points to 5,937.3. The FTSE 250 lost 13.32 points 11,730.2 points.

Restaurant Group was the highest place among the midcaps after the company behind the Frankie & Benny chains, Garfunkels and Chiquito reported increased 12pc year-round adjusted 56 m operating profits of £. It also pleased investors by announcing a rebound in the new year sale following disruption of snow in December.

John Beaumont, an analyst with Matrix Group, said: "we see the Group of decent restaurants as a quality with brands, well managed and, with the non-high street exhibition, it allows to avoid the fiercest competition. The shares closed up 26.3-306 p.

Yule catto was the biggest loser FTSE 250 after the rubber gloves manufacturer warned it's to be pressed by rising prices of raw materials, notably oil. James Tetly, Brewin Dolphin analyst, said: "the majority of the raw materials of Yule is in some way linked oil, and the recent escalation in the price of oil is therefore a concern".

The shares dropped 18.7 to 209 p despite the company, which was founded by Andrew Yule of Calcutta in 1863, better than expected profits of the reporting year. Profit before taxes reached £ 57. 8 m, compared to £ 7. 1 m in 2009.

Hargreaves lansdown has had a good last flourish in the FTSE 250 before his promotion to the index of trader in the quarterly reshuffle which comes into force Monday.

Shares of the company, founded and still 52pc owned by founders Peter Hargreaves and Stephen Lansdown, closed until 21 to 635 p after the strong demand of tracker Fund. Traders believe that trader trackers will be forced to buy all 9 m shares of the company closely.

ITV and wood Group, who are also promoted, has won 1 to 91 percent and lost 11½ to 655 p, respectively.

Bunzl, Alliance Trust and African Barrick Gold, societies relegated the bluechips in the midcaps, has acquired 10 to 734 p, 1.1 lost to 358 p and lost 12 to 535½p.

hansen Transmissions, up to 1.3-43 p, McBride, down from 0.7 to 140 p and Sportingbet, down 0.5 to 46.6 p p, are all to be relegated from the FTSE 250.

View the original article here