China Risks - Part 3

Investor Marc Faber said China’s economy will slow and possibly “crash” within a year as declines in stock and commodity prices signal the nation’s property bubble is set to burst.

The Shanghai Composite Index has failed to regain its 2009 high while industrial commodities and shares of Australian resource exporters are acting “heavy,” Faber said. The opening of the World Expo in Shanghai last week is “not a particularly good omen,” he said, citing a property bust and depression that followed the 1873 World Exhibition in Vienna.

“The market is telling you that something is not quite right,” Faber, the publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom report, said in a Bloomberg Television interview in Hong Kong today. “The Chinese economy is going to slow down regardless. It is more likely that we will even have a crash sometime in the next nine to 12 months.”

An index tracking Chinese stocks traded in Hong Kong dropped 1.8 percent today, the most in two weeks, after the central bank raised reserve requirements for the third time this year. The Shanghai Composite has slumped 12 percent this year, Asia’s worst performer, as policy makers seek to rein in a lending boom that’s spurred record gains in property prices. China’s markets are shut for a holiday today.

Copper touched a seven-week low and BHP Billiton Ltd., the world’s biggest mining company, fell the most since February on concern spending in the world’s third-largest economy will slow and after Australia boosted taxes on commodities producers. Rio Tinto Ltd., the third-largest, slid as much as 6 percent.

Chanos, Rogoff

Faber joins hedge fund manager Jim Chanos and Harvard University’s Kenneth Rogoff in warning of a crash in China.

China is “on a treadmill to hell” because it’s hooked on property development for driving growth, Chanos said in an interview last month. As much as 60 percent of the country’s gross domestic product relies on construction, he said. Rogoff said in February a debt-fueled bubble in China may trigger a regional recession within a decade.

The government has banned loans for third homes and raised mortgage rates and down-payment requirements for second-home purchases. Prices rose 11.7 percent across 70 cities in March from a year earlier, the most since data began in 2005.

The government has stopped short of raising interest rates to contain property prices. Within an hour of the central bank announcement on reserve ratios, Finance Minister Xie Xuren said that officials remained committed to expansionary policies to cement the nation’s recovery.

Stocks ‘Fully Priced’

The nation’s economy grew 11.9 percent in the first quarter, the fastest pace in almost three years. The government projects gross domestic product growth for the year of about 8 percent.

The clampdown on property speculation may prompt investors to turn to the nation’s stock market, Faber said. Still, shares are “fully priced” and Chinese investors may instead become “big buyers” of gold, he said.

BlackRock Inc. is among money managers reducing their holdings on Chinese stocks on expectations that economic growth has peaked. The BlackRock Emerging Markets Fund has widened its “underweight” position for China versus the MSCI Emerging Markets Index to about 7.5 percent from 4.6 percent at the end of March, the fund’s London-based co-manager Dan Tubbs said.

Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., China Construction Bank Corp. and Bank of China Ltd, the nation’s three largest banks, are trading near their lowest valuations on record as rising profits are eclipsed by concern bad loans will increase.

Local Governments

Citigroup Inc. warned in March that in a “worst case scenario,” the non-performing loans of local-government investment vehicles, used to channel money to stimulus projects, could swell to 2.4 trillion yuan by 2011.

Housing prices nationwide may fall as much as 20 percent in the second half of the year on government measures to curb speculation, BNP Paribas said April 23. Under a stress test conducted by the Shanghai branch of the China Banking Regulatory Commission in February, local banks’ ratio of delinquent mortgages would triple should home prices in the country’s commercial center decline 10 percent.

Shanghai is projecting as many as 70 million visitors to the $44 billion World Expo, more than 10 times the number who traveled to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. More than 433,000 people visited the 5.3 square-kilometer (3.3 square-mile) park on its first weekend.

China's Risks - Part 2

Deleted - Biased reporting

A Series on China's Risks - Part 1

Taking China's risks seriously
By Gerard Lyons (China Daily)
Updated: 2011-02-15 07:55

A static watch gives the right time twice a day. But it is of no use for the rest of the time. This fact is worth keeping in mind when looking at China's economy this year. For much of the last decade some people have predicted imminent doom and gloom for China. But their predictions are like reading the time by a static watch.

China has continued to grow from strength to strength. Its economy has soared. Its influence has grown. And all this has benefited Asia as well as the rest of the world.

The question then is: Is 2011 the year when problems in China will emerge? Is this the time when the static watch is right?

China's risks are different from those of the West, where debt problems persist. Across Asia, inflationary pressures are rising and monetary policy needs to be tightened.

The challenge for China is that in recent years it has tied itself too closely to the United States' monetary policy. In doing so, it has kept interest rates lower than necessary and its currency weak. Resolving these issues is vital and China has already started doing that.

The US and China both need to set monetary and fiscal policies to suit their domestic needs. The US is doing this. Facing deflation, the Federal Reserve (Fed) introduced a second round of quantitative easing, or QE2, last year despite the criticism it evoked from other countries. The US administration has followed it up with a huge fiscal boost. The expected result: The US economy will grow strongly this year, particularly in the first half.

Although the stimulus has reignited fears over the US government's debt, the reality is that the US had no choice. A staggering 43 million Americans get food stamps today, a clear indication of the scale of poverty. It is possible that the US policy will work in terms of ensuring growth, if not in solving all the problems of the country.

All of this highlights the need for Asian policymakers to follow the US - not by copying US policy, but by setting monetary policy to suit their domestic needs. The challenge is especially daunting for China.

The longer it takes China to tighten its policy, the greater its eventual problem. The Chinese authorities imposed a loan quota last year. But concerns over growth prevented them from making the quota tight enough. This year, however, there is no reason to hold back because growth looks set to be strong, boosted by the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015).

China's policy tools, no doubt, worked well during the financial global crisis, but there are risks now.

First, it has become harder to control the size of China's still fast-growing economy and its private sector.

Second, there is a need to rebalance the economy from investment to consumption. And although investment always sounds good, it is now so high in relation to GDP that not all of it may be worthwhile.

Third, China's vulnerability arises from its underdeveloped financial sector. Despite rising incomes, the options for investing household savings are limited: low interest-bearing bank accounts; equities, where governance concerns persist; or real estate where prices are already sky-high. This makes the economy prone to bubbles.

China needs to avoid the lethal combination of cheap money, one-way expectations and leverage. A few years ago the talk in the US was about the "Greenspan put": Interest rates kept low to support the equity market. China can't fall into the same trap with its property market.

All this raises the risk of a near-term setback in China. Rising food prices and wages add to the sense of urgency.

The authorities do not want to derail the economy. But any setback that makes growth suffer will have global ramifications, hitting commodities and trade, among others. Of course, if growth suffers a setback, the static watch doomsayers will claim they were right and there would probably be much speculation over the existence of bubble in China's economy. That would be wrong.

Any slowdown in growth would probably be temporary - a strong sign that the business cycle exists in China. Besides, while the economic trend is up, there will be setbacks on the way. [ I disagree]

These factors will provide a buying opportunity, not a reason to doubt the economy's rise. China's growth is for real. It is not a bubble economy. It is an economy prone to bubbles. And there is a big difference between the two. [ I disagree]

In recent years, markets have discounted the bad news in the US and finally taken seriously the flaws in the eurozone. The near-term risks facing China, like many countries in Asia, need to be taken seriously. Yet they also need to be kept in context, because they are unlikely to alter the longer-term positive outlook for growth.

According to Standard Chartered Bank, the world economy is in a super-cycle: a sustained period of high economic growth lasting a generation or more. The global economy is twice the size it was a decade ago and has already reached above its pre-recession peak.

A central feature of this super-cycle is the shift in the balance of economic and financial power from the West to the East, led by China. This was highlighted at the recent summit between President Hu Jintao and US President Barack Obama in Washington.

Soon after becoming president, Obama changed the relationship with China. Under his predecessor, George W. Bush, the US had a Strategic Economic Dialogue with China. Obama turned it into a Strategic and Economic Dialogue. This was significant. It emphasized the twin aspects of the relationship. But because the US recovery has been disappointing, the focus has been less on the "strategic" and more on the "economic" dimension of their relationship. Although the US has a larger economy, the relationship increasingly resembles one of equals.

The economic importance of China for the world economy has not been greater in modern times. It is vital for the world, Asia and China that Beijing addresses its inflation challenges now. This is no time to wait.

The author is chief economist and group head of global research at Standard Chartered Bank.

(China Daily 02/15/2011 page9)

Copyright By chinadaily.com.cn. All rights reserved

Outside the borders of any successful city, the wolves watch if lambs would come out. Shenzhen, Johor Bahru, Bronx



Feb 27, 2011
JB kidnap: Man pays $9m to free family
Johor Baru - A businessman from Singapore was forced to pay a ransom of $9 million to secure the release of his wife and daughter after they were kidnapped in Johor Baru, The Star newspaper reported yesterday.

The amount was described by the daily as Malaysia's largest ransom payment in recent years. It was paid after the businessman's family members were held for a few days.

The millionaire has businesses in real estate and gambling, the daily reported. It is unclear if he is a Singaporean or a foreign citizen based in Singapore.

Calls to the Johor police by The Sunday Times were not answered yesterday.

The nightmare for the family began when the businessman's wife, daughter and maid were driving in JB towards Singapore recently.

They were forced off the road by another vehicle in Permas Jaya, a township in eastern JB. The kidnappers took over the wheel of their vehicle and drove off with them to an undisclosed location.

Sources in Malaysia's police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur said the kidnappers then sent an MMS (multimedia messaging service) of the three victims being held at gunpoint to the businessman. They demanded a ransom of $50 million.

The businessman was given a warning not to alert the police and to pay up if he wanted his family back, The Star said.

It was learnt that after negotiations, the kidnappers agreed to reduce the ransom to $9 million, to be paid in large denominations of Singapore dollars.

The businessman was apparently instructed to drive to a plantation in Kulaijaya to drop off the money, the daily said. Kulaijaya is located just north of Johor's Senai Airport.

Sources said the victims were released at least two days after the ransom was paid. They were blindfolded and gagged during their ordeal that lasted for several days. They were eventually dropped off, unharmed, around Danga Bay in JB.

The police have launched a manhunt for the kidnappers, who are believed to be professionals, and have contacted Interpol for help as the criminals might have fled Malaysia.

The Star/Asia News Network

(BN) Buffett Says His `Trigger Finger Itchy' to Buy, With $38 Billion in Wallet

I used to admire him, but far less now. If u think of it in all his 80 yrs, he has never created any value. Coke, solomon, Burlington would all be doing fine without him. All he knows (and very well) are takeovers. He has never BUILT or CREATED anything.  His frugal life means despite his wealth he spends little and contributes hardly anything to the multiplier.  

No, that isn't how I want to live life. 

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Buffett Says Trigger Finger Itchy for Berkshire Takeovers

Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Warren Buffett said his "trigger finger is itchy" for takeovers after cash holdings at his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. climbed to $38.2 billion.

"Our elephant gun has been reloaded," Buffett said today in his annual letter to shareholders. Berkshire needs "good performance from our current businesses and more major acquisitions," after the company reported a 43 percent gain in fourth-quarter profit on derivative bets and earnings from its Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad, he said.

Buffett is seeking takeovers after Berkshire's $13 billion 2010 profit increased the firm's resources and near record-low interest rates limited the returns available in fixed-income markets. Buffett completed his biggest takeover, the $26.5 billion Burlington purchase, last February. Since then he's said he'll consider deals outside the U.S.

"He reloads at a rapid rate," said Thomas Russo, a partner at Gardner Russo & Gardner, who has about 10 percent of his $4 billion under management invested in Omaha, Nebraska- based Berkshire. "The hunt for new investments, and wholly owned ones, I don't think slows down whatsoever."

Berkshire's fourth-quarter net income rose to $4.38 billion from $3.06 billion. The profit for full-year 2010 was up 61 percent from 2009. Berkshire has advanced 5.9 percent on the New York Stock Exchange this year, beating the 4.9 percent advance in the Standard & Poor's 500 Index.

Investing Approach

Buffett, 80, outlines his investing approach in his letters and opines about economics, executive compensation and government policies. His annual communications with shareholders have won him a following of professional money managers and the moniker "the Oracle of Omaha."

"Commentators today often talk of 'great uncertainty,' Buffett wrote. "Don't let that reality spook you. Throughout my lifetime, politicians and pundits have constantly moaned about terrifying problems facing America. Yet our citizens now live an astonishing six times better than when I was born."

Buffett, who refers to Berkshire's stockholders as "owners," shuns quarterly conference calls with analysts and institutional investors, preferring to communicate by sending the letter and taking questions at the company's annual meeting.

Acquisitions may help Buffett increase earnings for Berkshire as investment income at the company's insurance subsidiaries slide. Investment income produced by units including reinsurer General Re and car coverage specialist Geico fell 5.9 percent in 2010 to $5.19 billion. Buffett said that may decline further in 2011 as investments he made during the credit crisis mature.

Perils of Leverage

Buffett warned in the letter about the perils of leverage and how his grandfather Ernest, a grocer, created a rainy day fund of $1,000 for his son Fred and similar funds for his other children. Buffett likened the savings to the minimum $20 billion in cash Berkshire customarily keeps on hand.

"By being so cautious in respect to leverage, we penalize our returns by a minor amount," Buffett wrote. "Having loads of liquidity, though, lets us sleep well. Moreover, during the episodes of financial chaos that occasionally erupt in our economy, we will be equipped both financially and emotionally to play offense while others scramble for survival."

Marmon Stake

Buffett said Berkshire will pay about $1.5 billion to increase its stake this year in Marmon, a unit of about 130 businesses, to 80 percent.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and General Electric Co. will probably return the $8 billion that Buffett invested in 2008 for securities paying 10 percent, Buffett said. Yields in fixed- income markets have fallen in the last two years, and Buffett, Berkshire's chairman and chief executive officer, said in October that investors buying bonds after the decline were "making a mistake."

The yield on two-year U.S. Treasuries fell to a record low of 31 basis points on Nov. 4 before rising to 71 basis points yesterday. The two-year note's average yield over the last 10 years was more than 250 basis points.

To contact the reporter on this story: Andrew Frye in New York at afrye@bloomberg.net .

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Kraut at dkraut2@bloomberg.net .

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S'pore doctor overcharged Bruneian patient: report

so never get the impression that when a surgeon smiles, she really cares for you. She is really smiling for the money you are giving to her.

Wayne's Prediction:
Having been put out on the front pages of ST, it is clear to me how this will conclude: Susan Lim will be sanctioned for a period of 5 years for overcharging and issuing false invoices. IRAS will find her guilty of tax evasion. Game's over, she put her hand, for too long, in the cookie jar....



S'pore doctor overcharged Bruneian patient: report

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN - THE deceased younger sister of Her Majesty Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Hjh Saleha was the victim of overcharging by prominent Singaporean surgeon Dr Susan Lim, an article from Singaporean daily Straits Times reported.

According to the February 24 issue of the newspaper, Dr Lim was treating the late Pengiran Anak Hajah Damit since 2001 up till her death in 2007, which was caused by breast cancer.

The report said a specialist, who was not named, treated the deceased and sent a bill for $400, which Dr Lim bumped up to $211,000, when she billed the Brunei High Commission. In another instance, another unnamed doctor charged $500 but Dr Lim once again raised the price to $93,500.


Dr Lim also charged the patient for cancelling two conferences, on top of treatment fees, with one bill costing $78,000 and the other up to $180,000.

She also charged between $35,000 and $45,000 a day when her employees accompanied the patient for radiotherapy sessions as the hospital, the newspaper reported.

When the patient was in intensive care for five days in May 2007, she was attended to by the doctors and nurses and for that, Dr Lim charged $450,000 for the first day and $250,000 for the other four days for "monitoring services", according to Straits Times.

The Brunei High Commission, which had by then noticed the irregularities in charges, alerted the Ministry of Health (MoH) and expressed concern over costly medical fees in July 2007.

In the same month, two representatives from MoH came to Singapore and spoke to Dr Lim Cheok Peng, the chief executive of Parkway Holdings, which runs medical centres where Dr Lim holds clinic.

These were allegations that were revealed in Singapore's High Court by Senior Counsel Alvin Yeo, the lawyer representing the Singapore Medical Council (SMC), according to the newspaper.

Yeo also said that the third party specialists who treated the patient would send their bills to Dr Lim and she would then mark up the bills when she sent her invoices to the Brunei High Commission.

In the hearing, Yeo also said that he was not asking the High Court to conclude that Dr Lim was overcharging, but added that a disciplinary committee should look into the matter.

Meanwhile, in August 2007, Dr Lim wrote to MoH to disregard the bills that were for services provided by other doctors and gave a 25 per cent discount on her own bills.

Almost three weeks later, she wrote to MoH apologising for the "inadvertent mistakes" made by her office.

The ministry then requested that Singapore's Health Ministry to intervene, stating that the charges were "unacceptable".

Three months later, Dr Lim once again wrote to MoH, and offered to waive her fees from January to June of 2007, as a gesture of goodwill and suggest that they pay up to $3.25 million only.

Originally, after the patient died, Dr Lim queried the rest of the 2007 bill, which came up to a whopping $24.8 million.

Senior Counsel Lee Eng Beng, Dr Lim's lawyer, told the court that his client had informed the deceased earlier on in their relationship that "the close care and attention she needed" would cost $100,000 to $200,00 a day.

The deceased had also assured Dr Lim that charges were not a problem and quoted that the "Istana is paying."

By January 2009, Dr Lim and her husband went to Brunei and offered to waive all her fees and third party bills if the ministry was prepared to issue a "letter of good standing".

The letter would have stated that the Brunei government would not pursue the matter any further and take no issue with her bills.

Her request was not entertained and claimed that she had a "fee agreement" with her patient.

The lawyer was further quoted in Straits Times as saying that an amendment to a regulation and its subsequent revocation appeared timed to target his client.

The amendment freed the legal adviser of the Singapore Medical Council of the obligation to inform the other party of any advice he gave to a disciplinary committee.

The hearing continues on February 28.

Arabs don't believe revolutions will spawn new dictators

Yes, there will be change, but haven't all good dictators been loved by their people before?

Did not Gaddafi/Mubarak have their countries interests at heart when they came into power?



Arabs don't believe revolutions will spawn new dictators

Tuesday, February 22 2011



In their first free political debate in nearly three decades, Tunisians have rejected the idea that a new set of strongmen might emerge from the uprisings, rocking the Arab world.

At a special session of the Doha Debates an audience of mainly students and young professionals voted 74 to 26 percent against the motion:" This House believes that Arab revolutions will just produce different dictators".

But one student warned, "What we have inherited from the old regime is like cancer… it needs radical surgery to remove it."

Another won applause when he argued passionately that "Tunisians had the quickest revolution in the world and we will have the quickest democracy too."

The debate took place in the heart of the old city in Tunis, less than a mile from where thousands of demonstrators overthrew President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14.

Speaking in favor of the motion were Rauoudha Ben Othman, Professor of Linguistics at the University of Tunis, and Kamal Ben Younis, Executive Director of the International Studies Association and Institute Tunisia.

Ben Othman warned that a new dictator could emerge even after the country's first free elections in nearly two decades, scheduled for this summer. She blamed a lack of accountability, transparency and a deep-rooted culture that favors loyalty to individuals, whoever they are.

Ben Younis, a career journalist, was equally downbeat about the political future in Tunisia and Egypt, where the ruling military council has promised elections in six months, following the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak.

He said "thousands" of dictators remained inside the security and political institutions in both capitals. "Only their heads have been cut off, not their bodies." In addition, he warned that Islamists, banned for years, could capitalize on poor and marginalized populations, to secure gains through the ballot box.

Speaking against the motion were Shibley Telhami, professor for peace and development at the University of Maryland , and Fares Mabrouk, founder of the Arab Policy Institute, a new think tank supporting democratic change in the Middle East and North Africa.

Dr. Telhami, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, acknowledged there were risks in every transition to democracy. But he said an unprecedented sense of popular empowerment, bolstered by the internet, meant Arab governments could no longer ignore public opinion.

"No one can ever put the genie back in the bottle… dictatorships are over… there is an indigenous momentum that is irreversible."

Mabrouk, the youngest speaker on the panel, said Tunisians had to come up with a new political model, combining human rights, dignity, and the rule of law.

"No one wants chaos. Our new model is not Iran, or Saudi Arabia. Even conservatives in our society are looking at Turkey as a possibility."

(BN) Madoff Trustee May Do What Bernie Never Did : Give Victims Real Profit

What, did God bless Madoff investors but not Lehman, Citi investors? Is this happening in the land where harvard, Stanford, MIT teach risk return?

Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.

Madoff Trustee May Do What Bernie Didn't: Give Victims Profit

Feb. 11 (Bloomberg) -- After Bernard Madoff was exposed as the biggest Ponzi schemer in U.S. history, Irving Picard was named to liquidate the con man's bankrupt firm and recover some of the $65 billion Madoff told customers was in their accounts. Two years later, Picard is about halfway to recovering the $20 billion customers invested before Madoff added phony profits.

As Picard pursues hundreds of lawsuits seeking $100 billion from banks and others he claims profited from the fraud, he may even be able to give some victims something Madoff never managed to deliver -- a legitimate return on their investment, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Feb. 14 issue.

His strategy is simple. "We're looking to collect as much money as possible," Picard said outside court Jan. 13, after a bankruptcy judge approved a $7.2 billion settlement Picard and U.S. prosecutors reached with the estate of Jeffry Picower, a Madoff investor who died in 2009.

The Picower settlement --- the biggest of its kind --- underscores the tricky position Picard is in: To return money to Madoff's victims, he has to first take it from somebody else. Picard's choices about whom to pay and whom to sue have led some victims to feel wronged again.

"He's doing what the receiver is supposed to be doing," says John V. Donnelly III, a partner with the law firm Cozen & O'Connor in Philadelphia, who represented an investor in recovering assets frozen in R. Allen Stanford's alleged $7 billion fraud.

Profiting From Fraud

Picard has made several decisions that paid off, including seeking additional funds from investors he claimed should have known they were profiting from a fraud, says Sandra Mayerson, a bankruptcy lawyer with the firm Squire Sanders in New York.

"He's consistently taken the most aggressive position possible," she says, "and that's been very successful in recovering money for the estate."

Just days after Madoff told authorities his financial empire was "one big lie" in December 2008, the Securities Investor Protection Corp. named Picard, 69, trustee of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, making him responsible for unwinding the fraud. Madoff, 72, is serving a 150-year sentence in federal prison in North Carolina.

When Picard was named Madoff trustee, the SIPC said he had liquidated more brokerage firms as trustee than anyone. A week later he announced he was leaving his law firm, Newark, New Jersey-based Gibbons PC, for the New York office of Baker Hostetler LLP, a 650-lawyer firm based in Cleveland.

Soul Mate

At Baker Hostetler, he joined David Sheehan, 67, a friend and former law partner, who serves as his chief lawyer in the Madoff case. In December, Picard filed a $19.6 billion suit against Bank Medici and its founder, Sonja Kohn, whom Picard called Madoff's "criminal soul mate," along with Bank Austria AG and UniCredit SpA. Kohn, who hasn't been criminally charged, has said she was a victim of the fraud.

In complaints unsealed this month, Picard claimed Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz, owners of the New York Mets, and JPMorgan Chase & Co. had all the information they needed to discover Madoff was running a vast fraud and looked the other way instead of taking steps to expose him. The suits seek $6.4 billion from JPMorgan and as much as $1 billion from Wilpon and Katz.

JPMorgan wasn't aware of Madoff's fraud, said Jennifer Zuccarelli, a spokeswoman for the bank, in a statement. The activity in Madoff's account was consistent with a legitimate investment advisory business, she says.

'Strong-Arm Effort'

Wilpon and Katz said Picard's suit against them is "an outrageous strong-arm effort to try to force a settlement by threatening to ruin our reputations and businesses." They called the trustee's claims "abusive, unfair and untrue."

If Picard and Wilpon and Katz negotiate a settlement, they might model it on a deal made in connection with Bayou Group's Ponzi scheme, uncovered in 2005. In that instance, a partnership tied to Wilpon gave up $12.9 million, which represented all profits it made plus 44 percent of the principal, after a judge ruled that Bayou investors could be pursued if they had seen "red flags" that should have alerted them to the fraud.

The case against the Wilpon and Katz "will strike fear into the hearts of a lot of people, because if they should have known, then a lot of people should have known," Mayerson says.

Not all of Picard's targets are banks or wealthy investors. Helen Chaitman, a New York City lawyer who was a Madoff investor, says she represents many people of relatively modest means whom Picard sued in the weeks leading up to the Dec. 11 deadline for him to file claims. The date, which was the two- year anniversary of Madoff's arrest, was also the day his son, Mark Madoff, committed suicide by hanging himself in his Manhattan apartment.

Net Winners

Some individuals, known as "net winners," withdrew more from their Madoff accounts than they invested. Picard is suing hundreds of them to recover the fictitious profits he frequently refers to in legal papers as "other people's money."

Most of those people withdrew and spent the money with no idea they were living off the proceeds of a fraud, says Chaitman, and many "are frantic" and have no way to pay, she says. Even clients with approved claims, who are likely to receive money from Picard, have been forced to sell their claims to investors for 50 cents to 65 cents on the dollar because they need cash, she says.

Picard says he will use his discretion not to pursue claims against Madoff victims who can show that paying back their profits from the fraud would cause financial hardship, according to a December press conference and his official website. As of Feb. 4, Picard had allowed claims made by 2,401 former Madoff investors and denied more than 13,471, according to his website.

Fees

So far the bankruptcy court has approved $119 million in legal fees for Picard and Baker & Hostetler. The money is to be paid by the SIPC, Picard has said in court papers. Work on the Madoff case accounted for at least $58 million of the firm's estimated $386 million revenue in 2010, according to The American Lawyer.

Chaitman, who has frequently opposed Picard in the Madoff case, credits him with uncovering details of Madoff's fraud, including the identities of many alleged accomplices that haven't come out through criminal prosecutions or an investigation by the SEC. "Thank God for Picard," she says.

To contact the reporter on this story: Bob Van Voris in New York federal court at rvanvoris@bloomberg.net .

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David E. Rovella at drvoella@bloomberg.net .

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(BN) Merkel Asks Why No Women on Boards as Ackermann Prompts Howls

politicians fail with F grade

 The right answer is: the best person for the job, whether man woman or gay, colored or white, handicapped or blind, young or in 90s..

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Merkel Seeks Women on Boards as Ackermann Draws Howls

Feb. 11 (Bloomberg) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel has filled one third of her ministerial positions with women. Deutsche Bank AG Chief Executive Officer Josef Ackermann doesn't have a single female on the 12-member group executive committee that oversees the nation's biggest bank.

Fresh from a scrap over making bond investors help cover the costs of bailing out European banks, Ackermann angered Merkel's ministers by saying last week that his board "will be more colorful and prettier" with a woman. Consumer minister Ilse Aigner responded by telling Handelsblatt newspaper that "if it's more color or beauty you want, you should go to a flower garden or a museum."

At Germany's 30 largest companies, just four of 186 management board positions are held by women, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Barbara Kux, 56, Siemens AG's head of global supply chain management, became the first woman in 12 years to sit on a board when she was appointed in 2008. The lack of women in top management is a "scandal," Merkel said at a Feb. 8 conference in Berlin.

"We should do much better than that," said Barbara Bierach, author of the 2002 book "Das Daemliche Geschlecht," or The Stupid Sex, which attempts to explain why there are few female managers in Germany.

The nation lags behind in Europe, where some governments have set quotas to improve the balance of female representation in corporate management. Norway was first, in 2003, to enforce female minimums. Spain followed in 2007 with its own legislation, and France plans to impose a 20 percent quota by 2012 and 40 percent by 2016 for its 2,500 biggest companies.

Waiting and Watching

Merkel, who has opposed quotas, said at the Berlin conference that she'll give German companies "one last chance" to confront the issue before her government enforces change.

At the European Union's biggest publicly traded companies, one of every 10 board members is a woman, the European Commission said in a gender equality report published last March. In Norway, 42 percent of board members at the country's largest companies are women.

Women account for about 12 percent of board members at France's benchmark CAC 40 Index companies, according to a study published last October by Ernst & Young and France Proxy. By contrast, only 3.2 percent of women hold management board positions at Germany's 200 biggest companies, according to a Jan. 18 study by the Berlin-based DIW economic institute. The proportion is 2.9 percent at the country's largest banks, up just half a percentage point since 2006, the report said.

Euro Peripherals

"The problem is that in certain areas, like banks and insurers, they like to recruit terribly nice young ladies," said Sybille Busch, who has run an executive consulting firm in Hamburg since the mid-1980s. "If you recruit lambs, they stay lambs, and you can't make wolves out of them."

Merkel, 56, and Ackermann, 63, have disagreed publicly over how to fix the sovereign-debt crisis that has already led to the financial rescues of Greece and Ireland. Merkel has called on bond investors to shoulder the cost of future sovereign bailouts, prompting Ackermann in November to say the chancellor's remarks were roiling markets and raising borrowing costs.

German lenders hold more than 112 billion euros ($152 billion) of debt issued by the governments of Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Italy, according to Bloomberg data.

The spat over how to save peripheral Europe comes less than three years since Merkel and Ackermann worked together to help stave off the collapse of commercial-property lender Hypo Real Estate Holding AG in what would have been the country's biggest bank failure since 1931.

Ackermann Initiative

Ackermann started a campaign two years ago to promote women at Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank, according to company spokesman Christoph Blumenthal. Eileen Taylor, the bank's global head of diversity, said in an e-mail that Ackermann's support has boosted diversity programs at the company.

"Joe knows that diversity is a business imperative and that diverse teams are smarter teams and lead to stronger business results," Taylor wrote in the e-mail.

Deutsche Bank didn't have a woman executive to send to the World Economic Forum conference in Davos last month, even after organizers offered the company an extra slot. Ackermann's "prettier" comment was made Feb. 3 after the bank reported 2010 earnings. He also said during the presentation that "it's unbelievably important that we succeed in bringing more women into management positions."

Deutsche Bank

Ellen Ruth Schneider-Lenne was a member of Deutsche Bank's management board from 1988 until her death in 1996. Schneider- Lenne, who was responsible for risk, also was the first female to become a top executive at a major German bank.

About 44 percent of Deutsche Bank's employees are women, and 16 percent hold managing director or director positions, according to Deutsche Bank's latest figures.

Ackermann initiated a program entitled Atlas, which selects 20 women each year from Deutsche Bank's business units and geographical regions "to groom suitable candidates for the bank's top management," the company said in its 2009 corporate sustainability report.

Merkel has rejected calls by her labor minister, Ursula von der Leyen, to impose a 30 percent quota, saying German companies should do more to promote women from within. Family minister Kristina Schroeder said she would force companies above a certain size to set and publish quotas for women on management and supervisory boards as a first step.

Germany's half-day school system and its affluence relative to other countries make it difficult for women to juggle motherhood and a career, and mean it's "much easier to stay at home," Bierach said in a telephone interview from Sydney where she now lives.

DAX 30

Deutsche Telekom AG introduced a quota a year ago for women in management positions, becoming the first DAX 30 company to do so. The former German telecommunications monopoly, based in Bonn, aims to increase the proportion of women in upper and mid-level executive posts to 30 percent by the end of 2015, it said in a March 15 statement.

Siemens, based in Munich, has two female executives on its eight-member board. Software company SAP AG and power company E.ON AG each have one. Stuttgart-based Daimler AG plans to appoint constitutional judge Christine Hohmann-Dennhardt to its management board to head compliance as early as next week, according to people familiar with the situation.

Merck KGaA in Darmstadt said yesterday it will increase the proportion of women in management to as much as 30 percent by 2016 from 22 percent.

Raven Mother

Female leadership is more common among family-owned German enterprises, where women run 25 percent of the companies, a report by the Bonn-based Intes Academy for Family-Owned Companies said.

German women "who dare to have a career" are often criticized by their peers, said Bierach, the author of the Stupid Sex. The German term "Rabenmutter," or raven mother, is a derogative word used to describe women who leave the nest to go to work. There is no male equivalent. The Nazi regime used to award a Mothers Cross as part of Adolf Hitler's plan to encourage Aryan population growth.

"There's a terrible legacy from the Nazi period," Bierach said. "It's a deep-seated culture problem. You're a raven mother if you don't make the spaghetti yourself."

Germany has slipped to 13th place in the World Economic Forum's latest Global Gender Gap report, which ranks 134 countries on 14 measures of treatment of and opportunities for men and women, published in October. It ranked sixth in 2006.

Iceland had the highest score last year, while the U.S. made the top 20 for the first time, at 19th place. Yemen was in last place.

To contact the reporter on this story: Angela Cullen in Frankfurt at acullen8@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Tim Quinson at tquinson@bloomberg.net

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(BN) Groupon Says It Plans to Expand Its Online Coupon Service to China 'Soon'

A bit late. China had groupon equivalents years ago. 

Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.

Groupon Says Will Start Service in China 'Very Soon'

Feb. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Groupon Inc., owner of the biggest coupon website, will "very soon" start service in China through a joint venture, Danny Yeung, chief executive officer of Groupon's Hong Kong unit, said.

The Chicago-based company has already hired about 120 employees in China, and plans to expand the workforce to about 1,000 in three months, Yeung said at a briefing in the city today. He declined to name the partner for the venture or specify when the company will start its service in China.

Groupon, which rejected a $6 billion takeover bid from Google Inc. in December, aims to expand its online sales of discount vouchers for restaurants, spas and other goods and services to China, the world's fastest-growing major economy. The electronic-commerce company faces competition from Chinese operators including Lashou.com and Meituan.com.

"We want to dominate the market in China," said Yeung, who joined Groupon after the U.S. company last year bought uBuyiBuy.com, where he was chief executive officer, as part of its expansion in Asia.

Groupon said last month it would use the $950 million raised from a round of financing to expand its website and buy back shares. The company boosted its subscriber base in the past year to 50 million worldwide from 2 million in the U.S. by buying rivals in other markets.

Groupon agreed to set up a venture with Tencent Holdings Ltd. to expand in China, Donews.com, a Chinese-language technology news website, reported on Jan. 13, citing people it didn't identify. Yeung declined to comment today on the report. Catherine Chan, a spokeswoman at Tencent, China's biggest Internet company, declined to comment on the report at the time.

Yeung said he will have a role in setting up the China operations. The business in China will be overseen by an existing Groupon executive, he said, declining to elaborate.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Lee in Hong Kong at wlee37@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Young-Sam Cho at ycho2@bloomberg.net

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Arab world is shaken - Obama can stir the pot

Yes, the naivety and folly of youth. Sure, the youth take their future in their hands, and the old make way for the new, as always. But nothing will change, neither the new president, nor the people.


THERE are many like Ahmed Mohammed, a 26-year-old surgeon, who have spent the last week lining up against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. 'People are saying we may get killed . . . In the future, they will say these people made history,' The New York Times quoted him as saying.

(BN) China Will Face Crisis Within 5 Years, 45% of Investors in Global Poll Say

How could a bubble come when every one is watching it?

Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.

China Will Face Crisis Within 5 Years, Investors Say

Jan. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Global investors are bracing for the end of China's relentless economic growth, with 45 percent saying they expect a financial crisis there within five years.

An additional 40 percent anticipate a Chinese crisis after 2016, according to a quarterly poll of 1,000 Bloomberg customers who are investors, traders or analysts. Only 7 percent are confident China will indefinitely escape turmoil.

"There is no doubt that China is in the midst of a speculative credit-driven bubble that cannot be sustained," says Stanislav Panis, a currency strategist at TRIM Broker in Bratislava, Slovakia, and a participant in the Bloomberg Global Poll, which was conducted Jan. 21-24. Panis likens the expected fallout to the aftermath of the U.S. subprime-mortgage meltdown.

On Jan. 20, China's National Bureau of Statistics reported that the economy grew 10.3 percent in 2010, the fastest pace in three years and up from 9.2 percent a year earlier. Gross domestic product rose to 39.8 trillion yuan ($6 trillion).

Any Chinese financial emergency would reverberate around the world. The total value of the country's exports and imports last year was $3 trillion, with about 13 percent of that trade between China and the U.S. As of November, China also held $896 billion in U.S. Treasuries. The trade and investment links between the two nations were underlined with Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit last week to the White House for meetings with President Barack Obama.

Worried Neighbors

Investors' concern contrasts with Chinese government statements on the outlook for the economy, which is poised to overtake Japan as the world's second biggest. The Politburo said last month that the nation had a "sound base" for stable and fast growth in 2011 after consolidating its recovery.

In an interview in Davos yesterday, Li Daokui, an academic adviser to the central bank, said he doesn't expect any "hard landing" and the economy may expand about 9.5 percent this year.

Fifty-three percent of poll respondents say they believe China is a bubble, while 42 percent disagree. China's neighbors are the most concerned: 60 percent of Asia-based respondents identified a bubble in the world's second-largest economy.

Worries center on the danger that investment, which surged almost 24 percent in 2010, may be producing empty apartment blocks and unneeded factories.

'Major Dislocations'

Jonathan Sadowsky, chief investment officer at Vaca Creek Asset Management in San Francisco, says he is "exceptionally worried" that the Chinese would eventually face "major dislocations within their banking system."

Chinese authorities also raised interest rates twice in the fourth quarter in a bid to choke off inflation, a sensitive political issue since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, which followed uncontrolled price increases. Food prices last year rose 7.2 percent, according to the National Bureau of statistics.

Haroon Shaikh, an investment manager with GAM London Ltd., cited "rapid wage inflation" and soaring property prices as the financial markets' chief concern.

Li said rising real estate prices are the "biggest danger" to the Chinese economy, in an interview with Bloomberg News in Davos, Switzerland. The People's Bank of China should "gradually increase rates in the first and second quarter," Li said.

Since peaking on Nov. 8 at 3159.51, the Shanghai Composite Index has slid about 14 percent. "The market is right to be nervous," Michael Pettis, a finance professor at Peking University's Guanghua School of Management, wrote in his Jan. 26 financial newsletter.

Worst Market

Some investors remain unbowed. "China can continue to grow over 10 percent for the better part of the next five years," said Ardavan Mobasheri, head of AIG Global Economics in New York.

Still, the poll found other signs of mounting investor caution toward China, where three decades of market-oriented reform has obliterated a legacy of Maoist impoverishment.

Asked to identify the worst market for investment over the next year, 20 percent of poll respondents say China versus 11 percent in the last poll in November. Almost half of those polled -- 48 percent -- say a significant slowing of growth was very or fairly likely within the next two years.

Michael Martin, senior vice president of MDAvantage Insurance Company of New Jersey, says the Chinese government "has executed brilliantly" in managing the economy. The government's capacity will be tested as the economy grows and becomes more complex, he says.

Export Reliance

Chinese officials have said they intend to wean the economy off its reliance upon exports, the source of trade tensions with the U.S., in favor of greater domestic consumption.

Peter Hurst, a broker with Sterling International Brokers in London, says he's concerned China will struggle to complete the transition.

"Yes, there are 1.3 billion people in China," he says. "But are they rich enough to become consumers?"

If China stumbles, the global economy will feel the impact, says Suresh Raghavan, chief investment officer for Raghavan Financial Inc. in Houston. "If the PBOC is successful at lowering growth rates to 7 percent, it will still feel like a recession for a lot of people around the world," he says.

Political Stability

Most poll respondents remained confident of the Chinese government's ability to fend off demands for greater political liberalization. Just 1 percent expect a political crisis within the next year and 27 percent expect one within the next two to five years.

And by a 60 percent to 30 percent margin, those surveyed say President Hu's policies were favorable to investors. Hu tied with German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the poll's top spot.

"The Chinese politicians are able to act on all necessary issues. That gives them a huge advantage compared to the Western economies," says Henry Littig, who heads his own global investment firm in Cologne, Germany.

The poll was conducted by Des Moines, Iowa-based Selzer & Co. for Bloomberg and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

To contact the reporter on this story: David Lynch in Washington at dlynch27@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Christopher Wellisz at cwellisz@bloomberg.net

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Muslim bodies irked by MM's remarks

this is a plaintive call for a certain section of community to move up together with the rest and not get left behind. True, those are neither new nor hard truths.

However, we all know it won't happen. its writing in the DNA of some of the people who happen to practice Islam, and its nothing to do with the faith itself.


Muslim bodies irked by MM's remarks
by Leong Wee Keat 05:55 AM Jan 29, 2011
SINGAPORE - Two Muslim organisations here have expressed "deep regret" at some of Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's remarks about the community that were published in the new book, Hard Truths to Keep Singapore Going.

The Association of Muslim Professionals (AMP) and Perdaus - the association of Islamic scholars here - issued media statements to register their disagreement with Mr Lee's views, which they said were neither new nor hard truths.

AMP's board of directors feel that the printed comments "have hurt the community and are potentially divisive", while Perdaus says Mr Lee's call for Muslim Singaporeans to be "less strict" in practising Islam "is both unfair and unacceptable".

Hard Truths is published by Singapore Press Holdings (SPH). SPH says the book's title is a reference to Mr Lee's remark, repeated several times in his interviews with the writers, "that there are hard truths or facts about Singapore that cannot be changed, and that make it critical for Singapore to have a stable society and strong, effective government".

In the book, when asked to assess the progress of multi-racialism here, Mr Lee said: "I have to speak candidly to be of value, but I do not want to offend the Muslim community. I think we were progressing very nicely until the surge of Islam came, and if you asked me for my observations, the other communities have easier integration - friends, intermarriages and so on, Indians with Chinese, Chinese with Indians - than Muslims. That's the result of the surge from the Arab states.

"I would say, today, we can integrate all religions and races except Islam." He added: "I think the Muslims socially do not cause any trouble, but they are distinct and separate."

But Perdaus feels that the level of integration "has significantly progressed" and "a better understanding and appreciation" of Singapore's cultures now exist between Muslims and non-Muslims here. It cited the community's participation in Inter-Racial and Religious Confidence Circles and contributions by humanitarian relief organisation Mercy Relief as examples.

On Thursday, the Islamic Religious Council of Singapore (MUIS) had said that Islamic teachings do not hinder Muslims from integration in Singapore society. AMP echoed these views and said that "a good Muslim is duty bound, in Islam, to be a good Singaporean".

It added that there was "nothing wrong" in ethnic communities asserting their identities, for example, through the Speak Mandarin campaign for the Chinese Singaporean community.

AMP said it is seeking clarity from the Government over Mr Lee's latest comments and how Government policies may or may not be affected by perceptions about the Muslim community.

(BN) Microsoft Gets `Little Credit' for Gains Amid Windows Concerns

The strategy for ms is simple. Produce the same stuff but quicker. I don't want office to look different else I would have opted for Mac ( which sucks in it's word) or google docs which is way too slow. 

Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.

Microsoft Gets No Credit for Gains Amid Windows Miss

Jan. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Microsoft Corp. fell after a report showing a shortfall in Windows revenue raised concerns about demand for the operating system and outshined better-than- predicted second-quarter sales and profit.

Windows sales of $5.05 billion missed the $5.2 billion average of analysts' estimates compiled by Bloomberg. That differed from the 55 percent gain in the Xbox unit, and numbers showing Microsoft's Office and Server businesses topped projections.

The contrast suggests that Microsoft may be losing sales as customers opt for competing devices, such as Apple Inc.'s iPad or Macintosh computers, rather than a new Windows-based machine, said Tony Ursillo, an analyst at Loomis Sayles & Co. in Boston. As rival operating systems gain ground, Microsoft's other products, such as Office, may also suffer, he said.

"The execution at this company has actually been pretty good over the last year," said Ursillo, whose firm manages $150 billion, including Microsoft shares. "The stock has gotten very little credit for it because the market is worried about the continued erosion of the Windows franchise and the potential erosion of the Office franchise."

Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, fell $1.12, or 3.9 percent, $27.75 at 4 p.m. New York time on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The shares lost 8.4 percent in 2010.

Tablet Makes Impact

Microsoft did see a "small impact" from tablets and other types of computing devices, though it was "not material," Chief Financial Officer Peter Klein said in an interview yesterday.

Apple sold 7.33 million iPad tablet-style machines last quarter, as well as 4.13 million Mac computers. Apple's share of U.S. PC shipments rose to 8.7 percent in the December quarter from 7.2 percent a year earlier, according to research firm IDC.

Those gains came at the expense of machines that run Windows. To catch up in tablets, Microsoft said this month it would make its next version of Windows run on ARM Holdings Plc's chip technology for the first time. The aim is to create smaller, thinner Windows tablets with better battery life.

Klein says the tablet market presents an opportunity rather than a threat in the long term.

"I'm more excited about the opportunity," he said. "All these new devices are market expansive for us."

Excluding the impact of a $1.71 billion in deferred sales recognized in the year-earlier quarter, Windows unit growth was in line with growth overall in the PC market of 2.7 percent as reported by Framingham, Massachusetts-based IDC. Still, some analysts had projected more.

Windows Phone 7

To address mobile market-share losses to Apple and Google Inc.'s Android operating system, Microsoft released its overhauled software for mobile phones -- Windows Phone 7 -- during the quarter. The company said this week it shipped 2 million licenses to use the software in handsets, a number that analyst Kevin Burden at ABI Research called disappointing.

The number was "in line" with what the company was expecting, Microsoft's Klein said.

"It's a good start," he said. "I recognize that it's early and we have a lot of work to do and we're going to continue to focus on that."

Second-quarter unearned revenue, a measure of multiyear

contracts, was $13.4 billion, missing analysts' $14.1 billion average estimate, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

'Way Behind'

Results in Windows overshadowed signs that Microsoft is benefiting from rising demand for gaming devices and products aimed at businesses.

Net income was $6.63 billion, or 77 cents a share, compared with $6.66 billion, or 74 cents, a year earlier, Microsoft said in a statement. Sales rose 4.9 percent to $20 billion.

The results beat the average projections of 68-cents in profit and $19.1 billion in sales, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

"Microsoft has been executing extremely well on the business side," Robert Breza, an analyst in Minneapolis for with RBC Capital Markets, told Bloomberg Television. "As people start to really focus on Microsoft and what they are doing in cloud computing -- with their Azure platform -- also with their new Office 365 program that sits in the cloud, hopefully that will get the company a little bit more respect."

In the Xbox division, the company kept expenses down, widening margins for a sixth straight quarter.

For some, that doesn't make up for Windows-related woe.

"Microsoft management has to be frustrated -- they've executed well for five quarters in a row and have got little to show for it in the stock price," Ursillo said. "But they have to take a look at themselves and realize they're losing share in their most profitable business and coming from way behind in the efforts they needed to stem those losses."

To contact the reporter on this story: Dina Bass in Seattle at dbass2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net

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Mass Anti-Government Protests Rock Egypt

Egypt, tunisia...reminds me of obama and acheh. after the euphoria, people look at each other and ask, "you mean we still have to work?"


Egyptian protester flashes Egypt's flag as anti-riot policemen use water canon against protesters in Cairo, Egypt, January 28, 2011

Egyptian Protests Expected After Friday Prayers
Protests in the Arab World
Egypt's Opposition Gears Up for More Protests
Tens of thousands of protesting Egyptians flooded into the streets after Friday's prayers in mounting demonstrations calling for an end to President Hosni Mubarak's 30-year rule.

Security forces fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters in central Cairo, where some of the larger demonstrations were held. Trucks of police armed with water cannons lined Cairo avenues as government forces attempted to disperse crowds.

Internet service, a key tool for activists, was shut down across the country shortly after midnight. Cell phone text messaging and data plans were also disabled. Telecom company Vodafone says the Egyptian government ordered all mobile telephone operators to suspend service in parts of the country.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appealed for Egypt's leaders and its people not to let violence escalate. He says world leaders should view the protests as a chance to hear the "legitimate concerns" of their people.

Earlier, Egypt's largest opposition group, the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, says at least five senior leaders and five former members of parliament were arrested in raids.

The group has said it will join protests, but has not organized the demonstrations headed by young people angry at poor living standards and authoritarian rule.

At least five people have been killed and the government says 800 people have been detained since Tuesday. Human rights groups say there have been more than 2,000 arrests.

The 82-year-old Egyptian president has not been seen or heard from since the protests began Tuesday with tens of thousands marching in Cairo and other cities.

In Washington, U.S. President Barack Obama said political reforms were "absolutely critical" to Egypt's "long-term well-being," boosting pressure on Mr. Mubarak to implement changes while acknowledging he is a critical U.S. ally.

In his first comments on the unrest in Egypt, Mr. Obama on Thursday urged the government and the protesters to refrain from violence.

Stanley Ho Casino Stake Saga Continues With Lawsuit

Yeah! it just took less than 24 hrs for me to be proven RIGHT!



The three-day public wrangle over Stanley Ho’s casino empire took yet another twist as a lawsuit accused family members of illegally taking control of his assets, a day after the Macau billionaire said the dispute was settled.

Amid conflicting statements made by Ho and his family, his lawyer Gordon Oldham filed the writ late yesterday in Hong Kong’s High Court. While the 89-year-old Ho announced on television that he no longer needed Oldham’s services, the lawyer says he still represents the tycoon and the writ appears to carry Ho’s signature.

Claim and counter-claim over the transfer of Ho’s 31.7 percent stake in Sociedade de Turismo e Diversoes de Macau SA has driven down the shares of SJM Holdings Ltd. by 12 percent this week. SJM runs most casinos in the Chinese city of Macau, where gambling revenue is four times that of the Las Vegas Strip.

“This story continues to unfold in a dynamic way and it will continue to make the public shareholder base of SJM uncomfortable because of the possible strategic impact of this volatility,” said independent industry consultant Jonathan Galaviz.

SJM shares fell 3 percent to HK$12.72 at the market close today, reversing earlier gains made before the lawsuit was reported by other media.

Ho built his fortune over five decades after Macau’s colonial government in 1962 granted him and his partners a gambling monopoly. While that ended in 2004 with the entry of operators including Sheldon Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands Corp., Ho was ranked Hong Kong’s 13th-richest man, with a net worth of $3.1 billion, by Forbes magazine this month.

Family Succession

Succession tussles are becoming more common in Asia as tycoons who built their wealth after World War II start handing over control of their companies, Galaviz said.

Ho made a televised appearance yesterday, reading an off- camera cue card from a reclining chair as one of his daughters held a microphone.

“The big problem has been resolved,” he said.

Later one of his four children by his deceased first wife, Clementina De Mello Leitao, said that her siblings had been excluded from the division of assets and that this was in violation of Ho’s intention to divide the estate equally among his 16 surviving children.

Leitao’s connections in Portugal and standing in Macau society were a big factor in winning the gambling monopoly, Angela Ho said in a statement e-mailed by her assistant last night.

Pansy and Lawrence Ho

Ho’s suit seeks to bar his five children by Lucina Laam King-ying, including Pansy and Lawrence Ho, and Chan Un-Chan, with whom he has three children, from dealing with shares in Lanceford, the family vehicle that holds the biggest stake in STDM. It also seeks damages from Lanceford directors for breaching their fiduciary duties in the improper or illegal issuance of Lanceford shares.

Maggie Ma, a spokeswoman for Melco International Development Ltd. didn’t immediately respond to two telephone calls and one e-mail requesting a comment from Lawrence Ho, the company’s chairman.

A Shun Tak Group spokeswoman, Cyndi Tang, referred questions for Pansy Ho, the company’s managing director, to Brunswick Group LLP, the public-relations company representing the Ho family members being sued.

Crystal Chan of Brunswick declined to say whether the new controlling shareholders of Lanceford were seeking legal advice.

Legal Battles

This isn’t the first conflict within the Ho family that’s played out in public. Stanley Ho’s sister Winnie Ho lost an appeal in 2008, when she sought to block SJM’s initial public offering saying she was owed $386 million in dividends. In 2001, Stanley Ho threatened to disinherit daughter Pansy when she dated the son of a business rival.

The shareholding record for STDM has been misplaced by the company, and it’s unclear if Lanceford still owns the stake that’s been claimed, Winnie Ho said today in a statement e- mailed by her assistant. Macau’s court is helping the company replace the record, she said.

In a restaurant at Ho's Grand Lisboa casino in Macau, Comei Kou was at the all-you-can-eat sashimi bar having dinner. Kou, who has worked for more than 20 years at another Ho-owned casino, said her co-workers were gossiping about this week’s dispute.

“It is like we are watching a TV drama,” Kou, 47, said between bites of raw salmon. “Money caused the fights.”

The case is Dr Stanley Ho v. Ho Chiu Fung Daisy et al, HCA145/2011 in the High Court of Hong Kong.

(BN) Casino Billionaire Ho Ends Family Feud Reading Cue Card in Reclining Chair

It's all for the money. We haven't heard the end of this. 

Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.

Billionaire Ho Ends Feud Reading Cue Card in Reclining Chair

Jan. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Hong Kong billionaire Stanley Ho withdrew a demand that family members return the bulk of his casino fortune and pronounced the end of an ownership dispute that threatened to split Asia's largest gambling empire.

Ho, 89, said yesterday in a televised broadcast that he had agreed to transfer his 31.7 percent stake in Sociedade de Turismo e Diversoes de Macau SA to five of his children and the woman he calls his third wife. The day before, he said those family members took the stake without his consent, and he was ready to take legal action against them to get it back.

"I have been really unhappy recently because of the disputes, my family members were unhappy as well," Ho said, reading an off-camera cue card from a reclining chair as his daughter held a microphone. "The big problem has been resolved."

Two days of conflicting statements from Ho's lawyer and the public-relations company representing some family members helped drive the stock price of STDM unit SJM Holdings Ltd. down by 4.9 percent yesterday, slicing about $480 million from its market value. SJM runs most casinos in the Chinese city of Macau, where gambling revenue is four times that of the Las Vegas Strip.

"I think it's still early to conclude that the dust has settled," Teng Yee Tan, an analyst with CIMB-GK Securities Ltd. in Hong Kong who has a "neutral" rating on the stock, said yesterday. "The families from the second, third and fourth wives have almost equal power in SJM."

Division of Assets

After the statement was broadcast on TVB, one of Ho's daughters said the recent share transfers don't conform to his repeated statements that his estate be divided equally among his children. Ho has 16 surviving children from four women.

The children of Ho's deceased wife, Clementina De Mello Leitao, were left out of the division of his assets, daughter Angela Ho said.

"My father speaks to me often and has stated publicly about how he intends to divide his estate evenly amongst his children," she said in a statement e-mailed by her assistant.

STDM owns 56 percent of SJM, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The STDM stake transferred to Ho's family members may be worth at least $1.6 billion based on yesterday's closing price of SJM's stock, which fell 68 Hong Kong cents to HK$13.12 after earlier sliding as much as 8.8 percent. In December, Ho transferred a 7.7 percent stake in SJM to Angela Leong, mother of his five youngest children.

Lisboa, Venetian

Stanley Ho also dismissed a lawyer he earlier hired to contest the dispute, he said in the broadcast. He was flanked by Chan Un-chan, whom he refers to as his third wife, and their daughter, Florinda. When he finished, they rolled the chair, with him still in it, out of the room in Chan's house.

"It seems like it's drawing to a close but there's always a chance that something else will pop up," said Aaron Fischer, a Hong Kong-based analyst for CLSA Ltd., who recommends buying the stock. "We still maintain a positive view because we think the management of the company will remain in place."

SJM operates 20 of Macau's 33 casinos, and its Lisboa and Grand Lisboa compete with Wynn Macau and Sands Macao on the city's peninsula. Sands China Ltd., a unit of billionaire Sheldon Adelson's Las Vegas-based company, also operates the Venetian Macao, the world's biggest casino by floor area, on an area of reclaimed land known as the Cotai Strip.

Bigger Than Vegas

SJM, Sands China and Wynn Macau Ltd. surged in Hong Kong trading in 2010 as total gambling revenue rose 58 percent to 188.3 billion patacas ($23.5 billion) on spending by Chinese tourists. Macau's increase of $8.6 billion last year is 50 percent more than the total gambling revenue for the Las Vegas Strip for all of 2010, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The Grand Lisboa's main casino floor, as big as an American football field and clouded by cigarette smoke, was filled last night with hundreds of mainland Chinese, some shouting and pounding on tables. People still wearing winter coats bet as much as HK$100,000 ($12,843) on a single hand of blackjack, oblivious to the dancer performing a cabaret act nearby.

The announcements over the public-address system were in Mandarin.

Ho built his fortune by luring bettors into smoke-filled halls with fading paint and worn carpets after Macau's colonial government in 1962 granted him and his partners a gambling monopoly. Born into a prosperous Eurasian family in 1921, Ho fled to Macau from Hong Kong during World War II.

Family Conflicts

Macau ended Ho's monopoly in 2004, allowing the entry of operators including Adelson's Las Vegas Sands Corp. Ho was ranked Hong Kong's 13th-richest man, with a net worth of $3.1 billion, by Forbes magazine this month.

This isn't the first conflict within the Ho family that's played out in public. Stanley Ho's sister Winnie Ho lost an appeal in 2008, when she sought to block SJM's initial public offering saying she was owed $386 million in dividends. In 2001, Stanley Ho threatened to disinherit daughter Pansy when she dated the son of a business rival.

In a restaurant at the Grand Lisboa, Comei Kou was at the all-you-can-eat sashimi bar having dinner. Kou, who has worked for more than 20 years at another Ho-owned casino, said her co- workers were gossiping about this week's dispute.

"It is like we are watching a TV drama," Kou, 47, said between bites of raw salmon. "Money caused the fights."

To contact the reporters on this story: Debra Mao in Hong Kong at dmao5@bloomberg.net Wendy Leung in Hong Kong at wleung12@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Frank Longid at flongid@bloomberg.net

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