DT Fine Art

MELBOURNE, Australia, Jan. 10, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ –
Applications for ICANN’s new Top-Level Domain program open 12 Jan for 90 days. ARI Registry Services provides insight into how the application period will unfold

A third of all applicants participating in ICANN’s (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) new Top-Level Domain program will come from the IT and financial services industries, according to figures released by ARI Registry Services today as the application window opens tomorrow.

ARI Registry Services is predicting more than 1000 applications will be submitted between 12 January and the 12 April 2012 deadline.

According to the new Top-Level Domain (TLD) technology provider, brands have shown the strongest interest with two thirds of all applications expected to be for a .brand new TLD. This will be followed by entrepreneurs (30% of applications) seeking to profit from generic terms like .shop or .hotel. The remaining 10% will come from governments and other groups wanting to represent their city or region online with a geographic TLD like .sydney, .paris or .tokyo.

Adrian Kinderis, CEO of ARI Registry Services, said: “Analysis of more than 400 clients we’ve engaged with globally over the past year shows technology and finance companies in Asia Pacific and the US lead the pack.”

Strongest interest has come from businesses in the Asia Pacific region (52%), followed by the United States (29%), Europe (10%), Middle East (7%) and Africa (2%).

“The first round of new domains will be dominated by technology brands (20%), as the IT industry recognises the huge opportunity to innovate. This will be closely followed by banks and other financial service providers (11%) who are jumping at the opportunity for the increased online security and trust that comes with a .brand domain,” Mr Kinderis said.

“Now’s the perfect time for brands to consider a new Top-Level Domain as part of their long-term digital marketing strategy,” he continued.

Speculating on the results, Mr Kinderis said the attractive sales and marketing benefits of new Top-Level Domains has likely appealed to the IT, finance and retail industries as a way to differentiate themselves – especially important in light of the economic downturn.

“A .brand new Top-Level Domain will deliver improved trust, leadership, customer engagement and message recall by providing a direct connection between the customer and the brand experience online. The rapid growth of e-commerce and online retail also complements the move to a .brand domain name. For example, in the near future we may see short, relevant and memorable domain names such as iphone.apple, creditcards.hsbc and shoes.nike.”

However, Mr Kinderis warned that potential applicants need to act quickly if they want to reap these benefits.

“There is a huge first-mover advantage for brands applying in the initial round. It’s taken ICANN six years to approve this program – no one knows when there will be another opportunity to apply. We are helping our clients get a head start with a progressive digital asset years ahead of their competitors. Brands which previously had to compromise their web address can now own a relevant and targeted address with huge potential search engine optimisation benefits.”

Mr Kinderis said a research report commissioned by ARI Registry Services in November found there is a low level of awareness about the program globally. Despite this, the report found significant revenue potential for entrepreneurs to own industry-specific Top-Level Domains such as .shop, .law or .hotel and commercialise them by on-selling second-level domains to relevant businesses (e.g. retailername.shop or lawfirm.law). It suggested that multi-million dollar annual returns are on offer for applicants willing to invest in a new TLD.

He noted that consumers and Internet users will see the first new Top-Level Domains appear online from early 2013, forever changing the way they’ll navigate the Internet.

Further statistical breakdowns of industry sectors and regions interested in applying for a new Top-Level Domain are available on request.

Media contact:Michael Korjen Public Relations ManagerARI Registry Services Ph: +61-3-9866-3710 Email: michael.korjen@ariservices.com
www.ariservices.com

About ARI Registry Services

ARI Registry Services (formerly AusRegistry International) is one of the top companies globally with the technology and expertise to activate, implement and manage new Top-Level Domains. Leveraging ten years of experience as a TLD registry operator, ARI Registry Services will provide new Top-Level Domain applicants with the same software and consulting services that currently drive the .au (Australia), the .ae (United Arab Emirates), the .qa (Qatar) and .om (Oman) country codes. Additionally, ARI Registry Services is the first TLD registry to operate non-Latin, country code Top-Level Domains and a global leader in the continued innovation and expansion of the Domain Name System.

Visit
www.ariservices.com or find out more about the new Top-Level Domain program here:
www.beyonddotcom.info

SOURCE ARI Registry Services

Copyright (C) 2012 PR Newswire. All rights reserved

The finance ministry has put a spanner in railways minister Dinesh Trivedi’s proposal, to incorporate five projects involving the construction of 453.73 km of rail tracks at a cost of Rs 2,197.41 crore in the upcoming rail budget in March.

The finance ministry’s reservations are that, four

France to Lose Aaa Rating From S&P, Finance Minister Says
January 13, 2012, 3:22 PM EST

• Business Exchange
• E-mail
• Print

More From Businessweek

• EU, ECB and IMF ‘Troika’ Mission Begins Greek Mission This Week
• ECB’s Draghi Says Swap Lines Might Imply Moral-Hazard Risk
• S&P Cuts Italy Two Levels on Rise in Costs of Financing Debt
• EFSF Shouldn’t Be Hurt by S&P Rating Cut, France’s Fillon Says
• Schaeuble Says Ireland and Portugal Are ‘On a Good Track’

By Mark Deen

Jan. 13 (Bloomberg) — French Finance Minister Francois Baroin said France has been stripped its AAA credit rating by Standard & Poor’s for the first time. He was speaking on France 2 television.

“It’s a reduction of one level, it’s the same level as the U.S.,” Baroin said. “It’s not a catastrophe,” he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Deen in Paris at markdeen@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Deen at markdeen@bloomberg.net

• Business Exchange
• E-mail
• Print

READER DISCUSSION

Eastman Kodak shares are down hard Friday afternoon after Bloomberg reported that the company is in advanced talks with Citigroup to provide the company with bankruptcy financing. The story, attributed to people familiar with the matter, says that Kodak could file Chapter 11 within weeks, after which it would hold an auction to sell off its patent portfolio.

The story says Kodak may seek $1 billion in debtor-in-possession financing.

The piece also says that Kodak is lining up a stalking horse bidder for the patent portfolio.

Kodak has been seeking to sell its portfolio of more than 1,100 digital patents to raise enough cash to stave off insolvency. The company meanwhile is pursuing patent infringement claims against Apple, Research In Motion and HTC.

Kodak shares in pre-market trading are down 13.2 cents, or 19.6%, to 54 cents.

–Japanese Finance Minister Noda calls the dollar’s fall to Y79.17 earlier in the day “sharp.”

–Noda says he will closely monitor the currency market.

–Noda’s description of the yen’s rise is still modest, suggesting risk of intervention may still be low.

(Updates throughout with more background.)

TOKYO (Dow Jones)–Japan’s finance minister on Tuesday described the yen’s rise earlier in the day as “sharp,” …

SAO PAULO (Dow Jones)–Brazil state-run National Development Bank BNDES said Tuesday that it would no longer help finance the proposed merger of Cia. Brasileira de Distribuicao, or CBD, (CBD, PCAR4.BR) and France’s Carrefour SA (CA.FR, CRRFY).

The deal’s financing was dependent on …

Mexico City Finance Secretary Ernesto Cordero acknowledged he hopes to be the ruling conservative PAN partys standard-bearer in next years Mexican presidential election.

He said at a press conference that he has aspirations for the top post but noted he must comply with the legally established timeframes and with his current enormous responsibilities.

A group of PAN party leaders, including four state governors, announced Thursday their support for Cordero in the contest for the partys 2012 nomination.

The secretary, who described himself as a proud Mexican who is committed to his country, said he appreciated the backing from a group of distinguished PAN members who recognized his track record in an open letter.

Its a great honor to be considered as a possible standard-bearer for my party to continue what have already been 10 years of achievement and progress, Cordero said.

The election season begins in October when the different parties start the process of selecting their candidates, a process that must be concluded in December.

Candidates are constitutionally required to resign from senior public posts six months before the July 1, 2012, ballot, although they may be asked to do so in October by their respective parties to guarantee fair conditions for all in the run-up to the election.

Candidates must officially register by January 2012 and electoral campaigns kick off in April.

The public support for Cordero, who analysts say has the backing of incumbent President Felipe Calderon, comes after other PAN politicians had already expressed interest in competing for the top office.

That list includes the secretaries of Education, Alonso Lujambio, and Labor, Javier Lozano, as well as the PAN leader in the lower house of Congress, Josefina Vazquez Mota, and Sen. Santiago Creel.

Mexico state Gov. Enrique Pe#241;a Nieto and Sen. Mario Fabio Beltrones are considered frontrunners to be the nominee of the main opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI.

Former presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador – who narrowly lost to Calderon in 2006 – and Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard – are potential candidates of the left-wing PRD party.

The PRI controlled the presidency from 1929 to 2000, when the PANs Vicente Fox was elected on a platform promising reform.

Mexicos constitution limits the president to a single six-year term.

It would be impossible to overestimate the depth of the embarrassment the French feel about Dominique Strauss-Kahns spectacularly sleazy fall from grace. Yet the nation is agog at the prospect of a consolation prize: The appointment of Ms Christine Lagarde, Frances Finance Minister, to replace him as managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Ms Lagarde seems to be the woman without enemies. She is supported by an unlikely alliance of her German counterpart, Wolfgang Schauble and Britains George Osborne, who doubtless admires her passion for Hayekian economics.

Despite their reservations about a European stitch-up, the Brazilians and Chinese seem to be warming to her.

All this is quite a triumph for a near-unknown, who spent her entire career in one of Americas largest law firms, and only took a junior Cabinet post in 2005 – and for French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the man who four years ago made her the first female Finance Minister in the entire G8.

Yet Ms Lagarde has a track record of terrifying competence. The elegant 55-year-old (still a size eight) is trilingual in French, English and Spanish. A former scholarship student, champion synchronised swimmer and scout troop leader, she joined the firm of Baker-McKenzie straight out of law school, rising to become its chairman before jumping ship to enter politics.

Part of the secret of Ms Lagardes success is that she maintains complete control over her image. She has been married twice, before settling down with an old friend from university whom she met again six years ago. But neither of her former husbands – the mysterious Monsieur Lagarde, who fathered her two sons, or Mr Eacran Gilmour, nationality uncertain, who runs companies in Poland – is even mentioned in her official biography or Whos Who listing.

She is also a first-rate television performer, capable of showing up for an interview with the United States comic Jon Stewart wearing a Gallic beret and play-acting the caricature Frenchman. It is possible she made the outfit herself – she has been known to run up smart dresses on her mothers old sewing machine – but, generally, she favours severe Armani and Chanel suits, Hermes handbags and discreet scarves.

In doing so, she embodies a distinctive chic miles away from the bling of the early Sarkozy presidency, which has made her a regular in the pages of the glossy magazines.

Her focus, though, has always been on her work: Even the supercilious enarques, Frances civil service mandarins, value her.

In addition to her competence, explains one Elysee aide, she always deals with challenges or feuds herself, never asking for support from the President (in contrast to all too many of Frances political divas). She is the least heavy-maintenance in the entire Cabinet, he gushes.

Although she has few enemies, those who have crossed Ms Lagarde share the shell-shocked look of someone who has been hit by a semi-articulated lorry.

Her junior minister for foreign trade – a job she had herself held – found himself shorn of most of his sensitive work soon after Ms Lagarde decided he was a lightweight. Shes always smiling, always polite but she is an American lawyer at heart – a killer shark, says a former Ministry of Finance official, who was fired for not showing up at her job enough.

Outside of France, Ms Lagarde is known as a networker among the worlds most powerful women, championing quiet affirmative action when needed to break the glass ceiling.

She has been called the rock star of international finance but she is more the Coco Chanel, preferring to build consensus and reach elegant solutions to testosterone-fuelled posturing. (Famously, she said that if Lehman Brothers had been called Lehman Sisters, it might not have imploded.)

It is, however, that preference for arbitration over conflict that could derail her IMF candidacy.

As Finance Minister, Ms Lagarde put an end to a legal battle over the near-collapse of Credit Lyonnais in the 90s – but Frances official Court of Audits has now indicated that the plaintiff received too much in compensation and questioned Ms Lagardes decision to overrule her bureaucrats. Piquantly, they will announce whether a judicial case will result on June 10, the very day when the IMF will name its next boss.

Still, do the magistrates really want to dash Frances hope of saving the IMF job for La Patrie?

If they decide against a court case and Lagarde does get the job, then President Sarkozy will doubtless contemplate the turn in his fortunes with glee. Ten days ago, his poll numbers were burning holes in the Elysee carpets. Now his most dangerous presidential competitor is facing a long term in jail; the Socialists are about to tear themselves to pieces; his wife is awaiting the birth of a son and receiving rave reviews for her luminous performance in Woody Allens new film Paris at Midnight and he has even come across as lovable in La Conquete, a The Deal-style biopic about his 2007 election campaign.

As everyone, even Les Rosbifs, lines up to back his Finance Minister to blaze a feminist trail at the worlds financial watchdog, Le President must be feeling that there is a God after all. THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

A federal district court judge in Alexandria, Virginia issued an opinion yesterday ruling that the ban on corporate contributions to federal candidates enacted in 1907 is unconstitutional. The ruling was issued in United States v. William Danielczyk, Jr, et al.

Less than a decade ago, the Supreme Court in Federal Election Commission v. Beaumont (2003) explicitly upheld the constitutionality of the corporate contribution ban at issue in the district court case.

The decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010), furthermore, that struck down the ban on independent corporate expenditures made clear that the opinion dealt only with corporate expenditures and not with contributions.

This leaves the Beaumont decision standing as existing Supreme Court doctrine, a decision that the district court judge conveniently ignores.

On May 16, 2011, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life, Inc. v. Swanson issued an opinion that correctly upheld the constitutionality of a corporate contribution ban based on the Supreme Court decision in the Beaumont case.

Federal district courts cannot overrule Supreme Court decisions, as the district court judge in this case is attempting to do.

The district court judge in this case does not have the authority to overrule the United States Supreme Court.

The district court opinion should be appealed and reversed by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

FRANKFURT — Amid growing expectations that Greece will have to restructure its debt, the German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, warned Thursday that a default could have grave and unpredictable consequences.

Add to Portfolio

• Barclays PLC

Go to your Portfolio »

Enlarge This Image

Thomas Peter/Reuters

Wolfgang Schäuble, German finance minister, seemed willing to give Greece more time.

But Mr. Schäuble’s comments left room for a less radical solution in which Greece might be given more time to pay its debts.

“There is no experience with what happens when a country inside a currency union becomes insolvent,” Mr. Schäuble said in an interview published Thursday in the German newspaper Handelsblatt.

European leaders have begun to discuss openly the possibility of extending the payback period for Greek debt, despite fierce opposition to that idea from the European Central Bank. Mr. Schäuble’s comments were interpreted by some as a sign that he had moved closer to the central bank’s view.

“We believe that today’s interview is key for markets in that it shows that politicians in charge of the matter in Germany, namely Chancellor Angela Merkel and Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, remain opposed to a rescheduling for the time being,” analysts at Barclays Capital wrote in a note.

But a Finance Ministry official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said that Mr. Schäuble stood by comments he made days earlier, in which he appeared to entertain stretching Greece’s bond payments.

In an interview published Sunday in the German daily Bild, Mr. Schäuble said an extension of Greek debt payments would be possible only if it could be done without causing private investors to withdraw their money from the country.

Mr. Schäuble and other European leaders have grown impatient with the pace of Greek efforts to sell state assets, improve tax collection and make the economy more competitive. They are trying to maintain pressure on Greek leaders, while acknowledging that they may have to deal with the possibility that Greece cannot meet all its obligations.

In an interview published this week by Der Spiegel, the German magazine, Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker of Luxembourg, who oversees regular gatherings of euro zone finance and economic ministers, said that a so-called soft restructuring might be considered, but only after Greece had completed a tough overhaul.

“It would be the last step in a very long process,” Mr. Juncker said.

On Thursday, he warned that Greece might not meet requirements to receive the next installment of aid from the International Monetary Fund, Bloomberg News reported. His comments were interpreted as further pressure on Greece to act more boldly.

“I’m skeptical about Greece,” Otmar Issing, a former member of the European Central Bank’s executive board, said on Thursday, according to Bloomberg News. “Greece is not just illiquid, it’s insolvent.”

Peter Bofinger, an economist who advises the German government, said on Wednesday in Hamburg that Greece’s creditors would need to accept a 40 percent cut in the value of the country’s bonds, and swap them for bonds issued jointly by euro zone members.

One idea that has been gaining favor among economics specialists is a pact in which holders of Greek bonds would agree to be paid back more slowly to avoid greater losses if Greece defaulted. Such an agreement would be complicated but possible, legal specialists say.

The European Central Bank, which is the largest holder of Greek debt, has refused to consider such solutions.