DT Fine Art

Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee addresses a seminar on Goods
and Services Tax, the introduction of which will smooth many wrinkles for
businesses and consumers. _Photo: S. Subramanium

By Harry Papachristou

ATHENS |
Sun Mar 11, 2012 6:58pm EDT

SINGAPORE: According to the latest Manpower Employment Outlook Survey released on Tuesday by employment services firm Manpower Singapore, employers expect the hiring pace to remain bright for the next three months.

Employer optimism rebounded slightly in the second quarter of the year, following a 15-percentage point fall in Q1.

Net employment outlook stands at 20 per cent after seasonal adjustments.

Of the 624 Singapore employers interviewed across seven industry sectors, 2 in 10 said they expect to increase staff in Q2, while 7 in 10 said they do not expect any changes to their workforce.

Only 2 per cent said they will cut headcount.

On a quarterly basis, hiring prospects in Q2 inched up by 4 percentage points, but fell 10 percentage points compared to the previous year.

The labour market in Singapore appears healthy with positive hiring plans for the second quarter of 2012. However, while employers in Singapore anticipate some opportunities for job seekers in the next three months, many remain cautious about adding employees as evidenced by the seven percent who dont know whether they will hire. With a tight labour market, employers will need to explore other approaches to sourcing talent and step up their efforts to attract the right fit for the organisation, said Linda Teo, country manager of Manpower Singapore.

The sectors which are most optimistic in adding headcount during the next three months are Public Administration Education (34%), Mining Construction (24%) and Finance, Insurance Real Estate (20%).

On a yearly comparison, hiring prospects have weakened in 6 of the 7 industry sectors.

Employers in the Wholesale Trade Retail Trade and the Services sectors report a 18 percentage point decline in hiring outlook.

Employers in the Finance, Insurance Real Estate sector report a 16 percentage point decrease, while employers in the Manufacturing sector report a decline of 12 percentage points.

The hiring outlook for Public Administration Education sector improved by 11 percentage points.

- CNA/ck

March 12 (Bloomberg) — European stocks rose for a fourth day, recovering from earlier losses, as the regions finance ministers prepared to approve a second bailout package for Greece. Commodities slid and the yuan weakened after Chinese exports grew at a slower pace than forecast.

The Stoxx Europe 600 Index advanced 0.1 percent as of 10:10 am in London. The Standard amp; Poors GSCI gauge of commodities fell 0.4 percent, led by natural gas, and the yuan declined after Chinas central bank weakened its daily fixing for the currency. Indian shares rose as the central bank unexpectedly cut reserve requirements for banks. The yield on the 10-year German bund dropped one basis point to 1.78 percent.

European finance ministers will meet in Brussels today to sign off on the 130 billion-euro ($170 billion) aid package for Greece and discuss Spains budget-cutting efforts. China reported the biggest trade deficit in at least 22 years on March 10, sapping optimism that was spurred last week by stronger- than-forecast jobs data in the US

Its been a much better start to the year than most investors had expected, Henrik Drusebjerg, a Copenhagen-based strategist at Nordea Bank AB who helps oversee $230 billion, said in an interview today. What most of us had expected as a return for the whole year has come around in two months. If theres anything indicating that global growth is having problems, people will be very quick to take some profits.

The Stoxx 600 advanced as three shares rose for every two that declined, reversing a drop of as much as 0.5 percent earlier. Accor SA climbed 3.3 percent as Credit Suisse Group AG recommended shares of Europes biggest hotel company. Misys Plc slid 2.4 percent after Temenos Group AG ended merger talks with the UK software maker. Temenos lost 3.4 percent.

India, China

The BSE India Sensitive Index, or Sensex, gained 0.5 percent after the central bank on March 9 reduced the amount of deposits lenders need to set aside as reserves to ease a cash squeeze in the banking system.

Exports from China rose 18.4 percent last month from a year earlier, while imports gained 39.6 percent. Analysts forecast a 31.1 percent increase in overseas sales and that inbound shipments would rise 31.8 percent, based on estimates from Bloomberg News surveys.

The yuan lost 0.2 percent to 6.3266 per dollar for the biggest drop since January. The daily reference rate was set 0.33 percent lower at 6.3282 per dollar. The currency can move 0.5 percent either side of the fixing.

Downside Pressure

Natural gas declined 2 percent to $2.278 per million British thermal units and copper dropped 0.7 percent to $8,438 a metric ton. China is the biggest buyer of copper. The GSCI gauge had climbed 2.1 percent over the previous three days. Oil fell 0.7 percent to $106.65 a barrel, the first drop in four days.

The data from China is a downside pressure on the oil market, said Ken Hasegawa, a commodity-derivative sales manager at Newedge Group in Tokyo. The trade deficit is much bigger than expected.

The cost of insuring European sovereign bonds rose for a second day, with the Markit iTraxx SovX Western Europe Index of credit-default swaps on 15 governments climbing four basis points to a one-week high of 356.

–With assistance from Kana Nishizawa in Hong Kong, Jacob Adelman in Tokyo, Abigail Moses, Claudia Carpenter and Andrew Rummer in London and Adria Cimino in Paris. Editors: Rob Verdonck, Justin Carrigan

To contact the reporters on this story: Rob Verdonck in London at rverdonck@bloomberg.net; Lynn Thomasson in Hong Kong at lthomasson@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Voss at sev@bloomberg.net

PARIS (Reuters) – German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble and his French counterpart Francois Baroin said on Tuesday that the worst of the euro zone crisis appeared to be over, but warned member states that was no excuse to skimp on difficult reforms.

We can say that the worst is behind us, but we cannot relax our efforts, Schaeuble told a conference in Paris. I think we can say with a 50 percent probability that the worst is behind us.

With some in Germany voicing concern about the European Central Banks recent injection of 1 trillion euros of liquidity into the euro zone banking system, Schaeuble said he was not concerned about the ECBs monetary policy.

The ECB had demonstrated its independence and had a track record of good decision making, Schaeuble said. Its decisions do not entail an inflationary risk, he said, suggesting that reports of a disagreement between ECB President Mario Draghi and Bundesbank chief Jens Weidmann had been exaggerated.

Baroin echoed his German colleagues comments, stressing the need for euro zone countries to press ahead with economic and fiscal reforms: If the question is whether the worst of the crisis is behind us, one can say yes … If we do not deviate from our path, the worst is behind us.

With the Socialist frontrunner in Frances presidential elections threatening to renegotiate a budgetary pact signed by 25 European leaders this month, Schaeuble said that bailout agreements such as those signed by Ireland, Portugal and Greece were being kept irrespective of changes of government.

I would not plead in favour of a revision, because I think we have taken the right decisions, he said.

Schaeuble said it was too early to speculate whether a further programme would be necessary for Greece, but he noted that its debt sustainability target was for 2020 and the average IMF programme only lasted for 3 or 4 years.

2020 is more than 3 or 4 years from now, he said.

(Reporting By Daniel Flynn and Leigh Thomas; editing by Andrea Evans)

CHANDIGARH: 38-year-old MBA and B Com Parminder Singh Dhindsa, who held PWD portfolio in the previous Parkash Singh Badal government, will be the new finance minister of Punjab.

Dhindsa was informed about his difficult responsibility by the chief minister on Tuesday during a meeting between Badal and Dhindsas father and senior Akali leader SS Dhindsa, a former Union minister, sources in the party told The Times of India.

BRUSSELS, March 13 (Reuters) – EU finance ministers
and officials met on Tuesday to discuss a European financial
transaction tax, Hungarys deficit problems and IMF resources to
be contributed to the euro zones bailout funding.

Following are comments by ministers and officials after the
talks:

GERMAN FINANCE MINISTER WOLFGANG SCHAEUBLE

ON FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX:

I cant imagine Id be won over to a financial transaction
tax with a few countries in the euro zone. That would be a rag
rug. That doesnt make sense. It is my conviction that the
smallest thinkable unit is a common currency.

We exchanged views and agreed that given the basis of
todays discussions we will take time to lead intensive,
informal talks at the informal (EU finance ministers) meeting
in Copenhagen.

I declared again that financial transaction tax in all of
Europe has clear priority as I am convinced that thats the best
solution. But we know that we need unanimous decisions for this
and whether well get those is uncertain.

So we talked about what wed do if it turns out in the next
weeks and months that we will not get a unanimous opinion in the
foreseeable future.

I believe the debate today made clear that there is an
understanding that we need such rules among almost all 27
members of the EU, so that I am confident we will find
solutions.

ON SUSPENDING EU COHESION FUNDS FOR HUNGARY:

We discussed the commissions proposal at length to suspend
cohesion funds for Hungary and we took this decision just now.
But we noted that… as soon as Hungary meets its obligations,
we have an automatic procedure to reverse the decision.

We agreed that we explicitly expect a report from the
commission at the Ecofin meeting on June 22 and that on June 22
we will deal with this then.

The commission has assured us… that of course if Hungary
meets its obligations it would take the necessary steps
immediately. But the decision to suspend the funds for 2013 has
been taken. It was unanimous, with one abstention, in the
Ecofin.

JUNCKER SUCCESSION

We have a preference and its the rule that we dont have a
permanent head of the Eurogroup but that we stick to the way it
has been that one of the member countries of the Eurogroup heads
the Eurogroup.

Weve got enough permanent chairmen. Its a very good
solution that Thomas Wieser is now the permanent head of the
Eurogroup working group.

For the Eurogroup, the German governments position is that
you dont need a permanent head. It could be a man of a woman. A
finance minister works quite well. A minister of agriculture
would not make so much sense.

ESM/EFSF

We will not talk about this in the cabinet tomorrow. But we
the commission will make proposals, which the working group will
work with and then well do it like the chancellor has always
said, that we will look into this again in the course of May 
and Ive said previously that March has 31 days.

The informal Ecofin in Copenhagen  is about right.

With the ESM we have a permanent mechanism. We have decided
to pay the first two of five tranches into it this year. We want
to decide soon when the next tranches get paid in. Thats very
important.

EU ECONOMIC AND MONETARY AFFAIRS COMMISSIONER OLLI REHN

ON EURO ZONE FINANCIAL FIREWALLS:

It is… now essential that we complete our crisis
response, a cornerstone of this response (is) the financial
firewalls. The constructive discussion we had yesterday and
today, make me confident on the prospect of an agreement by the
end of this month to reinforce the European financial
firewalls.

SPANISH ECONOMY MINISTER LUIS DE GUINDOS

ON SPANISH DEFICIT AND CUTS:

I dont think an additional cut of about 0.5 percent will
have any significant impact, neither on economic growth nor on
employment, or on the macroeconomic framework.

Our macroeconomic framework was based on hypotheses which
were very cautious, extremely cautious, so logically there is
some room.

Following are comments by ministers and officials before the
meeting:

GERMAN FINANCE MINISTER WOLFGANG SCHAEUBLE

ON FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX:

Well have a debate today about a fundamental political
orientation considering whether it is justified to exempt the
sale of financial products and services from a sales tax such as
we have on the sale of goods and services with a value added
tax.

I think its probably not justified, but of course there
are a number of arguments in favour and against.

You need a unanimous decision on tax issues, thats not
new. And that there are different opinions in the 27 states is
also not new, but you can debate it at least.

ON SITUATION IN GREECE:

We made progress in the Eurogroup yesterday. We saw the
private sector accepted the bond swap offer more than we
expected. Thats why, according to the … EU/IMF troika, we now
have a chance to get a slightly lower debt level in Greece in
2020 (than previously expected).

On that, too, people always said it would never work, that
(the private sector) would never accept it. You know if you
always knew in advance what you cant achieve, the world would
never have been created.

AUSTRIAN FINANCE MINISTER MARIA FEKTER

ON SITUATIONS IN HUNGARY AND SPAIN:

Unfortunately growth in Hungary did not go as planned and
thats why the numbers had to be adjusted down.

I want to make the critical observation that we would have
preferred to give Hungary some time to fall into line, namely by
offering a two-step process that makes a final decision on
sanctions at the start of the summer.

We must treat all states in the same way.

Yesterday we had a similar debate about Spain and we didnt
immediately impose sanctions but gave the them a chance to have
a more ambitious budget for 2012.

Looking at the pressure put on Hungary I feel as if we are
measuring with different measures.

LUXEMBOURGS FINANCE MINISTER LUC FRIEDEN

ON FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX:

We are talking about transactions that are almost always
cross-border transactions and if you only have the tax in a few
countries then the transactions would move elsewhere.

In principle the tax is fine but you need all 27 countries
to participate. We need also a debate about who pays for the
tax: is it the funds, is it the banks or is it in the end the
citizens, the investors?

All these factors need to be debated and I hope to have
that in the coming months, maybe not today. I dont think we
will reach a decision about this today.

For me there are lots of unanswered questions, especially
the one of the competitiveness of European financial centres.
You have to bear in mind that centres outside of Europe such as
New York and Singapore wont introduce the tax so thats why we
as Luxembourgers see big questions we would like to have
answered first.

Without (Britain) there will be no financial transaction
tax.

SPANISH ECONOMY MINISTER LUIS DE GUINDOS

ON SITUATION IN SPAIN:

We reiterated (last night) Spains commitment to the 3
percent target for 2013 and the only thing that was asked of
Spain was an adjustment of the path towards that 3 percent
figure, an additional adjustment this year, and Spain is
completely committed to that adjustment.

DE GUINDOS DECLINED TO SAY WHAT EXTRA STEPS SPAIN WOULD TAKE
TO MEET THE 2012 TARGET, BUT SAID:

Today we will discuss the maximum expenditure ceiling. It
is very important to note that the majority of Spains arguments
have been taken into consideration. Theres been a change in the
stability programme of the previous government that was
unrealistic in the current climate.

SWEDISH FINANCE MINISTER ANDERS BORG

ON FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX:

The financial transaction tax would be difficult to accept.
It would increase the households lending costs. It would
increase the cost of capital for companies. It would increase
the costs for governments.

ON DUBGET DEFICITS:

I think its very important that when we are seeing a
stabilisation in the Europen economies that we dont see any
depreciation of credibility. It is very important that the
Spanish government is sticking to their targets for 2013.

FRENCH FINANCE MINISTER FRANCOIS BAROIN

ON COUNTRIES NEEDS TO REDUCE BUDGET DEFICITS:

Whats true for Spain is true for all the other countries.
We are in the process of restoring confidence in the euro zone.
We are in the process of putting into place measures of
protection and deficit reduction.

No one can distance themselves from the target of budgetary
consolidation.

(Reporting by Annika Breidthardt, Justyna Pawlak, Robert-Jan
Bartunek, John ODonnell and Robin Emmott in Brussels, and
Julien Toyer in Madrid)

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

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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

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