Business News & Financial News

European stock markets closed sharply higher Friday, praising the employment figures significantly better than expected in the U.S. in January and other U.S. statistics considered encouraging for e global economy.

The CAC 40 index ended for the first time above 3,400 points since early August, with a gain of 1.52% to 3427.92 points. For the week, the benchmark index of the Paris took 3.29%.

The London Stock Exchange has sold for 1.81%, 1.67% that of Frankfurt and Milan up 1%. The pan-European STOXX index rose 1.49% 50a.

Concerns about the apparent lack of progress on the Greek case, however, have plunged the Athens Stock Exchange.

"After a month of January for significant investors, European stock markets continued their advance (…) the announcement of a fall in unemployment in the United States to its lowest level in three years (8.3%) and an imminent agreement on Greece maintain the euphoria on global indices, "said Fabrice Cousté, CEO of CMC Markets France. 

The upturn in the U.S. employment continued in January, with the highest rate of job creation observed in nine months, and the unemployment rate fell to , its lowest level in nearly three years, reflecting the impact of growth in the fourth quarter of 2011 at the beginning of new year.

The growth rate of services sector in the U.S. has in turn greatly accelerated in January, while economists had estimated that it would evolve in the ME I beat that in December, according to figures released by the Institute of Supply Management (ISM). 

In addition, orders to U.S. industry rose for the second consecutive month in December, driven by increased business investment, and the rate of growth of the sector services has increased significantly in January.

Wall Street closed up on Monday.

The Dow Jones gained 291.23 points (2.59%) to 11,523.01. The S & P 500 is 33.90 points (2.93%) to 1192.57. The Nasdaq Composite rose 85.83 points (3.52%) to 2527.34.

This data is likely to vary even slightly.

The New York Stock Exchange closed up 0.25% Friday, the Dow Jones 30 Industrial winning 29.66 points to 11,800.39. The S & P-500, wider, lost 0.22 points, or 0.02% to 1215.91.

The Nasdaq Composite fell 15.38 points his side of (0.59%) to 2572.61

These data are likely to vary even slightly.

The oil services group CGG Veritas said on Wednesday quarterly net earnings above expectations, boosted by strong performance of its subsidiary Sercel and recovery of marine activity.

The specialist geophysical services and equipment for the oil industry recorded a utilization rate of the fleet marine marked improvement, while Sercel, its subsidiary specialized in the production of geophysical equipment, has reported a significant increase sales of land equipment.

"Our results have improved significantly this quarter. They are excellent for Sercel.

With 5.12 billion euros of order intake in 2010, the French arms exports experienced a sharp drop from the previous year, when they had reached 8.16 billion, announced Wednesday the Departments of Defense and Foreign Affairs.

In a "difficult situation", France has retained last year's fourth largest exporter behind the United States, Britain and Russia, reads the report to Parliament on the exports of arms of France in 2010.

The main customers of France were Saudi Arabia, Brazil, India and Malaysia.

In the preamble to the report, the defense minister, Gérard Longuet, welcomed a "success" of France in a crisis.

He sees an encouragement "not to relax our efforts and to continue our work for our exports to strengthen the industrial and technological base defense of our country and preserve the 165,000 jobs that the industry has."

Over the period 2006-2010, the Middle East is the top destination for exports with 27%, followed closely by Latin America 25%, thanks to contracts with Brazil.

Asia represents 18% of the market, and expected success with India could advance this figure in years to come.Finally the percentage of world market share in Europe is 17%.

The contract for the sale of two ships Projection and Command (BPC) Mistral class in Russia for an estimated $ 1.2 billion was signed in June, and is not accounted for in 2010 .

The two helicopter carriers are built by the French shipyard DCNS, contractor on the contract, and STX, in collaboration with OSK.

DCNS, a public company, is controlled to 25% by the defense electronics group Thales.The Korean group STX, owner of the shipyards of Saint-Nazaire, is also involved in the construction of the Mistral.

As for the ongoing negotiations with several countries including Brazil and the United Arab Emirates to sell for the first time outside the Rafale combat aircraft from Dassault Aviation, they have not yet been completed.

Over the decade 2001-2010, the United States, Britain, Russia, France and Israel have shared 90% of the arms market.

European banks need a hundred billion of fresh capital to strengthen their balance sheet and address the current turmoil, said Thursday the Austrian Minister of Finance, Maria Fekter.

The issue of recapitalization of banks is a major enrolled in the agenda of the EU summit scheduled for Sunday, expected to make a comprehensive response to the debt crisis.

"Thank God it's not as high as suggested by the media.What is needed for the recapitalization is about 100 billion (euros), "said Maria Fekter at a conference.

Banking sources and the European Union had earlier told Reuters it would take 90 to 100 billion euros to recapitalize banks in the EU.

This amount, which is the subject of an agreement on the part of Twenty-Seven, should cover about sixty of the largest banks in the EU, the sources said.

"The amount was discussed by member states, it is now acceptable for everyone," said a source told Reuters the EU.

"The amount could exceed 90 billion euros," said a banking source.

The envelope must be added to the 50 billion already raised by European banks over the period from January to April and the funds raised on the market for which the sum is not yet precisely known.

Sovereign debt valued in "MARK TO MARKET"

It takes into account a requirement of capital adequacy ratio "core tier one" of 9% and retains the same definition of this ratio as that used in the last series of stress tests in July, despite protests from some countries.

Germany will for example not allowed to consider in its bank holdings "silent" they hold in other institutions and, in the same way, Spain will not recognize additional reserves of capital that Bank of Spain requires national banks.

As expected, the amount also takes into account a value to market value of sovereign debt held by banks.

This exercise of "mark to market" will cover not only the securities issued by the peripheral countries of the euro area but also those known as the center, who sometimes treat the secondary market at above face value, as the case for German Bunds.

"There is no reason that we inflicted only the negative aspects of this exercise without taking into account the positive aspects," said one source, but said it would have a positive impact on the envelope eventually required for such recapitalization.

This amount must now be discussed by finance ministers and between heads of state and government of the euro area and EU, who meet from Friday to Sunday in Brussels.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has opened a broad investigation into index funds (ETF) to ensure they are sufficiently transparent and do not feed market volatility, said Wednesday a leader of the U.S. stock policeman .

"The Commission staff are conducting a general review of index funds including on the sufficiency of the information provided to investors, the levels of liquidity and transparency of the underlying instruments in which the index products (FTE) invest, the accuracy valuations, the effectiveness of arbitration and the relationship between market volatility and FTEs, "said Eileen Rominger, Director of the Division of Investment Management at the SEC.

According to the text of a planned intervention Wednesday before members of Congress, the official stressed that the survey also aims to "gather and analyze detailed data on specific products."

This assessment is the second SEC investigation related to investment companies, after the commission decided in August to gather opinions on the potential risks of the use of derivatives by mutual funds ("mutual funds' ), ETFs and other structured funds.

ETFs, such as those managed by BlackRock, State Street and Vanguard Group, are financial products reproducing the weighting of an index and therefore its performance.Since their introduction in the 1990s, they took off to about 1,000 billion in assets (724.7 billion euros).

However, certain types of incidents and some ETF market, as the "flash crash" ('flash crash') of 6 May 2010, have fueled concerns of regulators, who fear that these index funds do not contribute to volatility markets and pose problems for the less informed investors.

During the 'flash crash', for example, ETFs have experienced massive changes in the meeting and represented 70% of aborted transactions.This incident prompted the SEC and stock exchange operators to set up a system of "circuit breaker".

The SEC also began to focus on leveraged ETF, used to multiply the gains, ETF and reversed, that achieve the performance opposite to that of the underlying index.

After the leak on the proposed closure of two blast furnaces in Liege, Belgium, Lorraine ArcelorMittal employees are concerned about their future. Employees of ArcelorMittal at the entrance of the site of Florange, September 9, 2011.

Article first published on LExpress.fr

In shock. Back Thursday night in Lorraine, Edward Martin, the CFDT delegate of ArcelorMittal Florange, found the words to shout his anger. "At noon, I was unable to speak," he admits. Hours earlier, he was still in Luxembourg, following a meeting of the EWC's No. 1 global steel industry. Meeting at which management claimed to have nothing to say to the union representatives, while in Belgium, the Walloon region have learned announced the closure of two blast furnaces in Liege. "The Belgian colleagues were crying," said Edouard Martin.Both blast furnaces were arrested temporarily. Florange such as: one ceased operations on July 6, the other on October 4. "How to extend credit to the word of Mittal who say one day it will not close and decide the opposite the next day? Edward Martin gets carried away. Eric Besson does not doubt the word of Mittal? It is more naivety is complicity! "

A Florange, fear is escalated after the announcement that hit the site of Liege. The area has already seen the closure of the steelworks in Gandhinagar in 2009. Teams know that ArcelorMittal wants to improve the productivity of blast furnaces and focus activity on large-capacity facilities, located by the sea, more profitable (Fos and Dunkerque in France, Ghent, Belgium, Bremen, Germany , Gijon, Spain).Seven sites in Europe are now involved in the activity stops, France, Belgium, Germany and Spain. On September 23, at the investor day in London, the management of Mittal announced an "optimization plan assets of € 1 billion" in the old continent.

"We wondered where it would find one billion, one begins to understand, but this is not enough, loose Edward Martin, furious. We always used the same refrain, the temporary closure. Until punch in the stomach the final decision. It is sure that with the presidential election, it would make a bad impression to announce closure of Florange. But what will happen there in June 2012? ". Segolene Royal after a fortnight ago, François Holland a week ago, Jean-Luc Mélenchon which is Florange this Friday, October 14. "But we are disgusted by the silence of French and European authorities, denounced Martin.Libya is saved, we save the banks, and we? We will not let them kill Florange. For thirty-three years I worked here. This plant is ours. In 1992, there had been 1.5% of payroll to pay for a new galvanizing line. They killed Gandhinagar, they will not kill Florange. Angry? Today, it is not anger, it's disgust. "

France should maintain its valuable credit rating "AAA" Despite the security which would make Paris a portion of the bond portfolio of troubled bank Dexia and a possible capital injection into banks, analysts said a Reuters poll .

They point out that this type of guarantee, recorded as an off-balance in the public accounts, and a possible capital investment banks, which could eventually generate a profit, do not pose a risk to the sovereign debt.

But the rescue of Dexia, which should be formalized on Sunday, and a new injection of public funds in other banks will form a new constraint on the flexibilities of the French government, which announced a few weeks ago to 12 billion euros of savings in order to preserve the triple "A" credit rating the highest possible.

Analysts point out however they can not confirm their hypothesis that once the details of the dismantling of Dexia are known.

The Belgian, French and Luxembourg reaffirmed Sunday after a meeting held at midday in Brussels their solidarity in the search for a solution that ensures the future of Franco-Belgian bank.

In a joint statement, the Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme and French François Fillon stated that the three governments give their full support to the proposals of management of the banking group, presented at a Board of Directors scheduled to begin at 15:00 in Brussels.

The activities of the Franco-Belgian bank, first bank in size in Europe to be a victim of the crisis of sovereign debt in the euro zone could be split and the most risky assets confined to a separate structure.

Brussels and Paris are trying to agree on the guarantees afforded by the two countries to the hive to accommodate the bond portfolio of 95 billion euros in Dexia, hoping not to aggravate the situation of public finances .

The rating agency Moody's has also increased pressure on the Belgian camp Friday night: it has placed the sovereign rating of Aa1 by explaining kingdom under surveillance will include assessing the costs and liabilities that the state could play in supporting Dexia.