Today's Reuters News Headlines - Yahoo! News:
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Yahoo co-founder Yang resigns
Tue,17 Jan 2012 08:24 PM PST
Reuters -  SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc co-founder Jerry Yang has quit the company he started in 1995, appeasing shareholders who had blasted the Internet pioneer for pursuing an ineffective personal vision and impeding investment deals that could have transformed the struggling company. Yang's abrupt departure comes two weeks after Yahoo appointed Scott Thompson its new CEO, with a mandate to return the once-leading Internet portal to the heights it enjoyed in the 1990s. ...
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Divers suspend search of capsized Italy liner
Wed,18 Jan 2012 02:06 AM PST
Reuters -  GIGLIO, Italy (Reuters) - Divers searching the capsized Italian cruise liner Costa Concordia suspended work on Wednesday after the vast wreck shifted slightly but officials said they are hoping to resume as soon as possible. Five days after the 114,500 tonne cruise ship struck a rock and capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio, hopes of finding anyone alive have all but disappeared and salvage experts are preparing to pump 2,300 tonnes of fuel from the hulk. ...
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Romney unscathed from debate attacks
Tue,17 Jan 2012 06:10 AM PST
Reuters -  MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina (Reuters) - Republican presidential hopefuls attacked Mitt Romney's record in business and government on Monday and challenged him to release his tax returns, but the front-runner emerged largely unscathed from a South Carolina debate. Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry and Rick Santorum questioned Romney's accomplishments and urged voters to take a critical look at the former Massachusetts governor as they tried to halt his growing momentum in the race to pick a challenger to President Barack Obama. ...
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Guantanamo commander defends prison mail review
Tue,17 Jan 2012 06:34 PM PST
Reuters - GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - The commander of the Guantanamo detention camp testified on Tuesday that it was necessary for Pentagon contractors to review the confidential mail prisoners receive from their U.S. military lawyers in order to ensure it did not contain contraband. Defense lawyers in the trial of alleged al Qaeda bomber Abd al Rahim al Nashiri said they had done nothing to earn that mistrust. They contend the order violates confidentiality rules and forces them to illegally disclose trial strategy, violating the defendants' right to a fair trial. ... Full Story | Top |
Fujifilm considering supporting Olympus
Wed,18 Jan 2012 01:08 AM PST
Reuters - TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's Fujifilm Holdings said on Wednesday it is considering supporting scandal-hit endoscope maker Olympus Corp although neither side looks likely to move quickly on an equity alliance that Olympus needs to shore up its finances. A $1.7 billion accounting fraud has severely depleted Olympus' net assets, but it is being supported by major Japanese shareholders who prefer bringing in an equity partner to selling the whole company or its assets. ... Full Story | Top |
SEC Inspector General Kotz leaving agency
Tue,17 Jan 2012 04:28 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - David Kotz, the tough internal watchdog at the Securities and Exchange Commission, is leaving the agency at the end of January to join a private investigative service. Kotz, 45, probed everything from the agency's failure to catch convicted Ponzi swindler Bernard Madoff to bungled SEC contracts and even pornography-watching by agency employees. But the hard-hitting lawyer has also drawn criticism from SEC staff who have complained his tactics have led to a culture of fear at the agency. ...
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Insight: EU banks shrink; Irish farmers, Qatari bosses flinch
Wed,18 Jan 2012 01:27 AM PST
Reuters -  LONDON (Reuters) - From his idyllic farm in Ireland's lush Wicklow Hills, Colin Hadden hatched a plan to supply his lean, grass-fed specialty lamb to some of Dublin's finest restaurants. Over the last two years, his small business boomed, taking on 15 people and opening a butcher shop and food hall. That was before his bank halved his overdraft facility to 50,000 euros. "They are literally making life impossible," said Hadden, who has been forced to ask suppliers for loans and provide credit to his restaurant customers, who are also suffering as EU banks shrink and the debt crisis bites. ...
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World Bank slashes global GDP forecasts, outlook grim
Tue,17 Jan 2012 11:31 PM PST
Reuters -  BEIJING/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The World Bank warned developing countries on Wednesday to prepare for the "real" risk that an escalation in the euro area debt crisis could tip the world into a slump on a par with the global downturn in 2008/09. In a report sharply cutting its world economic growth expectations, the World Bank said Europe was probably already in recession. If the euro area debt crisis deepened, global economic forecasts would be significantly lower. ...
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Romney says he is taxed at around 15 percent rate
Tue,17 Jan 2012 07:29 PM PST
Reuters -  MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina (Reuters) - Republican Mitt Romney acknowledged Tuesday that his income tax rate is "probably closer to 15 percent than anything," suggesting that one of the wealthiest people to ever run for U.S. president pays a much lower rate than most Americans. His comment, a day after Romney agreed for the first time to release his tax returns -- but not until April when they are generally filed -- added fuel to his Republican rivals' calls for him to be more transparent about his finances. ...
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Asian firms may eye RIM platform; Samsung denies interest
Tue,17 Jan 2012 09:51 PM PST
Reuters -  TORONTO/SEOUL (Reuters) - Research In Motion is not on Samsung Electronics Co's immediate shopping list, but the ailing Blackberry maker may still be attractive to Asian smartphone makers looking to compete against Google's Android, the world's fastest growing mobile platform. Samsung said on Wednesday it has no interest in buying RIM or licensing its operating system, refuting a tech blog report that Canada-based RIM was looking to sell itself to the South Korean technology giant. ...
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U.S. adds partners to communications satellites
Tue,17 Jan 2012 05:57 PM PST
Reuters - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Canada and four other countries will contribute $620 million toward the $1 billion cost of building and operating a ninth satellite in a new U.S. military communications system, a move that will improve cooperation among those countries and save money at a time when defense budgets are shrinking. U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
Treasury dips into pension funds to avoid debt
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:35 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Treasury on Tuesday started dipping into federal pension funds in order to give the Obama administration more credit to pay government bills. "I will be unable to invest fully" the federal employees retirement system fund beginning Tuesday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said in a letter to Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress. The House of Representatives is expected to vote on Wednesday on the Obama administration's request to raise the country's legal debt limit to $16.394 trillion. ...
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Accused White House gunman faces attempted assassination count
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:35 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An Idaho man was formally indicted on Tuesday for attempting to assassinate President Barack Obama and on other criminal charges after he allegedly opened fire on the White House in November. Oscar Ortega-Hernandez, 21, was named in a 17-count indictment that included charges of damaging the White House, illegal use of a firearm, assault with a dangerous weapon and interstate transportation of a firearm and ammunition. ...
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Citi's turnaround plan hits euro crisis speedbump
Tue,17 Jan 2012 02:26 PM PST
Reuters -  (Reuters) - The European debt crisis interrupted the plans of Citigroup Inc Chief Executive Vikram Pandit to rebuild the bank, which reported an 11 percent drop in quarterly profit and disappointed Wall Street amid lackluster investment banking and trading business. Citigroup shares fell more than 8 percent on Tuesday. The European crisis battered capital markets in the latter part of last year, hurting Citigroup's trading revenue and discouraging clients from doing deals that could have generated fees. ...
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Kraft to cut 1,600 jobs in split
Tue,17 Jan 2012 11:40 AM PST
Reuters -  (Reuters) - Kraft Foods Inc said that splitting into two companies would lead it to cut about 1,600 jobs in North America this year and that its 2011 profit should be slightly higher than it had previously forecast. About 40 percent of the job cuts come from the company realigning its U.S. sales division, Kraft said. About 20 percent of the jobs being cut in the United States and Canada are currently open positions, the company said. The planned job cuts do not include any cuts at manufacturing facilities. The 1,600 job cuts represent about 1.26 percent of the company's total workforce. ...
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Italian coastguard heard pleading with liner captain
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:53 PM PST
Reuters -  GIGLIO, Italy (Reuters) - Italian coastguards pleaded angrily with the captain of a stricken super-liner to return to his ship, according to recordings released on Tuesday as divers found five more bodies in the half-submerged wreck of the Costa Concordia. The discoveries took the known death toll to 11. One German who was listed as missing has been accounted for, Italy's civil protection department said, leaving 23 people still missing four days after the giant cruiser carrying more than 4,200 passengers and crew was ripped open by rocks off a Tuscan island. ...
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Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang resigns
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:32 PM PST
Reuters - SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc co-founder Jerry Yang has quit the Internet company he started in 1995, potentially appeasing shareholders who had blasted the Internet pioneer for impeding efforts to revive the struggling Web company. Yang's abrupt departure comes two weeks after Yahoo appointed Scott Thompson its new CEO, and after growing criticism of Yang and his handling of affairs dating back to an aborted sale to Microsoft. Yang is leaving the company's board of directors as well as all other positions within the company effective Tuesday, the company said. Shares of Yahoo gained 3. ...
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Samsung says not interested in buying RIM
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:28 PM PST
Reuters -  SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co said on Wednesday it was not interested in taking over Research In Motion after shares of the BlackBerry smartphone maker jumped more than 10 percent following a tech blog report that it was seeking to sell itself to the South Korean firm. "We haven't considered acquiring the firm and are not interested in (buying RIM)," Samsung spokesman James Chung said. Chung also said Samsung had not been approached by the Canadian firm for a takeover. ...
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SEC Inspector General Kotz leaving agency
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:33 PM PST
Reuters - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - David Kotz, the tough internal watchdog at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, is leaving the agency at the end of January, the SEC said on Tuesday. Kotz, 45, joined the SEC in December 2007 after previously working as the inspector general of the Peace Corps. He has made a name for himself as a prolific inspector general at the SEC, investigating everything from leasing and contracting to insider-trading and even pornography-watching by agency employees. ...
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Mitt Romney may not release tax returns until April
Tue,17 Jan 2012 03:21 PM PST
Reuters -  MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, under increasing pressure to release his tax returns now, continued to resist that timetable on Tuesday and said he probably would not make them public until April. Romney, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination to face Democratic President Barack Obama on November 6 and a former private equity executive with an estimated net worth of $270 million, has been reluctant to lift a curtain on his vast financial holdings. ...
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Guantanamo commander summoned to testify in court
Tue,17 Jan 2012 11:54 AM PST
Reuters -  GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - A U.S. military judge ordered the commander of the Guantanamo detention camp to testify on Tuesday about orders he gave that limit the mail prisoners can receive from their lawyers. The dispute about the handling of confidential legal correspondence pits military jailers against military defense lawyers even as the military prepares to expand the number of Guantanamo prisoners facing war crimes charges that could eventually lead to their execution. ...
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Cruise liner captain placed under house arrest: lawyer
Tue,17 Jan 2012 12:04 PM PST
Reuters -  ROME (Reuters) - An Italian judge has placed the captain of the stricken cruise liner which capsized off Italy's west coast under house arrest, allowing him to leave jail, his lawyer Bruno Leporatti told Reuters on Tuesday. Captain Francesco Schettino was arrested a day after the disaster accused of manslaughter and abandoning the ship before all of the people were evacuated. Prosecutors say he also refused to go back on board when requested by the coastguard. (Reporting By Silvia Ognibene, writing by Catherine Hornby)
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Analysis: What Europe can learn from Alexander Hamilton
Tue,17 Jan 2012 12:36 PM PST
Reuters -  LONDON (Reuters) - He was born out of wedlock, stained his reputation with an extra-marital affair and was mortally wounded in a duel. In between, U.S. Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, the first Treasury Secretary, laid the foundations of a modern financial system by establishing a national bank, securities markets and the mint. Crucially, the soldier turned political philosopher also knitted his young country together by having the federal government assume state debts incurred during the American Revolution in return for being granted expanded fiscal powers. ...
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Analysis: Rescue fund downgrade raises pressure on euro zone
Tue,17 Jan 2012 09:14 AM PST
Reuters -  BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Political resistance is clashing with financial imperatives as the euro zone tries to strengthen its capacity to rescue debt-stricken member states after Europe's temporary bailout fund lost its top-notch credit rating. Standard & Poor's downgrading of the European Financial Stability Facility to AA+ on Monday raised pressure on the 17-member currency area to end disputes holding up the launch of a permanent rescue fund, and to let both run alongside each other with full lending power from July. ...
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Exclusive: Union targets dual chairman-CEO roles
Tue,17 Jan 2012 10:58 AM PST
Reuters -  (Reuters) - An influential public-sector labor union has filed proxy proposals aimed at separating the roles of chairman and chief executive at Goldman Sachs Group Inc, JPMorgan Chase & Co and seven other big companies, officials told Reuters. The move, by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, will put new energy into a smoldering leadership issue that analysts expect to be among the hottest in corporate governance at annual meetings this spring. ...
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Greek debt talks to resume Wednesday in Athens
Tue,17 Jan 2012 12:20 PM PST
Reuters -  ATHENS (Reuters) - International creditors said on Tuesday they are coming back to the negotiating table with Greece to resume talks that broke down last week on a debt swap plan crucial to Athens' chances of avoiding a messy bankruptcy. Debt-choked Greece needs a deal with private bondholders very soon on how much financial pain they are willing to bear to persuade the EU and IMF to extend a new bailout and keep the state afloat when a big bond redemption comes due in late March. ...
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Billionaire Kremlin hopeful says Putin must change
Tue,17 Jan 2012 07:23 AM PST
Reuters -  MOSCOW (Reuters) - Mikhail Prokhorov, a super-rich tycoon challenging Vladimir Putin for Russia's presidency in March, said his country faced the danger of violent revolution if it did not break conservative resistance and move quickly to democracy. Prokhorov, a billionaire bachelor long seen more as playboy than politician, told The Freeland File on reuters.com Russians had shaken off a post-Soviet apathy and were now 'just crazy about politics'. ...
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Wells Fargo profit jumps on loan growth
Tue,17 Jan 2012 10:24 AM PST
Reuters -  (Reuters) - Wells Fargo & Co on Tuesday beat Wall Street estimates with a 20 percent increase in fourth-quarter profit, boosted by continued loan growth and improving credit quality. The improvement at the fourth-largest U.S. bank contrasted with an 11 percent decline in profit at Citigroup Inc, which saw its capital markets business battered by the European debt crisis. ...
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EU to take legal action over Hungary laws
Tue,17 Jan 2012 05:55 AM PST
Reuters -  BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Commission plans to take legal steps against Hungary over the country's laws on its central bank, judiciary and data protection, an EU official said on Tuesday. The European Union also said that change to Hungary's recent central bank law was a pre-condition for the resumption of talks on financial assistance, and that Budapest had one month in which to respond to the EU's concerns, the official said. If it failed to respond within a month, Hungary would face legal action. The decision was taken at a meeting of the EU's college of commissioners. ...
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S&P downgrades euro zone rescue fund
Tue,17 Jan 2012 09:02 AM PST
Reuters -  BRUSSELS (Reuters) - U.S. rating agency Standard & Poor's cut its credit rating of the euro zone's EFSF rescue fund on Monday, and Greece was under pressure to break a deadlock in debt swap talks if it is to avoid an unruly default. French Finance Minister Francois Baroin said there was no need to shore up the European Financial Stability Facility after S&P downgraded it by one notch to AA+ from triple-A, echoing the view of Germany, the only major euro zone member to retain a top-notch credit rating. ...
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Cruise operators' shares fall on ship disaster
Tue,17 Jan 2012 07:07 AM PST
Reuters -  (Reuters) - Shares of cruise operator Carnival Corp plunged 15 percent on Tuesday after a ship operated by its unit struck a submerged rock and keeled over off the coast of Italy late on Friday. At least three people died in the accident and dozens are still missing. Shares of Carnival's rival Royal Caribbean Cruises were down 7 percent. Susquehanna Financial cut its rating on both the stocks to "neutral" from "positive" due to the potential impact of the tragedy on the sector. Carnival's shares touched a near three-month low of $29. ...
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Panel clears audit firms of Olympus scandal blame
Tue,17 Jan 2012 02:15 AM PST
Reuters -  TOKYO (Reuters) - An unofficial panel of experts cleared global accounting groups KPMG and Ernst & Young of any responsibility for a $1.7 billion accounting fraud at Japan's Olympus Corp, though the role of the firms remained under official review. The scandal, one of corporate Japan's worst, had raised questions over the role of the two audit firms, which signed off on the accounts of the maker of medical equipment and cameras before the 13-year fraud finally surfaced in October. ...
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Obama jobs panel pushes tax reform, domestic drilling
Tue,17 Jan 2012 01:02 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's jobs council called on Tuesday for a corporate tax overhaul, expanded domestic drilling and new regulatory reforms, a set of proposals unlikely to provide a quick fix for high unemployment or gain much traction in an election year. A panel of top U.S. business leaders advising Obama - whose re-election chances could hinge on whether he can boost the fragile economy - offered its latest job-creation prescriptions at a meeting with him at the White House. ...
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Insight: In Arab Spring, economic gain may trump pain
Mon,16 Jan 2012 11:04 PM PST
Reuters -  AMMAN/CAIRO (Reuters) - Mazen Dajani, chief executive of Jordan's CTI Group, says the Arab Spring accomplished what the global financial crisis of 2008-9 did not: it pushed his company, one of the world's largest shippers of cement, into the red. CTI's shipments to Egypt plunged during the uprising against Hosni Mubarak early last year and have yet to recover, he says, while deliveries to Yemen were disrupted by unrest there. Trade with Libya is still suspended despite the end of last year's civil war. ...
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China policy easing ahead as growth hits 2-year low
Tue,17 Jan 2012 06:50 AM PST
Reuters -  BEIJING (Reuters) - China's economy expanded at its weakest pace in 2-1/2 years in the latest quarter, with the sagging real estate and export sectors heralding a sharper slowdown in coming months and fresh pro-growth measures from the government. Growth of 8.9 percent over a year earlier was slightly stronger than the 8.7 percent forecast by economists in a Reuters poll, but the data on Tuesday raised concerns about the immediate outlook and how much support China can offer a struggling global economy. ...
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Samsung Group plans record $41 billion investment in 2012
Tue,17 Jan 2012 09:57 AM PST
Reuters -  SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Group, which includes Samsung Electronics Co, said on Tuesday it is raising its 2012 investment to a record $41.4 billion, underscoring the widening gulf between the dominant South Korean conglomerate and its faltering competitors. Best known for making massive investments in new technologies ahead of rivals, Samsung is now banking on logic chips and OLED displays to repeat its roaring success in flash chips, computer memory chips and LCD flat-screens, even as a gloomy global economic and IT spending outlook forces its peers to be conservative in spending. ...
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Insight: Recovery at risk as Americans raid savings
Tue,17 Jan 2012 04:38 AM PST
Reuters -  NEW YORK (Reuters) - More than four years after the United States fell into recession, many Americans have resorted to raiding their savings to get them through the stop-start economic recovery. In an ominous sign for America's economic growth prospects, workers are paring back contributions to college funds and growing numbers are borrowing from their retirement accounts. Some policymakers worry that a recent spike in credit card usage could mean that people, many of whom are struggling on incomes that have lagged inflation, are taking out new debt just to meet the costs of day-to-day living. ...
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Disapproval of Congress hits new high: poll
Tue,17 Jan 2012 04:10 AM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A record 84 percent of Americans say they disapprove of the way the Congress is doing its job compared with just 13 percent who approve of how things are going, according to a Washington Post/ABC News public opinion poll published on Monday. The disapproval rating for Congress inched up two percentage points since October and reflects a year of lows for Congress that ended in a battle over a temporary extension of the payroll tax cuts for 160 million Americans. ...
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Tea Party "kingmaker" DeMint focuses on Senate races
Mon,16 Jan 2012 06:20 PM PST
Reuters -  MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina (Reuters) - Everybody was waiting for Jim DeMint. Mitt Romney had reason to hope the South Carolina senator would repeat his 2008 endorsement of his presidential bid. DeMint is the hero of conservatives in South Carolina, so his backing might well have clinched the crucial state for Romney. Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul had just as much reason to hope DeMint might support them, and put him in the role of kingmaker in the Republican race for the White House. ...
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Martin Luther King Jr. is remembered across the nation
Mon,16 Jan 2012 12:24 PM PST
Reuters -  CHICAGO/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Americans honored Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday with a traditional day of service as well as a new wave of economic injustice protests by Occupy Wall Street. On the first King holiday since the now-global Occupy movement launched in New York City in September, the reignited debate over inequality drew hundreds of protestors to march in wintry temperatures in Manhattan, stopping at a Bank of America branch to shout, "The banks got bailed out, we got sold out." At least two protesters were loaded into a police van at the march, held "because Dr. ...
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