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| Japan auto makers to boost domestic output before sales tax hike: media Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 10:00 PM PST  Japanese automakers will ramp up production early next year because they expect a big increase in car purchases before a sales tax hike in April, media reported on Sunday. Toyota Motor Corp will increase domestic output in January-March by about 10 percent compared with this month, the Nikkei business daily reported. Toyota has already told its parts suppliers that daily output in January-March will total around 14,000 vehicles, the Nikkei said without citing the source of its information. Mitsubishi Motors Corp and Suzuki Motor Corp will also keep domestic production lines running three days longer than originally planned in January to meet demand for newly introduced sub-compact models. Full Story | Top |
| Japan's top business lobby agrees to raise base pay next year: media Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 09:39 PM PST  Japan's most influential business lobby has agreed to raise workers' base pay for the first time in six years as the economy gains momentum and corporate earnings improve, the Asahi newspaper reported on Sunday. Many economists say an increase in base pay is essential to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's pledge to end 15 years of mild deflation and to help the Bank of Japan meet its 2 percent inflation target. The Keidanren business lobby will encourage its member companies to raise base pay next year in annual spring wage negotiations, the Asahi reported, citing a draft of the business lobby's negotiations strategy. Full Story | Top |
| Sony to give up on sale of its battery unit: media Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 07:31 PM PST  Japan's Sony Corp has decided not to sell its lithium-ion battery unit, media reported on Sunday, in a gamble that it can turn the business around with a weak yen and growing demand for smart phone batteries. In addition to a weak yen, which can boost overseas earnings, the battery unit is also seeing increased demand for some of its new products, the Nikkei business daily reported. For the past two years Sony had been planning to offload the unit, which was a pioneer in making lithium-ion batteries for computers and mobile devices but has struggled recently against cheaper South Korean rivals. A government turnaround fund tried to broker a sale of the battery business to a Nissan Motor Co Ltd and NEC Corp joint venture earlier this year. Full Story | Top |
| L.A. Dodgers star Yasiel Puig charged with reckless driving Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 06:13 PM PST  Los Angeles Dodgers star outfielder Yasiel Puig was arrested on Saturday after he was caught driving 110 miles per hour in a 70-mph (112-kph) zone in Florida, a highway patrol spokesman said. Puig, 23, who defected last year from his native Cuba, was handcuffed and taken to a jail in Naples, Florida, after his white 2013 Mercedes was pulled over, said Florida Highway Patrol spokesman Lieutenant Greg Bueno. Puig was traveling with two family members and a friend when he was stopped at 9:30 a.m. on Interstate 75, Bueno said. Puig was charged with reckless driving. Full Story | Top |
| NYPD's Ray Kelly oversaw transformative era in NY policing Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 03:13 PM PST  By Chris Francescani NEW YORK (Reuters) - In the final weeks of New York City police commissioner Ray Kelly's 12-year tenure, the spotlight has been focused on the city's falling crime rate and the NYPD's aggressive use of policing tactics like stop-and-frisk. Often overlooked in press reports about his legacy have been Kelly's efforts to transform policing in the country's biggest city through technological innovation and mass data-collection, which has been met with a mixture of praise and accusations of overreaching. Since taking charge of a force in 2002 that was "still using carbon paper and White Out," as Kelly has said, the New York City Police Department has become, by many policing experts' accounts, the most tech-savvy in the country, and crime has dropped by a third - twice the national average, according to some studies. Former commissioner Bill Bratton, who will succeed Kelly to the post, had in 1995 launched CompStat, a police performance management system that tracks and analyzes real-time crime data and holds precinct commanders accountable. Full Story | Top |
| Luxury brands step up battle for travelling shoppers Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 10:27 AM PST  By Pascale Denis and Astrid Wendlandt PARIS (Reuters) - Luxury brands are stepping up the battle for travelling shoppers with more outlets at airports and on cruise ships, tapping into one of the fastest growing sections of the market that looks set to keep booming thanks to soaring numbers of Asian tourists. Revenues from travel retail, which also includes sales on airplanes, rose 9.4 percent in 2012 to $55.8 billion, according to a market study by Generation Research. "Customers are spending time in airports where the environment has become increasingly sophisticated." The French luxury brand, the world's second-biggest behind Louis Vuitton by sales, has boutiques in four Asian airports and one at London's Heathrow, and next year will open a boutique in Paris Roissy Charles de Gaulle airport and another in Dubai. Kering's Gucci, which like mega-brand rival Louis Vuitton has suffered a slowdown in the past two years partly due to emerging market shoppers' growing preference for logo-free products, has opened boutiques in the same locations recently. Full Story | Top |
| Monte Paschi shareholders delay cash call, top executives may quit Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 09:58 AM PST  By Silvia Aloisi SIENA, Italy (Reuters) - Italy's third-biggest bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena was forced to delay a vital 3 billion euro ($4.1 billion) share sale to raise capital until mid-2014 because of shareholder opposition, plunging its turnaround plan into uncertainty. The bank's chairman and its chief executive may now resign after their plan to launch the cash call in January was defeated at an extraordinary shareholder meeting on Saturday due to the vote of Monte Paschi's top shareholder. The unprecedented clash between the lender's executives and its main shareholder - a charitable banking foundation with close links to Siena politicians - casts a pall over a tough restructuring meant to revive its fortunes. Chairman Alessandro Profumo, a strong-willed and internationally respected banker who was formerly the chief of UniCredit, said he and CEO Fabrizio Viola would decide in January whether to step down. Full Story | Top |
| Removal of chemical weapons from Syria delayed: watchdog Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 09:37 AM PST  By Georgina Prodhan VIENNA (Reuters) - The removal of deadly toxins from Syria under an international effort to rid the nation of its chemical arsenal will likely miss a December 31 deadline, the global chemical arms watchdog said. Bad weather and shifting battlefronts in Syria's civil war have delayed the delivery of essential supplies to sites where the toxins are being prepared to be sent to Latakia port, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said. "A delay will probably occur," Franz Krawinkler, the OPCW's logistics head told Austrian ORF state television on Saturday. "Because of various external influences, including the weather... certain logistical supplies that are needed for this transport, could not be delivered in time." Syria has agreed to abandon its chemical weapons by next June under a deal proposed by Russia and hashed out with the United States, after an August 21 sarin gas attack that Western nations blamed on President Bashar al-Assad's government. Full Story | Top |
| Syria's Assad sends message to Pope Francis, Vatican says Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 09:37 AM PST Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has sent Pope Francis a private message, the Vatican said on Saturday, without disclosing its contents. It was the first known time Assad has sent a direct message to the pontiff since the start of Syria's civil war in 2011. Pope Francis has made numerous appeals for an end to the conflict, the latest on Christmas Day. Vatican sources said the message likely included the Syrian government's position ahead of peace talks due to start on January 22 under U.N. auspices in Geneva. Full Story | Top |
| ECB'S Draghi sees no urgent need to cut rates further: report Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 06:54 AM PST  European Central Bank President Mario Draghi sees no urgent need to cut the euro zone's main interest rate further and no signs of deflation, he said in an interview published on Saturday. Asked about any further cuts to interest rates after the ECB cut its main refinancing rate to a record low of 0.25 percent in November, Draghi said: "at the moment we don't see a need for any urgent action." The 66-year-old Italian who has led the ECB since 2011, said it was not "normal or healthy" for real interest rates, the rate savers receive after allowing for inflation, to be negative however. "We are not seeing any deflation at present... but we must take care that we don't have inflation stuck permanently below one percent and thereby slip into the danger zone." In Europe, markets expect inflation to rise to the ECB's target level of close to but below 2 percent, he added. Full Story | Top |
| Monte Paschi chairman to decide in January on possible resignation Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 05:02 AM PST  Alessandro Profumo, chairman of troubled Italian lender Monte dei Paschi di Siena , said on Saturday he would decide whether to step down in January. "These are decisions one takes in cold blood and in the right place, I have nothing to say," Profumo told a shareholder meeting. Full Story | Top |
| First state-licensed marijuana retailers to open Jan. 1 in Colorado Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 04:19 AM PST  By Keith Coffman DENVER (Reuters) - The world's first state-licensed marijuana retailers, catering to Colorado's newly legal recreational market for pot, are stocking their shelves ahead of a New Year's grand opening that supporters and detractors alike see as a turning point in America's drug culture. Possession, cultivation and private personal consumption of marijuana by adults for the sake of just getting high has already been legal in Colorado for more than year under a state constitutional amendment approved by voters. But starting January 1, cannabis will be legally sold and taxed at specially regulated retailers in a system modeled after a regime many states have in place for alcohol sales - but which exists for marijuana nowhere outside of Colorado. For the novelty factor alone, operators of the first eight marijuana retailers slated to open on Wednesday morning in Denver and a handful of establishments in other locations are anticipating a surge in demand for store-bought weed. Full Story | Top |
| Reddit reaches for profits through a geek-culture bazaar Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 04:07 AM PST By Gerry Shih SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Social news hub Reddit snagged an interview with Barack Obama last year. After years of fitful experiments with paid subscriptions and display advertising, Reddit, with just 28 employees, has begun pouring resources into building an electronic bazaar. If Reddit Gifts, as the burgeoning bazaar is known, brings sustainable profitability, it would mark a turning point for an outfit that has exerted an outsized and sometimes controversial influence on Internet culture yet languished financially. Reddit estimates over 250,000 items have been purchased over the holiday, mostly as part of the 50 or so mostly geek-oriented Secret Santa gift exchanges - where zombie- or fantasy-themed presents, say, change hands - that users have created. Full Story | Top |
| Australia's iron ore ports prepare as Cyclone Christine nears Saturday, Dec 28, 2013 03:18 AM PST  By Morag MacKinnon PERTH, Australia (Reuters) - Ports in Australia's Pilbara region, through which almost half of the world's seaborne iron ore is shipped, were sending ships out to sea on Saturday ahead of a tropical cyclone that is forecast to reach the coast by Tuesday. The last of more than 40 vessels in the anchorages and harbor at Port Hedland are expected to leave by the early hours of Sunday, port spokesman Steed Farrell told Reuters. Ships were also moving out to sea from Dampier port, through which both iron ore and gas from the north-west shelf is shipped. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology said the storm, a Category 1 cyclone named Christine, was estimated to be 570 km (355 miles) north, northeast of Port Hedland and moving southwest, parallel to the coast, at 12 km (7 miles) per hour on Saturday evening. Full Story | Top |
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