Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TobagoJack who wrote (26720)	12/22/2007 10:07:26 AM
From: elmatador	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 217540

SCALE: Saudis plan huge sovereign wealth fund to dwarf Abu Dhabi’s $900bn and become the largest in the world. underlined the growing importance of sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia, and their increasingly bold moves to take advantage of the need for capital among western institutions. No need to worry. Those monsters will save any company in dire stratits. Saudis plan huge sovereign wealth fund By Henny Sender and David Wighton in New York and Sundeep Tucker in Hong Kong Published: December 21 2007 09:23 \| Last updated: December 21 2007 19:37 Saudi Arabia plans to establish a sovereign wealth fund that is expected to dwarf Abu Dhabi’s $900bn and become the largest in the world. The new fund will be a formidable rival for other government-owned investment funds in the Middle East and Asia, which are playing an increasingly active role in channelling capital to western companies, particularly financial companies hard hit by the US mortgage meltdown. EDITOR’S CHOICE Lex: Temasek joins the Wall Street party - Dec-21Merrill seeks way out of deep financial pothole - Dec-21Buying quest sees Temasek looking west - Dec-21Ex-NYSE colleague joins Thain at Merrill - Dec-04Stefan Stern: Lessons of a bloody transition - Dec-03Merrill’s new chief eyes overhaul - Dec-02News of the Saudi plan comes as Temasek of Singapore is in “preliminary” talks with Merrill Lynch concerning a multibillion-dollar stake in the ailing investment bank, according to a person familiar with the matter. “Merrill and Temasek have been talking for a while about this, although there are no indications that a deal is imminent,” the person said. Temasek was also approached as a possible investor in UBS and Morgan Stanley, although the investment banks later struck deals with Government of Singapore Investment Corp and China Investment Corp respectively, the person said. These stakes have avoided a serious political backlash but potential investments from the Saudis are likely to be subject to greater scrutiny. The effort is likely to be spearheaded by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which has a mandate to invest only internally. Previously, the Saudis’ oil wealth had gone partly to the kingdom’s central bank, the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority, and partly into the coffers of the ruling family. While the balance sheet of SAMA is public information, bankers say the figures capture only a small percentage of the total wealth of the country. The myriad investment vehicles of the various members of the royal family have never been transparent. Until now, SAMA’s investment policy has been conservative and largely limited to investment in bonds, especially US Treasuries, and shares. That contrasts with the mandate of its peers in the Gulf, which is increasingly geared to higher returns for when oil runs out, by investing in alternative assets such as private equity and hedge funds. That emphasis has lately yielded to a focus on buying major stakes in troubled financial firms on both sides of the Atlantic in the wake of the subprime mortgage meltdown. In contrast to its neighbours, Saudi Arabia has expanded its spending and next year’s budget includes ambitious infrastructure projects. King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia’s ruler, is believed to be a key sponsor of the investment initiative. People close to the situation said Merrill’s strategy was being driven from New York, giving John Thain, who succeeded Stan O’Neal as chairman and chief executive this month, an early chance to stamp his mark on the bank. However, Bill McDonough, a former president of the New York Federal Reserve, is also expected to play a key role in the talks. He is one of the 11 luminaries on Temasek’s international advisory panel, which also includes David Bonderman, the founder of TPG, and Ratan Tata, the Indian industrialist. Mr McDonough is also an influential figure at Merrill Lynch, having joined the bank last year as vice-chairman and special adviser to the chairman. ( In October Merrill announced $8.4bn of writedowns on mortgage-related investments and corporate loans, and the departure of Stan O’Neal, its long-serving chief executive. Some analysts predict that Merrill will announce an additional $8bn writedown when it unveils its fourth-quarter results in mid-January. The US bank’s stock price has nearly halved this year, cutting its market capitalisation to about $47bn. Dealmakers believe that Merrill would be comfortable with Temasek taking a stake of around 10 per cent, should a deal materialise. Merrill Lynch and Temasek declined to comment on Friday. Morgan Stanley announced this week that it is to receive a $5bn capital injection from China Investment Corporation, having disclosed a total writedown in the fourth quarter of $9.4bn after a disastrous subprime bet. Last week UBS took nearly $10bn from the Government of Singapore Investment Corp, a sister sovereign wealth fund of Temasek, while Citigroup received $7.5bn last month from the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. The deals have underlined the growing importance of sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia, and their increasingly bold moves to take advantage of the need for capital among western institutions. The three deals have yet to be endorsed or scrutinised by shareholders of the investment banks. The Financial Times reported on Friday that UBS is facing a shareholder revolt over its planned re-capitalisation deal with GIC and a mystery investor based in Saudi Arabia.

To: TobagoJack who wrote (26720)	12/22/2007 10:01:42 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 217540

RIP SUV: money.cnn.com <Stick a fork in them, they're done. SUVs once ruled the Earth but like the dinosaurs, they've outlived their time. By Alex Taylor III, senior editor In the era of high gas prices and tougher fuel efficiency standards, SUVs no longer meet consumers' desires. Never easy, the automobile business has gotten exponentially more difficult in recent months, as manufacturers rewrite their new model plans to cope with the eventual tightening of fuel economy standards. The latest victim is Volvo. According to a report in a Swedish auto magazine, Volvo is performing euthanasia on its popular sport-utility, the XC90. A revamped XC90 that was due to hit the market in 2010 has been cancelled because Volvo had no hybrid powertrain to put in it. For a brand that aspires to greenness as Volvo does, such an absence could be highly damaging to its environmental image. So after a facelift that will keep it on the market until 2012, the popular and highly-profitable XC90 will go wheels-up. Although Volvo denied any plans to kill the XC90, it wouldn't be the first SUV headed off to the automotive graveyard. According to intelligence work by Global Insight, the Waltham, Massachusetts research and consulting firm, General Motors (GM, Fortune 500) has decided not to replace the old Chevy TrailBlazer and GMC Envoy when they expire in 2010. And Lexus has designated no successor to the GX 470 when it goes away at the end of the 2009 model year. "They have to do it," says senior analyst John Wolkonowicz. "It is what consumers want." Other manufacturers area are moving old SUV nameplates over to new-style SUVs, known as crossovers, that weigh less, deliver better fuel-economy, and are less in-your-face than the old trucky ones. Both consumers and automakers will wind up paying for the changeover. Switching from old-style SUVs is expensive for automakers, who have to scrap their profitable truck engineering for more cost-constrained car mechanicals. That additional cost is likely to be passed along to consumers - along with all the other expenses of meeting the new fuel-economy requirements that could stretch as high as $5,000 a vehicle. It is an ignoble end to a proud motoring era. Not more than 15 years ago, SUVs ruled the automotive landscape and produced record profits during Detroit's last golden age. Now the most popular SUV of that era, the Ford Explorer, is headed to the scrap heap, done in by fuel economy and the lingering effects of tire-shredding and rollover issues from several years ago. The Explorer has been a shadow of its former self, selling at less than half of the 400,000 units a year it did during its glory years. The name will continue on but the vehicle is moving on the passenger car platform used by the Ford Taurus around 2011. (Those interested in a sneak preview can see Ford's (F, Fortune 500) concept-car version of the new Explorer at the 2008 Detroit auto show in January.) Likewise, the Chrysler Aspen and Dodge Durango, latecomers to the SUV party, will shift onto the unibody platform used by the Jeep Grand Cherokee. ... continued... > Good post TJ. Life's a giggle and 2008 looks primed for a lot of fun with political promises galore with opm and elections. I used to wonder why Microsoft and QUALCOMM liked to stack up mountains of money instead of doing the normal corporate thing and incurring huge debts to leverage up and buy more companies to get bigger. Not that I was in favour of such things and preferred that they didn't [not being a borrowing kind of guy myself - the one time I played borrow I got busted good and proper and rightly so]. Mqurice

To: TobagoJack who wrote (26720)	12/23/2007 7:07:27 AM
From: elmatador	Respond to of 217540

TJ "purchased some Sugar on the London Exchange etfsecurities.com at USD 15.55" Subsidy Cuts Boost Continent's Sugar Producers Posted to the web 17 December 2007 Ben Zwinkels THE European Union agriculture ministers have recently agreed to cut the prices offered to European sugar farmers by 36 per cent, bringing the European Union sugar rules into line with global frameworks. African sugarcane producers are among the first beneficiaries. This change was demanded of the European Union after the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled earlier this year that its existing 40-year-old guaranteed pricing system was illegal. The WTO's judgement followed a formal complaint from sugar cane producing countries. Countries like Australia, Brazil, and Thailand will now benefit from a reduction in subsidised european sugar on the global marketplace, along with other smaller sugar producing countries in Africa like Uganda, Cameroon, Rwanda and Kenya. In the past international campaigning groups for poor countries have highlighted many times the absurdities of agricultural subsidies, by focusing on those for sugar, a product that developing countries are especially good at producing. The sugarcane raw material generates sugar, anhydrous alcohol (a gasoline additive) and hydrated alcohol for the internal and external markets, with different price and demand dynamics. Supplying these markets without significant variations requires planning and management efforts. Over centuries, this had been carried out by local governments, starting in the decade of the 1990's, in a process that was concluded in 1999, responsibility was totally transferred to the private sector, and what exists today is a free market system without subsidies, where sugar and alcohol prices are set according to variations in supply and demand. Sugarcane prices are set according to raw material quality, to prices effectively obtained by the final producers and their percentage participation in the products' final price. Brazil is the largest world sugarcane producer, followed by India and Australia. On average, 55 per cent of Brazilian sugarcane becomes alcohol and 45 per cent sugar. The sugarcane plant offers one of the most cost-effective renewable resources among those renewable energy options that are readily available in developing countries. It is a highly efficient converter of solar energy and, in fact, has the highest energy-to-volume ratio among energy crops. It is a highly diversified resource, offering alternatives for production of food, feed, fibre and energy. Such flexibility is valuable in the developing world where fluctuations in commodity prices and weather conditions can cause severe economic hardships. It is expected that the abolished subsidies by the European Union on European sugar farmers will lead to more production of sugar cane in the developing countries, especially in Africa. International sugar prices are ruling now around $ 350 a tonne, which is good news for sugar mills also in Africa.Ugandan sugar industry: The Madhvani Group wins the battle. The Ugandan sugarcane production for example is already since a long time an important crop. One of the leading companies in the sugarcane industry in Uganda now is the Madhvani Group, which started the Kakira Sugar Works in 1940 near the pristine shores of Lake Victoria. The creator of the Karika Sugar Works was the Indian Muljibhai Prabhudas Madhvani, a man with great vision, who settled himself in 1912 in Jinja in Uganda. With little more than brains and an outgoing personality, he set up his own trading concern - his first step into a business that would later account for 10 per cent of Uganda's GDP. Kakira Sugar Works is a successful sugar cane plantation of 9,500 ha with a workforce of 7.500 staff and workers. The company cooperates with over 4,000 out growing farmers supplying sugar cane to the factory. The social infrastructure includes staff housing, electrical distribution systems, roads, a hospital and 12 schools for employees' children. With the abolished subsidies on sugar in Europe more possibilities will be created for Africa Sugar Cane companies. Kakira Sugar Works is already working on a major expansion programme in order to increase out growers land under cane to 13,000 hectares - with subsequent expansion to 18,000 hectares in the next 2-3 years. Relevant Links Agribusiness Economy, Business and Finance Europe and Africa In this respect the Madhvani Group will contribute substantially to guiding the out growers with initial seeds, crop cultivation and harvest methods. All this will lead to an annual increase of more than 160.000 tons of sugar. On the processing site Kakira Sugar Works is actually realising an important investment in the modernisation of the production plant and is creating a co -generation capacity of 21 MW of electricity, which will be delivered to the National Grid. Mr Zwinkels is a senior investment officer of the Equity Department at the Netherlands Development Finance Company FMO