Republicans still fighting to repeal Obama’s health rules January 3, 2011 REPUBLICANS in the House of Representatives plan to hold a vote this month to repeal President Barack Obama’s healthcare overhaul and say they have nearly enough support to override a presidential veto of the repeal, a top lawmaker said yesterday. “Unpopularity numbers are as high as 60 per cent across the country,” Fred Upton, the [...]
No bail granted to US woman accused of insider trading January 3, 2011 A FEDERAL magistrate refused to grant bail on Monday to a California woman charged with leaking inside information about technology companies. Prosecutors accuse Winifred Jiau of selling inside information about publicly traded companies, including computer chipmakers Marvell Technology Group and Nvidia to hedge funds, including the founder of a New York fund that prosecutors did [...]
OIL PRICES HIT TWO-YEAR HIGH January 3, 2011 Oil prices rose to a 27-month peak yesterday as upbeat European and US. manufacturing data and forecasts for cold weather reinforced optimism about economic and energy demand growth. US crude oil for February delivery rose 17 cents to settle at $91.55 (£89.86) a barrel, its highest settlement since early October 2008, after earlier rising as [...]
Market for private tech firms soars January 3, 2011 A GROWING and largely unregulated market in privately owned shares has sprung up as technology firms continue to rise in value exponentially. Investors are clamouring to own a stake in the next major internet firm before they are publically traded, driving the biggest surge in demand for privately-owned tech companies since the dotcom boom. Facebook [...]
iPhone alarm causes new year headache for Apple January 3, 2011 ALARMS failed for a third day for thousands of iPhone users yesterday, despite assurances from manufacturer Apple that the device would fix itself. Non-recurring alarms on the smart phone suffered a New Year bug that prevented the wake-up calls from working. The makers of the smart phone assured users the phones would work from yesterday, [...]
Buying up tech for a quick buck January 3, 2011 GOLDMAN Sachs and Digital Sky Technologies have shocked the investment world by swallowing a $50bn valuation for social networking site Facebook. But few were immediately prepared to dispute the price tag with Wall Street’s most prestigious investment bank: broken down per user, it doesn’t sound quite so outrageous, at $100 a head. After all, no [...]
Fiat’s shares rally after split as firm eyes Chrysler stock January 3, 2011 SHARES in a slimmer Fiat and sister company Fiat Industrial made a choppy debut on the Milan market yesterday, while chief executive Sergio Marchionne said Fiat could increase its stake in Chrysler past 50 per cent this year. Fiat SpA, which contains Fiat’s car and engine business, opened at €7.03 (£6.07) yesterday, while Fiat Industrial [...]
Toshiba eyes bite from Apple January 3, 2011 TOSHIBA is making its foray into the tablet war, offering a 10-inch device it says will be comparable in price to Apple’s iPad. The Toshiba Tablet, which will be available in the first half of 2011 and run Google’s forthcoming Honeycomb version of the Android operating system, is targeted at consumers. Like other touchscreen tablets, [...]
Expedia shares sink as it drops American Airlines January 3, 2011 THE shares of online travel agencies Expedia and Orbitz fell yesterday after Expedia dropped American Airlines tickets from its offerings. Expedia called its weekend action a response to the airline’s new “anti-consumer” and “anti-choice” commercial strategy. Expedia shares fell 2.7 per cent to $24.41 (£15.76) while Orbitz shares slid 3.2 per cent to $5.41. Expedia’s [...]
Attendances in Hollywood take a dive in 2010 January 3, 2011 LAST year proved a disappointing year for Hollywood, when higher prices for 3D movies failed to offset a decline in attendance. The number of tickets sold in 2010 slid about 5.4 per cent from 2009, according to box office analysts at Hollywood.com. It marked the biggest percentage drop since 2005 when attendance tumbled 8.1 per [...]
