Top World News

The stock market was boosted by upbeat economic reports on manufacturing and personal incomes that raised hopes for a quicker recovery.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 118.2 points, or 1.2 percent, to finish at 10,185.53. Energy stocks led the way after a strong earnings report from Exxon Mobil Corp. and a $1.54 a barrel increase in crude oil prices on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Airline stocks often fall when oil prices rise because fuel is one of their biggest costs. But the surge in energy stocks didn't hurt airlines on Monday.

The Amex airlines index rose 3.4 percent, with all 13 of its components closing higher.

Shares of American Airlines parent AMR Corp. rose 50 cents, or 7.2 percent, to $7.42, despite bad news from the Federal Aviation Administration. The FAA moved to fine AMR's American Eagle unit $2.5 million for allegedly failing to keep close enough tabs on weight and balance of baggage and other cargo, which can lead to problems controlling planes on takeoff and landing.

Continental Airlines Inc. gained 90 cents, or 4.9 percent, to $19.29; United Airlines parent UAL Corp. rose 52 cents, or 4.3 percent, to $12.75; Delta Air Lines Inc. added 40 cents, or 3.3 percent, to $12.63; Southwest Airlines Co. picked up 24 cents, or 2.1 percent, to $11.57; and US Airways Group Inc. rose 29 cents, or 5.5 percent, to $5.60.

Toyota and its dealers face the daunting prospect of being unable to sell models that made up 58% of Toyota's U.S. sales last year for an unknown period of time until the company and the U.S. government agrees on a way to prevent Toyota's accelerator pedals from sticking.

"For Toyota, basically, there is a real risk of losing potential market share, because you have companies now that are more competitive than they have been in decades," said Aaron Bragman, automotive analyst for IHS Global Insight.

Toyota's stock fell 8% or $7.01 per share on Wednesday to close at $79.77. CTS, which supplies the part believed to have caused the problem for Toyota, fell 2.4% and shares of Denso, a major Toyota supplier partly owned by Toyota, dropped 5.4%.

Bragman noted that Ford gained a full point of market share in the U.S. in 2009, and the Dearborn-based automaker is well-positioned to gain from Toyota's troubles.

John Murphy, Bank of America Merrill Lynch auto analyst, said in a report Wednesday that other brands - especially those such as Ford and Hyundai that are introducing models this year - are likely to pick up sales.

On Wednesday, Ford's stock rose 3.2% or 36 cents to close at $11.55 per share. Ford also is to report year-end earnings today.

Meanwhile, the shares of five publicly traded automotive dealership groups declined. Shares of AutoNation, the largest U.S. automotive retailer, fell 21 cents to close at $18.31 per share.

AutoNation spokesman Marc Cannon gave Toyota credit for getting information out to its dealers as quickly as possible, and for putting the consumer first.
"They are being very proactive," Cannon said.

AutoNation operates 207 franchises in the U.S., including 25 Toyota locations.

A spokesman for Bloomfield Hills-based Penske Automotive Group, which operates 39 Toyota, Lexus and Scion dealerships in the U.S., did not return a phone call Wednesday. Shares of Penske Automotive fell 74 cents to close at $14.09 per share on Wednesday.

AIG fell $1.56 to $26.50 in the four days ended Jan. 22, the ninth decline in the past 10 weeks of trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The insurer ended at $27.14 on Aug. 7, the last trading day before Benmosche replaced Edward Liddy. The shares have dropped 98 percent under the four CEOs who ran the firm since Maurice “Hank” Greenberg resigned in 2005.

AIG’s five-month slide nullifies the rally Benmosche sparked in his first weeks by promising to rebuild what was once the world’s biggest insurer. In the year before his arrival, New York-based AIG reported the biggest loss in U.S. corporate history and accepted government bailouts valued at $182.3 billion in exchange for preferred stock and debt that subordinated common stockholders.

“Regardless of who is at the helm, there are some numbers here that can’t be ignored,” said Catherine Seifert, an equity analyst with Standard & Poor’s. “If you’re going to be at the bottom end of the capital structure you need to know that there’s going to be something left for you” as a common shareholder.

Investors suffered under each CEO since Greenberg ended a reign of more than three decades amid a probe by then-New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. The stock fell by almost half in three years under Martin Sullivan before he was ousted by the board in June 2008. Robert Willumstad, whose three-month term ended when he delivered the firm to the government, saw shares drop more than 90 percent.

Out of Retirement

Liddy, called out of retirement by the government after a career at home and auto insurer Allstate Corp., reported losses of $61.7 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008 and $4.35 billion in the first quarter of 2009 before returning to profit in the second. Shares fell by a third during his tenure, which lasted less than a year.

Benmosche took control of a company whose funds had been drained by soured mortgage investments and bad derivative bets. The company was selling assets to repay its aid package, and top employees were fleeing to rivals. Some who remain are subject to pay curbs as a result of the bailout, and have been criticized by politicians and regulators who blamed the company for contributing to the credit crisis.

“Benmosche had a very tough hand,” said Paul Newsome, an analyst with Sandler O’Neill & Partners LP. “Not only did he have a company that needed a lot of work, but he was facing an extremely skeptical stock market.” Mark Herr, a spokesman for AIG, declined to comment.

ILFC

Steven Udvar-Hazy, the chief executive officer of AIG’s aircraft leasing unit, may leave the company as early as this week, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday, citing unidentified people familiar with the situation. John Plueger, International Lease Finance Corp.’s president and chief operating officer, may be named Udvar-Hazy’s successor, the newspaper said.

Udvar-Hazy, 63, was replaced last month as chairman of the business he founded 37 years ago by Douglas Steenland, a former airline CEO. AIG is considering selling or breaking up the world’s largest aircraft lessor.

Getting a Raise

Benmosche, a former CEO at life insurer MetLife Inc., negotiated a $7 million annual salary, compared with Liddy’s $1. He fought for higher pay for managers after his predecessor asked some employees to return a portion of their bonuses. Benmosche told staff that regulators were to blame for the insurer’s meltdown and said he would get tough in talks with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo over compensation.

“The worst thing that will ever happen to him is when he and I meet in the room and I close the door,” Benmosche, 65, said of Cuomo, according to a record obtained by Bloomberg. Cuomo was “unbelievably wrong” for demanding AIG employees return their bonuses and promising to publish the names of staff who didn’t comply, Benmosche said. Benmosche later apologized for the comments.

AIG under Liddy planned to repay the government’s original September 2008 bailout of $85 billion in two years and hired Paula Reynolds as chief restructuring officer to raise the funds by selling businesses and other assets. Reynolds, the former Safeco Corp. CEO who sold that firm to Liberty Mutual Group Inc., left AIG after Benmosche took over.

Benmosche, while still considering asset sales, has said he wants to slow the pace of deals to allow the units to generate profits that will boost their value. That objective is complicated by clients that have scaled back coverage in the recession and by rivals that are cutting prices to win business.

The Dow Jones closed down 2%, its worst fall since October, while Japan's Nikkei was down early on Friday.
Shares in major US banks Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Bank of America all fell.
Mr Obama - who said he was "ready for a fight" with banks - plans to limit the size of banks and impose restrictions on risky trading.
"Never again will the American taxpayer be held hostage by banks that are too big to fail," Mr Obama said.

Limiting risk taking
"While the financial system is far stronger today than it was one year ago, it is still operating under the exact same rules that led to its near collapse," Mr Obama said.
His proposals may mean that some of the biggest US banks have to be broken up.
They also include a ban on retail banks using their own money in investments - known as proprietary trading. Instead, banks would be limited to investing their customers' funds.
That attitude brought an immediate reaction from the markets.
Investment banking giant Goldman Sachs lost more than 4% despite announcing a sharp increase in profits. Bank of America fell 6.2% and shares in JP Morgan Chase were down 6.6%.
"Banking reforms do not come bigger than those proposed by President Obama," the BBC's business editor Robert Peston said.

Fighting talk
Mr Obama's move is his first proposal since Republican Scott Brown's shock victory in Massachusetts to win a Senate seat.
The Republican victory may make it harder to get Mr Obama's proposals passed in the Senate, as they are more likely to get held up in political wrangling.
"This is a political effort because of what happened in Massachusetts," said economist Peter Morici of the University of Maryland.
Banks have also been lobbying against more stringent regulation.
"If these folks want a fight, it's a fight I'm ready to have," Mr Obama vowed.
The president dubbed his proposals on limiting bank risk the Volcker rule - after Paul Volcker, one of his economic advisors and a former chairman of the Federal Reserve central bank.
The moves follow popular anger at financial institutions, who have been paying large bonuses to staff even as they accepted government bail-outs to keep them going.
Mr Obama's proposals appear to be a return to the principles underlying the Glass-Steagall Act.
That law - from the 1930s in the aftermath of the Great Depression - separated commercial and investment banking and was eventually abolished in 1999 under President Bill Clinton.
Mr Clinton's financial secretary at the time, Robert Rubin, previously worked at Goldman Sachs and went on to be an adviser to Citigroup until last year.
The latest proposals follow a $117bn (£72bn) levy on banks to recoup money US taxpayers spent bailing out the banks.
The tax will claw back some of the losses from a $700bn taxpayer bail-out of US banks known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (Tarp).
It was drawn up in the midst of the financial crisis in 2008, following the collapse of US investment bank Lehman Brothers and rescue of insurance giant American International Group (AIG).
The industry lobby group for banks suggested Mr Obama was trying to return the US to the past.
"The better answer is to modernise the regulatory framework and not take the industry and the economy back to the 1930s," said the Financial Services Roundtable, an industry group that represents large Wall Street institutions.
In the UK, City Minister Lord Myners said the US proposals were "very much in accordance with the direction we have been setting".
While shadow chancellor George Osborne said that if the Conservatives won the next general election, they would impose an identical dismantling of UK banks to those suggested by the US president.

According to global financial reporting standards, the company has reported a consolidated loss of Rs 521.7 crore against a profit of Rs 244.5 crore during the same quarter last year. However, excluding the one-time loss, DRL’s operational performance has been way above market expectations.

Net profit adjusted for impairment was Rs 230.7 crore, beating Street estimates, which expected it to be at Rs 159 crore. Profit margins also showed a marked improvement. DRL enjoyed an exclusivity period for its generic Sumatriptan during the December quarter last year leading to a high base year effect this December quarter. At Rs 1,730 crore, net revenues were down by 6% against market estimates of a 10% drop. The Street cheered the results, pushing the stock up by nearly 2% which closed at Rs 1,201.5.

DRL has fared better than the local industry. Its growth rate of 20% in the past eight months is above the industry rate of 16%. While its performance in the emerging markets of India and Russia has been the key growth driver, North America and Europe proved to be disappointing. The voluntary product recalls carried out by the company in the US market resulted in a flat growth in revenues. Going forward, its generic drug Omeprazole is likely to help ramp up its market share in the US.

DRL’s operational leverage and cost management has helped maintain its selling and other general expenses (excluding the amortisation expenses) at the same level as last year’s. Strategic changes made in senior management, mitigation of profit erosion in the German market, maintaining healthy product line in the US, increased focus on non-regulated branded markets and good operational leverage are likely to help the company achieve its target revenues of $3 billion by FY013.

When companies take their businesses out of the country, they encounter a myriad of standards, technical regulations and compliance issues, which differ from country to country. While these improve safety, health and environmental safety, they are also a significant difficulty for exporters wishing to bring products to the global market. To help them defeat these hurdles, SPRING Singapore set up the Export Technical Assistance Centre (ETAC) in 2006, in partnership with other government agencies, regulatory establishment and industry associations.

ETAC provides enterprises with information on values and conformance-related export requirements. Although ETAC focuses on the food, electrical/ electronic and environmental sectors, the centre also provides support to other industries. The ETAC team analyses new technical system to identify industry needs arising from the latest regulatory requirements, such as difficult and certification. ETAC also proactively conducts studies on existing system to assess their impact on industry and provides inputs to Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations.

Studies every time show that exporting firms are far healthier, more profitable and more competitive than their non-exporting counterparts. Even successful exporters can frequently expand their global reach by targeting new export markets or improving operations in existing export markets.

The Massachusetts Export Center is pleased to launch the Export Growth Initiative, plan designed for new and existing exporters in search of to expand their international market base. The plan focuses on four export-oriented industry clusters:

Global marketing is nothing but marketing done on national and international level and which involves understanding the similarities, dissimilarities and taking advantage of the opportunities to attain the goal. Concentrating on global marketing is as important as concentrating on domestic marketing if a company is aiming to increase sales.

Multinational marketing involves marketing in many countries. The marketing is based on the requirements of different countries and the returns are rewarding. Each region should be studied individually based on development, production and marketing. Such kinds of markets are known as region centric. Global marketing involves the whole globe. The entire world is summarized as a single market and the products that are released in the market should fit the needs of any regional marketplace. Marketers all over the world make the marketing decisions. Such a kind of market is known as geocentric.

Another key factor to the global marketing is the Internet, which introduced e-commerce. Businesses went going online and global. This encouraged the sales of the company and the figures are only increasing because of ever increasing Internet users. The geographical location of customers is no longer a hindrance. Global marketing management and business-to-business e-commerce is growing rapidly.

The world economy is expected to bounce back in 2010 with Asian economies continuing to pace global growth. Among the industrialized nations, the United States, where the financial system and labor market are showing signs of stabilization, will outpace Europe where stubbornly high unemployment is likely to sap the strength of recovery.

According to the International Monetary Fund's World Economic Outlook, the global output is expected to grow by 3.1 percent in 2010, with much of the recovery driven by emerging economies. The United Nations also expects the world economy to resume growth in 2010, but it warned that the recovery will be fragile.

On the upside, the U.N. report, World Economic Situation and Prospects for 2010, cheered increased industrial production, a rebound in global equity markets and a rise in international trade.

"This is an important turnaround after the free fall in world trade, industrial production, asset prices, and global credit availability which threatened to push global economy into the abyss of a new Great Depression in early 2009," the U.N. said.
"Our biggest challenge now is growth and bringing down unemployment". "That's our overwhelming challenge. Nothing is possible without that."

By doing so, the Fed hopes to entice Americans and U.S. businesses to boost spending, which would help the recovery.

US crude oil price faded below the key $70-a-barrel mark this week and gold slid as investors cut positions ahead of the year-end.

All of the stipulate growth will be generated by non-OECD countries, which will account for 51 per cent of global consumption by 2014.

Gold fell 1.6 per cent to $1,114 a troy ounce, down 4.1 per cent over the week, Base metals were boosted on Friday by strong Chinese output and trade data for November.

Aluminium hit the highest levels of the year at $2,280 a tonne, up 6.1 per cent this week. Copper fell 2.7 per cent to $6,850 a tonne over the week.

Cocoa prices hit 25-year highs on supply concerns with Liffe May cocoa up 1.7 per cent to £2,285 a tonne over the week.

Enveloping the universal scenario IT services is ubiquitous. Involving all aspects of life, the information sector and its various domains like software development, Search engine optimization, marketing, E-commerce, eBay research, Web design, eBay store management etc are making waves in global scenario. It's the grandeur ruling the market, and it's the ground-breaking in the competitive world of web development and other IT services.

With the E-commerce better known as Electronic commerce the internet promotion and electronic data interchange are also immerging. E-commerce is also called as business to business B2B or business to consumers B2C. With the growing world we also need to keep our pace by remaining in touch with the E-commerce.

Web design also plays a major collision on your business. It's all about design, new trends and fashion which always rolls and thus web designs needed to be updated. It should be all clear and tidy which attracts more consumers. The eBay store management is also mounting, you can sell any of your products to the worldwide users, and it gives you a strong platform to market yourself in the competitive world.

"Information technology and commerce are becoming inextricably interwoven. I don't think anybody can talk meaningfully about one without the talking about the other". Echoing the same, it's a fact that modern day businesses can't be visualized without IT services!!

Once the global business trade was restricted to small and mid level companies however the scenario is changing these days. Both large and big companies and corporations establish their offices manufacturing operations, and trade associations for making their business operations across the globe. The global nature of the companies is now letting their induction in the global share markets.

The global stock market around the globe reflects the coordination among the global corporate players. Interestingly the growing integration between each trading market is coordinated. The fluctuation in one market closely related to another in all the aspects. This economic relationship among the markets make a big impact on the stock scenarios is based on complete speculations.

The trendy heritage of the world stock markets is worth aphorism. The stock markets of the developed economies are the very decisive factor that decides the fate of the economies and also the ways in which stock trading has to be taken place. World economy is now watching these markets dancing on the finest tune of financial surges. The trade tradition and the finance culture in these global places are different from each other.

Global International is a reasonably priced investment for what seems to be an excellent return on your dollar. Now a day's people are holding on to their hard earned cash a little tighter than usual and won't give up that hundred or thousand dollars so fast. So Small investments are what you should be looking for on the internet while you're cruising.

The company has gone Global so fast because of its small capital outlay and its early success. Normally most companies would take several years to reach its growth. I've checked this company out quite thoroughly and it looks as though its Simplicity is also a very big factor. Simplicity tied to a low cost of investment is rare to find these days especially if you are a beginner entrepreneur.

When you are working with any of the companies you find on the internets that are successful keep in mind their methods. In other words if they lay out a plan of success follow it to the tee because more than likely that is the method that has gotten their customers or investors optimum return on their dollar.

This is a news feed and informational source for all things related to the coming recession which could be the greatest recession of the 21st century. Many economic advisors are warning of the biggest recession since the Great Depression of 1929 and these sentiments are echoed on this blog. We invite our readers to have an open mind while learning about this subject as the huge wealth of information can be confusing and counter-intuitive but that is the nature of the modern economy.

How Do I Protect My Savings And Investments?

This is a problem many people are asking themselves now as pensions, savings accounts and property investments all get hit by the downturn and the menace of monetary inflation. Those who have debt rather than savings are frantically trying to refinance their loans and mortgages after coming off fixed deals but despite low interest rates the safest place to be now is to have savings in safe commodities and no debt.

Hyperinflation, What It Is and How to Avoid It?

Hyperinflation also known as "Tiger Inflation" is the leading scare we have looming over the world economy, the possibility that countries throughout the world will hyperinflate their currencies away in a bid to inflate away their debts which is essentially a way of diluting all debts in a currency among all shareholders of that currency, what do I mean by shareholders? Basically anyone with any money held in that currency. A good example of this is that a dollar today would be worth 33% less if inflation went up 50% and a lot less if that was compounded each year. This is why safe commodities are the best option because they protects against hyperinflation better than any other investment in the long term.

It is important to note that what we are seeing in the global economy is not a private-sector lead bounce back, but a modest uplift in output courtesy of unprecedented fiscal and monetary measures by central banks and governments. While demand remains so weak, such support will continue to be necessary.

On bankers' payment and regulation, the robust attitude of most European nations, however, makes more sense than our own Government's more timid stance. While the investment banking arms of several banks are turning a profit, this is in large part because extraordinary help from the authorities has driven down the cost of their capital. This assistance is necessary for the good of the wider economy, but there is no justification for investment banks paying vast bonuses to their staff while they receive this special help, especially while non-financial sectors of the economy are still suffering.

Moreover, France and Germany are right that there needs to be a elementary shift away from the reckless model of lightly-regulated high finance, which did so much to generate the crisis. And, since flows of capital and bank employees are global, there needs to be global co-ordination to deliver this.

But the most critical message finance ministers need to heed today – and world leaders later this month – is of the dangers of complacency. There are some welcome signs that the pace of economic decline is slowing, even of a bottoming out to the global downturn. But this recovery, such as it is, is fragile. We are by no means out of the woods yet. The policy response of all G20 nations needs to reflect that sobering reality.

It is a borne fact that talking about worldwide business marketing is fiscally precarious especially that you are like diving into the realm of uncertainty where there are diverse cultures that have to be coped up with.

Talk to your clients

It really makes a whole lot of divergence when you personally converse with your clients. It is there that you can launch stronger ties where you can also discover what those you need to improve are. Ideally, it is performed by treating them somewhere as long as it would not be inside your office because tendency is, it can restrict them to open up and on your end, and you would not be able to achieve your goal. Simply get in touch with about 5 to 10 people by sending them a letter. When you get a favorable response, make an appointment and ask value- based questions such as the challenges they are facing and solutions for recovery.

Creative marketing campaigns

International business marketing will persistently require you to strive for innovation, this is because novelty attracts. It does not have to be a high- cost production commercial just to capture potential individuals. Think out of the box as others will say it. It does not matter what your other competitors will critique as long as you will reap the objectives of your action. The secret behind is that you understand perfectly what you are aiming for and not just for the sake of doing it. When those are done, it is high- time to get publicity.

Leverage existing relationships

Make a listing of all those that you know. Prioritize them into either A, B or C- A is for the advocates, B is for the budding supporters and C is for those you can hardly get in touch with. Send them an e-mail of everything that you have prepared so that when you will call them, you just have to ask them for numbers of those that they are acquainted with. This is one of the mediums for international business marketing that is cost- effective and high- impact.

According to its critics, the "Buy American" condition of President Obama's economic recovery package will set off a vicious cycle of 1930s-style retaliatory protectionist measures that will only push us and the rest of the world deeper into recession. Concern about a return to a version of "beggar thy neighbor" retaliatory trade policies, however, completely misses the real problem facing the global economy today.

The "Buy Keynesian" clause would let the President thread the political spine. He gets to keep the "Buy American" provision that many taxpayers (and Senators) are demanding. And, when foreign leaders accuse him of protectionism, he can rightly respond that their goods have been excluded not because they are foreign, but because their countries aren't pulling their weight in the international recovery.

More importantly, a Keynesian clause would increase the efficiency of both the U.S. and foreign stimulus packages by encouraging a virtuous circle of fiscal stimulus. Access to the U.S. stimulus expenditures increases the incentives for the rest of the world to carry out stimulus of their own. The larger the scale of these international efforts, the more effective each national stimulus plan will be.

As the world's largest economy -- with a gluttonous appetite for imports -- the United States is uniquely placed to lead the world out of a recession. Replacing "Buy American" with "Buy Keynesian" could actually go a long way toward filling the biggest hole in the current global response to the deepening recession: the lack of coordinated international fiscal policy.

Countries in the United States are the world's largest trading zones on our doorstep, there's little wonder that more and more companies are turning to export as a means of boosting their business.

Exporting however, isn't a footstep to be taken lightly and kick-starting an export initiative can be costly. The good news is that with thorough planning and the right finance partner, the rewards can be impressive.

A fundamental challenge exporters facing is cash flow. Demands on funds are huge and it's easy to find them spread more thinly than is comfortable: there's the investment required to seek out potential markets and the need to offer attractive terms of credit in order to win new contracts and customers.

Today the export procedure is quicker and Letters of Credit are largely outdated. Goods are being shipped faster and documentation often lags behind. Thus, customers are becoming less interested in doing business with suppliers that insist on using Letters of Credit because they have to commit funding to support purchases up front and deal with an excess of paperwork. To be competitive it's essential to be prepared to base your export initiative on 'open account' terms - issuing an invoice on the dispatch of goods or services and giving the customer somewhere between 30 and 90 days to pay.

But all is not lost. The key is to find the right funding partner and funding mechanism to help alleviate the risks associated with exporting and stabilize the cash flow required to fund it.

The topic of off shoring generates extreme differences of opinion among policy makers, business executives, and thought leaders. Some have argued that nearly all service jobs will eventually move from developed economies to low-wage ones. Others say that rising wages in cities such as Bangalore and Prague indicate that the supply of offshore talent is already running thin.

To a large extent, these disagreements reflect the confusion surrounding the newly integrating and still inefficient global labor market. Much as technology change is making it possible to integrate global capital markets into a single market for savings and investment, so digital communications are giving rise to what is, in effect, a single global market for those jobs that can now, thanks to IT, be performed remotely from customers and colleagues.

The newly integrating nature of this global labor market has strategic and tactical implications for companies and countries alike. Information and insight about it are sparse, however, and executives and policy makers have little of either for making the decisions they face. To provide help for governments and companies in both high- and low-wage economies, the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) analyzed the potential availability of offshore talent in 28 low-wages.

The global financial crisis, brewing for a while, really started to show its effects in the middle of 2008 and into 2009. Around the world stock markets have fallen, large financial institutions have distorted or been bought out, and governments in even the wealthiest nations have had to come up with rescue packages to bail out their financial systems.

On the other hand many people are concerned that those responsible for the financial problems are the ones being bailed out, while on the other hand, a global financial meltdown will affect the livelihoods of almost everyone in an increasingly inter-connected world. The problem could have been avoided, if ideologues supporting the current economics models weren’t so vocal, influential and inconsiderate of others’ viewpoints and concerns.

A fall in last week's claims for unemployment insurance in the US has led to a share market bounce around Asia which has also pushed the Australian market higher.

Economists are predicting that a further 175,000 Americans were put out of work in October, but this would actually be the best result in more than a year.

If the figures come in on, or better than, expectations then expect the US markets to go up, probably driving a rise in Australia on Monday, but if the figures disappoint it will probably put today's rally into reverse.

Major movers:

World Markets:

The region's other major markets were generally slightly less enthusiastic than Australia, although Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was close.

West Texas crude oil firmed slightly on the global economic optimism, reaching $US80.09 a barrel by 4:45pm, while Tapis (which more directly affects Australian petrol pump prices) also strengthened to $US82.25.
Gold remained strong at $US1,091.68 an ounce.
The Australian dollar also gained ground, as it has been doing on most recent bursts of renewed economic confidence. At 4:45pm it was worth:

As nearly everyone is attentive, there are sobering economic statistics facing our country at the present time. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the current unemployment rate in the United States is 9.6 percent (August 2009), and the unemployment rate for Native Americans is generally believed to be at least two times the national rate (according to the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development). Some sources estimate the figure of Native American unemployment to be as high as eighty or ninety percent in some states.

Thus, in the current untrustworthy state of the American national economy, it is our opportunity as Native Americans to embrace these statistics as an impetus for change. In light of the fact that a lack of capital is often cited as an obstacle in the formation of Native American businesses, the creation of small businesses can be an effective answer.

Small business growth is vital to the reinstatement of our economy, through the creation of local jobs and the stimulation of local economy. And if we consider that within the demographic of the Native American and Alaska Natives we have over two million opportunities for new small businesses, we have the prospect of truly influencing the American economy in an extremely positive way.

"Small and minority-owned businesses must play a momentous role in our efforts to restore economic growth. Small businesses employ half of the nation's private sector workforce; create a large share of the Nation's new jobs; and introduce many groundbreaking ideas into the marketplace," said President Barack Obama in October 2009.

Let us hold tightly to our heritage while we boldly reach for the future, with our inventiveness, innovation, and inspiration to guide us. With peace and perseverance, we as a nation will triumph over these trials, just as we have in the past.