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| BP wins reprieve over Gulf spill payouts: U.S. appeals court Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 08:04 PM PDT  By Jonathan Stempel (Reuters) - BP Plc won a legal reprieve in its effort to force the administrator of a settlement related to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill to tighten standards in assessing claims, potentially sparing the oil company billions of dollars of extra costs. A divided 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans on Wednesday directed U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier, who in March had approved administrator Patrick Juneau's evaluation methods, to take a fresh look at which claims are legitimate. ... Full Story | Top |
| Firms controlled by Asia's richest man face Australian tax fight Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 08:00 PM PDT  SYDNEY (Reuters) - The Australian Tax Office is pursuing unpaid taxes from companies controlled by Asia's richest man, Li Ka-shing, that relate to profits made in the country's power, gas and water industries. The Federal Court recently ruled against two companies related to Li's Cheung Kong (Holdings) Ltd , ordering they pay A$776 million ($726.92 million) in unpaid tax and penalties. ... Full Story | Top |
| BP's well control exec says he was unprepared for U.S. Gulf blowout Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 03:46 PM PDT  By Kathy Finn NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - BP's manager in charge of controlling the Macondo blowout in 2010 was never trained to permanently plug a ruptured oil well and said in court on Wednesday the British company was not fully prepared for the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history. On day three of the second phase of a federal trial in New Orleans over the accident in the Gulf of Mexico, BP's James Dupree also said "yes" when asked if the company was "starting from scratch" when it scrambled to stop the leak. The U.S. District Court trial could lead to fines of more than $17 billion. ... Full Story | Top |
| U.S. companies warn of delays, furloughs from shutdown Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 03:39 PM PDT  By Alwyn Scott NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. government shutdown is beginning to hit the factory floor, with major manufacturers like Boeing Co and United Technologies Corp warning of delays and employee furloughs in the thousands if the budget impasse persists. Companies that rely on federal workers to inspect and approve their products or on government money to fund their operations said they are preparing to slow or stop work if the first government shutdown in 17 years continues into next week. ... Full Story | Top |
| Brazil's Odebrecht bets on Mexico, eyes oil reform Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 03:17 PM PDT  By Ana Isabel Martinez and Elinor Comlay MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Brazilian conglomerate Odebrecht has an $8.1 billion investment plan to expand in Mexico's petrochemical and infrastructure sectors, the chief executive of its Mexican business said on Wednesday. "We expect strong growth in Mexico in the next few years," Luis Weyll, chief executive of Odebrecht's Mexican operation, told Reuters in an interview. ... Full Story | Top |
| U.S. expels three Venezuelan diplomats in tit-for-tat move Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 02:53 PM PDT  By Andrew Cawthorne CARACAS (Reuters) - Washington has expelled Venezuela's highest-ranking diplomat in the United States and two others from its embassy in retaliation for Venezuela's booting out three American diplomats accused of fomenting sabotage, both governments said on Wednesday. The flare-up appears to derail some tentative moves to improve relations between Caracas and Washington since President Nicolas Maduro took over this year from the late socialist leader Hugo Chavez, whose 14-year rule was halted by cancer. ... Full Story | Top |
| TSX steady as U.S. shutdown hits energy, boosts gold Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 02:18 PM PDT  By John Tilak TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada's main stock index was little changed on Wednesday as a U.S. government shutdown hit the energy and financial sectors, but boosted the bullion price and gold-mining stocks. A day after The Democratic-led U.S. Senate voted to kill Republicans' latest attempts to modify an emergency government funding bill, hopes the debt crisis would be resolved soon began to dwindle. The uncertainty spurred a jump in gold, which is seen as a safe-haven asset, as investors placed bets on the commodity. Gold stocks gained as a result. ... Full Story | Top |
| TransCanada says Keystone leg to start on time; Brent premium shrinks Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 02:17 PM PDT By Nia Williams and Matthew Robinson CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - The southern portion of TransCanada Corp's Keystone XL oil pipeline is 95 percent complete and the company is focused starting the line by the end of 2013, a TransCanada spokesman said on Wednesday. Rumors that the line's start might be delayed into 2014 have dogged the North American crude market in recent weeks. TransCanada's comments that the line would start on schedule helped narrow international Brent crude's premium to U.S. oil futures by around 70 cents to around $5.13 in afternoon trade. ... Full Story | Top |
| Testing on Keystone southern leg expected in November: TransCanada Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 01:42 PM PDT CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - TransCanada Corp expects testing on its Keystone XL crude pipeline to be completed in early November and it will begin filling the line for the first time shortly afterwards, a spokesman said on Wednesday. Major construction of the 700,000 barrel per day pipeline from Cushing, Oklahoma, to Nederland, Texas, is expected to be completed by the end of October, spokesman Shawn Howard said in a statement. "Commissioning of the pipeline is already underway and is expected to be completed in early November. Line fill can begin shortly thereafter. ... Full Story | Top |
| Exercise 'as good as medicines' in treating heart disease Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 01:06 PM PDT By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - Exercise may be just as good as medication to treat heart disease and should be included as a comparison when new drugs are being developed and tested, scientists said on Wednesday. In a large review published in the British Medical Journal, researchers from Britain's London School of Economics and Harvard and Stanford universities in the United States found no statistically detectable differences between exercise and drugs for patients with coronary heart disease or prediabetes, when a person shows symptoms that may develop into full-blown diabetes. ... Full Story | Top |
| Brazil's anti-spying Internet push could backfire, industry says Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 11:55 AM PDT By Esteban Israel and Alonso Soto SAO PAULO/BRASILIA (Reuters) - For tech companies in Brazil, the government's decision to target their operations in response to U.S. spying is about as smart as sending an angry email in the heat of an argument. President Dilma Rousseff's plan to force Internet companies to store user data inside the country will not fix Brazil's security concerns and could instead send costs soaring and hurt future investments in a key emerging market for companies like Google, Facebook and Twitter, industry executives and analysts say. ... Full Story | Top |
| Mexican conservatives show openness on reform tied to energy bill Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 09:50 AM PDT By Dave Graham MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's main opposition party has signaled it is ready to compromise over demands for electoral reform that risk impeding a government bill to liberalize the oil industry. Last month, the conservative National Action Party (PAN) proposed an electoral reform that seeks to curb the power of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, which has dominated Mexican politics for most of the past century. ... Full Story | Top |
| Billionaire rocketeers duke it out for shuttle launch pad Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 09:39 AM PDT  By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - Four decades ago, NASA's Launch Complex 39A was at the center of the Cold War race to the moon. Now the mothballed launchpad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which dispatched Neil Armstrong and his crew on their historic Apollo 11 mission in 1969, is the focus of a battle of another sort, between two billionaire techies seeking to dominate a new era of private space flight. ... Full Story | Top |
| Foreign investors seen warming to Nigeria's power sector: official Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 08:37 AM PDT By Tim Cocks LAGOS (Reuters) - The initial sell-off of state power assets, designed to end decades of electricity shortages, mostly attracted local oligarchs, while foreign firms with the technical know-how shied away from the risks of doing business in Nigeria. But that may be changing, the chairman of the presidential task force on power Bekindo Dagogo-Jack told Reuters on Tuesday. ... Full Story | Top |
| Hungary flags possible legal action against Croatia over MOL Wednesday, Oct 02, 2013 08:15 AM PDT By Krisztina Than BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Hungary may take legal action against Croatia in a long-running dispute over oil and gas group MOL's investment in Croatian peer INA, the Hungarian government said on Wednesday after Croatia issued an arrest warrant for MOL's chief executive. Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government, the largest single shareholder in MOL, said it would ask MOL's management to consider selling its near-50 percent stake in INA to the Croatian government or a third party, after what it said were "unacceptable" steps taken by Zagreb against MOL. ... Full Story | Top |
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