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| Armed men seize two airports in Ukraine's Crimea, Russia denies involvement Friday, Feb 28, 2014 01:06 PM PST  By Alissa de Carbonnel and Alessandra Prentice SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine (Reuters) - Armed men took control of two airports in the Crimea region on Friday in what Ukraine's government described as an invasion and occupation by Russian forces, stoking tension between Moscow and the West. More than 10 Russian military helicopters also flew into Ukrainian airspace over the region on Friday, Kiev's border guard service said, accusing Russian servicemen of blockading one of its units in the port city of Sevastopol, where part of Moscow's Black Sea fleet is based. Tensions have been rising on the Black Sea peninsula, the only Ukrainian region that has an ethnic Russian majority and the last major bastion of resistance to the overthrow of Moscow-backed Viktor Yanukovich as president almost a week ago. Moscow has promised to defend the interests of its citizens in Ukraine. Full Story | Top |
| Obama warns Russia of 'costs' for intervention in Ukraine Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:05 PM PST  By Steve Holland and Matt Spetalnick WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama warned Russia on Friday that military intervention in Ukraine would lead to "costs," as tension with old foe President Vladimir Putin rose in a Cold War-style crisis. "We are now deeply concerned by reports of military movements taken by the Russian Federation inside of Ukraine," he told reporters. Obama and European leaders would consider skipping a G8 summit this summer in the Russian city of Sochi if Moscow intervenes militarily in Ukraine, a senior U.S. official said. Full Story | Top |
| Detroit creditors want more time to vet city's bankruptcy plan Friday, Feb 28, 2014 06:21 PM PST  Detroit faces a long legal fight over its valuable art collection and other key matters in its historic bankruptcy case that make it imperative to push back the start of a trial on the city's debt adjustment plan, a bond insurer argued on Friday. In a filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Syncora Guarantee Inc warned that lawsuits will be filed over the Detroit Institute of Arts' collection, which the city is not selling at this point to help pay its $18 billion in debt. Syncora, which guaranteed payments on some of Detroit's bonds, and other creditors have pushed for the sale of art works to raise more cash for the city to spread among its thousands of creditors, who face steep losses in the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history. But critics of Christie's work suggested that the appraisal of only a small slice of Detroit's collection undervalued the art collection as a potential asset in helping to resolve Detroit's bankruptcy. Full Story | Top |
| Jailed Venezuela protest leader mocks Maduro's talks Friday, Feb 28, 2014 01:58 PM PST  By Andrew Cawthorne and Daniel Wallis CARACAS (Reuters) - Jailed Venezuelan protest leader Leopoldo Lopez scoffed on Friday at President Nicolas Maduro's efforts to open talks with opponents and businessman after a month of demonstrations and violence that have killed at least 17 people. Maduro, 51, seems to have weathered the worst of an explosion of protests against his socialist government that exposed deep discontent with economic problems and brought the nation's worst unrest in a decade. Some students are still setting up roadblocks and clashing with police in Caracas and the western state of Tachira. But the number of protesters has dropped, and many Venezuelans have begun heading for the beach to enjoy a long weekend for Carnival celebrations. Full Story | Top |
| U.S. GDP revised down, but hints of economic thaw emerge Friday, Feb 28, 2014 01:52 PM PST  By Lucia Mutikani WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government slashed its estimate for fourth-quarter economic growth on Friday in the latest sign of a loss of momentum, but some tentative signs emerged that suggested the worst of the slowdown may be over. Gross domestic product expanded at a 2.4 percent annual rate, the Commerce Department said, down sharply from the 3.2 percent pace it reported last month and the 4.1 percent logged in the third quarter. "I don't think the fundamentals have changed appreciably," said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody's Analytics in West Chester, Pennsylvania. "That suggests some stabilization in economic activity," said Millan Mulraine, deputy chief economist at TD Securities in New York. Full Story | Top |
| Fed may need to let inflation run hot to meet goals: Evans Friday, Feb 28, 2014 12:42 PM PST By Jason Lange NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve should be willing to let inflation temporarily run above its target level so as to more quickly bring the economy back to health, a top Fed official said on Friday, even as a second policymaker signaled the very idea left him cold. The debate, between Chicago Fed President Charles Evans and Philadelphia Fed President Charles Plosser, underscored a fundamental disagreement over the central bank's optimal approach to policy under new Fed Chair Janet Yellen. To Evans, one of the Fed's most dovish policymakers, allowing inflation to run above the Fed's 2-percent target would be a small price to pay for bringing the U.S. economy back to full employment quickly, and could even signal the Fed's commitment to making good on its goals. To Plosser, an ardent policy hawk, letting inflation rise above the target would call into question the Fed's commitment to its goals, undermining its policy effectiveness. Full Story | Top |
| Documents show 1990s effort to 'humanize' Hillary Clinton Friday, Feb 28, 2014 04:29 PM PST  By John Whitesides and Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Aides in former President Bill Clinton's White House crafted a strategy to "humanize" then-first lady Hillary Clinton and work around her "aversion" to the national media, according to documents released on Friday. The documents also detailed the first lady's struggles in the early 1990s with her healthcare task force, including worries about resistance on Capitol Hill and an aide's warning the plan could not meet a pledge to allow patients to pick their doctors, a promise that also came back to haunt President Barack Obama. The release of nearly 4,000 pages of previously sealed documents by the Clinton Presidential Library served to revisit Hillary Clinton's record and early struggles with her image as she gears up for a potential 2016 run for the presidency. An August 31, 1995, memo by Clinton's press secretary Lisa Caputo suggested she do interviews with "regional media." "Hillary is comfortable with the local reporters and enjoys speaking with them," the memo states. Full Story | Top |
| Buffett letter could show Berkshire winning streak over Friday, Feb 28, 2014 03:07 PM PST  By Luciana Lopez NEW YORK (Reuters) - A five-year bull market may have finally outdueled one of the U.S. stock market's biggest bulls, and Warren Buffett will probably tell investors on Saturday that his 43-year run of beating the Street has come to an end. By his own benchmark for performance, Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc almost certainly lagged a red-hot stock market in 2013 and probably also fell short over the previous five years, his favored timeframe for measuring the firm's return for its investors. Using the gain in Berkshire's book value per share after taxes, which Buffett traditionally contrasts with the pre-tax total return, including dividends, on the Standard & Poor's 500 Index, Berkshire will be hard pressed to match the S&P's 128.2 percent gain in the five years ended December 31, 2013. The whopping 32 percent total return on the S&P last year only makes it more likely that Berkshire's book value did not match the index's five-year performance. Full Story | Top |
| Ex-SAC trader Martoma seeks to toss insider trading conviction Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:59 AM PST  By Jonathan Stempel NEW YORK (Reuters) - Former SAC Capital Advisors LP portfolio manager Mathew Martoma asked a U.S. judge to throw out his insider trading conviction, saying federal prosecutors did not prove he committed a crime and that improper evidence and jury bias tainted the verdict. The request submitted late Thursday night in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan was expected. It followed Martoma's February 6 conviction on two counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy. "This court should enter a judgment of acquittal on all counts," Martoma, 39, told U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe, who presided over the roughly month-long trial, in the filing. Full Story | Top |
| In slight to Hollande, Berlin fetes Sarkozy Friday, Feb 28, 2014 08:18 AM PST  By Noah Barkin BERLIN (Reuters) - In his first major speech since losing the French presidency in 2012, Nicolas Sarkozy weighed in on euro zone integration, the Ukraine conflict and the risks of weak leadership in Europe to an adoring crowd of fellow conservatives in Berlin. Despite promising to leave politics for good after his bitter defeat to Socialist Francois Hollande, Sarkozy has since hinted he may return "out of duty". Before speaking at a Konrad Adenauer Foundation event on Pariser Platz near the Brandenburg Gate, he paid a visit to Angela Merkel in the Chancellery. Merkel, whose Christian Democrats (CDU) are natural allies with Sarkozy's conservative UMP, controversially refused to meet Hollande during the French election campaign. Full Story | Top |
| Mt Gox: The brief reign of bitcoin's top exchange Friday, Feb 28, 2014 08:14 AM PST  The collapse of Mt. Gox might appear sudden, but bitcoin insiders say its downfall began nearly a year ago as the virtual currency exchange tangled with regulators, split from former business partners and grappled with cyber attacks. Mt. Gox's fall lays bare the difficulties the bitcoin community faces as it tries to square its freewheeling, libertarian ideals with the rigorous regulation required in financial services and customers' needs for reliable service. Once the world's biggest bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox on Friday filed for bankruptcy protection, saying it may have lost nearly half a billion dollars worth of the virtual coins due to hacking into its faulty computer system. U.S. federal prosecutors have subpoenaed Tokyo-based Mt. Gox - and other bitcoin businesses - to seek information on a recent spate of disruptive cyber attacks that overwhelmed some exchanges and forced them to suspend withdrawals. Full Story | Top |
| Obama warns Russia of 'costs' for intervention in Ukraine Friday, Feb 28, 2014 03:59 PM PST By Steve Holland and Mark Felsenthal WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama warned Russia on Friday that military intervention in Ukraine would lead to "costs," as tension with old foe President Vladimir Putin rose in a Cold War-style crisis. "We are now deeply concerned by reports of military movements taken by the Russian Federation inside of Ukraine," he told reporters. Obama and European leaders would consider skipping a G8 summit this summer in the Russian city of Sochi if Moscow intervenes militarily in Ukraine, a senior U.S. official said. "The United States will stand with the international community in affirming that there will be costs for any military intervention in Ukraine," Obama said in the White House briefing room. Full Story | Top |
| No Iran report with new bomb research information: IAEA Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:20 AM PST  By Dan Williams and Fredrik Dahl JERUSALEM/VIENNA (Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear watchdog said on Friday it had not prepared a report with new information about suspected atomic bomb research in Iran, after Israel urged it to go public with all information it has regarding such suspicions. Israel's statement followed a Reuters report on Thursday that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had planned a major report on Iran last year that might have revealed more of its alleged activities that could be used for designing a nuclear warhead, but had held off as Tehran's relations with the outside world thawed. Sources familiar with the matter said the IAEA apparently had not gone ahead with writing the report and that there was no way of knowing what extra information might have been included in such a document, although one source said it could have added to worries about Iran. According to the sources, the IAEA was believed to have dropped the idea of a new report, at least for the time being. Full Story | Top |
| Thai protest leader says to unblock Bangkok roads, still target ministries Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:56 AM PST  By Amy Sawitta Lefevre and Pracha Hariraksapitak BANGKOK (Reuters) - Anti-government protesters will clear their camps from main roads they have blockaded in the Thai capital since mid-January but step up efforts to oust the government by trying to shut down ministries, their leader said on Friday. The protesters have been trying since November to push out Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and eradicate the political influence of her brother, ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, seen as the real power in Thailand. "We will stop closing Bangkok and give every intersection back to Bangkokians. We will stop closing Bangkok from Monday," protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban told supporters on Friday. Full Story | Top |
| 'Blade Runner' Pistorius faces day in court Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:47 AM PST  By Ed Cropley JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Olympic and Paralympic track star Oscar Pistorius will stand in a Pretoria dock on Monday to face a charge of murdering his girlfriend, opening the decisive chapter in the story of the rise and fall of one of the world's most recognizable athletes. Barring a last-minute change of heart, the 27-year-old South African will enter a plea of "not guilty", repeating his bail hearing assertions that he killed model Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine's Day 2013 after tragically mistaking her for an intruder hiding in the toilet. Or he could leave the Pretoria High Court a free man, with no more than a slap on the wrist and a suspended sentence. Prosecutors will seek to prove that Pistorius - known as "Blade Runner" after his carbon-fiber running prosthetics - fired four rounds from a 9 mm pistol through the door of the toilet adjoining the bedroom of his luxury Pretoria home in a deliberate attempt to kill whoever was lurking behind it. Full Story | Top |
| Consumer sentiment inches up in February Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:02 AM PST  Consumer sentiment rose marginally in February even as concerns about the extreme weather persisted, a survey released on Friday showed. The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan's final reading on the overall index on consumer sentiment for February came in at 81.6, slightly above the 81.2 in both the preliminary February number and the final January reading. "The most significant implication is not whether consumers have correctly assessed the weather's negative impact on the economy, but the resilience consumers have demonstrated in the face of the polar vortex as well as higher utility bills and minimal employment gains," survey director Richard Curtin said in a statement. Full Story | Top |
| Turkish opposition challenges law tightening judicial control Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:30 AM PST  By Gulsen Solaker ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey's main opposition party asked the top court on Friday to overturn a law tightening government control of the judiciary, which it sees as a bid by Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan to snuff out a corruption scandal. Hours after the law was enacted late on Thursday, Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag appointed at least nine new senior members of the judiciary. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) said the law contained many violations of the constitution, and appealed to the Constitutional Court to repeal it. Voice recordings posted on YouTube this week purporting to be Erdogan discussing financial matters with his son have piled pressure on him as he battles graft allegations, which pose one of the biggest challenges of his 11-year rule. Full Story | Top |
| Euro zone inflation stabilizes in 'danger zone' Friday, Feb 28, 2014 08:06 AM PST  By Jan Strupczewski BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Euro zone inflation stabilized in the European Central Bank's "danger zone" in February but did not fall as expected, making it less likely the ECB will loosen monetary policy further at its monthly meeting next week. European Union statistics office Eurostat estimated on Friday that consumer prices in the 18 countries sharing the euro rose an annual 0.8 percent this month. Fears the bloc may be at risk of deflation as it struggles to recover from its debt crisis have raised expectations the ECB will use interest rates or other policy tools to give the economy further support. "The higher than expected inflation numbers reduce the chances of an ECB rate cut at next week's meeting, and we maintain the view that ... the central bank will keep rates on hold," said Nick Kounis, head of macro research at ABN AMRO. Full Story | Top |
| Ex-Murdoch British CEO Brooks paid official for Saddam anthrax story Friday, Feb 28, 2014 06:44 AM PST  By Michael Holden LONDON (Reuters) - Rebekah Brooks, the ex-chief executive of News Corp.'s British newspaper arm, told a London court on Friday she had paid a public official for a story about former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein planning to attack Britain with the poison anthrax. Brooks, who is on trial on charges of sanctioning such illegal payments, said she agreed to pay for the 1998 report when she was deputy editor of Rupert Murdoch's Sun tabloid because there was an "overwhelming public interest" to do so. On Thursday, Brooks admitted she had authorized payments to public officials, something which is illegal, on a "half a dozen" occasions from 1998 to 2009, a period which covered her time as time as editor or deputy of Murdoch's British tabloids, the Sun and News of the World. Appearing for a sixth day in the witness box at London's Old Bailey court, Brooks said the public official, who was later revealed to be a chief petty officer in the Royal Navy, had called the paper about the threat from Saddam and the deadly poison anthrax. Full Story | Top |
| Russian court puts Putin foe under house arrest, bars Internet use Friday, Feb 28, 2014 04:42 AM PST  By Ian Bateson MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian court placed opposition leader Alexei Navalny under house arrest for at least two months on Friday and barred him from using the Internet or speaking to the media. The court said Navalny, an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin and a leader of anti-Kremlin protests in 2011 and 2012, had violated rules barring him from leaving Moscow. Kremlin opponents say the upheaval in neighboring Ukraine, where protests forced President Viktor Yanukovich from power after he scrapped plans for closer European Union ties to move closer to Moscow, has deepened Putin's determination to prevent any revival the earlier street demonstrations. They say Putin is also clamping down on dissent after engineering the release of long-jailed oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and two members Pussy Riot before the Sochi Olympics, which ended last week. Full Story | Top |
| EU-U.S. trade talks face growing hostility, ministers warn Friday, Feb 28, 2014 07:11 AM PST  By Robin Emmott ATHENS (Reuters) - Free-trade talks between the United States and the European Union are in danger of being derailed by populist groups opposing everything from globalization to multinationals, EU ministers and business leaders said on Friday. The rise of anti-EU parties, reports of U.S. spying in Europe and accusations that a trade pact would pander to big companies have combined to erode public support for a deal that proponents say would dramatically increase economic growth. "We are grappling with people who are anti-European, who are anti-American, who are anti-free trade, who are anti-globalization and who are anti-multinational corporations," Finland's minister for Europe and trade, Alexander Stubb, told his EU counterparts and business leaders at a meeting in Athens. With the euro zone's economy barely out of a two-year recession, EU governments see a trade deal with the United States as the best way to create jobs. Full Story | Top |
| Mt. Gox files for bankruptcy, hit with lawsuit Friday, Feb 28, 2014 11:30 AM PST  By Yoshifumi Takemoto and Sophie Knight TOKYO (Reuters) - Mt. Gox, once the world's biggest bitcoin exchange, filed for bankruptcy protection in Japan on Friday, saying it may have lost nearly half a billion dollars worth of the virtual coins due to hacking into its faulty computer system. Wearing a suit instead of his customary T-shirt, Mt. Gox's French CEO Mark Karpeles bowed in contrition and apologized in Japanese at a news conference at the Tokyo District Court, blaming his firm's collapse on a "weakness in our system", but predicting that bitcoin would continue to grow. Gregory Greene, who estimated his bitcoin stake at $25,000, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Chicago late on Thursday, saying Mt. Gox had failed "to provide its users with the level of security protection for which they paid. Baker & McKenzie, a Chicago-based law firm that represents Mt. Gox, declined to comment. Full Story | Top |
| Cyprus faces fresh bailout uncertainty after privatization vote Friday, Feb 28, 2014 06:39 AM PST  By Michele Kambas NICOSIA (Reuters) - Cyprus re-submitted a controversial privatization law to parliament on Friday in a last-ditch attempt to win support from fractious lawmakers threatening to derail its international bailout program. The 'No' vote raises the risk the island will be plunged back into fiscal turmoil just a year after the 10 billion euro lifeline from the European Union and IMF pulled it back from the brink of default. Under that plan, Cyprus must privatize its ports, telecoms and electricity companies to raise up to 1.4 billion and pay down debt by 2018. Centre and left wing parties rejected the privatization scheme. Full Story | Top |
| Israel warns Lebanon to curb Hezbollah reprisals for air strike Friday, Feb 28, 2014 03:49 AM PST  Israel warned Lebanon on Friday to prevent threatened Hezbollah retaliation for an alleged Israeli air strike on a site used by the guerrillas on the Syrian border. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied carrying out Monday's strike, in keeping with its silence on at least three such attacks over the past year targeting suspected Hezbollah-bound convoys of advanced weapons from civil war-torn Syria. In an unusually forthright public statement about the incident, Hezbollah said on Wednesday it would "choose the time and place and the proper way to respond" against Israel, with which it fought a war in south Lebanon in 2006. Israel has frequently promised to target Lebanon at large in any new conflict, noting that Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Shi'ite Muslim militia, had politicians in the Beirut government. Full Story | Top |
| China's central bank opens liquidity front in hot money war Friday, Feb 28, 2014 02:27 AM PST  By Pete Sweeney and Lu Jianxin SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China's central bank delivered two major surprises to investors this week: it engineered a sharp decline in the yuan against the dollar and at the same time relaxed its tight grip on money markets that had kept interest rates firm. In effect, the central bank was playing bad cop with speculators in the foreign exchange market to try to shake out one-way appreciation bets, while making nice with money market traders. That was a marked change from December and January when the regulator appeared deaf to howls of pain emerging from China's money market as interbank lending rates spiked, rattling both domestic and global investors. "The PBOC has suddenly become surprisingly soothing, and that has resulted in a great improvement in money market sentiment," said a trader at a Chinese commercial bank in Shanghai, although he questioned how long the new environment would last. Full Story | Top |
| U.S. staring contest with Japan stretches out Pacific trade pact Thursday, Feb 27, 2014 10:01 PM PST  By Krista Hughes WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A standoff between the United States and Japan is holding up talks on a sweeping Pacific free trade pact and a lack of authority to push an eventual deal through the U.S. Congress without amendment may be undercutting Washington's hand. After weekend talks in Singapore, including two separate sessions between Japan and the United States, Japanese Economics Minister Akira Amari said "considerable gaps" remained with the United States on bread-and-butter issues like farm tariffs. Other officials at the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) talks, which aim to create a free trade zone spanning 12 countries and nearly 40 percent of the global economy, noted the impasse between the two biggest economies in the bloc. "What happens between Japan and the U.S. is pretty key because they are the big players," Australian Trade Minister Andrew Robb told CNBC television, estimating that countries were about 80 percent done on market access issues, which include the tariffs and quotas causing much of the U.S.-Japan tension. Full Story | Top |
| Main Israel lobby seeks to regain footing as Netanyahu visits U.S Thursday, Feb 27, 2014 10:05 PM PST  By Matt Spetalnick and Jeffrey Heller WASHINGTON/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - For years, Israeli leaders visiting Washington have been boosted by America's main pro-Israel lobby, its influence on U.S. Middle East policy long accepted as a matter of conventional wisdom. But when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses an annual convention of Israel's U.S. supporters next week, he will find the group trying to show it has not lost its touch after the White House blocked its push for Congress to impose new Iran sanctions. While no one doubts the American Israel Public Affairs Committee remains a potent political force, AIPAC - and the Israeli government it seeks to bolster in Washington - can ill afford any perceptions of weakness in advancing its agenda at such a critical juncture in U.S.-Israeli relations. The largest pro-Israel lobbying group will gather at a time when its conservative leadership - not unlike the right-wing Israeli premier - are at odds with President Barack Obama over his diplomatic strategy for resolving the West's nuclear standoff with Iran, Israel's arch-foe. Full Story | Top |
| Baghdad motorbike blast, other attacks kill 52 in Iraq Thursday, Feb 27, 2014 10:56 PM PST  By Kareem Raheem BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least 52 people were killed Thursday as a motorcycle rigged with explosives detonated in Baghdad's Sadr City and militants targeted mostly Shi'ite neighborhoods around the country. Blood covered the ground, storefront windows were shattered and shoes and motorcycle parts were strewn around the market, according to a Reuters correspondent at the scene. "I was hit in my face and my hands and when I got up, everyone was screaming and running towards me away from the blast." It was not clear who was behind the bombing but violence against Shi'ites is often blamed on the Sunni Muslim Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), an al Qaeda-linked group. Baghdad has been hit by wave after wave of bombings since April as the precarious peace enjoyed since the end of Iraq's sectarian war in 2008 has unraveled. Full Story | Top |
| Panama Canal, consortium reach preliminary deal to finish work Thursday, Feb 27, 2014 08:41 PM PST  By Lomi Kriel PANAMA CITY (Reuters) - The Panama Canal and a Spanish-led consortium expanding the major maritime artery have reached a preliminary deal to complete work on a project stymied in a row over $1.6 billion in cost overruns, the canal's administrator said on Thursday. The deal foresees the consortium, which is led by Spanish builder Sacyr alongside Italy's Salini Impregilo, finishing work by December 2015. The dispute has fanned fears of delays that could cost Panama millions of dollars in lost shipping tolls. "We have reached a conceptual agreement that protects the interests of the Panama Canal," Panama Canal Administrator Jorge Quijano said in a statement. Full Story | Top |
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