News & Financial Advice

The number of unemployed in Germany fell in August to its lowest level since November 2008, thus establishing the conditions for continued growth in household spending needed to recover more balanced economy.

The Federal Labour Office said on Tuesday a drop of 17,000 job seekers in seasonally adjusted data (SDA) between July and August, whose number was reduced to 3.193 million.

This decline is however slightly less than that envisaged by economists to Reuters, who had anticipated a decline of 20,000.

In July, the decrease in the number of unemployed was 21,000 according to revised figures, against 20.000 originally announced.

The unemployment rate remained steady in August, and in line with expectations at 7.6% of the workforce.

On the employment front, Germany seems to fare better than its European partners, since the rate of unemployment in the euro area remained unchanged in July at 10%.

The German government has also been criticized by other countries, including France, who believe that Berlin does not enough to stimulate domestic demand, which would be favorable for exports of country partners.

"SUCCESS STORY"

"The impressive performance of the labor market can become a real success story if it eventually leads to a recovery in private consumption," said Carsten Brzeski, of ING Financial Markets.

"This is not only the decline in unemployment bodes well for private consumption but also job creation. Since the beginning of the year, the trend in employment is still growing," says he.

Berlin, however, reflected in an austerity plan intended to save 80 billion euros over the next four years.

"The U.S. economy is very bad right now," he told a press conference Heinrich Alt, the Federal Labour Office.

"There are a lot of risks.Until now the trend is stable but we can not ignore that the situation is more fragile than other periods of recovery. "

Economists estimate that slower growth should however not too cripple the labor market, while in the second quarter of the German economy grew at its fastest pace since the country's reunification in 1990.

"The economy will not be able to maintain these high growth rates. The pace will slow in the fall and next year.But the slowdown will not be strong enough to have a significant impact on the labor market, "says Eckart Tuchtfeld, Commerzbank.

In unadjusted data, the number of unemployed fell from 4,000 in August to 3.188 million against 3.192 million in July for an unemployment rate unchanged at 7.6%.

The Federal Office of Statistics for its part announced that the number of people working in Germany had increased from 40,296,000 in June to 40.305 million in July.

* Chart the evolution of unemployment in Germany:

r.reuters.com/nec48n

The month is September is historically the less buoyant year for Wall Street.And this year, economic indicators expected during the first days of the month will put the nerves of investors challenged at risk to initiate a new downtrend.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index lost nearly 13% since April, gradually accumulating as disappointing economic indicators which have fueled fears of "double dip" relapse into recession after the 2008 crisis -2009.

But the benchmark index of the place New York has so far found strong support around the threshold of 1,040 points, while penetration of the support triggering a wave of purchases.

The Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke reassured the markets at least temporarily, saying Friday that the Fed was ready to act if the economic situation deteriorates. But indicators coming days may revive concern.

"The indicators tend to be consistently to be below expectations," said Nick Kalivas, equity analyst for MF Global."I think that these indicators will trigger new sales next week."

Monthly statistics of the labor market expected Friday should show that 99,000 jobs have been destroyed in August, partly due to the end of temporary contracts linked to the decennial census, while job creation in the private sector should not exceed 42,000.

Until then, the ISM index of purchasing managers in industry and services will probably reflected a further slowdown in business growth.

The S & P 500 tested the threshold of 1040 points on two occasions during the past week but each time he finished the day up.This media has systematically encouraged buyers to return to the market over the past 10 months the index has not marked down so only once and briefly, in July.

DOMINATES THE SHORT TERM

The S & P 500, primary references many managers and analysts, finished Friday at 1064.59 points. If he drove the support of 1,040, it could fall in the range of 1010-1020 points.On the upside, he ran into resistance from its 14-day average at 1076.65, which limits its potential for recovery.

In the options market, this situation encourages the purchase of "put" on the S & P 500, which entitles the holders to sell futures on the index at a price fixed in advance.

"The overall feeling of investors in the options market has become very skeptical, purchases could go beyond the call buyers," said Ryan Detrick, senior technical analyst for Schaeffer's Investment.

The ratio "was able to call" used to measure changes in the general sentiment of the market, stood at 0.61 on Thursday, against 0.59 in average over the last 21 meetings.

Beyond the technical factors, investors will also monitor the statements of managers of major companies such as General Electric and Boeing at the conference "Global Industrials Unplugged" organized by Morgan Stanley.

On Friday, the semiconductor giant Intel cut its revenue forecast for the current quarter. Investors have largely ignored this warning, the Intel action ending the day up, but new estimates of this type could undermine the morale of the market.

Faced with such a combination of risk factors, many investors may take their time before returning to the market.Especially since September is historically the worst month for the three major indexes on Wall Street.

The wait will be promoted in the coming days by the prospect of a weekend of three days with the celebration of Labor Day Monday, September 6.

For Scott Marcouiller, head of technical strategy at Wells Fargo Advisors, a "rally" seems unlikely in the current context.

The growth of the U.S. economy in the second quarter was much weaker estimated initially at 1.6% annualized 2.4% originally announced cons, particularly penalized by the higher increase in imports for 26 years, published revised statistics show Friday.

Economists polled by Reuters on average expected a downward revision even more pronounced at 1.4%, mainly due to higher imports and slower recovery in business inventories. (See)

Export growth was revised to 9.1% for the second quarter, while the previous estimate reported an increase of 10.3%.Imports have them, increased by 32.4%, against 28.8% in the first estimate.

Following this publication, futures on U.S. indexes have increased their gains, while European markets are back in positive territory.

The European Commission announced that it authorized the repurchase of the French specialist of the PPE Sperian by the American conglomerate Honeywell, as the operation does not affect competition.

The transaction represents 1.4 billion dollars (1.06 billion euros), a sum which includes the takeover of Honeywell debt of 300 million euros Sperian.

The European Commission has estimated that all Honeywell-Sperian will face a significant number of competitors.

The American group, who beat the investment fund Cinven for redemption Sperian has developed on the segment of protective equipment in recent years. He acquired Norcross Safety Production including $ 1.2 billion in 2008.

EADS announced that it is more of its objectives in 2010, reinforced by the recent trade performance of Airbus, its flagship division.

The European aerospace and defense, however, reported first-half results down, therefore including exceptional negative currency effects.

During the period January to June, the adjusted operating profit – before interest, taxes, goodwill and exceptional items – EADS fell 54% to 406 million euros.Net income decreased 51% to 185 million while turnover was up 1% to 20.3 billion euros.

The evolution of exchange rate weighed on operating profit adjusted to 550 million euros.

In the second quarter alone, adjusted operating income down 51% to 323 million euros, net profit plunged 61% to 82 million and revenues fell 3% to 11.35 billion.

For this period, 14 analysts polled by Inquiry Financial Europe AB anticipated adjusted operating profit of 285 million euros and a net profit of 146 million and a turnover of 11.25 billion.

Given the high level of orders placed at Farnborough Air Show in July, Airbus now believes it could end the year with over 400 gross orders when he was 300-400 commands at beginning of year.

Deliveries should be on their side on some 500 aircraft (498 in 2009) and the manufacturer plans to increase the production rate of its single-aisle aircraft from 34 units per month at present to 40 units per month from the first quarter of 2012.

Penalized by a more difficult environment, the helicopter manufacturer Eurocopter for its part should register a level slightly lower than shipments in 2009.

EADS now expects to post revenues of more than 44 billion euros in 2010 on the basis of one euro to 1.35 dollar but maintains its objective of operating income adjusted to about one billion euros.

When presenting its first quarter results, the company said it expected to reach a turnover "broadly stable" – he had totaled 42.82 billion euros in 2009 – on the basis of a euro to $ 1.40.

Nippon Steel, the fourth largest producer of steel, has experienced an improvement in its results for the fifth consecutive quarter, but reported lower than expected given the market slowdown in growth in China.

The Japanese group has announced a recurring earnings, before taxes and exceptional items, of 61.9 billion yen (541 million euros) for the period April to June, against a loss of 56.7 billion yen a year earlier .

Its sales jumped 30% to 970.6 billion yen.

The steelmaker Nippon nevertheless intends to realize an annual profit of 250 billion yen, while the Thomson Reuters consensus I / B / E / S expects 316 billion yen.

Nippon Steel and ArcelorMittal joins said he expects a sharp drop in its third quarter results, in the grip of a slowdown in economic growth in China, a seasonal decline in activity and an increase prices of raw materials.

The sharp drop in prices in China have led steelmakers to cut production and the market could find itself in a situation of excess supply even while Beijing hardened its policy and reduced exports.

The Japanese group also announced Wednesday it would form a technical alliance with Australian BlueScope Steel for reinforced steel products for construction markets to boost sales abroad.

After the results, the title of Nippon Steel closed up 3.73%, to 306 yen.

Offer Pigasse-Bergé-Niel got the endorsement Monday of the supervisory board of the World allows both parties to enter into exclusive negotiations to resume and recapitalization of the newspaper said Monday the company director of the editors of World.

France Telecom announced earlier in the day that it would withdraw its offer of resumption of the World after the supervisory board, with the competing offer Friday received strong support from employees every day.

Two meetings were held in the afternoon.The supervisory board of the World Ltd has approved 13 votes for and 5 abstentions, while the supervisory board of the World Partners and Associates, which owns 60% of the World Ltd, has voted with 11 votes with 9 abstentions, told Reuters Gilles Van Kote of the Society of Editors of the World.

The European Commission has condemned the French Bolloré to pay a fine of 21 million euros for price fixing in the market for carbonless paper.

The Commission fined Bolloré fined 22.68 million euros in December 2001 but the company had appealed to the European Court of Justice annulled the decision in September 2009 for procedural issues.

"The Commission has re-adopted the decision by correcting the procedural error that led to the cancellation of the 2001 decision," the EU executive said in a statement.

It has reduced the original amount of the fine to reflect the cooperation of Bolloré.