News & Financial Advice

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.

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.

Ericsson, the world leader in mobile network equipment, reported second-quarter results below analysts' expectations, the Swedish group, suggesting a difficult market including the continued reluctance of operators to invest.

The telecom equipment market begins to show signs of life but the level of customer spending is still very far from what it was before the crisis.

Ericsson, which has made tens of billions of crowns in savings to cope with falling demand, said that reducing costs would continue to be his priority as business conditions remain difficult.

In the second quarter, operating profit excluding joint ventures and excluding restructuring charges, stood at 5.3 billion kronor (564 million euros) against 6.1 billion a year ago and an average forecast of analysts of 5 8000000000.

Revenues fell 8% to 48 billion crowns, while analysts had forecast on 50500000000.

On Thursday, Nokia Siemens Network (NSN), one of his main rivals, posted a decline of 5% of its turnover in the period.

Like NSN, Ericsson said its sales had been affected by supply shortages of certain components.

"We believe (the break) weighed negatively to height of three to four billion kronor on sales for the quarter," the company said in a statement.

Ericsson's gross margin, 39%, came out at a level well above expectations, the group has benefited from the effect of cost reductions and a "mix" positive activities.

Laurent-Perrier announces increase of 17.3% of its turnover in the first quarter of fiscal 2010-2011, the group enjoying champagne strong exports to the United Kingdom, the United States, the Germany and Asia.

The turnover in Q1 (April 1-June 30) reached 36.8 million euros against 31.4 million a year earlier.

The export sales have reached 69.5% of sales of the brand, a gain of 6.7 points compared to first quarter of last year.

"If it confirms the recovery in demand, growth in volumes in the first quarter should not be extrapolated over the whole year," the company said in a statement, adding nevertheless that the price / mix should gradually recover in coming quarters.

The group generates a significant portion of its revenues in the third quarter (October-December), corresponding to the festive season to season.

The results of the first half ended September 30, 2010 will be published on 1 December 2010.

The stock has increased by 24.4% since the beginning of the year, after declining 8.5% in 2009. It has a market capitalization of 400 million euros.

The Spanish bank Banesto publishes an interim result down 6.8% due to the recognition of a higher amount of provisions for bad debts, which impacted the margins of the establishment.

The Spanish bank has registered a net profit of 381.7 million euros, while analysts polled by Reuters had expected 376 million euros.

Banesto, majority owned by Spanish bank Santander and the first to publish its interim results, said it recorded $ 85 million of exceptional provisions.

The ratio of Banesto related bad loans to total loans stood at 3.48% against 3.12% at end-March, while analysts at Citi said they expect that this ratio reaches a peak during the year 2011.

The net interest income, or about what a bank earns on loans decreased costs related to its deposit, rose 0.5% to 863.6 million euros against 855 million expected by analysts.

Around 7:15 GMT, gaining 0.8%, while the Stoxx index comprising the major European banking stocks was virtually unchanged at the same moment (-0.05%).

The NYSE closed up 0.18% Monday, the Dow Jones 30 Industrial 18.24 points to 10,216.27 winner.

The S & P 500 is broader, took 0.77 points, or 0.07%, to 1078.73. The Nasdaq Composite fell on his side of 1.91 point (0.09%) to 2198.36.

These data are likely to vary even slightly.

The U.S. agency mortgage refinance Fannie Mae, which had a significant stake in the subprime crisis, said Monday in a loss of 11.5 billion dollars in the first quarter, and asked the federal Treasury to grant further 8.4 billion dollars by the end of June to offset its deficit. "Our first quarter results are due primarily to costs associated with credit, which remain high due to weaknesses in the economy and market américainde residential property," said Fannie Mae said in a statement.

The additional $ 8.4 billion requested to be added for an additional $ 15.3 billion already disbursed by the Treasury on March 31, intended to fill the deficit in December 31, 2009."Given the current trends in housing and financial markets, we continue to expect net deficits in the future, and therefore we will obtain additional funding from Treasury," the company said.

This aid, granted in exchange for preference shares held by U.S. taxpayers also costs for Fannie Mae, who had to pay first quarter dividend of $ 1.5 billion to the federal government, widening its quarterly loss Group share 13.1 billion.

The credit losses increased from the fourth quarter 2009 and first quarter 2010, from 4.1 to 5.1 billion, "reflecting the increased number of defaults, partially offset by a slight reduction in the magnitude of these losses, "the company said.

The rate of seizures has increased in the first quarter, Fannie Mae said: macroeconomic conditions and "the protracted decline in prices of residential property at the national level continue to lead to an increasing proportion of our loans go from being of default than before.

And given the minimum time for them to sell foreclosed properties (unfinished evictions, repairs, legal deadlines to allow property owners to eventually settle their debts to stay home ..), the body just to put on the market properties seizures, delaying the cash flow.

Last week, the other major parastatal mortgage refinancing, Freddie Mac, had published a quarterly loss of 7.980 billion and $ 10.6 billion requested additional assistance from Treasury.

In late March, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had estimated that the reform Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae should expect "a period of greater stability in financial markets." The Treasury had announced in late December that it would close until end 2012 loss of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

The two bodies were placed under the supervision of the U.S. government in September 2008, at the height of the crisis, when they threatened to collapse under the weight of their debt. Since then, the state has pumped hundreds of billions of dollars to keep them afloat.

How will the bailout work of the euro?

To stem the panic that erupted late last week, the states of the euro area have been working throughout the weekend and agreed on a massive rescue plan on several floors, as shown in this graphic.

The ECB breaks a taboo

It is an essential part of rescue plan devised this weekend in Brussels. While he did not hear of it, Jean-Claude Trichet has agreed that the European Central Bank buys government debt. All explanations in this article.