The eastern European country met the terms of its 5 billion-euro accord by narrowing its budget deficit to 4.35 percent of gross domestic product last year from 6.5 percent in 2010, Franks said at the end of a two-week visit to the capital Bucharest to conduct the fourth review of Romania

Anheuser-Busch InBev this week is rolling out Bud Light Platinum, an upscale version of its best-selling label. It’s the brewer’s latest bid to pump up flagging sales of its flagship brand, and to counter liquor sales that are taking a bite out of beer industry-wide.

Platinum, which hit the shelves in St. Louis on Monday, has been in the works for four years, said Mike Sundet, A-B’s senior director for Bud Light marketing. Geared to be a higher-end version of its namesake, it is still a clear light lager, though one with considerably more punch than Bud Light - 6 percent alcohol by volume compared to 4.2. It’s a bit sweeter, and a bit smoother. And it’s designed for drinking not so much around the backyard grill but in the club, or at least a classy bar.

“It’s higher-end. It’s sophisticated,” Sundet said. “There’s a time and a place where consumers are looking for drinks that make them feel like they’re stepping up.”

The beer comes in a distinctive, cobalt blue bottle. Its tag line is “top-shelf taste.” It is being launched with two 30-second ads early in Sunday’s Super Bowl, one which features a roomful of diverse, attractive young professionals sipping Platinum at an after-hours office party, complete with a DJ playing a track by Kanye West.

Platinum is a clear play for a demographic that has been bypassing beer in favor of the hard stuff more and more lately, said Ben Steinman, publisher of Beer Marketer’s Insights.

“They’re going after the spirits drinker, there’s no question about that,” he said. “It’s a very interesting play.”

For the past decade or so, spirits have been eating into the market for beer, especially so-called “premium” lagers such as Budweiser and Bud Light. Liquor sales now make up more than one-third of the U.S. alcohol market, up from 28 percent in 2000, according to research firm Discus. Beer’s share has fallen below 50 percent. Add in the fast growth of craft beers, and it’s no surprise that sales of A-B’s big brands have been slipping.

Platinum is “definitely not a craft beer,” Sundet said. A-B has been trying to tap that market with its new Shock Top line and with deals like last year’s acquisition of craft label Goose Island.

The new brew, Sundet says, is targeted more at people who have shifted to drinking spirits.

That could prove to be a good strategy, said David “Bump” Williams, a longtime industry analyst.

“If it’s their intention to try and get some spirit shoppers back into beer, I think this could be it,” he said. “Bud Light Platinum has a pretty good shot.”

The track record for these Bud Light brand extensions is rather mixed.

A-B InBev launched Bud Light Lime in 2008, and it sells well, particularly in the summer months. It notched 1.77 million barrels in sales in 2010, according to Beer Marketer’s Insights, good for 1 percent of the U.S. market.

A year later, out came Bud Light Golden Wheat, a more direct challenge to successful beers such as Miller Coors’ Blue Moon short term personal loans. It never caught on with drinkers, selling at its peak just a few hundred thousand barrels. It’s now nearly absent from shelves, and will be discontinued as Platinum ramps up, Sundet said.

“We’re going to continue to try new things,” he said. “Some are going to succeed. Some aren’t.”

NO CHEAP ENDEAVOR

Launching these beers isn’t cheap. Sundet wouldn’t say how much A-B InBev will spend to market Platinum, but the official kickoff comes with two ads during the Super Bowl, where a 30-second spot averages $3.5 million. And that’s just for starters. There will be billboards and big events - like last week’s St. Louis launch party at the Chase Park Plaza’s Starlight Room and a happy hour for Wall Street traders on Wednesday - buzz on the internet and a barrage of TV and radio ads to come. Steinman estimates A-B InBev shelled out at least $30 million apiece marketing Bud Light Lime and Golden Wheat in their launch years, and a similar plan for Platinum is likely.

“Platinum will be out there. ‘Ubiquitous’ could be just a slight exaggeration,” he said. “The A-B distribution network still absolutely has the capability to push it. Retailers are interested in it. It’s going to get TV advertising and support.”

But however much A-B InBev may push Platinum in the next few months, the true test will come later. Will people buy that second six-pack once the novelty wears off? Will they actually order it instead of a gin and tonic?

It’s far too soon to know. While Platinum started to hit shelves in Texas and a few other markets last week, its national rollout began Monday.

Here in St. Louis Platinum displays started popping up at grocery stories by Tuesday and there 12-packs stacked seven-high at Randall’s Wine and Spirits in south St. Louis. But several bars along Washington Avenue downtown said they weren’t carrying the new beer just yet.

At The Over/Under Bar and Grill, general manager Brian McAfee was taking a wait-and-see approach before deciding how much space he would give to the blue bottles in the refrigerator behind the bar.

“We’ll definitely try some out,” he said. “But we may wait until people start asking for it.”

A-B InBev hopes a lot of people do, said Williams, for it has much riding on Platinum. It’s their shot to bite back at spirits, to woo drinkers who have turned away from beer, to show they can produce a new product just as well as their rivals at MillerCoors. And it’s obvious the brewery is putting a lot into its new brand, from the beer to the ads to the stuff consumers don’t see.

“The wholesalers are doing their job. The packaging folks have done a phenomenal job developing a beautiful package. Everything’s good,” he said.

“Now, is it what the consumer wants?”

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The automaker, which includes the Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep brands, earned $183 million in 2011, compared with a loss of $652 million in the prior year.

And the company said that even better times are ahead, as it forecast it will make about $1.5 billion this year, with an 18% jump in revenue.

Chrysler took a charge of $551 million during the year related to refinancing in order to pay off the higher-interest loans it received from the U.S. and Canadian governments during the 2009 bailout. Despite the loan repayment, taxpayers lost about $1.3 billion of the $12.5 billion in bailout funds Chrysler received in 2009.

Chrysler posted a 24% jump in U.S. auto sales in the year, leading the way to a 22% increase in sales worldwide to 1.86 million vehicles. Revenue jumped 31% in the year to just under $55 billion.

And 2012 sales got off to a good start as the company also announced Wednesday that it had a 44% increase in U.S. sales in January compared to a year ago. It was the largest U.S. sales volume in a January since 2008.

The company reported fourth-quarter net income of $225 million, a turnaround from the net loss of $199 million a year earlier and the company’s most profitable quarter since it emerged from bankruptcy.

There are no analysts’ forecasts for the company’s results, since its stock isn’t publicly traded. Besides Fiat’s controlling stake in the company, the rest of the shares are held by union-controlled trust funds set up to pay for retiree health care costs.

Ford Motor (, Fortune 500) has already reported its biggest profit since 1998. General Motors (, Fortune 500), which also went through a bankruptcy and bailout in 2009 along with Chrysler, is expected to report improved earnings later this month. That will make it the first year since 2004 that all three major U.S. automakers will be profitable at the same time.

The last time Chrysler Group reported an annual profit was when it was a unit of DaimlerChrysler in 2005, when the Chrysler unit of that company reported income of $2.02 billion. The company last reported an annual profit as an independent company was in 1997, just before it was purchased by Daimler AG.

The Big Three all also gained U.S. market share in 2011, the first time that has happened since 1988. While U.S. auto sales rebounded in 2011 to 12.8 million vehicles, they were still far below pre-recession levels of between 16 million to 17 million a year.

But the reorganization of 2009, when the automakers shed excess capacity, dealerships and — in the case of GM and Ford — their weaker brands have allowed the industry to make money at far lower levels of sales. A few years earlier, they were all losing money despite much larger sales volumes. 

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Late Monday, following the agreement by a large majority of countries in the European Union to sign a new treaty designed to stop overspending in the eurozone, Greece’s Prime Minister Lucas Papademos indicated that progress was being made.

“It is likely that the market will initially cheer an agreement should it be reached reflecting reduced concerns that Greece will default disorderly in March,” said Lee Hardman, an analyst at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ.

Though Greece remains the epicenter of Europe’s debt crisis, leaders are pushing ahead with other plans to tie economies together. The new treaty, commonly known as the fiscal compact, was agreed at a summit. Only Britain and the Czech Republic opted out of the deal that is meant to make it more difficult for countries to run up massive debts, like the ones that are currently roiling the 17-nation eurozone.

The hope among participants is that the tighter rules will restore confidence in their joint currency and convince investors that all of them will get their debts under control. For now, investors appear to be giving European policymakers the benefit of the doubt especially as there are hopes a second bailout of Greece will agreed alongside a debt-reduction deal between the country and its private creditors, possibly as soon as this week.

In Europe, the FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was up 0.9 percent at 5,719 while Germany’s DAX rose 1 percent to 6,508. The CAC-40 in France was 1.2 percent higher at 3,305.

Wall Street was poised for a solid opening _ Dow futures and the broader S&P 500 futures were both up 0.5 percent.

The improvement in sentiment was evident in the currency markets too where the euro was up 0.4 percent at $1.3193. The euro often garners support when investors look to take on more risk.

Despite the more optimistic backdrop Tuesday, Europe’s debt woes remain the main worry in the markets. A growing fear is that Portugal may also need to get private creditors to reduce their debts, even though Europe’s leaders say Greece’s debt-reduction deal is a one-off. Portugal’s borrowing costs have been rising consistently to record highs over recent days as the economy shows few signs of improving

“The market also has Portugal in its spotlight as regards the potential default risk, and the Portuguese 10-year yield opened just above the 18 percent level this morning,” said Neil MacKinnon, global macro strategist at VTB Capital.

Earlier in Asia, solid Japanese industrial data helped stocks rally.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.1 percent to 8,802.51 after data showed December industrial activity rose 4 percent over the previous month. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 1.1 percent to 20,383.3 and Seoul’s Kospi was up 0.8 percent at 1,955.79.

China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite Index was up 0.3 percent at 2,292.61 ahead of Wednesday’s release of a key manufacturing index. Investors are hoping for a loosening of credit curbs if it shows activity is slowing amid lackluster global demand.

Oil prices tracked equities higher _ benchmark oil for March delivery was up 98 cents to $99.76 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

____

Joe McDonald in Beijing contributed to this report.

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]]> http://businesstorrents.com/african-union-urges-increased-intra-regional-trade-to-help-economic-growth-bloomberg/feed/ http://businesstorrents.com/obama-putting-colleges-on-notice-on-high-tuition/ http://businesstorrents.com/obama-putting-colleges-on-notice-on-high-tuition/#comments Sat, 28 Jan 2012 08:52:02 +0000 Avensis http://businesstorrents.com/obama-putting-colleges-on-notice-on-high-tuition/ President Barack Obama fired a warning at the nation’s colleges and universities on Friday, threatening to strip their federal aid if they “jack up tuition” every year and to give the money instead to schools showing restraint and value.

Obama can’t proceed, though, without the OK from Congress, where the reaction of Republican lawmakers ranged from muted to skeptical. Higher education leaders worried about the details and the threat of government overreach, and one dismissed it as mere election-year “political theater.”

Average tuition and fees at public colleges rose 8.3 percent this year and, with room and board, now exceed $17,000 a year, according to the College Board.

Obama delivered his proposal with campaign flair, mounting a mainstream appeal to young voters and struggling families. He said higher education has become an imperative for success in America, but the cost has grown unrealistic for too many families, and the debt burden unbearable.

“We are putting colleges on notice,” Obama told an arena packed with cheering students at the University of Michigan.

“You can’t assume that you’ll just jack up tuition every single year. If you can’t stop tuition from going up, then the funding you get from taxpayers each year will go down.”

Obama is targeting only a small part of the financial aid picture _ the $3 billion known as campus-based aid that flows through college administrators to students. He is proposing to increase that amount to $10 billion and change how it is distributed to reward schools that hold down costs and ensure that more poor students complete their education.

The bulk of the more than $140 billion in federal grants and loans goes directly to students and would not be affected.

Rising tuition costs have been attributed to a variety of factors, among them a decline in state dollars and competition for the best facilities and professors. Washington’s leverage to take on the rising cost of college is limited because American higher education is decentralized, with most student aid following the student. And that’s not counting the legislative gridlock.

“If you were a betting person, you would not bet on it getting done, simply because the political atmosphere in Washington is so poisonous,” said Terry Hartle, senior vice president at the American Council on Education, an organization that represents colleges in Washington.

Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., chairman of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said Obama put forward “interesting ideas that deserve a careful review.” But Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., who leads a House panel with jurisdiction over higher education, said Obama’s plan should have tackled federal regulations that she said contribute to the problem.

The top Democrat on the House education committee, Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., said Congress has bipartisan concern about the rising costs of college and thinks the president’s plan will open up a conversation about the problem. Some Republicans in the past, including Rep. Buck McKeon of California, have offered proposals similar to the president’s.

Others were sharper in their critique.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., a former education secretary, questioned whether Obama can enforce any plan that shifts federal aid away from colleges and universities without hurting the students it is meant to help. “The federal government has no business doing this,” he said.

Enacted or not, Obama’s plan may have the kind of popular appeal he can use in the campaign.

In Ann Arbor, he soaked up the cheers of students as he outlined the agenda from his State of the Union speech, and gave a shout out to the popular quarterback of the school’s football team. And Obama used the college-aid matter to put the onus for action on Republicans, again painting them as obstructionists and himself as the fighter for the middle class.

Mary Sue Coleman, president of University of Michigan, said schools should be challenged to find ways to restrain costs, but they can’t continue to make up for state cuts. Money for state universities in Michigan dropped by 15 percent in this year’s state budget, and many _ including the University of Michigan _ raised tuition to help make up for the lost support.

Obama challenged states to be more responsible, too.

“He recognizes every part of it,” Coleman said. “That’s what was so powerful about the speech.”

Kevin Carey, policy director at the independent Education Sector think tank, said higher education leaders will surely detest Obama’s plan even if they do not say so directly.

“Instead, they’ll work behind the scenes to kill it,” Carey predicted.

University of Washington President Mike Young said Obama showed he did not understand how the budgets of public universities work. Young said the total cost to educate college students in Washington state, which is paid for by both tuition and state government dollars, has actually gone down because of efficiencies on campus. While universities are tightening costs, the state is cutting their subsidies and authorizing tuition increases to make up for the loss.

“They really should know better,” Young said. “This really is political theater of the worst sort.”

Obama also wants to create a “Race to the Top” competition in higher education similar to the one his administration used on lower grades. He wants to encourage states to make better use of higher education dollars in exchange for $1 billion in prize money. A second competition called “First in the World” would encourage innovation to boost productivity on campuses.

Obama is also pushing for the creation of more tools to help students determine which colleges and universities have the best value.

Michigan was Obama’s last stop on a five-day trip to sell his State of the Union agenda in politically important states.

The White House has begun facing criticism from Republicans and daily questions from reporters about the blurring of Obama’s governing and campaign-style events. Presidential spokesman Jay Carney said Obama went before Michigan students to promote a policy idea.

Said Carney: “We’re not going to tell people not to applaud.”

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Durable goods orders climbed 3.0 percent, the Commerce Department said on Thursday. Economists had forecast orders rising 2.0 percent.

Durable goods range from toasters to big-ticket items like aircraft which are meant to last three years and more.

Orders last month were buoyed by 5.5 percent increase in bookings for transportation equipment as orders for civilian aircraft surged 18.9 percent. Boeing received 287 orders for aircraft during the month, according to the plane maker’s website, up from 96 in November.

Non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, a closely watched proxy for business spending plans, advanced 2.9 percent.

Business spending, which has helped the economy to recover from the 2007-09 recession, had been showing signs of cooling but December’s rebound in new orders suggested corporations might be growing more willing to invest.

“What it does tell you about going into the new year is that there’s some momentum here,” said Jacob Oubina, an economist at RBC Capital Markets in New York.

Also, shipments of non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, which go into the calculation of gross domestic product, rose 2.9 percent after declining 1.0 percent in November.

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Graphic on jobless claims:

link.reuters.com/xah36s

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Investors in U.S. stock futures appeared to take little notice of the data, with prices slightly higher. U.S. Treasury debt prices pared gains modestly no teletrack payday loans.

Increased consumer spending and efforts by companies to restock their shelves likely led the U.S. economy to accelerate at the end of 2011 although many economists expect some of that strength to wane early this year.

A report due Friday is expected to show the economy grew at a 3.0 percent annual rate in the fourth quarter, up from 1.8 percent in the previous period.

The proxy for business spending plans had dropped 1.2 percent in November and 0.9 percent in October. Economists’ had expected a 1.0 percent gain last month.

Orders for motor vehicles edged up 0.6 percent. Excluding transportation, orders rose 2.1 percent.

In a separate report, Labor Department data showed new U.S. claims for unemployment benefits rising last week but the underlying trend continued to point to improving labor market conditions.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 21,000 to a seasonally adjusted 377,000, the Labor Department said. The prior week’s figure was revised up to 356,000 from the previously reported 352,000.

On Wednesday, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the U.S. central bank could do more to help growth if the economy falters, after policymakers said interest rates would remain near zero until late 2014.

Among the darker clouds looming over the U.S. economy, Europe is still racing to contain a sovereign debt crisis that is widely seen triggering a recession in the euro zone.

Greece resumes tortuous negotiations on a debt swap with private creditors in Athens on Thursday, with the European Central Bank thrown into the mix after IMF chief Christine Lagarde said public sector holders of Greek debt may need to take losses too.

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The former stockbroker, Kenneth Neely, worked for St. Louis-based Stifel in its St. Peters office from October 2002 until January 2007 and later worked at another broker-dealer, AXA Advisors in Clayton, from December 2007 to July 2009.

In November 2009, the Missouri Commissioner of Securities accused Neely of committing multiple violations of selling unregistered and nonexempt securities, transacting business as an unregistered agent and making untrue statements in connection with the sale or offer of securities in a St. Charles real estate investment trust and a fraudulent investment club.  

According to the state of Missouri, Neely told friends and church members that his investment club would pay up to 20 percent in interest a year, however he failed to tell the investors that the securities were unregistered. He did this when working at Stifel and later at Axxa, the state said.

Neely was convicted in February 2010 on mail fraud charges and sentenced to 37 months in prison. He is serving his sentence at a federal correctional facility in Indiana.

Today, the Missouri Secretary of State’s office announced Stifel’s settlement after a two-year-long investigation by the Enforcement Section of the Missouri Securities Division. The Stifel “failed to reasonably supervise an agent who operated a criminal investment scheme while at the firm” according to the state’s consent order.

“These events occurred more than five years ago. We welcome the opportunity to put this matter behind us,” the company said in a press release no fax payday loan. “All of the affected clients will receive restitution … We would note that Neely’s illegal activities occurred outside the scope of his employment with Stifel.”

While agreeing to the facts surrounding the case, Stifel neither admits nor denies the regulator’s allegations, the consent order said.

According to the state, Stifel failed to detect or investigate red flags during Neely’s employment, including a customer’s check sent to Neely’s home address and a customer’s concerns relating to Neely’s investment club. The state found that Stifel failed to reasonably supervise Neely, his private securities transactions and emails.

“Every firm has a duty to supervise and to take steps to detect fraudulent activity by its agent, and this action reinforces that investors should always exercise caution when looking at potential investments,” Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan said in a statement.

Stifel will pay $531,385 in restitution and interest to 10 investors in Missouri, California, Florida and Maryland. Additionally, Stifel will pay $500,000 to the Missouri Investor Education and Protection Fund and $70,000 for the costs of the Securities Division’s investigation.

As part of the settlement, Stifel’s registration with the state is censured, and the firm is required to hire a consultant to study its supervisory and compliance activities. A report from the consultant is due in three months.

New York-based AXA, Neely’s other former employer, signed a similar consent order with the state in December 2010.

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