China's epic traffic nightmares

Drivers check for a better view during "Car Free Day" in Beijing.

More people live in China than any other country, and in 2010 it surpassed the United States as the largest car market on Earth. As the popularity of automobiles grows, China's infrastructure has struggled to keep pace.

The result is -- like anywhere else in the world -- traffic jams.

Yet traffic jams in China are not always brief hiccups during the evening commute. In fact, the worst jams in China, while rare, can last for days.

Source & Image : CNN Money

Obama raises California cash for race's last month

WASHINGTON (AP) — Fresh off his strongest fundraising month this year, President Barack Obama is looking to raise millions of dollars from celebrities and wealthy donors in California with just one month left in a tightening race.

The two-day swing through the solidly Democratic state highlights the critical role that fundraising will play in the campaign's final weeks as Obama and his Republican rival, Mitt Romney, escalate their barrage of television ads in competitive states like Ohio. The president is to return there Tuesday.

Romney, campaigning in up-for-grabs Florida, sought to build on the momentum from a debate performance last week that even Democrats conceded was "masterful." The Republican told a crowd of about 12,000 in Port St. Lucie that he had enjoyed himself, ticking off a list of Obama shortcomings he said he had exposed during the first debate.

"Now of course, days later, we're hearing his excuses," Romney said. "And next January we'll be watching him leave the White House for the last time."

As Romney finished speaking, someone in the crowd of supporters behind him held up a giant Israeli flag alongside smaller American flags, underscoring the amplified role that foreign affairs and the Middle East is playing as the presidential race draws to a close. Romney on Monday plans a major foreign policy address at the Virginia Military Institute, intended to throw Obama back on his heels over his handling of unrest in Libya and elsewhere.

Obama campaign spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki, dismissing what she called Romney's fourth or fifth attempt to explain his global intentions, said the bar is high for Romney to convince voters he's prepared to be commander in chief.

"We are not going to be lectured by someone who's been an unmitigated disaster on foreign policy every time he sticks his toe in the foreign policy waters," Psaki said aboard Air Force One as Obama made his way to California.

Even as Romney sought to reap further rewards from his debate performance, a string of good news for the president threatened to steal the former Massachusetts governor's spotlight.

A jobs report Friday showing unemployment at the lowest levels of Obama's presidency was quickly followed Saturday by a fundraising report showing Obama and Democrats had raised $181 million in September. It was their best fundraising month of the campaign, but fell short of their record $190 million raised in September 2008 as the president campaigned for his first term.

Romney's campaign has not released its report for the month, and Republicans sought to downplay Obama's financial advantage. The party's national chairman, Reince Priebus, said he had been counting all along on being outraised by Obama and Democrats.

"This isn't going to come down to money. This is going to come down to heart," Priebus said. "We'll beat them on the ground, and we'll have all the money we need to be competitive."

After trailing Romney in the money race for most of the summer, Obama is back on top and pulling out all the stops to keep it that way. In what will be his final fundraising trip out West this election, Obama is enlisting his celebrity pals — from actors to singers to chefs — to donate to his campaign and encourage their fans to do the same.

In one event alone, a late-night soiree high above the Los Angeles skyline, Obama expected to rake in $3.75 million. Wolfgang Puck's WP24 in the Ritz-Carlton hotel will host the $25,000-per-person event for about 150 supporters.

Former President Bill Clinton was to join Obama earlier Sunday for a more intimate gathering with elite, longtime donors at the home of entertainment mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg. Then on to the main event: A star-studded concert at the Nokia Theatre with entertainment by actor George Clooney and musical guests Stevie Wonder, Jon Bon Jovi and Katy Perry.

As Obama played for California cash, his surrogates took to the talk shows to pound the theme that Romney's success in last week's debate was propped up entirely by dishonesty.

The president "was a little taken aback at the brazenness with which Gov. Romney walked away from so many of the positions on which he's run, walked away from his record," said David Axelrod, a top Obama strategist. "That's something we're going to have to make an adjustment for in these subsequent debates."

At the same time, Ann Romney was working to soften her husband's image, a frequent refrain as Romney's campaign seeks to broaden his support among centrist voters in the race's final weeks. Introducing her husband on Sunday, Mrs. Romney called him "a good and decent person" who had helped others throughout his life.

"Now we're going to get a chance for him to really care for others, because we're going to have the chance to see him get people back to work again," she said.

Both campaigns were prepping their running mates for Thursday's vice presidential debate — and working to keep expectations low lest their candidate underperform.

On Sunday Priebus called Vice President Joe Biden "a gifted orator," while former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., who challenged Romney in the GOP primary, suggested Paul Ryan would hold back on any hostility out of respect for Biden's status as a senior statesman.

While in California, the only official presidential business for Obama comes Monday in Keene, Calif., where he will designate as a national monument the home of Latino leader Cesar Chavez, the founder of the United Farmworkers Union who died in 1993.

Yet even that move has political overtones, resonating with some Hispanic voters — a crucial bloc in Obama's 2008 coalition and a critical component of his 2012 plan to keep Romney at bay.

Priebus spoke on CNN's "State of the Union." Axelrod spoke on CBS' "Face the Nation" and Gingrich on NBC's "Meet the Press."

___

Peoples reported from Port St. Lucie, Fla. AP White House Correspondent Ben Feller contributed to this report.

Source & Image : Yahoo

Huawei and ZTE pose security threat, warns US panel

Chinese telecom firms Huawei and ZTE pose a security threat to the US, a congressional panel has warned after its probe into the two companies.

The two firms should be barred from any mergers and acquisitions in the US, the panel has recommended in its report set to be released later on Monday.

It said the firms had failed to allay fears about their association with the Chinese government and military.

The two are among the world's biggest makers of telecom networking equipment.

"China has the means, opportunity and motive to use telecommunications companies for malicious purposes," the committee said in its report.

"Based on available classified and unclassified information, Huawei and ZTE cannot be trusted to be free of foreign state influence and thus pose a security threat to the United States and to our systems."

Both Huawei and ZTE have previously denied the charges.

Source & Image : BBC

Europe Still at Odds Over the Workings of Its Bailout Fund

BRUSSELS — It has been referred to as “the bazooka” — the 500 billion euro European bailout fund that after much dispute will have its first board meeting on Monday.

Dreamed up two years ago by euro zone ministers and officials as a permanent weapon against any financial problems that might besiege the region, the $650 billion bazooka might eventually be aimed at Spain’s banking crisis. Or it could be wielded to scare off bond market speculators who might otherwise try to drive up the borrowing costs of beleaguered governments in Madrid or other euro zone capitals.

But as with many of the other improvised solutions to the euro zone’s problems, the bailout fund’s reality is less elegant than the theory behind it.

As euro zone finance ministers gather for their monthly meeting on Monday in Luxembourg, there is still considerable disagreement over how the fund — known officially as the European Stability Mechanism — will work and how effective it will be at raising money. There is no certainty, in other words, that the bazooka can be ready to fire in time to help countries like Spain that are already in the throes of crisis.

To begin with, the bazooka is being introduced with most of its financial ammunition not yet loaded. That is because the fund will be the euro zone’s first in which the initial money will be paid in by the 17 members of the European Union that are in the zone, rather than taking the form of government guarantees.

Each euro zone government will contribute start-up money in amounts roughly proportionate to the size of the country’s economy. But once they are all in by 2014, those contributions will total only 80 billion euros. The first installments, totaling 32 billion euros, are due this Thursday.

The bazooka is to achieve its full firepower of 500 billion euros by selling European Stability Mechanism bonds in the open market, with the government contributions serving chiefly as collateral. The 500 billion euros are then supposed to backstop euro zone governments by a variety of means, including providing loans, buying those countries’ bonds or providing precautionary lines of credit.

Euro zone member states have not yet agreed on the circumstances under which the fund will be used directly to prop up a country’s commercial banks — as Spain would like — to avoid piling even more debt onto national balance sheets. And until the fund starts selling bonds, there is no way of telling whether investors will buy them.

“Whether the E.S.M. will soon be in a position to lend to troubled sovereigns depends primarily upon market appetite for the vehicle’s bonds,” said Mujtaba Rahman, an analyst at the Eurasia Group. “This is the biggest unknown.”

Inaugurating the fund is not the only thing the euro zone finance ministers, who constitute the fund’s board of governors, will have on their agenda Monday, when they are expected to name Jean-Claude Juncker, Luxembourg’s prime minister, as chairman. They will also be grappling with other pressing euro zone business.

But it is the success, or its lack, of the rescue fund that could have the most lasting impact on the euro zone.

Markets rallied last month after the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, Germany, cleared the way for German participation in the fund by ruling that such involvement would not conflict with national law. But the fact that the matter reached Germany’s highest court indicated the deep dissension in the country about the fund. Many Germans are already wary of paying to prop up countries like Greece and regard the rescue fund as a first step toward the common sharing of debt among euro zone members.

More recently, finance ministers from Germany, Finland and the Netherlands set off new alarms about the fund when they issued a statement proposing that any bank bailouts from it go only toward future problems — not to help clean up current messes. If that proposal gains traction, it could cast doubt on the terms of a bank bailout for Spain, which is expected soon to seek 40 billion euros in rescue loans for its most troubled banks.

“You can’t have these three countries bringing this confusion,” a European diplomat said Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity because talks on how the fund should operate were still going on. The rules “should be settled,” the diplomat said.

But getting any clarity this week seems unlikely.

Using the bazooka to shoot money directly into banks was part of a grand bargain struck in June, when euro area leaders agreed to subject their banks to more robust supervision led by the European Central Bank. Yet that part of the deal now threatens to come apart, too, because France and Germany are deeply divided over how many banks the central bank should oversee.

Even if direct assistance to banks becomes possible in the future and is made the bazooka’s primary function in attacking problems in countries like Spain, Ireland and Cyprus, analysts have cautioned that more money will be needed from the contributing governments.

That would be an unwelcome prospect in fiscally conservative northern countries like Finland, Germany and the Netherlands, where electorates have grown concerned about the cost of bailouts.

Another role for the fund is that of a buyer of government bonds, which would complement the program recently announced by the European Central Bank. The program is aimed at intervening in the bond markets to help hold down a government’s borrowing costs. In turn, that country would need to adhere to strictly monitored budgetary discipline.

At the meeting on Monday, the Spanish finance minister, Luis de Guindos, is expected to discuss additional budget-tightening measures recently announced by his government — which Spanish and some European officials hope can make the country deemed worthy of a bond-buying program. But Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of Spain is unlikely to make any formal requests for assistance until after regional elections in Galicia, on Oct. 21, to avoid voter hostility associated with international lending programs.

Source & Image : New York Times

Einstein letter on God to be auctioned on eBay

LONDON (AP) — A letter in which Albert Einstein dismissed the idea of God as a product of human weakness is being sold on eBay for a starting price of $3 million.

The letter, handwritten in 1954, a year before Einstein's death, was addressed to philosopher Eric Gutkind. In it, Einstein discussed his views on religion, including calling "the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."

An anonymous collector who bought the letter in 2008 is putting it on sale on online auction site eBay from Monday. The auction closes Oct. 18.

Eric Gazin, a spokesman for the sale, said Sunday: "With the interest in Einstein, along with the questions this (letter) touches on, we feel it is well worth the price."

Source & Image : Yahoo

Ann Romney: People got to see husband as she does

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. (AP) — Ann Romney says she's glad people watching the first presidential debate have finally been able to see her husband, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, as she does: "A good and decent person."

Speaking Sunday before she introduced her husband, Mrs. Romney says people got to see the former Massachusetts governor as someone who cares for others — and that Americans will be able to see him display that quality again when he gets people back to work.

The campaign wants to soften Romney's image in the final weeks of the campaign and maintain his focus on the middle class.

At the same event, Romney promised he would "not raise taxes on middle class families!"

Romney's campaign said that 12,000 people attended the event, including 3,000 in an overflow area.

Source & Image : Yahoo

The stock market rally is over

The S&P 500 will finish 2012 at 1,440, up a healthy 15% for the year but in the exact same spot where it started the fourth quarter, according to an exclusive CNNMoney survey.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Despite a slowing global economy, political and fiscal uncertainty and ongoing turmoil in Europe, the U.S. stock market has delivered quite the performance this year, thanks in large part to stimulus efforts by the world's central banks.

But experts believe the robust gains are now remnants of the past. In fact, according to an exclusive CNNMoney survey of 37 investment strategists and money managers, the S&P 500 will finish 2012 at 1,440, up a healthy 15% for the year but in the exact same spot where it started the fourth quarter.

"I'm not suggesting for anyone to get out of their equity positions, but our view is that most of the gains for the year are behind us," said Cetera Financial Group markets strategist Brian Gendreau, whose year-end target for the S&P 500 stands at 1,450.

The reason for the stagnation? According to the strategists and money managers surveyed by CNNMoney, there are a number of hurdles putting downward pressure on stocks.

CNNMoney survey: Where the markets are headed in 2012

The first major obstacle is the Nov. 6 presidential election. Leading up to that day, stocks will likely trade in a narrow range, as everyone from policymakers to investors is holding his or her breath, said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank, who is also predicting the S&P 500 will end the year at 1,450.

Once the White House winners have been declared, volatility will only increase as the next hurdles pop up.

"After the elections, lawmakers will have to face the fiscal cliff, and they only have a handful of days to debate and pass new legislation before the end of the year," said Oliver Pursche, president of Gary Goldberg Financial Services, who expects the S&P 500 to finish the year at 1,435.

Individual investors miss the rally ... again

Congress has until midnight on Dec. 31 to prevent a series of tax cuts from expiring, and to keep funding intact for hundreds of federal programs. As long as Congress remains noncommittal about how to avert the fiscal cliff, "at best, it will be a turbulent time for the markets," said Pursche.

Headlines out of Europe will also add to the volatility, said Gendreau.

While the political and economic uncertainty that's currently plaguing the United States and Europe would typically trigger a market sell-off, experts say intervention from the European Central Bank and the Federal Reserve have been helping keep markets afloat -- though it's not enough to keep the rally going.

"All the liquidity they're slushing out is keeping a floor underneath the market," said Pursche. "As a result, we're not expecting to see a material decline in stocks. But we also don't foresee any catalyst that could propel the market significantly higher."

First Published: October 7, 2012: 7:35 PM ET

Source & Image : CNN Money

Businesses 'lack trust' in banks

Half of the 1,560 businesses questioned said they mistrust banks and building societies, while 38% said they trust them less than a year ago.

Banks and building societies remain the main source of finance for firms.

Meanwhile, a separate survey revealed businesses' hiring intentions fell to a 28-month low in September.

But the report from accountants BDO also said that business optimism showed a rebound this month, "continuing the zigzag pattern of ups and downs in confidence of the last four years".

The BCC survey said 57% of firms felt confident they could secure external finance, while 37% said they were not confident of doing so.

Some 59% of those polled said a government-backed business bank would make them more confident about accessing finance.

But when asked about government-backed finance schemes, 43% of firms had not heard of any, with younger businesses and micro firms most likely to be unaware of them.

"Financial institutions need to rebuild trust and repair damaged relationships with businesses and improve transparency," said John Longworth, the BCC's director general.

"Regulators should look to increase competition in the banking sector to ensure businesses have more choice, and the government must ensure that plans to create a British Business Bank mean more funds available to growing businesses."

Source & Image : BBC

RPI inflation changes 'may hit pensioners'

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has started a consultation on changes to the calculation of the retail prices index (RPI).

These would make the RPI move more slowly, in step with the consumer prices index (CPI).

Pension experts have warned that any changes would cut pensioners' incomes.

The ONS is independent of the government and says it wants to see if there is any need to make a change.

But in the light of the government's controversial changes in 2011 - which moved the uprating of public sector pensions from RPI to CPI, as well as the uprating of benefits and tax credits - critics may see any move by the ONS as a back-door method for the government to save money.

Darren Philp of the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) said any rewiring of the RPI would have "huge implications".

"Pension funds are major investors in government debt and changes to index-linked bonds could have far-reaching impacts on those investments," he said.

"It could also alter the amount by which pensions being paid to former workers are increased each year."

As well as private sector pensions, RPI changes would affect the value of inflation linked savings certificates and index linked bonds, or gilts, issued by the government.

The RPI usually rises faster than the CPI, with an average gap of 0.9 percentage points each year since CPI was first used in 1996.

The gap has been due to a variety of factors:

The overall gap between RPI and CPI is very volatile from month to month and year to year.

In August the gap was 0.4 percentage points, but in recent year has been as wide as 2.3 percentage points, back in August 2007.

The "formula effect" historically has contributed about half of the average gap between the two measures.

But since the start of 2010, when the ONS changed the way it measured movements in the prices of clothes, the formula effect has become the most dominant influence.

The Office for Budget Responsibiity (OBR) has forecast that the overall gap between the two inflation measures will widen in the coming years, to an average of 1.4 percentage points during the rest of this decade.

Linda Whitney, of the actuaries Aon Hewitt, said there was a danger that most people might not realise the importance of this issue.

"Our research has shown that most people do not even understand the concept of inflation, let alone the significance of a change to the way RPI is calculated," she said.

Possible changes

The options the ONS is going to look at are: no change at all; partial changes to the RPI's formula, which would reduce the gap with CPI slightly; or changing the construction of RPI to remove the formula effect altogether, which would shrink the overall gap considerably.

Any change would inevitably ensure that RPI rose more slowly than would otherwise have been the case and make it similar to the CPI.

This would directly depress future increases in private sector pensions.

It would also cut the returns on the £18bn worth of inflation-linked policies which have been sold by National Savings and Investment (NS&I), and also the return on index-linked bonds sold by the government to professional investors.

If there was any potential detriment to gilt holders, whose index-linked holdings are currently worth £349bn, a change would have to be approved by the Bank of England and even the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Some gilt holders would also be able to demand that their holdings be redeemed immediately if the RPI formula was altered.

Changes to RPI may be seen as just a way to reverse the boost given to the formula effect in 2010, and to rein in its exaggerated influence on the figures.

One group of people which has become keenly aware of the importance of any change from RPI to CPI are 30,000 British Airways pensioners.

Some members of the Airways Pension Scheme (APS) have spent the past year or so campaigning against the decision of their scheme trustees to move from RPI to CPI for pension uprating, in the wake of the public sector changes.

The leader of the aggrieved BA pensioners, Capt Mike Post, said: "Even the cleverest of people can be unaware of the importance of a change, especially when it is compounded over many years in retirement."

The consultation lasts until the end of October, with any changes starting in March next year.

Source & Image : BBC

Remains of Infant Who Died 2 Years Ago Found in Family's Back Yard

A child welfare check led authorities to discover the remains of an infant whose death two years ago went unreported by his family, New York State Police said today.

Acting on a search warrant, authorities worked overnight to dig up the back yard of the Farmingdale, N.Y. home where the boy's family resides.

"It is absolutely a suspicious death and it is being investigated as such," State Police Major Patrick Regan told The Associated Press. "We don't have a cause of death, and to our knowledge, there was never a report made of the child being missing."

The remains of an infant were unearthed and sent to the medical examiner's office to confirm the identity of the child and cause of death.

The corpse is believed to be of Justin Kowalczik. The 17-month-old died in the summer of 2010 and his death went unreported until an investigation was launched last week, police said.

On Wednesday, authorities from the Suffolk County Child Protective Services visited the home of Robert Rodriguez and Heather Kowalczik to conduct a welfare check on their 6-year-old child, police said.

During that time, authorities say they became aware that Justin, who is one of Kowalczik's three children, was not accounted for.

The New York State Police interviewed Heather Kowalczik, who told police Justin died shortly after the family moved from Orange County, N.Y.

During the interview, authorities said they were also able to pinpoint a location in the family's backyard where the boy had allegedly been buried.

Rodriguez, who is the father of the couple's two older children, was identified as a person of interest and sought by police.

Authorities became alarmed when the couple's 9-year-old son did not show up for school on Friday.

An Amber Alert was issued and the child was located, police said.

The couple's two children have been placed in protective custody, police said.

Neither Rodriguez nor Kowalczik have been charged.

Also Read

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‘SNL’ skewers first presidential debate, Chris Matthews, Big Bird (VIDEO)

(NBC)

Last week's presidential debate provided plenty of fodder for "Saturday Night Live," which devoted two sketches and the bulk of its "Weekend Update" segment to skewering the event.

On the cold-open, former cast member Chris Parnell returned to "SNL" to play moderator Jim Lehrer, who was steamrolled by Mitt Romney despite the Republican nominee's forewarning.

"Jim, when it comes to jobs President Obama prefers what I call a trickle-down government solution," Romney, played by Jason Sudeikis, said. "Now my plan is different. It involves 41 basic elements, six abrupt reversals of position and three outright lies."

"Mr. President, Governor Romney has just said he killed Osama bin Laden," Lehrer's Parnell said. "Would you care to respond?"

In another sketch, MSNBC's Chris Matthews--who unloaded on Obama's listless performance on Wednesday and again Thursday--was imitated by Sudeikis. "What the hell happened? I want answers!" he said.

"Well you've got to hand it to Mitt Romney," Seth Meyers said on the "Weekend Update" segment, "because President Obama sure did."

Meyers also picked the debate's winners and losers, including Lehrer.

"He was like a ghost visiting a scene from his past life," Meyers said, "helplessly waving his arms to get their attention" and "stammering like Hugh Grant in a rom-com."

"Also, Jim, you gotta keep the guys to time," Meyers said. "If that's how long you think two minutes is, your wife is a lucky woman."

Aside from Romney, Fox News was the clear winner, Meyers said. "When that thing ended you guys must've looked at each other and said, 'I think we can report this one exactly as it happened.'"

Another winner: America. "Is there anything more exciting than Joe Biden thinking it's up to him to get the lead back?" he said. "There's like a 50 percent chance he's gonna come out at the next debate with his shirt off."

Big Bird, though, refused to engage in partisan politics in his cameo appearance.

"I don't want to ruffle any feathers," he said.

Source & Image : Yahoo

To Regulate Rapid Traders, S.E.C. Turns to One of Them

RED BANK, N.J. — As billions of shares course through the stock market each day, investors rely on the government to keep up with Wall Street’s rapid-fire traders.

But in an acknowledgment that the Securities and Exchange Commission has fallen behind the firms it regulates, the agency is turning to one of those high-frequency traders for help.

Tradeworx, a 45-person firm based in New Jersey, will dispatch its experts to Washington this month to tutor regulators on a sophisticated computer program that will give the S.E.C. its first real-time window into the stock market — something firms like Tradeworx have had for years. The S.E.C. program, designed by Tradeworx, is set to go into operation at the end of this year.

The program, called “Midas” by the S.E.C., is part of a broader effort at the agency to monitor the proliferation of new technologies and to crack down on practices that have given sophisticated traders an advantage over ordinary investors. The agency recently hosted public meetings on computerized trading to examine some of the recent failures in the market, like the malfunction at Knight Capital that wreaked havoc on stock prices in August. Last week, the Nasdaq exchange had to cancel errant trades after a technical problem caused shares of Kraft to soar.

The S.E.C.’s rudimentary technology has hobbled its ability to untangle these events and police the automated trading firms. With the Tradeworx program, the agency will gain access to every bid to buy stocks and every offer to sell shares on each of the nation’s 13 public exchanges. The system, akin to an X-ray machine for the stock market, could enable regulators to detect whether trading firms are overwhelming the market’s plumbing when they rapidly submit and cancel orders.

“The average person on the street thinks that the S.E.C. has these massive computers that all orders are going through,” said Gregg Berman, the agency official leading the effort. “That has not been the case, but we hope to now have that with this new system.”

Some industry experts have said that the Tradeworx program is the quickest and, at a cost of $2.5 million this year, the cheapest way for the agency to catch up with the high-speed trading industry, which has gone from being a niche player a decade ago to being responsible for more than half of all trading in American stocks today. But the initiative raises a new set of questions about whether the industry is the best source for unbiased information about the markets.

David Lauer, a former employee of other high-speed trading firms, wrote in recent testimony to a Senate subcommittee that the Tradeworx program was “reminiscent of the fox guarding the hen house.”

“You don’t rely on the subject of your study to build the device you are going to be studying them with,” Mr. Lauer said in an interview after the hearing.

The S.E.C. said it sought out other bids and even considered building its own database, an effort that would have taken several years and cost millions of dollars more than the Tradeworx project. Mr. Berman added that the agency looked to Tradeworx only for data feeds that were the same no matter who provided them.

The chief executive of Tradeworx, Manoj Narang, argued that if he sold bogus data to the government, it would be obvious. More important, he said, the S.E.C. has few alternatives.

“Where else are they going to be able to get these capabilities?” Mr. Narang said. “They are not available from anywhere other than high-speed trading firms. We’re the only ones who possess it.”

Today, the S.E.C. relies on the official trading record, known as the consolidated tape, which includes the price of every trade executed on any of the nation’s stock exchanges. Most sophisticated trading firms bypass the official record by buying data directly from the exchanges. The firms compile a full record milliseconds before the consolidated tape is assembled and obtain a wider range of information, including orders that are submitted but never executed.

Mr. Berman said that data from Tradeworx would be used throughout the S.E.C., from the enforcement division looking to catch wrongdoing to the division of trading and markets that keeps daily watch over the markets. The data could allow the S.E.C. to analyze claims that some firms take advantage of their faster data feeds to jump in front of slower traders, and complaints that sophisticated traders can jam the system with so many orders that it slows down trading for others.

Mr. Berman, a former hedge fund co-manager and nuclear physicist, led the agency’s examination of the flash crash of 2010, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 5 percent in five minutes and then mostly recovered. He is now leading the broader effort to bring the S.E.C. into the modern world of trading. As the agency falls farther behind, he is helping to build a new Office of Research and Analytics, which is looking to hire people with experience on Wall Street and in computer programming. The agency is also moving closer to creating a so-called consolidated audit trail, which will allow regulators to see the identity of the firm behind every trade.

But any future efforts depend on the S.E.C. having access to the sort of basic data that Tradeworx will provide.

Source & Image : New York Times

Calif. gasoline prices hit all-time high - twice

LOS ANGELES (AP) — California motorists faced another day of record-breaking gasoline prices Sunday, though relief appeared to be on the way.

In its latest update early Sunday, AAA reported that the statewide average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline was $4.655. Saturday's average of $4.6140 was the highest since June 19, 2008, when it was $4.6096.

The four-penny-per-gallon jump Sunday was less than Saturday's increase, which was 12 cents.

Sunday's price, like Saturday's, was the highest in the nation, with the Golden State overtaking Hawaii as the state with the most expensive fuel due to a temporary reduction in supply.

In some locations, fuming motorists paid $5 or more per gallon while station owners had to shut down pumps in others.

A station in Long Beach had California's priciest gas at $6.65 for a gallon of regular, according to GasBuddy.com. Meanwhile customers at an outlet in San Pablo paid just $3.49, the lowest price in the state.

The average for a gallon of regular was $4.69 in Los Angeles, $4.71 in San Diego and San Francisco, $4.55 in Sacramento and $4.90 in Santa Barbara, according to GasBuddy.com.

The dramatic surge came after a power outage Monday at a Southern California refinery that reduced supply in an already fragile and volatile market, analysts said. The refinery came back online Friday and prices were expected to stabilize in the coming days.

Patrick DeHaan, senior petroleum analyst at GasBuddy.com, predicted the average price could peak as high as $4.85 before coming back down.

Source & Image : Yahoo

Philippines, Muslim rebels agree to landmark peace deal

MANILA/KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - The Philippine government and Muslim rebels agreed on a deal to end a 40-year conflict that has killed more than 120,000 people, President Benigno Aquino said on Sunday, paving the way for a political and economic revival of the country's troubled south.

The agreement begins a roadmap to create a new autonomous region in the south of the mainly Roman Catholic country before the end of Aquino's term in 2016, giving the Muslim-dominated area greater political powers and more control over resources.

Expectations are high that after nearly 15 years of violence-interrupted talks, both the government and the country's largest Muslim rebel group will keep their pledges in the agreement, to be signed on October 15 in Manila and witnessed by Aquino and Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak.

"This framework agreement is about rising above our prejudices. It is about casting aside the distrust and myopia that has the plagued efforts of the past," Aquino said via a live broadcast from the presidential palace.

The new entity, whose exact size will decided by plebiscites ahead of elections in 2016, will be called Bangsamoro -- the term for those who are native to the region and which Aquino said honored "the struggles of our forebears in Mindanao".

The south's volatile and often violent politics could still hamper the plans. There is a risk that radical Islamic factions could split off from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and carry on fighting in a region that has a history of links with al Qaeda militants.

Shortly after the announcement, a breakaway group said it would continue to fight for an independent Islamic state.

"We do not care if the government and the MILF reached an agreement. We do not want the Bangsamoro entity or whatever they may call it," said Abu Misry Mama, spokesman of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Movement, in the southern city of Davao.

The group launched attacks on army positions in the south in August as government and rebel negotiators held talks in Kuala Lumpur, but were repulsed by government troops.

Another threat comes from powerful clans who control some areas in the region and may fear a loss of political influence.

The MILF and the government still need to thrash out details of their broad agreement in the months ahead as a 15-member commission drafts a law by 2015 to send to Congress.

The two sides agreed only that there would be "just and equitable" sharing of resources, which are believed to include large reserves of natural gas. Determining how much power the area will have over law, such as its scope to administer sharia justice, is another remaining challenge for negotiators.

Philippine chief negotiator Marvic Leonen told reporters in Kuala Lumpur, where the talks were held, that many hurdles remain and that the agreement was just the beginning.

"Peace processes are not easy. The agreement only heralds a change of the status of the parties vis-a-vis each other, from enemies perhaps to partners," he said, following the talks that have been brokered by Muslim majority Malaysia.

Hopes of peace have been raised in the past only to be dashed, most recently in 2008 when the Supreme Court declared a deal unconstitutional in a decision that set off rebel attacks and a fierce military offensive that displaced 750,000 people.

The prospects seem brighter now, analysts say, because Aquino commands strong political capital and has committed to a final settlement by the end of his term.

NEW OPPORTUNITIES

A spokesman for the armed forces, Colonel Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos, said a successful implementation of the deal would now allow the military to focus their resources on defending the country's territorial rights in a row with China over the South China Sea.

The deal could also reap economic benefits as the Philippines defies its reputation as a laggard with strong growth and a resurgence in investor interest.

After four decades of conflict, the MILF leaders are ageing and, analysts say, eager to see some fruit from the years of peace negotiations.

They said the leadership may be motivated by the prospect of royalties from huge untapped deposits of oil, gas and mineral resources in rebel areas, part of an estimated total of $312 billion in mineral wealth in Mindanao. France's Total has partnered with Malaysia's Mitra Energy Ltd. to explore oil and gas fields in the Sulu Sea off Mindanao.

The deal is unlikely to have much immediate impact on the economy of Mindanao, said Steve Rood of the Asia Foundation, citing concerns about the region's poor infrastructure, education and health services.

He said investors should take a longer view in the tourism and agricultural sectors, where Mindanao could become a hub for certification of halal products, those prepared under Islamic guidelines. The global halal industry is valued at around $2.1 trillion.

The new entity and its jurisdiction, expected to cover five provinces under the existing autonomous region plus parts of Lanao del Norte and North Cotabato provinces, will be determined through a plebiscite after the passage of the organic law.

Presidential peace adviser Teresita Quintos-Deles said the areas to be added had previously voted to be part of the autonomous region. She added the southern cities of Isabela and Cotabato may also be covered by the new entity.

The Muslim area will gain powers such as the right to impose taxes to cut central government subsidies, a bigger share in revenues from natural resources and a more active role in internal security.

But the Philippine government will continue to hold exclusive powers of defense and security, foreign policy, monetary policy, and citizenship and naturalization.

"This framework agreement paves the way for a final, enduring peace in Mindanao," Aquino said. "This means that hands that once held rifles will be put to use tilling land, selling produce, manning work stations, and opening doorways of opportunity for other citizens."

(Additional reporting by Manny Mogato in Manila; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)

Source & Image : Yahoo

Taming Volatile Raw Data for Jobs Reports

7:32 p.m. | Updated

CATHERINE RAMPELL

Dollars to doughnuts.

The unemployment rate fell to 7.8 percent in September, its lowest level since President Obama took office. With just a month to go before the election, the news seemed too good to be true, at least for some Mitt Romney supporters.

Almost immediately some conservative pundits began accusing the Labor Department, which released the jobs numbers on Friday, of cooking the books. After all, the household survey — the survey that the unemployment rate comes from — showed that the number of people with jobs rose 873,000 in September, though the gain had averaged 164,000 each month earlier this year.

These numbers are always tremendously volatile, but the reasons are statistical, not political. The numbers come from a tiny survey with a margin of error of 400,000. Every month there are wild swings, and no one takes them at face value. The swings usually attract less attention, though, because the political stakes are usually lower.

Look how noisy these numbers are, and always have been!

The numbers, by the way, are especially imprecise (and prone to revision) when the economy is making a turn, or when regular seasonal patterns start to change. And there is reason to believe that one particular seasonal pattern — the start of the college school year — may be partly responsible for the big swing in September.

One of the biggest sources of volatility in the last couple of months (and one of the major contributors to the big bump in job-getters in September) was the group of workers between 20 and 24 years old.

Historically, the employment levels for that group have dropped sharply in September, probably because many people in their early 20s are leaving summer jobs and going back to school.

For each year since 1948, the average level of employment for this group has fallen by 398,000 from August to September. In fact, before this year, employment for this age group had risen just two times in that period: 1954 (a gain of 5,000), and 1961 (a gain of 22,000).

This year was the third time on record that the number of people in this age group gained jobs in September, and the gain was big: 101,000.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Numbers are not adjusted for seasonality.

How to explain this major deviation from the historical trend, other than conspiracy theories?

If you look back at August, an unusually high share of this age group stopped working, compared with past employment patterns in August. From 1948 to 2011, the number of those 20 to 24 who had jobs fell by an average of 98,000 from July to August. This past August, it fell by 530,000, the biggest loss on record.

Over the last couple of decades, in fact, the job losses for this age group have been growing each August, suggesting that over time young people have been leaving their summer jobs earlier and earlier.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Numbers are not adjusted for seasonality.

In other words, seasonal patterns might be evolving — people starting school and leaving their summer jobs earlier in the summer — which has big implications for how the Labor Department digests and reports the monthly employment data.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics adjusts its raw survey data to correct for seasonal patterns, and since a decline in employment is expected for those 20 to 24, the economists at the bureau increased the level of employment for this group in the seasonally adjusted numbers.

Changes in seasonal patterns like this one can introduce more error into the headline numbers, and can at least partly explain why the overall change in household employment looked so much bigger in September than seems plausible. After seasonal adjustment, the increase in employment among those 20 to 24 was given as 368,000. That’s about 42 percent of the overall increase in employment growth for people of all ages. (After making seasonal adjustments on the August figures, the employment level for 20- to 24-year-olds was reported as declining by 250,000.)

All of which is to say the bureau aims to release the most informative numbers it can. But it is seeking to measure the state of the American job market quickly, based on surveys that are inherently incomplete — and the adjustments that are meant to fill in the gaps have their own shortcomings, particularly when seasonal trends change.

In case you still believe that the models the bureau uses are being manipulated to put President Obama in a better light, note that there are no political appointees currently serving in the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The employees are all career civil servants who have worked under both Republican and Democratic administrations. (The commissioner of the bureau is supposed to be a political appointee, but that position is vacant. The acting commissioner, John M. Galvin, has held the position since January, and he is a career civil servant.)

Economists at the Bureau of Labor Statistics regularly adjust the models they use to account for factors like seasonality and the number of new companies entering the economy, and the revisions are often very large.

Economists outside the bureau have been weighing in, too, both on how the latest numbers should be adjusted and what the next few months of jobs reports should look like. A paper presented last month as part of the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity series, for example, incorporated data on people flowing into and out of unemployment to forecast that the unemployment rate would most likely stagnate for a few months to come.

A version of this article appeared in print on 10/06/2012, on page B1 of the NewYork edition with the headline: Taming Volatile Raw Data for Jobs Reports.

Source & Image : New York Times

What Jerry Sandusky can look forward to in prison

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Jerry Sandusky will walk into state prison with little more than a watch and wedding band. He'll be able to work a 30-hour week to make a few dollars. He'll be able to watch Penn State football, but not violent movies.

If the former Penn State defensive coach is sentenced Tuesday to a long state prison term, he will find himself far removed from the comfortable suburban life he once led, placed under the many rules and regulations of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections.

Even Sandusky's own attorney believes that whatever sentence he gets, at age 68 Sandusky will likely live out his days inside a state prison. Prison officials, written policies and former offenders provided a detailed look to The Associated Press about the regimented life behind bars that Sandusky faces.

Sandusky has been housed in isolation inside the Centre County Correctional Facility in Bellefonte since his conviction in June on 45 counts of child sexual abuse, and has spent his days reading and writing, preparing a statement for sentencing, and working out twice a day, defense attorney Joe Amendola said.

"Jerry is a very likable guy — he gets along with everybody," Amendola said last week, as he worked with Sandusky to help get his affairs in order, including a power of attorney and updated will. "He's a model inmate. He doesn't cause problems, he's sociable, he's pleasant."

Assuming Judge John Cleland gives him at least two years — the minimum threshold for a state prison sentence — Sandusky's first stop will be the Camp Hill state prison near Harrisburg, where all male inmates undergo a couple weeks of testing to determine such things as mental and physical health, education level and any treatment needs.

Prison officials will assign him a security level risk and decide which "home prison" to send him to.

Although Sandusky's home in the Lemont area of State College is only a couple miles from Rockview state prison, there is no way to predict where he will end up.

Older inmates sometimes end up at Laurel Highlands, which can better treat more severe medical problems, or Waymart, a comparatively lower-security prison in the state's northeastern corner.

The roughly 6,800 sex offenders are scattered throughout the prison system, which has no special units for them. Treatment is available for sex offenders, and those who hope to be paroled have to participate.

"My guess is he'll wind up in a minimum-security facility, and probably a facility for nonviolent people," Amendola said.

A convicted sex offender who spent 10 years in prison, and who works with other released sex offenders through the Pennsylvania Prison Society, said Sandusky won't be able to keep a low profile.

"You can have some control over how obscure you are as a prisoner," said the 52-year-old man from the Philadelphia suburbs, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the stigma attached to sex offenses. "You can either make yourself standout, or you can stay closer to the woodwork. There's no hiding that man."

The state will provide him with clothes, shoes and bedding, and the first set of toiletries. He'll be able to bring a wedding ring without gemstones, a basic watch worth $50 or less, eyeglasses and dentures. Sandusky uses a machine for sleep apnea and takes medications.

State prison menus rotate monthly, and two of the three daily meals are hot. Exercise rules vary, but inmates generally spend an hour or more a day in the yard, which might entail walking, playing ball or lifting weights. If he's at a prison that allows baseball or softball, the bat has to be tethered and secured to the backstop. In the kitchen, knives also are tethered.

Inmates can buy a television with a 13-inch screen for their cells, at a cost of about $275, with prison-designed programming of about 15 channels that costs some $15 a month. The channels include the networks but no R-rated movies or shows with a lot of violence.

He'll be able to watch college football, including Penn State, when the games are broadcast on ESPN or another major network.

"A lot of guys live for it," said man who works with released sex offenders. "Football season is huge."

Sandusky, a regular attendee at a Methodist church in State College, will be able to go to religious services.

There's also a shared television in the day room, a common area where inmates congregate when not confined to their cells. The guards usually decide what channel to have it on. Cards are popular, as are dominoes and board games.

If he has a musical bent, Sandusky will have a list of approved instruments to choose from for purchase.

Sandusky, who has a master's degree, will be encouraged to work, and most inmates do, although it's not technically mandatory. An inmate's first job is often in the kitchen or doing janitorial work, while more coveted occupations include maintenance, landscaping, clerical work or tutoring.

The pay barely covers the cable bill: 19 to 51 cents an hour, with a 30-hour work week. Some of that money may go to pay fines or costs, or toward the $10 copay for a doctor visit.

If people on the outside put money on his account, it also can be deducted to pay any fines and costs.

For those who can afford it, the commissary sells snacks, cigarettes and toiletries. He'll be able to have books and magazines sent to him inside prison, but if personal property starts to pile up, officials will direct him to box it up and send them home.

Most Pennsylvania prison cells are designed for two people, but it's possible he could end up in his own cell or in a small dormitory.

Visiting rules vary by institution, but all visits last at least an hour, and facilities generally allow two or three visits per week, with five to eight visitors allowed at once. Inmates can have up to 40 people on their visiting list.

There's another possibility for Sandusky, said Bill DiMascio, executive director of the prison society: they could swap him for an inmate in another state.

"They might even put him in a federal prison," DiMascio said. "They have some other options."

If Sandusky writes a book, state law will prevent him from making any money off of it.

Source & Image : Yahoo