Daily International Headlines

Citroen launches into his rental car, according to information published Tuesday in Le Parisien, Aujourd'hui en France. The automaker plans to launch this new service from September 20, first time in Paris, Bordeaux, Marseille and Lyon before extending the scheme to other cities.

Users can rent the vehicle remotely, by phone, and it delivered to the address of their choice within three hours. "The prices are comparable to those found on the market, says a source at the automaker in Paris payday advance low fees. Just for the delivery or return home the vehicle, the service will cost 14 euros.

No need for subscription, understands the newspaper. Prices and rental period will vary widely.All types of Citroen vehicles will be offered, including the C-Zero electric car that is not yet commercialized.

A new website and an iPhone application should be launched in early 2011 to facilitate the leasing and add customized services such as insurance, download maps and other accessories.

LE FIGARO. – Do you double dip scenario?

I believe more in a low growth as a relapse of the activity. There have been a very sharp slowdown, as the pace of growth fell from 5% at end 2009 to 1.6%. These figures, subject to some volatility, however, overstate the true extent of the downturn even if the coming quarters, many uncertainties remain.

Let's start with the volatility …

The restocking of companies boosted the activity at year end, without any increase in imports. The opposite effect has played in the first quarter. Despite the slowdown of GDP, domestic demand excluding inventories accelerated, rising by over 4% annual rate in the second quarter. The latest indicators (monthly or weekly) are obviously more worrying, especially in real estate.However, we do not rely on the construction as an engine of the economy!

What drives the U.S. economy?

Exports are an important driver. They rose 15% between mid-2009 and mid-2010 and continue to grow at a rate of 10% per annum. Investment in equipment has also greatly contributed to the recovery since late 2009.

What can we expect consumption?

Two elements of condition, the rate of savings and disposable income. Households who have seen their assets melt, have sought to rebuild their savings. Their savings rate, which now exceeds 6% – against less than 2% in 2007 – should now be stabilizing. Changes in consumption should therefore, over the next month, depending on that of their disposable income and therefore the payroll.So far, the increase in weekly hours of work allowed a reasonable growth of income despite the weakness in job creation. But after hours of work returned to normal, job creation of about 130,000 each month will be needed to avoid a recurrence of the activity. But the last three months, there was an average of only 50,000 jobs created in the private sector.

Is there any new stimulus package?

Even if they are significantly smaller than before the crisis, the leeway of economic policy are not necessarily zero. Two measures are also to be discreetly passed: an extension of the duration of unemployment benefits and federal funding of $ 26 billion to states. Americans are pragmatic: whether to again support the economy, they will.The Federal Reserve may also help prevent a recession by pushing more time to raise rates and, especially, in announcing a new program of buying shares of Treasury bonds.

ALSO READ:

The U.S. growth revised sharply downwards

"We are confident in the future," says Olivier Piou, CEO of Gemalto, with BFM Radio, which recently released its results on Thursday for the first half of 2010. So much so that the specialist manufacturer of digital security and smart cards, SIM cards and electronic passports is a turnover of one billion euros in the second half. "The acquisitions made early nosu costs a little money, but we must continue to invest. We can because we are confident, "says CEO of Gemalto. Gemalto has "changed dimension. Now we're a start-up. When I arrived in the company, I do not think I'd still be in office with such a turnover, "he says.

"Lack of communication of the group"

A trust that does not necessarily share the financial markets.At 9:30, the action Gemalto shows a decrease of 4.28% to 28.19 euros in a market up 1.07%, the largest drop in the SRD. "This drop is excessive, an analyst who follows reacts value. The elements that have affected the first half performance was known. The discrepancy between results and expectations of the market indicates a lack of communication from the group. "

Gemalto in line with the consensus

However, the group released under the first-half turnover of 840 million euros, up 5% at current exchange rates. "We accelerated our offers have been very well received, because they correspond to a real need," said Olivier Piou. There is a real market potential of contactless payments, particularly in Africa and South Asia.In France, we are in trouble because we took too far ahead. "

The group's net profit amounted to 63 million euros, down 7.35% from a year earlier. "Today, the consensus of analysts is around 200 million euros profit the year is well within our range," says Olivier Piou. In 2009, the group posted a net profit of 148 million euros.

No new acquisitions

In addition, Gemalto first half operating profit down 15.2% to 67 million euros but he "remains in line with the company plan to increase its result in 2010," the group said in its statement. Gemalto is 300 million euros in income from operating activities in 2013.Of the three main activities of Gemalto, security has the highest increase (+21%) in the first half to 148.2 million euros (17.6% of sales) to the mobile phone (8%) to 451.7 million euros (53.8% of sales) and secure transactions (1%) to 207.4 million euros (24.7% of sales).

After several acquisitions, including the United States and Germany, the group does not provide new acquisitions. Olivier Piou said that Gemalto had to concentrate in the second half on the integration of recent operations.

Click on the thumbnail to enlarge the graphics.

The Dow Jones wins 0.92% at the opening. The Nasdaq, 1.23%. And the S & P, 1.31%. From the first minutes of trading, the indexes have increased their earnings. The Dow Jones already posted a gain of 1.23% to 10,595.06, while the S & P 500 1115.12 1.23% to taking and the Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.1% to 2279.52 .

The month of August begins on sound footing, after a month of July under the sign of the rally. Wall Street has indeed the balance Friday night, but after a volatile session. The Dow Jones has sold just 0.01% at 10,466 points, but has had its best monthly performance (7.18%) last year. The Nasdaq was awarded 0.13% to 2255 points. In July, the Nasdaq and the Standard & Poor'500 have earned 6.9%.

The slowdown, confirmed the U.S. economy, however, has influenced the trend.In fact, the Commerce Department announced preliminary second quarter GDP rose just 2.4% annualized, while the consensus was expecting 2.5 and he had grown more openly 3.7% first quarter. Traders are still welcomed other indicators more encouraging: the Chicago PMI for July was well above expectations (even if relapse at its lowest since November 2009) and the final index of consumer sentiment for July improved slightly although it remains a net withdrawal a month.

On Monday, investors showed they appreciated the performance of enterprises. The KBW index of bank took 1.69%, encouraged by the strong results presented today by BNP Paribas and HSBC.

The ISM manufacturing index is expected with caution

On the face of macroeconomic indicators, meanwhile, on Friday, the U.S. employment report, investors will closely monitor the publication at 16:00 on Monday, the ISM manufacturing index for July (consensus 54) index ISM activity in the industry, which could either be moderating further, but also show that on Monday the 12th consecutive month of growth in manufacturing output. It could increase by 54.6% against 56.2% previously. It also is known that at 16:00 the index of construction spending for June, due in slight decline of -0.5% against -0.1% previously.

"Employment and consumer credit (Friday) will be crucial electronic check payday advance.Other market movers are, unsurprisingly, the two ISM surveys, analysts said Aurel Bgc. Investors have "overreacted" to last week regional surveys, which are very volatile … The ISM manufacturing index, released today, will determine the market trend over the week. "

Latest quarterly publications before the summer break

On the corporate side, no new publication will boost the morale of investors. Indeed, the largest quarterly publications arrive this week to an end, on both sides of the Atlantic after the accounts variously appreciated Merck, Chevron, McAfee or Friday, "recently published expected these days This should provide some important information and news on different sectors of activity, analysts said Aurel Bgc.

This week will publish in fact the computer services company VeriSign (Monday), and Electronic Arts, as well as Pfizer, Dow Chemical, Procter & Gamble (Tuesday).It will then turn to Time Warner (Wednesday) and Kraft Foods and Viacom (Thursday).

The investors also will keep an eye on the pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Meyers, and the other on the pharmaceutical distributor CVS Caremark, who will pay interim dividends.

In the news this Monday, Ford (1.63% to 12.98 U.S. dollars) has announced having completed the sale of the Volvo automobile brand and related assets in China Zhejiang Geely to $ 1 8 billion.

Walt Disney (-1.75% to 34.28 dollars) will also be closely watched after the announced sale of its studio Miramax for more than 660 Million Dollars to Filmyard Holdings.

The acquisition of Alico by the insurer MetLife (-0.45% to 41.87 dollars) will not bring much to the insurer that he had hoped and the latter announced Monday a program to increase capital to finance this acquisition.First life insurance company in the U.S., MetLife now expects an increase in its annual operating profit of between 40 and 45 cents per share. The group had initially estimated that the acquisition of Alico would be accretive to its results between 45 cents to 55 cents per share in 2011.

The U.S. stock market should be reluctant to take on the leadership on Monday. The index futures are predicting a slight decline in opening of U.S. markets. The index futures Standard & Poor's 500 and Nasdaq 100 fell back in effect respectively by 0.13% to 1099.50 points from 0.04% to 1873.10 points.

On Friday, the NYSE has ended sharply higher, buoyed by another round of quarterly results from U.S. companies of good quality and were reassured on the results of resistance testing in European banks. The Dow Jones gained 0.99% and the Nasdaq 1.05%. On the whole last week, the Dow Jones gained 3.23% and the Nasdaq rose 4.15%.

On the foreign exchange market, the euro steadied against the dollar. In the morning, it was worth 1.2901 dollars against 1.2906 dollars on Friday.

A busy week on the macroeconomic level.Today investors expect the sales figures for new housing. Another highlight, the U.S. central bank should publish its Beige Book Wednesday on the economic conditions. It will be very guarded while the president of the institution, Ben Bernanke said Wednesday before Congress the slow recovery, with no announcement of new funding in the economy.

On Tuesday, it is the Standard & Poor's / Case Schiller home prices and consumer confidence, which will be followed, before investors only look the next day on orders of durable goods. But it was the day Friday with the first estimate of gross domestic product (GDP) U.S. second quarter to be expected this week.This new burst of publications should be followed especially when investors are questioning the strength of new U.S. economic recovery No fax pay day loans.

U.S. companies are still likely to take stock in their accounts this week, including the program six companies forming part of Dow Jones. Tomorrow investors expect such figures CIT and Lockheed Martin and those sitting in the middle of DuPont.

To follow today the title of BP traded on Wall Street. The British press refers to a departure from the CEO of BP, before tomorrow, the date of publication of interim results of the oil giant.

Always on the side of values, General Electric said Friday its increased dividend of 20%, the quarterly dividend from 10 cents to 12 cents.GE also announced a resumption of its share repurchase programs. He had stopped this practice in September 2008. The board gave its approval for an additional $ 11.6 billion. "GE hopes to finish the year with $ 25 billion in cash, including proceeds from the sale of a majority stake in its subsidiary NBC Universal to Comcast" say the analysts at Aurel BGC. Some of this money will be used to buy three billion dollars in preferred shares that the group has sold to the holding company Berkshire Hathaway of Warren Buffett in October 2008.

Also note Friday night, the FDIC, the federal agency whose primary responsibility is to guarantee bank deposits, announced the bankruptcy of six new American banks, bringing to 102 the number of closing establishments since the beginning of year.These six failures will cost about 394 million dollars to its compensation fund the FDIC.

The end of the nightmare in the Gulf of Mexico may be close. BP wants to believe in all cases: two days after the start of the crucial test of strength of the new funnel, no sign of leakage was observed. "We have no indication that oil or gas escape" of damaged wells, said the vice-chair of Kent Well. Tested since Thursday, the giant funnel that contains the daily flow pouring millions of gallons of toxic liquid into the ocean, seems to hold good.

Uncertainty remains high: the compressed oil, trapped in the wells blocked by the funnel, eventually creating gaps and spread back into the ocean.According to Thad Allen, head of operations against the oil spill administration, BP must conduct further tests because the measured pressure does not allow to draw definitive conclusions about what is happening inside the well.

High pressure would suggest that well resistance is good and there is no leakage. Low pressure instead leave thinking that oil escaping elsewhere. Admiral Allen said that the pressure increased from 0.1 to 0.6 bar per hour, which was a good sign. But Friday, the level of pressure in the well still left casts "doubt on the possible existence of a leak." On Saturday, Vice President of BP, however, that the pressure inside the well had continued to increase."The fact that the pressure continues to mount gives us more confidence that the test works," he added, stressing that the data are "quite" in the range predicted by the engineers.

The extended testing

As a precaution, the oil company said Saturday it would extend the period of initial testing prévuepour last 48 hours. "We continue in phases of six hours each time. If there is a change in the way we do, we will announce it, "said Mark Salt, a spokesman for BP at the end of this period.

If the test proves successful the well will remain closed until the risk of leak is definitely ruled out by injecting concrete through a relief well. An operation could be completed in early August.However, if a leak is detected, the valve will be reopened and the oil will be pumped to surface ships.

"If we decide to reopen the pit, oil drain into the Gulf for some time," said Mr. Wells, the time to connect the pumping lines at the wellhead. This would obviously a major failure for the oil group that tries since the end of April to contain the largest oil spill in U.S. history.

Since April 22, nearly 520 million gallons of crude that would have flowed into the ocean, estimated Tuesday the International Energy Agency. Even if the leak was finally stopped, Deepwater would remain one of the worst oil spills in history (see graphic below), a nightmare to $ 3.5 billion for BP and irreparable ecological catastrophe.

With the football World Cup, TF1 maintains its primacy in terms of both audience and advertising. In the final between the Netherlands to Spain on Sunday night, the first private channel totaled 63.1% audience share and 14.1 million viewers together with peaks at 17.4 million at the end meeting. For the private channel, it is "a record audience for a football match without a French team. It is also the third best year for hearing TF1. Stephane Deverge, director of sports pole TF1 Publicité, also welcomed "the prime-time audiences who, throughout the competition, gathered 8.2 million viewers on average."

31 million visits

Louis Welsh, president of EADS, is convinced. The decision of the World Trade Organization (WTO), said Wednesday that "illegal" certain EU subsidies paid to Airbus for the A380, "changes nothing" for the A350. "The support for the A350 are not iIn the" scope "(Field, Ed) of the panel that reviewed the complaint of Americans," said Louis Welsh Saturday. He added: "It was explicitly stated that although such aid is not in the" scope ", they were sentenced prior BLES, since the system of repayable advances itself is not contrary to the rules WTO.

Always on the fringes of economic meeting organized by the Circle of economists in Aix-en-Provence, Louis Welsh, assured that Airbus would submit an offer in time with U.S. partners for the bulk tanker contract from the U.S. Air Force."We have reached an agreement with 200 companies amricaines. The Pentagon must decide to fall on the mega-tanker contract enviton estimated at 35 billion dollars. Airbus and Boeing have until July 9 to finalize their proposals. A decision is expected next fall. "I think the nervousness that manifests Boeing in this case and the propaganda campaign that he led for three or four days shows qu'ls fear that we have a competitive bid on the tanker," said Louis Welsh. Ambiance, atmosphere …

ALSO READ:

"Airbus: WTO condemns EU

"Boeing and Airbus have been fighting for years

The one that Sunday was a "very very big niche tax" that deserved a helping hand plane finally spared. Baroin, Budget Minister returned to his whims and confirmed on Wednesday in an interview to Le Parisien / Today in France that the government would not reverse the reduced VAT rates for restaurants given a year ago.

"This measure is maintained" said the mayor of Troyes. "If it must be questioned, the debate will take place during the next presidential election," he added.

10 billion savings

It must be said that the budget minister no longer had much choice. Tuesday morning, his minister, Christine Lagarde, had hammered on RMC and BFM-TV that the reduction in tax loopholes would not affect the VAT at 5.5% of restaurant owners.Baroin will have to find other niches planing to recover 10 billion euros economy expected by 2013. The minister on Wednesday gave few tracks a bit fuzzy.

Besides the movement of the plane 10% on tax loopholes previously announced, it confirms the non-replacement of 100,000 civil service posts (3 billion savings), reduced operating costs (2000000000), the reduction of lifestyle State … Baroin explains that this is the second round of general revision of public policies.The first, launched in late 2007 as it would have to generate 7 billion euros.

ALSO READ:

The 5.5% VAT on food challenge

The reduction in VAT in the catering numbers

"The tax loopholes planed 8.5 billion

"Restoration: more than 20,000 jobs since a year

"Resto: VAT rate maintained (Lagarde)