International Business News

Toyota Motor, the leading Japanese automotive, said he expected to experience a substantial increase of its annual operating profit to more than 1,000 billion yen (9.7 billion euros), unprecedented since the outbreak of the financial crisis.

From January to March, Toyota has increased its quarterly profit more than fivefold to 238 billion yen, while analysts expected 223 billion yen.

This increase is partly explained by a gradual return of the group's production to previous levels to natural disasters that have disrupted last year.

Net income for the fourth quarter of fiscal offset has meanwhile risen to 121 billion yen against 25.4 billion last year. 

At a press conference, CFO Satoshi Ozawa has stressed "the extraordinary contribution of cost reduction efforts."

Akio Toyoda, grand-son of the founder of the group, has embarked on a strategy to reduce costs in all segments, Japanese production lines to those of Mississippi, through the design and engineering involved in the creation of new vehicles and equipment.

IMPROVING MARGINS

The aim is to boost margins Toyota and ride the wave of recovery in sales. The group said it expects to improve its margin to 4.5%, against 1.9% last year, allowing it to move closer to its goal of 5% that he wants to wait until 2015.

It is however far from the 7.1% margin posted by Nissan or Honda's 6.5%. It is even less than half to more than 10% of South Korea's Hyundai.

In fiscal 2012/2013 in progress, the group expected to increase its operating profit to 1.000 billion yen, while analysts expect 990 billion. Toyota also predicted a net profit increase to 760 billion yen against 284 billion for the year 2011-2012.

These comparisons are favored by the difficulties encountered last year during which Japan was hit by an earthquake and a tsunami before Thailand, where lies much of its production line, is in turn affected by floods.

Despite the strength of the yen, the main obstacle to its exports, Toyota is committed to build at least 3 million vehicles this year in its factories in Japan, nearly triple production of its local competitors, Honda and Nissan. 

Toyota has also said that its sales in emerging markets were in line with its projects, particularly in China, where sales from January to April will allow him to imagine a million sold annually vee ; vehicles.

Toyota announced in April a new program to reduce development costs by more than 20%, with an emphasis on sharing components.

Action Toyota ended unchanged Wednesday, before the publication of its accounts. She won more than a third since the low hit in late November by the Exchange.

"It is not possible to renegotiate the pact budget", said on Monday a spokesman for German Chancellor. This ensures that Francois Hollande will be welcomed "with open arms." German Chancellor Angela Merkel (the Bundestag by December 2, 2011).

Germany has raised its conditions Monday to President-elect Francois Hollande, ruling out any renegotiation of the European fiscal pact and all initiatives "growth deficit".

"It is not possible to renegotiate the fiscal pact", which has already been "signed by 25 of the 27 member states of the European Union", which aims to strengthen discipline in public finance management, said the spokesman of Chancellor Angela Merkel, Steffen Seibert, during a press conference.

He was asked about the willingness of Mr. Holland to add a component to the pact on growth. In this regard, Mr. Seibert also reiterated the conditions of Berlin: Germany does not want "a growth deficit, but growth through structural reforms."

Clearly, there is no question for the Merkel government in Europe to promote recovery policies, but to promote the path chosen by Germany and the labor market reforms implemented by former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder .

French President elect had scored on his victory speech by his willingness to "give to the European dimension of growth, employment, prosperity, the future" and explain in Berlin and other partners that "the austerity could no longer be inevitable. "

A little later, Angela Merkel said that Francois Hollande is welcomed "with open arms" during his first visit to Germany, taking place after the handover. "We work well together and intensively," said Merkel at a news conference in Berlin, stressing that "the Franco-German cooperation is essential for Europe and we all want Europe to succeed" .

Wall Street fell more than 1.2% Friday, accusing them of this fact its worst weekly performance since the beginning of the year, within the scope of the announcement of a number of new jobs for the month of April far below expectations.

The Dow Jones Industrial 30 yielded 1.27%, or 168.32 points to 13,038.27. The S & P-500, wider, lost 22.47 points, or 1.61%, to 1369.10. The Nasdaq Composite fell on its side of 67.96 points (-2.25%) to 2,956.34.

On the whole week, the Dow has sold 1.4%, the S & P 500 2.4% and Nasdaq 3.7%. The latter two had their worst week since November and December respectively.

Some 115,000 people were recruited in the nonagricultural sector last month, announced Friday the Labor Department, against 154,000 in March and 259,000 in February, two figures it is true revised ; s up (for a cumulative total of 53,000).

Economists anticipated 170,000 net new jobs for the month of April after the 120,000 originally announced for March.

The unemployment rate, calculated from a separate survey, returned to 8.1% of the workforce, against 8.2% in March and 8.3% in February, a level not seen since January 2009 when it was 7.8%. 

Despite this recent positive development, the market players have mostly retained the figure for job creation, which leads them to fear a slowdown in U.S. growth.

At its current level, it is already considered insufficient to significantly reduce unemployment.

The approach of elections in Greece and France and any uncertainties they may have a Europe which still has not put the debt crisis behind it also contributed to stopping the coast.

"Market participants liquidated their positions after the employment figures and should not change posture throughout the weekend," said Frank Lesh, an analyst at FuturePath Trading LLC. 

The energy values ​​were strongly accused the coup after the employment statistics, due to fears of a possible slowdown weigh on demand black.

Because of these fears, the price per barrel of U.S. light crude also fell 4%, from below $ 100 for the first time since February. The S & P compartment of the energy of Wall Street has sold 2.17%.

The action Exxon Mobil sold 1.26% to 84.57 dollars and Chevron that of 2.14% to 103.72 dollars, the two values ​​are among the largest declines in the Dow Jones .

The area composed of values ​​related to utilities, considered defensive in times of uncertainty, is the only one that ended in the green, with a gain of 0.16%.

The action Estee Lauder has lost 5.35% to 60.72 dollars after the U.S. cosmetics group announced earnings guidance deemed disappointing for the fourth quarter of fiscal year and expressed his concerns about the slowdown in China. 

The way LinkedIn has instead won 7.21% to 117.30 dollars after the professional social network has raised its annual results after better than expected first quarter, supported by strong growth in business services.

The action took Dole 7.69% to 9.39 dollars after the distributor of fruits and vegetables said he could split some divisions following a strategic review its activities.

The sanitation system of pensions and social benefits is underway. The state expects to save over 800 million euros a year. Three of the four ministers of the Greek far-right party Laos opposing the new austerity measures demanded by the creditors of the countries presented their resignations Friday, February 10

The Greek authorities have discovered two years about 200,000 cases of fraud and pension benefits, and expect the fight against these practices an annual saving of over 800 million, sources said Tuesday the Ministry of Labour.

Taking advantage of the carelessness and corruption of large parts of the administration, this large-scale fraud was on a range of schemes, pension after death that relatives of the deceased continued to receive disability pensions granted to Greeks perfectly valid, said the same sources. A total of sanitation system of pensions and benefits, via a generalized computerization underway, should allow Greece to save more than 800 million euros a year.

Assisted by police, the Ministry of Labour now back as a new track, that of firms reporting imputed social contributions – some 4,000 cases have already been identified – to sell at full price coverage for uninsured assets, nearly third of the workforce. About sixty of these companies is currently in the crosshairs.

With some 7 billion euros of social benefits per year, including $ 2 billion for unemployment benefits, Greece is the European average, but the effectiveness of these funds in the fight against poverty and exclusion is less to that country partners. Over the revelations of fraud have occurred in recent months, including the Greeks had discovered the case of the island of Zante in the Ionian Sea, showing an abnormally high rate of blind or that of the island of Kalymnos (southeast ), which appeared afflicted with high rates of mental illness.

The consortium led by Russia's Gazprom to develop the giant Shtokman gas field in the Arctic in June will announce an overhaul of this project, which accuses several years of delay, have we learned from several sources within the consortium, industry and Russian authorities.

Gazprom and its allies in this project, which include the French Total and Norway's Statoil, plan to give up on the Shtokman gas transit to Europe through pipelines in favor of production liquefied natural gas (LNG), the sources explained.

They stated that no decision on this point had been adopted so far, but several sources have said that the consortium had canceled all tenders already started to build. 

A redesign of the project could result in a delay in the production field, currently scheduled for 2016.

"For now, the technical configuration of the project not suitable for any of the shareholders, so they are not willing to take a final investment decision," said a source in the consortium.

Signing a new agreement could intervene at a meeting of investors in St. Petersburg in June, she added.

"After that one year might be necessary before a final investment decision. They need time to launch new tenders and find new suppliers. "

Small and medium businesses, entrepreneurs and self-family businesses, which account for most of the economic fabric of the country, paying a heavy price for the Greek crisis. The European Commission is trying to address the funding problems they suffer. In Greece, six out of ten SMEs have seen their incomes decline in 2011.

Up to a thousand individual companies will put the key under the door every week in Greece in the first half of 2012 due to the serious crisis that is sinking the country, said Friday the European Commission, which seeks to root the problem.  

"Greece is facing an economic crisis and social crisis which is reflected in the situation of small and medium enterprises: six out of ten companies have seen their incomes decline in 2011 and 150,000 jobs were lost," said the Commission in a press on the sidelines of the visit to Athens Friday the European Commissioner for Industry, Antonio Tajani. "It is estimated that during the first half of 2012, up to 1,000 small businesses have closed every week," said the statement, which does not provide estimates on the number of companies created in parallel.

The Commission therefore calls for increased aid to these companies, self-entrepreneurs and family businesses, which form the bulk of the Greek economic fabric. Since last September, the European Union through its Task Force for Greece including trying to find ways to overcome the credit crunch affecting SMEs, banks, deficit, cut off from markets and dependent on the ECB, having suspended loans. In March, a special guarantee fund, with 500 million euros, was created by the EU to promote through the European Investment Bank lending to SMEs up to a billion euros.

According to the Commission, in 2010, Greece had 742,600 very small businesses, employing a total of 2.512 million employees, over 85% of total employment in the country, a record level in the EU. These structures produce 35.3% of the value added of the country against 21.8% on average in the EU. With 14% of employees on average in Greece, against 33% in the rest of the EU, large companies they create 28% of the value added, highlighting the low productivity of small businesses in Greece, the Commission added.

European shares declines sharply at mid-session Tuesday, after a long weekend by Easter, the statistical disappointing U.S. employment numbers in March and in Halftone China's foreign trade darkening global economic outlook at the time opens in the U.S., the earnings season.

In Paris, shortly before 13h, the CAC 40 lost 1.43% (47.37 points) to 3,272.44 points. In Frankfurt the Dax gave 1.06% and London, the FTSE fell by 0.95%. Pan-European Eurostoxx 50 index gave up 1.31%.

The Euro Stoxx 50 index of volatility, the main barometer of investor nervousness in Europe jumped 12% to its highest in five weeks.

The sectors most dependent on exports to emerging markets, including automotive and mining, are among the largest declines under the impact of slower growth in Chinese imports. Peugeot lost 3.7%, 3.6% Renault.

Wall Street is expected to rebound in the opening in the light of index futures in New York advancing 0.1% to 0.35%.

The government deficit in France amounted to 5.2% of GDP in 2011 against 5.7% forecast in the Finance Act, prompting the government to ; improve its forecast for 2012 to 4.4% against 4.5% previously.

The public deficit, which includes state, local and social security funds, totaled 103.1 billion euros last year, according to preliminary results of the national accounts published by INSEE Friday.

The public debt amounted to 85.8% of GDP at end 2011, to 1.7173 trillion euros, up 122.1 billion in one year, and this leads to a more e ; up 84.9% as expected.

The deficit was the end of 2010 to 7.1% or 137.0 billion. 

Armed with this result, "we expect to accelerate our progress in reducing the public deficit to 4.4% of GDP, and keep the 3% in 2013," said the budget minister, Valérie Pécresse, in interview published Friday in Le Monde.

At 5.2% end of 2011, "it's 10 billion better than the objective of which France had undertaken", welcomed the Prime Minister, Translation ois Fillon.

"France has done much better thanks to the efforts of the French," said President Nicolas Sarkozy.

The Socialist Francois Hollande, favorite in the polls for the presidential election, pledged to cut the deficit to 4.5% end 2012 and 3.0%, the limit the European Stability Pact, the end of 2013. 

BOOST FOR 2012

The lower deficit in 2011 will ease the task of the next president, provided that economic growth does not collapse, the effort is less important.

But the trend was poor in January and a sharp economic slowdown is expected for all of 2012, likely to derail the accounts if it were larger.

Last year, the tax burden increased by 1.3 points to 43.8% of GDP, due to higher taxes (+ 7.8%).

Spending continued to decelerate, with growth of 2.1%, a rate lower than GDP growth in value, after 2.3% in 2010 . Public spending accounted for 55.9% of GDP in late 2011 after 56.6% in late 2010.

Revenues have increased it by 5.9% after 3.3% in 2010, and accounted for 50.7% of GDP from 49.5% in late 2010.

Interest paid by France to its income increased 9.5% due to increased debt and the impact of the acceleration of inflation on compensation of indexed bonds.

Operating expenses slowed, wages rising by 1.6%, after 2.1% in 2010, and intermediate consumption decreases by 1.5%.

Social benefits have remained the same dynamic in 2010, up 3.1% after 3.2%. Public investment increased by 1.6%, after falling 8.0% in 2010.

On the revenue side, taxes on income and wealth grew by 10%: the increase in tax revenues from both the corporate income tax (8.7 billion ) than the general social contribution (5.2 billion) and income tax (3.6 billion), note INSEE. Taxes on products and production are up 5.8%.

Social contributions have accelerated (+4.1% after +2.0%), in connection with the resumption of payroll and annualized general relief contributions social.

DEBT NOT ALWAYS CONTROL

The State contribution to the debt ratio increased from 90.3 billion euros last year, a somewhat larger variation than its financing needs.

The difference results from an increase in cash (5.9 billion) and loans to troubled countries in the Euro zone (10.4 billion). Conversely, the State shall be reimbursed a portion of loans to the automotive sector (4.0 billion), note INSEE.

The debt of central government bodies amounted to 10.4 billion at end 2011, down 3.7 billion, due to the deleveraging of the Company's equity participation of the State (-3.5 billion).

The contribution of local government debt reached 166.3 billion against 161.1 billion in late 2010.

The contribution of social security funds to the debt increased 30.4 billion to $ 205.4 billion. The change in debt, larger than the deficit resulted mainly from the increase in cash of social security funds (12 billion), said INSEE.

Net inflows of life insurance has turned positive in February for the first time since August. But the lights are far from all being returned to green. Explanations.

Life insurance finds the appeal to the French. Net new money (deposits less withdrawals) was positive in February in France, to the tune of 300 million euros for the first time in seven months, according to figures released Friday by the two main associations of insurers. This figure confirms the recent comments from several insurers, which reported a relative normalization of the market after a very difficult semester, unprecedented in the history of this offering.

Withdrawals down

The return to the green net inflows is primarily attributable to a sharp slowdown in redemptions (withdrawals), down 24% compared to January. They are still 21% above their level in February 2011. At the same time, payments recorded a more moderate decline of 14% compared to January 2012 and 13.5% compared with February 2011, according to figures released by the French Association of Insurance (AFA), that meets the French Federation of Insurance Companies (FFSA) and the Group of mutual insurance companies (Gema). The total amount placed on life insurance contracts has increased from 1.369 billion to 1.377 billion in January end in late February.

These figures tend to confirm the speech held by many insurers, who announced several weeks back to "a sense of normalcy," the term used by the CEO of AXA France, Nicolas Moreau, mid-February. "The movement announced inflection is confirmed over the last month," he told AFP the president of the FFSA, Bernard Spitz, while calling for caution. "It is far too early to see a trend," he warned. Life insurance, however, seems out of the rut, after a year-end nightmare.

Crisis in the eurozone and sluggish economy

The product has suffered because of the deepening crisis in the euro area, which prompted investors to favor short-term investments. But many of these products were already pushed forcefully by banks, launched a hunt for deposits in view of the arrival of the new regulatory framework, says Basel III.

Climate degradation, but also the planned reduction of Scellier, also resulted in the postponement of significant financial investments to real estate. "There was an overall campaign debt", marked, among other things, a wave of mortgage repayments, observed Mr. Moreau. He said "it is possible that at the peak of the crisis, our people have chosen to pay off debt rather than reinvest."

Calming the markets

The normalization of markets, beginning in 2012, supported by advances on Greece and off operations of the European Central Bank (ECB), have provided some form of appeasement. "The purchases have decreased significantly, people are less worried" at the end of 2011, said Thursday the CEO of the insurance arm of BNP Paribas, Eric Lombard. "On the first months of 2012, Aviva is pleased with the evolution of the collection," said Aviva France Friday. However, several factors unfavorable to life remain, primarily the arrival of the retired generation "baby boom" and the continued decline in yields. Last month, the CEO of CNP Assurances, Gilles Benoist, and had talked about "turning point".  

"Life insurance is going to find his true vocation, which is not to compete with short-term banking products, but to constitute a real reserve of long-term savings and fund pensions and dependency," he had said. A vocation that does not seem challenged by the candidates in the presidential election in a position to be elected. "On the substantive issues, there is a line of force that consensus on the left and right is one that returns a favor long-term savings," said Mr. Spitz. For him, "everybody understands that to have growth, you need investment and therefore long-term savings. I have no fear as long as this message has gone."

According to Airbus, the final WTO report confirms massive subsidies granted to Boeing. The U.S., by contrast, talk about a great victory for the American aircraft manufacturer in this case. Airbus delivered 534 aircraft in 2011, a record.

The European aircraft manufacturer Airbus said Monday that the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization (WTO) confirmed and extended the same sentence on subsidies granted to U.S. rival Boeing. "The report of the Appellate Body confirms and expands the scope of the conviction by the WTO on massive subsidies granted to Boeing illegal," he said in a statement Airbus (EADS), which still considers its commercial harm to $ 45 billion.

Airbus issued this statement even before the official announcement of the decision of the Appellate Body of the WTO. In this case, the judges of the WTO had estimated March 31, 2011 at trial that some of these U.S. aid constituted subsidies inconsistent with global trade rules. The judges then had amounted to "at least $ 5.3 billion" for the period 1989-2006.

"This report confirms the existence of illegal subsidies paid by the U.S. to Boeing," said the manufacturer according to which grants "a few billion dollars resulting from today's decision" is in addition to " at least $ 5.3 billion "subsidy initially estimated. Airbus estimates that the Appellate Body rejected "almost 90% points of the appeal filed by the U.S. against the earlier findings of the WTO and validates all of the call of the European Union ".

The U.S. response was not long in coming. According to a statement the U.S., the WTO ruled that the aircraft manufacturer Boeing had received four to six times less public subsidy than its European rival Airbus. The U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk exterior even boasts a "great victory" in the WTO, stating that "comparable figures", the Geneva organization had identified only "three to four billion dollars" of illegal subsidies of American States United, against $ 18 billion in illegal subsidies from the European Union.

According to the U.S., EU subsidies have cost the equivalent of 342 aircraft orders to Boeing, while conversely the U.S. subsidies have lost the equivalent than "a little over 100 "aircraft orders to Airbus.

"The view of the United States has prevailed," welcomed Mr. Kirk. "It is now clear that European subsidies to Airbus are much more important – and it amounts in multiples – and caused much distortion that may have done everything the United States for Boeing," has he added. "This decision is a victory for the great industrial and American workers," said Mr. Kirk.

However, Washington has also, communicated before the WTO itself does not make public its judgment on appeal. This is expected later Monday.