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Citigroup to pay $33 mn in gender bias law suit

New York, April 04: Citigroup Inc (CN) has agreed to pay USD33 million to about 2,500 current and former female brokers at its Smith Barney unit to settle a three-year-old discrimination lawsuit, court papers show.

A federal judge must approve the proposed settlement, which was described in papers filed Wednesday by the brokers` lawyers with the US District Court in San Francisco.

The plaintiffs had accused Smith Barney in the original March 2005 complaint of preventing female brokers from competing fairly with men for new accounts, promotions and pay, and depriving women of equal training and sales support.

They also accused Smith Barney of using past performance, which they called "the results of historical discrimination," as a means to award business and pay.

According to court papers, the proposed settlement "provides a significant recovery to the class and easily falls within the range of reasonableness." Citigroup also agreed to change how it awards bonuses and assigns accounts, and adopt measures to help retain and promote women, the papers show.

"The settlement has the potential to be one of the most innovative approaches in any settlement of this type," said Kelly Dermody, a partner at Lieff, Cabraser, Heimann & Bernstein LLP representing the brokers, in an interview.

"It will include the input of outside experts who will not only help Citigroup better train, develop and retain women, but also make the company itself more successful," she said.

Citigroup did not immediately return a call seeking comment. Dermody said she did not know how many of the female brokers still work at Citigroup.

A hearing on the proposed settlement is set for April 30, court records show.

`India to take measures against profiteers to curb prices`

Singapore, April 04: India on Thursday warned that it will not hesitate to take stern measures against hoarders and profiteers in view of the spiraling prices of essential commodities.

"We will not hesitate to take the strictest measures, including using legal provisions against hoarding and profiteering whether in food, cement or steel," Commerce Minister Kamal Nath said here.

The minister, who is here to attend the `incredibleindia@60` event showcasing the growth of a resurgent India, told reporters that though there was the provision of 18g of the Industrial Act, "we don`t propose to use it."

Nath said the biggest task was to provide food to the poor. "Our biggest challenge with India is the supply side management especially in the below poverty line."

Inflation hits 3 year high at 7%; food, minerals dearer

New Delhi, April 04: India’s wholesale price index reached the highest mark of 7 percent in three years for the week ending March 22, compared to 6.68 percent in the previous week, the government data showed on Friday. The inflation rose due to higher prices of food, vegetables, minerals and manufactured items, even as measures to tame prices are expected to take effect only in 2-3 weeks.

During the week, prices of fruits and vegetable, pulses, cereals, eggs, meat and fish went up, while condiments and spices were cheaper. The mineral category-index shot up by 38.2 percent driven by 46 percent rise in prices of iron ore.

In the manufactured items category, sunflower oil, vanaspati, butter, mustard oil, sugar and groundnut oil became expensive, while prices of ghee, coconut oil mellowed down by 1 percent each.

At the same time, prices of steel ingots, alloy steel casting were higher. However, car chassis moved down by one percent.

With rapidly rising rate of inflation, the government has begun pulling out all stops to boost domestic supply situation by withdrawing incentives on export of at least 40 items, including steel, cement and non-Basmati rice.

The government has already reduced duties on import of different varieties of palm oil and the duty cut on soya oil would be one of the options to be considered by the empowered Group of Ministers (eGoM).

In one shot, the government has also raised the minimum export price for non-Basmati rice from USD 650 per tonne to USD 1000.

However, Manila-based Asian Development Bank expects these measures to influence prices only by the month end.

The high rate of inflation could also prompt RBI to take monetary measures, like raising short-term lending and borrowing rates and squeezing money supply in its annual credit policy scheduled to be announced on April 29.

Pointing out that global circumstances are fuelling inflation, ICICI Bank managing director K V Kamath said, "I am sure policy makers both at the monetary level and in the ministry will work together to ease supply side constraints."

The government has already moved into top gear in its fight against inflation and announced a host of fiscal measures like scrapping import duty on crude edible oils and banning export of non-basmati rice and pulses.

Earlier in the week, Minister of State for Finance P K Bansal said, "the government is conscious of it (inflation), the measures would be taken wherever the situation warrants."

-Mobile slashes iPhone price to 99 euros

Frankfurt, April 04: T-Mobile has slashed its price in Germany for the most basic version of Apple Inc`s iPhone to 99 euros (USD 155) from 399 euros ahead of the expected launch of a new model.

In an offer posted on Friday on its website, T-Mobile said it would sell the 8 gigabyte version for as little as 99 euros together with a two-year contract costing 89 euros a month from April 7 through June 30.
The 16 gigabyte version will continue to cost 499 euros, in conjunction with a minimum 49 euros-per-month two-year contract.
Apple is expected to launch later this quarter a third-generation, high-speed version of the iPhone, which propelled it into 10th place in global handset vendor rankings in the fourth quarter of 2007 after its launch at the end of June.
Bank of America analysts expect Apple to produce as many as 8 million of the new iPhones in the third quarter. Apple itself has said it expects to have sold 10 million iPhones in total by the end of 2008.
Deutsche Telekom said at the end of January it had sold 70,000 iPhones since they went on sale in Germany at the beginning of November, but has given no update since.

Kamal Nath warns against hoarding commodities

Singapore, April 04: Trade Minister Kamal Nath said on Friday that his government will take stern action against those engaged in hoarding commodities and profiteering from the trade.

"We will not hesitate to take the strongest possible measures, including using some of the legal provisions that we have against hoarding, against profiteering, whether it`s in food, in cement, in steel," he said on the sidelines of a conference in Singapore.

The minister, who is here to attend the `incredibleindia@60` event showcasing the growth of a resurgent India, told reporters that though there was the provision of 18g of the Industrial Act, "we don`t propose to use it."

Nath said the biggest task was to provide food to the poor. "Our biggest challenge with India is the supply side management especially in the below poverty line."

"We have great supply-side challenges in India at the moment with 15 million people moving from having one meal a day to two meals a day," he added.

India banned exports of non-basmati rice on Monday to try to increase domestic supplies after soaring food prices pushed wholesale price inflation to a 14-month high.

Asia can overcome food, fuel inflation: World Bank

Danang(Vietnam), April 04: The economies of East Asia are sound and should be able to weather a slowdown as well as inflationary pressures from the high price of rice and other commodities, a senior World Bank official said on Friday.

Global rice prices have been rising since October when India, which normally exports 4 million tonnes annually, banned exports of non-basmati rice.

Other major producing countries like China, Egypt and Vietnam have also curtailed exports of rice, the staple food of about half of the world`s 6.6 billion people, threatening to drive prices even higher and heightening food security fears.

"High and rising food prices, especially rice prices, posed a special challenge," Juan Jose Daboub said in a statement at a two-day meeting of Asian finance ministers in Danang, Vietnam.

"Governments needed to take short-term steps to protect the poor, but also to ensure that long-term solutions were found to relieve shortages," said Daboub, a World Bank managing director and one of three deputies to its president, Robert Zoellick.

Inflation across the region was contributing to significant reductions in the incomes of the poor, who have to spend between one-third and two-thirds of their income on food, Daboub said.


However, he cautioned against adopting excessive state subsidies to deal with food inflation, saying that could seriously strain fiscal positions and distort markets.

Daboub`s statement to the 10-nation ASEAN group on the global slowdown said the region was "positioned well to weather the downturn, thanks to sound economic management, strong growth and accumulated reserves over the past decade".

A World Bank report on Tuesday said Asia faced a tough job in managing inflation at a time when economic growth was slowing.

Rising food and fuel prices have helped drive inflation to a 26-year high in Singapore, a 14-month high in India and the highest in more than a decade in Hong Kong, China and Vietnam, which is hosting the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) meeting.

The Philippines, one of the world`s biggest rice importers, has sought to buy large shipments from Vietnam and Thailand to replenish its dwindling stocks.

The government wants to have enough rice for 30 days of consumption before July, when the supply of local rice dwindles.

FDI inflows in India cross $20 bn in April-Feb 2007-08

New Delhi, April 04:India received USD 20.13 billion dollars as Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in April-February 2007-08, up 70 per cent from USD 11.88 billion that flowed in a year ago.

The USD 20.13 billion inflow "is the highest FDI into equity in the country during any year", an official release said on Friday.

FDI inflows in February 2008 grew a whopping 712 per cent over the year-ago period to USD 5.67 billion, surpassing the inflows received in any single year since 1991 barring 2006-07, it said.

Microsoft and ***** execs meet but no progress: report
Friday April 4, 1:58 am ET

NEW YORK - Senior executives at Microsoft Corp (NasdaqGS:MSFT - News) and ***** Inc (NasdaqGS:YHOO - News) met this week to discuss their proposed merger but did not get anywhere with the talks, the Wall Street Journal said on its Web site, citing people familiar with the matter.
Microsoft executives were not willing to raise their offer and ***** continued to be unwilling to enter any formal talks unless the offer was raised, the Journal said on Friday, citing those sources.

The meeting was the second of its kind, without the presence of bankers, between top executives at both companies and took place near *****'s headquarters in Sunnyvale, the Journal said.

Microsoft offered to buy ***** for $31 a share on January 31 but ***** rejected the offer, currently valued at about $42 billion, saying it substantially undervalued the company.

Representatives at Microsoft were not immediately available. A ***** spokeswoman declined to comment.

takeover a turning point in car industry: UK experts

London, April 04: Tata`s takeover of Jaguar and Land
Rover will be a key turning point in the car industry`s
history, automobile experts say.


Coventry-based Nick Seale of the Warwick Manufacturing
Group believes that the takeover will also be of global and
historic significance.

Seale said: "when the history of the motor industry is
written, they will look back on this event as one of the key
turning points.

"The Indian purchase of two of the strongest brands in
the world car industry is really significant because the
industry, 20 years from now will be very different, and if I
was a betting man, I will say India will be a major player."

He told the Coventry evening Telegraph: "the US companies
have been world leaders for 50 years now but they are
experiencing difficulties. The Japanese have risen and out of
the Japanese/US power struggle and we`ve suddenly got the emerging
world of India and China becoming a real force.

"An Indian company buying two of the world`s largest brands is really significant and it will be a turning point. Although there`s going to be no visible change in the short
term, it`s a really significant move.


"I`ve been doing some work with a motorcycle company in India and India is absolutely fascinating from an industrialisation point of view. Indian companies are going to
be increasingly powerful in the world."

According to Seale, Ford had "sold off a really good business", and added that it was not Tata`s style to come in heavy handed and make sweeping changes which is excellent.

Jaguar-Land Rover could also benefit from Tata`s business portfolio which is spread across an array of sectors from it services to tea production and steel
with more than 289,000 people in its workforce in 80 countries, Seale added.

"One of the strengths of Tata is they have such a broad industry portfolio which is protective in terms of world changes in industry. You are not tied in to the motor
industry. It`s really an exciting time and is fascinating to see all these things going on. Tata are in it for a very long time," Seale said.

Seale`s optimism was echoed this week by Prime Minister Gordon Brown during his visit to Coventry.

Brown said: "the important thing is we continue to safeguard jobs in the future and what the Tata company has said is they will invest in Jaguar-Land Rover and still
maintain apprenticeships in the area and will invest in new technologies of the future.

"And so for the 16,000 people who depend on Jaguar-Land Rover the future is, as Tata says, one we can safeguard by everybody working together to make this a great success."

SEBI keeping a close watch on stock markets

New Delhi, April 04: The Securities and Exchange Board of India on Friday said it is keeping a close watch on stock markets to ensure that everything is going well and to safeguard the interests of retail investors.

"Whenever there is large growth there are problems... SEBI is keeping a close watch on the (stock) markets," SEBI whole time member T C Nair said here today.

The regulator was determined to ensure that "everything is going well" apart from robust governance measures at exchanges, he added.

The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex crossed 21,000 point mark in January this year, but declined by over 5,500 points since then. Today, the 30-share index nosedived 489.43 points to end at 15,343.12 points.

"Markets will go up and down and I do not know about what will happen to a day-to-day investor, but chances of high returns for a long-term investor are quite good," Nair added.

The government and SEBI are in the process of making retail investors a partner in the growth of capital markets, he said, adding that despite strong volatility in the markets, interests of long-term investors were safe considering strong fundamentals of the economy.

During five years since October 15, 2002, the Sensex has grown by 536 per cent providing high returns to investors, he said.

Acknowledging huge investments made by mutual funds in the markets, the SEBI member said their investment was providing a relative stability to the markets despite reports of outflow of funds by foreign institutional investors.

At present, there are over 850 mutual fund schemes and around 87 proposals are lying with the regulator, Nair said, adding that investments in mutual funds have grown to about Rs 5,66,000 crore from Rs 3,60,000 crore a year ago.

"Although mutual funds have withdrawn about Rs 28,000 crore over the past one month, their large investments still provide stability and confidence in the markets," Nair said.

He further said growth of the capital market was "only a tip of the iceberg" as at present only 5 per cent of the household savings were invested in the market.

"If 10 per cent of the household savings are invested in the market, one can only imagine what will be the scenario," he said, adding that no investor would repent if he makes long-term investment in the Indian stock markets.