International News

The Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF) to better protect investors. Like announced last April, the MFA has launched with the collaboration of the supervisory authority, a new public financial information. His goal? To better inform its clients on banking, savings, insurance, financial markets or the credit. The public will get information on insurance products (home, auto, life, health …), bank accounts, means of payment, bank books or the functioning of financial markets, products collective savings, companies listed on the Stock Exchange, the securities account.

"Applications will be redirected by the operators to specialists of the AMF or the supervisory authority," says Madeleine Guidoni, mediator of the AMF.The policeman of the Exchange hopes to meet customer expectations disappointed that their banks do not have better information about the content of such Fund.

Life buoy

"The financial institution has taken to bad habits for marketing of financial products", regrets the AMF Ombudsman Paperless payday loans. With this new service, the regulator should thus be able to better track business practices of banks and better focus the control activities.

After the merger of the bank authorities and insurance giving birth to the supervisory authority, the creation of this service, as required by the economy minister, Christine Lagarde, is like a lifeline to investors, including confidence in financial markets has been severely affected by the numerous cases of fraud or scam.

Called Bank Savings Insurance News Service, is available in a website – www.abs-infoservice.fr – a telephone helpline – 0811901801 – and a postal address – 61 Rue Taitbout, 75009 Paris. The domestic number is available Monday through Friday from 8:00 to 6:00 p.m..

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Between the French listed companies and U.S. investors, the reports are looking good. Despite the crisis, Paris remains the third preferred destination after Great Britain and Germany. But this affinity could become even more intensity, if we believe a research firm Financial Dynamics on the attractiveness of companies listed on the Paris Stock Exchange with 30 institutional investors on Wall Street. Europe weighs only 13.8% of their portfolio and the size of France went a small 1.6%, which suggests the study, could grow if the managements of French companies were showing "greater transparency and if the publications were more accurate results and frequent. All these qualities, however, already claimed by large listed companies. Yet Americans remain unsatisfied.While 62% feel well informed about investment opportunities, 38% complain that they do not quite grasp the subtleties of the governance and regulation at the French. This does not prevent them from playing for high: 39% of respondents prefer large-cap, over 10 billion euros. And 23% opt for those between 5 and 9.99 billion euros.

To choose between two companies in the euro area, 53% of investors focus first on to dissect the "fundamentals", only 16% consider the prospects for growth as critical. Which is good in this day and age.

Ten weeks after the arrival on the shelves of stores of its nearest competitor, Nespresso is on the offensive … judiciary. Nestle, the world leader in food and owner of Nespresso, sued Friday in front of the Tribunal de Grande Instance of Paris the U.S. Sara Lee, which sells in France for use in coffee pods Nespresso machines under the brand Gold ( coffee house).

According to our records, Casino is also covered by this assignment, as distributor caps Gold. However, neither Carrefour or Leclerc or Auchan, which also sell, have received blue paper. Nestle has obviously wanted to spare its main customers in France.

In fact, the Swiss Casino attacks because it sells, in addition to pods Gold, its own brand caps, also compatible with Nespresso machines.Available for less than one month, they were designed by CSC, a company founded by a former boss of Nespresso, which claims to have found a way around the patents by the Swiss group. The best advertising we could do that Nestle would drag us to court, "repeated John Paul Gaillard, head of CSC. The latter will have to wait to see if it will receive such a boost from his former employer.

1700 patents

Nestlé experts (engineers, mechanics, lawyers), which took ten weeks to complete their technical analysis of the capsules, however, have not yet completed its review of those Casino."This assignment is a clever shot pool with three bands, according to a avocat.Casino will prepare his defense for Gold, while avoiding having to contradict itself in any future case."

Nestle has taken the risk of him a (bad) publicity to defend its brand and its margins."We welcome fair competition, the company said, but we will take all appropriate measures to defend our intellectual property rights."

With the Nespresso coffee machines tailored to accept (in theory) that caps his coffee house and sold exclusively in a distribution network owned, Nestle has a nugget that was made last year a number of business by 1.94 billion euros (up 22%) and whose profitability, kept secret, is close to levels recorded in the luxury industry.

The 1700 patent cover both Nespresso pods, machines, and the mechanism that provides the link between the two. The assignment of Sara Lee would focus on these last two points, not the pods themselves. While those of Nespresso, aluminum, are completely sealed, those of Gold, plastic, are already holes.The panel discussion promises to be tricky. Pending the outcome of the proceedings, which could take 12-18 months (unless an agreement was reached earlier), provides Nespresso not have noticed the slowdown in its rate of growth since the arrival of new competitors. Sara Lee and sell between 1.1 and 1.5 million capsules of coffee … ten to twenty times less than Nescafe.

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While France has 75,000 Internet subscribers high-speed fiber optics, Maxime Lombardini, Chief Free said that France has everything to expedite the arrival of this new technology into homes. While some question the framework put in place in France to deploy fiber, Free hand, considers that promotes investment and competition and allows the French to receive subscriptions less expensive in Europe. Free calls within the regulation, its competitors to invest with him in fifty common.

LE FIGARO. – France takes it from behind in the deployment of fiber optics?

Maxime LOMBARDINI. – Quite the contrary, France is ahead. The advent of fiber optics in homes is accelerating.After three years of work, France is at the forefront in Europe, thanks to a very successful framework that enables rapid deployment of fiber networks without digging sidewalks and minimizing interference in the condominium thanks for sharing. In addition, this framework allows consumers to freely choose their provider and gives them the cheapest in Europe. In France, subscriptions to fiber costs 30 euros a month, against more than 100 U.S. dollars. Operators will deploy fiber in the condo together for 5 million homes in the dense areas. Four operators have begun deployments significant.Result, there will be at the end of the year more than 100,000 subscribers to the optical fiber (FTTH), and hundreds of thousands in late 2011.

Why do operators do not they do more advertising for the fiber?

We do not launch national campaign as the fiber is not everywhere. But when a neighborhood or a town is connected, we inform our ADSL subscribers and the people that for the same price, we offer very high-speed fiber. They have therefore a very fast internet access. Other immediate benefits they can receive television via their optical box on multiple televisions, enjoy high definition, the catch-up TV, 3D programs, etc..

France Telecom has called on its competitors to co-invest with him on a fifty Commons. Free is he leaving?

Sure.We have responded positively to France Telecom, which will pose a dedicated fiber to each home to Free bundle. For Free, this represents an investment of tens of millions of euros. We ourselves will today call for co-investment in more than 50 towns, including Paris, Nice, Marseille, Toulouse, Nantes, representing nearly 3 million potential catch. We ask that interested operators to respond to us by early July.

How much will you invest?

In fiber optics, Free has taken 2 million and 1.5 million work in the study. I confirm that we have 4 million homes connected with fiber in 2012. We signed agreements with condominium units representing 350,000. Free has invested 350 million euros in the fiber to date in 2010 and will invest over 150 million. The creation of direct and indirect employment is significant.All this shows that we are in a phase of very concrete investment and our motivation to deploy broadband is strong.

This hampers Does the deployment in parallel, on your mobile?

No. Free has the means to pursue these two sites in parallel: in 2010, over 2 billion turnover, the group will spend more than $ 750 million to capital spending, while remaining one of the least indebted telecom operators to Europe.On mobile, the deployment is well underway, and we, again, created over 1,000 jobs directly and indirectly.

When towns and villages can they expect to be connected to fiber optics?

If governments continue to encourage all operators to invest and participate in construction through big loan, we can begin to connect the less dense areas in 2011.

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In an email sent Wednesday to news agencies that Credit Agricole has made the announcement. The financial institution said its commitments related to the Greek state reached 850 million euros, 600 million for its Greek subsidiary Emporiki. No further comment was made.

The news comes as the crisis Greek climbed a step, revived by the relegation of the country score in the category of speculative investments by the rating agency Standard & Poor's. Many analysts believe that Credit Agricole is one of the banks most exposed to the current crisis in Greece.

More generally, according to the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the French banks in Europe are most concerned with exposure estimated at 75.12 billion dollars (57 billion euros), followed by German banks with exposure estimated at 45 billion dollars (34 billion euros).

French banks are the only institutions to have bought Greek Emporiki to Credit Agricole and Societe Generale for Geniki. The latter has not yet discussed the amount of its commitment.For its part, the general manager of BNP Paribas, Baudouin Prot, said Wednesday that his institution's exposure to Greek banks was "absolutely negligible" fast cash loans.

The sector battered stock market

The markets are in any case a very dim view of the involvement of French banks in a country attacked by the rating agencies. Investors fear that such consequences could lead to default or restructure the debt of Greece.

Results: The bank is breaking titles in stock. The action of the Credit Agricole fell 3.41% Wednesday to the Paris Stock Exchange, after declining more than 7.6% during the session. It lost 9.57% over the five days and 10.60% since the beginning of the year.

Societe Generale has limited the damage on Wednesday with a decline of 0.33% in closing. But the fall is much heavier since January 1 of that Credit Agricole, with a decline of 16.42%.

For its part, BNP Paribas dropped 3.48% on Wednesday at the close of Paris, and 8.80% since the beginning of the year.

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Since Tuesday, investors are moving away from safe-haven assets following the various signs of recovery in the global economy. The success of Intel promote appetite for risk. What will weigh on the dollar. Just as the maintenance of the speech by the Fed, which promotes interest rates still very low even for long.

EUR / USD – Sessions hectic since early April

After the Easter weekend, there has been a depreciation of the euro against the dollar in a climate of distrust of so-called risky currencies. The operators were cooled in their appetite for risk because of their fear on the issue of Greece. The single currency has lost about 220 pips * from a quotation of dollar 1.3500 1.3282 U.S. dollar on Thursday at 10am (lowest of the week).

Then the tension on the markets have weakened.Speech by Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the ECB (European Central Bank) last Thursday, has eased the financial world. He said he pursued the policy of low interest rates up to 1% in the euro area. And it has said that "Greece was able to reduce its deficit" and had already started to employ strong measures.

Nothing better to give a boost to the euro. The last weekend, offering assistance to 30 billion euros – Athens does "not want to use" – the European Union gave a big blow oxygen, allowing the euro to rise around 1 36 dollar on Monday.After two sessions of stagnation (Monday and Tuesday), the exchange rate has increased again, bolstered by renewed investor optimism about the strength of the global recovery due to favorable economic statistics, while comments Fed chairman on a forecast of "moderate growth" have weighed on the greenback.

On Tuesday, the foreign exchange markets have welcomed the issuance by Athens Treasury bills.And on Wednesday, Ben Bernanke (Beige Book) reiterated Wednesday that the rate of the institution should remain close to zero, at which they are set since December 2008, for an extended period, dismissing speculation of an anticipated tightening of Fed monetary policy, which has given new impetus to the euro.

As expected by analysts Realtime Forex Tuesday, which saw the euro test the 1.3541 support for better back, it is mounted to 1.3667 to 18 hours.

CDN / JPY – Same trend

Nippon side, the euro followed the same "trend" * weekly against the yen. The single currency began a decline of more than 400 pips against the yen. On Monday, the euro / yen was quoted at 127.70 to touch a low of 123.40 yen. But from the response Trichet yesterday, the euro strengthened to 125.60 yen to return.

The yen fell for the sixth straight session against the euro, with one course from Wednesday to 127.07 yen against 126.83 yen the day before.

GBP / USD – Sterling held up better than the euro

Across the Channel, the BoE (Bank of England) has also left interest rates unchanged at 0.5%, indicating that this was not the time to make a recovery rate of payday loan lenders.

Monetary side, the pound sterling, however, fared better than the euro against the dollar. Like British macro-economic figures emerged this week (GDP 0.4% and manufacturing output up 1.3%), the pound has evolved into a "range *" between 1.5130 and 1.5320 dollar.

* The cable is able to break this channel by treating up to 1.5473 dollar.

Against the yen, the pound again the delay and found almost the level of 144.21 yen on Monday.

CHF / EUR – Swiss Franc still going strong

On Wednesday, the Swiss franc 1.4362 per euro symbol. This is a very strong for the Swiss franc, which traded in 2009 almost all the time between 1.50 and 1.54.

Since the beginning of the year, the Swiss Frabce climbed more than 5%. This is not the business of the Swiss Central Bank, whose foreign exchange policy is heckled.

The yuan under the spotlight of the world

On Wednesday, Ben Bernanke, who appeared before the Joint Economic Committee of Congress, reiterated that "the United States must continue to press China to bring it to revalue its currency, the yuan."Barack Obama this week's encounter homolgue Chinese President Hu Jintao on China's trade deficit background.

Most economists agree that the currency is undervalued – by 40% according to analysts and has been used to obtain an economy more oriented toward exports to domestic consumption.

On the one hand, in case of revaluation, China would be ready to counter the speculative bubbles that threaten, and inflationary pressures. But then again, remember that a more expensive yuan will be more expensive for the "Western" to fill all Chinese products.And they will have the effect of melt exchange reserves in dollars of the Chinese, which does allow them to buy as many more U.S. Treasury Bonds, and therefore finance the debt of the United States …

* Definitions

• Forex: For Foreign Exchange, or foreign exchange market

• Technical analysis: analyst or chartist. She studied graphic evolution courses. The research in the historical price behavior involved in a situation to predict the evolution of financial securities.

• Pips: Price Interest Point. Unit rating for foreign currency. It designates the last digit used: in the case of the euro, the fourth decimal place.

• Trend: trend.

• Range: range.

• Support: value as the price has very little chance to pass down.

• Resistant: value as the price has very little chance to overtake on the rise.

• EUR: Euro, USD: U.S. Dollar, or U.S. dollar JPY Japan Yen or Japanese yen, GBP: British Pound, CHF: Swiss franc.

Antoine Gosset-Grainville, deputy director of Fran?ois Fillon's office for nearly three years, will soon be appointed Director General of the Caisse des Depots et des Consignations (CDC). A decree of the President of the Republic should, except surprise formalize the appointment.

Revealed last week by Le Point, arriving rue de Lille, where they are officially "no comment" – is not expected until May. It would also be included in a broader reorganization of the management team of the Caisse des Depots, whose mission has grown with the crisis of the past two years.

Antoine Gosset-Grainville, 44 years Wednesday, should be specifically in charge of financial matters and strategic subsidiaries and shareholdings.Alain Quinet, currently director of finance, strategy and sustainable development, would be offered another position in the house.

Inspector of Finance, former lawyer for competition at Gide Loyrette Nouel, "the man with suspenders" Matignon is both well-versed in the intricacies of state and business community for having had the upper hand with the Prime Minister on economic issues: strategist, he has "all the qualities for the job," says a former employee.

The idea of the director general of the public, Augustin de Romanet, is among other muscles of the piloting of subsidiaries – NPC, Transdev, ISPs … – and the role of shareholder faxless payday advance .The CDC is indeed present in this capital of many companies, some of which (Post, Dexia) will be on center stage in the months ahead.

By calling to him near the existing power-AGG is not only close to Fran?ois Fillon but also appreciated the team-Elysian former Deputy Secretary General Jacques Chirac is also an asset in his game Admittedly, Augustine Romanet is now guaranteed to go to the end of his term when his post had been many rumors at the beginning of the quinquennium.But the CDC and its branch are under surveillance, to the end of March 2012 will arise when the question of renewing the current mandate.

On Monday, the CGT said that "if confirmed, the arrival (Antoine Gosset-Grainville editor's note) would complete the questioning of the republican principle of autonomy of the CDC, which is threatened to" UMPisation " . Outside of any political stripe, the CDC has seen in recent years, several deputy directors of the Matignon office. Dominique Marcel (with Lionel Jospin), Augustin de Romanet (with Jean-Pierre Raffarin) and Alain Quinet (with Dominique de Villepin) especially had before him, opted for the venerable institution.

Finishing the week? Difficult even within an hour of the closing address. The CAC 40 was indeed well embedded in the green, but 16 hours, the morale of Americans showed degraded. The investors in the United States and Europe reacted immediately.

Around 16.45, the flagship index of Paris evolves close to equilibrium after being tipped into the red. The CAC 40 is around 3930 points. The index of consumer sentiment fell to 72.5 in March against 73.6 in February. Americans are less optimistic about employment prospects.

Earlier on Friday, retail sales in the United States have however withstood the bad weather in February.Against all odds, they rose by 0.3% compared to January (in data seasonally adjusted) while analysts felt they had declined by 0.2%.

This supports other new ad, released Thursday, which was rather reassuring, even if they still underscore the difficulties overseas cheapest one. Like the U.S. trade deficit fell to 37.29 billion dollars from 39.9 billion in January. Other good news side of the labor market "listings weekly unemployment fell to 462,000 from 469,000 the previous week. Perhaps, then, that the ACC will manage to close the week at the Green …

Mixed signals

But some lingering doubts in the markets due to the mixed signals sent to the assumption by the United States, Japan and China.The latter confirmed his great form with a rise in industrial production by 20.7% yoy in January and February, coupled with increased investment in fixed assets of 26.6%. But the United States, the government announced a record budget deficit of 220.909 billion dollars in February, while the decrease in the number of newly unemployed was less than expected, with 462,000 new registrations against 460,000 estimated.

In Japan, meanwhile, lowered its estimates of GDP for the fourth quarter 2009, up 0.9% from the previous quarter, instead of +1.1%. This is in addition a possible credit crunch in China because of rising inflation (2.7% in February).

Firstly, the current account deficit remained virtually stable in France in January over December, to 3.4 billion euros, against 3.3 billion euros in December, by BdF cashadvance .

The automotive sector in the form

The CAC 40 is pulled up by the automotive sector. Renault (+1.85% to 33.885 euros) is the fourth largest increase in the index. It is preceded by Peugeot (+1.90% to 21.990 euros). Far behind Michelin earns 0.46% to 57.19 euros. Valeo lost 0.22% to 24.91 euros.Faurecia is gaining 0.53% to 14.33 euros.

The bank also support document: Credit Agricole (+1.20% to 12.2 euros), BNP Paribas (0.67% to 57.28 euros) and Societe Generale (+1.66% to 44.730 euros) seem announcements have given the Chinese tighten credit.

EADS (-0.07 to 14.840 euros): the controversy swells around the financing of the A400M. Matignon is mulling an appeal to the general loan or option focusing on the state budget.

Pernod Ricard (+0.10% at 60.30 euros) which has launched a bond issue of 1.2 billion euros on Thursday, brought together an order book exceeding 5.5 billion euros. The proceeds from the offering will be used to repay the installments shorter credit union to extend the maturity of the debt.

Total (stable at 39.10 euros) is always under pressure.The CGT oil group called for a resumption of the strike in the refinery when the Justice will rule on his request for interim measures for the crime of interference with employee representative bodies. The CEC will file early next week a motion to that effect.

Mich?le Bellon, Assistant General Manager of Dalkia, will succeed Michael Francony at the head of the ERDF, the distribution subsidiary of EDF (-0.42% to 38.125 euros).

EDF Energies Nouvelles has announced Friday that U.S. power company Indiana Power and Light (IPL) had canceled the contract of sale of electricity on wind project Lakefield, in south-west of the State of Minnesota. The Exchange sanctions: -2.80% to 36.160 euros.

Cellectis (-0.69% to 10.02 euros) on Friday announced a turnover in 2009 rose 14% to 12.1 million.The group also announced a strengthening of its cash to 45.6 million euros against 28.7 million a year earlier.

As for publications, Rally (-1.18% to 25.9 euros), which controls Casino (-0.25% to 60.86 euros) will announce its annual results.

A rock concert without a little moss, is like "a guitar without the strings" in the words of Didier Wampas. "Beer is part of the concert!" Confirms Franck Le Bihan, head of debit, the company that supplies drinking the Zenith in Paris. In good years, that is to say those who have many dates of foreign rock bands or hard and metal, he sold 70,000 liters of beer and worse (when the French variety is the poster) 40,000 liters. "This is hard rock that consumes the most," says he, even if the reggae concerts Appliances are not left behind. Thus in 2009, Mot?rhead concert which brought together 3000 spectators, it is 3000 liters of beer are gone, one liter per person! Some shows, however, reserve some surprises to the landlord of the premises."To Vanessa Paradis, spectators often come in pairs, drank lots of champagne," says he. However, at 8 euros cutting cons 4 euros the 33 cl beer, has quickly made. But beware, even if an artist sells a lot more drinking than another, it affects not percentage. The drink is for the room.

Unlike the Z?nith, the Palais Omnisport de Paris Bercy (POPB) does not go through a dealer, is the room that takes care of the bar to which it employs, as the night between 40 and 70 people. Again, these are the concerts or hard metal that consume the most. Thus, for two performances of AC-DC (17,000 spectators each time), fans of Angus Young have drunk more than half a liter per person …cons under 25 for B?nabar cl.

The sale of alcohol is so important for rooms that Zenith is a 10% discount on the amount of rent if the artist makes an intermission … It must be said that at the Zenith in Paris, the bar is not less than 20% of annual turnover! In POPB is 10% "only" because of the large number of sporting events for which it is forbidden to sell alcohol. "I often say, if one takes away the bar, the ticket prices will increase by 20%!" Says Daniel Colling director of Zenith in Paris. Certainly, it is the artist who set the ticket prices and not the room, but if it earns more money from the bar, it will increase the rent and the amount of seats will be increased.Therefore Pascal Negro, CEO of Universal Music France sums up the situation thus: "the lemonade is the future of music-hall!".

Minor awards of the bar at the Zenith in Paris

For the 2008-2009 season, viewers spent an average per person:

2.34 EUR B?nabar (variety)

4.04 euros for Trust (French hard rock)

6.97 euros for Alpha Blondy (reggae)

7.06 euros for Prodigy (electro)

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While remaining for purchase on Ipsen, Gilbert Dupont decided Monday to withdraw the value of its favorite value list 'Midcap', arguing that "the handsome fellow course of action for a month (+9.4% ), compared with a performance of CAC Mid & Small190 limited to 0.6%, now leaves a potential stock market growth below 15%.

The withdrawal gave the lead in the wing during the specialist medicines, while trying again to exceed 40 euros. Around 15 hours, the action Ispen yielded 2.05%, to 38.75 euros, and signs the worst performance of the DRS on Monday.

However, the broker said it maintains its price target to 44.80 euros. To recall, the pharmaceutical group released late October sales up 7.8% to 256.4 million euros in the third quarter and raised in the same time its annual targets.The operating margin has been adjusted between 17 and 17.5% against 14% previously.

Gilbert Dupont has also highlighted the potential for marketing of LPG-1 class in the United States. The FDA (U.S. Health Authority) request to effect different actors perform a series of further clinical trials. Clinical trials are currently being published.