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The stakeholders have taken a number of initiatives to activate the secondary bond market which has remained dysfunctional since its inception in 2005, depriving the capital market of the gains and benefits expected from it.
   Since its inception at the Dhaka bourse on January 1, 2005, only a treasury bond lot was transacted on the secondary market.
   The Dhaka Stock Exchange held a meeting recently to identify the deterrents to secondary bond trading, DSE chief executive officer Salahuddin Ahmed Khan told New Age.
   Representatives from the finance ministry, the Bangladesh Bank, the Securities and Exchange Commission, Central Depository Bangladesh Ltd, and primary dealers of treasury bonds attended the meeting.
   Salahuddin said, ‘The meeting named a number of issues that should be resolved immediately to create an active secondary bond market.’
   No capital market can reach maturity without a strong bond market, he observed.
   He said a deputy secretary representing the finance ministry told the meeting that the tax on turnover for government bonds needed to be revised to create an effective secondary treasury bond market. The deputy secretary also assured that the government would consider the tax issue on brokerage turnover to bring the transaction charges on bonds down to a reasonable level.
   ‘The DSE told the meeting that it too was ready to reduce the brokerage charges on bond transaction to a reasonable level,’ Salahuddin said.
   The meeting asked the representative of a primary dealer to discuss with all the primary dealers and propose reasonable transaction charges on treasury bond trading within a week, he said.
   The DSE CEO said the meeting proposed that treasury bond trading should be held on the spot market of the bourse until 1:00pm to facilitate same-day settlements.
   ‘The stock exchange shall advise its authorised banks to issue Bangladesh Bank cheques for guaranteed and same-day settlements of bond transactions,’ Salahudding said, referring to proposals made by the meeting.
   The meeting also proposed that every primary dealer should appoint at least one broker to place orders through the bourse. The PDs, with the support of the brokerage houses, shall increase the marketing of government bonds to the investors, the meeting suggested.
   At the meeting, representatives from the Bangladesh Bank and the PDs proposed creating a separate window for offering all relevant information on the secondary bonds.
   Earlier, the central bank selected eight banks and a non-banking financial institution as PDs to handle the government-approved securities on the secondary bond market and issued a guideline for them.
   The nine primary dealers entitled to deal in treasury bonds are the state-owned lenders Sonali, Janata and Agrani banks, private sector banks Prime, Uttara, Jamuna, Southeast and National Credit and Commerce, and lease financier Industrial Development Leasing Company.
   ‘We will hold another meeting soon as the DSE will continue with its efforts to activate the country’s secondary bond market,’ Salahuddin said.
   He said the finance adviser at a recent meeting with a DSE team also gave assurance of his support in developing the secondary bond market.
   Currently, government bonds of five-year, 10-year, 15-year, and 20-year maturities are being traded on the market.

US Trade Representative’s office has inquired about the action plans of Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority and Department of Fisheries to protect workers’ rights in EPZs and fish processing plants, business source said.
   The American trade office made the queries while hearing the petition of a US trade union to deny Bangladesh generalised system of preferences for the country’s deplorable labour rights conditions, particularly in EPZs and shrimp sector.
   ‘Submissions must reach USTR latest by October 19 and these will be testimony to the Bangladesh delegation’s claims about improvement in workers’ conditions,’ said a business executive, informed about the Thursday’s hearing in Washington.
   In the petition, American Federation of Labour and Congress of Industrial Organisation said Bangladesh does not deserve GSP facility as EPZ workers are denied trade union rights, workers’ movements are repressed by law enforcers and child labour exists in fish processing units.
   At a session, USTR executive director Marideth Joy Sendlar on Thursday heard the arguments made by AFL-CIO representative and responses from the members of Bangladesh delegation.
   BEPZA chairman Brigadier Ashraf Abdullah Yusuf and Bangladesh Shrimp and Fish Foundation chairman Syed Mahmudul Haque elaborated the steps taken to improve workers’ conditions in EPZs and shrimp plants.
   But the USTR wanted to see detailed work plans and inquired about the BEPZA’s progress in implementing full-fledged trade unionism in factories by 2008 which the Bangladesh authorities had agreed in 2004.
   The claim of shrimp sector’s representative could not also convince the American trade office, which wanted to see the plan of action to eliminate child labour from and improve workers’ condition in fish processing plants.
   In the hearing, which is part of USTR’s annual review process on GSP scheme, AFL-CIO specialist Jeffrey Vobt agreed that some progress was made in some areas, but aggressive reforms were needed to do more for workers’ welfare.

China’s largest oil producer, China National Petroleum Corp, has agreed to invest in a joint venture oil refinery near the capital of Chad, state media reported Saturday.
   A subsidiary of CNPC, the CNPC Service and Engineering Ltd, has signed an agreement with the central African country’s government to jointly invest in a refinery company to the north of the capital N’Djamena, Xinhua news agency reported, quoting a company announcement.
   The CNPC subsidiary will take charge of the construction and will use Chinese design, manufacturing standards and equipment in the refinery, the report said.
   CNPC did not give financial details of the investment nor did it indicate when the project will start.
   Chad has 13 oilfields but imports all its refined oil products, the company said earlier.
   Chad, which has a population of about 9.8 million, is an increasingly important oil exporter, while China is building a major presence in Africa, particularly aiming to guarantee supplies of oil and other commodities for its booming economy.
   Since its first cooperation on oil exploration with Sudan in 1996, China had invested in 27 major oil and natural gas projects in 14 African countries by the end of 2005 including Sudan, Algeria, Angola and Nigeria, Xinhua said.

Government on Saturday expanded the scope of service tax refund paid to exporters and increased the number of sectors eligible for reduced interest rates on pre-shipment and post-shipment credit to provide much-needed relief to businesses against an unabated rise in rupee.
   Exporters would now be given a refund of taxes paid on seven services, instead of four allowed earlier. The new services to be included in the scheme are general insurance, technical testing and analysis, and inspection and certification.
   The Centre had last month announced exempting services rendered by ports, road transport and railways from the purview of tax.
   It has also allowed payment of interest on an amount up to a maximum of one million dollars kept in Exchange Earners Foreign Currency accounts. The rate of interest, however, will be decided by the banks and the measure would be valid up to October 31, 2008.
   Besides, ‘such accounts should be in the form of term deposits, with a maturity of one year,’ the Finance Ministry said in a statement.
   The measures would partially provide relief to exporters, whose margins have been hit by the rising rupee, which has appreciated to a record high of 39.36 to a dollar, highest since March 1998.
   The list of sectors eligible for reduced interest of 4.5 per cent minus the benchmark prime lending rate on pre and post-shipment credit has also been expanded to 12.

The tender evaluation committee has finally chosen a firm out of five bidders for the third phase work of the planned container terminal at Pangaon of Keraniganj in Dhaka, shipping sources said.
   The committee sent the name of the selected firm to the shipping ministry on August 28. The purchase committee will meet shortly to decide on it, said an official of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority.
   The third phase work on Pangaon container terminal will begin, as soon as the purchase committee approves the bid, he said.
   The project, taken up by the shipping ministry to facilitate waterway transportation of containers between Chittagong Port and Dhaka, is running behind the schedule by more than two years.
   The terminal project was scheduled to be completed by June 2007 and officials now say it will take two more years.
   Land development works under the first and second phases of the project were completed in December 2006.
   The BIWTA received five offers in the tender for the third phase work. The tender was opened on July 18.
   MCCC-ITCL Joint Venture, MASB-MBEL Joint Venture, Development Constructions Ltd, China Major Bridge Engg. Ltd Joint Venture, TEL-CPC-HCM-Joint Venture and Abdul Monem Ltd took part in the tender.
   Works under the third phase include setting up jetties, RCC yard and river protection measures, said the official.
   The BIWTA also invited tender for the fourth phase work and received seven bids. The offers were opened on September 27.
   The tender evaluation committee is now evaluating the proposals. The forth phase work includes construction of container freight station, head office building, repair shop, other buildings, water tank and water supply network, gas station and other utilities.
   On completion of the project, containers would be transported to Dhaka from the Chittagong Port by six barges, officials concerned said. Annual transportation of containers would be nearly 1.20 lakh twenty-foot equivalent units of containers or about one-fifth of the containers handled at the country’s prime seaport.
   Apart from saving the freight costs, the Pangaon terminal would significantly reduce pressure on roads, they said.
   According to Chittagong Port Authority sources, 6.54 lakh TEUs of containers were handled at the Chittagong Port in 2003-04 fiscal year. The number was 5.6 lakh in 2002-03.
   The 60-acre land at Pangaon of Keraniganj near Dhaka city was selected for setting up the private container terminal by the Stevedores Services of America, a US company.
   The BIWTA signed an agreement with SSA in 1998 in this regard. But the government had to repeal the agreement following a legal battle, which followed strong opposition from civic groups led by Chittagong city mayor, ABM Mohiuddin Chowdhury, who is in jail now.

Banglalink has revised call charges for its prepaid packages ‘banglalink desh’ and ‘banglalink desh rang’ recently.
   The peak hour call charge for banglalink desh has been reduced to Tk1.75/min from 5pm to 12am to any operator’s number, said a press release.
   The other call charges and benefits of the package are Tk1.15/min from 9am to 5pm to any operator’s number, Tk0.75/SMS to any operator, and three FnF numbers
   (both Banglalink and other operators’ numbers to maintain the positioning of all-network pakage).
   ‘banglalink desh rang’, a new package of Banglalink, now offers three FnF numbers (Banglalink numbers) with a call charge of Tk0.50/min.
   The other call charges of the package are Tk0.99/min
   from 9am to 12am to any Banglalink number and Tk2/min from 9am to 12am to other operators’ numbers. The SMS charges are Tk0.25/SMS to any Banglalink number and Tk0.50/SMS to other operators’ numbers.
   Both the packages offer call charges of Tk0.29/min to any Banglalink number and Tk 0.99/min to other operators’ numbers from 12am to 9am.

An international mobile
   fair will be held at the Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre in Dhaka on December 10-14 aiming to increase the number of mobile phone subscribers in the country.
   Bangladesh Mobile Phone Businessmen Association in cooperation with the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers and Commerce and Industry will organise the fair tilted ‘2nd Dhaka International Mobile Phone Fair-2007.’
   President Professor Iajuddin Ahmed is expected to inaugurate the fair.
   In this connection, a press conference was held in the FBCCI meeting room in the capi8tal on Saturday.
   FBCCI president Mir
   Nasir Hossain, first vice-president Mohammad Ali, vice-president Dewan Sultan Ahmed, adviser of BMBA and former chairman of BTRC Syed
   Margub Murshed and BMBA president and convenor of the fair Engineer M Nizam Uddin Jitu spoke at the press conference.
   They said mobile phone operators, mobile phone set producers and importers organisations and IT education providers will take part in the fair. A total of 120 stalls and five pavilions will be set up at the fair.
   The mobile phone operators will provide different packages for its clients, and mobile phone sets and SIM cards will be available at the fair less than the market prices, they said.
   The fair will remain open from 9:30am to 8:30pm on working days and from 9am to 10pm on holidays.
   For flourishing the sector, two seminars with the telecommunication experts will be held during the fair.

Hilmy Cader, global CEO of MTI Consulting, arrives in Dhaka Saturday on a short visit.
   During the visit, he is expected to meet the existing corporate clientele and business leaders in Bangladesh.
   MTI Consulting is a fast growing international consulting outfit. Over a span of 10 years, MTI has utilised its well acclaimed solutions to clients over 275 projects in 33 countries covering five continents.

Canada has become the first country to notify the World Trade Organistion that it has agreed to allow a Canadian company to make generic medicines for export, the world body said Friday.
   ‘The WTO received from Canada, on 4 October 2007, the first notification from any government that it has authorised a company to make a generic version of a patented medicine for export under special WTO provisions agreed in 2003,’ the WTO said in a statement.
   The triple combination AIDS therapy drug TriAvir will now be made in Canada by the Canadian company Apotex and exported to Rwanda.

The head of UBS publicly admitted Saturday that the giant Swiss bank had underestimated the crisis in the US sub-prime home loans credit market, and that several top executives paid for that mistake with their jobs.
   Marcel Ospel, UBS president, told the Neue Zuercher Zeitung newspaper the bank had over-invested in subprime-related instruments, even though he stressed its size and other activities would help it pull through.
   ‘We poorly evaluated the impact of changing interest rates’ in the United States which triggered the problems in that country’s mortgage sector, he said.
   ‘The problems started with the last change in interest rates and were compounded by DRCM,’ UBS’s Dillon Read Capital Management hedge fund that had been incorporated into the bank’s investment arm and which was closed in May.
   DRCM had racked up 380 million Swiss francs ($325m) in losses in the US high-risk, or subprime, mortgage market before then, making it one of the early victims of the ongoing meltdown.
   UBS announced last Monday that it had taken a hit of 4.0 billion Swiss francs ($3.4b) from its worthless subprime investments.
   Ospel said two executives linked to the losses, Huw Jenkins, the head of UBS’s investment banking business, and Clive Standish, the bank’s financial director, were removed from their posts.

Looking out over the Caucasus mountains from his busy construction site, British property developer Tom Rawlins has reason to feel more than a little pleased with himself.
   ‘If you know what you’re doing, you can make a lot of money here,’ said Rawlins, who is selling dozens of luxury condos and chalets as fast as he can build them in the Sochi ski resort of Krasnaya Polyana.
   Rawlins is one of a small but growing number of foreign investors taking an interest in Sochi, a Soviet-era resort on the Black Sea coast in southern Russia that was selected earlier this year to host the Winter Olympics in 2014.
   ‘It’s a very interesting area for Russia. It’s an area that’s going to grow,’ said Gianni van Daalen, managing director of the Baltschug Kempinski hotel in Moscow.
   Van Daalen signed a preliminary agreement with local authorities at the Sochi-2007 economic forum this month to develop four hotels in Sochi and Anapa, another Black Sea resort.
   ‘The drawback is really to see whether they’re going forward with infrastructure,’ said van Daalen, a view echoed by other businessmen at the investment forum.
   The region is beset by transport problems, but government authorities have vowed to spend billions of dollars to develop local infrastructure and build sport venues for the Olympics.
   ‘A major sport event opens up major opportunities for business,’ president Vladimir Putin, a major backer of Sochi’s Olympic bid and frequent visitor at the resort, told investors at the forum.
   So far, the main investors at Krasnaya Polyana, a ski resort in the mountains above the city, are state gas giant Gazprom, aluminium magnate Oleg Deripaska and mining tycoon Vladimir Potanin.
   But Putin and other Russian officials at the forum stressed that foreign investors were welcome too.
   ‘I want to underline that there should be no national distinctions. The criteria should be cost and quality,’ Putin said.
   The first major foreign investor to signal an interest has been Austrian construction giant Strabag, which is 30 per cent owned by Deripaska and has experience in building facilities at European ski resorts.
   Strabag is bidding for a 2.1 billion dollars contract to upgrade the roads in Sochi. The company’s CEO, Hans Peter Haselsteiner, said the Olympics would create ‘unique opportunities’ for investors.
   Other businessmen also showed their interest, including Valery Sazhenkov, director of Russia operations for Schneider Electric, a leading French maker of equipment for electricity distribution.
   ‘We have a long tradition in sporting infrastructure. We hope this unique experience will be required for the Winter Olympics in Sochi,’ Sazhenkov told investors at the forum.

Eurozone banks are likely to tighten credit, especially to big companies, following recent upheaval in money markets, the results of a European Central Bank survey released on Friday showed.
   ‘Nearly 50 per cent of the banks said that the credit market events were expected to contribute to a tightening of credit standards for loans and credit lines to large enterprises over the next three months,’ the survey said.
   Loans to businesses would be affected more than loans to households, and the effect would be felt mostly by large groups seeking long-term funds for acquisitions and restructuring, it added.
   The October 2007 survey of eurozone banks was released almost a month early ‘due to the credit market tensions which began this summer,’ the ECB said.
   Bank of America economist Gilles Moec noted that ‘the financial market turmoil is trickling down to the businesses and to a much lesser extent to households.’
   Credit standards for corporate lending were now at their highest level since the second quarter of 2003, he said.
   In August, fears about the US market for high-risk home loans erupted as several major banks and financial groups reported large losses linked to mortgage-backed securities.
   The ensuing shockwave, which triggered sharp falls on global stock markets, forced banks to tighten their lending standards, which in turn sparked a credit crunch.
   ‘The tightening seemed mainly to affect large transactions, such as loans granted to finance acquisitions,’ ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet said in Vienna Thursday ahead of the survey’s release.
   ‘Looking forward, banks expect to tighten credit standards further in the fourth quarter of 2007,’ he added.
   Lending to households was also affected by a deterioration of housing market prospects in countries like France and Spain, Moec said, and by expectations that economic activity would slow later this year.
   Demand for such loans was lower, in part owing to ‘a worsening of consumer confidence,’ the bank survey found.
   Moec noted that banks had moderately eased standards for consumer credit in the third quarter.
   That was explained by a slight increase in competition, he said, estimating that ‘banks probably tried to shift their retail lending towards consumer credit.’
   However, they ‘seem to be convinced that credit market difficulties will persist,’ reinforcing the probability the ECB would leave interest rates unchanged until well into 2008, Moec said.
   Trichet had highlighted ‘heightened uncertainty’ regarding the outlook for eurozone growth as a result of the credit crisis.
   Banks that responded to the ECB survey ‘expect credit standards for consumer credit and other lending to households to tighten considerably’ in the coming months, the central bank said.

Italian minister of Economy and Finance Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa has been selected as the new chairman of the International Monetary and Financial Committee, a post for which Indian finance minister P Chidambaram was a serious contender.
   Padoa-Schioppa succeeds Gordon Brown, the UK’s former chancellor of the Exchequer, who resigned in July 2007. His chairmanship of the policy steering committee of International Monetary Fund will be for a term of three years.
   Chidambaram was, at one time, thought to be a serious contender for the coveted post but his candidacy lost momentum in the final rounds.
   In a recent meeting with PTI, the minister downplayed the notion that he was in some kind of a ‘race’ or ‘election’ for the post and highlighted the fact that countries like India had pushed for a term limit on the post, just as how the Development Committee of the World Bank functions. That has been accepted.
   The IMFC was established in September 1999 to replace the Interim Committee set up in 1974 and strengthen the role of the primary advisory committee of the IMF’s board of governors.
   The IMFC advises the board of governors on supervising the management and adaptation of the international monetary system and dealing with sudden disturbances that might threaten stability of the system.

The giant takeover battle for ABN Amro took a fresh twist on Friday after British bank Barclays pulled out, paving the way for a rival bid from a European consortium led by the Royal Bank of Scotland.
   The RBS consortium’s offer, worth about 71 billion euros ($101b), expired Friday. A source close to the matter said RBS will reveal the level of ABN shareholder support early next week.
   British bank Barclays acknowledged that it had failed to win sufficient support to buy the Dutch bank for around 62.5 billion euros.
   Both bids were records for the European banking sector.
   The RBS consortium also comprises Belgian-Dutch group Fortis and Spain’s Banco Santander.
   In a statement, Barclays said that not all the conditions relating to its offer were fulfilled. ‘As a result, Barclays withdraws its offer with immediate effect,’ it added.
   In Amsterdam, ABN Amro spokesman Neil Moorhouse said the bank understood the
   decision and expressed
   ABN’s ‘appreciation for the cooperation efforts and confidence Barclays showed in ABN Amro.’
   The RBS bid is more attractive because it is higher and mainly in cash, compared to the Barclays offer, which was mostly in shares.
   However, ABN Amro chairman Rijkman Groenink has not recommended either takeover bid to shareholders.
   Last month, he had criticised the Barclays offer as being too low, while hitting out at the consortium’s plans to break up ABN.
   The RBS-led grouping wants to take apart ABN Amro and share its assets among its members.
   Barclays, on the other
   hand, had wanted to merge
   ABN Amro’s operations with its own to create a vast global group.
   Under the consortium deal, Santander would take over ABN’s Italian and Brazilian operations, while Fortis would assume its retail banking division based in the Benelux countries.
   RBS would take cash from the sale of ABN Amro’s US unit LaSalle as well as the group’s institutional banking business.
   ABN had said Monday it had finalised the sale of LaSalle to Bank of America for 21 billion dollars.
   The consortium’s offer for the Dutch bank is pitched
   at 38.40 euros per ABN
   Amro share and is 93 per cent in cash.
   Prior to Friday, Barclays, Britain’s third-biggest bank, had seen its share price hit by the global credit squeeze — which had dented the value of its mainly-shares offer.
   Barclays’ original bid for ABN Amro was worth 67 billion euros before the group’s share price hit reverse gear.
   Initially, ABN Amro management had backed the Barclays takeover bid, but withdrew its support in June after the RBS consortium put more cash on the table.
   On a positive note, Barclays said Friday that it had requested payment from ABN Amro of its ‘break’ fee totalling 200 million euros — which was far higher than the cost of its bid.
   ‘I thank Barclays shareholders and employees for their overwhelming support for this transaction over the past months,’ Barclays chief executive John Varley said in his company’s statement.
   ‘Barclays has strong momentum and I am confident that we will continue to deliver significant growth in the coming years.’

The French finance ministry opened an internal probe on Friday into the state’s involvement in an insider trading scandal at aerospace group EADS.
   In a statement the ministry said finance minister Christine Lagarde ‘today asked Betrand Schneiter, the inspector
   general of finances, to examine the action of the ministry’s
   services as regards EADS between the end of 2005 and June 2006’.
   Several top executives and two corporate shareholders at the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company are suspected of illegally selling millions of euros in shares just before they announced big problems at EADS subsidiary Airbus.
   Le Figaro newspaper this week reported that 21 top EADS executives as well as Germany’s DaimlerChrysler and the French Lagardere group were cited in a report by the financial market watchdog AMF for insider trading.
   The French state is a major EADS shareholder with 15 per cent, while a consortium of other investors including German regional governments holds 7.5 per cent.
   Earlier on Friday former finance minister Thierry Breton told a French Senate committee the government had no involvement in the insider trading scandal.
   ‘The state is beyond reproach in this affair,’ Breton told a hearing of the Senate finance committee called to shed light on the issue.
   ‘I understand perfectly the strong emotions that this affair has evoked in public opinion,’ said Breton, now a senior lecturer at Harvard University’s school of business administration.
   But he added that the state ‘acted in an exemplary fashion’ and did not dump its shares in EADS before delays in the production of Airbus’ super-jumbo A380 were made public in June 2006.
   The opposition Socialists have raised questions over the purchase by the state-owned bank Caisse des Depots et Consignations of EADS shares owned by German automaler DaimlerChrysler and defence and media group Lagardere, whose chief executive Arnaud Lagardere is a close friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy.
   Breton told the Senate hearing that he was ‘truely displeased’ when he found out that the CDC had bought shares from Lagardere but that he was not given any advance notice of the transaction and only learned about it in the press.
   Sarkozy’s spokesman separately said that the president did not have any knowledge of Airbus’ problems when he served as interior minister in the former government.
   He added that Sarkozy believes that ‘all of the answers must be given’ to mounting questions over the role of the former government in the affair.
   ‘There is a very high demand for transparency,’ said presidential spokesman David Martinon.
   Airbus chief executive Thomas Enders, one of the executives allegedly cited in the AMF report, strongly denied the allegations in an internal memo seen Friday by AFP.

Merrill Lynch Co, Inc, a big Wall Street investment bank and brokerage, warned investors Friday it will post a third quarter loss because of soured bets it made on the mortgage and debt markets.
   The financial powerhouse’s top executive voiced disappointment as Merrill Lynch said it expects to reveal a loss of up to 50 cents a share when it releases its third quarter earnings roundup on October 24.
   Merrill Lynch’s profit warning sees it join a growing list of well-known financial firms anticipating heavy losses tied to the downturn in the US housing market and mortgage-backed securities.
   It flagged its expected loss four days after Citigroup Inc, America’s largest banking group by market value, warned its third quarter profit would likely fall by around 60 per cent due in part to ailing mortgage investments.
   ‘While market conditions were extremely difficult and the degree of sustained dislocation unprecedented, we are disappointed in our performance,’ Merrill Lynch’s chairman and chief executive Stan O’Neal said.
   Merrill, one of the best-known names on Wall Street, said it has been forced to make write-downs of around 4.5 billion dollars related to distressed debt and mortgage security holdings.
   The big write-downs are more than double what Merrill reaped in second quarter net profit. The bank reported a net profit of 2.1 billion dollars in the April-June period.
   Like other financial groups, Merrill has been hit hard by the credit woes unleashed on global markets in August. The credit squeeze, which rocked global stock markets, stemmed from fears over America’s stressed mortgage market.
   Demand for mortgage-backed securities dried up in August as major banks started revealing hefty losses from such securities.
   The resulting fallout forced banks to tighten their lending standards which in turn worsened the credit crunch.
   The depth of some of the losses will become clearer as Merrill and its rivals release their third quarter earnings in coming weeks.
   Merrill re-shuffled some of its top managers this week before Friday’s announcement and said its operations outside the United States will help offer it a protective cushion.

A onetime Morgan Stanley rules-compliance officer and her husband have been each sentenced to serve six months’ home detention after they pleaded guilty to criminal charges in an insider-trading case, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
   US District Judge Victor Marrero also ordered Randi E Collotta, 30 years old, to serve four years’ probation and her husband, Christopher Collotta, 34, to serve three years’ probation, said the report.
   The judge ordered the Collottas, who are both
   lawyers, to each pay a 3,000 US dollar fine and to each forfeit 4,500 dollars as part of their sentence.
   In May, the Collottas each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and one count of securities fraud.

Asia’s largest carrier Japan Airlines is preparing to book a loss of about 20 billion yen ($171m) in possible fines by US authorities, a report said Saturday.
   The company is looking to officially announce the decision in November after discussing the matter with auditors, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said, without citing sources.
   Japan Airlines is among the targets of an investigation by US and European authorities over a massive price-fixing conspiracy or ‘cartel’ among international carriers in connection with surcharges for rising oil prices, the paper said.
   The US Justice Department announced in August that British Airways and Korean Airlines each agreed to accept 300 million dollars fines in connection with conspiracies to fix the prices of passenger and cargo flights.
   Virgin Atlantic and Lufthansa AG, which were also part of the cartel, have agreed with US authorities to cooperate with their investigation on the matter.
   Japan Airlines is going through a drastic restructuring programme, cutting thousands of jobs and routes and shifting to smaller planes.

More than a million Made-in-China Boy Scout badges are being recalled for having unacceptably high lead levels, a US scouting spokesman said Friday.
   ‘During a routine test of products, Boy Scouts of America found that one component of a totem, a cub scout recognition item, contains unacceptable amounts of lead’ said Gregg Shields, a spokesman for the Dallas, Texas-based group.
   There was no incident reported linked to the recognition badges worn on the uniforms of boys aged 7-8.
   But the scouts asked all members to hand them in where they were purchased, and ordered them off the market.
   ‘We have directed all of our shops and retailers who sell the products to remove it from their shelves immediately and maker Kahoot has called for a voluntary consumer recall and urged anyone who may have purchased the item to remove it from their children’s possession,’ the spokesman added.
   Lead can cause learning disabilities in children if it enters the bloodstream. It has been illegal in US paints since 1978.
   The US consumer safety agency on Thursday announced the recall of more than 635,000 Chinese-made toys, key chains and other products that contain unsafe levels of lead or pose a choking hazard.
   China has been hit by a spate of product recalls, including toys and baby cribs that have sullied the ‘Made-in-China’ brand in the United States and elsewhere around the world.
   China is the world’s top toy exporter, selling 22 billion toys overseas last year, or 60 per cent of the globe’s total.

World oil prices fell further from historic highs this week amid news of rising crude reserves in the United States, which is the biggest global energy consumer.
   Oil and other dollar-denominated commodities were buoyed by a weak US dollar, which makes them cheaper for buyers using stronger currencies.
   A spirited rally on Friday by the US dollar, which followed a strong report on US job creation in September, fizzled out as the news was not enough to sustain investor confidence in the US unit.
   In recent weeks, the greenback has come under pressure on speculation that the US Federal Reserve, which reduced borrowing costs by half a point last month, will continue to cut borrowing costs as signs emerge of a US slowdown.
   The European single currency had surged Monday to a record high of 1.4283 dollars.
   Oil: The price of Brent crude oil dropped from its record high of 81.05 dollars per barrel this week, but remained supported by tight energy supplies ahead of the northern hemisphere winter, when demand for heating fuel peaks.
   ‘Traders are starting to worry about the heating oil inventory in the US market,’ said Victor Shum, an analyst with energy consultancy Purvin and Gertz.
   ‘In the summer, traders worried about the gasoline (petrol) level. Now, traders are starting to worry about the heating oil level.’
   Traders focus on reserves in the United States because the country is the world’s biggest energy consumer, ahead of number two China.
   The US Department of Energy’s weekly report released Wednesday showed stockpiles of distillates, including heating fuel, unexpectedly dropped by 1.2 million barrels to 135.9 million barrels during the week ended September 28.
   Industry analysts had forecast a rise of 1.3 million barrels.
   Crude oil rose by 1.2 million barrels last week, the DoE report showed. Most analysts had expected oil reserves to fall.
   ‘The overall oil market remains fundamentally tight in the fourth quarter,’ Shum said.
   A week ago, Brent oil hit a record high 81.05 dollars, while New York crude struck an all-time peak of 84.10 dollars last month.
   By Friday, Brent North Sea crude for November delivery sank to 78.70 dollars a barrel, from 79.55 dollars a week earlier.
   New York’s main oil futures contract, light sweet crude for delivery in November, tumbled to 80.75 dollars a barrel, from 82.10 dollars a week earlier.
   Precious Metals: Gold prices surged to the highest level for 27 years as the sliding US dollar boosted the precious metal.
   On the London Bullion Market, gold prices leapt as high as 747.90 dollars an ounce — which was last seen in January 1980 — before paring its gains.
   Gold has also found support from recent record crude oil prices, which have raised fears about rising inflation. Gold is regarded as a store of value and a hedge against inflation.
   Other precious metals gained from gold’s surge, with silver hitting 13.86 dollars — the highest since last April — before pulling lower.
   On the London Bullion Market, gold eased to 737 dollars an ounce at Friday’s late fixing, from 743 dollars a week earlier.
   Silver decreased to 13.43 dollars an ounce at Friday’s late fixing, from 13.65 dollars a week earlier.
   On the London Platinum and Palladium Market, platinum fell to 1,364 dollars an ounce at the late fixing Friday, from 1,377 dollars a week earlier.
   Palladium climbed to 366 dollars an ounce, from 343.75 dollars.
   Base Metals: Base metals prices were mixed, but star performer lead hit another record high amid persistent supply problems.
   The price of lead for delivery in three months hit an historic 3,720 dollars a tonne on the London Metal Exchange.
   Lead was ‘underpinned by a slew of supply side disruptions, tightness in the lead concentrate market, the seasonally strong winter battery demand season and declining Chinese lead exports,’ said Barclays Capital analysts.
   Global stockpiles of lead are already at historically low levels.
   On Friday, the price of copper for delivery in three months advanced to 8,245 dollars a tonne on the London Metal Exchange, from 8,098 dollars a week earlier.
   Three-month aluminium prices declined to 2,436 dollars a tonne, from 2,518 dollars.
   Three-month nickel prices fell to 30,500 dollars a tonne, from 31,450 dollars.
   Three-month lead prices increased to 3,675 dollars a tonne, from 3,380 dollars.
   Three-month zinc prices eased to 3,055 dollars a tonne, from 3,080 dollars.
   Three-month tin prices climbed to 16,025 dollars a tonne, from 15,520 dollars.
   Cocoa: Cocoa prices suffered heavy losses, plunging by 4.0 per cent in London and almost 9.0 per cent in New York as speculators took profits after a recent strong run.
   Two weeks ago, prices had soared to two-month peaks on concerns over tight supplies in leading producer Ivory Coast.
   By Friday on the LIFFE, London’s futures exchange, the price of cocoa for December delivery sank to 958 pounds a tonne, from 999 pounds a week earlier.
   On the New York Board of Trade, the December contract tumbled to 1,861 dollars a tonne, from 2,025 dollars the previous Friday.
   Coffee: Coffee prices were mixed in subdued trading conditions.
   By Friday on the LIFFE, Robusta quality for November delivery decreased to 1,904 dollars a tonne, from 1,910 dollars one week earlier.
   On the NYBOT, Arabica for December delivery rose to 135.45 US cents a pound, from 128.15 cents.
   Sugar: Sugar prices turned sour, falling in both London and New York.
   Meanwhile, India is on course to overtake Brazil as the world’s biggest sugar producer in 2007/2008, the International Sugar Organization said earlier this year.
   Global sugar output was forecast to outpace demand by a record 10.8 million tonnes in the crop year ending September 2008, according to the ISO.
   By Friday on the LIFFE, the price per tonne of white sugar for December delivery dipped to 277 pounds, from 280.50 pounds a week earlier.
   On the NYBOT, the price of unrefined sugar for March delivery receded to 9.85 US cents a pound, from 10.12 cents a week earlier.
   Grains and Soya: The prices of grains and soya pulled back after a record-breaking week that saw wheat hit a record close of 9.52 dollars per bushel in Chicago on Monday.
   With bad weather damaging harvests in several countries, wheat prices have nearly doubled since January, surging past 9.0 dollars per bushel, while soybeans reached a record 10.0 dollars last week.
   US farmers are likely to boost wheat and soybean crops in 2008 in response to critically high prices, potentially displacing others such as corn and cotton, analysts said.
   By Friday on the Chicago Board of Trade, the price of maize for December delivery dipped to 3.42 dollars a bushel, from 3.73 dollars a week earlier.
   Wheat for December delivery eased to 9.04 dollars a bushel, from 9.47 dollars the previous week. November-dated soyabean meal — used in animal feed — slipped to 9.51 dollars, from 9.91 dollars.
   On the LIFFE, the price per tonne of wheat for May delivery stood at 178.00 pounds on Friday.
   Rubber: Rubber prices were flat, with traders mainly sidelined as China, the world’s largest buyer, was closed for a week-long holiday.
   Traders said that concerns over tight supplies supported the market.
   By Friday, the Malaysian Rubber Board’s benchmark SMR20 was at 216.70 US cents per kilo, unchanged from the previous week.

British company to invest $13.255m in Adamjee EPZ
A British company in the name and style Exhibit Clothing Ltd is going to set up a garments manufacturing unit in the Adamjee Export Processing Zone. The 100 per cent foreign-owned company will invest around 13,255 million dollars and produce all types of men, women and children clothes. The company will create employment opportunity for 4042 Bangladeshi nationals including, 40 foreign nationals. An agreement to this effect was signed between the Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority and the Exhibit Clothing Ltd at the BEPZA Complex in capital recently. AZM Azizur Rahman, general manager (investment promotion) of BEPZA, and Munir Ahmed, chairman of Exhibit Clothing Ltd, signed the lease agreement on behalf of their respective organisations. AKM Mahbubur Rahman, member (finance), Lt Col Md Tawfiq-e-Elahi, general manager (security), Md Tanvir Hossain, manager (investment promotion), and Md Abdus Sobhan, manager (industrial relations), of BEPZA were present at the deal signing ceremony.
— New Age

Power crisis hampers Tele Talk expansion work
Expansion work of Tele Talk network in the country’s southern region is being hampered as the authority failed to connect electricity line to its towers due to power shortage. Local Tele Talk officials said its towers erected beside the Barisal-Faridpur-Dhaka highway could not be connected to the power line yet much to the frustration of the customers. Sources said Power Development Board and Palli Bidyut Samiti have imposed restriction on giving power supply to the towers of the mobile telephone companies due to the acute power crisis. The Tele Talk has erected 67 towers to expand its network connection for more than one lakh customers of southern region.
— UNB