NOTE: Poll of 2,230 adults; 1,049 Democrats; 827 Republicans; taken Nov. 2-12, 2007; margin of error
± 2.1 percent for all adults; ± 3.0 percent for Democrats and ± 3.4 percent for Republicans.
Who would win right now? When an unidentified Democratic nominee is pitted against an unidentified Republican, the Democrat gets 42 percent of voters, the Republican 27 percent and another 27 percent don't know who they'd vote for.
(http://news.yahoo.com)
Published: November 19 2007 20:24 | Last updated: November 20 2007 03:16
Merrill Lynch has launched its biggest foray into India’s real estate market, joining a growing number of foreign financial institutions seeking to tap into the fast-growing but volatile sector.
The US bank is paying about $377m for a 49 per cent share in a portfolio of residential projects managed by DLF, the country’s largest listed developer, in one of the biggest deals of its type in India.
Wall Street investment banks have descended on India’s real-estate sector looking for opportunities since the government relaxed rules governing foreign investment in 2005.
Participants range from the proprietary arms of investment banks, such as Whitehall, Goldman Sachs’s real estate fund, to specially established Indian real estate funds.
Indian developers have also raised more than $7bn on India’s stock market and London’s Alternative Investment Market since August last year, according to estimates by Ernst & Young and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
DLF said Merrill Lynch was buying the stake in seven “mid-income” residential projects spread across Chennai, Bangalore and Kochi in southern India and Indore in the north. The projects would take seven to eight years to complete.
The transaction, Merrill Lynch’s sixth in Indian real estate, brings its investment in the sector to about $550m.
The preferred mode for most foreign institutions had been to invest alongside the major developers, said Sri Rajan, head of Bain & Company’s private equity consulting practice in India.
Greenfield investments remain challenging for foreign investors in India because of the problems of acquiring blocks of land large enough for big projects.
Late last year, JPMorgan announced its first investment on its own balance sheet in Indian property, paying $60m for a stake in a residential project being developed by Mumbai group, Lodha Builders.
Analysts believe there will be an increasing number of such equity tie-ups as Indian developers hunt for capital.
The Reserve Bank of India, the central bank, has clamped down on foreign lending to the sector to help contain inflation and to ease pressure on the rupee, which has been appreciating against the dollar.
DLF said of the deal: “DLF continues to remain focused on keeping its net economic interest in homes business to a 10-year horizon.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
At least 10% of the time, the lab finds the shipments contaminated, says David Eisenberg, chairman of Anresco Labs.
Most of the time, the lab tells no one but the importer who's paying for the test, Eisenberg says. The Food and Drug Administration is none the wiser.
The practice has been going on for years, at Anresco and other labs that test imported food. The FDA gets the favorable test results, but failing ones aren't sent to the FDA if importers tell labs not to send them, five lab operators told USA TODAY.
Equivalent to nearly $147,000 per year, average weekly pay for Manhattan residents shot up 16.7 percent from the same period of 2006, maintaining its spot as the wealthiest county in the United States.
Nationally, the average rise was 5.1 percent to $885 per week, or $46,000 per year, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said.
People in Manhattan, home to Wall Street, earned three to four times more than their neighbors in other New York City boroughs and almost five times more than workers in the state of Montana.
Manhattanites in the financial activities supersector made an average of $10,156 per week, or about $528,000 per year, largely because year-end bonuses and commissions are paid in the first quarter, the bureau said in a news release.
Manhattan far outpaced the average wage in the boroughs of Queens ($831), the Bronx ($788), Brooklyn ($742) and Staten Island ($733), partially explaining its gentrification and economic discrepancies with the rest of New York City.
After Manhattan, the country's top-ranked counties in the first quarter were Fairfield, Connecticut, a New York City suburb, at $1,979, followed by Suffolk, Massachusetts, which includes Boston, at $1,659, and San Francisco at $1,639.
Four of the 10 counties with the highest average wages were in the New York area, while three others were in and around San Francisco, near the Silicon Valley high-technology corridor.
Among the 50 states and the District of Columbia, the capital Washington ranked first at $1,428 per week, followed by New York state at $1,397, Connecticut at $1,263, Massachusetts at $1,110 and New Jersey at $1,097.
The lowest weekly wages were in Montana ($600), South Dakota ($602), North Dakota ($615) and Mississippi ($616).
(Reporting by Daniel Trotta; Editing by John O'Callaghan)
Virginia grandmother Ruby Fauntleroy, 74, knew something was wrong when her rent payment bounced shortly after her Social Security check had been direct-deposited into her bank account.
Fauntleroy went to the bank, where a teller told her that the account was frozen following notice of a court judgment and garnishment order by Capital One. Fauntleroy had been trying to pay off this $4,000 credit card debt for years, but dropped her monthly payment to $100 after her husband died and her income declined. Capital One sued, and won a judgment.
"I was just numb, I couldn't believe this could happen," said Fauntleroy. "I told the bank, 'You know nobody is supposed to take a government check,' but they did. I couldn't sleep at night, I couldn't eat. I thought, why are they doing this to me when I was trying to pay [my debt]?"
When Exempt Isn't
Legal aid agencies across the country say they've been flooded with calls from seniors and disabled people whose accounts have been frozen by bill collectors. This is happening even though the federal government specifically prohibits the garnishment of exempt funds such as Social Security and veterans benefits.
In the worst cases, seniors go hungry or without medication because they have no access to funds -- in some cases, for months at a time. "People can really bumble around for months trying to get their accounts unfrozen because the procedures they have to follow are so Byzantine," says Claudia Wilner, attorney with the New York-based Neighborhood Economic Development Advocacy Project (NEDAP), which handles about 200 such cases a year.
In August, three senators asked the inspector general of the Social Security Administration to investigate the extent of the problem, querying the nation's largest banks on how often the practice occurs. The Senate Finance Committee held hearings on the issue in September.
Slow to Respond
The problem comes amid enormous growth in consumer debt, and changes in technology that make it easier and cheaper for creditors to seize bank accounts. Although banks can tell whether an account contains exempt funds before they issue a freeze, they argue that ignoring a restraining order would leave them in contempt of state court.
But even when both the creditor and the bank agree a mistake has been made, bureaucracy can leave seniors in limbo for weeks. Laurie Doran, staff attorney for South Jersey Legal Services, had a client who discovered the levy on her account when she went to buy medication. "They zapped both her savings and checking, and she didn't have access to any funds," says Doran. "She came over from the pharmacy in an absolute panic."
Although attorneys for both the creditor and the bank immediately agreed to lift the freeze, it couldn't be done because the levy officer -- a liaison between the court and the bank -- was unresponsive. It took two weeks to unravel, during which the elderly woman's health deteriorated.
Death by a Thousand Fees
Moreover, some banks are making a profit off these account holders through exorbitant fees. Banks typically charge a non-refundable legal processing fee of $100 to $150 for the freeze itself. Then, when the consumer, unaware of the freeze, pays their bills, they can incur significant overdraft fees.
In one case, Chase Bank froze the checking account of a New York retiree -- whose only income was from Social Security -- following a $920 judgment for an unpaid dental bill. The woman had $929.54 in her account, but the dentist never got anything. "Chase Bank managed to grab the entire account," says her attorney, Jim Baker of the Northern Manhattan Improvement Project.
The 72-year-old wrote nine checks against the account without realizing it had been frozen; several of those checks were presented twice for payment. Chase charged $30 each time. In addition, the bank was debiting 45 cents a month from her account for credit insurance. "Every time the first of month rolled by and Chase couldn't debit its 45 cents, they charged her another $30," says Baker. In four months, the account was empty.
Even when a freeze is lifted and garnished funds are restored, banks often refuse to refund fees. "The banks say they have the right to charge fees because it's a deposit agreement," says Wilner. "They say they are not acting through the legal process, but through a contractual agreement, so the regulatory exemption doesn't apply to them."
Trolling for Delinquencies
The problems are becoming more frequent because of the burgeoning debt collection industry. In 2005, $110 billion in face-value debt was purchased by third-party debt buyers, 90 percent of it credit card receivables, according to the Association of Credit and Collection Professionals.
In New York City, the number of consumer debt cases filed in civil court has grown 300 percent in 5 years, to 320,000 cases in 2006, according to a new report from the Urban Justice Center. Ninety percent were brought by third-party debt buyers. Almost $1 billion in claims were made against New York City residents, and creditors obtained judgments of nearly $800 million, the center estimates.
Once a default judgment goes through, the creditor's attorney sends an electronic information subpoena and restraining notice, which has the same power as a court order. The cost is minimal. "The volume of collection activity is way up," says Baker. "Creditors used to have to have some reason for thinking someone had an account at a specific bank. Now they simply send out a blanket email to every bank in the tri-state area, and say, 'If so-and-so has an account, freeze it.'"
On the consumer side, the problem is compounded by direct deposit: This year, 85 percent of Social Security recipients received their payments electronically, up from 41.5 percent in 1985. Someone who encounters a freeze may have subsequent checks slip into the account before they're able to find their way through the legal maze.
Frozen and Refrozen
Meanwhile, creditors who are rebuffed often turn around and file a new claim for the same debt. New Yorker Waverly Taliaferro, 70, worked for decades as a photographer before retiring in 2001. He and his wife lived off of his Social Security payment and her income. In 2003, when she was laid off, they fell behind on a credit card bill. Their account was frozen in 2006, which Taliaferro discovered on his way to the grocery store. Over the next 23 days, he says, he and his wife survived on a 10-pound bag of brown rice.
After his lawyer was able to remove the freeze, Taliaferro began receiving his check by mail, and paying $23 to a check-cashing service to cash it. Six months later, his attorney told him that Chase Bank had issued a policy not to freeze exempt funds, so Taliaferro opened an account -- and received a $100 bonus from the bank for using direct deposit. The account was frozen 16 days later because it contained non-exempt funds -- what was left of the bonus money from Chase.
"Absolutely nothing will stop that debt buyer from trying to freeze it again," says Taliaferro's attorney, Johnson Tyler of South Brooklyn Legal Services. "When a credit card company sells off a debt, they don't sell it with a red flag that says, 'We tried to collect and she's on Social Security.' It's sold as part of a bundle of debt. We have cases where the debt buyer froze the account three times in a row on a client who is homeless and mentally impaired. A judge ordered them to stop and they still did it."
A Modern-Day Debtors' Prison?
Consumer advocates say Congress should adopt federal legislation modeled after a California law that prohibits a restraint on the first $2,500 of any account into which Social Security funds are directly deposited."That would simplify things for the banks, and essentially effectuate the whole purpose of what Congress wanted to accomplish with exemption laws," says Tyler.
For her part, Fauntleroy says she's done with credit cards, although she still gets daily offers in the mail. "They keep trying, but I won't bite -- I even got one from Capital One," she says. "Either they're crazy or they think I am!"
Like Fauntleroy, many seniors try to make good on their debts, legal advocates say. "Many of our clients made payments for years until they couldn't do it anymore," says Patricia Duecy, a paralegal with Legal Services of Northern Virginia who worked on Fauntleroy's case. "Some of them did pay them off -- if you looked at what they actually charged, outside of late fees and interest.
"A long time ago the country made a decision that when a person is old or poor, they should have a subsistence income to pay for rent, food, and medicine," Duecy adds. "The money is supposed to be going to their basic needs and not going into the hands of debt collectors. If we can't protect the most vulnerable among us, what are we doing?"
(http://finance.yahoo.com)
I was intrigued and excited to meet and interview Alexander Roy, who, with a co-driver, claims to have broken the unofficial transcontinental driving record, racing from New York City to the Santa Monica Pier in 31 hours and four minutes in a 2000 BMW M5.
The pair are backing up their boast with plenty of documentation, including in-car video, GPS markers, eyewitnesses, and a time card punched in Manhattan and again when they reached the California coast (the time card machine was flown across country and held on the pier by a waiting friend).
I'm not endorsing the feat. I'm not encouraging anyone else to attempt it. It's dangerous and could've been deadly for innocent people along the 2,795 mile route. I do believe Alex when he tells me he did all he could to mitigate the dangers to others, and I believe him when he tells me he lost sleep worrying about it. He says they plotted the course on interstate highways during a stretch of time when traffic would be at a minimum (over the Columbus Day weekend in 2006), and avoided reckless driving that might call attention to themselves, since a single police stop would've likely ended their chance at infamy. Roy says they didn't tailgate, didn't weave, didn't flash lights at other drivers, and avoided passing on the right or at super high speeds.
He's an interesting character who took his pursuit of the record very seriously, enlisting the help of friends to create spreadsheets documenting checkpoints, mileage and time goals, gas station stops and driver rotations. They mapped out the route mile by mile, choosing the roads of least resistance, avoiding tolls, traffic lights, and construction projects. Alex says they only hit four tolls and three or four red lights and three turns the entire way and had only one scare of a possible police stop in OklahomHe says they averaged 90.1 miles per hour and still managed to get 17.6 mpg, even with the extra weight of a spare 20-gallon gas tank in the rear. They spent most of the trip in sixth gear, avoiding heavy acceleration and aggressive braking, hitting their highest speeds (up to 160 mph) on stretches of empty road in the late night and early morning hours, assisted by night vision cameras with thermal imaging monitors inside to reveal animals, obstacles, officers, even potholes not clearly visible to the naked eye. The car was also equipped with four GPS units (one each for the driver, co-driver and backseat and a backup), police scanners, a CB radio, a radar detector, laser jammers, stabilized binoculars (day and night vision) and an air-to-ground radio to keep in touch with a Cessna overhead, flown by a friend who led Alex and his team across the midwest.
Alex tells me he hopes other people don't try to replicate his feat, not because he doesn't want his record broken, but because he doesn't want anyone to get hurt. The speed demon claims he doesn't speed anymore and won't try to repeat his high-speed journey, although he may race on a track from time to time. He's now spending his time promoting a book he wrote about his life and exploits and record-breaking run. When I asked him about his motivation, he spoke of his late father who dreamed of and attempted to take part in the Cannonball run, and of his own love for the film, but reiterated the physical and emotional tolls of two years of planning and 30-plus hours of wide-eyed high-speed driving.
"I think everybody, at the end of the day, is inspired by Burt Reynolds," he said with a smile. "Because that's funny. Cannonball Run is funny. What we did I think is incredible and maybe fascinating — but I don't think it was funny."
Fri Nov 16, 2007 5:01pm EST
By Kim Dixon and Lisa Richwine
NEW YORK (Reuters) - While Republicans vying for the U.S. presidency warn about Democratic plans for a "government takeover of healthcare," many companies in the sector see opportunities should a Democrat win.
Supporting cheaper versions of pricey biologic drugs and helping Americans without health insurance are among the benefits cited by executives this week at the Reuters Health Summit in New York.
The spiraling cost of health care is often named the biggest domestic policy worry in national polls.
Democrats back more expansive measures to boost coverage of the 47 million Americans currently uninsured and support greater us of generic drugs to curb costs.
"What Democrats are very likely to support is a national approach to the uninsured," said David Snow, chief executive at Medco Health Solutions Inc (MHS.N: Quote, Profile, Research). "Net-net for Medco, it's a good thing."
Medco was spun off of drugmaker Merck & Co (MRK.N: Quote, Profile, Research) in 2003 and sells pharmacy services to employers and the government, reaching 60 million people. Demand for its services would likely grow if more people were insured. Rivals include CVS Caremark (CVS.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and Express Scripts (ESRX.O: Quote, Profile, Research)
Executives, including big drugmakers more wary of government involvement, say the pressure to hold down health costs means the government's role is likely to expand under either party.
"Ultimately, I don't think the American public wants to spend more than more than 16 percent of their GDP (gross domestic product) on healthcare," UK's Shire Plc (SHP.L: Quote, Profile, Research) chief executive Matthew Emmens said.
Health care costs were about 16 percent of GDP in 2005, according to government data, but are projected to rise to nearly 20 percent of GDP by 2016.
Of the conventional wisdom that Democrats are worse for healthcare than Republicans, Emmens said: "I don't believe that."
Many pharmaceutical executives worry about pressure on prices coming from employers who provide health insurance and individuals who have seen their co-payments increase.
"Hopefully in the U.S. we'll be able to address that more with market forces and less through government intervention," Roche Holding AG (ROG.VX: Quote, Profile, Research) chief executive Franz Humer said.
One factor driving costs is so-called biologic drugs, man-made versions of human proteins that are more complex to make and often several times more expensive than chemical-based drugs.
Legislation creating a legal pathway to approve cheaper generic versions has stalled in Congress but more Democrats than Republicans back it.
One company that wants to sell generic biologics is Abbott Laboratories' (ABT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) spin-off Hospira Inc (HSP.N: Quote, Profile, Research). Hospira Chief Executive Chris Begley said companies seeking to cut health costs are poised to benefit in the current environment.
"If you can't afford something, does it really add value?" he said, referring to branded drug prices.
Hospital companies struggling with rising levels of unpaid medical bills and are encouraged by proposals to increase insurance coverage.
The "further on the left you get, the more comprehensive their solutions tend to be and the more they care about getting everyone into the system," which would benefit the industry, said hospital chain Tenet Healthcare's (THC.N: Quote, Profile, Research) Chief Executive Trevor Fetter.
HEDGING BETS
Major drugmakers oppose several measures backed by Democrats, such as legalizing cheaper imported prescriptions from Canada and letting the government negotiate drug prices in the federal Medicare health program.
"Historically they have been seen as a little distant from the industry," said Schering-Plough Corp (SGP.N: Quote, Profile, Research) Chief Executive Fred Hassan, adding that individual Democrats have been supportive.
Companies are hedging their bets, with national polls showing Democrats have a shot at the White House and could retain control of both houses of the U.S. Congress.
The sector has significantly boosted the proportion of campaign contributions going to Democrats in the 2008 election cycle, compared with 2006, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Individuals and political action committees associated with the health sector have given just over half their contributions thus far to Democrats, about $3.9 million, versus $3.8 million to Republicans, according the group.
That contrasts with the 2006 election cycle, where the sector gave about two-thirds of their contributions, or $13.2 million to Republicans, versus $6.1 million to Democrats.
Smaller biotech companies may be especially vulnerable to effort to hold down drug prices.
"If you don't have a free market mechanism for pricing, it's going to dampen the investment climate, and that is going to hurt the smaller companies more than the big companies," Onyx Pharmaceuticals Inc (ONXX.O: Quote, Profile, Research) chief executive Hollings Renton said.
In the end, the industry's worries are tempered by the belief that Americans will not want to give up the idea of choice -- of pharmaceuticals, doctors or health plans.
"Even the proposals put out by the candidates are moderate," said Schering-Plough's Hassan. "Nobody is saying we are going to do away with employer-sponsored health care."
(Editing by Tim Dobbyn)
Travellers face price hikes and confusion after the Government unveiled plans to take up to 53 pieces of information from anyone entering or leaving Britain.
Anybody about whom the authorities are dubious can be turned away when they arrive at the airport or station with their baggage.
Those with outstanding court fines, such as a speeding penalty, could also be barred from leaving the country, even if they pose no security risk.
The information required under the "e-borders" system was revealed as Gordon Brown announced plans to tighten security at shopping centres, airports and ports.
This could mean additional screening of baggage and passenger searches, with resulting delays for travellers.
The e-borders scheme is expected to cost at least £1.2billion over the next decade.
Travel companies, which will run up a bill of £20million a year compiling the information, will pass on the cost to customers via ticket prices, and the Government is considering introducing its own charge on travellers to recoup costs.
(http://www.dailymail.co.uk)
At the end of 2006, 65.7% of the identified official foreign exchange reserves in the world were held in United States dollars and 25.2% in euros.
Monetary Authorities with the largest foreign reserves in 2007.
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