New GCLC Working Paper - Article 81 EC and Strategic Behavior

I have a new paper in the GCLC working paper series (in French), which deals with the question of how firms may seek to instrumentalize Article 81 EC in order to gain a competitive - strategic - advantage. This paper was presented at a conference organized by Antoine Masson from the University of Luxembourg in December 2008.

Nicolas

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[raivo pommer-www.google.fi.]

SPARDA BANK SPIONAGE

Europas größte Privatbank schreibt Verluste, die Allianz trennt sich von chinesischen Aktien und die Sparda-Bank stellt wegen der Daten-Spionage durch die Bahn Strafanzeige.

Europas größte Privatbank Sal. Oppenheim hat im vergangenen Jahr rote Zahlen geschrieben. Das Ergebnis nach Steuern rutschte auf minus 117 Millionen Euro, teilte das Bankhaus mit.

Im Vorjahr hatten die Privatbankiers noch 255 Millionen Euro verdient und das beste Ergebnis ihrer mehr als 200-jährigen Geschichte erzielt.

"Sal. Oppenheim konnte sich den enormen Belastungen, welche die Finanzmarktkrise für den gesamten Finanzsektor bringt, nicht entziehen“, sagte der Sprecher der persönlich haftenden Gesellschafter, Matthias Graf von Krockow.

[raivo pommer-www.google.ee.]

JAPAN SOFTBANK

Softbank, now with about 20.6 million subscribers, controls about 19.2 percent of the nation's market, up 1.1 percentage points from the previous fiscal year. But average sales per user declined for voice calls, while they were up for data transmission.

Losses on investments from the market downturn dragged on its earnings, according to Softbank, which bought British cellular giant Vodafone Group PLC's struggling Japanese operations in 2006.

A major one-time loss related to payments for bonds for its mobile unit as well as a write-off for its optical fiber Internet services, also hurt results, it said.

One business area that performed better than last year was its Internet-related "cultural" businesses such as advertising, Internet shopping and auctions, Softbank said.

Softbank also introduced attractive mobile content such as video of comedy acts popular in Japan called "S-1 Battle," and easy-to-use applications called "mobile widget."

For the fiscal year ending March 31, Softbank's profit dropped 60.3 percent to 43.2 billion yen, on 2.67 trillion yen in sales, down 3.7 percent on year.

Softbank did not give a net profit forecast, but expects operating profit for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2010, to rise 17 percent from the fiscal year just ended to 420 billion yen.

[raivo pommer-www.google.ee]

raivo pommer-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee

THE Australian dollar

At the local close, it was trading at US72.45c, up from Thursday's close of US72.36c.

During the session, the unit traded between US73.24c and US72.24c.

It began the local session at a six-month high of US73.18-22c.

ICAP economist Adam Carr said risk appetite was boosted by the declining US dollar.

The safe-haven currency declined during the four-day Easter break after news that US bank Wells Fargo had posted a better-than-forecast guidance for its first-quarter earnings.

"The Aussie's tracked higher," Mr Carr said. "We've had a couple of bounces up a couple of hundred points.

"US dollar weakness has been the key thing over the Easter period. Today, we've given some of those gains back, but not a lot. Significantly, we've held over US72c."

According to Wells Fargo, it expects "record" net income, about $US3 billion ($4.1 billion) for the first three months of 2009.

Markets considered it another sign of improvement in credit and lending markets. But Mr Carr said the overnight offshore session could prove volatile for the Australian dollar.

[raivo pommer-www.google.ee.]

raivo pommer-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee

BRITICH BILLIONARE

These women are the latest in a long line of billionaire offspring who have decided to work for mom or dad. The allure seems obvious: lots of responsibility at a young age, little chance of being fired by the boss and the opportunity to contribute to the family's legacy.

But how seriously do these women take these jobs, and how likely is it that they'll actually inherit the corner offices, eventually run billion-dollar enterprises and oversee thousands of employees?

To find the most promising progeny, we scoured the daughters of the world's 793 billionaires and found 25 worth watching. They range in age from 25 to 59, include a couple sets of sisters and hail from 12 countries and work in such diverse industries as cosmetics, media and shipping.

Not included are any heiresses who have already inherited the fortune as well as the business, thus eliminating someone like Margaret (Maggie) Magerko, 43, who now runs and owns 84 Lumber, founded by her father. Also left off are ones who are succeeding on their own, such as Ralph Lauren's daughter Dylan, who owns the popular Manhattan store Dylan's Candy Bar.

So who are the rising stars? One of the best known is Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka, who seems destined for the job. At 27, she has already become a fixture in her father's empire as an executive vice president for the Trump Organization and a star in her dad's primetime show Celebrity Apprentice. Enterprising as the Donald himself, Ivanka has also found time to be a fashion model and the face of Ivanka Trump Jewelry, her own luxury diamond line.

Others already sit on the boards of the world's largest public companies. Vanisha Mittal Bhatia, 28, is a board member of steel behemoth ArcelorMittal (market cap $37 billion), along with its chief executive, her father Lakshmi Mittal, and American billionaire Wilbur Ross. She is the only family member besides her dad on the board, though her brother Aditya Mittal is CFO and member of the Group Management Board.

Meanwhile, France's Delphine Arnault-Gancia, 34, became the first woman board member of luxury goods group LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, run by her father, at age 28 and was named deputy managing director of Christian Dior in April 2008.

[raivo pommer]

raivo pommer-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee

Auf der Streckbank der großen Krise

In Deutschland ist die Hypo Real Estate zum Inbegriff der Krisenbank geworden. Das Institut ging ohne Not Milliardenrisiken ein und musste mit bisher 102 Milliarden Euro an Staatsgeld und -garantien gestützt werden. Deshalb bekam es auch den Titel "Drecksbank" verliehen - von Deutschlands höchstem Finanzaufseher Jochen Sanio höchstpersönlich.
Die globale Finanzkrise setzte dem Treiben ein abruptes Ende und bescherte der Bundesregierung ein neues Leitmotiv. Was für Adenauer die Deutschland AG war, ist für Merkel die systemrelevante Bank: Nur wenn es unseren Banken gut geht können wir unseren Wohlstand erhalten.

Unter dieser Annahme eilt die Regierung einer Bank nach der anderen zu Hilfe. Sie spannt einen nationalen Rettungsschirm auf, sie lässt die Bilanzierungsregeln lockern und breitet ein Netz aus, in das die Institute ihre Schrottpapiere abwerfen sollen. Sie gibt das Geld der Steuerzahler aus, weil sie glaubt, nur so ließe sich die Kernschmelze des Finanzsystems - und damit ein Absturz der gesamten Wirtschaft - verhindern.

Und stets heißt es: Die Hilfsaktionen seien gar nicht so teuer. Der größte Teil der Milliarden, die der Staat bereit stelle, seien ja Garantien - also gar kein richtiges Geld. Zahlen müsse der Staat nur dann, wenn die Sache schief gehe. Und die staatlichen Retter tun so, als ob sie diesen "worst case", diese denkbar schlechteste Entwicklung, tatsächlich verhindern können.

[raivo pommer.]

raivo pommer-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee

316 MILLIARD EURO

Neue Hiobsbotschaft für die Staatskassen: Bund, Länder und Gemeinden müssen sich bis 2013 auf beispiellose Steuerausfälle von insgesamt 316 Milliarden Euro einstellen. Das teilte das Bundesfinanzministerium in Berlin nach Abschluss der Beratungen des Steuerschätzerkreises mit.

Allein in diesem Jahr muss der Staat mit Mindereinnahmen von 45 Milliarden Euro gegenüber der November-Schätzung rechnen. Für 2010 wird nochmals mit einem Ausfall von 84,7 Milliarden gerechnet im Vergleich zur Steuerschätzung vor einem Jahr. Im Jahr 2011 steigen sie voraussichtlich auf 93,4 Milliarden Euro. 2012 wird mit Mindereinnahmen von 93,2 Milliarden Euro gerechnet. Für 2013 wurde das erste Mal geschätzt, hier gibt es keine Abweichungen.

Ausfälle in diesem Ausmaß hat es bisher noch nicht gegeben. Die Staatsfinanzen drohen wegen der Mindereinnahmen in einer bisher unvorstellbaren Größenordnung in den nächsten Jahren aus dem Ruder zu laufen. Auch Finanzminister Peer Steinbrück (SPD) stellt sich auf eine Schuldenxplosion ein. Er kündigte zuletzt einen Anstieg der Neuverschuldung für 2009 auf rund 80 Milliarden Euro an. Auch im nächsten Jahr plant Steinbrück neue Kredite für den Bund in dieser Größenordnung oder gar mehr ein. Bis Ende Mai soll ein zweiter Nachtragsetat für 2009 vorliegen.

[raivo pommer -.www.google.ee]

raivo pommer-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee

HE British parliamentary expenses scandal claimed its first ministerial scalp last night with the standing down of junior Justice Minister Shahid Malik.

Mr Malik stepped down pending an investigation after The Daily Telegraph revealed Britain's first Muslim minister had claimed tens of thousands of pounds for a second home while paying below-market rent for his main house.

The newspaper said Mr Malik had claimed pound stg. 66,827 on his London home over three years, while paying less than pound stg. 100 a week on a house in his constituency he designated as his main residence.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has asked an independent adviser on ministerial interests, Philip Mawer, to investigate the claims, said a spokesman, adding that it was expected Mr Malik would return to his job if cleared.

"There have been accusations made in the past 24 hours against Shahid Malik, in particular that he received preferential rent on his main residence," said the spokesman. "Because that allegation would represent a potential financial benefit ... this could represent a breach of the ministerial code."

House of Commons Speaker Michael Martin was under growing pressure to step down at next year's general election for resisting a crackdown on MPs and expenses to concentrate on finding who leaked the data to The Daily Telegraph.

The Times labelled yesterday the British parliament's "darkest day" after a former minister, Elliot Morley, was kicked out of the parliamentary Labour Party for his abuse of expenses, and a Conservative MP stepped down from the opposition front bench over his claims.

Conservative MP Andrew MacKay may be ordered by his party to pay back more than pound stg. 100,000 ($200,975) in allowances he claimed by exploiting a system that allowed MPs to claim benefits to maintain a second home.

Mr MacKay and his wife, fellow Conservative MP Julie Kirkbride, own two homes. He designated one as his second home and she designated the other as hers, meaning they could claim allowances for both homes but were left with no primary residence.

[raivo pommer -.www.google.ee.]

raivo pommer

Participants to the 2009 Annual Meetings of the Board of Governors of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Group are in Dakar, Senegal, on Monday to begin the event.

The Meeting, which is under the theme; “Africa and the Financial Crisis: An Agenda for Action", is taking place at the King Fahd Complex Conference Centre in the Meridian President Hotel.

It will be preceded by High Level Ministerial sessions and Seminars on current economic and development issues, notably the prevailing global financial crisis as well as urgent challenges facing the continent.

The AfDB’s Annual Meeting, usually held in May, is the biggest gathering of financial and development experts on the continent. Finance ministers, senior government officials, business leaders, academics, media, and representatives of international organizations and civil society, make up the over 1,500 participants attending the Meeting.

Governors, usually Finance and Economy Ministers and central Bank governors representing the 77-member countries (53 Regional and 24 non-Regional countries), constitute the AfDB’s highest policy-making body.

The annual meetings are statutory occasions for the governors to review the Bank Group’s administrative, financial and operational activities in the past financial year and provide guidance on the future operations of the Bank Group.

This year, activities leading up to the Board sessions include a Ministerial Roundtable on “Africa and the Financial Crisis: An Agenda for Action” to be co-chaired by Bank Group: President Donald Kaberuka and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) Executive Secretary, Abdoulie Janneh.

[raivo pommer -.www.google.ee.]

Global economic crisis dims Africa’s prospects

The prevailing global economic crisis has gravely affected African economics with GDP growth falling by more than half from a projected 5.7% to 2.8% in 2009, according to “African Development Outlook”, an annual publication launched on Sunday, 10 May 2009, in Dakar, Senegal, on the sidelines of the Annual Meetings of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Group.

The book, published jointed by the African Development Bank, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, says the crisis has literally diminished consistent economic growth recorded by many African countries in the past five years.

Due to the global economic downturn, the continent can expect only 2.8 per cent in 2009, less than half of the 5.7 per cent expected before the crisis, the report said. The majority of African economies recorded an average of 5% growth in the last half-decade.

However, AEO’s authors see growth rebounding to 4.5 per cent in 2010. Growth in oil-exporting countries is expected to fall to 2.4 per cent in 2009 compared to 3.3 per cent for the net oil importers.

The 2009 African Economic Outlook covers 47 African countries, up from 35 last year.

It says the collapse of commodity prices and falling demand from OECD countries will have an adverse effect on Africa’s national budgets, with the regional budget deficit for 2009 projected to hover around 5.5 per cent of GDP compared to a surplus of 3.4 predicted in the AEO one year ago. Foreign direct investment decreased by about 10 per cent in 2008. The 2009 AEO also finds that while official development assistance (ODA) increased in 2008, there are concerns over downward pressure on donor aid budgets due to the ongoing economic crisis.

For most of the 1970s and 1980s, growth in Africa was largely constrained by internal factors. Decades of reform addressed most of the internal factors. Combined with a favourable external environment, Africa enjoyed half a decade of growth rates above 5%. The financial crisis which has now become an economic crisis has eroded benefits accumulated during the years of reform. With a projected growth rate of only 2.8%, and a bias on the downside, many people will slip into poverty. This is a setback beyond the control of Africans and is likely to be protracted. Using an updated methodology, the Outlook reports that only a handful of African countries are on track to meet the target of halving the share of the population living on less than one dollar a day by 2015.

“However, we should not despair,” says Louis Kasekende, Chief Economist of the AfDB, “the decade of reform has introduced efficiency in macroeconomic management and made the African economies more competitive. Countries should therefore desist from implementing policies that restrain further integration of the continent into the global trading and financial environment.”

On a positive note, the 2009 AEO notes that Africa is better positioned to weather the crisis than it was ten years ago. Many countries have undergone prudent macroeconomic reforms in the past few years which have strengthened fiscal balances and reduced inflation to single-digit levels. Many have also benefited from substantial debt relief, with the result that debt service/export ratios are low in most countries.

For his part, Javier Santiso, Director and Chief Development Economist of the OECD Development Centre notes that “Asian and Latin American emerging markets have become increasingly important trade and development partners, which also reduces the continent’s vulnerability to the economic performance of OECD countries.”

The 2009 AEO has a special focus on innovations in information and communication technologies (ICTs). It concludes that despite low penetration rates for new technologies, innovative applications of ICT have been proliferating to areas such as e-banking, e-payments, e-agriculture, e-trade, e-government and e-education. Many of these new tools are helping to shape an improved business environment by contributing to market development, overcoming traditional infrastructure constraints and reducing business costs.

“These enterprising uses of ICT show that African countries can pursue growth based on greater domestic investment and consumption, in turn reducing the impact of exogenous shocks and crises,” adds Javier Santiso.

Regional Overviews

Southern Africa
Economic growth in Southern Africa registered at 5.2 per cent in 2008, down from 7 per cent in 2007. It is expected to slow dramatically in 2009 to 0.2 per cent before recovering to 4.6 per cent in 2010. In South Africa, growth is expected to fall to 1.1 per cent due to the impact of the global economic crisis on demand for its mineral exports compounded by a contraction in private consumption and investment. In Angola, the economy is expected to contract by 7.2 per cent in 2009 on the assumption that the reduction in quotas by OPEC countries will translate into a reduction of oil production. In 2008, Madagascar and Malawi benefited from strong growth in agriculture in both countries, and large investments in the mineral sector in the former.

North Africa

Average GDP growth in North Africa is expected to improve slightly from 5.3 per cent in 2007 to 5.8 per cent in 2008. It is then expected to slow significantly in 2009, to 3.3 per cent before increasing to 4.1 per cent in 2010. All North African countries will grow more slowly in 2009, due to cutbacks in oil production and tourism receipts. Morocco and Tunisia have more diversified production and exports that make them less vulnerable to the reduction in demand resulting from the crisis, but growth will slow there as well.

West Africa

Real GDP growth in West African countries is projected to slow to 4.2 per cent in 2009, from 5.4 per cent in 2008 and 2007, before strengthening to 4.6 per cent in 2010. Projections for 2009 indicate a slowdown in Nigeria’s growth rate to 4 per cent, as a result of the OPEC quota on oil production and the declining investment. Most of the other countries in the region are also expected to experience slower growth in public and private investment associated with lower commodity prices and remittances. Liberia and Sierra Leone, however, are expected to continue to enjoy high growth rates as output recovers after years of conflict.

Central Africa

In 2008, average GDP growth in the seven countries of Central Africa registered 5 per cent average growth, up from 4 per cent in 2007. In 2009, GDP growth is expected to slow sharply to 2.8 per cent and increase to 3.6 per cent in 2010. Reduction in demand for oil and minerals will undermine growth in resource-rich countries.

East Africa

The average growth rate for East Africa is projected at 7.3 per cent in 2008, down from a very strong 8.8 per cent in 2007. The region’s performance is expected to slow to 5.5 per cent in 2009 and remain about the same in 2010. Ethiopia, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda – which were the fastest growing economies in East Africa in 2008 -- are projected to maintain moderately robust growth in 2009 and 2010 because demand for their major agricultural and horticultural exports is less sensitive to the effects of the crisis. Comoros, and Seychelles are expected to continue stagnating; with depressed tourism due to the global recession, and civil unrest, in the case of Comoros. Growth in Djibouti, which registered at 5.9 per cent in 2008, is projected to accelerate in 2009 and 2010 to about 6.6 per cent. Kenya is expected to exhibit strong growth in 2009 (5 per cent) due to the recovery of domestic demand after a slowdown in 2008.

[raivo pommer -.www.google.ee.]

Vor Google gibt es kein Entkommen. Wenn wir nach einer neuen Wohnung, einem neuen Auto oder einer neuen Liebe suchen, wenn wir bei uns irgendeine Krankheit vermuten, ein Kochrezept brauchen oder in den Urlaub fahren wollen, dann fragen wir: Google. Google ist im Netz omnipräsent, Google hat ein Quasi-Monopol. Genau deshalb werden auch immer mehr Unkenrufe laut, man müsse sich vor der „Datenkrake“ in Acht nehmen. Und jetzt macht uns ein amerikanischer Professor auch noch den Vorschlag, man soll sich genauso verhalten wie Google. Geht’s noch?

Doch halt. „Was würde Google tun?“ ist kein Buch über Google. Es ist viel mehr ein Buch darüber, wie das Internet unsere Welt verändert hat und was man von Google lernen kann. Wie das geht, erklärt einem unterhaltsam, informativ und auch noch verständlich der New Yorker Medienexperte Jeff Jarvis.

In der Medienbranche ist Jarvis bekannt wie ein bunter Hund, auch wenn er wohlerzogene Haare hat. Er ist als eine der einflussreichsten Persönlichkeiten des „Weltwirtschaftsforums“ in Davos gelistet, der Verleger Hubert Burda hört ihm gerne aufmerksam zu, und die britische Tageszeitung „Guardian“ schmückt sich mit einer Jarvis-Kolumne.

Die nur leicht wuschelige Frisur und der gepflegt gestutzte Bart lassen den Professor für interaktiven Journalismus rundum sympathisch erscheinen. Der wache Blick durch die dünnen Kunststoffgläser seiner Brille verrät: Jarvis ist freundlich, aber nicht gemütlich. Im Gegenteil. Jarvis bringt die Sachen auf den Punkt – mitunter in scharfem Ton. Der ehemalige Reporter und jetzige Blogger hat eine besondere Fähigkeit, Beobachtungen gezielt auf ein gut sitzendes Schlagwort zuzuspitzen. Google-optimiert, sozusagen.

Wie Google das Wirtschaftsleben verändert hat, demonstriert Jarvis an seinem Blog www.buzzmachine.com. 2005 hatte er sich einen Dell-Computer gekauft. Unzufrieden mit dem ständig kaputten Gerät und genervt davon, von der Firma in Service-Warteschleifen zwischengeparkt zu werden, brachte er mit dem Blogeintrag „Dell nervt“ seinen Unmut zum Ausdruck. Er beschrieb sein Elend mit dem teuer bezahlten Wartungsservice, und Dutzende, Hunderte und schließlich Tausende von Menschen schlossen sich Jarvis’ Meinung an. Suchte man bei Google nach „Dell“, erschien sein schimpfender Beitrag schon bald nur wenige Positionen hinter der offiziellen Website der Firma. Dell hatte ein Problem.

Lange versuchte die Computerfirma, die Meinungen ihrer Kunden im Netz zu ignorieren. Man zog sich auf die Position zurück, wenn jemand etwas von Dell wolle, dann solle er sich gefälligst an die Dell-Website wenden. Außerdem: Wer lese schon Blogs? Auf die Dauer ließ sich das Geraune nicht ignorieren. Das Image war angekratzt, und dieser Kratzer wurde zum Riss. Nach einem knappen Jahr änderte die Firma ihre Haltung. Jetzt kontaktierten Dell- Techniker Blogger, die über ein Dell-Computerproblem berichteten, um ihnen zu helfen. Mit positiver Resonanz: Im Netz erntete man dafür lobende Worte, ja lichte Begeisterung. Dells negative Berichterstattung schlug nicht nur in eine positive um, das Unternehmen hatte verstanden, wie man im Internetzeitalter operiert.

An Beispielen wie diesen erklärt Jeff Jarvis anschaulich, was sich durch Google verändert hat. Denn früher blieb es großen Organisationen vorbehalten, mit viel Aufwand Millionen von Leuten zu erreichen – über Werbung oder Veröffentlichungen in Medien. Seit dem Internet und dank Google ist das anders. Jeder Eintrag im Internet kann potenziell Millionen von Zugriffen haben – wenn er über Google abgefragt wird.

Jarvis’ Buch arbeitet Stück für Stück heraus, was durch das Internet und Google anders geworden ist. Dass ein Unternehmen sich heute nicht mehr nur um die Meinung der Presse, sondern auch um die Meinung seiner Kunden bemühen muss – und von ihnen lernen kann. Dass man Fehler nicht mehr leise, still und heimlich unter den Tisch fallen lässt, sondern damit offensiv und transparent umgeht.

„Was würde Google tun?“ macht dem Leser nicht nur deutlich, wie sich die Welt verändert hat, sondern wie man damit umgehen kann. Als Anregung überzeugt das. Interessant ist jedoch, dass Jarvis’ Konzept offensichtlich seine Grenzen hat. Denn sein eigenes Nachrichtenprojekt Daylife.com befolgt all diese Regeln und hat es dennoch nicht zu großem Erfolg im Netz geschafft. Was nicht gegen das Buch spricht. Wahrscheinlich ist es mit den Netzregeln so wie mit denen zum Komponieren eines Top-Hits. Es erscheint einem so einfach – und doch gelingt es wenigen, sie zu formulieren.

[raivo pommer.]

Drei Milliarden Euro

Wäre der Kapitalzufluss gescheitert, hätte der mit 2,7 Milliarden Euro (2008) in den roten Zahlen steckenden Landesbank für Hamburg und Schleswig-Holstein im Juni das Aus durch die Finanzaufsicht gedroht. Das Kapital wird allein von den Ländern bereitgestellt. Die neuen Stammaktien werden zu je 19 Euro herausgegeben. Die Entscheidung zur Kapitalzufuhr wurde nach Angaben des Versammlungsleiters und Aufsichtsratsvorsitzenden Wolfgang Peiner von allen Gesellschaftern einstimmig getragen.

Die Kapitalerhöhung war einziges Thema der Hauptversammlung - aber ein schwieriges. Die Beratungen der Länder, der schleswig-holsteinischen Sparkassen sowie des Großinvestors J.C. Flowers zogen sich in der Hamburger Bankenzentrale über neun Stunden bis zum Abend hin. Nach Peiners Darstellung waren sich die Beteiligten am Mittag im wesentlichen über die Kapitalerhöhung einig, danach ging es um wasserdichte juristische Formulierungen.

Flowers, der auch an der strauchelnden Hypo Real Estate beteiligt ist, sowie die Sparkassen hatten im Vorfeld eine Geldzufuhr «mangels Masse» abgelehnt. Sie wollten ihre Anteile aber nicht zu stark verwässert sehen. «Der Einigungswille war erkennbar», sagte Peiner. Zwar konnte der Aufsichtsratschef die exakten Besitzverhältnisse am Abend noch nicht benennen, ihm zufolge werden die Länder über 80 Prozent halten (bisher 60 Prozent) und Flowers von 25,7 Prozent Anteil auf unter 10 Prozent zurückfallen. Der Rest wird von den Sparkassen gehalten.

Mit der Entscheidung sei die Zukunft der Bank gesichert worden, sagte Peiner. Auflage der Finanzaufsicht sei nun, dass der Milliardenbetrag bei dem Institut eingezahlt wird. Außerdem muss bis spätestens 30. Juni ein entsprechender Eintrag ins Handelsregister erfolgen.

Für die Entscheidung war nach dem Finanzmarktstabilisierungsgesetz zwar von vornherein nur eine einfache Mehrheit notwendig, die durch die Ländermehrheit gegeben war. Doch die Länder wollten keine Entscheidung mit absehbarem juristischem Nachspiel durchdrücken. Alle Anteilseigner wollen den Angaben zufolge auf Rechtsmittel verzichten und anhängige Verfahren zurücknehmen.

«Mit der Kapitalerhöhung erhält die Bank ein solides Fundament und kann so die Kreditvergabe in ihrer Heimatregion ­ gerade auch in der Wirtschaftskrise ­ sichern», sagte Peiner. «Die Neuausrichtung der Bank kann jetzt mit Nachdruck betrieben werden», meinte Hamburgs Finanzsenator Michael Freytag (CDU). Alle Anteilseigner zögen an einem Strang. Mit der Entscheidung «sind die entscheidenden Weichen für die Zukunftsfähigkeit der HSH Nordbank gestellt worden», ergänzte der schleswig-holsteinische Finanzminister Rainer Wiegard (CDU). Auch der HSH-Nordbank-Vorstandsvorsitzende Dirk Jens Nonnenmacher zeigte sich erleichtert: «Das Votum ist ein klares Bekenntnis der Aktionäre zum vorgelegten Konzept der Fortentwicklung der Bank.» Er wolle das Vertrauen nutzen, um ein «verlässlicher Partner für die regionale Wirtschaft zu bleiben».

Nach monatelangem politischen Tauziehen hatten sich Hamburg und Schleswig-Holstein zu der überlebensnotwendigen Kapitalaufstockung bereitererklärt. Nach dem Milliardenverlust 2008 betrug das Ergebnis vor Steuern im 1. Quartal minus 188 Millionen Euro und war doppelt so hoch wie im Vorjahresquartal. «Die Bank ist auf einem guten Weg», resümierte der Aufsichtsratschef. Das aktuelle Ergebnis wird durch die Restrukturierung der Bank und die Bedienung der Garantien des Finanzmarktfonds SoFFin belastet. Das Geldinstitut muss auf Kernbereiche zusammenschrumpfen und streicht mehr als 1000 Stellen.

[raivo pommer]

Vaclav Klaus, the President of the Czech Republic, chairs the delegation of the European Union at the EU-Russia summit in Khabarovsk. The Russian-speaking politician conducted successful reforms to establish capitalism instead of socialism in his country. However, the European Union sees the Czech leader as a politician who impedes the process of the European integration. Klaus has never released any anti-Russian statements, despite the problem of the notorious US missile defense system.




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Klaus is considered the prime adversary of the European integration. His counterparts did not want him to chair the European Union six months ago. Vaclav Klaus refused to introduce the euro in his country. He was the only European politician, who welcomed the results of the Lisbon Treaty referendum in Ireland in 2008 (the EU Constitution thus remained unchanged).

In February, Klaus compared the European Union to the USSR, when he said that the EU had become a non-democratic structure that left no freedom of choice, similarly to communist regimes of Eastern Europe.

Vaclav Klaus is probably the most prominent politician in Europe’s former socialist camp during the recent 15 years. He became the finance minister of the Czech and Slovak Federative Republics after the collapse of socialism in 1989. Klaus became the president of the Czech Republic in 2003 and was reelected last year.

Vaclav Klaus’s reforms to change the political and economic regimes in the country were absolutely painless. Czech cars are competitive and reputable in Europe; the country’s agriculture can fully supply the nation with high-quality and inexpensive food. The Czechs do not travel to neighboring states for earnings as it happens in most of other countries of the former socialist camp. The living standard in the Czech Republic has become higher than that in Poland, Hungary and in the Baltic States.

In the beginning of the 1990s, Klaus wanted to make his country become a NATO member. However, he harshly criticized the wars in Yugoslavia and Iraq in 1999 and in 2003. He also stood up against Kosovo’s independence. He repeatedly supported the idea to deploy elements of the US missile defense system in the Czech Republic, although he did not take any efforts to give the process a go.

Klaus’s attitude to Russia has been changing periodically. He was a totally pro-Western politician in the beginning of the 1990s. As soon as he became the president, he said that he did not share anti-Russian sentiments of his predecessor, Vaclav Havel. Klaus has never said anything negative about Russia during the recent six years. When Georgia attacked South Ossetia in 2008, the Czech president stated that Georgia should not be justified for its actions.

On May 13 Klaus set out a protest against the attempts to rewrite the history of Second World War and urged other leaders not to blacken the role of the USSR and Russia in the history of the 20th century.

Vaclav Klaus can considerably improve the relations between Russia and the European Union. However, his European counterparts may not want it at all.

[raivo pommer.]

"Die Führung der Deutschen Bank hat Kenntnis erhalten von möglichen Verstößen in früheren Jahren gegen interne Vorgaben oder rechtliche Anforderungen im Zusammenhang mit Aktivitäten, welche die Abteilung Konzernsicherheit betreffen", hieß es in der knappen Pressemitteilung. "Die bisher vorliegenden Fakten lassen erwarten, dass es sich nur um wenige Verstöße handelt und Kontendaten oder andere Informationen über Kunden nicht betroffen waren."

Sonderprüfung der Bafin

Die Deutsche Bank hat eigenen Angaben zufolge die Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht (Bafin) über den Fall informiert. Diese hat eine Sonderprüfung angeordnet.

Der Vorstandsvorsitzende Josef Ackermann und der Leiter der Internen Revision hätten in Abstimmung mit dem Prüfungsausschuss des Aufsichtsrats eine Anwaltssozietät mit einer unabhängigen Untersuchung beauftragt, teilte Deutschlands größte Bank zudem mit.

Unter Verweis auf die laufende Bafin-Prüfung wollte der Sprecher zunächst keine näheren Angaben zur Art der Verstöße machen.

[raivo pommer]

Germany, the land of Goethe, Thomas Mann and Beethoven, has an unlikely pop culture hero: Donald Duck. Just as the French are obsessed with Jerry Lewis, the Germans see a richness and complexity to the Disney comic that isn’t always immediately evident to people in the cartoon duck’s homeland.
Disney

Comics featuring Donald are available at most German newsstands and the national weekly “Micky Maus”—which features the titular mouse, Goofy and, most prominently, Donald Duck—sells an average of 250,000 copies each week, outselling even “Superman.” A lavish 8,000-page German Donald Duck collector’s edition has just come out, and despite the nearly $1,900 price tag, the publisher, Egmont Horizont, says the edition of 3,333 copies is almost completely sold out. Last month the fan group D.O.N.A.L.D (the German acronym stands for “German Organization for Non-commercial Followers of Pure Donaldism”), hosted its 32nd annual congress at the Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, with trivia and trinkets galore, along with lectures devoted to “nephew studies” and Duckburg’s solar system.

“Donald is so popular because almost everyone can identify with him,” says Christian Pfeiler, president of D.O.N.A.L.D. “He has strengths and weaknesses, he lacks polish but is also very cultured and well-read.” But much of the appeal of the hapless, happy-go-lucky duck lies in the translations. Donald quotes from German literature, speaks in grammatically complex sentences and is prone to philosophical musings, while the stories often take a more political tone than their American counterparts.

Whereas in the U.S. fans of Donald Duck tend to gravitate to the animated films, duck fandom in Germany centers on the printed comics published in the kids’ weekly “Micky Maus” and the monthly “Donald Duck Special” (with a print run of 40,000 copies), which sells mainly to adult readers.

Donald Duck didn’t always find Germany so hospitable. In the years following World War II, American influence in the newly formed Federal Republic was strong, but German cultural institutions were hesitant to sanction one U.S. import: the comic book. A law banning comics was proposed, and some American comics were eventually burned by school officials worried about their effects on students’ morals and ability to express themselves in complete sentences.

[raivo pommer]

Before those killings, accommodation was the rule. The Mafia was Italy's secret vice: it kept Sicily in order, doled out rough justice and provided safe Sicilian seats to politicians cunning and ruthless enough to do deals with them. Falcone and Borsellino were given the task of bringing the Mafia to book and ending Mob rule in the island, and unlike their predecessors they went about it vigorously.

They organised the first mass trials of Mafiosi, and cajoled the government into giving convicted gangsters uniquely tough conditions in jail to prevent them continuing to run the gangs from inside. The Mafia had a beginning, Falcone argued, so it must also have an end.

Infuriated by the challenge, the Mafia began turning on its former friends in the political world. First to die was the former mayor of Palermo, Salvo Lima, Giulio Andreotti's key contact in the Mob. Falcone and Borsellino were murdered months later.

But now the man who killed Falcone has testified in court in Rome that, even after Lima's death, the politicians had not given up hope of sweet-talking the Mafia into another cosy arrangement.

The testimony of supergrasses is often suspect, but if an authority as important as Antonio Ingroia, a top anti-Mafia magistrate in Palermo, gives credit to what he says, it is to be taken seriously. In their last months, both Falcone and Borsellino felt that the political establishment had hung them out to dry. "In Sicily," Falcone said, "the Mafia kills the servants of the state that the state has not been able to protect." He saw it coming. Now we know chillingly that he was right, and that he had been abandoned. The survival of the political establishment was considered to be far more important than the breaking of the Mafia.

Months later both men were dead and for the first time the ordinary people of Palermo took to the streets in furious protest. This was partly out of sympathy for the dead men and their families, and partly because the autostrada bombing could easily have wiped out innocent Sicilians along with the magistrates (one reason the Mafia had been tolerated up to that point was because they only killed their own kind). With a start, the Italian state woke up: finally it saw that its very existence was at stake. A new age was under way.

[raivo pommer.]

Whichever way you look at it, the announcement that Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National Party, might attend a royal garden party at Buckingham Palace is a milestone moment in British politics. For it marks another stage in the transformation of Britain's biggest far-right party from a past of street thuggery to the brink of electoral breakthrough. Griffin could next month become the party's first member of the European Parliament.

The real question is whether it has done that by shrugging off its neo-fascist antecedents and entering the extreme right of mainstream politics – or is it being done by the perpetration of long-running confidence trick upon the electorate? The answer to that lies in the one man whose personal writ runs authoritatively throughout the party. So has Nick Griffin really changed?

There can be no doubting the unsavoury background from which Griffin emerges. It is deep rooted in his family history. His parents met while heckling a Communist Party meeting in north London in 1948. Nicholas John Griffin, who was born a decade later, was as a boy reputedly given by his grandfather some of the more anti-Semitic literature of Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists. While at private school in Suffolk aged 13, he was reading Hitler's Mein Kampf and making notes in the margins. "Adolf went a bit too far," Griffin conceded in 2006.

[raivo pommer.]

In 22 years in Parliament I have opposed all pay increases for MPs that are out of line with the rest of the public sector. In 2001, along with about 60 colleagues, I opposed the 42 per cent increase in the additional costs allowance which is the source of so many of our present troubles. I do not seek to pretend to be holier than others. The truth is that just about all of us are vulnerable in the current climate.

However, the sight of the Telegraph's political correspondent, Benedict Brogan, on Question Time last week, pompously refusing to disclose his sources when no one was asking him to do so was almost too much to bear. What, he was asked, had his paper had paid the person who stole the now famous expenses disc. A minor matter maybe, given the wider issues at stake, but not an unreasonable question in this age of transparency.

The Daily Telegraph has never been above practising a little fraud on its readers. When I first visited Vietnam, in 1973, I was amazed to discover that the paper's Saigon correspondent, whose reports appeared almost daily under the byline John Draw, was in fact Nguyen Ngoc Phac, an officer working for General Cao Van Vien, chief of staff of the Southern army.

So blatant was the arrangement that Phac used to appear in uniform at the Reuters office to tap out his reports. It wasn't that his dispatches resembled the official line. They were the official line.

When I got home I raised the matter with the then Telegraph editor, the late Bill Deedes, but I couldn't get a straight answer out of him.

In 1976, after the fall of the fascist regime in Portugal, someone walked into the Ministry of Information in Lisbon and emerged with a file on a journalist who reported for the Telegraph from Portugal's African colonies, where fierce wars were raging. The file – a copy of which I still retain – showed he was in the pay of the Portuguese secret police.

True, under the editorship of Max Hastings and Charles Moore, the Telegraph enjoyed a period of respectability, but lately – having fallen into the hands of the Barclay Brothers – it has become little more than a broadsheet version of the Daily Mail. Indeed, many of the new masters, Mr Brogan included, were recruited from the Mail.

Under their tutelage, much of the Telegraph's political and economic reporting has become, frankly, doo-lally. My personal favourite among the many ludicrous stories that in recent years have adorned what passes for the Telegraph news pages was headed "Brown raised taxes to the highest level in 20 years". Pinch yourself and then ask "Who was prime minister 20 years ago?". Why, none other than the Telegraph's beloved Margaret Thatcher. And for how long had she been prime minister? Eight years. Good God, if all a Labour government managed in its first 10 years was to raise taxation to the level that it was under Mrs Thatcher at the height of her ascendancy, Middle England can surely sleep easy in their beds.

Among the many falsehoods that we poor, inadequate, despised representatives of the people have had to put up with over the years is the oft-repeated suggestion that when Parliament is not sitting we are all sunning ourselves in the south of France. (I have lost count of the number of times, on a sunny summer's evening, even coming down the steps of my office, I have been slapped on the back by a passing constituent remarking, "All right for you with your three months' holidays".)

More serious is the suggestion that we are all somehow pocketing the money we are given to employ staff and run an office. This is an old favourite with our most loathsome tabloids, but lately it has migrated. This, for example, was an ignoramus called Ian Cowie in the Money section of the Telegraph on 4 April: "Now that the average MP claims £135,600 a year for expenses – yes that's right, more than five times national average earnings – this means they avoid paying £54,000 a year tax which HMRC would demand from anyone else lucky enough to receive such payments."

Mr Cowie expounded on this thesis over the best part of two pages and returned to the subject last week. In what other profession would staff salaries, office rent, utility bills, the rent of photocopiers and so on be counted as income? In 22 years, not a penny of that money has ever touched my bank account.

Perhaps the most outrageous recent example of the growing culture of impunity when it comes to discussing alleged corruption by the political classes was the front page of the Daily Mirror on 31 March under a banner headline "THEY ARE ALL AT IT". The story, by one Bob Roberts, began "Greedy MPs pocket an average £144,176 in expenses on top of their bumper salaries, shock figures revealed yesterday..."

Actually, we are not all at it. The only place I have ever worked where they were "all at it" was Mirror Group Newspapers in the 1970s. There, at the end of the first week, my expenses were rejected by the man who was supposed to vouch for their accuracy on the grounds they were so low they would embarrass everyone else in the office.

[Lyrics]

supper danke für alles

[Müzik dinle]

danke schon gute nachricht

[passing drug test]

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