CNBC and Yahoo! Finance announced a deal Wednesday in which the business news cable network will become the top content source for Yahoo's financial news arm.
Conversely, CNBC will be providing a broadcast platform for Yahoo! Finance's original content and contributors, the two companies said in a joint statement. The deal is effective immediately and will allow CNBC content to be integrated into Yahoo! Finance and the Yahoo! Homepage.
The statement said the two companies will maintain editorial control of their respective sites.
In addition, later this year the two companies will team up for co-branded, original videos that will appear on CNBC.com and on Yahoo! Finance. "Yahoo! Finance’s journalists will contribute to CNBC’s Business Day programming and CNBC clips, news and analysis will be prominently integrated into Yahoo! Finance and featured across the Yahoo! network," they said.
"This collaboration is about two leaders in their respective spaces coming together,” said Mark Hoffman, President and CEO of CNBC. “With CNBC taking a central role on the biggest business news site in the world, we now have the ability to provide real-time news, analysis and information to a larger audience and offer unmatched advertising solutions for marketers looking for access across multiple platforms."
"This partnership is a key step forward in Yahoo's strategy to become a premium media network," said Robertson Barrett, vice president of news and finance at Yahoo.
Yahoo Finance is one of the most visited business destinations on the Internet and CNBC is the dominant business news cable channel.
Yahoo is no stranger to striking alliances with media companies and this partnership furthers its ambitions to become one of the top destinations for news and entertainment. For instance, it has a deal with Walt Disney Co's ABC News to use its content and jointly produce journalism projects.
The alliance with CNBC is a way to extend both Yahoo's and CNBC's audiences across the Internet and entice advertisers to pay premium prices. CNBC and Yahoo Finance have a combined unduplicated online audience of more than 40 million people, according to comScore data.
"We have really high quality audiences and we have great content," said Kevin Krim, general manager of CNBC Digital.
Neither Krim nor Barrett would go into the terms of the multi-year deal but they said it included a share in revenue from advertising.
Yahoo and CNBC said they will maintain their relationships with other media companies. Yahoo, for instance, has partnerships with Reuters, The Associated Press and Dow Jones.
Comcast Corp controls CNBC.
(Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft Corp. and NBCUniversal, which is majority-owned by Comcast.)
Reuters contributed to this report.
Money Management: What's a Bank Account For? - Huffington Post
It's traditional for bankers and their customers to think about banking as centered on the bank account. Even policy makers talk about "banking the unbanked" as if opening a bank account immediately changes a person from financially excluded to included. The bank account is the top line indicator examined by the Global Findex, the new survey of financial access by 150,000 adults from over 148 countries. The finding that 43 percent of adults in the developing world have bank accounts has quickly become the reference point for financial inclusion.
For decades, balancing one's checkbook has been the cornerstone of personal finance for conscientious adults in the developed world. When I first opened an account of my own, I received a little checkbook-sized booklet in which to write down every deposit and withdrawal. I learned that keeping track of the bank balance was like the personal hygiene of finance, like brushing your financial teeth.
The implicit message, not just for me, but I think for society at large, was that the bank account was the locus of money management. All one's main financial transactions would pass through the account, and the account would serve as a kind of running financial statement, showing not only income and expenses but also personal solvency. (I'm setting aside for now the very important function of accounts as savings vehicles. That's a story for another day.)
I believe this 1950s image of the bank account is an unacknowledged presence in the minds of bankers and policy makers like the G-20 financial inclusion group when they advocate banking the unbanked. There is an assumption that opening an account equates with using an account to manage personal finances.
But what if the low income people who don't have bank accounts -- and many who do -- don't see things that way?
Consider three observations that suggest that the image of the bank account as the central money management tool is simply not relevant for many low income people:
• The Global Findex shows that many bank accounts in the developing world are relatively inactive. While in high income countries, 72 percent of accounts have more than two withdrawals per month, in low and middle income countries that figure plummets to 16-17 percent. Many people appear to be using their accounts simply as a way to get paid.
• Yet Portfolios of the Poor reveals that low income people have complex financial lives in which they manage many financial arrangements at the same time. Individuals often have multiple, complicated transactions going on at once - cash stashed away somewhere, a loan from a friend, sales on credit, etc.
• In many countries that have introduced them, "no frills" bank accounts designed as starter accounts for the poor have experienced very low usage.
This raises the very important question: for low income people who are "unbanked" where does "money management" reside? And what is money management, anyway?
Money management is an essential component of financial capability. I propose the following definition: money management is the ongoing process of keeping track of one's financial status so that as new financial decisions arise one can make them appropriately and maintain personal solvency. The focus is on maintaining a consolidated view of where one's financial assets and liabilities are at any given time.
If I have a bank account that keeps track of deposits and pay outs, I can consult my bank statement whenever I have to make an important financial decision, and therefore I do not need to keep the money management function in my head. I can outsource a big part of my money management process to the bank account.
But what if I am a first time user of an account? I might prefer to keep track in the way I am used to, which in all likelihood means keeping a running tab in my head. Unless I already keep a written record of my financial transactions (probably rare except for sophisticated microenterprises) it might not occur to me to use an account as a money management tool. Moreover, if most of my transactions remain informal, a bank account would not be a very good representation of my financial life.
The implications of this observation for providers and policy makers are profound. Providers and policy makers should not expect people to shift their locus of money management in a twinkling. It is likely to be a gradual process, involving financial education (how to use an account as a money management tool) and, perhaps even more important, the formalization of transactions so more of them flow through the account.
This observation also shows the fallacy of no frills accounts: perhaps the low demand for the money management support provided by an account shows that many people are satisfied with the money management function that resides between their ears. It also poses a challenge to payments innovations like mobile money or remittances sent through money transfer organizations. If provided outside the context of a bank account, such transactions do not result in consolidation of the money management function, but instead require a person to continue to keep track in the head (or somewhere else).
I am finally left with a question I do not know how to answer, but it is a question that should occupy anyone working on financial inclusion. If we want to assist people in their efforts to be competent money managers, what is the best mix of services? I would welcome your thoughts.
Private equity courts pension funds for M&A finance - Reuters UK
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) - Starved of finance from hard-pressed banks, private equity firms in Europe are sounding out yield-hungry pension funds, insurers and sovereign wealth funds as alternative sources of the finance they need to do deals.
If they are successful, they will open up a funding channel that could prove vital in keeping the private equity sector in business as the European bank sector struggles to escape from the clutches of the euro-zone crisis.
Big investors could be an alternative source of the large amounts of debt with which private equity finances acquisitions, via so-called leveraged buyouts (LBOs), and industry players say talks are already taking place between the two sides.
Institutions have long been backers of private equity funds, often investing equity alongside buyout firms into large deals, but have not in the past ploughed money directly into private equity company debt.
"We've had a number of discussions about the possibility of opening up the institutional market," HgCapital partner Richard Donner told Reuters, while a senior debt adviser to private equity groups said he has had similar experiences.
"My view is that you will see new entrants come into fill the gap, and it is starting to happen," said Paul Scott, CIO and head of sponsor coverage at GE Capital EMEA (GEA.N) - the banking business of General Electric (GE.N), itself trying move into the space left by banks.
Between them, Donner and Scott have had talks with life assurance providers, large U.S. and Canadian pension funds and sovereign wealth funds interested in potentially high-yielding private equity debt to supplement returns from underperforming treasuries and equities.
Private equity dealmaking collapsed in the wake of the financial crisis as bank lending dried up. That severely restricted both the size and volume of leveraged buyouts, as private equity houses put in the equity but need to find a large part of the deal value in the form of debt.
INVESTMENT APPETITE
European leveraged buyout lending dropped from some 140 billion euros in 2007 to just 44.5 bln last year, according to Thomson Reuters LPC data.
A handful of deals, such as the buyout of BSN Medical by EQT this week and the sale of fish-finger maker Iglo Group, just highlight lenders' desire to focus on companies with which they are already familiar, bankers say.
"Banks continue to lend, but seem to have a preference for providing credit to companies they know well. New deals appear more difficult to finance regardless of size," said Florus Plantenga, who leads European private equity coverage at advisory firm Houlihan Lokey.
The issuance of high-yield bonds, which allow institutions to invest in high-coupon private equity debt, has compensated for some of the dearth of leveraged lending by more than tripling to 76 billion euros since 2007.
But that market is volatile, reaches only the largest deals, and overall lending for buyouts is down more than 25 percent.
Low yields from treasuries, volatile performance from equities and no incentive to hold cash, are all prompting large institutions to consider better risk-weighted returns elsewhere.
"A lot of people are looking for yield and 2 to 3 percent from government gilts does not do much for them. Pension funds need to make their 6 to 7 percent a year and they are looking for things that are relatively low risk," said David Currie, chief executive, private equity investments, at Standard Life (SL.L).
Some have made inroads into corporate debt, with Aviva (AV.L) recently lending self-storage group Big Yellow 100 million pounds at an annual interest rate of 4.9 percent.
That appetite for better performance from their investments could take them to private equity-backed buyouts with debt pricing starting at about 5 percentage points above Euribor, some say.
LACK OF LIQUIDITY
Specialist debt investors and managers, such as Haymarket Financial, have sprung up, but some believe there are prospects of investors getting more directly involved.
"What you could easily see is institutions that need yield - life companies and pension funds - coming directly into the private placement market," said Steven Davis, who heads the corporate finance practice for law firm SJ Berwin.
But despite the talk, no deals have yet come to fruition. And challenges remain, not least the lack of liquidity and the absence of widespread credit ratings that institutions need to help inform their investment decisions.
"I have talked directly to one or two of these big U.S. life offices and they are very interested until such time as you tell them it is illiquid and unrated," Donner said.
That could lead some investors and providers of finance to consider pooled debt investment vehicles, that would have echoes of the collateralised loan obligation funds that took so much of the buyout debt underwritten by banks in the boom time of the early to mid 2000s.
The disappearance of new CLOs in the credit crisis went hand in hand with the banks' retreat in Europe, as concerns of widespread defaults led to tumbling prices, and fears over toxic debt tarred many collateralised debt vehicles.
But some large investors could establish their own debt investing arms, bringing the management of debt investing in house, or look to work with a partner who can source debt deals, GE Capital's Scott said.
"From our perspective it would be great for there to be greater depth in the institutional market," said HgCapital's Donner. "If someone could crack it, I'd be delighted."
(Editing by Douwe Miedema and David Holmes)
Hollande's finance minister says €450,000 pay cap 'matter of justice' - The Guardian
France's finance minister has declared a crusade against executive pay at state-controlled companies, describing a wage cap of €450,000 (£365,000) a year for bosses as a matter of "justice and morality".
Pierre Moscovici said the pay squeeze would come into effect over the next two years and deliver on a campaign promise by France's new Socialist president, François Hollande, who sought to tap into widespread public anger over executive salary packages
"Earning €450,000 a year doesn't seem to me a deterrent if we want to have quality men and women at the head of our companies," said Moscovici. He added that the measure was needed to "make state companies more ethical" and respond to "the demands of justice and transparency" at a time of economic crisis.
The government expects to publish a decree on the pay cap next month. Turning the screw on executives, it will then introduce a bill in parliament later in the year to address stock options, so-called "golden parachute" clauses and other components of executive salary packages.
The limit will apply to all companies in which the state holds majority ownership, including the postal service, nuclear power giant Areva, electric utility EDF, railway company SNCF and public transport operator RATP.
Hollande set clear limits on executive pay on the campaign trail, saying no executive at a state company should earn more than 20 times the lowest-paid worker's salary. Fewer than 20 executives currently have salaries over the limit, the finance ministry said.
"I'm convinced the strict salary framework at public companies will inspire the stabilisation of certain practices in the private sector," Moscovici said, promising that all salaries for top executives at state firms would now be made public.
The UMP, the party of former president Nicolas Sarkozy, dismissed the cap as political posturing. "It's a campaign promise. They're pretending to fix our problems by reducing executives' salaries. It falls under the category of 'ostentatious morality'," said UMP leader Jean-François Copé. "They make the French people believe they are fixing the problems with the budget and the economy by reducing the salaries of our country's executives. It's extremely hypocritical. This doesn't fix anything."
Exclusive: Syria prints new money as deficit grows: bankers - Reuters
AMMAN |
AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria has released new cash into circulation to finance its fiscal deficit, flirting with inflation after violence and sanctions wiped out revenues and led to a severe economic contraction, bankers in Damascus say.
Four Damascus-based bankers told Reuters that new banknotes printed in Russia were circulating in trial amounts in the capital and Aleppo, the first such step since a popular revolt against President Bashar al-Assad began in 2011.
The four bankers said the new notes were being used not just to replace worn out currency but to ensure that salaries and other government expenses were paid, a step economists say could increase inflation and worsen the economic crisis.
The United Nations says Assad's forces have killed at least 10,000 people in a crackdown, and the government says more than 2,600 members of its security forces have died.
The four bankers, along with one business leader in touch with officials, said the new money had been printed in Russia, although they were not able to give the name of the firm that printed it. Two of the bankers said they had spoken to officials recently returned from Moscow where the issue was discussed.
"(The Russians) sent sample new banknotes that were approved and the first order has been delivered. I understand some new banknotes have been injected into the market," said one of the bankers. All requested anonymity.
Two other senior bankers in Damascus said they had heard from officials that a first order of an undisclosed amount of new currency had arrived in Syria from Russia, although they were unable to confirm whether it had entered circulation.
Outgoing Finance Minister Mohammad al-Jleilati said last week that Syria had discussed printing banknotes with Russian officials during economic talks at the end of May in Moscow. He said such a deal was "almost done", without going into details.
However, the central bank later denied through state media that any new currency had been circulated.
Goznak, the state firm that operates Russia's mint and has exclusive rights to secure printing technology, regularly prints money for other countries. It declined to comment.
"LAST RESORT"
Russia is one of Syria's major political backers and a close trading and economic partner. There are no sanctions in place that would bar a Russian firm from printing money for Syria.
Syrian money was previously printed in Austria by Oesterreichische Banknoten- und Sicherheitsdruck GmbH, a subsidiary of the Austrian central bank. That order was suspended last year because of European Union sanctions, an Austrian central bank spokesman said.
One of the four bankers described the decision to use newly printed money from Russia to pay the deficit as a "last resort" after several months of consideration.
Syria's deficit has swollen because of declining government revenues and loss of oil exports hit by sanctions. The government is loathe to impose unpopular measures to fight the deficit, like cutting subsidies or raising taxes.
"The deficit is there and it is already increasing and increasing quickly. And to finance it they have decided to print currency," said the senior businessman, who is familiar with the subject and in touch with monetary officials.
Bankers say a priority has been to continue salary payments for over 2 million state employees among a workforce of 4.5 million in a country of more than 21 million people.
"You cannot allow the public sector to collapse," said one of the bankers."
"People are getting their wages and there are no complaints if they are paid at the end of every month. If we reach a stage where they are not paid there will be a crisis."
Syria's $27 billion 2012 budget was the biggest in its history, taking many by surprise. Bankers say the spending surge was motivated by a desire to create more state jobs and maintain subsidies to help ward off wider discontent.
The private sector has suffered large scale layoffs, but workers in the public sector have kept their jobs and had steady wages despite a salary freeze.
Financing the spending has proven difficult. The central bank has exceeded borrowing limits from public banks, and private banks are reluctant to buy government bonds, one of the bankers said.
Inflation is already running at 30 percent, although the central bank considers it manageable.
Authorities have spent state funds on subsidies to keep the prices for household utilities and petrol unchanged, and have announced planned price controls on basic commodities. However, electricity prices for big industries have risen by 60 percent and the price of subsidised diesel fuel has also risen.
The authorities plan to inject only a small amount of new currency to prevent runaway inflation, said one of the bankers.
"But there is a limit to how much fresh money could be injected into the economy in such highly uncertain times. Reckless printing of money as a way of buying short term reprieve could be economic suicide," the banker added.
(Additional reporting by Fredrik Dahl in Vienna; Editing by Oliver Holmes and Peter Graff)
Free money fattens the Swiss bankroll - Sydney Morning Herald
Who said there was no such thing as free money?
The flight of capital in global markets has become so extreme that you actually have to pay to park your money in Switzerland, in Swiss sovereign bonds that is.
While bonds around the world offer a yield, a return on investment, the picturesque tax haven in the middle of Europe now boasts a ''negative yield'' on its sovereign debt.
Putting this in perspective, the yield on a Greek bond is 30 per cent - compared with below zero. And it still looks pricey.
The countdown is on for the Greek elections this Sunday. And as the world contemplates a possible Hellenic exit from the eurozone, or a ''Grexit'', as market parlance would have it, the region's bond markets have hit their tipping point once again.
Sharemarkets, having briefly and perversely rallied on news of the €100 billion ($125.6 billion) bailout of Spain's banks early this week - something that should have been bad news as Spain had been consistently denying its banks needed help - fell on Tuesday but recovered last night.
When the sharemarket and the bond market start telling you different things, though, it is usually the bond market which has it right. Equities are plodding along yet bonds are warning of danger ahead.
It may be that the strength in equities is precisely due to the fact that bond yields in what are deemed the safer countries are so low (about 1.65 per cent in both the US and Britain and 1.2 per cent in Germany).
And it may also be that investors are simply fed up with super-low yields. At least quality industrial shares carry a decent dividend yield, albeit with less security and greater exposure to economic downturns than bonds.
The third point in favour of shares is, as many see it, the inevitability of further radical central bank stimulus: money printing, QE3, LTRO, assorted programs to appease equity markets and ''kick the can down the road''.
This latest pricing in credit markets indicates a law of diminishing returns, though, when it comes to stimulus, and kicking that old can down that old road.
Switzerland, which has retained its currency though the 20-year euro experiment, this week for the first time ever, boasts a negative yield curve on its six-month to five-year paper.
No yield at all in other words - just the ''sleep at night'' factor; that if things turned really pear shaped in the impending contagion from a Greek exit and further wobbles in Spain, your money could be parked in Swiss francs until it was safe to bring it out.
However, the amusing paradox is that the Swiss franc protects an investor against a fall in the euro, or a default in a southern European bond, but it also allows the Swiss to pay their own sovereign debt by … you guessed it … issuing more sovereign debt.
There is a catch. Last September, as Europeans were fleeing the euro in the last holus-bolus flight to safety, the Swiss National Bank was forced to peg its currency.
The franc was running so hot that it was threatening to demolish the country's high-quality export sector and its tourism. After all, why go skiing in Switzerland when to do so next door in Italy, Austria and France was half the price?
The currency fix didn't entirely quell the tide of capital, though. Hence the negative yield. This week, two-year rates are costing investors 36 basis points.
Meanwhile, below the Pyrenees, Spain's 10-year debt sank to its lowest price, which means its highest yield, in 15 years at 6.83 per cent.
At that rate, it is too expensive for the embattled government in Madrid to issue bonds and refinance. The cost of Italy's debt, likewise, became prohibitive, hitting six-month highs above 6 per cent.
The spectre of contagion once again haunts Europe and there is still another $1 trillion to borrow and refinance this year. Italy, the second-largest debtor in the eurozone, has more than €9 billion to raise in the next couple of days.
And as the calls go out from banks and markets for QE3, for another round of free money to prop up stockmarkets, it is ever apparent the benign effects of central bank stimulus diminishes with each program.
More and more people are questioning the Keynesian logic of splashing the cash around. The more compelling logic would be that splashing the cash about has failed. The result has been to pile debt upon debt.
Perhaps when they let Greece go - and it might take Spain and the rest of the periphery to be cleaned out, too - nature and markets can take their course.
In the meantime, if there is another enormous stimulus, it will provide at least short-term relief for the sharemarkets. And for Australia it might turn out to be fleetingly positive, putting a floor under commodity prices as markets opt, however briefly, to park their money in hard assets.
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Homeless man's wash in city river changes his life after he finds haul of money worth $77,000 - Daily Mail
By Anthony Bond
|
Lucky break: Timothy Yost has been told he can keep the $70,000 he found
When people are homeless, they are lucky if a passer-by throws them a bit of spare change in the street.
But when one homeless man in the U.S. decided to visit a Texas park, he could not have expected how lucky he would be.
Timothy Yost found a bag full of money, but it was confiscated off him and a police investigation started into its origins.
But following a vote at Bastrop city council last night, the 46-year-old was told he could have the stash - worth an astonishing $77,000 - back.
According to the American-Statesman, Mr Yost's attorney Aleta Peacock said: 'It is a great day for Bastrop; it is a great day for Mr. Yost.'
The homeless man went to wash his feet in the Colorado River in January when he came across the bag.
He decided to investigate further and kicked the bag, upon which it jingled.
Inside, the homeless man found a mound of South African coins and wet cash.
Mr Yost then took the bag of money to a bank, where he tried to swap the damp bills for fresh money.
However, the bank clerk became suspicious and called the police.
X marks the spot: Bastrop Fisherman's Park, where Mr Yost made his find
Krugerands: One of the South African gold coins Mr Yost discovered
The city of Bastrop then kept hold of the money while detectives tried to find the owner of the haul and see if a crime had occurred.
Speaking to Your News Now, Bastrop Police Chief Michael Blake said: 'Under common law in Texas, typically if it is buried and we are not able to find the rightful owner for the funds within the prescribed time period, then the finder of the funds can petition to be awarded those funds.'
However, Mr Yost was left having to celebrate his new found wealth in prison.
He has since been jailed for public intoxication and criminal trespass.
Moody's: Spain's credit rating could be cut to junk within three months - Daily Telegraph
Mr Rajoy also published a letter to EU leaders calling for action from the ECB, which is forbidden by treaty to take instructions from politicians.
“Businesses and households need access to liquidity. That is impossible if doubts persist over the sustainability of the debt of sovereign states,” he wrote to Herman van Rompuy, the EU president, and José Manuel Barroso, chief of the European Commission. Mr Rajoy said: “Today, the only institution we have with the capacity to assure the required conditions of stability and liquidity is the European Central Bank.”
Spanish yields, or implied interest rates, on its bonds this week reached euro-era highs, as investors shunned the debt after the weekend announcement that the country had asked for a €100bn (£80bn) bail-out to rescue its banks.
Intended to shore up confidence in Spain, the move has stoked worries about the government’s ability to finance itself, since it required outside help.
Spain will soon follow Portugal, Ireland and Greece in seeking a sovereign bail-out, according to a majority of economists polled by Reuters. Of the 59 analysts canvassed, 35 said it was likely or very likely Spain will do so in the next 12 months.
Yields on Spanish 10-year debt were on Wednesday trading over 6.7pc, close to Tuesday’s record highs. Anything past 6pc is seen as unsustainable.
Italian borrowing costs have also risen as investors lose faith in its position, with yields on its 10-year debt trading over 6.2pc.
Rome had to pay interest rates of almost 4pc - up from 2.3pc in a similar auction last month - to borrow €6.5bn for a year from the debt markets.
German finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Italy was safe it it sticks to its path of austerity and reforms. But Mario Monti, Italy’s technocrat leader, warned Europe is at a “crucial” moment.
German finance minister says Greeks cannot be 'spared' - BBC News
The German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble, has said that ordinary Greeks cannot escape painful cuts and must accept them, however they vote.
He told Stern magazine that while he had "really huge sympathy for the man on the street in Greece", he could "not spare him" a cut to the minimum wage.
Germany, the richest eurozone state, strongly opposes relaxing conditions for the bailouts given to Greece.
Mr Schaeuble said Sunday's election in Greece would not change the situation.
Antonis Samaras, head of Greece's main conservative party New Democracy, has again urged voters to reject anti-bailout campaigners.
The country is holding a repeat general election on Sunday after parties failed to agree on a new government following the original ballot on 6 May.
By law, no opinion polls may be conducted in the final two weeks before the election. The last available surveys suggested New Democracy were neck and neck with the far-left anti-bailout bloc Syriza.
'Not easy'Rigid austerity measures were attached to the two international bailouts awarded Greece, an initial package worth 110bn euros (£89bn; $138bn) in 2010, then a follow-up last year worth 130bn euros.
"In a crisis... the little man suffers and the rich feather their own nests," Mr Schaeuble said.
"It is not easy to cut the minimum wage in Greece, when you think of the many people who own a yacht."
But, he stressed, if Greece wanted to regain competitiveness, the minimum wage "must fall".
"An election result will not change anything about the real situation of the country, which is in a painful crisis due to decades of economic mismanagement," the minister added.
On Tuesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said countries such as Greece that had received bailouts could not expect the conditions attached to be relaxed.
Immigration pledgeSpeaking to reporters on Wednesday, Antonis Samaras said his party would do "everything for there to be a government" after 17 June.
His two conditions, he said, were amending the last bailout in order to create jobs and staying in the eurozone.
"We have to change this programme in order to stimulate job growth... while at the same time we must try to remain with the Eurozone," he said.
The conservative leader also vowed to "take back" Greek cities from illegal immigrants if his party won on Sunday.
"We have to take back our cities from those who have flowed in without any permission whatsoever," the Greek party leader said.
Illegal immigration is a sensitive issue in Greece, where a far-right party, Golden Dawn, won seats in the May election on an anti-immigration platform.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee meets insurers as losses mount - Economic Times
Mukherjee made this observations after meeting with the head of state-run insurance firms. He said that the overall profitability is clearly driven by the investment income, with continued deterioration in the core business of premium underwriting.
"The ministry has suggested certain welcome steps to curb the unhealthy competition in underwriting premiums and it will help restore the sustained business growth," he said.
The finance minister cautioned that India is the only country in Asia with a combined ratio of 105 and above consistently during the last five years and all the four PSU general insurers have been largely responsible for such a trend.
"It is well understood that growth in top line cannot be at the cost of bottom line," he said.
Mukherjee also said that state-run insurers shall necessarily have a presence in all the towns up to tier IV classification as per census.
"Such an early foothold will be advantageous in business sense," he said, adding that the ministry has already asked insurers to reorganise the existing loss making branches.
Financial services secretary DK Mittal said that insurers have been given the deadline of June 30 to expand their reach in tier IV cities. Mukherjee also appraised the insurers that the government is working with the insurance sector regulator on a number of regulatory issues.
The minister said India will be the fastest growing general insurance market during this period with an average growth of 15% and insurers should expand their reach through all mechanism available.
"Out of the available 80,000 bank branches, less than 7000 are being used by PSU insurers and we need to scale up bancassurance immediately," he said.
He also stressed that insurers should strengthen coverage of agriculture insurance. Mukherjee said that in order to tap the growing segment of insurable population that is IT savvy, insurers must immediately take to the e-governance route.
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