International Headlines and Stories

The boom in fuel prices had widened the trade deficit in French in 2008. In 2009, the fall in oil prices has allowed France to limit the damage. The French trade deficit, is to tell the difference between exports and imports stood at 43 billion euros in 2009 against 55.4 billion in 2008, according to official figures published this friday.

The year 2009 was marked by a sharp fall in world trade has declined by 13% by volume. In this context, French exports fell by 17% and imports by 18% in value, is the Secretary of State for Foreign Trade. "However, from the second quarter, with the gradual recovery of international trade, the French foreign trade contributed positively to the French growth, it is said in the statement creditreport .

For CGT Peugeot Sochaux (Doubs), the recall of vehicles demonstrates "the limits of the Toyota, denouncing a kind of production with" the minimum time to study and design of facilities, personnel and wages " and "no talk of outsourcing to the death."

The crisis facing Toyota is the task of oil and other manufacturers. Before PSA, the U.S. Ford has suspended production as a precaution for some commercial vehicles in China using the same faulty accelerator pedal as Toyota. This measure concerns, however, less than 2,000 vehicles. Besides the joint venture with PSA, Toyota owns with another Japanese, Subaru.Their factory is located in Indiana, the United States.

Toyota is forced to recall millions of cars around the world for lack of accelerator pedal detected in the United States, Canada, China and Europe. Nothing the United States, 2.3 million vehicles have been recalled over 270,000 points of Canada and 75,000 in China.

In Europe, the number of affected vehicles could reach 1.8 million. Eight models are concerned: AYGO, iQ, Yaris, Auris, Corolla Verso, Avensis and RAV4. The number of cars each country concerned should be seen "running next week," said the spokesman for Toyota.

The Japanese giant's chairman, Akio Toyoda, apologized Saturday for this one problem.World leading manufacturer since 2008, Toyota had already experienced a technical problem that forced him to recall cars in the United States due to a defect in the carpet can also block the accelerator

"The Awards of the Asia-Pacific mixed

"Wall Street falls into the red

After closure of Wall Street without trend Monday, European stock markets are heading into the red Tuesday. In Paris the CAC 40 yielded 1.06% at 4000.05 points, in London, the FTSE-100 lost 0.71% to 5498.71 points and in Frankfurt the Dax concedes 1.61% to 5943 points.

The Central Bank of China has announced two measures to try to curb the overheating of the economy: raising the reserve requirement ratio for banks and rising interest rates on treasury bills to one year.

On Tuesday, the Bank of France issued at 8:30 its monthly business survey for the month of December: the gross domestic product (GDP) of France is expected to grow 0.5% in the fourth quarter of 2009.For the full year 2009, the government expects a drop in GDP of 2.25%.

Fifteen minutes later, the Budget Ministry said the budget deficit of the French state has widened to a record 143.3 billion euros on 30 November, against 66.6 billion a year earlier, and is expected throughout 2009 slightly below 140 billion.

Yesterday after the close of U.S. markets, the g aught aluminum Alcoa has announced a return to the red in the fourth quarter with a net loss of $ 277 million, widening its losses to $ 1.151 billion in 2009.In the series of American publications yesterday, Electronic Arts announced that it raised its forecast for losses in 2009-2010.

In an interview with Le Figaro, Christine Lagarde, economy minister, justified the measure "exceptional" tax on the bonus, resulting in a bill for the banks of around 360 million euros.

Across the Atlantic trade for November will be highlighted at 14h30.

As for currencies, the euro begun to rise again against the dollar Tuesday after the rebound of the single European currency yesterday. The euro gained 0.09% to 1.4526 dollar. The oil in turn is sharply down. The barrel of Brent North Sea crude for February delivery lost 1.70% to 70.67 dollars per barrel "Texas Light Crude (WTI) traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange for the same maturity, nibbles 1 53% at 81.61 dollars.

The detailed values to follow.

The number of new listings weekly unemployment has never been this low since mid-2008 the United States. During the week ended December 26, 432,000 cases were filed, against 452,000 the previous week, according to figures released Thursday in Washington.

This new statistic goes against the expectations of analysts. The consensus of economists polled by Reuters had expected an upward effect on new registrations to 460,000.

The downward trend observed since the spring is thus confirmed, after two weeks of increases observed in early December.

He had said in November he confirmed Monday. The British confectioner Cadbury rejects bid officially launched by the giant U.S. Food Kraft Foods. In a paper stock, the confectioner highlights the objectives of long-term growth above expectations to show the low supply of Kraft.

Cadbury expects organic growth of 5 to 7% per year instead of 4 to 6%. The profit margin would rise between 16 and 18% by 2013 instead of a margin of about 15% in 2011. He waits finally growth of dividend per share "double digit" from 2010. All of which explains why Cadbury's assets are worth more than 10 billion pounds (about 11 billion euros) proposed by Kraft Foods.

"Kraft Cadbury tries to buy at a discount, to provide some growth in its business model attractive to non-conglomerate low growth, irritated Roger Carr, the chairman of candy in the document.

Hershey, Nestle and Ferrero instantly

The rejection of the offer Kfrat opens an avenue to other agri-food specialists. According to CEO Todd Stitzer British group, "third parties" have actually indicated their interest but he refuses to name them yet.

The U.S. chocolate maker Hershey is in a strong position. Last month, Todd Stitzer had clearly said he would prefer a merger with the latter rather than Kraft because Hershey is already a partner of Cadbury in the United States. The Italian group Ferrero and Swiss giant Nestle are also in the race.

Nothing very serious, but a real nervousness gripped the market on weekends. French values are clearly divided down for the fourth straight session and Wall Street began a real consolidation.

The publication of poor results by the computer manufacturer Dell, whose profits have halved in a year, has certainly cast a pall. Therefore, the decline was widespread in technology stocks in the whole document: Among the largest declines over the weekend, tech stocks, but also banks, real estate and many cyclical industries.

In fact, beyond these poor results, the market consolidates because investors are worried about the strength of the recovery, the deteriorating public finances and relapse indicators on housing states USA.Therefore, in the absence of fresh news can revive the dynamic market, investors have preferred to take profits. To top it off, President Obama held a relapse of the activity was not excluded if the recovery efforts were abandoned and the Japanese authorities have recognized that the country has fallen into recession, with falling prices for the seventh consecutive month.

After two years of crisis that we have known, investors have seen others, but should not the signs of depression are increasing, with an avalanche of bad economic data and disappointing results.The virtuous circle that has established a stock exchange, with expectations of gradual recovery in activity and improvement in profits needs to be supported, if the correction could increase.

For now, the indexes are still near the highest: more than 10,000 points for the Dow Jones, over 3,700 for the CAC 40. We must beware of making catastrophism, the scenario out of recession is good for equities, the key is to remember that the current consolidation is beneficial because it restores margin for operations to start rising.

While waiting to see clearer, gold opportunity to play its full role investment haven to more than $ 1,100 an ounce in London.

"BLOG – Learn to handle hedges

The GDF Suez group presented on Thursday its quarterly financial results. In the first nine months of the year, operating income (EBITDA) is logged down by 2.7% to 10.1 billion euros. The group confirmed in a statement likely to increase positive one throughout the year 2009.

Always on the period from January to September, sales reached 57.9 billion euros, down moderately from 1.2% (-2.8% change in organic).

Net debt amounted to 27.8 billion euros at end September 2009, unchanged compared to end June 2009 and down 1.1 billion euros compared to late 2008.

"Group activity in the first nine months of the year confirms the strength of our business model. Despite the downturn that we announced in the third quarter, we confirm our annual targets.In a difficult economic environment, GDF SUEZ continues its industrial development while reducing its debt levels, allowing the group to prompt the return of growth in its major markets, "said Gérard Mestrallet, CEO of GDF Suez in connection with the publication of its results.