1 UK youth fight
for economic survival (Laurie Penny in The Guardian) Some
months ago prime minister David Cameron spoke contemptuously of people moving
from college or university straight on to the welfare rolls. It’s beyond
hypocrisy that those in power still treat this as a lifestyle choice for the
feckless rather than a cruel necessity brought about by the spending choices of
the prime minister and his pals. Plans to remove social benefit for rent from
the under-25s are due to be quietly shelved this week. They are being shelved
because they are financially unworkable and not because they are unjust;
something that was obvious from the start.
Debt,
student loans and housing insecurity. Never knowing when or if you’ll ever have
a roof over your head, or enough money at the end of a precarious working week
to buy decent food. That’s the reality of life for millions of people in
Britain today, sapping our energy and sucking away our youth, and it’s
fortunate for all of us that some are still finding the strength to organise.
Rent
is at the centre of it all. Rent and the impossibility of paying it. Rents in
some places in London have risen 20% in the last year, while wages for
under-30s have fallen by between six and 10% in real terms over the last
decade. In major cities, many of those who haven’t been forced out by soaring
prices are living two or three to a room or attempting to camp in empty
buildings — of which there are thousands in London, since speculation has
continued unabated in the recession.
At
least 75,000 young people in the UK are going to be homeless this Christmas —
and those numbers have soared, according to housing charities. It’s going to be
a cold, hard, angry winter.
2 Citigroup to
shed 11,000 jobs (San Francisco Chronicle) Citigroup
said it will cut 11,000 jobs, a bold early move by new CEO Michael Corbat. The
cuts amount to about 4% of Citi's workforce. The bulk of them, about 6,200
jobs, will come from Citi's consumer banking unit, which handles everyday
functions like branches and checking accounts.
Citi said that it will sell or scale back consumer
operations in Pakistan, Paraguay, Romania, Turkey and Uruguay and focus on 150
cities around the world "that have the highest growth potential in
consumer banking." About 1,900 job cuts will come from the
institutional clients group, which includes the investment bank. The company
will also cut jobs in technology and operations by using more automation and
moving jobs to "lower-cost locations."
Investors
appeared to like the move. They sent Citi stock up $2.17, or 6.3%, to close at
$36.46 Wednesday. Job cuts are a familiar template in a banking industry
still under the long shadow of the 2008 financial crisis. Banks are
searching for ways to make money as new regulations crimp some of their former
revenue streams, like trading for their own profit or marketing credit cards to
college students. Customers
are still nervous about borrowing money in an uncertain economy. And they are
still filing lawsuits over industry practices like risky mortgage lending that
helped cause the crisis.
Citi
fared worse than others. It nearly collapsed, had to take two taxpayer-funded
bailout loans, and became the poster child for banks that had grown too big
and disorderly. After a long stretch of empire-building, it has been
shrinking for the past several years, shedding units and trying to find a
business model that's more streamlined and efficient. While the job cuts
are among the first major moves by Corbat, they are in line with Vikram Pandit's
blueprint. Citi's roster of 262,000 employees is down from 276,000 at this time
in 2009.
3 Arab spring and
a new crop of entrepreneurs (Abdul Basit in Khaleej Times) The Arab Spring has opened a new world
with endless possibilities for young entrepreneurs of the region, according to
former deputy prime minister of Malaysia Tun Musa Hitam. “The younger demographic, especially, has the potential
to bear great influence on the future of the world economy and can be harnessed
through increased understanding of these opportunities which will boost
investor confidence and resources they put into tapping this market,” Musa said.
The truth is that business doesn’t and shouldn’t
recognise borders, ideologies, race or religion, he said, adding: “It’s all
about the opportunities.” Commenting on the challanges for the promotion of
Islamic finance, he said: “The word ‘Islamic’ should not inspire fear but be a
by-word for opportunity. By communicating the positive benefits of Islamic
finance for both the Muslim and non-Muslim communities, we have no doubt that
its prevalence will grow and that it will become an appealing alternative
across more markets.” It is estimated that Muslims have spent $2.1 trillion on
the halal economy, $500-600 billion on food and halal related products.
4 Business
without bribery possible in India (Biman Mukherji in The Wall Street Journal) Fewer Indian companies than multinationals believe it is
possible to do business in India without bribery and corruption, according to
global consultancy KPMG’s latest “India Fraud Survey.” The survey, which
canvassed 293 senior company officials in India, found that 56% of respondents
from multinational companies said business could be done without resorting to
payoffs, compared with 44% from Indian companies.
The report found that 71% of those surveyed said fraud is
an inevitable cost of doing business in India. Of the respondents, 55% said
that they had experienced fraud in the last two years. “This is dangerous as it
could lead to organizations having a tolerant approach towards fraud and
subsequently not investing enough in the appropriate fraud risk management and
controls,” the survey said.
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