Greek MPs agree to cut 15,000 more jobs; Gold rally may lose steam; Millions desert Facebook; India tech freshers' pay in time warp

1 Greek MPs agree to cut 15,000 more jobs (BBC) The Greek parliament has passed a bill which will see 15,000 state employees lose their jobs by the end of next year. It is part of continuing moves by the centre-right government to cut costs and ensure more bailout money from international creditors. But it was vociferously opposed by protesters outside parliament.

The new law will overturn what had been a constitutional guarantee for civil servants of a job for life, says the BBC's Mark Lowen in Athens. The sector has been seen as notoriously bloated since it expanded in the 1970s and 1980s as successive administrations employed their own people, our correspondent adds.

State workers who have broken rules will be targeted for dismissal, but many are expected to be replaced by younger employees in key sectors such as health. So the law will not slim down the public sector, our correspondent says. That would be achieved by a parallel plan that would see 150,000 state jobs go by the end of 2015, by replacing only some of those who retire. The law is a condition for Greece to receive its next tranche of loans worth 8.8bn euros ($11.4bn). 

2 Gold rally may lose steam (Tatyana Shumsky in The Wall Street Journal) Gold prices are up 6.8% from recent 26-month lows, but there is evidence that these gains are temporary, traders and analysts say. A rush to buy physical gold and jewelry in India and China helped prices bounce higher last week. But at the same time, financial investors were leaving the market.

Gold held at exchange-traded funds, which trade and store the metal on the investors' behalf, continued to decline as investors sold their shares. In addition, Comex open interest, the number of futures contracts left open overnight without offsetting transactions, were dropping, a sign investors are moving to the sidelines.

"If the US is gently recovering, equities are performing better and there's no inflation pressure, why buy gold?" said David Wilson, director of metals research and strategy at Citigroup. Over the next 12 months, he expects gold prices to fall. Still, some investors say neither gold's downdraft nor its subsequent recovery have changed their reasons for owning precious metals.

Jeffrey Sherman, portfolio manager for commodities at investment firm DoubleLine, said his fund continues to hold precious metals as a hedge against the currency-eroding power of loose monetary policies. "We're printing more money than ever in the US," Mr. Sherman said, so he considers gold "an insurance policy" against a decline in the value of the dollar.

3 Millions desert Facebook (Juliette Garside in The Guardian) Facebook has lost millions of users per month in its biggest markets, independent data suggests, as alternative social networks attract the attention of those looking for fresh online playgrounds. As Facebook prepares to update investors on its performance in the first three months of the year, with analysts forecasting revenues up 36% on last year, studies suggest that its expansion in the US, UK and other major European countries has peaked.

In the last month, the world's largest social network has lost 6m US visitors, a 4% fall, according to analysis firm SocialBakers. In the UK, 1.4m fewer users checked in last month, a fall of 4.5%. The declines are sustained. In the last six months, Facebook has lost nearly 9m monthly visitors in the US and 2m in the UK. Users are also switching off in Canada, Spain, France, Germany and Japan, where Facebook has some of its biggest followings. A spokeswoman for Facebook declined to comment.

"The problem is that, in the US and UK, most people who want to sign up for Facebook have already done it," said new media specialist Ian Maude at Enders Analysis. "There is a boredom factor where people like to try something new. Is Facebook going to go the way of Myspace? The risk is relatively small, but that is not to say it isn't there." Alternative social networks such as Instagram, the photo sharing site that won 30m users in 18 months before Facebook acquired the business a year ago, have seen surges in popularity with younger age groups.

4 India tech freshers’ pay in time warp (Debjyoti Ghosh & PP Thimmaya in The Indian Express) India's $108-billion IT industry is among the country's largest organised private sector employers, but the bottom of the sector's pyramid appears to have little to cheer about. While the overall wage hike in the IT sector has dropped to single digits of late, the salaries of freshers have remained stagnant in the past three to four years. Experts say this trend is likely to prolong as firms navigate a difficult business environment.

Staffing companies point out that in the current market, on average, a fresher in the software services industry draws a salary in the range of Rs 2.75-3.5 lakh per annum when compared to Rs 2.75-3.3 lakh offered during 2008-09. Thanks to increasing margin pressure, demand-supply imbalance, declining business volumes and rising training costs, pay packages at the entry level have not seen an upward swing in the recent past. This is at a time when prices in the country have grown by more than 8% in each of these years.

TV Mohandas Pai, chairman, Manipal Global Education and former director at Infosys, opined that the freshers' salary is likely to remain at the same level for some more years due to the demand-supply mismatch. The IT industry absorbs around 250,000 engineering graduates every year but the annual output is around 600,000 students, giving them lesser bargaining power in a market-driven economy. The sector employs around three million people with close to 60% in the fresher category or well below two years of experience.