Reuters
August 16, 2006 TOKYO - Dell Inc.'s recall of 4.1 million notebook computer batteries could cost Sony Corp. anywhere from 10 billion yen to 50 billion yen ($85-$430 million), hurting the Japanese electronics maker's short-term earnings and its brand image, analysts said.
"As the batteries were made by Sony, the possible impact of the news on Sony's earnings is a concern," said Eiichi Katayama, an analyst at Nomura Securities Co. Ltd. "Until management discloses details of the cause, the risk of a larger impact remains." |
By Timothy Gardner
Reuters Tue Aug 15, 2006 NEW YORK - Seven northeastern U.S. states said on Tuesday they had agreed on a model rule that would create the country's first market for heat-trapping carbon dioxide by curbing emissions at power plants.
The agreement, called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, is relatively weak compared to the European Trading Scheme, the emissions trading program set up by the European Union to meet its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. But one expert said it was a landmark agreement that may help force the federal government to take action on reducing greenhouse gases. |
Reuters
Tue Aug 15, 2006 NEW YORK - Billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an ex-smoker, on Tuesday announced plans to donate $125 million to help the world stop smoking.
Bloomberg -- ranked by Forbes magazine as the 40th richest American with an estimated wealth of more than $5 billion -- banned smoking in New York bars and restaurants in 2003 and now wants to take his anti-smoking campaign worldwide. "Tobacco is the world's leading killer," Bloomberg, first elected mayor in 2001, said in a statement. "Smoking doesn't just hurt smokers, it also harms and can kill people around them." The personal donation aims to make the world tobacco-free by improving programs that help smokers stop and preventing children from starting, Bloomberg said. The key partners will be existing organizations, but they are still being finalized. Bloomberg, 64, who said he quit smoking almost 30 years ago, said he undertook his personal crusade against the habit because he could not stand to see people dying when he knew they could be saved from early death if they stopped smoking. |
AFP
Tue Aug 15, 2006 ATHENS - Officials from the United Nations, European Union and a maritime organization are set to meet in Greece Thursday to map out a strategy for containing a massive Mediterranean oil spill caused by the conflict in Lebanon.
Nearly 15,000 tons of leaked oil from the Jiyyeh electric plant, bombed by Israel last month, has polluted some 140 kilometers (87 miles) of the Lebanese coast and spread north into Syrian waters, according to the United Nations Environment Programme. If all the oil from the damaged facility, 30 miles south of Beruit, were to seep into the sea, officials said, the environmental fallout could rival the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill that devastated Alaska's Prince William Sound. |
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER
AP Economics Writer Tue Aug 15, 2006 WASHINGTON - The slowdown in the once-sizzling housing market is spreading, with 28 states and the District of Columbia reporting spring sales declines, led by big drops in former boom areas of Arizona, Florida and California.
Nationally, sales were down 7 percent in the April-June quarter this year compared with the same period in 2005, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday in its latest state-by-state look at housing conditions around the country. The Realtors survey showed that the biggest declines occurred in states that had been enjoying red-hot sales during the five-year housing boom. |
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