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Gold and its miners’ stocks are rocketing higher as speculators and investors alike return to this left-for-dead sector.  This sudden deluge of capital inflows has crowned gold stocks the best-performing sector of this young new year by far, shocking traders.  And this stunning reversal of fortunes in both the metal and the companies producing it is only starting, so it’s exceedingly important to understand what’s going on. […]

Citing a desire to gain a foothold in the growing market for the Internet of Things, the leadership of Mozilla said it is ceasing development efforts on its Firefox smartphone operating system. Mozilla is ending development on Firefox OS for smartphones after version 2.6 is released in May. The development team that had been working on the OS will now work on initiatives related to connected devices […]

Markets are currently in a well-oiled “death spiral,” according to Citigroup Inc. analysts led by Jonathan Stubbs. “It appears that four inter-linked phenomena are driving a negative feedback loop in the global economy and across financial markets,” the analysts write, citing the resilient U.S. dollar, lower commodities prices, weaker trade and capital flows, and declining emerging market growth. “It seems reasonable to assume that another year of extreme moves in […]

LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network and most of us have an account. Let’s face it, no one actually reads 95% of the stuff that appears on the feed but there is so much of sharing done that LinkedIn is slowly inching closer and closer to the top of the list of largest content aggregators. There are 3 main types of users of the platform and […]

UAE.  The start of 2016 signalled another loss of growth momentum at UAE non-oil private sector firms, with business conditions improving at the weakest rate since March 2012. Underpinning the slowdown was a relatively subdued rise in new work, which was linked in turn to a near-stagnation in new export business. Growth rates for output and employment also eased, though stocks of pre-production items increased more quickly. […]

On the seventh floor of a Doha tower block, in a room filled with display cases containing old coins, clocks and Koranic manuscripts, 82-year-old Hussain Alfardan sits fingering a pearl necklace he says is worth $2 million. “These pearls are yakka, the highest grade of natural pearl – each piece is rare. Today the pearl is the number one stone in the world. The most expensive stone, […]

Video Bashar al-Jaafari, the Syrian government’s chief negotiator, blamed the opposition for the postponement of the talks, calling them a failure. By NICK CUMMING-BRUCE and SOMINI SENGUPTA February 3, 2016 GENEVA — The United Nations on Wednesday temporarily suspended the fledgling talks aimed at ending the war in Syria and called on the countries fueling the conflict to do more to yield results, as Syrian government forces sharply escalated an offensive […]

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An Apple logo hangs above the entrance to the Apple store on 5th Avenue in the Manhattan borough of New York City, July 21, 2015. Reuters/Mike Segar NEW YORK Apple Inc (AAPL.O) must pay VirnetX Holding Corp (VHC.A) more than $625 million for using the patent licensing company’s Internet security technology without permission in its FaceTime and iMessage features, a federal jury in Texas said on Wednesday. […]

A GoPro Hero 3+ camera is seen at the Nasdaq Market Site before before GoPro Inc’s IPO in New York City, June 26, 2014. Reuters/Mike Segar GoPro Inc (GPRO.O) forecast current-quarter revenue well below analysts’ estimates on weak demand for its wearable cameras and the company named Brian McGee as its new chief financial officer. GoPro said McGee, who joined the company from Qualcomm Inc (QCOM.O) in […]

|By Arabian Post Staff|Bank Sarasin-Alpen (ME) Limited, the former Middle East affiliate of co-defendant Swiss Private Bank J. Safra Sarasin, has failed to deposit $35 million in damages by the deadline of February 1, 2016 as per the order of the DIFC Court, the aggrieved party announced. The case relates to one of the biggest financial mis-selling cases in the GCC region. The defendant bank apparently failed […]

|By Matein Khalid| “One country, two systems”. This was the historic formula under which Margaret Thatcher agreed to hand over the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong to the People’s Republic of China, then ruled by Paramount Leader Deng Xiao Ping. The Hong Kong dollar’s spike to 7.81, on the high end of its 7.75 – 7.85 band, demonstrates the sheer scale of the speculative attack against […]

Oil bulls distressed that last week’s rally fizzled can find some comfort in forecasts for a bigger and longer rebound by the end of the year. Analysts are projecting prices will climb more than $15 by the end of 2016. New York crude will reach $46 a barrel during the fourth quarter, while Brent in London will trade at $48 in the same period, the median of […]

Reuters/ DEBORAH M. TODD AND ANYA GEORGE THARAKAN/Alphabet Inc easily beat Wall Street’s quarterly profit forecasts on Monday, helped by strong mobile advertising sales, sending the shares of Google’s parent higher in after-hours trading to surpass Apple Inc as the most valuable U.S. company. For the first time, the company disclosed the profitability of Google’s search engine and its other online services, and how much it is […]

MODI SARKAR PICKS NAMES TO TRUMP RIVALS

 

By Arun Srivastava

 

The politics of vengeance has been the key factor in the Modi government denying the smart cities to the eastern Indian states. Except Bhubaneswar, Odisha’s capital, no city from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand or Bengal has made it to the smart list. Last year, when the names of the cities for including in the list of the smart cities were being finalized Bihar government was given the impression that at least three of its cities – Bhagalpur, Biharsharif and Muzaffarpur – are among the 97 shortlisted and would be upgraded. But none made it to the first list of 20 released by the Union minister Venkaiah Naidu.

 

Reacting to it Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar compared the Centre to the fabled “andher nagri (City of lawlessness)” for ignoring Bihar while picking the first list of 20 smart

ALL EYES ON BHUBANESWAR OF FUTURE

 

By Ashok B Sharma

 

The mantra of maintaining equidistance from the Congress and the BJP has played well for the Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. He gets a certification of appreciation from the NDA government at the Centre for urban development. Another feather is on his cap as Bhubaneswar becomes the number one choice for development of Smart City under an ambitious flagship programme mooted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014.

 

The central government is slated to release appropriate funds for development of Bhubaneswar from the upcoming Budget which will be operationalized from April 1 – the day celebrated as Odisha Dibas in remembrance of the formation as a separate state in 1936.

 

Other major urban infrastructure developments on the anvil are the development of Paradeep as a port city and upgrada

Letters spell the word ”Alpahbet” as they are seen on a computer screen with a Google search page in this photo illustration taken in Paris, France, August 11, 2015. Reuters/Pascal Rossignol How much is Google-parent Alphabet Inc spending on “moonshots” – self-driving cars, glucose-monitoring contact lenses, Internet balloons and other ambitious projects? Investors will get their long-awaited answer when Alphabet reports fourth-quarter results after markets close on […]

Regular readers of the Reddit website might soon see their long wait for an official mobile app coming to an end. In an online post about things to expect from the site in 2016, co-founder and CEO Steve Huffman yesterday revealed that an Android app for Reddit is currently being tested in a private beta version and an iOS app “should follow it out soon.” Now in […]

SMOULDERING CONGRESS EMBERS MAY LEAP TO FLAME ANY TIME

 

By P. Sreekumaran

 

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has survived a scare. Thus reads the headline in a prominent English daily. But has he really weathered the political storm?

 

Significant straws in the wind proclaim, loud and clear, that he has not. True, he has managed to secure short-term legal relief. But the price, both in political and electoral terms, the Congress and the party-led United Democratic Front (UDF) Government may be called upon to pay will be prohibitively high. That is for sure.

 

As for the UDF politics, it is stinking to the high heavens. It cannot get any worse than this. The only question is: how long can a thoroughly discredited Government brazen it out?

 

The legal relief for Chandy and Power Minister Aryadan Mohammed has

Yahoo Makes Over Mobile App, Home Page in the U.S. Google long ago overshadowed Yahoo, but the company is still working to acquire and retain new users to its network of sites. To that end, Yahoo has just updated its mobile app and home page in the United States. Simply stated, Yahoo is giving prominence to news, content and video on its home page. Viewers will see […]

Perhaps taking aim at the well-entrenched presence of other tech giants in the education market, Apple confirmed Thursday that it has acquired LearnSprout, a San Francisco-based startup that specializes in education analytics and used for tracking the performance of students. The purchase of LearnSprout should give Apple some ammunition as it tries to challenge the existence of Microsoft’s software programs and Google’s Chromebook in the classroom. Apple […]

INDIA IN SWEET SPOT TO BALANCE THE ACT

 

By K R Sudhaman

 

India is in a sweet spot as global economy is not looking good in the face of market turmoil in China. A global recession triggered by poor showing of European economy had hit badly the export led growth model of China, whose economy grew by 6.9 per cent in 2015, the slowest in two decades. Following this slowdown, high commodity prices had started correcting exerting more pressure on China down turn. The massive over investment in China in steel, cement, shipbuilding, petrochemicals, real estate and other infrastructure sectors began to burst. This volatility in equity and commodity markets did not augur well for the global and Chinese economies. Global economy may not be in a crisis as in 2008 during the financial meltdown but it is certainly not out of the woods and outlook for global economy is certainly bearish in 2016.

MADHYA PRADESH EXPLORES AVENUES

 

From L.S. Herdenia

 

BHOPAL: Psychiatrists can play a major and decisive role in checking suicides by farmers. This claim was made at the conference of Psychiatrists held in Bhopal. It was suggested that governments should seek the help of Psychiatrists and use a holistic multipronged approach to prevent farmers from taking such an extreme step.

 

The four-day conference of Indian Psychiatric society discussed various issues relating to mental problems of the people, the lack of doctors, social stigma attached to mental disease, absence of research and effect of internet over use and mobile in triggering mental problems. Shortcomings in the Mental Care Bill pending in the Rajya Sabha was yet another item which was discussed at the conference.

 

The World Psychiatric Association’s first-ever Indian-origin president

Drivers in the U.S. oil hub of Houston can fill their tanks for less than the cost in Abu Dhabi and Dubai for the first time since 2008 as falling crude prices push Middle East exporters to cut government fuel subsidies. The price of the cheapest grade in the United Arab Emirates, of which Abu Dhabi is the capital, is 1.51 dirhams per liter ($1.55 a gallon) […]

WHY TAX/GREEN BREAK FOR INDIA’S RICH?

 

By Garga Chatterjee

 

On 16th January, with much fanfare, the Union government announced its “Start-up India” scheme. On attendance were big people, big enough not to deserve any income tax break in their next seven lives. But this is precisely what the Government of India (GoI) has offered – an income tax exemption for first three years of a “start-up”. There will also be tax exemption on capital gains. After all its fake environment-love recently in Paris, this GoI scheme has also offered a three-year exemption on environment law compliance! Entities will only need to self-certify! In the name of “start-up”, exactly what anti-environment, anti-labour racket are we starting up here? This will also be true for labour law and working condition compliance (including payment of wages and benefits to staff). Shamelessly, this whole sch

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