Dubai’s banks are extending loans to the local diamond industry, boosting the emirate’s ambitions of becoming a top trading hub as funding to rival Antwerp dries up. Emirates NBD PJSC. (EMIRATES), Mashreqbank PSC. (MASQ), and National Bank of Fujairah PJSC., are financing diamond cutters, polishers and traders operating on the Dubai Diamond Exchange for the first time, Peter Meeus, chairman of the exchange, said in an Oct. […]
African markets are gradually opening to Islamic finance, buoyed by governments’ debut sales of sovereign sukuk (Islamic bonds) and legislative efforts to make the sector more attractive for companies across the region. Despite the strong growth of Islamic finance in its core markets, the Middle East and southeast Asia, the industry has lagged in Africa, which is home to one in four of the world’s Muslims. This […]
Phone Works is a new line of smartphone-connected testing and layout tools from Ryobi. The Phone Works modules connect to your iOS or Android phone through the headphone jack and can be controlled through the free app. Modules include a plumbing scope camera, a moisture meter, stud finder, laser level, laser distance measurer, IR thermometer, and a laser pointer. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service […]
By S. Sethuraman A global economy, wobbling six years after the financial market crash of 2008, cannot need anything better than a firm commitment of the world’s financiers to build a more robust, sustainable, balanced, job-rich economic order. Global unemployment is at its all-time peak, especially in Europe and large parts of developing world. Finance Ministers of 188 nations met at the 2014 Annual Meetings […]
By BRIAN KNOWLTON October 12, 2014 WASHINGTON — Fighters for the Islamic State were managing to blend in with disenfranchised Sunni populations in some Iraqi towns and villages near the capital, raising the chances of militant attacks against targets in Baghdad, President Obama’s top military adviser said on Sunday. “I have no doubt there will be days when they use indirect fire into Baghdad,” the adviser, Gen. Martin E. […]
From Pradeep Kapoor LUCKNOW: Bahujan Samaj Party supremo. Mayawati is unnerved at the prospects of her party at the next assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh scheduled in May 2017. After the BSP’s disastrous results at the Lok Sabha elections in May this year, the BSP chief made another mistake by not fielding party candidates in the by elections to the state assembly in September this year. […]
By Ashok B Sharma India’s foreign trade has badly suffered since the beginning of the global financial crisis in August-September 2008 and the subsequent shock of the sovereign crisis in Eurozone added to the problem. Over dependence on markets in the developed countries was the cause for shrinkage in Indian exports. As the recovery in developed countries and increase in demand is slow, India should […]
Hugh Grant in Four Weddings and a Funeral Photo: Alamy Anyone who thinks Hugh Grant is not an accomplished actor is surely underestimating how difficult it is to do light comedy. It’s harder than drama, but the secret is making it look effortless, and effortless performances are rarely appreciated – it’s the showy mannerisms and thundering speeches that win awards, not comic timing (which you only notice when […]
|By TAP Staff| Etisalat is planning its first ever sukuk issuance in a follow-up to its debut conventional bond earlier this year, bankers are being quoted as saying. According to these sources, the state monopoly telecom player of the UAE, rated Aa3/AA-/A+, is in talks with banks for the potential Islamic bond issuance, proceeds of which are set to go towards infrastructural improvements of its telecommunications network. […]
Hackers are threatening to post online a large collection of photos, including nude images, sent by Snapchat users and apparently intercepted via third-party apps, Business Insider is reporting. The number of photos in question — at least 100,000 — is much larger than number of the nude celebrity photos stolen from Apple’s iCloud earlier this year. Many images are likely to be of users under the age […]
Fast food chain Dairy Queen is pushing out a security story and it’s anything but sweet. The international firm on Thursday confirmed cyber criminals hit systems at some of its DQ locations and one Orange Julius location in the United States. Dairy Queen blamed the Backoff point-of-sale malware that has been infiltrating retail systems around the country. This is the same malware that invaded Target’s systems last […]
A decline in sales is leading Apple to make an attempt at revitalizing its iPad tablet — possibly by introducing new models. The company plans an event Thursday, just a month after the company debuted the iPhone 6. Apple is preparing for an event near its Cupertino, California, headquarters. It will reportedly then show off new models of the iPad, as well as its Mac computers, as […]
By Kalyani Shankar Will the ensuing Assembly polls to Haryana and Maharashtra be seen as a referendum on the new Modi government? No doubt stakes are high for both Prime Minister Narendra Modi who feels on the top of the world after his landslide victory and congress President Sonia Gandhi, who is suffering from the most humiliating defeat in the recent Lok Sabha polls. It is […]
By Nora Chopra While Narendra Modi has already held a number of rallies, the central leadership of the Congress is missing from action in both the states of Haryana and Maharashtra. Rahul began his campaign in Maharashtra on 8 October in Mahad in Raigad district and the second rally Ausa in Latur district. With these two rallies he has covered Konkan and Marathwada. He is supposed to […]
JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) hired senior bankers from Rothschild and Standard Chartered Plc (STAN) for its investment banking business in the Middle East. The New York-based bank named Majed Al Mesmari, previously at Rothschild, as head of investment banking coverage in the United Arab Emirates, it said in a statement today. Fahad Al-Deweesh has joined from British lender Standard Chartered to lead investment banking coverage in […]
By Nantoo Banerjee Believe it or not, the half-a-million-employee-strong postal department of the government of India faces the biggest threat to its 150-odd years’ existence from no other than the world’s largest courier conglomerate, Deutsche Post AG, a $55-billion German behemoth. Already a victim of governmental apathy and the Narasimha Rao-Manmohan Singh-led 1991-92 reform that led to a massive overhaul of the then departments of posts […]
By G. Srinivasan The inexorable humid weather in the capital in the festive month of October has robbed the exuberant moments of celebrations, even as the weather patterns across the country seem to be swinging in extremes. India and other developing countries may continue to be in a denial mood that weather-related aberrations are not directly due to the broad climate change that is sweeping the universe […]
From Pradeep Kapoor LUCKNOW: In the name of memorial for late Prime Minister Charan Singh, various political parties are coming together to face the challenge from BJP in Uttar Pradesh. Much significance is being attached to Meerut rally on October 12 when Samajwadi party national president Mulayam Singh Yadav and his chief minister son Akhilesh Yadav and JD President Sharad Yadav could share same platform. […]
Video | Fighting Rages in Syrian Border Town President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey warned that the Syrian border town of Kobani might fall to Islamist militants as fighting intensified between Kurdish rebels and Islamic State fighters. By KARAM SHOUMALI and ANNE BARNARD October 7, 2014 MURSITPINAR, Turkey — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey said Tuesday that the Syrian border town of Kobani, under siege from Islamic State fighters, was […]
Some patients recalled seeing a bright light; a golden flash or the Sun shining Photo: Rex “To die, to sleep – To sleep, perchance to dream – aye, there’s the rub, For in this sleep of death what dreams may come …” So says Hamlet, pondering his own mortality in perhaps the most famous soliloquy Shakespeare ever wrote. The question “Is there life after death?” has fascinated human […]
For the second time since June, AT&T has acknowledged that it has been hit by an insider data breach. The telecom giant is warning consumers that an employee, who has since been fired, illegally accessed the personal information of some of its users, making off with Social Security numbers and driver’s license numbers. In a letter sent to the Vermont attorney general earlier this month, AT&T officials […]
Remember BadUSB? If you use a USB device to move digital files from one machine to another, you need to know the latest news on this flaw in design specs that could put your computers at risk. Attack code for this flaw, which is impossible to patch, is now public. Security researchers Brandon Wilson and Adam Caudill released two patches to existing firmware for the Phison 2251-03, […]
A hidden-away feature on Facebook Messenger appears to be ready enable users to take advantage of peer-to-peer (P2P) payments whenever Facebook decides to implement the service. Screenshots and videos of the feature were taken by Stanford computer science student Andrew Aude following a heads-up last month by digital forensic expert Jonathan Zdziarski. We reached out to Aude to learn more about how close to implementation the Messenger […]
Big On Telecom signs distribution deal with Blackphone DUBAI, 3 days ago Blackphone has signed a master distributor partnership with Big On Telecom, a Big on Group company headquartered in Dubai, to expand the brand’s presence in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) regions. The agreement marks a significant step in Blackphone’s growth, with Big On Telecom having started testing and launch discussions with telecom operators in […]
