Global shares rise before U.S. budget talks, yen at two-year low

LONDON (Reuters) – World shares and the euro edged higher on Friday as U.S. lawmakers prepared to resume negotiations on avoiding a fiscal crisis, while the yen hit a two-year low on the prospect of drastic monetary easing in Japan.

U.S. President Barack Obama and lawmakers are set to have a last round of talks before a New Year deadline to reach a deal on averting major tax increases and spending cuts which could drag the economy and others around the world into recession.

Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will meet congressional leaders from the Republican and Democrat parties at the White House at 2000 GMT.

The MSCI all world share index was up 0.15 percent shortly after trading opened in Europe. With London’s FTSE 100 <.ftse>, Paris’s CAC-40 <.fchi> and Frankfurt’s DAX <.gdaxi> all just in positive territory, the regional FTSEurofirst 300 <.fteu3> was up just over 0.1 percent and moving towards last week’s 19-month high.</.fteu3></.gdaxi></.fchi></.ftse>

Members of Congress were divided on the odds of success at the budget talks, but IG strategist Stan Shamu noted some hope in the markets. “There is growing optimism that a deal can be knocked (together) before the deadline,” IG strategist Stan Shamu wrote in a note.

In Asia, Japan’s benchmark Nikkei index hit a 21-month high as markets priced in a huge injection of stimulus by the Bank of Japan following the election of a new government. The expectations also pushed the yen to a new two-year low versus the dollar.

The yen has now fallen roughly 10.5 percent versus the dollar in 2012, its biggest annual drop since 2005. At the same time Japan’s benchmark Nikkei is up 22 percent for the year.

“The Japanese equity market has turned positive, providing good sentiment for global investors, with many making money and putting the money into commodity markets such as the oil market,” said Tetsu Emori, a commodity fund manager at Astmax in Tokyo.

The euro edged up past $ 1.325 as trading remained thin as Christmas holidays continued for many investors. It came as France reported its economy had grown 0.1 percent in the third quarter.

European bond markets were largely quiet. German Bund futures rose on concerns that a U.S. budget deal will, after all, remain elusive.

(editing by David Stamp)

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Apple still can’t build enough iPad minis

A common issue often presents itself when Apple (AAPL) launches new products: it can’t build them fast enough. We’ve seen it time and time again, most recently when Apple launched the iPhone 5 and 150,000 dedicated factory workers still couldn’t keep up with demand. Now, a report has surfaced claiming that Apple’s manufacturing partners in the Far East can’t build units fast enough to keep pace with Apple’s iPad mini orders.

[More from BGR: Microsoft Surface trampled at the bottom of the tablet pile this Christmas]

According to Digitimes’ supply chain sources, Apple’s parts suppliers have prepared enough components to build between 10 million and 12 million iPad mini tablets in the fourth quarter to accomodate heavy demand. Apple’s manufacturing partners are only expected to ship 8 million assembled units, however.

[More from BGR: Mark Cuban: Nokia Lumia 920 ‘crushes’ the iPhone 5]

The report states that yield rates are improving though, and Apple is expected to ship 13 million iPad mini tablets in the first quarter of 2013.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Jay Chou raps about a corrupt eunuch

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Taiwan‘s pop king Jay Chou has played roles as varied as superhero, vampire and cowboy. So his latest album about an influential but corrupt court eunuch may not sound all that odd to his fans.

In “Gong Gong with A Headache” released Thursday, Chou raps about the eunuch who has a secret passion for women but “must not touch them.” ”Gong Gong” is a name for court eunuchs in China.

In the music video, Chou dances stiffly like a zombie to the tune of hip hop, dressed in satin imperial court costume.

The singer also wrote the song. He says he was inspired by the popular drama series “The Legend of Zhen Huan” and other court dramas that have captivated audiences in China and Taiwan.

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Former President George H.W. Bush in intensive care: spokesman

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – Former President George H.W. Bush is in the intensive care unit of a Houston hospital and is in “guarded condition,” family spokesman Jim McGrath said Wednesday.

“The President is alert and conversing with medical staff, and is surrounded by family,” McGrath said in a statement.

Bush was admitted to the intensive care unit on Sunday, McGrath said.

(Reporting By Corrie MacLaggan; Editing by Paul Thomasch)

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Brent holds near $111 on US fiscal uncertainty; Japan supports

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Brent crude held near $ 111 per barrel on Thursday as jittery investors stayed on the sidelines with a deadline to avert a U.S. fiscal crisis approaching, while hopes the new Japanese government’s policies will spur demand supported prices.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Republican lawmakers resumed talks on Wednesday over the so-called fiscal cliff – tax hikes and spending cuts slated to take effect next week that could push the economy back into recession.

“There is no easy way to resolve the U.S. fiscal cliff, but there should be a compromise at some point and that’s what the market is looking for,” said Tetsu Emori, a commodity fund manager at Astmax in Tokyo.

Front-month Brent futures slipped 16 cents to $ 110.91 per barrel at 0501 GMT, giving up some of the previous session’s 2 percent gain.

Brent may face some resistance between $ 112 and $ 113 before falling towards $ 102.7 over the next three months, according to Wang Tao, Reuters market analyst for commodities and energy technicals.

U.S. crude dropped from a nine-week high reached on Wednesday, shedding 6 cents to $ 90.92.

Oil futures rose in early Asian trade, taking a cue from Japanese stocks, which were at an 18-month high after the country’s new prime minister said beating deflation in the world’s No. 3 oil consumer and taming a strong yen were his top priorities.

“There are hopes that the aggressive fiscal policies will help Japan get out of deflation and, as it is an importer of commodities, that’s a positive for oil markets,” Emori said.

The government will pursue bold monetary policy, flexible fiscal policy and a growth strategy to encourage private investment, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Wednesday .

CLIFFHANGER

The White House and Republicans are still far apart, as hopes for legislation to prevent the U.S. economy from tumbling off the fiscal cliff switch to the Senate.

Democrats control a majority in that chamber but still need some support from Republicans across the aisle for a likely attempt to raise taxes on the wealthy.

Obama will try to revive budget crisis talks – which stalled last week – when he returns to Washington on Thursday after cutting short his Christmas holiday in Hawaii.

“While markets have vacillated between optimism and pessimism over the prospects for a compromise, we expect a deal only at the last minute, with lots of decisions delayed into the New Year and austerity of roughly 2 percent of GDP,” Bank of America-Merril Lynch analysts said in their weekly report.

Worries about supplies from the Middle East rose once more after security forces in the United Arab Emirates arrested a cell of UAE and Saudi Arabian citizens which they said was planning to carry out militant attacks in both countries and other states.

The region holds some of the world’s largest oil fields and as a result any unrest in the area triggers supply concerns.

Oil futures may rise in the first quarter of 2013 with the global economy showing early signs of a pick-up, and on expectations that the fiscal crisis will be resolved.

Encouraging economic data from China, aggressive action by the European Central Bank to help its economies, and quantitative easing by the U.S. Federal Reserve together brighten the outlook for oil in the near-term.

U.S. crude could rise to $ 100 per barrel and Brent may test $ 120 by the end of March, said Emori.

Also supporting prices are expectations that U.S. crude stockpiles may have decreased last week as refiners kept inventory low for year-end tax purposes.

Crude stocks may have dropped by 1.9 million barrels in the week ended Dec 21, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.

Inventory data from the American Petroleum Institute will be released on Thursday, while numbers from the Energy Information Administration will be out on Friday, a day later than usual, because of the Christmas holiday.

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Britain’s royal family attends Christmas services

LONDON (AP) — Britain‘s royal family is attending Christmas Day church services — with a few notable absences.

Wearing a turquoise coat and matching hat, Queen Elizabeth II arrived at St. Mary Magdelene Church on her sprawling Sandringham estate in Norfolk. She was accompanied in a Bentley by granddaughters Beatrice and Eugenie.

Her husband, Prince Philip, walked from the house to the church with other members of the royal family.

Three familiar faces were missing from the family outing. Prince William is spending the holiday with his pregnant wife Kate and his in-laws in the southern England village of Bucklebury. Prince Harry is serving with British troops in Afghanistan.

Later Tuesday, the queen will deliver her traditional, pre-recorded Christmas message, which for the first time will be broadcast in 3D.

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Early Childhood Obesity Rates Might Be Slowing Nation-Wide

About one in three children in the U.S. are now overweight, and since the 1980s the number of children who are obese has more than tripled. But a new study of 26.7 million young children from low-income families shows that in this group of kids, the tidal wave of obesity might finally be receding.Being obese as a child not only increases the risk of early-life health problems, such as joint problems, pre-diabetes and social stigmatization, but it also dramatically increases the likelihood of being obese later in life, which can lead to chronic diseases, including cancer, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Children as young as 2 years of age can be obese–and even extremely obese. Early childhood obesity rates, which bring higher health care costs throughout a kid’s life, have been especially high among lower-income families.”This is the first national study to show that the prevalence of obesity and extreme obesity among young U.S. children may have begun to decline,” the researchers noted in a brief report published online December 25 in JAMA, The Journal of the American Medical Association. (Reports earlier this year suggested that childhood obesity rates were dropping in several U.S. cities.)The study examined rates of obesity (body mass index calculated by age and gender to be in the 95th percentile or higher–for example, a BMI above 20 for a 2-year-old male–compared with reference growth charts) and extreme obesity (BMI of more than 120 percent above that of the 95th percentile of the reference populations) in children ages 2 to 4 in 30 states and the District of Columbia. The researchers, led by Liping Pan, of the Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, combed through 12 years of data (1998 to 2010) from the Pediatric Nutritional Surveillance System, which includes information on roughly half of all children on the U.S. who are eligible for federal health care and nutrition assistance.A subtle but important shift in early childhood obesity rates in this low-income population seems to have begun in 2003. Obesity rates increased from 13.05 percent in 1998 to 15.21 percent in 2003. Soon, however, obesity rates began decreasing, reaching 14.94 percent by 2010. Extreme obesity followed a similar pattern, increasing from 1.75 percent to 2.22 percent from 1998 to 2003, but declining to 2.07 percent by 2010.Although these changes might seem small, the number of children involved makes for huge health implications. For example, each drop of just one tenth of a percentage point represents some 26,700 children in the study population alone who are no longer obese or extremely obese. And if these trends are occurring in the rest of the population, the long-term health and cost implications are massive.Public health agencies and the Obama Administration have made battling childhood obesity a priority, although these findings suggest that early childhood obesity rates, at least, were already beginning to decline nearly a decade ago. Some popular prevention strategies include encouraging healthier eating (by reducing intake of highly processed and high-sugar foods and increasing fruit and vegetable consumption) and increased physical activity (both at school and at home).The newly revealed trends “indicate modest recent progress of obesity prevention among young children,” the authors noted. “These finding may have important health implications because of the lifelong health risks of obesity and extreme obesity in early childhood.”

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs.Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
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Egypt’s leader signs contentious constitution into law

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi has signed into law a new Islamist-drafted constitution he says will help end political turmoil and allow him to focus on fixing the fragile economy.

Anxiety about the deepening economic crisis has gripped Egypt in past weeks, with many people rushing to take out their savings from banks and the government imposing new restrictions to reduce capital flight.

Results announced on Tuesday showed Egyptians had approved the text with an overwhelming 63.8 percent, paving the way for a parliamentary election in about two months.

The win gives Islamists their third straight electoral victory since veteran autocrat Hosni Mubarak was toppled in a 2011 revolution, following their earlier wins in parliamentary and presidential elections.

The presidency said Mursi signed a decree enforcing the charter late on Tuesday after the official announcement of the result of a referendum approving the basic law, Egypt’s first constitution since Mubarak’s overthrow.

The text has sharpened painful divisions in the Arab world’s most populous nation and prompted often violent protests on the streets of Cairo.

Opposition groups condemn the new basic law as too Islamist and undemocratic, saying it could allow clerics to intervene in the lawmaking process and leave minority groups without proper legal protection.

But Mursi, catapulted into power by his Islamist allies, believes adopting the text is key to ending a protracted period of turmoil and uncertainty that has wrecked the economy.

He argues the constitution offers enough protection to all groups, saying many Egyptians are fed up with street protests that have prevented a return to normality and distracted the government from focusing on the economy.

An atmosphere of crisis has deepened in Egypt since the vote, with many Egyptians rushing to take out cash from banks and hoarding hard currency savings at home.

Sharpening people’s concerns, the authorities imposed currency controls to prevent capital flight. Leaving or entering Egypt with more than $ 10,000 cash is now banned.

Rocked by often violent protests in the run up to the two-stage referendum this month, Cairo was calm, with only a small group of protesters burning tires overnight.

Mursi’s government says its opponents are damaging the economy by prolonging political upheaval. It has pledged to impose unpopular tax increases and spending cuts to win a loan package from the International Monetary Fund.

Adding to the government’s long list of worries, Communications Minister Hany Mahmoud resigned from his post citing his “inability to adapt to the government’s working culture”.

The United States, which provides billions of dollars a year in military and other support for Egypt and sees it as a pillar of security in the Middle East, called on Egyptian politicians to bridge divisions and on all sides to reject violence.

“President Mursi, as the democratically elected leader of Egypt, has a special responsibility to move forward in a way that recognizes the urgent need to bridge divisions,” State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell said.

(Writing by Maria Golovnina; Editing by Jon Boyle)

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Acer’s $99 Android tablet might not launch in the U.S.

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Jack Klugman, famed for TV role on “The Odd Couple,” dead at 90

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Emmy-winning actor Jack Klugman, a versatile, raspy-voiced mainstay of U.S. television during the 1970s and early ’80s through his starring roles in “The Odd Couple” and “Quincy, M.E.,” died on Monday at the age of 90.

Klugman, whose pairing with Tony Randall on “The Odd Couple” created one of television’s most memorable duos, died at his home in the Woodland Hills section of Los Angeles following a period of declining health, according to his son, Adam Klugman.

“He went very suddenly and peacefully … he was there one minute and gone the next,” the actor’s son told Reuters, adding that the elder Klugman had “been in convalescent mode for awhile.”

He said his father had lost his ability to walk and spent much of his time in bed. His wife of four and a half years, Peggy Crosby, former daughter-in-law of the late singer Bing Crosby, was with him when he died, his son said.

In addition to his TV success, Klugman enjoyed a healthy career on the stage as well as in movies and made successful forays into horse breeding and political activism. Not even the loss of a vocal cord to cancer in 1989 could silence him for long.

Klugman gained fame for playing slovenly sports writer Oscar Madison in the sitcom “The Odd Couple” – a role he also had played on Broadway – and then as a crusading coroner in the crime drama “Quincy, M.E.“

“The Odd Couple,” based on Neil Simon’s play about two disparate divorced men forced to share an apartment, ran for five years on the ABC network, starting in 1970, but was never a hit during that time. Only through reruns did Klugman and co-star Randall, who played neat-freak Felix Unger, leave their mark as one of U.S. television’s great sitcom teams.

“We had wonderful respect for one another, we liked working together but we never became friends,” Klugman told the Miami Herald in 2005. “I think that was on account of me. I was withdrawn. I never let anybody get too close.”

It was not until Klugman’s cancer surgery, following years of heavy smoking and throat problems, that a friendship developed with Randall. Klugman had no voice and was glumly resigned to the end of his acting career, but with Randall’s encouragement, he returned to the stage.

They resurrected their “Odd Couple” roles in a 1993 TV movie, and Klugman paid tribute to Randall, who died in 2004, in the memoir “Tony and Me: A Story of Friendship.”

“Quincy, M.E.,” which ran on NBC from 1976 to 1983, saw Klugman assume a heavy behind-the-scenes role. He recalled that he spent 20 hours a day working on the series, and he twice sued its producer, Universal Studios, for a share of the net profits he claimed were owed to him.

LOVE OF HORSES

Horses were perhaps Klugman’s first love – both as a keen gambler starting in his teens and later as a breeder. One of his horses, Jaklin Klugman, finished third in the 1980 Kentucky Derby and earned millions as a stud.

Born Jacob Joachim Klugman on April 27, 1922, he grew up in a tough Philadelphia neighborhood. In 1945 a loan shark was after him due to gambling losses so he fled to Pittsburgh, where he studied drama at Carnegie Tech and worked several jobs to settle his debts.

Two years later in New York, Klugman appeared opposite Henry Fonda in the national stage production of “Mr. Roberts.” In 1960, Klugman received a Tony nomination for his supporting role in the musical “Gypsy.”

In Hollywood, Klugman had notable supporting roles in such films as “12 Angry Men” (1957), “Days of Wine and Roses” (1962) and “Goodbye, Columbus” (1969).

He won the first of three Emmys in 1964 for an appearance on the legal drama “The Defenders.” Klugman and Randall each received Emmy nominations for each of the “Odd Couple” seasons, with Klugman winning in 1971 and 1973 and Randall in 1975.

Klugman also earned four Emmy nominations for NBC’s “Quincy, M.E.” His character, who stepped out of his role as medical examiner to solve murders that flummoxed the Los Angeles police, never had a first name.

Klugman is survived by Crosby, his second wife, whom he married in 2008 after a 20-year courtship; and two sons, Adam and David, from his first marriage to late “Match Game” panelist Brett Somers. Klugman and Somers were separated for more than 30 years of their 54-year marriage, which ended with her death in 2007.

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; additional reporting and writing by Dean Goodman; Editing by Steve Gorman and Paul Simao)

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