Stories Report on Business is following today :
Toyoda faces challenge when he testifies
Toyota Motor Corp.'s troubles continue to mount, just as its embattled president prepares to testify at a congressional hearing Wednesday. Weekend reports disclosed internal documents in which the auto maker touted the fact that it saved more than $100-million (U.S.) by bargaining with the U.S. government on a recall of floor mats. Troublesome for the company from an optics standpoint is that the money saved on the recall of 55,000 vehicles came in a section of a document titled "Wins for Toyota - Safety Group." Toyota responded to the reports by stressing again that it puts safety first, and to believe otherwise based on one document would be wrong. But, Jeff Kingston, the director of Asian studies at Temple University Japan, told The Associated Press, "this is any executive's worst nightmare - a damning document comes out and exposes your company as having basically gone slow and tried to delay addressing significant safety problems with their product."
Separately today, Toyota said a U.S. grand jury subpoena for documents related to the recalls had been sent from the attorney's office for the southern district of New York. The Securities and Exchange Commission has also asked for documents, it said.
Two committees will be holding hearings this week, and Toyota chief Akio Toyoda is scheduled to testify Wednesday.
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Toyota subpoenaed, problems grow
Toyota boasted saving $100-million on recall
U.S. investigators sift haystacks of safety data
Toyota chief readies for Congress grilling
British firm begins Falklands drilling
Desire Petroleum PLC, a British oil exploration company, said today it has started drilling near the Falkland Islands, a move expected to heighten the tensions between Britain and Argentina. Argentina wants drilling in the region restricted, while Britain has vowed to take the necessary steps to protect its interests, though both sides have said they will end the dispute peacefully. The two countries went to war over the Falklands in 1982. Read the story
Soros frets over euro
George Soros fears for the euro, even if Greece emerges intact from its debt crisis. Writing in The Financial Times, Mr. Soros goes through the history and principles of the currency union and notes that while "makeshift" help should be enough to save Greece, whose debt troubles have spooked financial markets and prompted the EU to promise to support the country, still in question is the outlook for other debt-burdened European countries such as Spain, Italy, Portugal and Ireland. Wrote Mr. Soros: "Together they constitute too large a portion of euro land to be helped in this way. The survival of Greece would still leave the future of the euro in question. Even if it handles the current crisis, what about the next one? It is clear what is needed: more intrusive monitoring and institutional arrangements for conditional assistance. A well-organized euro bond market would be desirable. The question is whether the political will for these steps can be generated." Read the article
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How EU countries used derivatives
Euro currency union shows strains
The personal cost of Greece's debt crisis
Could Germany afford to bail out Greece?
Markets await Bernanke
U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke gives his so-called Humphrey-Hawkins testimony to the U.S. House and Senate on Wednesday and Thursday. While markets always pay close attention to the Fed's monetary policy report to Congress, there may be even more scrutiny given the U.S. central bank's decision to raise its discount rate by one-quarter of a percentage point last week. While the Fed had flagged plans to do that, its timing caught markets surprise. "Given the market's sensitivity to tightening prospects, he will likely outline, again, the Fed's exit strategy road map - to explain the difference between measures that are designed to unwind emergency lending support and measures that raise the cost of funds or reduce their supply," BMO Nesbitt Burns said this morning. "While credit markets have healed sufficiently and no longer need life-saving support, the economy is still in the recovery room. Removing the monetary medicine prematurely would risk sending the patient back into intensive care. And with inflation pressures extinct - witness the first monthly decline in core consumer prices in 26 years - the Fed can take its time to nurse the economy back to full health."
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Near absent U.S. inflation cools rate-hike talk
Fed begins pullback from easy money policies
CIBC, National report Thursday
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and National Bank of Canada kick off the first-quarter results of Canada's major banks, both reporting earnings on Thursday. Investors are watching bank results for signs of credit losses stabilizing. "We think that credit card provisions have peaked," UBS Securities Canada analyst Peter Rozenberg said of CIBC. "Therefore declining card losses should drive lower [provisions for credit losses]and higher earnings growth in the near term."
Mr. Rozenberg added in a research note that UBS expects National Bank and Royal Bank of Canada "to be amongst the first major banks to raise dividends in [fiscal 2010]when there is more clarity on [provisions for credit losses] the economy, and the regulatory and capital environment."
EMI to keep Abbey Road
EMI has decided to keep the renowned Abbey Road recording studio after all. The music company's earlier plan to sell the studio that had been home to The Beatles sparked angst in Britain and a grassroots campaign to save it. EMI said on the weekend, though, that it is instead talking to outside investors about plans to "revitalize" the studio made so famous by the cover of the band's 1969 album Abbey Road.
Salida meets Buffett
Even for money managers, $1.68-million is a bit much to pay for lunch. Today's meal, however, is with Warren Buffett and the proceeds go to charity. Toronto's Salida Capital, which won an annual auction to dine with Mr. Buffett, meets the famed investor today at the Smith and Wolensky restaurant in New York City. It paid $1.68-million (U.S.) for the chance to send up to eight guests to the luncheon. As Salida's chief executive officer Courtenay Wolfe said when the company won the charity auction, "it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to talk to one of the most successful investors in the world. That's an experience it's hard to put a price tag on. That's invaluable to us, on a personal and professional level."
From today's Report on Business
Shale gas drillers face scrutiny in U.S.
Task force to consult on savings, debt
Canadians warm up to tax-free savings accounts