Isnin, 7 Januari 2013

NST Online Business Times : latest

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Cahya Mata fully redeems RM400m bonds

Posted: 07 Jan 2013 05:58 PM PST

RAM Ratings has received confirmation that Cahya Mata Sarawak Berhad fully redeemed its RM399.6 million Serial Bonds and the Conditional Payment Obligations of the Facilitator Bank (2005/2012) on 28 December 2012.

Following this, RAM Ratings no longer has any rating obligation on the debt issue, which had previously carried an A1 rating, with a stable outlook. -- Reuters

KL shares open lower in early trade

Posted: 07 Jan 2013 05:56 PM PST

Share prices on Bursa Malaysia opened lower, in early trade, as investors took profits after yesterday's gains, dealers said.

After 37 minutes of trading, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) eased 7.29 points to 1,686.87, after opening 2.8 points lower at 1,691.36.

HwangDBS Vickers Research said the local bourse may follow the market pattern of Wall Street, which was consolidating its recent gains with its key equity indices slipping between 0.1 per cent and 0.4 per cent last night.

"On the chart, the benchmark FBM KLCI, after a tiny 0.1 per cent rise yesterday, is expected to swing sideways between its immediate support and resistance levels of 1,685 and 1,700 points ahead.

"Nevertheless, we will probably see more action in the small and mid-cap space to be driven by rotational play, continuing yesterday's performance in the FBM 70 Index and the FBM Small Cap Index," it added.

Local corporate developments would aid stocks like Perdana Petroleum, which secured a letter of award for the supply of four units of vessels worth RM430 million.

Others include Malaysian AE, which won a RM140 million sub-contract job for ship loading facilities in Sabah and Kumpulan Jetson which secured a RM84 million turnkey hotel project in the United Kingdom.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index erased 56.42 points to 15,324.96, the Industrial Index declined 10.46 points to 2,800.98 and the Plantation Index fell 43.94 points to 8,258.75.

The FBM Emas Index gave up 42.93 points to 11,470.86, the FBMT100 slipped 43.70 points to 11,318.03, the FBM Mid 70 Index lost 24.60 points to 12,486.31 and the FBM Ace Index was 33.16 points lower at 4,242.18.

Losers led gainers 109 to 181 with 198 counters unchanged, 1,148 untraded and 29 others were suspended.

Volume was thin at 160.71 million shares worth RM105.343 million.

Among actives, Asia Media-WA rose 6.5 sen to seven sen, Scomi Group added half-a-sen to 37.5 sen while Asia Media fell half-a-sen to 20 sen.

Heavyweights, Maybank was lower at RM9.05, Sime Darby lost nine sen to RM9.56 while Axiata was flat at RM6.71. -- Bernama

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Hagel has history of controversial positions - CNN International

Posted: 07 Jan 2013 08:10 AM PST

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • Officials say Obama will nominate former Sen. Chuck Hagel as defense secretary
  • Several GOP lawmakers voicing staunch opposition to his nomination
  • Hagel has taken controversial positions on several issues that could be on his plate

Washington (CNN) -- If he becomes defense secretary, former Sen. Chuck Hagel will bring Vietnam battlefield experience, criticism of U.S. policy in Afghanistan and tensions with his own Republican Party to the Pentagon.

President Barack Obama's announcement of Hagel's nomination to the defense post will occur around 1 p.m. Monday, along with the nomination of counterterrorism chief John Brennan to be the CIA director, a senior administration official said.

Hagel honed a reputation on Capitol Hill as someone with an independent streak who was willing to take controversial positions and break rank with his Republican colleagues. And several leading Republican lawmakers are already voicing staunch opposition to his nomination.

It's unclear what his priorities would be as defense secretary, but in the past he's taken controversial positions on several topics that could be on his plate.

If the Senate confirms his nomination, a man who once said his Vietnam experience made him determined to do everything in his power to prevent war stands to become Obama's main military policy adviser.

As a lawmaker, Hagel voiced opposition to troop surges in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Critics have decried him as too dovish, while supporters have praised him for moderate views on many defense issues.

In his 2006 biography, Hagel is quoted saying he isn't a pacifist.

"I'm a hard-edged realist. I understand the world as it is," he said. "But war is a terrible thing. There's no glory, only suffering."

As senator, Hagel voted against sanctions on Iran, saying he favored direct negotiations, viewpoints not at odds with but to the left of President Obama. Hagel also supported negotiations with Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist group, and he said a lot of things criticized as insufficiently supportive of Israel, a longtime and strong U.S. ally.

Recently, many Republicans have struck upon comments Hagel made in a 2007 interview that some perceived as anti-Jewish, when Hagel said the "Jewish lobby intimidated lawmakers."

Rabbi Aryeh Azriel, a longtime friend of Hagel's, disputed that perception, saying the former senator is "definitely a friend of Israel."

"He is independent, has wonderful, fresh ideas to try to re-engage the discussion about the Middle East," Azriel said.

Hagel "has long severed his ties with the Republican Party," Sen. Lindsey Graham told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday.

Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, called the Hagel nomination an "in-your-face" choice by Obama and didn't rule out staging a filibuster to prevent a vote on Hagel's nomination.

"Hagel, if confirmed to be secretary of defense, would be the most antagonistic secretary of defense towards the state of Israel in our nation's history," he said.

Hagel supported the Pentagon's old "Don't Ask, Don't Tell Policy" governing gays in the military. He has faced opposition from gay-rights groups for a 1998 comment when he questioned whether a nominee for an ambassadorship was suitable because he was "openly, aggressively gay." He apologized for that remark in December, the only public statement he's made since his name came to light as one of those in the running for the post.

Last month the Log Cabin Republicans took out a full-page ad in The New York Times, criticizing Hagel and calling him "wrong on gay rights, wrong on Iran, wrong on Israel."

As criticism of Hagel has mounted in recent weeks, a group of former members of Congress and foreign policy professionals have come to his defense.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, said Sunday that Hagel would receive a "thorough vetting" just like any other presidential nominee.

"Whoever is nominated for secretary of defense is going to have to have a full understanding of our close relationship with our Israeli allies, the Iranian threat, and the importance of having a robust military," McConnell said on ABC's "This Week." "So whoever that is I think will be given a thorough vetting. And if Sen. Hagel is nominated, he'll be subjected to the same kinds of review of his credentials as anyone else."

CNN's Mike Mount, Kevin Liptak, Jill Dougherty and Candy Crowley contributed to this report.

Banks Reach Settlement on Mortgages - New York Times

Posted: 07 Jan 2013 08:38 AM PST

11:38 a.m. | Updated

Bank of America agreed on Monday to pay more than $10 billion to Fannie Mae to settle claims over troubled mortgages that soured during the housing crash, mostly loans issued by the bank's Countrywide Financial subsidiary.

Separately, federal regulators reached an $8.5 billion settlement on Monday to resolve claims of foreclosure abuses that included flawed paperwork used in foreclosures and bungled loan modifications by 10 major lenders, including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citibank. About $3.3 billion of that settlement amount will go toward Americans who went through foreclosure in 2009 and 2010, while $5.2 billion will address other assistance to troubled borrowers, including loan modifications and reductions of principal balances. Eligible homeowners could get up to $125,000 in compensation.

The two agreements are not directly related, but they illustrate the extent of the banks' role in the excesses of the credit boom, from the making of loans to the seizure of homes.

Under the terms of the Bank of America deal, the bank will pay Fannie Mae $3.6 billion and will also spend $6.75 billion to buy back mortgages from the housing finance giant.

The settlement will resolve all of the lender's disputes with Fannie Mae, removing a major impediment to Bank of America's rehabilitation. The bank had settled its fight with Freddie Mac, the other government-owned mortgage giant, in 2011.

Both Fannie and Freddie, which have posted billions of dollars in losses in recent years, have argued that Countrywide misrepresented the quality of home loans that it sold to the two entities at the height of the mortgage bubble. Bank of America assumed those troubles when it bought Countrywide in 2008.

Before the latest settlement announced on Monday, the Countrywide acquisition had cost Bank of America more than $40 billion in losses on real estate, legal costs and settlements, according to several people close to the bank.

By removing part of the bank's mortgage albatross, the move is a continued retreat from home lending by Bank of America, even as rivals including JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo compete for the profitable refinance business that has boomed with interest rates persistently low.

Bank of America also agreed to sell the servicing rights on about $306 billion worth of home loans to other firms. In separate statements, Nationstar Mortgage Holdings and the Newcastle Investment Corporation announced they were buying the rights. Those servicing costs, which were roughly $3.4 billion in the third quarter, have weighed on the bank's profits, especially as borrowers fall behind on their bills.

Brian T. Moynihan, the bank's chief executive, said in November that he intended to sell off about two million loans the bank currently serviced.

"Together, these agreements are a significant step in resolving our remaining legacy mortgage issues, further streamlining and simplifying the company and reducing expenses over time," Mr. Moynihan said in a statement on Monday.

Bank of America said it expected the settlement to hurt its fourth-quarter earnings by $2.5 billion because of costs tied to foreclosure reviews and litigation. The firm also expects to record a $700 million charge, an accounting move known as a debt-valuation adjustment, related to an improvement in the prices of its bonds.

The deal on Monday helps the bank move away from its troubled mortgage business. Still, the bank's attempts to resolve other costly mortgage litigation have so far been stymied. Looking to appease investors that sued the bank for losses when mortgages packaged into securities imploded during the financial crisis, the bank agreed to pay $8.5 billion in June 2011. But the settlement, which would help mollify investors including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Pimco, has been stalled.

Further thwarting Bank of America's retreat from the mortgage business, federal prosecutors sued the bank in October, accusing it of churning through loans so quickly that quality controls were virtually forgotten. The Justice Department sued the bank under a law that could mean Bank of America could pay well more than $1 billion to settle.

Bank of America has been embroiled with other legal woes, including accusations that it misled investors about the acquisition of Merrill Lynch. Shareholders, led by pension funds, had said the bank provided false and misleading statements about the health of the Wall Street firm, which, unknown to the public, was racking up huge losses in late 2008 amid turmoil in the markets.

The separate agreement with 10 banks on foreclosure abuses concludes weeks of feverish negotiations between the federal regulators, led by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the banks. That settlement will end a troubled foreclosure review mandated by the banking regulators.

The deal, which was hashed out over the weekend, had teetered on the brink of collapse after officials from the Federal Reserve demanded that the banks pay an addition $300 million to address their part in the 2008 financial crisis, according to several people briefed on the negotiations who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Federal Reserve, though, agreed to back down on the demands in the hope that the pact could move ahead and bring more immediate relief to homeowners struggling to stay afloat in a time of persistent unemployment and a sluggish economy.

The multibillion-dollar foreclosure settlement was driven, to a large extent, by banking regulators, who decided that a review of loan files was inefficient, costly and simply not yielding relief for homeowners, these people said. The goal in scuttling the reviews, which were mandated as part of a consent order in April 2011, was to provide more immediate relief to homeowners.

The comptroller's office and the Federal Reserve said on Monday that the settlement "provides the greatest benefit to consumers subject to unsafe and unsound mortgage servicing and foreclosure practices during the relevant period in a more timely manner than would have occurred under the review process."

The relief will be distributed to homeowners even if they did not file a claim for their loan files to be reviewed.

Concerns about the Independent Foreclosure Review began to mount in within the comptroller's office, according to the people familiar with the matter. The alarm, these people said, was that the reviews were taking more than 20 hours a loan file at a cost of up to $250 an hour. Since the start of the review, the banks, which are required to pay for consultants to review the files, had spent an estimated $1.5 billion.

More vexing, the banking regulators said that the reviews were not providing any relief to borrowers or turning up meaningful instances where homes of borrowers current on their payments were seized, according to these people.

Michael J. de la Merced and Ben Protess contributed reporting.

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