FedEx Corp. (FDX) said fiscal first-quarter earnings will exceed its previously dour expectations and projected a profit this quarter largely above analysts' estimates as the company benefits from improvement internationally and cost controls.
Shares rose 4.8% premarket to $76.11.
The company has been pressured during the recession as shipping volumes have fallen, more than offsetting benefits from falling fuel costs. FedEx - considered an economic bellwether - in June projected earnings of 30 cents to 45 cents, far below analysts' then-average estimate of 68 cents.
But the company said Friday that earnings should come in at 58 cents when it fiscal first-quarter results on Wednesday. In part, Chief Financial Officer Alan B. Graf credited better-than-expected volume in FedEx's international priority-delivery service.
He added that despite "encouraging signs" in the global economy, "it is difficult to predict the timing and pace of any economic recovery."
Still, FedEx projected earnings for the current quarter of 65 cents to 95 cents. Analysts were predicting 70 cents.
In the first quarter, revenue per shipment declined across the company amid lower fuel surcharges. Graf added, "We continue to face a very competitive pricing environment combined with significant overcapacity" in the less-than-truckload freight market.
Separately, FedEx disclosed an Internal Revenue Service audit team plans to assess taxes and penalties of $14 million related to employment and withholding taxes in 2002. The company plans to "contest the erroneous conclusions' in the audit.
It added the IRS is looking at similar issues for 2004 through 2008.
-By Mike Barris, Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-2330; mike.barris@dowjones.com
9.10.2009
港鐵獲墨爾本鐵路專營權
港鐵<00066.hk>附屬Metro Trains Melbourne(MTM)與澳洲維多利亞省政府簽署專營權協議，由09年11月30日起為墨爾本鐵路提供營運及維修服務，首期為期8年。
港鐵擁有MTM六成股權，而澳洲當地兩間鐵路公司UGL Rail及John Holland，佔其餘四成股權。
墨爾本鐵路網絡共有15條鐵路線，全長372公里，每周有340萬人次使用。(wr/w)
Bilibala comments:
MTR is one of the HKG based corporation that successfully internationalize its business.
港鐵擁有MTM六成股權，而澳洲當地兩間鐵路公司UGL Rail及John Holland，佔其餘四成股權。
墨爾本鐵路網絡共有15條鐵路線，全長372公里，每周有340萬人次使用。(wr/w)
Bilibala comments:
MTR is one of the HKG based corporation that successfully internationalize its business.
君臨天下
恆隆集團<00010.hk>與恆隆地 產<00101.hk>宣布，恆隆地產董事高伯遒斥資4085萬元，向港鐵<00066.hk>購入「君臨天下」1個單位。另 外，恆隆集團及恆隆地產董事袁偉良同時以4372萬元，向港鐵購入「君臨天下」1個單位。
兩項交易涉資8457萬元，恆隆地產預計錄得6200萬元收益，將用作一般營運資金。(da/w)
Bilibala comments:
HKG's real estate start to move upward, but only in the high end properties. Especially the ones on top of MTR station. This give an great opportunity for MTR to diversify its business into the low risk utility segment and high risk real estate market. Provide awesome return to its shareholders.
兩項交易涉資8457萬元，恆隆地產預計錄得6200萬元收益，將用作一般營運資金。(da/w)
Bilibala comments:
HKG's real estate start to move upward, but only in the high end properties. Especially the ones on top of MTR station. This give an great opportunity for MTR to diversify its business into the low risk utility segment and high risk real estate market. Provide awesome return to its shareholders.
Ex-Google China CEO Launches VC Fund
09-09-2009 | Source: Global Investor Magazine - Click here to take out a FREE Trial
Kai-fu Lee, former chief executive of Google China, is launching a $115 million venture capital fund, Financial Times reports. The fund will seek to create five Chinese start-ups a year in the internet and mobile internet sector, or in cloud computing, an internet service.
The Information Works Fund has attracted the interest of some big names in the internet industry, such has Steve Chen, co-founder of YouTube, Foxconn, the electronics contract maker, Legend Holdings, the parent of PC maker Lenovo, and venture capital firm, WI Harper.
The fund will provide early-stage incubation and seed money to develop entrepreneur talent in China. Many Taiwanese-backed venture capital firms, such as Acer spin-off, ID Tech, are players in China but are unwilling to enter the early-stage phase.
For the complete story, click here.
2.6 million more people into poverty
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The first year of recession took a toll on household incomes, drove 2.6 million more people into poverty, and cost 1 million people their employer-provided health care, the government reported Thursday.
Real median household income fell 3.6% in 2008 to $50,303, while the number of people living in poverty rose by 2.6 million to a record 39.8 million, or 13.2% of the population, up from 12.5% in 2007, the Census Bureau said. Read the full report.
Real median incomes had risen for three straight years before the dropoff in 2008. The decline in median incomes in 2008 was similar to that seen in the past two recessions, but less than in the years around the 1974 and 1982 recessions
In a finding sure to resonate with the debate on health-insurance reform, the government reported that the number of Americans without health insurance at any time during the year climbed by 800,000 to 46.3 million, or 15.4% of the population. The percentage of uninsured was unchanged from 2007 and has been essentially unchanged since 1991.
The number of people receiving employer-provided health care fell by 1 million to 176 million, while the number under government-funded health-care rose by 4.4 million to 87.4 million. About 25 million have private insurance not provided by an employer.
About 21 million people worked full-time but had no health insurance.
The number of children without health insurance fell to 7.3 million, the lowest since 1987, when the data were first collected. Fewer than 10% of children were uninsured, while 20% of adults under 65 were uninsured. Fewer than 2% of people over 65 were uninsured.
Nearly half of noncitizens were uninsured, accounting for about one-fifth of the total uninsured.
Rex Nutting is Washington bureau chief of MarketWatch.
Bilibala comments:
Poor & needy people are normally the one who suffer the most in recession and benefit the less in times of recover (hurt by inflation with less or even none of salary increase).
If we can free up our hand & some of our money to offer support, we should do so.
Real median household income fell 3.6% in 2008 to $50,303, while the number of people living in poverty rose by 2.6 million to a record 39.8 million, or 13.2% of the population, up from 12.5% in 2007, the Census Bureau said. Read the full report.
Real median incomes had risen for three straight years before the dropoff in 2008. The decline in median incomes in 2008 was similar to that seen in the past two recessions, but less than in the years around the 1974 and 1982 recessions
In a finding sure to resonate with the debate on health-insurance reform, the government reported that the number of Americans without health insurance at any time during the year climbed by 800,000 to 46.3 million, or 15.4% of the population. The percentage of uninsured was unchanged from 2007 and has been essentially unchanged since 1991.
The number of people receiving employer-provided health care fell by 1 million to 176 million, while the number under government-funded health-care rose by 4.4 million to 87.4 million. About 25 million have private insurance not provided by an employer.
About 21 million people worked full-time but had no health insurance.
The number of children without health insurance fell to 7.3 million, the lowest since 1987, when the data were first collected. Fewer than 10% of children were uninsured, while 20% of adults under 65 were uninsured. Fewer than 2% of people over 65 were uninsured.
Nearly half of noncitizens were uninsured, accounting for about one-fifth of the total uninsured.
Rex Nutting is Washington bureau chief of MarketWatch.
Bilibala comments:
Poor & needy people are normally the one who suffer the most in recession and benefit the less in times of recover (hurt by inflation with less or even none of salary increase).
If we can free up our hand & some of our money to offer support, we should do so.
Google moves toward micropayments for newspapers
by Caroline McCarthy
With micropayments and transaction platforms a buzzworthy sector of the Web right now, it's no surprise that Google would want to get in on the game.
But Mountain View's pitch is a little bit different: The payment platform it plans to build, according to the Nieman Journalism Lab, is geared toward newspapers that want to charge for digital content.
Google's plan was detailed in a letter that the company sent to the Newspaper Association for America, basically requesting information pertaining to paid-content models.
"While currently in the early planning stages, micropayments will be a payment vehicle available to both Google and non-Google properties within the next year," the letter, as published by the Nieman Lab, explained. "The idea is to allow viable payments of a penny to several dollars by aggregating purchases across merchants and over time. Google will mitigate the risk of non-payment by assigning credit limits based on past purchasing behavior and having credit card instruments on file for those with higher credit limits and using our proprietary risk engines to track abuse or fraud. Merchant integration will be extremely simple."
This is interesting, as Nieman Lab points out, because Google's plan aggregates payments into a bundle for processing, something that could potentially quell publisher concerns about transaction fees. The plan is very preliminary, obviously.
Google's Checkout product, the online transaction service that would likely be the base for the hypothetical micropayment system, has been around for a few years now. But it hasn't made a huge dent in far bigger competitor PayPal, and it's also been experiencing some big problems, as my colleague Tom Krazit reported Thursday.
"The Newspaper Association of America asked Google to submit some ideas for how its members could use technology to generate more revenue from their digital content, and we shared some of those ideas in this proposal," a statement from Google's PR department read. "It's consistent with Google's effort to help publishers reach bigger audiences, better engage their readers and make more money."
It ought to be pointed out, of course, that Google has been the target of harsh criticism from the newspaper industry (as well as other sectors of the publishing business) for profiting from third-party content. Wall Street Journal editor Robert Thomson went so far as to call online news aggregators (not mentioning Google by name) "parasites or tech tapeworms."
Meanwhile, the payment platform that's been getting the most scrutiny and interest in the tech press these days has been, of course, Facebook's "credits" system. But while Facebook's pitch thus far has been toward nonprofits looking for small donations and game developers using virtual goods, it's still impossible to discount the fact that Google's micropayments move could be aimed at staking a claim in the same territory.
Note: This post was expanded at 7:09 a.m. PDT.
Bilibala comments:
Currently, other than search engine, Google did not make money in other business. Look forward to see how is the corp doing in You Tube and its mobile phone, if it works and may be the newspaper will work too.
With micropayments and transaction platforms a buzzworthy sector of the Web right now, it's no surprise that Google would want to get in on the game.
But Mountain View's pitch is a little bit different: The payment platform it plans to build, according to the Nieman Journalism Lab, is geared toward newspapers that want to charge for digital content.
Google's plan was detailed in a letter that the company sent to the Newspaper Association for America, basically requesting information pertaining to paid-content models.
"While currently in the early planning stages, micropayments will be a payment vehicle available to both Google and non-Google properties within the next year," the letter, as published by the Nieman Lab, explained. "The idea is to allow viable payments of a penny to several dollars by aggregating purchases across merchants and over time. Google will mitigate the risk of non-payment by assigning credit limits based on past purchasing behavior and having credit card instruments on file for those with higher credit limits and using our proprietary risk engines to track abuse or fraud. Merchant integration will be extremely simple."
This is interesting, as Nieman Lab points out, because Google's plan aggregates payments into a bundle for processing, something that could potentially quell publisher concerns about transaction fees. The plan is very preliminary, obviously.
Google's Checkout product, the online transaction service that would likely be the base for the hypothetical micropayment system, has been around for a few years now. But it hasn't made a huge dent in far bigger competitor PayPal, and it's also been experiencing some big problems, as my colleague Tom Krazit reported Thursday.
"The Newspaper Association of America asked Google to submit some ideas for how its members could use technology to generate more revenue from their digital content, and we shared some of those ideas in this proposal," a statement from Google's PR department read. "It's consistent with Google's effort to help publishers reach bigger audiences, better engage their readers and make more money."
It ought to be pointed out, of course, that Google has been the target of harsh criticism from the newspaper industry (as well as other sectors of the publishing business) for profiting from third-party content. Wall Street Journal editor Robert Thomson went so far as to call online news aggregators (not mentioning Google by name) "parasites or tech tapeworms."
Meanwhile, the payment platform that's been getting the most scrutiny and interest in the tech press these days has been, of course, Facebook's "credits" system. But while Facebook's pitch thus far has been toward nonprofits looking for small donations and game developers using virtual goods, it's still impossible to discount the fact that Google's micropayments move could be aimed at staking a claim in the same territory.
Note: This post was expanded at 7:09 a.m. PDT.
Bilibala comments:
Currently, other than search engine, Google did not make money in other business. Look forward to see how is the corp doing in You Tube and its mobile phone, if it works and may be the newspaper will work too.
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