Nova Scotia's mumps outbreak is showing no signs of slowing down, infecting more than 200 people in the province and putting public-health officials across the country on alert.
In Ontario, a spokesman for the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care said yesterday the province has confirmed three cases and is awaiting test results on five others. The outbreak, which began in late February, has also infected 34 people in New Brunswick and one in Prince Edward Island.
"The rest of the country has been alerted and everybody's keeping a really close eye to see if they might get some cases," Jeannette Macey, head of disease surveillance in the immunization and respiratory infections division at the agency, said yesterday.
"Mumps is pretty prevalent all over the world, so you can expect you will get outbreaks from time to time," Ms. Macey added. "It's been quite a few years since we've seen any in Canada, so I guess to some extent we were due for one."
Mumps causes fever and swollen saliva glands, but it can also lead to such serious illnesses as meningitis and, in rare cases, sterility in men. It is spread by activities such as coughing, sneezing, sharing drinks and kissing, and it can take up to seven days for symptoms to appear.
Vaccination is the best prevention for mumps, but doctors say young adults in their late teens and early 20s are more prone to the disease because they were born in a period when only one dose of vaccine was administered to children. Since 1996, preschoolers have received two doses.
Shelly Sarwal, a Nova Scotia medical officer of health, said the province is considering giving a second vaccine to people in this age group. In the meantime, she says there could be more cases across the country as university students who may be carrying the disease return home for the summer.
"We do expect to see more cases. And we also expect that this outbreak with go on for some time. ... We're going to be looking at something over months, not something that's going to end in a couple of days," Dr. Sarwal said.
This is the third outbreak of mumps in Nova Scotia in the past 1½years. The other two were smaller, infecting about 20 people each time. Larger outbreaks have also been seen in other countries recently, including the United States and Britain.
Those infected are asked to sequester themselves at home for nine days. Last month, a number of students at Dalhousie University in Halifax voluntarily stayed in isolation in residence rooms to prevent the disease from spreading.
Dr. Sarwal said she doesn't know the origin of Nova Scotia's outbreak. About 30 per cent of people who have the mumps show no symptoms, she said.
Young adults tend to be more social and, therefore, prone to catching the disease.
"There's not much you can actually do," Dr. Sarwal said. "We just ask people to stay home and limit their contact with other people in order to prevent the spread."
Sunday, May 6, 2007
The Epoch Times Ireland Mayweather Wins Decision Over De La Hoya
LAS VEGAS, May 5 — Floyd Mayweather Jr. had just defeated Oscar De La Hoya in their superwelterweight title bout in a split decision Saturday night when a controversy threatened to delay, if not upend, his victory.
Richard Schaefer, the chief executive of De La Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions, looked at the scorecard and erupted. The scores by the three judges looked transposed, which would have given De La Hoya the victory, because his scores were listed as coming from the blue corner, when he was actually in the red one. Schaefer stormed out of the MGM Grand Garden Arena, a copy of the scorecard in hand, looking in the bowels of the building for one of the Nevada State Athletic commissioners or someone from the World Boxing Council, which sanctioned the fight.
He found none of them, but upon his return to the arena, he stepped onto the edge of the ring, where he got enough information from an assistant at the commission to satisfy him that the scores were rendered correctly on the scorecard even if the colors that marked the corners were not.
For a few minutes, the scene in the ring resembled something out of the examination of hanging chads on presidential ballots of Palm Beach County in Florida counties during the 2000 election. TV and still cameras surrounded them as Schaefer stoically tried to learn what had occurred.
“Every other promoter would probably protest and it would drag on and there’d be hearings,” Schaefer said at a news conference. “But this sport doesn’t deserve that. I believe it was an honest mistake.”
He wasn’t entirely satisfied with the paper trail he had seen and said with sarcasm that W.B.C. officials could not be found because “they went on to cash their check.”
De La Hoya and Mayweather will be able to cash very substantial checks very soon. De La Hoya (38-5), the former champion, was guaranteed $23.3 million and Mayweather (38-0) $10 million, but their share of pay-per-view revenue will vault their earnings into an even higher stratosphere.
Theirs was a fight in which De La Hoya was the clear aggressor, throwing more punches, and frequently pummeling Mayweather on the ropes. Mayweather had greater success in the middle of the ring, taking advantage of De La Hoya’s less-than adequate left jab. Although Mayweather lives here, this city is De La Hoya Country, and the fans roared for every flurry, and every punch landed, whether they were effective or not.
“All those shots he was throwing, he was missing,” Mayweather said afterward at a news conference, which he entered with his friend, the rapper 50 Cent. “I was catching them on my shoulders.”
According to PunchStat figures compiled by CompuBox, De La Hoya threw more punches, 587 to Mayweather’s 481, but was less efficient, connecting on 122 to Mayweather’s 207. They threw nearly the same number of jabs, but Mayweather landed 69 to De La Hoya’s 40. And while De La Hoya threw 100 more power punches, Mayweather landed 56 more.
“When I was boxing him, I said, ‘Damn, it’s easy hitting him in the face,’ ” said Mayweather, clad in a naval jacket. “How’d he beat all those guys when it’s so easy to him in the face? I was waiting for his left hook, but he wasn’t going to hit me with it because I could see it coming.”
Mayweather won the fight, 116-112 and 115-113, on the scorecards of the judges Chuck Giampa and Jerry Roth. Tom Kaczmarek, the third judge, scored it 115-113 for De La Hoya.
Mayweather said he believed he won eight rounds. “I beat the best at 130, 135, 140, 147, and I now I beat the best at 154,” he said, although he said he actually weighed 148. “And I’ve made a ton of money.”
Floyd Mayweather Sr., who is estranged from his son, whom he developed as an amateur and young professional, and who later trained De La Hoya for six years, said he thought De La Hoya had won.
De La Hoya said he did not believe he had lost, but his voice showed little conviction when he said he felt that he had won.
“You have to respect the judges,” he said, adding that he did what he had to do, followed his trainer Freddie Roach’s game plan to be aggressive and cut off the ring as much as possible. But he said his jab failed him on a night when he desperately needed one. “He’s a great fighter,” he said. “What can I say? You can’t say anything bad about him.”
Mayweather said he was retiring but he hedged a little on giving up a potentially larger payday for a rematch. “I don’t know what the future holds for Floyd Mayweather,” he said, adding that he would speak to his advisers.
De La Hoya said only that he was returning to the drawing board to assess what happened. He is 34, and has now lost 5 of his last 12 fights.
It is unlikely that Mayweather, if he remains retired, will become a partner and executive in Golden Boy Promotions, as two other fighters who have beaten De La Hoya, Bernard Hopkins and Sugar Shane Mosley, have. Hopkins and Mosley stood behind De La Hoya on a stage as he spoke.
De La Hoya and Mayweather might eventually be able to put aside the acrimony that characterized the promotion of the bout, which HBO and Golden Boy hope will shatter the record of 1.99 million pay-per-view purchases, if not the non-heavyweight record of 1.4 million.
Throughout the run-up to the bout, Mayweather played the gleeful bad guy, trash-talking and taunting, while De La Hoya played his serious foil. On Saturday night, though, Mayweather said he was a good guy who loves his children and feeds the homeless and battered women.
But he audaciously entered the ring wearing an enormous sombrero and trunks that were the color of the Mexican flag. De La Hoya, of course, is Mexican-American and entered to the sound of Mexican music.
When Schaefer was asked if the scorecard snafu resulted from one or more judges being unable to distinguish one boxer form another, he said with a laugh, “Well, Floyd was wearing a Mexican outfit.”
Next Article in Sports (2 of 37) »
Tough road for MSoft, Yahoo tie
New York - Yahoo's stock gains on Friday show that some investors like the idea of a Microsoft acquisition, but a deal is not assured.
A number of barriers are working against a deal, including Microsoft's historical reticence to large acquisitions, the risks of integrating two large operations and Yahoo's possible resistance to being absorbed by the Redmond, Washington, software giant.
As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft and Yahoo executives are taking a fresh look at a merger of the two companies or some kind of match-up that would pair their companies' respective strengths, according to people familiar with the situation.
However, the talks - rumours of which come and go - appear to be early stage, and their status is unclear. Indeed, one source close to Microsoft says talks are not underway currently.
Nonetheless, to many, a merger would create a more formidable competitor to Google, with a better shot at checking its growing dominance of internet advertising. While Microsoft has the most to gain from a tie-up, the company has historically been averse to large, tricky acquisitions.
Meanwhile Yahoo, with less to gain and more to lose, appears cool to the idea. Yahoo's shares, though, skyrocketed on Friday on the reports, trading as high as $33.61, before settling down to $30.94, up 9.8% on the day. Microsoft shares fell 1.4% to $30.52.
Barriers to a deal
History and the sheer size of any transaction work against a deal. Talks have been rumoured for more than two years without result, even though many have seen a tie-up as "a quick fix, and the only fix, to Microsoft's broken internet business," Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster said in a note on Friday. He gave a merger only 25% odd of success.
Microsoft's largest acquisition to date was Great Plains software, which it bought in 2001 for $1.1bn. Munster estimates Microsoft will have to pay at least $60bn to win Yahoo, which he believes will demand a price that reflects the accelerated growth in search advertising it expects to reap from the Panama upgrade. The New York Post reported deal talk at about $50bn, or approximately $35 a share.
Any price tag is likely to carry a lofty valuation for Yahoo, which already is pricier than Google. According to Factset Research, an offer of $35 a share, would value Yahoo at 62.5 times current year estimates, nearly double Google's multiple of almost 34 times earnings estimates.
Microsoft, though, may have to pay that amount in order to gain the scale necessary to catch Google on the web. Within Microsoft, the winds that helped derail talks last year may have shifted.
At that time, managers within Microsoft's online group pushed for the company to rely on its own online search and ad systems and not buy Yahoo. But several of the architects of those systems have since left the company.
Meanwhile, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer is under pressure to complete an acquisition to boost the company online. Last month, Microsoft and others including Yahoo, lost the chance to buy DoubleClick when Google swooped in and bought the online-ad specialist for $3.1bn.
"Yahoo is the only game-changing acquisition for Microsoft," Goldman Sachs analyst Anthony Noto wrote on Friday. Microsoft needs scale in advertisers, which is typically driven by scale in search queries, which it has failed to achieve on its own.
"Only Yahoo (not DoubleClick or any other acquisition other than potentially eBay with 5 million sellers, all of which could be advertisers) has a large base of advertisers and searchers."
Microsoft handled only 10% of web searches in March, compared with 22% for Yahoo and 54% for Google, according to measurement firm Nielsen//NetRatings.
However, top Yahoo executives could be a big obstacle to any deal. Co-founder Jerry Yang, for one, has a reputation for disliking Microsoft and avoids using Microsoft products, says one person familiar with the matter.
Top Yahoo staff might leave if Microsoft acquired the company and triggered a vesting of their Yahoo options.
Overall, Yahoo feels that its recently overhauled strategy, including a new organisational structure, investments in social media and mobile services and strong recent momentum in inking partnerships, has positioned it to better compete and take advantage of the boom in online advertising.
It also fears a loss of flexibility and agility that could occur if it is swallowed up by the enormous Microsoft, which is involved in many large technology markets.
Fighting Google
Though the integration of the two companies' operations would be a daunting prospect, industry watchers say the two companies would do well to team up against Google.
Microsoft would bring to the table a richly funded and well-staffed search-engine technology effort that could in time counter Google's technical superiority there.
Meanwhile, Yahoo would supply stronger consumer web traffic and a formidable advertising operation - including a solid salesforce, larger base of advertisers and a strong set of advertising-related technologies in both the search and display arenas.
Yahoo also would give Microsoft other valuable internet businesses, from a leading local-search service to small-business services to the HotJobs employment site.
"Together they are a force to be reckoned with," says Ben Kirshner, chief executive of New York search-marketing firm, Elite SEM Inc. "Separate, Google is just laughing all the way to the bank."
A number of barriers are working against a deal, including Microsoft's historical reticence to large acquisitions, the risks of integrating two large operations and Yahoo's possible resistance to being absorbed by the Redmond, Washington, software giant.
As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft and Yahoo executives are taking a fresh look at a merger of the two companies or some kind of match-up that would pair their companies' respective strengths, according to people familiar with the situation.
However, the talks - rumours of which come and go - appear to be early stage, and their status is unclear. Indeed, one source close to Microsoft says talks are not underway currently.
Nonetheless, to many, a merger would create a more formidable competitor to Google, with a better shot at checking its growing dominance of internet advertising. While Microsoft has the most to gain from a tie-up, the company has historically been averse to large, tricky acquisitions.
Meanwhile Yahoo, with less to gain and more to lose, appears cool to the idea. Yahoo's shares, though, skyrocketed on Friday on the reports, trading as high as $33.61, before settling down to $30.94, up 9.8% on the day. Microsoft shares fell 1.4% to $30.52.
Barriers to a deal
History and the sheer size of any transaction work against a deal. Talks have been rumoured for more than two years without result, even though many have seen a tie-up as "a quick fix, and the only fix, to Microsoft's broken internet business," Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster said in a note on Friday. He gave a merger only 25% odd of success.
Microsoft's largest acquisition to date was Great Plains software, which it bought in 2001 for $1.1bn. Munster estimates Microsoft will have to pay at least $60bn to win Yahoo, which he believes will demand a price that reflects the accelerated growth in search advertising it expects to reap from the Panama upgrade. The New York Post reported deal talk at about $50bn, or approximately $35 a share.
Any price tag is likely to carry a lofty valuation for Yahoo, which already is pricier than Google. According to Factset Research, an offer of $35 a share, would value Yahoo at 62.5 times current year estimates, nearly double Google's multiple of almost 34 times earnings estimates.
Microsoft, though, may have to pay that amount in order to gain the scale necessary to catch Google on the web. Within Microsoft, the winds that helped derail talks last year may have shifted.
At that time, managers within Microsoft's online group pushed for the company to rely on its own online search and ad systems and not buy Yahoo. But several of the architects of those systems have since left the company.
Meanwhile, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer is under pressure to complete an acquisition to boost the company online. Last month, Microsoft and others including Yahoo, lost the chance to buy DoubleClick when Google swooped in and bought the online-ad specialist for $3.1bn.
"Yahoo is the only game-changing acquisition for Microsoft," Goldman Sachs analyst Anthony Noto wrote on Friday. Microsoft needs scale in advertisers, which is typically driven by scale in search queries, which it has failed to achieve on its own.
"Only Yahoo (not DoubleClick or any other acquisition other than potentially eBay with 5 million sellers, all of which could be advertisers) has a large base of advertisers and searchers."
Microsoft handled only 10% of web searches in March, compared with 22% for Yahoo and 54% for Google, according to measurement firm Nielsen//NetRatings.
However, top Yahoo executives could be a big obstacle to any deal. Co-founder Jerry Yang, for one, has a reputation for disliking Microsoft and avoids using Microsoft products, says one person familiar with the matter.
Top Yahoo staff might leave if Microsoft acquired the company and triggered a vesting of their Yahoo options.
Overall, Yahoo feels that its recently overhauled strategy, including a new organisational structure, investments in social media and mobile services and strong recent momentum in inking partnerships, has positioned it to better compete and take advantage of the boom in online advertising.
It also fears a loss of flexibility and agility that could occur if it is swallowed up by the enormous Microsoft, which is involved in many large technology markets.
Fighting Google
Though the integration of the two companies' operations would be a daunting prospect, industry watchers say the two companies would do well to team up against Google.
Microsoft would bring to the table a richly funded and well-staffed search-engine technology effort that could in time counter Google's technical superiority there.
Meanwhile, Yahoo would supply stronger consumer web traffic and a formidable advertising operation - including a solid salesforce, larger base of advertisers and a strong set of advertising-related technologies in both the search and display arenas.
Yahoo also would give Microsoft other valuable internet businesses, from a leading local-search service to small-business services to the HotJobs employment site.
"Together they are a force to be reckoned with," says Ben Kirshner, chief executive of New York search-marketing firm, Elite SEM Inc. "Separate, Google is just laughing all the way to the bank."
RBS consortium ‘bids for LaSalle’
ABN Amro was on Sunday weighing the merits of a $24.5bn offer for its US subsidiary, LaSalle, from a consortium led by Royal Bank of Scotland as part of a proposed €71bn break-up bid for the Dutch lender.
The consortium’s bid for LaSalle, submitted on Saturday, is significantly higher than the $21bn offer ABN Amro has already agreed with Bank of America, conceived as a prelude to a sale of the rest of ABN to Barclays. However, the price is conditional on the consortium succeeding with its plan to buy the whole of ABN Amro.
The consortium, which includes Santander of Spain and Fortis, the Belgo-Dutch group, was on Sunday continuing to work with ABN Amro to clarify its proposed takeover bid, which values the bank at €38.40 per share.
People familiar with the talks said the consortium’s plans left several important questions unanswered, such as how it would raise the €27 a share in cash it is planning to include in its offer for ABN Amro, and how this would be divided between the three banks.
However, those people also stressed the talks were fluid and the situation could change. Under the terms of its agreement with BofA, ABN Amro had until midnight, New York time, on Sunday to accept a higher offer for LaSalle. BofA then has five days to match the bid.
The LaSalle sale process has been thrown into confusion after a Dutch commercial court ruled on Thursday that the deal must be put to ABN Amro shareholders. The ruling prompted BofA to file a lawsuit against ABN Amro in New York, claiming it would suffer billions of dollars in damages if the LaSalle deal did not go ahead.
The consortium is planning to create a bid vehicle that would buy ABN Amro and then divide its assets among the three banks. The cash component would be partially funded with rights issues by Fortis and Santander in the fourth quarter of the year. Merrill Lynch, the investment bank advising the consortium, is understood to have committed to underwrite the entire bid.
However, the consortium has so far failed to clarify on what terms these rights issues would be carried out or how much cash they would raise. It also remains unclear how the ownership of the bid vehicle will be structured, or whether the Dutch central bank will accept such a proposal.
ABN Amro’s management and supervisory boards must rule whether the consortium’s offer for LaSalle is superior to BofA’s bid. Lawyers disagree on whether ABN Amro is allowed to accept a conditional offer, and any decision to do so may draw further legal challenges from BofA.
The consortium had also been planning to make its offer for ABN Amro conditional on there not being any outstanding legal actions against the bank. But it is now understood to have dropped that condition.
The consortium’s bid for LaSalle, submitted on Saturday, is significantly higher than the $21bn offer ABN Amro has already agreed with Bank of America, conceived as a prelude to a sale of the rest of ABN to Barclays. However, the price is conditional on the consortium succeeding with its plan to buy the whole of ABN Amro.
The consortium, which includes Santander of Spain and Fortis, the Belgo-Dutch group, was on Sunday continuing to work with ABN Amro to clarify its proposed takeover bid, which values the bank at €38.40 per share.
People familiar with the talks said the consortium’s plans left several important questions unanswered, such as how it would raise the €27 a share in cash it is planning to include in its offer for ABN Amro, and how this would be divided between the three banks.
However, those people also stressed the talks were fluid and the situation could change. Under the terms of its agreement with BofA, ABN Amro had until midnight, New York time, on Sunday to accept a higher offer for LaSalle. BofA then has five days to match the bid.
The LaSalle sale process has been thrown into confusion after a Dutch commercial court ruled on Thursday that the deal must be put to ABN Amro shareholders. The ruling prompted BofA to file a lawsuit against ABN Amro in New York, claiming it would suffer billions of dollars in damages if the LaSalle deal did not go ahead.
The consortium is planning to create a bid vehicle that would buy ABN Amro and then divide its assets among the three banks. The cash component would be partially funded with rights issues by Fortis and Santander in the fourth quarter of the year. Merrill Lynch, the investment bank advising the consortium, is understood to have committed to underwrite the entire bid.
However, the consortium has so far failed to clarify on what terms these rights issues would be carried out or how much cash they would raise. It also remains unclear how the ownership of the bid vehicle will be structured, or whether the Dutch central bank will accept such a proposal.
ABN Amro’s management and supervisory boards must rule whether the consortium’s offer for LaSalle is superior to BofA’s bid. Lawyers disagree on whether ABN Amro is allowed to accept a conditional offer, and any decision to do so may draw further legal challenges from BofA.
The consortium had also been planning to make its offer for ABN Amro conditional on there not being any outstanding legal actions against the bank. But it is now understood to have dropped that condition.
Warren Buffett going global
Alec Hogg reports from Omaha: Buffett, the world's top investor wants much more money outside the US.
Omaha -
After the success of his first step, the $4bn acquisition of Israel's Iscar, the world's smartest investor is now keen to invest aggressively outside of his home country.
Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett (76) articulated this to 27 000 shareholders who made the annual pilgrimage to his US heartland hometown over the weekend. Buffett said in the next few months he will be stepping up efforts to invest abroad, admitting "we can be validly criticised for not making more of an effort (in the past)".
Corn-fed Buffett is a notoriously bad traveller who prefers crunching numbers (and working the phone) from his modest office and home in Omaha. On a rare trip to France some years back, he made news when eschewing its best restaurants in favour of burger and fries (and an annual report) in his Paris hotel room.
Virtually all of Berkshire's 217 000-employee, $100bn a year operation is housed in the US. So Buffett's desire to substantially raise the "half dozen or so" non-American investments heralds a new direction for the group.
Buffett told the seventh consecutive record crowd at Berkshire's annual general meeting (AGM [up 3 000 on last year]) that during the next few months he will be working closely with the CEO of the new Israeli subsidiary to pursue opportunities outside America.
He explained: "The hard fact is that we were not on the radar screen abroad as we have become in the US. Eitan (Wertheimer, Iscar's chairman) has a programme to change that."
Berkshire's pre-meeting corporate movie helped focus shareholder attention on the strategy, showing them what Buffett and vice chairman Charlie Munger (83) witnessed at Iscar when visiting Israel in September.
Buffett enthused that the acquisition was a bigger highlight than last year's world record one-year net worth gain of $17bn. He raised a spontaneous cheer from the AGM attendees when shown on video saying "Israel will always be here....and Berkshire will always be in Israel." Usually subdued Munger raved about Iscar's technology and space age production plant.
The offshore drive comes as Berkshire has been upping the ante with already sizeable bets against the Greenback, a currency which Buffett is convinced will continue sliding: "...(the US) is following policies that over time are likely to see the dollar fall in value against major currencies. For a while now we have been focused much more on buying into companies that generate revenue in other currencies".
In the past four years, Buffett's view of continued dollar weakness has netted Berkshire a direct profit of $2,2bn in its foreign exchange bets. He says Berkshire has now traded out of all barring one of those currencies, but isn't about to give that secret away: "You'll be surprised (at the one we still hold); but you'll have to wait until next year to find out."
Although much of the attention is offshore, Buffett says he continues to invest in the US share market, injecting a further $5bn into equities during the first three months of the year. But while he prefers shares to fixed interest alternatives on a longer-term view, he expects future gains to be modest.
South Africa received its first ever mention at the Berkshire AGM when Buffett noted that the event had this year attracted 600 shareholders from outside the US and Canada: "This is a record (up from 400 last year) with about 100 from Australia and almost as many from South Africa."
The latest unit trust portfolios confirm the growing interest. At the end of March, seven South African unit trusts owned a combined R158m worth of Berkshire Hathaway stock. Biggest individual holder was the Investec Opportunities Fund's R71m, all of which was acquired during the quarter.
The fund's manager Clyde Rossouw, in Omaha with colleague Sam Houlie, said he enjoyed the experience. Long-time "Buffett-philes" Kokkie Kooyman (Sanlam Investment Management) and Walter Aylett, formerly of Coronation, clearly delighted in their Pied Piper role of attracting the expanding number of SA asset management professionals.
Although leading SA value house Allan Gray was notable by its absence, there were sizeable contingents at this year's Berkshire AGM from Sanlam, Coronation and stockbrokers BJM (which run a special Berkshire Hathaway fund for small investors).
Moneyweb Radio market commentator David Shapiro was among those making their first visit.
Less welcome than these fresh converts to the Buffett cause were a handful of activists who used the global stage to express their opinions.
It was hardly a hijacking. Buffett allowed them to state their cases clearly but without disrupting much of the five-hour public session. But statements and subsequent questions from three different interest groups contrasted starkly with the relaxed mood and focused themes of past years.
FirstRand co-founder Laurie Dippenaar, attending his fifth consecutive AGM, reckoned: "Warren [Buffett] handled it very well, but seemed a bit rattled by the end of it. It's not his style to be portrayed as the bad guy. I think he will do something to ensure he's not subjected to this kind of thing again."
Berkshire was criticised from the floor about its investment in PetroChina (accused of propping up the regime in Sudan); for dams in Northern California owned by its electricity subsidiary PacifiCorp (which has decimated salmon fishing in the area); and for the group's continued support of Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion bodies.
Omaha -
After the success of his first step, the $4bn acquisition of Israel's Iscar, the world's smartest investor is now keen to invest aggressively outside of his home country.
Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett (76) articulated this to 27 000 shareholders who made the annual pilgrimage to his US heartland hometown over the weekend. Buffett said in the next few months he will be stepping up efforts to invest abroad, admitting "we can be validly criticised for not making more of an effort (in the past)".
Corn-fed Buffett is a notoriously bad traveller who prefers crunching numbers (and working the phone) from his modest office and home in Omaha. On a rare trip to France some years back, he made news when eschewing its best restaurants in favour of burger and fries (and an annual report) in his Paris hotel room.
Virtually all of Berkshire's 217 000-employee, $100bn a year operation is housed in the US. So Buffett's desire to substantially raise the "half dozen or so" non-American investments heralds a new direction for the group.
Buffett told the seventh consecutive record crowd at Berkshire's annual general meeting (AGM [up 3 000 on last year]) that during the next few months he will be working closely with the CEO of the new Israeli subsidiary to pursue opportunities outside America.
He explained: "The hard fact is that we were not on the radar screen abroad as we have become in the US. Eitan (Wertheimer, Iscar's chairman) has a programme to change that."
Berkshire's pre-meeting corporate movie helped focus shareholder attention on the strategy, showing them what Buffett and vice chairman Charlie Munger (83) witnessed at Iscar when visiting Israel in September.
Buffett enthused that the acquisition was a bigger highlight than last year's world record one-year net worth gain of $17bn. He raised a spontaneous cheer from the AGM attendees when shown on video saying "Israel will always be here....and Berkshire will always be in Israel." Usually subdued Munger raved about Iscar's technology and space age production plant.
The offshore drive comes as Berkshire has been upping the ante with already sizeable bets against the Greenback, a currency which Buffett is convinced will continue sliding: "...(the US) is following policies that over time are likely to see the dollar fall in value against major currencies. For a while now we have been focused much more on buying into companies that generate revenue in other currencies".
In the past four years, Buffett's view of continued dollar weakness has netted Berkshire a direct profit of $2,2bn in its foreign exchange bets. He says Berkshire has now traded out of all barring one of those currencies, but isn't about to give that secret away: "You'll be surprised (at the one we still hold); but you'll have to wait until next year to find out."
Although much of the attention is offshore, Buffett says he continues to invest in the US share market, injecting a further $5bn into equities during the first three months of the year. But while he prefers shares to fixed interest alternatives on a longer-term view, he expects future gains to be modest.
South Africa received its first ever mention at the Berkshire AGM when Buffett noted that the event had this year attracted 600 shareholders from outside the US and Canada: "This is a record (up from 400 last year) with about 100 from Australia and almost as many from South Africa."
The latest unit trust portfolios confirm the growing interest. At the end of March, seven South African unit trusts owned a combined R158m worth of Berkshire Hathaway stock. Biggest individual holder was the Investec Opportunities Fund's R71m, all of which was acquired during the quarter.
The fund's manager Clyde Rossouw, in Omaha with colleague Sam Houlie, said he enjoyed the experience. Long-time "Buffett-philes" Kokkie Kooyman (Sanlam Investment Management) and Walter Aylett, formerly of Coronation, clearly delighted in their Pied Piper role of attracting the expanding number of SA asset management professionals.
Although leading SA value house Allan Gray was notable by its absence, there were sizeable contingents at this year's Berkshire AGM from Sanlam, Coronation and stockbrokers BJM (which run a special Berkshire Hathaway fund for small investors).
Moneyweb Radio market commentator David Shapiro was among those making their first visit.
Less welcome than these fresh converts to the Buffett cause were a handful of activists who used the global stage to express their opinions.
It was hardly a hijacking. Buffett allowed them to state their cases clearly but without disrupting much of the five-hour public session. But statements and subsequent questions from three different interest groups contrasted starkly with the relaxed mood and focused themes of past years.
FirstRand co-founder Laurie Dippenaar, attending his fifth consecutive AGM, reckoned: "Warren [Buffett] handled it very well, but seemed a bit rattled by the end of it. It's not his style to be portrayed as the bad guy. I think he will do something to ensure he's not subjected to this kind of thing again."
Berkshire was criticised from the floor about its investment in PetroChina (accused of propping up the regime in Sudan); for dams in Northern California owned by its electricity subsidiary PacifiCorp (which has decimated salmon fishing in the area); and for the group's continued support of Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion bodies.
NJ Gov. Corzine going back to work Monday -report
NEW YORK (Reuters) - New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, who was critically injured in a car crash on April 12, will return to work on Monday, his spokesman was quoted as saying on Saturday.
"The governor expects to resume his duties on Monday," said Anthony Coley, Corzine's communications director, The New York Times reported on its Web site.
Corzine, who was released from the hospital on Monday after breaking his left leg, several ribs, a collarbone and his sternum, was doing well, Coley said.
The governor's office could not immediately be reached for comment.
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Corzine was injured when the sport utility vehicle he was traveling in collided with a vehicle that swerved to avoid another car. The SUV was going 91 mph (146 kph) and Corzine was not wearing a seat belt, for which he later apologized, saying he had set a bad example.
The Democratic governor was in intensive care for most of his 18-day stay at Cooper University Hospital in Camden and has been recovering at the governor's mansion in Princeton.
"Doctors are very pleased with how he's progressing," the newspaper quoted Coley as saying.
(Writing by Chris Michaud, editing by Peter Cooney; World Desk Americas))
"The governor expects to resume his duties on Monday," said Anthony Coley, Corzine's communications director, The New York Times reported on its Web site.
Corzine, who was released from the hospital on Monday after breaking his left leg, several ribs, a collarbone and his sternum, was doing well, Coley said.
The governor's office could not immediately be reached for comment.
Reuters Pictures
Editors Choice: Best pictures
from the last 24 hours.
View Slideshow
Corzine was injured when the sport utility vehicle he was traveling in collided with a vehicle that swerved to avoid another car. The SUV was going 91 mph (146 kph) and Corzine was not wearing a seat belt, for which he later apologized, saying he had set a bad example.
The Democratic governor was in intensive care for most of his 18-day stay at Cooper University Hospital in Camden and has been recovering at the governor's mansion in Princeton.
"Doctors are very pleased with how he's progressing," the newspaper quoted Coley as saying.
(Writing by Chris Michaud, editing by Peter Cooney; World Desk Americas))
Saturday, March 24, 2007
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