Asian shares slip, Basel ruling supports banks

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Asian stocks drifted down on Monday as investors booked profits from a New Year rally that had pushed markets to multi-month highs, although financial stocks gained after global regulators decided to relax draft plans for tough new bank liquidity rules.
Commodity prices mostly held steady, supported by data showing the U.S. economy continuing on a path of slow but steady recovery that propelled Wall Street stocks to a five-year high.
Financial bookmakers called Europe's main share indexes to open flat or slightly lower, while S&P 500 index futures traded in Asia eased 0.2 percent, pointing to a weaker start in New York.
"It just seems like markets are entering a consolidation phase after recent gains and with most markets trading at fresh 12-month highs," said Stan Shamu, market strategist at financial spreadbetting firm IG in Melbourne.
The dollar fell against the yen, coming off a two-and-a-half year peak it had logged against the Japanese currency as investors adjusted to the possibility of more monetary stimulus in 2013 from the Bank of Japan and less from the U.S. Federal Reserve.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus>, which had reached its highest level since August 2011 on Thursday, eased 0.1 percent, while Tokyo's Nikkei share average <.n225> retreated after touching a 23-month high in early trade to close down 0.8 percent. <.t>
CASH BUFFERS
The MSCI benchmark's financial sector sub-index <.miapjfn00pus> firmed after the Basel Committee of banking supervisors agreed on Sunday to give banks four more years and greater flexibility to build up cash buffers so they can use some of their reserves to help struggling economies.
HSBC Holdings Hong Kong shares rose 1 percent, while Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd gained 0.6 percent. <.hk><.ax>
Shares in Japanese exporters were supported by the trend of a weakening yen, which traded around 87.85 to the dollar, up 0.3 percent on the day, after the U.S. currency rose as far as 88.40 yen, its highest in nearly two-and-a-half years, on Friday.
The dollar posted a gain of around 2.7 percent against the yen last week, its biggest weekly rise in more than a year. Its gains had accelerated after minutes from the Federal Reserve's December meeting showed some policymakers had considered ending the Fed's bond-buying program as early as this year.
By contrast, many investors are now betting that Japan's new government, led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, will push to weaken the yen and drive through aggressive fiscal stimulus, and pressure the Bank of Japan to do the same on the monetary side.
Although the dollar may pull back against the yen given the speed of its rise over the past month, its uptrend seems likely to remain intact, said Hiroshi Maeba, head of FX trading Japan for UBS in Tokyo.
"My sense is that the market could still head much higher," Maeba said. "I think 90 yen might be reached pretty soon."
The dollar firmed against the euro, which traded around $1.3035.
The U.S. stock benchmark S&P 500 index <.spx> closed at its highest level since December 2007 on Friday after data showed a steady pace of jobs growth and brisk expansion of the services sector in the world's biggest economy.
That offered support to growth-sensitive commodities, with copper little changed just below $8,100 a tonne, while Brent crude oil eased a little to around $111.20.
Spot gold firmed 0.3 percent to around $1,660 an ounce.

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Valderrama course creator Ortiz-Patino dies aged 82

MADRID (Reuters) - Jaime Ortiz-Patino, a Spain-based golf promoter who created the famous Valderrama course and who was one of the driving forces behind the growth of the sport in the Iberian nation, has died at the age of 82.
"Jaime Ortiz-Patino...passed away this morning in the Costa del Sol hospital in Marbella," the Spanish golf federation (RFEG) said in a statement on their website (www.rfeg.es) on Thursday.
Born to Bolivian parents in Paris in June 1930, Ortiz-Patino created the Valderrama course, designed by Robert Trent Jones, in the mid 1980s and was able to lure the Ryder Cup there in 1997, the first time the competition has been held outside the British Isles.
The course was the home of the Volvo Masters between 1988 and 1996 and from 2002 to 2008 and has also hosted the Amex World Championships and the Andalucia Masters.
Known as "Jimmy" to his friends, Ortiz-Patino, whose grandfather was a fabulously wealthy Bolivian tin magnate, amassed a collection of golfing memorabilia that captured the history of the game over 500 years.
It included clubs, balls, prints, books and manuscripts, ceramics, photographs and paintings and was auctioned at Christie's in London last year.
"All the members of the Spanish golf federation would like to express their deepest condolences to family and friends," the RFEG said. "Rest in peace.

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Stricker headed for semi-retirement

At the end of another long year, and only a month away from the start of another season, Steve Stricker quietly posed a question that sounded out of place for a guy with more than $25 million in PGA Tour earnings over the last six years.
"What if I went to Kapalua to defend and didn't play again the rest of the year?"
When he arrived on the shores of Maui for the season-opening Tournament of Champions, he had reached a compromise. Stricker, who turns 46 next month, is going into semi-retirement. When he leaves Kapalua, he won't return again until the Match Play Championship at the end of February.
He'll play the majors and World Golf Championships that are held in America, maybe a few other tournaments to get ready for the majors, and the John Deere Classic, which has become his hometown event ever since the Greater Milwaukee Open went away.
"I've proved to myself I could come back," said Stricker, once mired in a slump so severe he was voted PGA Tour comeback player — two years in a row. "I had a great run the last six years. I think it's just the travel, the time away. When I get home, I'm not there. I'm focused on where I go next. When I do something, I'm in it. I've had enough of being totally focused on golf and my life. And I wanted to not have it be about me anymore."
Stricker is wired differently from most. He gets as much pleasure taking his kids to school in Wisconsin as winning golf tournaments. He would rather spend his fall in a deer stand with a bow than on the practice green with his putter.
He has been thinking about cutting back for the last few years, only the decision was never easy. Not when he was as high as No. 2 in the world, a regular on U.S. teams in the Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup.
Even with some winter stubble after nine holes of practice on the Plantation Course at Kapalua, he looked fresh and ready to go.
"I'm excited about the year because I finally made this decision to scale back," he said. "You know me. I've been this way since Day One. I've never played a lot. I enjoy my time at home, and I've tossed around this idea with my family the last couple of years. Finally making a decision to scale back has lifted a little bit of a burden from me. I'm just as excited to play this week as I've ever been."
Stricker won the Tournament of Champions a year ago for his 12th career win, although that turned out to be the highlight of his year. In one of the more peculiar trends, he became the third straight player to win the PGA Tour's opener and not win again the rest of the year.
He faces a 30-man field of PGA Tour winners that is missing some of the top stars, no longer unusual in this global landscape of golf with Europeans competing deep into November and some international players, such as Ernie Els, starting next week in South Africa. Among those absent from Kapalua are Rory McIlroy, Tiger Woods, Luke Donald and Justin Rose, the top four players in the world ranking.
Stricker won't see many of them until he gets to Arizona for the Match Play Championship.
At least he's not walking away entirely. Over the last few weeks, he looked at the schedule and didn't feel he could miss the big events, particularly the majors. He hasn't set a number of events he wants to play, but it will be somewhere around 10.
What to do with all that free time? It won't be limited to a car pool or a deer stand. Stricker is forming a foundation with a new sponsor, American Family Insurance, with the goal of helping adolescents. The seed money comes from the charity donation he received for winning the Payne Stewart Award and playing on the Ryder Cup team.
His other sponsors — Titleist, Avis and the New York Stock Exchange — are behind his decision to cut back. Stricker has restructured his endorsement deals because he is playing less, and he plans to do more personal days with clients.
"I was prepared to lose all that, I really was," Stricker said. "For the most part, they're happy for me."
He still hasn't talked to PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem. Stricker is one of the most popular figures on tour because of the way he treats people. For now, this semi-retirement does not include The Players Championship or even the FedEx Cup playoffs, even if he has a reasonable shot at the $10 million bonus.
He would play the Presidents Cup or Ryder Cup if he qualifies. With his limited schedule, he would be playing some good golf.
And yes, he'll still practice. His 14-year-old daughter, Bobbi Maria, is a natural athlete who is getting into golf. There were a few times last year she wanted to go to the golf course with his dad, but Stricker feared he wouldn't get any work done on his game.
"Now I can put in some time with her," Stricker said. "She's talked about hitting more balls in the winter. I can spend more time with her doing that, and playing with her in the summer if she wants to."
The strongest part of her game? Stricker smiled.
"She putts good," he said.
Part of Stricker wishes he had done this sooner, but the time didn't seem right. He would emerge from his fall break to play in the World Challenge hosted by Tiger Woods, and then Greg Norman's Shootout in Florida, and he found himself not wanting to leave.
"The coolest part is I'm playing as good as I ever have," Stricker said. "I've accomplished a lot of things. I proved to myself I can come back from where I was and I played great for an extended period of time. The major thing is missing, but that's not hugely important to me. I don't have to win a major. Obviously, I'd love to. But it's not going to define who I am. It's all good. I feel like I'm doing this for the right reason.
"I felt like it would be a bold move a couple of years ago, and I think it's a bold move now," he said. "Some people might think it's not a good idea. But I think it is for me."

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PREVIEW-Golf-Players in paradise for PGA Tour season opener

 If winning breeds winning, then the picturesque Hawaiian island of Maui is a paradise in more ways than one for the select group of players competing at this week's $5.7 million Hyundai Tournament of Champions.
The only way to qualify for the elite field of 30 in the PGA Tour's season-opening event was through victory on the U.S. circuit last year and, with no cut and a guaranteed cheque after Monday's final round, the pickings are certainly favourable.
"It's always great to be here," American Hunter Mahan, a twice champion on the 2012 PGA Tour, told reporters at the Kapalua Resort while preparing for Friday's opening round.
"Obviously you won on the PGA Tour the year before so it's a great start and every player enjoys coming here and wants to start here.
"It's exciting but it's also crazy ... I feel like the year never really ended last year, it just kind of keeps on going. But it's certainly fun to be here."
Masters champion Bubba Watson agreed.
"Who would not want to come to Maui and play golf?" the American left-hander smiled.
"Ride in a golf cart in the pro-ams and practice rounds wearing shorts and then the tournament starts and you have to walk. But other than that it's great.
"A great time for the family, hanging out with friends and seeing the scenery. Playing the golf course is a challenge," Watson said of the par-73, 7,411-yard Plantation layout, "but it's a fun time to start off the year here in Maui."
DOWN TIME
Many of the players competing at Kapalua make the most of what time they have away from the golf course by surfing, swimming and taking the ever popular whale-watching cruises but Mahan said he was unlikely to follow suit.
"I don't particularly like the water that much," Mahan said. "I get seasick pretty easily, so I won't be out in the water too much.
"There's a hundred different things you can do here. At the same time, this is great weather and I'm trying to work on my game a little bit and make sure I get enough time for that."
While the Maui attractions are certainly plentiful for the competitors and their families, seven leading players who had qualified for the PGA Tour's season-opener have opted not to travel to Hawaii, mainly for tournament scheduling reasons.
Those notable absentees are world number one Rory McIlroy, second-ranked Luke Donald and Justin Rose (fourth), along with former Kapalua winners Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els and Sergio Garcia.

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What Happened to the 2012 Tech Bubble That Never Was

Turns out Facebook's fizzled IPO was a pretty good microcosm for 2012 in startup land: it was all one big fizzle. The final numbers for last year in venture-capital IPOs and acquisitions are in, and while there was no dot-com-era type of explosion, the much hyped new tech bubble appears to have just... petered out. There remains hope, as always, for the unpredictable year ahead. Here are some key stats from the Thompson Reuters and National Venture Capital Association survey released Wednesday:
RELATED: Mark Zuckerberg Promises Not to Bail on Facebook for the Next Year
Venture-backed companies made less money for their investors than they did a year ago.
There is less investment money out there, overall, with investors doling out $6.9 billion last quarter, compared to $10.1 billion the year before and $8.4 billion a quarter before that — a trend that The Wall Street Journal noted back in September, which we speculated may have had something to do with Facebook's IPO fail.
Acquisitions of "venture-backed companies" were also down, totaling $3.52 billion last quarter down from $4.99 the year before, as were acquisitions in general, which totaled $21.5 billion, down 11 percent from $24.09 billion in 2011.
The number of companies that opted to IPO fell to eight from 11 the year before.
The most positive figure from the entire report is actually skewed: Those eight companies that did IPO companies raised more money on average, combing out with higher valuations — an average that is weighed down almost entirely by Facebook. But venture-backed companies did raise $21.5 billion (way up from $10.7 billion the year before), which was the strongest annual funding since 2000.
RELATED: Ah, This Is Where the Real Silicon Valley Hackers Are
These numbers match the trends we saw all year, with Facebook's initial stock drop scaring away investors from start-ups, venture capitalists having a hard time raising money for tech ventures, and companies like Kayak pushing off their IPOs as long as possible until market conditions suit edtheir needs. It's just a lot of hesitancy. Part of that might just be a Facebook effect, or maybe 2012 was the "peak of the hype cycle" as Scott Sandell, a venture capitalist at New Enterprise Associates, described the year to The Wall Street Journal's Pui Wing-Tam.
RELATED: Tech Bubble Cautionary Tales: When Equity Replaces Money
And a descent generally follows a peak, right? Still, Sandell doesn't see 2013 as a year of doom or gloom for Silicon Valley. Things are sunny! "The end isn't anywhere near," he said, pointing to bright spots in companies that sell technologies to businesses. Of course, those aren't the big tech 2.0 companies we hear about all the time, the ones that made up the much discussed and much more specific social media bubble. What will become of the Twitters and Tumblrs, the Pinterests and Paths and SnapChats and all the clones they've already spawned? The path is less clear than ever, but, hey, it's only the first week fo January. And it probably won't be as bad as this.

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Patent hints Apple may bring its own unique stylus to iOS devices

Many people had a good laugh when Samsung (005930) unveiled the Galaxy Note last year and made a big deal out of the device’s Palm Pilot-like stylus. But once the Galaxy Note became a hit, people stopped snickering and began to take the stylus seriously as an accessory once again. Apple (AAPL) is apparently considering hopping on the stylus bandwagon, as HotHardware reports that the company has filed a patent for a pen accessory it describes as an “active stylus” that “can either act as a drive electrode to create an electric field between the drive electrode and the sense lines of a mutual capacitive touch sensor panel, or as a sense electrode for sensing capacitively coupled signals from one or more stimulated drive rows and columns of the touch sensor panel or both.”
[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]
Putting things into plain English, HotHardware says that this active stylus “would perform the same functions as a traditional stylus, it would just do a better job” by allowing for “more accurate input.”
[More from BGR: Nokia predicted to abandon mobile business, sell assets to Microsoft and Huawei in 2013]
Since Apple has willingly followed market trends over the past year by releasing a larger version of the iPhone and an 8-inch version of the iPad, it shouldn’t be too surprising that Apple is considering adding a stylus to its lineup of iOS products. That said, you probably shouldn’t expect Apple to release an “iNote” phablet anytime in the near future even if the company does release the next-generation iPhone in two different sizes.

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Quick fix for Boot Camp brings Windows 8 to new iMac computers

Early adopters of Apple’s (AAPL) new iMac computers who chose the 3TB Fusion Drive model have been unable to use Boot Camp Assistant. The program, which allows OS X users to install a Windows partition on their computers, is limited to drives of up to 2.2TB. Apple has hinted that the software may be updated in the future to support larger drives, however no set time frame has been given. Despite the set back, it has been discovered that it is still possible to create a working Boot Camp partition on new iMacs.
[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]
TwoCanoes Software notes that, “since it is not possible to get around the 2.2 TB limitation with booting Windows, it is possible to organize the partitions so that Windows is the last of the first four partitons [sic] and is within the first 2.2 TBs of space on the drive. Since the Mac can see the remaining space above the 2.2 TB limit, this space can be used for addtional [sic] storage space for OS X.”
[More from BGR: Nokia predicted to abandon mobile business, sell assets to Microsoft and Huawei in 2013]
TwoCanoes has created a simple step-by-step guide that will help users install Windows on their new iMac computers, and the fix will work with the latest version of Microsoft’s (MSFT) operating system, Windows 8.

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Samsung forced to reveal Galaxy sales data to Apple

Samsung (005930) was found to have infringed upon six of Apple’s patents this past August and ordered to pay the company $1.05 billion in damages. Apple (AAPL) is also seeking additional damages after its bid to blocks sales of eight Samsung devices failed. In order to asses the damages, Apple requested that Samsung hand over its sales data for its popular Galaxy line of smartphones and tablets. The company refused, however, in an effort to protect its confidential pricing details and profit margins.
[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh recently ruled that Samsung must file an exhibit listing the total number of units of sold during certain time periods, Bloomberg reported. In a separate order, the Judge granted Samsung its request to delay the publication of part of a sealed document that showed per-unit operating profit for two of its phones.
[More from BGR: Nokia predicted to abandon mobile business, sell assets to Microsoft and Huawei in 2013]
Koh denied most of Apple’s and Samsung’s other requests to seal documents, noting that here isn’t a “compelling reason” that would require them to be sealed.

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Apple may have sold up to 4 million iPhones to businesses in Q4

As we’ve mentioned countless times, it’s a good thing that RIM (RIMM) will release BlackBerry 10 soon, because otherwise Apple (AAPL) and Android will continue to wreck its market share among enterprise users. Benzinga reports that Trip Chowdhry, a managing director at Global Equities Research, has put out a research note estimating that Apple sold between 3 million and 4 million iPhones to businesses over the past quarter, some of whom have switched over from BlackBerry.
[More from BGR: ‘iPhone 5S’ to reportedly launch by June with multiple color options and two different display sizes]
“This figure emerges from a combination of new purchase of iPhones and users switching to iPhones from Blackberry,” Chowdhry writes. “After the two-year contract expiration on Apple iPhone[s], [the] majority of the enterprises have replaced their employees’ current phones with the new iPhone 5.”
[More from BGR: Nokia predicted to abandon mobile business, sell assets to Microsoft and Huawei in 2013]
As for reasons why more companies are switching to the iPhone, Chowdhry says that salespeople for key enterprise apps such as Salesforce, Workday and VMware are increasingly “demonstrating their enterprise offering on iPhones, which is also acting as a trigger for enterprises to purchase iPhones for their employees.” Chowdhry also thinks that the advent of mobile device management software has boosted the iPhone’s security capabilities and has made it less risky for companies to adopt.

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Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing in the UK Industry Market Research Report Now Updated by IBISWorld

The Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing industry is very competitive due to falling prices and low profit margins, and as a result, manufacturing has tended to shift to countries that have access to low-cost labour and deep and efficient supply chains. Industry revenue is expected to continue to fall over the next five years to 2017-18, but at a much lesser rate than it did in the previous five years to 2012-13.

London, United Kingdom (PRWEB) January 04, 2013
The Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing industry is very competitive, characterised by falling prices and low profit margins. Demand for computers and peripheral equipment has been promoted by falling prices and the release of new and enhanced products, software and applications. However, computer and peripheral equipment manufacturing has tended to shift to countries that have access to low-cost labour and deep and efficient supply chains. As a result, the number of firms and establishments in this industry has been falling.
The UK industry is expected to generate revenue of £1.13 billion in 2012-13, down 0.5% compared with 2011-12. The domestic market for computers and peripheral equipment is estimated at £8.1 billion in 2012-13, down 0.5% compared with 2011-12. Industry revenue is expected to contract by an annualised 8.5% in the five years through 2012-13 due to falling unit prices, weak domestic demand and growing imports. According to IBISWorld industry analyst Nigel Fitzpatrick, “domestic demand for industry products has been negatively affected by the slow economy and associated weakness in business investment and consumer spending”. Some unprofitable operations have closed and some companies have transferred production capacity from the UK to countries where manufacturing costs are low, such as China and countries in Eastern Europe.
Industry revenue is expected to continue to fall over the next five years to 2017-18, but at a much lesser rate than it did in the previous five years to 2012-13. Fitzpatrick adds, “industry activity in the next five years will be affected by a loss of market share in both domestic and export markets”. Competitive downward pressure on average unit selling prices will also negatively affect revenue.
The Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing industry has a low level of market share concentration. The top four players are expected to account for 18.9% of industry revenue in 2012-13. Major companies include RM, Stone Group and Viglen.
For more information on the Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing industry, including latest industry trends, statistics, analysis and market share information, purchase the full report from IBISWorld, the nation’s largest publisher of industry research.
IBISWorld industry Report Key Topics
Companies in the Computer & Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing industry produce electronic computers, such as mainframes, desktop computers, laptops and computer servers; and computer peripheral equipment, such as storage devices and input/output devices such as printers, monitors and keyboards.
Industry Performance

Executive Summary

Key External Drivers

Current Performance

Industry Outlook

Industry Life Cycle

Products & Markets

Supply Chain

Products & Services

Major Markets

Globalisation & Trade

Business Locations

Competitive Landscape

Market Share Concentration

Key Success Factors

Cost Structure Benchmarks

Barriers to Entry

Major Companies

Operating Conditions

Capital Intensity

Key Statistics

Industry Data

Annual Change

Key Ratios
About IBISWorld

Recognised as the nation’s most trusted independent source of industry and market research, IBISWorld offers a comprehensive database of unique information and analysis on many UK industries. With an extensive online portfolio, valued for its depth and scope, the company equips clients with the insight necessary to make better business decisions. Headquartered in London, IBISWorld serves a range of business, professional service and government organisations through more than 10 locations worldwide. For more information, visit http://www.ibisworld.co.uk or call (020) 3008 6568.

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