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MOORESVILLE, N.C. (AP) -- Lowe's Cos., the No. 2 home-improvement retailer, said Monday its third-quarter profit fell 30 percent as customers continued to delay large purchases amid a weak economy. But Lowe's said some of the hardest hit home markets are stabilizing.

Profit in the quarter ended Oct. 30 was $344 million, or 23 cents per share, down from $488 million, or 33 cents per share, in the same quarter last year. Results in the latest quarter included one-time costs related to closing some stores and no longer pursuing some future stores, as well as a tax benefit. Excluding those items, profit was 24 cents per share, matching analyst expectations according to a poll by Thomson Reuters.

Revenue edged down 3 percent to $11.38 billion from $11.73 billion, narrowly beating an average analyst estimate of $11.28 billion.

Sales in stores open at least one year fell 7.5 percent in the quarter. The metric is considered a key measurement of retailer health.

''The broad-based pressures of the macro environment are clearly evident in our sales as consumers continue to delay large purchases until they feel better about the economic outlook,'' said CEO Robert A. Niblock in a statement Low fee payday loans.

Home-improvement retailers have seen sales slip as consumers cut back on big-ticket remodeling projects amid the recession. Although the U.S. housing market is stabilizing, after a nearly three-year decline, home prices remain far below their peak.

Niblock said the company is beginning to see better performance in some of the hardest-hit housing markets, including California, Florida and parts of the desert Southwest.

For the fourth quarter, the company predicts sales will be flat compared with the $9.98 billion reported in the year-ago quarter. Analysts expect revenue of $9.91 billion.

Lowe's expects earnings of 9 cents to 13 cents per share for the fourth quarter. Analysts expect earnings of 10 cents per share.

For the year, the company expects sales to fall 2 percent to 3 percent, implying revenue of $46.75 billion to $47.24 billion. Analysts expect revenue of $46.84 billion.

Lowe's projects full-year earnings of $1.16 to $1.20 per share, while analysts expect $1.20 per share.

Lowe’s Posts Lower Profit but Sees Housing Market Stabilizing

The network equipment maker Cisco on Monday raised its bid for Norwegian videoconferencing equipment maker Tandberg. The increase was backed by holders of more than 40 percent of Tandberg’s shares, few of whom had warmed to Cisco’s previous bid.

Cisco’s new offer of 170 Norwegian kroner ($30.25) a Tandberg share, up from the 153.50 kroner bid that more than 90 percent of shareholders had dismissed, values Tandberg at nearly 19 billion kroner ($3.41 billion).

Few analysts expected Cisco to walk away, having repeatedly touted online videoconferencing as a key growth area, especially as companies save on travel costs during the downturn.

Tandberg shares were up 3.9 percent at 163.80 kroner in early European trading.

“I think they will get Tandberg at 170” kroner, an analyst, Anita Huun at Handelsbanken, said.

Panta Capital, a small London firm advising on merger arbitrage that had called the initial bid too low, said the new offer was “fair” and likely to succeed guaranteed payday loan. “I think it’s a done deal now,” Peter Germonpre, of Panta, said.

Mr. Germonpre said the new offer was more in line with the valuation of another major videoconferencing equipment provider, U.S. Polycom Inc. He said the small group of shareholders whose views he had represented in his earlier statement would be much more inclined to tender their shares.

Cisco said the offer, which expires on Dec. 1, was backed by Tandberg’s two largest shareholders, Folketrygdfondet funds and Oppenheimer Funds, and had received acceptances from owners of more than 40 percent of its stock.

“The new offer represents the ... final price for this transaction,” Cisco said in a statement.

The offer is in line with analysts’ views that Cisco could raise its bid to around 160 to 170 crowns.

Cisco Raises Bid for Tandberg of Norway

MIAHUATLÁN, Mexico — During the best of the times, Miguel Salcedo’s son, an illegal immigrant in San Diego, would be sending home hundreds of dollars a month to support his struggling family in Mexico. But at times like these, with the American economy out of whack and his son out of work, Mr. Salcedo finds himself doing what he never imagined he would have to do: wiring pesos north.

Unemployment has hit migrant communities in the United States so hard that a startling new phenomenon has been detected: instead of receiving remittances from relatives in the richest country on earth, some down-and-out Mexican families are scraping together what they can to support their unemployed loved ones in the United States.

“We send something whenever we have a little extra, at least enough so he can eat,” said Mr. Salcedo, who is from a small village here in the rural state of Oaxaca and works odd jobs to support his wife, his two younger sons and, now, his jobless eldest boy in California.

He is not alone. Leonardo Herrera, a rancher from outside Tuxtla Gutiérrez in the southern state of Chiapas, said he recently sold a cow to help raise $1,000 to send to his struggling nephew in northern California.

Also in Chiapas, a poor state that sends many migrants to the United States, María del Carmen Montufar has pooled money with her husband and other family members to wire financial assistance to her daughter Candelaria in North Carolina. In the last year, the family has sent money — small amounts ranging from $40 to $80 — eight times to help Candelaria and her husband, who are both without steady work and recently had a child.

“When she’s working she sends money to us,” the mother said. “But now, because there’s no work, we send money to her.”

Statistics measuring the extent of what experts are calling reverse remittances are hard to come by. But interviews in Mexico with government officials, money-transfer operators, immigration experts and relatives of out-of-work migrants show that a transaction that was rarely noticed before appears to be on the rise.

“It’s something that’s surprising, a symptom of the economic crisis,” said Martín Zuvire Lucas, who heads a network of community banks that operate in poor communities in Oaxaca and other underserved Mexican states. “We haven’t been able to measure it but we hear of more cases where money is going north.”

At one small bank in Chiapas that used to see money flowing in from the United States, more money is going out than coming in.

“I’d say every month 50,000 pesos are sent from here to there,” said Edith Ramírez Gonzalez, a sales executive at Banco Azteca in San Cristóbal de las Casas. “And from there, we’d receive about 30,000 pesos.” Fifty thousand pesos is $3,840.

With nearly half its population living in poverty, Mexico is not well placed to prop up struggling citizens abroad. Mexico could lose as many as 735,000 jobs this year and its economy may decline 7.5 percent, government economists predict, making the country one of the worst affected by the global recession.

Still, poverty is a relative concept. It is easier to get by on little in Mexico, especially in rural areas, allowing the poor to help the even more precarious.

In Miahuatlán, Sirenia Avendano and her husband may be more down and out than their two sons, both in their 20s, who wait tables at a Mexican restaurant in central Florida and have seen their hours reduced and their tips drop precipitously. But they live in their own home, on land they use to grow corn and other crops.

“We’re poor, but nobody can throw us out of this house,” Ms payday loan lenders. Avendano said, wiping away tears at her kitchen table as she spoke of her sons’ economic travails. “They worry about that. What happens if they can’t pay the rent?” To help make ends meet, she sells chiles rellenos, a popular delicacy, around the neighborhood.

“We have an obligation to help them,” said her husband, Javier. “They’re our sons. It doesn’t matter if they are here or there.”

In other cases, the migrants are returning home, as the many passengers who hop off the bus that runs regularly from northern California to a gas station in Miahuatlán make clear. “There’s nothing up there,” said a young man with an overflowing suitcase who returned one recent night.

Still, although a study by the Pew Hispanic Center from July showed a sharp decrease in the number of Mexicans heading north, there has been no sign of a mass exodus of migrants back to Mexico. Immigrants’ families say it took great effort to scrape together the thousands of dollars needed to send relatives to the United States, a sum that includes the fees charged by the people who help them sneak in.

“It’s expensive to cross, and it was a great sacrifice for us,” said Mr. Salcedo, 43, who has sent about five wire transfers to his son Alfonso, 18, who this year lost his job as a cafeteria dishwasher.

As expected during an economic slowdown, the money sent home by immigrants has fallen. The Bank of Mexico reported recently that remittances during the first nine months of this year dropped to $16.4 billion, a 13.4 percent decline compared with the same period in 2008.

The flow of money out of Mexico is believed to be a tiny fraction of the remittances still arriving. “The evidence in this regard so far is anecdotal,” said Juan Luis Ordaz, senior economist at the Spanish bank BBVA Bancomer, who has begun investigating the reverse money flow.

Families of migrants speak proudly of their successful relatives in the United States and use the remittances they receive to do anything from buying livestock to replacing dirt floors with concrete. The importance of such money, which is among Mexico’s top sources of foreign currency, cannot be overstated. An estimated 5.9 percent of Mexican households, about 1.8 million families, receive economic support from abroad, studies show. For them, the money represents roughly 19 percent of total income for urban households and 27 percent for rural ones, according to government data analyzed by BBVA Bancomer.

For the Salcedos, the economic woes are intense on both sides of the border. The ones still here had moved to the outskirts of Mexico City seeking opportunity, but now they are on the verge of returning to Oaxaca because the owner of the land they are squatting on ordered them out.

For Alfonso, the situation has been just as difficult. He crossed into the United States in December with about $500 that his father gave him, supplemented with money he earned doing odd jobs in Tijuana. He found a job in San Diego paying enough for him to send home $170 the first month and $120 the next. The third month, he told his family he could afford to send only $40.

Then, like so many others, he lost the job and stopped sending anything.

Now his father has begun sending money the other way, usually about $60, less transfer fees. “We’ve decided to tighten our belt until we’re all working again,” Mr. Salcedo said.

Antonio Betancourt contributed reporting from Mexico City, and Dominique Jarry-Shore from San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico.

Money Trickles North as Mexicans Help Relatives

Hot News: Off the Charts: Job Losses Mount, Enduring and Deep

The rise in unemployment that has occurred in the current recession has been hardest on young workers, while having a smaller effect on older workers than previous downturns. Women have been more likely than men to hold on to their jobs.

The overall unemployment rate, which reached 10.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis last month, remains below the post-World War II peak of 10.8 percent, reached in late 1982. But the proportion of workers who have been out of work for a long time is higher now than it has ever been since the Great Depression.

The persistence of joblessness for so many people — 5.6 million Americans have now been out of work for more than half a year even though they have continued to seek employment — may provide the greatest challenge for the Obama administration if it decides to seek a new economic stimulus program.

The short-term unemployment rate — the proportion of the work force that has been jobless for less than 15 weeks — has begun to decline, however, and stood at 4.5 percent in October after peaking at 4.9 percent in May.

That decline is a signal that the recession, which officially began in December 2007, probably has ended. In past recessions since World War II, the National Bureau of Economic Research has always dated the end within two months of the peak in short-term joblessness.

Over the last three years — since October 2006 — the overall unemployment rate has risen by 5.8 percentage points. That is the largest such increase since the Great Depression, providing another indication of the rapidity and severity of the current downturn.

Before this cycle, the sharpest 36-month increase since World War II was a 4.9 percentage point rise in the period that ended November 1982.

The accompanying charts show the short- and long-term unemployment rates during the three cycles since World War II when the unemployment rate rose above 8 percent, and reflect how different groups of workers fared in each.

Each of the charts begins in the month when the broadest measure of employment — the proportion of people over age 16 with jobs — hit a cyclical peak. The first two end when that measure reached a cyclical low, several months after the recession was later deemed to have ended no fax payday loans. The final chart runs through October, the latest month available.

With each chart are calculations on the proportion of jobs that were added or lost from the peak through the bottom for differing groups of workers.

This cycle has been the worst over all, with the government’s household survey in October finding 7.7 million fewer jobs than in December 2006, when the employment-to-population ratio reached its high for the current cycle. The declines during the two earlier cycles, from November 1973 to June 1975 and from December 1979 to March 1983, were 0.8 percent and 2.0 percent, respectively.

Women have held on to jobs better than men have during this downturn, reflecting a pattern that prevailed during the previous cycles.

One major difference is how older workers have fared. The number of jobs held by men over 55 is up 5.6 percent since the cycle began, and the number of jobs held by women of that age has risen by 9.3 percent.

There are fewer jobs for workers age 54 to 64 than when the cycle began, but that group has done much better than younger workers.

By contrast, younger workers were more likely to hold on to their jobs in the two previous downturns.

It is not clear why that pattern has changed. It is against federal law to discriminate against older workers, but that law was passed in 1967, before either of the previous downturns. It could be that the plunge in real estate and stock prices in 2008 led fewer older workers to decide to retire.

The proportion of the work force out of work for more than 15 weeks reached 5.7 percent in October, well above the 4.2 percent figure reached in 1982. That had been the highest such figure since the government began calculating the number in 1948.

The proportion that has been out of work for at least 27 weeks — half a year — is now 3.6 percent, also a record.

Off the Charts: Job Losses Both Deep and Enduring, Especially for the Young

WASHINGTON, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- Aided by the home buyer tax credit, the outlook for U.S. housing market appears headed for a sustainable recovery next year, said an expert of the National Association of Realtors (NAR) on Friday.

Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said the projections are enhanced by a tax credit expansion to more home buyers through the middle of 2010.

Home resales are projected to total 5.7 million next year, up from an estimated 5 million this year. Prices will climb 4 percent after a projected decline of 13 percent this year, Yun said.

"Given the success of the first-time buyer tax credit to date, and the need for qualified buyers to continue to absorb inventory that will include additional foreclosures over the coming year, we are hopeful about the impact of the expanded tax credit because it will stabilize home prices," he said, "home prices should rise between 3 and 5 percent in 2010."

A federal tax credit of up to 8,000 U.S. dollars for first-time homebuyers has helped stoke sales this year. The incentive was set to expire at the end of this month, but the NAR and other housing groups successfully lobbied to get the credit extended quick cash.

Now buyers can claim the credit if they sign a contract by April 30 and close the deal by the end of June. Lawmakers also expanded the program to include a 6,500 dollars credit for existing homeowners who have lived in their current residence for at least five years.

Yun estimated that the tax credit brought in between 350,000 to400,000 buyers this year and projected that its extension will continue to lift the market by 15 percent.

The NAR said that existing-home sales are expected to total 5.01 million in 2009, a gain of 2.0 percent over last year, and then are forecast to rise 13.6 percent to 5.69 million in 2010.

"A steady draw down of inventory will help home values to turn positive in 2010, but risks such as unemployment remain in the economy," Yun said.

The October unemployment rate jumped to a 10.2 percent, or 26 year high. Economists warned that unemployment might get even worse in the coming months.

U.S. housing market to recover modestly

NEW YORK (Reuters) - – U.S. stocks rose on Friday, with the Dow industrials briefly rising more than 1 percent, as robust commentary from some retailers reinforced hopes of an uptick in consumer spending in the holiday season.

* Earnings and outlooks from JC Penney (JCP.N) and Abercrombie & Fitch Co (ANF.N) overshadowed an early November reading on consumer sentiment, which hit its lowest level in three months.

* The Dow Jones industrial average ( no fax payday loans.DJI) gained 94.01 points, or 0.92 percent, to 10,291.48. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) rose 8.97 points, or 0.83 percent, to 1,096.21. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) jumped 18.86 points, or 0.88 percent, to 2,167.88.

(Reporting by Edward Krudy; Editing by Jan Paschal)

Stocks climbs on retailers' view, Disney results

NEW YORK (Reuters) – JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) Chief Executive Jamie Dimon called the idea that any bank is too big to fail "ethically bankrupt" and said regulators should have the power to wind down even the largest lenders.

"If some unforeseen circumstance should put this firm at risk of collapse, I believe we should be allowed to fail," Dimon wrote on Friday in The Washington Post. "Global economic growth requires the services of big financial firms. It also requires that big financial firms be allowed to fail."

JPMorgan is the second-biggest U.S. bank by assets and is considered by many the healthiest of the country's four largest traditional commercial banks.

Since the September 2008 bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (LEHMQ.PK), many analysts have viewed JPMorgan, American International Group Inc (AIG.N), Bank of America Corp (BAC.N), Citigroup Inc (C.N), Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) and others as too large to be allowed to fail, fearing the impact on markets and economies worldwide.

Dimon argued against caps on banks' size, saying increased scale can benefit customers, shareholders and the economy by permitting better products to be delivered fast and cheaply.

He advocated a regulatory system that would ensure that even the biggest banks could fail "in a way that does not put taxpayers or the broader economy at risk Low fee payday loans."

Dimon said regulators deserve authority to manage failures of large financial institutions, including the ability to replace management, sell assets, and wipe out shareholders and even unsecured creditors.

International cooperation is also necessary, he said, because of the global impact of a major failure. He pointed to the many multinational companies, not just in banking, that operate around the world.

The "too big to fail" idea is "politically, economically and ethically bankrupt," Dimon wrote.

"As Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner recently put it, 'No financial system can operate efficiently if financial institutions and investors assume that government will protect them from the consequences of failure,'" Dimon went on. "The term 'too big to fail' must be excised from our vocabulary."

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel; editing by John Wallace)

JPMorgan's Dimon says end "too big to fail"

Hot News: Rules Would Restrict Overdraft Fees on Debit Cards

BRUSSELS (AFP) – Franco-Belgian bank Dexia, the target of a major bailout late last year, announced a 274-million-euro net profit for the first quarter on Friday after losses of 3.3 billion euros for 2008.

The figures compared to a loss of more than 1.5 billion euros (2.25 billion dollars) for the corresponding three-month period last year.

And they enabled the bank -- deep in restructuring negotiations with Brussels -- to argue it had already "considerably reduced" its risk profile.

Citing "sizeable" progress since the disposal of troubled US bond insurance subsidiary Financial Security Assurance, chief executive Pierre Mariani's comments were clearly aimed at the European Commission, eight months into a state-aid probe.

In August, the commission said it had "reservations" over the bank's restructuring plans, but chairman Jean-Luc Dehaene insisted that talks were progressing in an "open and constructive climate."

Dexia, which posted third-quarter income of 1.37 billion euros, was yellow carded by the commission last month for announcing to markets the early repayment of debt without first alerting European competition authorities.

However, in a statement Mariani stressed that the bank had "confirmed its profitability with a third consecutive positive result, thanks to the good performance of its core activities and to the magnitude of its restructuring plan."

Belgian banking and insurance group KBC meanwhile announced a second quarterly net profit running, and said it too was entering the home straits in its own negotiations over restructuring with the commission.

It posted net profits of 528 million euros for the third quarter, up from 302 million euros between April and June and a dramatic turnaround from cumulative losses of seven billion euros at the height of the crisis between July 2008 and March 2009.

Dexia posts profit amid EU state-aid negotiations

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Barack Obama announced Thursday that the White House will hold a job forum in December, acknowledging high unemployment is one of the "great challenges" facing his administration. Related U.S. federal deficit hits 176 billion dollars in October U.S. economy rebounds in third quarter after four consecutive quarters of contraction U.S. economy rises 3.5% in third quarter Is U.S. economy out of the woods?Obama said that over the past 10 months, the government has taken a number of bold steps to break the back of this recession.

The U.S. economy grew 3.5 percent in the third quarter after four consecutive quarters of contraction, but unemployment has continued to climb.

"The economic growth that we've seen has not yet led to the job growth that we desperately need," and millions of Americans "are desperately searching for jobs," Obama said before departing on a week long trip to Asia that ends on Nov. 19.

Obama reaffirmed that unemployment, usually a lagging indicator, will improve slower than the economic growth.

"Given the magnitude of the economic turmoil that we've experienced, employers are reluctant to hire," he said online payday loans.

Obama said his administration has "an obligation to consider every additional responsible step that we can to encourage and accelerate job creation in this country."

"That's why in December we'll be holding a forum at the White House on jobs and economic growth," Obama said.

The forum will gather CEOs and small-business owners, economists and financial experts, as well as representatives from labor unions and nonprofit groups, to talk about how they can work with the government to create jobs and get economy moving again.

The October unemployment rate jumped to a 10.2 percent, or a 26-year high, and the White House has warned it could get a little worse before it starts getting better.

Many economists expected that the unemployment rate will not return to below 9 percent in 2010. They said creating jobs has become the biggest test for the Obama administration.

Obama to hold job forum in December

SYDNEY (Reuters) – A rare rally in the U.S. dollar was the focus in Asia Friday as investors wondered if President Barack Obama's week-long visit to the region would generate pressure for some countries to let their currencies rise.

The bounce in the long-suffering U.S. dollar added to profit-taking on commodities like gold and oil, while weakness in shares across Asia supported the dollar as a safe-haven trade.

Obama kicks off his first official tour of Asia by meeting Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama on Friday, then goes on to Singapore, China and South Korea.

High on the agenda will be U.S. calls for Asian countries to do more to stimulate domestic demand instead of relying on exports to America. That would likely require much of Asia, and China in particular, to let their currencies appreciate.

But there's an inherent contradiction in the U.S. stance.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner often states his desire to see a strong dollar, yet at the same time wants Asian exporters to let their currencies gain ground against the dollar.

Leaders of Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation seemed to give ground this week by backing "market-oriented" exchange rates. Yet many of the same countries were spotted intervening to buy the dollar to stop an export-damaging rise in their own currencies.

Traders said this burst of buying caught many speculators short and was a major reason the U.S. dollar bounced so far.

The euro had pulled back to $1.4858, from Thursday's peak around $1.5048, while the dollar reached 90.30 yen from the week's 89.26 trough.

Against a basket of currencies the dollar (.DXY) was up at 75.596 and off 15-mth lows of 74.774, though it remains within a downtrend channel that stretches back to May.

The dollar's rise added to pressure on oil, already burdened by a surprisingly large increase in U loans until payday.S. crude inventories. Nymex crude for December delivery was off 38 cents at $76.56, after shedding 3 percent on Thursday.

Likewise, spot gold was dragged down to $1,103.60 per ounce, from a record peak of $1,122.95.

U.S. CONSUMER FATIGUE

Most share markets in Asia tracked Thursday's fall in U.S. stocks, which snapped a six-day winning streak.

The Dow Jones average dropped 93.79 points, or 0.91 percent, on Thursday to 10,197.47, while the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) lost 11.27 points, or 1.03 percent, to 1,087.24.

The MSCI index of Asia Pacific stocks outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS) followed on Friday to be off 0.9 percent at 407.24. Some blamed concerns about U.S. shoppers.

On Thursday, Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) forecast earnings during the key holiday quarter could miss Wall Street estimates as its customers face rising unemployment.

"It is inevitable for exporters in Korea and China to be hit as U.S. retailers are unlikely to enjoy the holiday shopping season," said Choo Hee-yeop, a strategist at Korea Investment & Securities.

In Japan, the benchmark Nikkei (.N225) lost 39.51 points to 9,764.98 after snapping a four-day rising streak on Thursday and looked headed for its lowest close in a week. The broader Topix (.TOPX) was flat at 867.50.

Struggling Japan Airlines Corp (9205.T) as well as a slew of banks including No. 2 lender Mizuho Financial Group (8411.T) and No. 3 bank Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (8316.T) announce earnings results later in the day.

(Reporting by Wayne Cole)

Currencies in focus as Obama tours Asia

OSLO, (Reuters) — The network equipment maker Cisco Systems said Monday that it was extending the offer period for its $3 billion bid for the Norwegian video conferencing company Tandberg by nine days to Nov. 18.

“The terms and conditions set out in the offer document remain in place during the extended offer period,” Cisco said in a statement.

The Cisco chief executive John Chambers said last week that he believed the Tandberg deal would be closed but threatened to drop the offer after investors holding about 30 percent of Tandberg shares demanded a higher price than the 153.50 kroner a share ($27.61) offered by Cisco.

Tandberg’s directors have recommended the offer be accepted. Its shares closed up 0.5 percent at 151.80 crowns.

Cisco made its offer for Tandberg -- its first attempt at a public European takeover -- conditional on 90 percent acceptance quick cash.

It was not immediately clear how many shares were tendered before Cisco extended the deadline.

Analysts have said Cisco’s offer, regardless of when and how it closed, could trigger more deals involving video conferencing firms like No. 2 player Polycom .

Other technology companies like Hewlett-Packard also offer high-end video conferencing.

Many analysts had expected Cisco to raise its bid, as acquiring the market leader in video conferencing would accelerate its push in selling video equipment and software.

Cisco Extends Acceptance Period for Tandberg Bid

SYDNEY, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Europe's second-largest insurer, AXA SA, sought to double its bet on Asian growth on Monday, unveiling a planned $7 billion buy-out of its Asian assets and sale of its Australian assets to local rival AMP Ltd.

In order to help fund the buyout of the Asian assets, AXA SA said it would seek to raise 2 billion euro ($3 billion) through a right issue.

But AXA Asia Pacific's independent directors rejected the main plank of the complicated deal, under which AMP would buy all of AXA Asia Pacific's shares, including the French parent's stake before selling the Asian assets back to AXA.

"They've obviously wanted to have at least some of the assets of AXA Asia Pacific for some time. They wanted to do it cheaply before and they're probably wanting to do it cheaply again," said Ross Barker, managing director of Australian Foundation Investment Co.

With the buyout, AMP would buy all of the shares in the Asia Pacific unit, including the parent's (OOTC:KIDSQ) 53 percent stake in a deal worth $10.3 billion, and then sell AXA Asia Pacific's Asian assets back to the French parent for an undisclosed price.

AXA Asia Pacific's independent directors said the proposal "significantly undervalued" the company.

"The proposal has been received against the backdrop of recent weakness in global financial markets and before the growth of our Asian operations is fully reflected in our profitability," AXA Asia Pacific Chairman Rick Allert said in a statement.

AXA SA holds its Asian operations through its stake in Australia-based AXA Asia Pacific Holdings (OOTC:AXAPY) but now wants to own these assets outright, doubling its exposure to Asian life insurance savings, including in China and India.

AXA Asia Pacific shares jumped 30 percent on news of the takeover bid, with the market punting on AMP and AXA improving the offer.

"The Asian assets are attractive," said Mark Daniels, head of Australian equities for Aberdeen Asset Management.

"That's one of the reasons why you'd hold AXA (Asia Pacific). They've got a very good business in Hong Kong and other Asian businesses are coming on track," Daniels added.

In a separate development, AXA's 15.6 percent stake in China's No.4 life insurer, Taikang, attracted foreign and domestic bidders, including Temasek and Blackstone, valuing the holding at more than $1 billion, sources told Reuters guaranteed payday loan.

"A BIT LIGHT"

AMP's cash-and-shares offer for all of AXA Asia Pacific, the first stage of the deal, implied a bid of A$5.43 per AXA Asia Pacific share, valuing the target firm at A$11.2 billion ($10.3 billion), based on AMP's closing share price on Friday. AMP is offering a 26 percent premium to AXA's close on Friday.

AMP is offering 0.6896 of its own shares plus A$1.3796 in cash for each AXA Asia Pacific share.

AMP said in a separate statement the proposal would value the Australian and New Zealand assets of AXA Asia Pacific at around A$4 billion, based on AMP's closing share prices on Thursday.

The second leg of the deal would be for AXA SA to buy AXA Asia Pacific's Asian businesses from AMP for about $7 billion.

"Our view would be that it probably looks a bit light," Ross Barker, managing director of Australian Foundation Investment Co, AXA Asia Pacific's seventh-largest fund manager shareholder, said of the offer.

AXA SA tried to buy out the minorities in AXA Asia Pacific five years ago but was knocked back.

AXA Asia Pacific has operations in Hong Kong, China, India, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia, providing about two-thirds of total operating earnings.

The deal underscores AMP's hunger to grow wealth management business after losing out in a bid for British insurer Aviva Plc's (OOTC:AIVFF) assets to National Australia Bank Ltd (OOTC:NABZY) earlier this year.

The Australian wealth management sector is poised to more than double over the next decade, backed by an ageing population, the country's mandatory superannuation pension scheme and the likelihood of continued strong economic growth.

But the industry also faces tough new regulations that could curb fee growth.

Australia's competition watchdog plans to review the AMP bid, which would put Australia's two biggest life insurers together, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) said on Monday.

AXA is being advised by Macquarie Group (OOTC:MCQEF) while Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB) is advising AXA SA.

AMP is being advised by UBS (NYSE:UBS) , a source familiar with the advisory arrangements said.

France’s AXA SA Unveils $7 Bln Asian Growth Plan

HONG KONG — Asian stock markets opened the week with gains across the board, taking their cue from U.S. markets that rose even after the United States recorded its highest jobless rate in more than 26 years.

The Nikkei 225 average was flat in late morning trading on Monday as the market digested the U.S. jobs data, which had both negative and positive aspects for equities, though tech shares were weak after a key U.S. index for chip stocks fell.

China-linked shares like Hitachi Construction gained on anticipation that Chinese economic indicators out later this week will be good, though investors were searching for fresh factors as Japan’s earnings season winds down.

The U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly jumped to 10.2 percent in October, a 26-½ year high, but job losses for August and September were revised to show 91,000 fewer jobs were lost than previously reported. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 0.2 percent and the Nasdaq by 0.3 percent.

“The jobs data basically wasn’t that good, but one thing the figures did do is raise expectations that low interest rates will remain in effect for a while, which is good for stocks,” said Yutaka Miura, a senior technical analyst at Mizuho Securities.

“Certainly the number of jobs being lost has been revised downward, but it’s hard to see this as much of a good thing, and my impression is that people taking this view are stretching things a bit. The market is going to waver, trying to make up its mind about how to see the data.”

The Nikkei, which began the day in negative territory, edged up 0.1 percent to 9,797.75, while the broader Topix fell 0.4 percent to 870.80.

Taiwan stocks gained 0.9 percent, with banking stocks like Cathay Financial rising on hopes Taiwan could soon sign a much anticipated financial services pact with China installment payday loans.

Cathay Financial, the island’s top listed financial holding firm, jumped 3.1 percent. The banking and insurance sub-index rose 2.8 percent.

Financial stocks also gained favor in Hong Kong, where the Hang Seng index was up 1.2 percent. China Life rose 1.3 percent, HSBC was up 0.8 percent and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China gained 0.6 percent in early trading.

The Shanghai market edged up 0.2 percent.

The S.&P./ASX 200 index in Australia was 1.6 percent higher on Monday, with takeover activity bolstering the financial sector and mining stocks shrugging off weaker base metals prices as gold maintained prices near a record high.

Financial shares were the center of attention after the insurer AXA Asia Pacific Holdings knocked back a $10.3 billion break-up plan that would have left its Asian assets with its French parent AXA and its Australian assets with a rival, AMP. The news sent AXA shares surging 30.5 percent.

Gold miners received a boost as gold hovered just shy of a record high above $1,100 an ounce reached in the previous session. Newcrest Mining gained 3.5 percent while Lihir Gold was up 3 percent.

Seoul shares rose 0.7 percent, led by steel, construction and select tech shares.

The steel maker Posco rose 2.9 percent and Hyundai Steel was up 2 percent. The government said South Korean steel companies plan to spend 18.7 trillion won, or $16 billion, in the next three years on equipment to reduce greenhouse gases and energy consumption.

Reuters

Stock Markets in Asia Start Week on Positive Note

HONG KONG -- Hong Kong shares climbed early Monday after U.S. stocks posted gains in spite of weaker-than-expected jobs data Friday, with insurers and airlines pacing the advance. The Hang Seng Index rose 1.1% to 22,066.88, with China Life Insurance Co. Ltd. rising 1.9% and Ping An Insurance Group Co. of China Ltd. up 2.2%, while Cathay Pacific Airways gained 2.1%. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index rose 1.5%, unaffected by a drop for mainland China-listed stocks. The Shanghai Composite recently dropped 0.4% to 3,151.03, after rising in the previous six sessions.

Hong Kong Shares Advance, But Shanghai Stocks Drop

LONDON — “Profit is not satanic,” John Varley, the chief executive of Barclays, told an audience at St. Martin-in-the-Fields church here this week.

The day before, Josef Ackermann, the chief executive of Deutsche Bank, Germany’s biggest bank, had insisted at a conference here, “Size is not necessarily evil.”

While not exactly Gordon Gekko’s “greed is good” speech from the movie “Wall Street,” Brian Griffiths, an adviser to Goldman Sachs International, said during a recent panel discussion at St. Paul’s Cathedral on “the place of morality in the marketplace,” that bonuses would encourage charity and lift the economy.

“We have to tolerate the inequality as a way to achieve greater prosperity and opportunity for all,” Mr. Griffiths said.

With the Most Rev. Rowan D. Williams, archbishop of Canterbury and head of the Church of England, recently calling on those who work in finance to repent, the debate over bank reforms is becoming a modern-day morality play.

“We haven’t heard people saying ‘Well, actually, no, we got it wrong,’ ” Archbishop Williams noted, referring to the lapses that set off a financial crisis that globally caused trillions of dollars in bailouts and losses. But all the moral outrage has set off a counterreaction among a host of European bankers who are defending their industry and their paychecks, often in moral terms.

Many of the scenes are playing out in houses of worship, with executives sounding, by turns, defiant and plaintive. Sometimes their near-confessions read like attempts to reconcile, even justify, the values of religion and those of banking — not always quite convincingly.

The two sides of the Atlantic have taken markedly different paths to reform from the financial disaster. The United States has moved slowly on regulation and sought only to impose pay caps on the seven companies that received multiple multibillion-dollar bailouts. The Continental Europeans have been quicker to impose a raft of regulation on big financial firms, including strict limits on bonuses, as in France.

And even in Britain calls are gathering pace to force its bailed-out banks — the Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds — to break up so that no one is “too big to fail.”

Rejecting such proposals from senior Bank of England officials and Paul A. Volcker, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Mr business cards. Ackermann said that “large firms do have a benefit for the users of financial services and for our economies at large.”

At St. Martins, Mr. Varley did not dispute that banks played a role in the economic crisis, but he stressed that making money per se was not immoral. He said that banks were the “backbone” of the economy and that bonuses were necessary because “talent is highly mobile.”

“If we fail to pay, or are constrained from paying, competitive rates, then that talent will move to another employer,” he said, in a church that is known for its work with the homeless.

Bankers are facing the brunt of growing criticism from regulators, central bankers and ordinary citizens for continuing large compensation packages while the industry is being propped up by government funds.

A recent pledge by Goldman Sachs to donate $200 million to its charitable foundation did little to defuse public anger about its plan to pay $16.7 billion in compensation this year.

The Rev. Christopher Harrison, a member of the Nottingham city center clergy and a former adviser to Britain’s Treasury, said much more was needed than just giving to charity. “There is a general feeling that the level of bonuses we’ve seen have been obscene,” he said in a telephone conversation on Thursday. “There is a need for proportionality and more robust social responsibility.”

Stephen K. Green, the chairman of HSBC, agreed. Last month, he called for a change of culture among bankers. The banking sector “owes the real world an apology,” he said, as well as “a commitment to learn the lessons.”

But some people in high places say that is already happening.

The bishop of London, Richard Chartres, said the economic crisis already had many in the banking industry re-examining their place in society and their contribution to the commonweal.

“I have seen firsthand in my own meetings and conversations around the capital how it has provoked deeper contemplation within the financial community of the relationship between money and society,” he wrote in an e-mail message. “Profound shocks can open us to a new awareness.”

European Bankers Defend Their Pay and Bonuses

Even as Washington tries to rein in Wall Street pay, bankers are likely to make unusually large gains on the stock grants and options they received after shares in their companies fell sharply during the financial meltdown.

As banks cut bonuses last year, they shifted more pay into stock and options from cash. Within months, the financial system began to mend — partly with the help of billions of dollars in government aid — and that stock began surging in value. Some of it can be cashed in starting in just a few months.

And so the bonuses Wall Street received last year, billed as paltry at the time, are turning out to be among the most lucrative payouts ever.

Goldman Sachs, for instance, sharply cut nearly all bonuses it paid last year but gave some executives more options than usual.

The company gave its general counsel, for instance, 104,868 stock options and 14,117 shares in December, when the bank’s stock was around $78.

Now the bank’s shares have more than doubled in value, making the general counsel’s stock and option award worth nearly $12 million, according to Equilar, an executive compensation research firm in California.

That executive is just one of many Wall Street workers who have seen the bonuses they received last year soar in value, even though some of the shares cannot be sold for a few years.

Goldman’s bonus pool last year was $4.82 billion, according to the New York attorney general’s office, but because about half of that was paid in stock, it is now worth upwards of $7.8 billion. At JPMorgan Chase, workers have seen the value of the stock awarded them last year increase at least $3 billion.

“People have to look at the sizable gains that have been made since stock and options were granted last year, and the fact is this was, in many ways, a windfall,” said Jesse M. Brill, the chairman of CompensationStandards.com, a trade publication. “This had nothing to do with people’s performance. These were granted at market lows.”

Wall Street has long used a mix of stock and cash for bonuses. But the greater emphasis on cash before the financial crisis began meant executives could walk away rich even as their companies collapsed.

That has left many on Wall Street — and in Washington — demanding that a greater portion of pay be made in stock in hopes of rewarding long-term performance rather than short-term bets.

The Treasury’s special master of pay, Kenneth R. Feinberg, has said there is “too much reliance on cash” on Wall Street and has proposed stock as an alternative.

Banks began the trend by paying more in stock last year. Then, in February, Congress required that bonuses at bailed-out banks be paid entirely in stock. Last month, the Treasury Department took the idea further by proposing that some executives’ salaries be paid in stock. The result is that Wall Street workers have more of their pay at risk than ever.

Still, some compensation experts say the risk has been decreased by the government’s backing of the financial system and historically low stock prices. After all, they point out, companies like JPMorgan, American Express and Capital One issued stock and options last year when their share prices had little chance of going anywhere but up.

The stock gains raise questions about the wisdom of pushing bonus pay too far in either direction, favoring either cash or stock. Normal theories about stock compensation and risk-taking may not hold true today, compensation experts say, in large part because of the government’s continued financial support of the industry.

And they say the upside at many banks is far bigger than the downside, particularly for banks like Bank of America and Citigroup that have not yet seen their shares recover.

“Right now the world is set up for these people to take big gambles,” said Kevin J. Murphy, a professor at the University of Southern California who advised the Treasury Department on pay. “The worst part of the asymmetry comes from the too-big-to-fail guarantee” that has been reinforced by the government aid.

Wells Fargo was one of more than a dozen major banks to award executives stock and options since the bailout. In February, the bank gave nearly three million options and roughly 528,000 shares to 11 executives. On paper, the grants have increased in value to $57.3 million from $12.1 million, according to Equilar.

Pat Callahan, one of the Wells Fargo executives to receive the grants, said the bank’s board always considers equity grants in February.

“Of course in February the price was very low, but nobody knew what was going to happen,” she said. “It’s true that the stock price change from February to now is a mix of economic recovery and things that we’ve done.”

The Wells Fargo options start to become available early next year, though executives there are not allowed to sell more than half of them until a year after they retire. Of course, the stock could fall rather than rise before then, as could shares of other banks like Goldman or JPMorgan.

The stock payouts strike some experts as a way to simply defer windfalls into the future.

“The stock doesn’t bother me. What bothers me are the gross amounts,” said Charles M. Elson, a corporate governance professor at the University of Delaware. “Most people are focused on cash payments, and they ignore the stock. When you issue stock in a period of economic distress, you’ve often given someone a gift.”

Many financial workers, of course, do not consider their compensation a gift, despite widespread criticism of their high pay.

And some pay experts point to stock losses on Wall Street in recent years. Ira T. Kay, the head of compensation at the consulting firm Watson Wyatt, said, “No one’s looking to give them sympathy, but it’s not correct to say they haven’t felt the pain of their shareholders.”

Still, at some banks, like Goldman and JPMorgan, the stock in the bonus pools from 2006 and 2007 has almost fully recovered its value.

For upcoming compensation at Citigroup and Bank of America, the Treasury Department mandated the banks pay executives almost entirely in stock. That means if performance goals are met, 19 executives at Citigroup would split $133 million in stock this year and 12 executives at Bank of America would share in $78.6 million in stock.

But greater upside lurks. If Citigroup’s stock returns to its early 2008 price of $29, from just above $4 on Friday, the executives’ shares from this year alone would be worth more than $800 million. Even if the stock rose to only $12, their shares would be worth $400 million.

At Bank of America, seven executives could see their pay packages become worth more than $10 million apiece if the bank’s stock increases just $10. A bank spokesman, Bob Stickler, said, “Under that scenario, executives get paid because the shareholders are being paid.”

The Treasury Department declined to comment when asked if these bank executives were being set up for windfalls. Lucian A. Bebchuk, a Harvard Law School professor who advised Treasury on pay rules, said, “What should we have done differently?”

“It would be better if you could take the stock and somehow neutralize what the government did, but that’s really tricky,” he said. “If you have equity compensation, sometimes there are massive windfalls.”

Windfall Is Seen as Bank Bonuses Are Paid in Stock

NEW YORK (Reuters) – As unemployment in the United States edges above 10 percent, anxious investors will look to earnings reports from major retailers for signs of life in the beaten-up consumer.

Comments from Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N), the world's largest retailer, as well as from a host of smaller stores, will be of vital importance to investors trying to judge the recovery's pace.

"The best way of gaining an insight into the consumer is from hearing from the companies that sell to them," said Peter Boockvar, an equity strategist at Miller Tabak & Co in New York.

Stocks are up 50 percent since the lows in March, but the market has languished recently as investors try to determine the strength of the economic recovery.

"Fundamentals and valuation pretty much fully reflect reality so now we have to rely on liquidity, momentum and psychology to help guide the direction," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank in Chicago.

Unsurprisingly, discount retailers are expected to do better. Wal-Mart and Kohls Corp (KSS.N) are both expected to post slightly better third-quarter earnings than a year ago.

Wal-Mart should see earnings of 81 cents per share, compared with 77 cents a year earlier, when it reports results on Thursday, according to analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

Kohls also will give its quarterly scorecard on Thursday.

Higher-end department stores probably will not fare as well as their discount cousins. Macy's Inc (M.N) is expected to see third-quarter losses widen on Wednesday and JC Penney's (JCP.N) profit is likely to be down sharply when it reports results on Friday.

What these companies, and especially Wal-Mart, say about the future will potentially overshadow profit figures. Top-line revenue performance will be key in judging to what extent business is creeping back.

October retail chain sales showed half of retailers fell short of Wall Street's expectations -- another blow for hopes of a widespread recovery for the holiday season.

"People know that global growth is definitely improving, but the U.S. consumer still remains stretched," Boockvar said.

WHAT'S $81 BILLION AMONG FRIENDS?

November's record U.S. Treasury debt refunding during the week is a reminder of the cost of economic recovery and the toll on consumers as the U payday loans in one hour.S. dollar remains under pressure. Recent auctions have been strong, but any sign that appetite for the debt is waning could ruffle markets.

Three Treasury auctions are scheduled this week to refinance U.S. government debt in a record $81 billion November refunding. Last month signaled the end of the Federal Reserve's Treasury purchase program, removing one element of demand.

"This is going to be an auction where the Fed can't participate. They've run out of their $300 billion limit. We'll have to see how demand steps up on its own," Ablin said.

After giving some hints to help financial markets gauge how long they will keep interest rates ultra-low, Fed officials will hit the lecture circuit during the week to offer their views on the economic outlook.

Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo will speak on financial regulation on Monday. He will be followed by five regional Fed bank presidents throughout the week. All are likely to face questions on the economy.

TRADE GAP AND CONSUMER SENTIMENT

The menu of economic indicators will be relatively light after the past week's huge helpings of data.

Friday the 13th is the day to note, when the U.S. international trade deficit for September will be released, along with October's import and export prices. The first reading for November on consumer sentiment will also be given that day by the Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers.

The September trade gap is expected to edge up to $31.60 billion from $30.71 billion the previous month, according to economists polled by Thomson Reuters.

Import and export prices in October are also likely to have increased, the Reuters poll showed. Import prices are projected to have gained 1 percent in October, following a tiny rise of 0.1 percent the previous month. October export prices are forecast to have risen 0.2 percent, following a decline of 0.3 percent in the previous month.

The Reuters/University of Michigan consumer sentiment index for November is forecast at 71.0, up slightly from October's final reading of 70.6.

(Wall St Week Ahead appears weekly. Comments or questions on this one can be e-mailed to edward.krudy@thomsonreuters.com)

(Reporting by Edward Krudy; Editing by Jan Paschal)

Stocks eye retailers as jobless ranks grow

WASHINGTON – Regulators have shut United Security Bank, a small bank in Georgia, bringing the number of bank failures this year to 116 amid the struggling economy and a cascade of defaults on loans.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on Friday took over United Security Bank, based in Sparta, Ga., with $157 million in assets and $150 million in deposits and two branches. Ameris Bank, based in Moultrie, Ga., agreed to assume the assets and deposits of the failed bank.

The failure of United Security Bank is expected to cost the federal deposit insurance fund an estimated $58 million.

Small bank in Ga. closed

TORONTO (Reuters) – Toronto's main stock index ended higher for a fourth straight session on Friday as gold miners rallied around record high bullion prices, offsetting the index's fall at the outset on weak jobs data that fueled worry about economic recovery.

Shares of Barrick Gold Corp, one of the biggest contributors to the TSX's rise, were up 3.1 percent at C$44.83, while Goldcorp shares rose 3 percent to C$44.48.

The price of gold extended gains to hit a record high above $1,100 per ounce on Friday, due largely to a weak U.S. jobs report.

The U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly jumped to a 26-1/2 year high of 10.2 percent last month.

"Gold is reacting to the bad news this morning that the unemployment rate in the U.S. is above expectations. Everyone is focusing on the fragility of the recovery," said Michael Sprung, president at Sprung & Co. Investment Counsel no teletrek payday advance.

Gold hit the record high shortly after markets opened and allowed the resource-heavy TSX to reverse an early selloff that was blamed on the U.S. jobs report, as well as a weak Canadian jobs report.

Canada lost 43,200 jobs in October, more than even the gloomiest analyst had predicted, dashing hopes for a quick economic rebound.

Both reports sent the TSX down as much as 82 points before gold spearheaded a quick move to higher territory.

The S&P/TSX composite index finished the day up 69.72 points, or 0.62 percent, at 11,250.42, with eight of its 10 main groups higher. The index was up 3.1 percent on the week.

($1=$1.07 Canadian)

(Reporting by Jennifer Kwan; editing by Peter Galloway)

Gold miners pull TSX out of jobs-linked funk

WASHINGTON – Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner acknowledges the federal budget deficit is too high, but that the priorities now are economic growth and job creation.

Asked repeatedly on NBC's "Meet the Press" whether this means taxes will rise, Geithner avoided giving specifics. He did say President Barack Obama is committed to dealing with deficit in a way that will not add to the tax burden of people making less than $250,000 a year.

The White House has not decided how to reduce the red ink, Geithner said in an interview broadcast Sunday.

"Right now we're focused on getting growth back on track," he said. "And we're not at the point yet where we have to decide exactly what it's going to take."

He acknowledged that the economic recovery, while showing positive movement, has been shaky and uneven.

"A lot of damage was caused by this crisis. It's going to take some time for us to grow out of this. It could be a little choppy," he said. "It could be uneven. And it's going to take awhile."

A bright spot in the recovery identified by Geithner is the banking system, which he said is "dramatically more stable" because of the government bailout.

Geithner said that just one year ago economic activity came to a standstill as major financial institutions shut down due to lack of liquidity.

Even though 115 banks have failed so far this year, Geithner said there has been a "dramatic improvement in confidence," with private capital back in the system. He said large businesses are now able to borrow again.

But Geithner said more needs to be done to assist small businesses, adding that the administration is working to help open up credit to them.

After financial institutions were widely blamed for assuming too much risk and bringing the economy to the brink of collapse, Geithner said a concern now is that they might end up being too timid.

"The big risk we face now is that banks are going to overcorrect and not take enough risk," he said. "We need them to take a chance again on the American economy. That's going to be important to recovery."

Geithner acknowledged the economy remains tough for many workers who have lost jobs and it's going to be some time before the employment outlook starts to brighten for many of them.

"Unemployment is worse than almost everybody expected. But growth is back a little more quickly, a little stronger than people thought," he said.

Unemployment hit a 26-year high of 9.8 percent in September, and the October report due in the coming week could show it topping 10 percent.

Geithner said it's too early to decide if a second government stimulus package should be offered, though he acknowledged unemployment probably will rise even more before it starts to turn around. Economists expect to see job growth after the first of the year, probably in the first quarter, he said.

"You're not going to see real recovery until it's led by the private sector, by businesses," he said.

He said the administration supports steps being considered by Congress like extending unemployment insurance and the homebuyer tax credit.

Geithner: Economy rebounding, but job growth lags