NYT : Net Neutrality’s Holes in Europe May Offer Peek at Future in U.S.

Net Neutrality’s Holes in Europe May Offer Peek at Future in U.S.

Last spring, Swedes got a tantalizing offer: If they subscribed to Sweden’s biggest telecom provider, Telia Company AB, they could have unlimited access on their mobile phones to Facebook, Spotify, Instagram and other blockbuster apps.

Swedish regulators tried to put a stop to it. They argued that the arrangement violated the so-called net neutrality rules in the European Union, which require internet providers to offer equal access to all web content. Essentially, once a user’s data cap was reached, Telia would restrict other apps, but not the big ones.

The issue is now working its way through the courts. As it does, the offer is still available.

Such deals may be gaining momentum in the United States.

The Federal Communications Commission is expected to vote on Thursday to roll back the net neutrality rules in the United States. While the European Union has such rules in place, telecom providers have pushed the boundaries at times in Sweden, Germany, Portugal and elsewhere, offering a glimpse at the future American companies and consumers may face if protections are watered down.

The F.C.C. chairman, Ajit Pai, is seeking a sweeping repeal of the Barack Obama-era rules, paving the way for internet service companies to charge users more to see certain content or to restrict access to some websites. High-speed internet service providers, or I.S.P.s, could charge companies a fee to deliver their content more quickly.
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Europe has sought to combat such practices by adopting net neutrality rules aimed at ensuring that I.S.P.s in the bloc’s 28 member states can’t pick the web’s winners and losers. The regulations are binding and enforced by each country’s national telecom regulators.

For the European Union’s sprawling market of over 500 million citizens, the rules have mostly helped prevent bad behavior.

“There is not a long trail of abuse by telecom operators in net neutrality,” said Philippe Defraigne, a director at Cullen International, a Brussels-based consultant that covers telecoms and the digital economy.

That’s largely because unlike in the United States, Europeans have plenty of choices for internet access at home and on their mobile phones. France has four major mobile and internet operators and nine low-cost offshoots. Britain has more than 50. And there aren’t dominant giants born of megamergers, like the ones between Comcast and NBC Universal, and Verizon and AOL.

Even so, telecom operators in Europe have tried to take advantage of some of the gray areas in the rules.

When Netflix entered the European market in 2012, some national telecom companies forced it to pay “tolls” to deliver content to customers. Netflix did not name the companies but told a regional regulator in a letter that the dispute showed “the importance of strong net neutrality rules.”

The bloc’s rules also left open a major regulatory loophole for a practice called zero rating, in which a mobile network does not charge for data used on certain applications or services, giving them a leg up against competitors. The few regulatory disputes that have arisen in Europe have mostly involved big telecom companies that steer users to Facebook and other services.

Mr. Pai dismantled zero ratings protections in the United States even before he unveiled the plan to undo net neutrality rules entirely.

In Europe, the loophole created a confusing patchwork of interpretations in different countries over whether zero rating violates net neutrality. Sweden’s regulator concluded that the Telia offer didn’t treat internet traffic equally and should be halted. Want to stream music from a scrappy Spotify competitor? Telia would “throttle,” or artificially slow, that service once users reached their data caps, although they could keep listening to Spotify.

That doesn’t necessarily bother consumers.

“From a user perspective, I don’t think it’s a problem and I think most consumers don’t think it’s an issue,” said Magnus Haglunds, a Stockholm-based independent music producer who uses the Telia service. “There are those who may have to change from Apple Music to Spotify. But then they get free surfing on Spotify.”

Wasn’t net neutrality being compromised? “It’s not Cuba,” Mr. Haglunds replied. “Cuba has a problem. There they don’t have any internet at all.”

But the offer alarmed Swedish media companies, which warned that the deal gave Facebook an advantage over competitors, and Telia an edge over other telecom operators.

In February, Indian regulators shut down a separate Facebook zero rating deal with the mobile phone carrier Reliance Communications, saying carriers should not be allowed to “shape the users’ internet experience.”

A Swedish court ultimately overturned the decision on technical grounds after Telia appealed. Telia continues to offer the service in Sweden and other Nordic countries. But Sweden’s administrative court is expected to issue a broader decision on zero rating rules this year.

Critics of the rollback in the United States have cited zero ratings schemes in Europe, or versions of it, as an omen of how the web may be split.

Representative Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, posted a screen grab on Twitter from the Portuguese mobile carrier Meo that went viral. The shot showed basic monthly subscription plans with names like Social, Messaging and Video, each appearing to favor a batch of established apps.

“Providers are starting to split the net into packages,” Mr. Khanna wrote.

In Germany, a similar case involved a Deutsche Telekom offer called StreamOn, which allows users to access unlimited videos and music from specific partners like Netflix. The country’s telecom regulator approved the deal, drawing criticism from consumer activists. StreamOn sought to address some of the concerns by expanding the offer to include around 50 partners.

“This a battle for the next century,” said Klaus Müller, the chairman of the Federation of German Consumer Organisations, a lobbying group. “We can either have oligarchical markets with huge players, or a big variety of companies with lots of competition, which would be good for consumers but bad for big business.”

Many in Europe are watching the F.C.C. ruling with trepidation. Over 200 European companies signed a letter to Mr. Pai warning that ending the net neutrality rules will undermine privacy, free speech and competition on the internet.

Robert Beens, the chief executive of Startpage, a Dutch privacy-based encrypted search engine used by surveillence-wary consumers who don’t want their search data recorded, said his company could be put in jeopardy.

Half of the 2 billion searches done annually through Startpage are in the United States. If American I.S.P.s start charging companies to be in the internet’s fast lane, Mr. Beens said he would not be able to keep up with deep-pocketed competitors like Google, Bing and Yahoo.

“People want privacy, but what if we can’t pay the amounts of money that I.S.P.s are looking for?” he said. “In the U.S., people would have a slower connection to our search engine. It could really harm our business model.”

Perhaps the biggest issue for Europe — and other parts of the world — is that countries watch what the United States does.

“The U.S. set good standards for the globe, but now they could go backward,” said Maryant Fernández Pérez, a senior policy adviser at European Digital Rights, an association of civil and human rights organizations advocating an open digital environment.

“The consequences are not very good internationally.”

Reuters - Italy puts on hold sales of stakes in ENI, ENAV -sources

ROME, Dec 11 (Reuters) - Italy has suspended a plan to sell stakes in two businesses it controls to holding company Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP) after European authorities questioned whether it should be shifting assets to a state-controlled entity, sources said on Monday.

Last month, the Treasury started the process of offloading shares in air traffic controller ENAV and energy group ENI as part of a programme of privatisations intended to cut the euro zone’s second-highest public debt proportionate to output.

But European statistics agency Eurostat has raised doubts about such a transaction, Italian government sources said, because CDP is publicly owned, although its assets are not considered part of the public accounts.

Eurostat and the Treasury have been in contact on the matter informally, and the Bank of Italy has produced a written opinion suggesting the regulator may not accept that the deal cleans up public finances, the sources said.

More worryingly for Rome, Eurostat could decide to count all of CDP’s liabilities when calculating Italy’s public debt, which already stands at 131.6 percent of gross domestic product.

Under the privatisation plan, the Treasury had hoped to raise up to 3 billion euros ($3.54 billion) by selling 50.37 percent of ENAV and most of its 4.34 percent holding in ENI.

Eurostat has already expressed concern about the established practice whereby the Treasury sells state assets to CDP, in which it holds 83 percent.

Since 2012, CDP has bought thousands of millions of euros worth of state-owned real estate, foreign investment insurance firm Sace, holding company Fintecna and service provider Simest.

>>> HNA - have a look to HNA stakes in Europe (DBK GY,vac fp, c8i gy...)



From: LAURENT CHEKROUN (MAKOR SECURITIES LO) At: 12/11/17 13:11:32
Subject: FT : Swissport bonds face heavy selling pressure on worries about HNA Group

Swissport’s bonds sold off heavily on Monday morning as investors grew increasingly nervous about the stretched finances of the Swiss aviation services company’s Chinese parent HNA Group.

S&P last week cut Swissport’s rating one notch to B-, deeply in “junk” territory, citing the “aggressive acquisition policy, tolerance for high leverage, and contracting liquidity” at its parent company HNA. The financial health of the airlines-to-finance conglomerate came under scrutiny this year after Chinese regulators acted against private companies moving money out of China.

Both Swissport’s €364m 6.75 per cent secured bond and its riskier €265m 9.75 per cent unsecured bond fell to below face value for the first time this year on Monday. The unsecured bond is now bid at 97.25 cents on the euro, according to Tradeweb data, which equates to a yield of more than 10 per cent.

“It’s all about HNA,” said one bond trader. “There’s so much noise around it.”

These unsecured bonds were bid as high as 110 cents at the start of November, meaning that bondholders are sitting on a 13 percentage point paper loss in little over a month.

Swissport’s short-term loans to the HNA Group have sparked particular concerns among bond investors. The Swiss company made a €400m 90-day loan to an affiliate of HNA in August that was due to mature at the end of November. However, Swissport informed its bond investors earlier this month that it was rolling the maturity of the loan to January 28, while also allowing HNA to delay payment on €8m interest.

The rollover of the loan has particularly rattled some bond investors because the indenture for Swissport’s bonds states that loans to HNA affiliates “cannot be extended beyond 90 days”. The company has been able get around this restriction because it has said it has made “a new €400m related party loan” on a “cashless rollover basis”.

“It’s a little disingenuous – it’s not really in the spirit of the law,” said one bond investor.

HNA’s bonds also came under pressure on Monday. The €300m 363-day bond HNA raised at 8.875 per cent yield in November is now trading at 93.75 cents on the euro.

FT : Swissport bonds face heavy selling pressure on worries about HNA Group

Swissport’s bonds sold off heavily on Monday morning as investors grew increasingly nervous about the stretched finances of the Swiss aviation services company’s Chinese parent HNA Group.

S&P last week cut Swissport’s rating one notch to B-, deeply in “junk” territory, citing the “aggressive acquisition policy, tolerance for high leverage, and contracting liquidity” at its parent company HNA. The financial health of the airlines-to-finance conglomerate came under scrutiny this year after Chinese regulators acted against private companies moving money out of China.

Both Swissport’s €364m 6.75 per cent secured bond and its riskier €265m 9.75 per cent unsecured bond fell to below face value for the first time this year on Monday. The unsecured bond is now bid at 97.25 cents on the euro, according to Tradeweb data, which equates to a yield of more than 10 per cent.

“It’s all about HNA,” said one bond trader. “There’s so much noise around it.”

These unsecured bonds were bid as high as 110 cents at the start of November, meaning that bondholders are sitting on a 13 percentage point paper loss in little over a month.

Swissport’s short-term loans to the HNA Group have sparked particular concerns among bond investors. The Swiss company made a €400m 90-day loan to an affiliate of HNA in August that was due to mature at the end of November. However, Swissport informed its bond investors earlier this month that it was rolling the maturity of the loan to January 28, while also allowing HNA to delay payment on €8m interest.

The rollover of the loan has particularly rattled some bond investors because the indenture for Swissport’s bonds states that loans to HNA affiliates “cannot be extended beyond 90 days”. The company has been able get around this restriction because it has said it has made “a new €400m related party loan” on a “cashless rollover basis”.

“It’s a little disingenuous – it’s not really in the spirit of the law,” said one bond investor.

HNA’s bonds also came under pressure on Monday. The €300m 363-day bond HNA raised at 8.875 per cent yield in November is now trading at 93.75 cents on the euro.

FT : The UK has tied its hands with Brexit agreement

The UK has tied its hands with Brexit agreement
British government may have secured the best arrangement available to Leavers

The battle over what Friday’s EU-UK Brexit agreement actually means has over the weekend proved as fierce as the negotiations that led to the deal. But only in the UK, where there seems to be confusion, wilful or not, about what the country has committed itself to.

Some things should be crystal clear from the official joint report of the phase 1 agreement, the reaching of which was the EU’s condition for moving on to trade and transition talks (while continuing to fill in the details of a legally binding withdrawal treaty).

The phase 1 agreement “is without prejudice to discussions on the framework of the future relationship”, the parties assert up front. But it very much prejudices the future relationship in itself, insofar as it circumscribes what forms that relationship could take in the area of trade. That is because of the commitments the UK has finally made over the difficult issue of the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. (Other aspects of the agreement, on citizens’ rights and settling the UK’s financial obligations, ended up right in the landing zone most observers had identified long ago — very close, in other words, to what the EU had demanded at the outset. My FT colleagues provide all the analysis you need.)

There are four things to note.

First, the relevant parts of the agreement are, as David Allen Green has put it, not so much agreements between several parties as promises the UK alone is making to the world. That is a natural consequence of the UK being the disrupter of the status quo ante, but one that its domestic debate too rarely recognises.

Second, the strength of the commitments over Northern Ireland is remarkable. Article 42 states that the Good Friday agreement “must be protected in all its parts” (my italics), Article 43 “recalls [the UK’s] commitment to the avoidance of a hard border, including any physical infrastructure or related checks and controls” and, most strikingly, Article 46 underlines that while the “commitments and principles outlined in this joint report will not predetermine the outcome of wider discussions on the future relationship” between the EU and the UK, they “must be upheld in all circumstances, irrespective of the nature of any future agreement”.

In other words, these promises are not conditional on the UK’s future trade deal with the EU or indeed on its obtaining such a deal at all.

Third, what is the substance of the solution? As Katy Hayward writes in an article retweeted by Sabine Weyand, the EU's deputy chief Brexit negotiator, there are three scenarios envisaged for the future trade relationship, and only two satisfy these highly fortified commitments on the Irish border. The three scenarios are set out in Article 49. Here the UK first asserts its “intention” to satisfy the border objectives through the future UK-EU relationship, but that is impossible if it leaves the EU’s regulatory and customs unions outright, as I explained last week.

“Should this not be possible” — which is the case under the UK’s current policy — the UK “will propose specific solutions”, which everyone would be very interested to know. But don’t hold your breath. Rely instead on the third option, under which the UK “will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement”.

This does not mean staying in the single market, as some seem to think, because not every page of the single market rule book matters for border checks. But almost every page relating to trade in goods does, as do more or less all the rules of the customs union. That means the UK, if it wants an orderly withdrawal agreement with the EU, has now explicitly committed itself to keeping its own regulation and customs barriers aligned in all those areas where divergence means goods crossing borders must be subject to controls (as well as some services and other economic activities relevant the Good Friday Agreement).

That means, essentially, that either Northern Ireland, or the entire UK, must stay in the customs union and follow the single market rules for physical goods. Brexiters in the UK cabinet have tried to say “full alignment” is compatible with “taking back control over our laws” — it is only the goals of the EU that Britain would have to fully align itself with, you see. Of course, when it comes to EU directives, all member states already have the freedom to decide how exactly to meet the regulatory goals. But it is unlikely to fly for regulations let alone customs rules. On the former, the UK should expect something like the European Economic Area countries’ obligation to “freely” write into law the relevant EU regulations. On customs, nothing short of replicating the common external tariff will do.

The UK also promises that Northern Ireland will not have a different status from the rest of the country against its will — hinting at the sort of high regulatory and customs autonomy I have advocated. The further promise that there will never be barriers to trade from Northern Ireland into Great Britain rather suggests it is not ruled out that there could be barriers the other way.

Fourth and finally, this would not actually be such a bad deal for Brexit Britain. Unless Northern Ireland has a special status, “full alignment” as a way to avoid border checks on the island of Ireland will also suffice to avoid border checks between Britain and continental Europe. That would rule out independent free-trade agreements, but would safeguard the UK’s participation in manufacturing supply chains such as car production. Not a bad prize. It would not do anything for services, of course, but on the other hand the British obsession with ending the free movement of people would be satisfied.

As I have explained in the past, the reasons why the single market’s four freedoms are inseparable are economic as well as political. While the free movement of goods can be separated from the others, services and people are entangled for good economic reasons. Once the UK wanted to end free movement for people, it was looking at saying goodbye to its free services trade with the rest of the world. But it could, in theory, keep full free trade in goods if it could only abide by common regulations. That, it seems, is what it has just opted for in practice.

>>> Gemalto +3.6% - article below mentionned and Short Interest halved vs last w


Future Demand for Connected Logistics Market to grow at a CAGR of 33.2+% by 2025, Top Manufacturers Profiled are Huawei Technologies, IBM, Infosys, Intel, Microsoft, ORBCOMM, Oracle Alcatel-Lucent, Amazon Web Services, BT9, Gemalto
A comprehensive analysis of the “Global Connected Logistics Market 2017 -2022” is been done in this intelligence report. It includes the investigations done on the past progress, ongoing market scenarios, and future prospects. An accurate data of the products, strategies and market shares of leading companies in this particular market is mentioned. This report presents a 360-degree overview of the competitive scenario of the global market.
Connected Logistics market to grow at a CAGR of 33.2+% by 2017 – 2025.
Connected logistics helps in building up, enhancing associations between all accomplices engaged with the logistics arrange by empowering center administrators to screen internal and outward activity. This outcomes in more straightforwardness and improved productivity. Nearness of business exercises over the different locales of globe makes it required for associations to settle on cutting edge framework. Data, which is the scarcest asset in the business world, can be proficiently and viably utilized with the assistance of connected strategic systems to rethink generation calendar and logistics. The connected logistics market tries to fabricate the aggressive advantages in universe of furious rivalry by tending to issues with innovation and speed. It can fill in as a strong apparatus for achievement in the present aggressive business condition, since responsiveness to client needs is the key determinant. An undertaking that cooks immediately to the requirements of the client is the champ.
Real time vehicle tracking is influenced less demanding with the approach of cutting edge vehicle to control system and tracking system. Real time quick reaction to false occasions can be given utilizing security programming. The product recognizes the unapproved objects controlled by people in the vehicle vehicles and screens section focuses. Some key clients in the connected logistics market are arrangement suppliers, correspondence hardware suppliers, government organizations and specialists, system integrators, M2M, IoT, and general broadcast communications organizations, oversaw benefit and middleware organizations, Internet personality administration, protection, and security organizations.
Global Connected Logistics Market to grow at a CAGR of 33.2+% by 2025.
Top Key Vendors:
Accenture, AT&T, Cisco, SAP, Huawei Technologies, IBM, Infosys, Intel, Microsoft, ORBCOMM, Oracle Alcatel-Lucent, Amazon Web Services, BT9, Gemalto, PTC, Qualcomm, Samsung Electronics, Siemens, TCS, and Vitria and so on.
It explains a detailed outline of the Global Connected Logistics Market depending on the important parameters. End users, products, regions, and many other segments are studied and explained. A brief idea of the driving forces which help make the market more flourishing is discussed in order to help the client understand the future market position. Estimated revenue growth in terms of volume with respect to the market for the upcoming years has been mentioned in depth.
Major system segments include monitoring management systems, logistics management systems, warehouse management systems and security systems. Technology systems consist of cellular, Wi-Fi, Satellite, ZigBee and NFC. Key devices include gateways, sensor nodes and RFID tags. Service based contributing to connected logistics market size include 3PL services, professional services and system integration. Railways, airways, roadways, and seaways are classified under transportation modes.
North America has been the biggest market for connected logistics, though Asia-Pacific is relied upon to witness the quickest development among every one of the regions, amid the estimated time frame. The anticipated development can be owed to variables, for example, the development of digitalization, progression in new technologies, development in the retail business, and increasing adoption of connected technologies by significant logistics suppliers in the region. Further, because of quick innovative headways in supply chain management and change in technological infrastructure, the region tends to adopt connected logistics solution at a fast scale in the coming years.
In the last sections of the report, the manufacturers responsible for increasing the sales in the Global Connected Logistics Market have been presented. These manufacturers have been analyzed in terms of their manufacturing base, basic information, and competitors. In addition, the technology and product type introduced by each of these manufacturers also form a key part of this section of the report.

Reuters - France to allow blockchain for trading unlisted securities

France to allow blockchain for trading unlisted securities



The new rules mean that banks and fintech companies can set up blockchain platforms where unlisted securities can trade instantly, cutting out middlemen like brokers and custodian banks.

Securities listed on financial exchanges will still be required to pass through custodians and clearing houses.

“The use of this new technology will allow fintech firms and other financial actors to develop new ways of trading securities that are faster, cheaper, more transparent and safer,” Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said in a statement.

Le Maire added that the new rules would be “another asset for Paris’ attractiveness as a financial center” as the sector seeks to put itself on the fintech map, where London currently looms large.

Eager to attract business from London after Brexit, the French government has already introduced measures to make Paris a more attractive financial center ranging from payroll tax cuts to a labor reform and promises to set up more international schools.

Blockchain, which first emerged as the system underpinning cryptocurrency bitcoin, is a shared ledger of transactions that is maintained by a network of computers on the internet rather than a central authority.

Financial institutions have been ramping up their investments in the nascent technology in the hope that it can help reduce the complexity and cost of some of their burdensome back office processes.