La TRibune : Les "arrangements troubles" de Lafarge avec l'Etat islamique

Les "arrangements troubles" de Lafarge avec l'Etat islamique

Le groupe français a négocié avec l'Etat islamique en vue d'obtenir des autorisations pour laisser passer aux checkpoints les employés de son usine syrienne, selon Le Monde.

Le cimentier Lafarge a tenté en 2013 et 2014 de faire fonctionner "coûte que coûte" son usine en Syrie "au prix d'arrangements troubles et inavouables avec les groupes armés environnants, dont l'organisation Etat islamique (EI)", affirme mardi Le Monde.

En cause : la cimenterie de Jalabiya, située à 150 kilomètres au nord-est d'Alep, rachetée par Lafarge en 2007 et mise en route en 2011. "Jusqu'en 2013, la production se maintient malgré l'instabilité croissante dans la région due à la guerre civile qui a débuté en 2011", relève le quotidien. Mais "à partir du printemps 2013", l'EI "prend progressivement le contrôle des villes et des routes environnant l'usine de Lafarge".

"Des courriels envoyés par la direction de Lafarge en Syrie, publiés en partie par le site syrien proche de l'opposition Zaman Al-Wasl et que Le Monde a pu consulter, révèlent les arrangements de Lafarge avec le groupe djihadiste pour pouvoir poursuivre la production jusqu'au 19 septembre 2014, date à laquelle l'EI s'empare du site et Lafarge annonce l'arrêt de toute activité", explique Le Monde.

Des négociants qui commercialisent le pétrole raffiné par l'EI
Lafarge, qui cherche à garantir l'accès à l'usine de ses ouvriers et des marchandises, missionne notamment un certain Ahmad Jaloudi "pour obtenir des autorisations de l'EI pour laisser passer les employés aux checkpoints". Des échanges de courriels "permettent de conclure que la direction de Lafarge à Paris était au courant de ces efforts".

Autre preuve du quotidien : "Un laissez-passer estampillé du tampon de l'EI et visé par le directeur des finances de la wilaya (région) d'Alep, daté du 11 septembre 2014, atteste des accords passés avec l'EI pour permettre la libre circulation des matériaux".

Pour pouvoir fabriquer le ciment, Lafarge est aussi passé par "des intermédiaires et des négociants qui commercialisaient le pétrole raffiné par l'EI, contre le paiement d'une licence et le versement de taxes", assure le journal. Lafarge, qui a depuis fusionné en 2015 avec le Suisse Holcim pour devenir un géant des matériaux de construction, n'était pas joignable dans l'immédiat à Paris.

>>> US Gapping Up

Gapping up
In reaction to strong earnings/guidance: LEN +3.7%

M&A news: ASEI +12.6% (to be acquired by OSI Systems (OSIS) for $37.00/share in cash, or ~$269 mln), NSR +4.1% (announces intention to separate into two independent and publicly traded companies)

Select EU financial related names showing strength: SAN +2.5%, BCS+2.4%, PUK +2.2%, DB +2%, ING +2%, RBS +1.9%, LYG +1.5%, CS+1.4%

Other news: CDXC +9.2% (responds to recent report of short sellers; co exploring options in response to 'attack' ), OPK +7.8% (confirms FDA approval for RAYALDEE; U.S. launch planned for H2 of 2016),IMPV +7.7% (Elliott Associates disclosed a 9.8% active stake, confirming reports it has acquired a position. Elliott said it has initiated dialogue with management and the Board on ways to increase shareholder value), RDHL +6.8% (positive final results with primary and secondary endpoints met in phase 1 study with Yeliva in advanced solid tumors), CYRN +6.1% (Thomson Reuters (TRI) announced a strategic partnership with CYREN (CYRN).g), GWPH+3.5% (selects infantile spasms as the fourth target indication for its Epidiolex orphan pediatric epilepsy development program), MITK+3.3% (issued patent by the USPTO for its unique system for processing and extracting content from the image of a driver license captured using a mobile device), UAL +3.1% (Outlines value-driving initiatives), KBH +2.8% (in sympathy with LEN), GBT +2% (prices upsized offering of 6.4 mln shares of its common stock at $18.75/share), GEVO +1.8% (Intracoastal Capital discloses 3.1% passive stake)

Analyst comments: RUN +1.8% (initiated with an Outperform at Oppenheimer), ERIC +1.7% (upgraded to Neutral from Sell at Goldman), MRO +1% (upgraded to Overweight from Equal-Weight at Morgan Stanley)

>>> US Gapping down

Gapping down
In reaction to disappointing earnings/guidance: WERN -11.4%, KMX-3.5%, CP -2.4%


Select metals/mining stocks trading lower: HMY -5.8%, SBGL -3.4%,GFI -3.3%, AG -3.1%, PAAS -3.1%, KGC -2.5%, ABX -2.4%, SLW -2.3%,NEM -2.1%, GDX -1.9%, AUY -1.9%, GOLD -1.9%, GLD -1.2%

Other news: OIBR -76.7% (requests judicial reorganization after debt agreement talks with creditors breaks down), SCYX -12.8% (announces launch of public offering of common stock and warrants), SWFT -6.6% (in sympathy with WERN), CSAL -4.7% (announces the pricing of a secondary offering of ~14.7 mln shares of common stock by selling shareholders on behalf of Windstream (WIN) at $26.01/share), PLNT-4.7% (announces a 10 mln share class A common stock offering by selling stockholders), PRTK -3.8% (commences underwritten public offering of 3.75 mln shares of its common stock), HTLD -2.5% (in sympathy with WERN)

Analyst comments: USAC -5.1% (downgraded to Sell from Neutral at Goldman), STO -0.8% (downgraded to Sell from Hold at Deutsche Bank)

FT : Leonardo-Finmeccanica set to go on acquisition trail

Leonardo-Finmeccanica set to go on acquisition trail

Chief executive Mauro Moretti wants to secure control of ATR, the regional aircraft manufacturer

Mauro Moretti is in expansion mode. Barely two years after arriving to shake up and streamline the top 10 global defence company, Finmeccanica, the chief executive of the newly-rebranded Leonardo-Finmeccanica is talking about acquisitions.
“We are ready to buy or exchange businesses,” he says in an interview with the Financial Times. “We want to grow in our core areas, particularly in helicopters and defence electronics.”
Mr Moretti indicated that Leonardo could even be willing to swap part of the Italian industrial champion’s 25 per cent stake in European missile maker MBDA.
Airbus should take note. Europe’s leading aerospace and defence group has long coveted control of the missile company in which it and BAE Systems each have a 37.5 per cent stake.

Mr Moretti’s eye, meanwhile, is on winning control of ATR, the regional aircraft maker jointly owned by it and Airbus.
DRS Technologies, the US electronics business put up for sale by Leonardo last year and then withdrawn after a stronger than expected turnround, could also be a swap candidate, although the Italian company intends to retain control, says Mr Moretti.
The former trade union official — who was handpicked by Italy’s prime minister to revive the partially state-owned company — is feeling so flush after reporting a sharp rise in net profits, from €20m in 2014 to €527m in 2015, that he is even considering restarting dividend payments next year. Leonardo has not paid a dividend since 2010.
But not everything is quite as rosy as Mr Moretti would wish. A British vote this week to quit the European Union would pose a real threat, not just to Leonardo, which has significant interests in the UK, but to the country’s entire defence industry, he says.

“Europe is moving towards . . . common defence projects,” he says. “Obviously if [Britain] exits from Europe it is quite difficult to have the same opportunities in future.”
He adds that on its own, Britain or any other European country would not be able to fund development of the cutting edge technologies that are necessary to compete against richer defence budgets in China or the US.
Leonardo’s UK businesses — AgustaWestland, the helicopter maker, and Selex, a leading maker of radars and sensors — would be handicapped by a leave vote, says Mr Moretti. Eventually, he adds, Leonardo could be forced to review its investments in Britain.
A vote to leave would make life more difficult for Mr Moretti, he says, just as the outlook for Leonardo begins to improve. The company, once a ragbag of industrial interests struck by serial allegations of corruption, has in the past year shed its rail and bus businesses to focus on aerospace, defence electronics and security.
But rebuilding Leonardo’s reputation after high-profile corruption scandals will take time. This month a former chief executive, Giuseppe Orsi, saw his acquittal reversed by an appeals court for his role in alleged kickbacks in an Indian helicopter contract.
Reports have resurfaced in the Indian media that the Indian government has blacklisted Leonardo as a result, although Mr Moretti says the company has not been informed of any such move.

He admits there has been an issue with corporate culture at Leonardo but says this is changing. He challenged Indian authorities to come in and scrutinise the company’s practices.
Mr Moretti has sought to clean up Leonardo’s image, along with the chairman, Giovanni de Gennario, a former chief of police who led investigations into the mafia. Mr Moretti says he has replaced all executives who were tainted by corruption allegations.
His efforts at changing perceptions appeared to be paying off last year, with Leonardo’s shares reaching a seven-year high in November.
However, the stock has fallen by a third since the beginning of this year and the company still retains its junk credit rating.
Leonardo’s recovery still needs to prove itself, say analysts, even if good progress has been made. Uncertainty clouds the outlook for the company’s helicopter division — badly hit by the sharp downturn in its key market of oil and gas exploration.

These questions will be answered, promises Mr Moretti. As far as the oil and gas sector is concerned, this will be the trough year, he believes. The oil price has passed $50 a barrel, strengthening his conviction that the helicopter sector is on the brink of recovery. “By the end of 2016 we will have a positive trend,” he says.
Leonardo has come a long way in the nearly two years since Mr Moretti arrived, but there is still some way to go.
Just over a year ago he said he would be in a new job within two years. Now, his timeline has stretched a bit. Mr Mr Moretti says he will not be looking for a new challenge before 2020. “I would like to complete this mission,” he adds.

>>> US Early premarket gappers

Early premarket gappers

Gapping up: IMPV +9.5%, OPK +8.3%, CYRN +4.5%, RBS +3.2%, BCS +3.1%, PUK +2.9%, AV +2.9%, GWPH+2.6%, SAN +2.5%, LEN +2.4%, DB +2.2%, LYG +2.2%, ING +2.1%, UN +2%, SHPG +1.9%, GEVO +1.8%, CS+1.8%, ASML +1.7%, DEO +1.6%, KBH +1.4%, MT +1.3%, ERIC +1.3%, TOT +1.2%, ARMH +1.2%, NGG +1.2%,BP +1.1%

Gapping down: WERN -10.9%, LBTYA -10.3%, SCYX -7.9%, HMY -7.5%, CSAL -7%, PRTK -3.8%, ABX -3.1%, SBGL-2.7%, KGC -2.7%, GDX -2.7%, AUY -2.5%, NEM -2.3%, SLW -2.2%, GOLD -1.8%, AG -1.5%, GLD -1.4%, RIG-1.2%, WLL -1.2%

>>> Mr Soros - Guardian Article & My point of view.

This Article has been published yesterday a 10pm, Reading this article, I don't think that is the same MR Soros talking few weeks ago about his short position...GBP is trading up 5.7% on the last 5days vs Euro and 4% vs USD...yesterday a strong hand bought a decent size of EuroStoxx future in the market an even if Polls were better this week end after Miss Cox murder I don't think it will be enough for a big global rebalancing from institutional investors...yesterday move appeared to me to be more a short covering ahead of long awaited referendum...Market is still difficult to read and even I think that UK will remain I won't buy the market here, think we can trade lower before the end of the week...I will buy on deep..(BTFD)...this could be wishfull speculation of a old broker sitting in front of these screens all day but can't buy here for the most courageous I will go small short to play this correction.
Laurent


George Soros: EU exit risks 'black Friday' - http://bit.ly/28LxTTn

Exclusive: Currency speculator warns devaluation would mean more disruption than when UK dropped out of ERM in 1992

The world’s most famous currency speculator has warned a vote on Thursday for Britain to leave the EU would trigger a bigger and more damaging fall for sterling than the day he forced Britain out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism almost a quarter of a century ago.

George Soros, writing in the Guardian, said that a Brexit vote would spark a “black Friday” for the UK, but the devaluation of sterling would bring none of the benefits to the economy that it enjoyed after it dropped out of the ERM on 16 September 1992 – Black Wednesday.

He said that, as in 1992, there would be big financial gains for speculators who had bet on the UK leaving the EU but that such an outcome would leave “most voters considerably poorer”.

Soros said that unlike after Black Wednesday, there was little scope for a cut in interest rates, the UK was running a much larger current account deficit, and exporters would be unable to exploit the benefits of a cheaper pound due to the uncertainty caused by a vote to leave the EU.

“Sterling is almost ­certain to fall steeply and quickly if leave wins the referendum,” Soros said. “I would expect this devaluation to be bigger and also more disruptive than the 15% ­devaluation that occurred in September 1992, when I was fortunate enough to make a ­substantial profit for my hedge fund investors at the expense of the Bank of England and the British government.”

In the months following the UK’s departure from the ERM, interest rates were cut from 10% to 5.5% – easing the financial burdens facing consumers and businesses. However, with official borrowing costs currently at 0.5%, Soros said rates were already at the lowest level consistent with the stability of British banks and meant there was little the Bank of England could do in the event that Brexit led to a recession.

A vote to leave would force the pound to slide towards parity with the euro – “a method of joining the euro that nobody in Britain would want” – and plunge more than in September 1992 when his $10bn (£6.9bn) bet against the pound broke the Bank of England.

“Too many believe that a vote to leave will have no effect on their personal financial positions. This is wishful thinking. If Britain leaves the EU it will have at least one very clear and immediate effect that will touch every household: the value of the pound would decline ­precipitously. A vote to leave the EU would also have an immediate and dramatic impact on financial markets, investment, prices and jobs,” Soros added.

“A vote to leave could see the week end with a black Friday and serious consequences for ordinary people,” Soros said.

Michael Gove, the justice secretary and leading leave campaigner, said Soros had previously predicted that Britain would be better off with the single currency, a forecast which proved the currency speculator had made mistakes.

“George Soros is an advocate of the single currency, an advocate of European integration,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “If economic forecasters were as reliable as doctors or airline pilots then we’d all be billionaires. When we reflect on what George Soros is saying we also need to remember he has got things wrong in the past.”

Gove said the EU model was a “sinking ship” which Britain could unshackle itself from, and “send Europe in a better, more progressive direction”.

Two days before the polls close a series of high-profile figures warned about the risks of a vote to leave. Enda Kenny, the taoiseach of Ireland, appealed to Britain to vote to remain inside the EU, warning that the return of a stronger border between Ireland and Northern Ireland required by a Brexit vote would play into an old narrative – “one of division, isolation and difference”.

Writing in the Guardian, Kenny warned of a psychological effect, saying the reappearance of the old border after decades of work to promote peace and reconciliation “would be a step backwards and present an opportunity for others, with malign agendas, to exploit”.

Jeremy Corbyn repeated his careful endorsement of a remain vote. The Labour leader said he was “not a lover” of the EU but had come to a rational decision about his support for remain. He cautioned that either result was possible: “I’m hoping there is going to be a remain vote; there may well be a remain vote, there may well be a leave vote.”

Amid worries about whether Labour supporters would turn out for remain, Len McCluskey, who heads the Unite trade union, wrote that he was not surprised that they were concerned about immigration.

“In the last 10 years, there has been a gigantic experiment at the expense of ordinary workers. Countries with vast historical differences in wage rates and living standards have been brought together in a common labour market,” he said. “The result has been sustained pressure on living standards, a systematic attempt to hold down wages and to cut the costs of social provision for working people.”

Sterling rallied on Monday as polls published over the weekend showed a rise in support for the remain camp after the death of Jo Cox and propelled the pound to its biggest one-day move in almost eight years when compared with the world’s other major currencies.

Sterling jumped more than 2% to touch $1.47 against the dollar and headed towards €1.30 against the euro. The FTSE 100 index of leading shares jumped 3% to 6,204 – pulled higher by the banking and property companies that had dragged it lower in recent weeks.

Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, accused remain supporters of trying to take advantage of the death of Cox. “What we are seeing here is the prime minister and the remain campaign trying to conflate the actions of one crazed individual with the motives of half of Britain who think we should get back control of our borders and do it sensibly.”

Soros said that speculators – hailed the Gnomes of Zurich in the 1960s by Harold Wilson – had made large profits at Britain’s expense at the time of the 1967 devaluation. “Today there are speculative forces in the markets much bigger and more powerful. And they will be eager to exploit any miscalculations by the British government or British voters. A vote for Brexit will make some people very rich – but most voters considerably poorer,” Soros said.

Not all economists agree with Soros’s assertion that a rate cut will not be possible: economists at JP Morgan are among those forecasting a cut to zero in August from the historic low of 0.5%.

But economists at Pantheon Macroeconomics expect sterling to plunge if there is a vote for Brexit. “If Britain opts for Brexit – as it well could, given the latest neck-and-neck opinion polls – sterling likely will plunge,” Samuel Tombs at Pantheon said, warning the market was underestimating how far sterling could fall. Tombs warned that capital outflows could be “gargantuan”.