Unilever buys Maryanne Shearer’s T2, with annual sales of A$57 million, to expand tea presence

Unilever buys Maryanne Shearer’s T2 to expand tea presence

Published 09 September 2013 09:02

Sue Mitchell

T2’s Maryanne Shearer has sold her business to Unilever for an undisclosed sum.

She opened her first teashop on Brunswick Street in Melbourne’s funky Fitzroy in 1996 and made her name selling brews such as Sencha Quince, Liquorice Legs and Strawberries & Cream. Now Maryanne Shearer, the founder of Australia’s fastest-growing premium tea chain T2, has sold out to the world’s largest tea company, Unilever. The purchase price was not disclosed, but with annual sales around $57 million and a record of strong double digit sales growth, it’s fair to assume that Ms Shearer, 50, will be able to retire in comfort when she finally tires of tea. Read more of this post

How the Resources Race Is Institutionalizing Poverty

How the Resources Race Is Institutionalizing Poverty

By Tunggadewa Mattangkilang on 7:01 pm September 7, 2013.
Balikpapan/Jakarta. It is not only plantations but also oil and gas companies that threaten to turn parts of Papua into an industrial wasteland. American multinational ConocoPhillips announced that it was planning to restart exploration, including seismic testing, in the Warim block — located several hundred kilometers inland from Merauke, Papua — in the near future. Read more of this post

Thailand is Southeast Asia’s most prolific carmaker, streets ahead of nearest-rival Indonesia

Boom times for the ‘Detroit of Southeast Asia’

Published: 2013/09/09

BANGKOK: At a high-tech factory in the world’s fastest growing auto production hub, industrial robots and white-suited workers put the finishing touches to hundreds of cars rolling off the assembly line each day. It could be a scene from Toyota City or Detroit, but this is Thailand, a country better known for its beaches and rice paddies. With major carmakers hit by a global economic downturn, the Southeast Asian nation has emerged as a rare bright spot in recent years. Thailand’s auto production surged 70 per cent in 2012 from the previous year, to 2.48 million vehicles, according to the Paris-based International Organisation of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers. In contrast, China and India saw only single-digit gains. Read more of this post

Legoland owner to develop $90 million KidZania Singapore themepark

Legoland owner to develop KidZania Singapore

Sunday, September 8, 2013 – 09:30

Jasmine Ng

The Business Times

SINGAPORE – Malaysia’s Themed Attractions and Resorts – owner of Legoland and Sanrio Hello Kitty Town in the country – is launching its first overseas theme park, KidZania Singapore, to tap rising travel demand in the region. It has partnered Maybank, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific, Yakult, Canon and The Soup Spoon to set up five establishments in KidZania – an indoor theme park where children can pretend to be surgeons, pilots, runway models, journalists, chefs, firemen and many other professions. Read more of this post

Tide Reverses in Latin America; Brazil’s Prospects Fall While Mexico’s Rise as Fed Prepares to Ease Bond Buying

September 8, 2013, 7:35 p.m. ET

Tide Reverses in Latin America

Brazil’s Prospects Fall While Mexico’s Rise as Fed Prepares to Ease Bond Buying

THOMAS CATAN

The divergent fortunes of global emerging markets can be told through Latin America’s two biggest economies: Mexico and Brazil. Think of it as a tortoise-and-hare story. For the past decade, Brazil has boomed by selling raw materials to China. Its expanding middle class gorged on a tide of cheap credit unleashed by central banks in advanced economies as they tried to energize their recoveries. Read more of this post

More money, more problems for Norway

More money, more problems for Norway

Monday, September 9, 2013 – 08:50

AFP

OSLO – Norway which goes to the polls today, is an island of prosperity in Europe, with so much money that it literally doesn’t know what to do with it. The Nordic country faces an embarrassment of riches as it tries to figure out how to spend its huge pile of oil money without damaging the economy in the long run. “All countries around us are forced to reduce their spending,” said Mr Oeystein Doerum, chief economist at Norway’s largest bank, DNB. “Our biggest challenge is that our oil wealth is so huge, we run the risk of wasting it on substandard projects that are not profitable enough.” Read more of this post

Russia to Brazil Intervention Adds to U.S. Debt Woes Amid Losses

Russia to Brazil Intervention Adds to U.S. Debt Woes Amid Losses

Investors suffering the worst losses in Treasuries since at least 1978 can add dollar sales by emerging-market central banks to their list of challenges. Speculation that the Federal Reserve, the biggest buyer of Treasuries, will reduce its purchases sent U.S. debt down 4.1 percent this year and boosted the dollar against developing-nation currencies for four straight months, matching the longest streak since 2001, according to Bloomberg data. India, Brazil, Russia and Indonesia have intervened in foreign-exchange markets, and dollar sales mean liquidating Treasuries, according to bond traders at Scotiabank and Bank of America Corp. Read more of this post

N.Y. Subpoenas Bitcoin Firms in Probe on Criminal Risk

N.Y. Subpoenas Bitcoin Firms in Probe on Criminal Risk

New York’s top banking regulator sent subpoenas to 22 digital-currency companies, including BitInstant LLC and Dwolla Corp., to determine whether new regulations should be adopted to govern the emerging industry, according to a person familiar with the matter. Bitcoin is a virtual currency created four years ago that can be used to buy and sell a broad array of items, from electronics to illegal narcotics, according to the agency. Read more of this post

Hedge Funds Cut Back on Fees; Pressure From Disappointed Investors Changes ‘2 and 20’ Model

Updated September 9, 2013, 12:31 a.m. ET

Hedge Funds Cut Back on Fees

Pressure From Disappointed Investors Changes ‘2 and 20’ Model

GREGORY ZUCKERMAN, JULIET CHUNG and MICHAEL CORKERY

Pressure from disappointed investors is forcing hedge funds to roll back their fees, putting the standard charge of 2% of assets under management and 20% of investment profits on the endangered list. Until a few years ago, most funds were like upscale New York restaurants: Some succeeded, others failed, but almost none cut prices. This pricing power was a product of the tens of billions of dollars that flowed into the industry after the tech meltdown of 2000, when savvy investments by some hedge funds shielded their investors from the drubbing suffered by holders of broad stock funds. Read more of this post

Haunted Greeks Sell Real Estate EBay-Style to Evict Debt Specter

Haunted Greeks Sell Real Estate EBay-Style to Evict Debt Specter

A legend that has swirled around the dilapidated mansion on Smolenski Street in Athens is that the ghost of the previous owner deters prospective buyers by moaning: “The house is mine.” The Greek government refuses to be spooked. The protected two-story mansion and tower, replete with palm trees in the overgrown gardens, will be sold on Sept. 17 to the highest bidder in an EBay-style Internet auction. Greece is trying to dispel criticism it’s not doing enough to sell real estate pledged as part of its 240 billion-euro ($315 billion) rescue. Read more of this post

Defiant Dancers Warn of Assad’s Reprisals as U.S. Warships Wait

Defiant Dancers Warn of Assad’s Reprisals as U.S. Warships Wait

As U.S. warships carrying cruise missiles took position in the Mediterranean, Syrian revelers danced in defiance to tunes extolling their president. “These songs put us in a beautiful mood,” said Nazhat Haj Ali, a supporter of Bashar al-Assad, describing the beach party on the sea’s eastern shore he had organized in the coastal city of Tartus four days ago. “Let the warships come. Our president is strong, and if they attack, he will emerge stronger.” Read more of this post

Classic Ferraris, Bentleys soar in value as gold price sinks

Updated: Saturday September 7, 2013 MYT 2:11:56 PM

Classic Ferraris, Bentleys soar in value as gold price sinks

LONDON: Classic cars such as Ferraris, Bugattis and Bentleys soared by 28 percent in value in the year to June, outstripping gold, art and luxury London property thanks to rising demand from wealthy Asians. Property consultancy Knight Frank, which publishes an index tracking the performance of luxury goods, said the world’s wealthy were putting more money into tangible items that they could enjoy as the world economy looks to be recovering. Read more of this post

Cash-Starved Spanish Companies Run Out of Time

Cash-Starved Spanish Companies Run Out of Time

Patricia Carral Cunningham says the economic recovery may come too late for her business even after she kept up sales to weather Spain’s six-year slump. “I’ve put up all my personal assets as guarantees and now there’s no way I can get another credit line,” according to Carral, 50, who says her Madrid-based construction company Soldray S.L.’s 20 years of experience helped it survive the end of a real-estate boom in 2007. Read more of this post

America Faces the Shock of the Old; Future Economic Growth May Depend on Innovation

September 8, 2013, 5:48 p.m. ET

America Faces the Shock of the Old

Future Economic Growth May Depend on Innovation

JUSTIN LAHART

U.S. companies just haven’t been pushing boundaries like they used to. Innovation is the secret sauce of growth, enabling an economy to advance at a faster pace than the mere combination of investment and labor allows. A history of innovation encompassing the likes of the light bulb and the Internet is a big reason why the U.S. economy has been so much more robust over the long haul than others. But there is no guarantee that past will be prologue. Read more of this post

A solar-energy firm backed by entrepreneur Elon Musk ditched a type of “Happy Meal” share-lending deal that has given some investors indigestion

September 8, 2013, 8:29 p.m. ET

Musk-Backed SolarCity Scraps ‘Happy Meal’ Deal

Financing Technique Has Concerned Some Investors

MICHAEL SICONOLFI And MICHAEL ROTHFELD

A solar-energy firm backed by entrepreneur Elon Musk ditched a type of “Happy Meal” share-lending deal that has given some investors indigestion. SolarCity Corp., SCTY -2.53% a San Mateo, Calif., energy-services provider where Mr. Musk is chairman, made the disclosure recently in an amended securities filing. At issue is a financing technique for cash-starved companies named after the McDonald’s Corp. MCD +0.63%meal-and-toy combo. Companies strapped for cash serve up everything investors need to profit: bonds that are convertible into stock if the borrower does well and tools for betting against the firm if its prospects sour. Read more of this post

Billion dollar bond shows South Korea is hot – and it knows it

Billion dollar bond shows South Korea is hot – and it knows it

Reuters Sep 6, 2013, 02.12PM IST

SINGAPORE: Korea is hot and it knows it. To prove it, Seoul has just issued a $1 billion 10-year bond that highlights just how different Korea is from the rest of emerging Asia. While Indonesia issues dollar bonds in desperation – and India only in its imagination – to shore up ailing currencies, South Korea did so to flaunt its credentials as Asia’s new safe haven. Demand was so great that Seoul could have issued a bond five times the size. A third of the debt was placed with foreign central banks and sovereign wealth funds – the world’s most prestigious and conservative investors. It marks a dramatic turnaround for a country that was an IMF pupil during the Asian financial crisis 16 years ago and traditionally gets hammered, along with Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia, when investors sour on Asia’s emerging markets. Read more of this post