Rupee loses ground, 1$ --> Rs.45 : Forex

NEW DELHI: Rupee depreciated sharply against dollar on Wednesday as it breached the Rs 45 a dollar level to close at 45.12 against previous close of Rs 44.84 on Tuesday. Softening of crude prices has boosted the perception regarding US economy, which has pushed up value of dollar against most of the currencies in the world. Rupee also suffered because of that and it touched the lowest level in the last 22 months on Wednesday. While exporters, who stand to gain, rejoiced the fall, importers ran for cover. The worst hit will be the oil marketing companies, which import crude. As they are selling at substantially lower price than the import cost, depreciation of rupee will make the cost of imported crude higher and increase their deficit. While importers rushed to buy dollar, expecting it to appreciate further in the short-term, exporters withdrew from the market. This widened the gap in the demand and supply. A senior banker said unless the Reserve Bank Of India intervenes with dollar supply, fall of rupee will continue. The depreciation will also affect the government's effort to contain inflation. As prices of commodities are fixed on the basis of landed imported value in the rupee term, the depreciation of rupee will push prices up. The good news is that prices of commodities like steel and copper are falling in the international market. But, the depreciation in rupee against dollar will moderate the impact of fall in the global prices in the domestic market. A senior banker said that so far, RBI is not intervening to arrest the fall in rupee as this will improve India's export competitiveness. But, he said the central bank would not allow the currency to fall below the current level. Therefore, he added that RBI is likely to intervene in the market by increasing the supply of dollar to arrest the fall in rupee against dollar. As dollar appreciated against most of the currencies, the gold price in the international market fell sharply. On Wednesday, the yellow metal traded at $763.20 per ounce - the lowest level since October 25, 2007. It fell by over Rs 200 per 10 gram in the Indian market. On Multi Commodity Exchange, gold closed at Rs 11,441 per 10 gram. The silver price also fall sharply to close at Rs 18,550 per kg.

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Mittal holds Arcelor assembly in Delhi

It couldn’t be a bigger homecoming parade than this: top executives of the world’s largest steel maker, ArcelorMittal, have gathered in the homeland of the world’s richest Indian for their annual leadership summit.

Yes, India is obviously special for ArcelorMittal chairman Laxmi Niwas Mittal, for not only has he decided to locate his first-ever greenfield projects in India, he’s brought his top management — some 700 senior managers drawn from 60 nationalities — to experience the country first hand.

A far cry from their last venue, cine-friendly Cannes, this UM (dare we call it United Mittal?) General Assembly in India’s newly n-powered capital, was a high-voltage event. Security was tight at the conference hall of the Taj Palace hotel, only select media were allowed inside to witness the company powwows, and the only ‘outsider’ to participate in the 4-day jamboree was also as big as it gets: finance minister P Chidambaram. The focus was to discuss future corporate strategies and provide a platform to share best practices.

Mr Mittal soon struck an upbeat note: “India is high on ArcelorMittal’s growth plans. We remain committed to our projects in Orissa and Jharkhand, our first greenfield projects globally. There is progress on both projects and we hope to begin some construction work by first half of the next year and start producing steel by second half of 2012.”

And Mr Mittal’s optimism was palpable despite the fact that his projects in India were facing up to 50% cost overruns — which could put the final figure at $30 billion — due to delays in mining and other approvals.

“Though there have been some delays, we would complete the first phase of the 12-million tonne steel projects each in the two states, within 36 months of getting all approvals,” he asserted. “This would be a big improvement over project development activities in the country where SAIL’s Bokaro and Bhilai plants took almost 12 years to complete.”

Not even the turmoil in Singur could cast a shadow on Mr Mittal’s view about India’s potential to attract overseas investment. “One example (Singur) cannot be example for the whole country. One can face this kind of problem in any country. Of course, the event provides us with something to learn. But it cannot deter us from our investments and there is no question of revisiting our proposal for India,” he declared, adding as a pointed aside that if India could go ahead with 123 Agreement without Left support, solving the Singur impasse would not be difficult.

Company president and CFO Aditya Mittal shared his father’s exuberance over the projects and also reminded the company’s India-based managers about the importance of the meet: “You will get to see all the members of company’s group management board on one table for the first time in the country!” For a company that is spread around the world, such an annual feat is a mammoth task, but a necessary one if the management has to work as a coordinated team.

The group management board comprises Michel Wurth, Gonzalo Urquijo, Davinder Chugh, Christophe Cornier, Sudhir Maheshwari, Aditya Mittal and, of course, LN Mittal.

“We have about 3,20,000 employees in the group and events like this help bring together thoughts and processes that need to be shared by them. When we end this 4-day summit on Friday, the company would have gained substantially,” a company official beamed.

Besides getting to understand what makes the top management at ArcelorMittal tick, the executives also got a chance to interact with finance minister P Chidambaram, who is understood to have shared his vision of India as an attractive investment destination. But besides this big-ticket guest, the rest of the conference is being devoted to getting down to the brass tacks of running a steel conglomerate — sessions on productivity management, emerging technologies, HR practices, corporate social responsibility, labour, health and safety-related issues and more.

Awards for employees showing exemplary performance at work in their respective divisions were also on the cards, but the best has been saved for the last day — getting up close and personal with the host country. “Over 80% of the executives at the summit are here for the first time. India is a big country and I would like to see some glimpses of this beautiful country,” said an official who also deals with the company’s China operations.

ArcelorMittal will invest about $50 billion till 2012 to increase its global steel capacity to 130 mt from present 110 mt and increase iron ore production from 45 mt to 110 mt over the next four years. In India, the company intends to spend over $20 billion for two 12-mt steel plants in Orissa and Jharkhand.

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Internet Service Providers

An Internet service provider (ISP, also called Internet access provider or IAP) is a company which primarily offers their customers access to the Internet using dial-up or other means of data telecommunication.

ISPs may provide Internet e-mail accounts to users which allow them to communicate with one another by sending and receiving electronic messages through their ISPs' servers. ISPs may provide other services such as remotely storing data files on behalf of their customers, as well as other services unique to each particular ISP.

ISP Interconnection

ust as their customers pay them for Internet access, ISPs themselves pay upstream ISPs for Internet access.

In the simplest case, a single connection is established to an upstream ISP and is used to transmit data to or from areas of the Internet beyond the home network; this mode of interconnection is often cascaded multiple times until reaching a Tier 1 carrier. In reality, the situation is often more complex. ISPs with more than one point of presence (PoP) may have separate connections to an upstream ISP at multiple PoPs, or they may be customers of multiple upstream ISPs and may have connections to each one of them at one or more point of presence.

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What is Business?

A business (also called firm or an enterprise) is a legally recognized organizational entity designed to provide goods and/or services to consumers. Businesses are predominant in capitalist economies, most being privately owned and formed to earn profit to increase the wealth of owners. The owners and operators of a business have as one of their main objectives the receipt or generation of a financial return in exchange for work and acceptance of risk. Notable exceptions include cooperative businesses and state-owned enterprises. Socialistic systems involve either government, public, or worker ownership of most sizable businesses.

The etymology of "business" relates to the state of being busy either as an individual or society as a whole, doing commercially viable and profitable work. The term "business" has at least three usages, depending on the scope — the singular usage (above) to mean a particular company or corporation, the generalized usage to refer to a particular market sector, such as "the music business" and compound forms such as agribusiness, or the broadest meaning to include all activity by the community of suppliers of goods and services. However, the exact definition of business, like much else in the philosophy of business, is a matter of debate.

Business Studies, the study of the management of individuals to maintain collective productivity in order to accomplish particular creative and productive goals (usually to generate profit), is taught as an academic subject in many schools.
(Ref. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business)

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Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association

The cross symbol was first used in a 1934 advertisement for the Hospital Service Association, today known as Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota. Company secretary E.A. van Steenwyk had Viennese artist Joseph Binder create a poster that included a blue Greek cross. Van Steenwyk continued to use the symbol to identify his company's health plans, and the Blue Cross began to be used in other parts of the country.

In 1939, the Chicago-based American Hospital Association began using the Blue Cross symbol to signify that health plans across the country met certain standards. The AHA continued to administrate the use of the symbol until the Blue Cross Association was founded in 1960. The two organizations remained affiliated until 1972.

Another health plan gained popularity in the lumber and mining camps of the Pacific Northwest around the same time that Kimball created his plan. These would provide medical care by paying monthly fees to medical service bureaus composed of groups of physicians. The first of these, Pierce County Medical Bureau (now known as Regence BlueShield) in Tacoma, Washington, was founded in 1917 and is now a part of The Regence Group. The shield symbol was created in Buffalo, New York by Carl Metzger in 1939, and the first official Blue Shield plan was founded in California that same year. In 1948 the symbol was informally adopted by nine plans called the Associated Medical Care Plans, and was later renamed the National Association of Blue Shield Plans.

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I asked Jaya to apologise: Big B

Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan spoke out on his wife Jaya Bachchan's anti-Maharashtrian comments, a day after Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray rejected her apology in Mumbai Mirror.

"The casual off-the-cuff remarks made by her at the music launch function were without malice or deliberate intent, but if it has caused hurt to the sentiments of Maharashtra, Maharashtrians and indeed the city and citizens of Mumbai, then she must seek regret and offer apology. Everything that we possess today is what came to us from this great state and city," Big B wrote in his blog.

Bachchan goes on to say.

"Mumbai and Maharashtra has given us glory and recognition. I am 66 years old and 40 of those years have been spent living in Mumbai. Is it ever possible that we will dishonor it? Never!"

Jaya Bachchan has apologised for her alleged "anti-Marathi" remarks after Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) activists went on a rampage in Mumbai on Tuesday.

Activists tore off posters of films featuring members of the Bachchan family. Jaya, speaking to reporters late on Monday, apologised and said the comments made by her were completely unintentional and that no one should take them seriously.

MNS chief Raj Thackeray had demanded an unconditional apology from Jaya for her alleged anti-Marathi utterances, failing which the party would prevent screening of all films starring any of the Bachchans in Mumbai.

He said that the actress had "insulted" the state and its people under the guise of promoting the national language.

At a film function on Saturday night, Jaya had said: "People of Maharashtra, please excuse me. I am from Uttar Pradesh so I will speak in Hindi."

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