MF Global trustees offer mixed signals to customers

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Customers of the failed futures brokerage MF Global got mixed signals on Wednesday about their chances of recovering all of a $1.6 billion shortfall after two trustees involved in the firm's liquidation offered different outlooks about their chances of success.

In prepared testimony before the Senate Agriculture Committee, former FBI Director Louis Freeh -- who is responsible for winding down MF Global's parent company -- told lawmakers he is quite confidence that "all of the customers of MF Global Inc eventually will be made whole."

But James Giddens, the trustee for the broker-dealer unit tasked with recovering customers' missing funds, offered a less rosy picture, saying legal obstacles to recovering the money still remain.

"We very much would like to pay every customer 100 percent, however, it will be a time consuming, difficult uphill battle," Giddens told the Senate panel.

"We appreciate Mr. Freeh's apparent support and confidence in our ability to collect and allocate additional substantial assets and certainly that remains our singular focus."

Wednesday's congressional hearing was convened to examine both the collapse of MF Global and Peregrine Financial Group, a smaller Iowa-based futures brokerage that filed for bankruptcy July 10 after its founder Russell Wasendorf Sr. attempted suicide and left a note where he admitted to running a nearly 20-year fraud by forging bank documents.

More than $200 million of customer money is missing at Peregrine, according to regulators.

Wasendorf was arrested days after his suicide attempt on charges of lying to regulators. He is also facing a civil lawsuit by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The CFTC and criminal authorities, however, have still not filed any charges in connection with MF Global's collapse back in October and the loss of customer money.

"The failure of two futures brokerages in a nine-month time span has deeply wounded investor confidence in the futures markets," said Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Debbie Stabenow.

"We have heard from farmers and businesses who, after MF Global collapsed, opened accounts at Peregrine. For these folks, lightning really does strike twice in the same place, and they rightfully want to know why. I want to know why."

EXECUTIVE SUITE

Giddens told lawmakers on Wednesday he expects to soon return to MF Global customers who traded on U.S. exchanges 80 percent of their accounts, but that far less money so far has been returned to those who traded on foreign exchanges.

He said he is actively pursuing what "may be valid claims" against directors and officers, including former Chief Executive Jon Corzine and is also continuing "active discussions" with JPMorgan Chase & Co, the bank that was holding customer money which was transferred overseas.

When asked by lawmakers whether or not Corzine, a former U.S. senator and governor of New Jersey, knew about the transfer of customer money, Giddens said he felt there was evidence pointing to the brokerage's executive suite.

"I think the preponderance of the evidence indicates that management, senior management at MF Global was aware of the liquidity crisis and was aware that customer funds toward the end were being utilized to cover other costs in the firm," Giddens said.

Bankruptcy claims for sale by MF Global customers had risen to around 90 cents on the dollar by early June, reflecting growing optimism that most cash would eventually be restored, although many expect it will take years to do so.

(Reporting by Alexandra Alper, Aruna Viswanath and Sarah N. Lynch in Washington; additional reporting by Jonathan Leff in New York; Editing by Maureen Bavdek and Tim Dobbyn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/mf-global-corporate-trustee-sees-customer-funds-returning-141230499--finance.html

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Project Management Tips for Launching a Startup | Sphinx Web ...

Advertise here with BSA

Any Internet-based startup will require a lot of attention during the early phases of development. To launch a successful product you?ll need a targeted market share and a solid idea of what you?re looking to accomplish. For startups this often leads to monetization, building a community, or offering a unique service to the public.

featured preview - web design studio agency for startup office

In this article I want to share some ideas for managing a startup project. Whether you?re working alone or with a team, there will always be work to do. But if you can tackle this work in the right mindset you?ll notice distinct progress a lot quicker. And as the startup scene continues to grow you?ll find yourself more inspired and dedicated than ever before!

Include Branding from the Start

Marketing and branding ideas are super important for any product. But working online you really need to setup a brand which is quickly recognizable to your audience. When visitors find your company logo online it offers a reference in their mind to connect with your website.

The only way any startup can succeed is through enough PR and marketing status. Obviously this will get easier when you?re pushing 100k pageviews monthly. But when first getting started it?s a huge struggle to even hit this marker. Just keep in mind that marketing should become a passive process ? every day you should find time to leave blog comments and drop backlinks around the web.

Dropbox Office Headquarters - logo branding

It is difficult to suggest any specific marketing techniques because there are so many different kinds of startups. But universally any startup can benefit from listings in a web design inspiration gallery. There are hundreds of online CSS galleries which you can submit your link to get some attention. These galleries would bring in smaller trickles of visitors which over time can develop into very solid returns.

Focus on Results

Any new features you?re coding should be 100% related to the project at large. The first year of any startup?s life cycle is the most important time to build out the product to include all the bare-bones features. Try to avoid nitpicking at tiny changes in HTML or CSS unless they?re blatantly obvious and affecting the user interface.

Positive results are what turn your startup into a small business or larger company. You want to see traffic numbers increase over time, along with user registrations and revenues. People who are already visiting your website will be more likely to share the link online or via word of mouth. But if the website is shoddy or missing features, most first-time visitors won?t bother to return again.

Breaking Down Larger Ideas

When you have so many ideas going through your head at any time it can be difficult to sit down and focus on just a single outlet. Yet this level of concentration is necessary for completing goals in a precise, accurate manner.

empty conference meeting room desks

I recommend that you take down notes on all the different features you?d like to create. This can be written on paper or stored digitally with any to-do list application. These notes should be rough concepts and it?s your job to go over them and pick out which ideas are worthwhile. Take your top 5 and start building to see what you can achieve.

Try to keep your ideas small and easily manageable. During the first few weeks after launching it?s best to focus on smaller goals which you can complete in 1-3 days. If your idea is going to require 2 weeks for implementation it may be wise to break things down even further. Attempt to complete smaller chunks so you don?t end up feeling burnt out from working consistently.

Quick Development Phases

Speed is probably the single most indicative trait I associate with a startup. New products built for the Internet are often just experiments created by curious people. You launch a startup idea and see how it fares out in the real world.

The purpose of working in a startup cycle is to learn lessons quicker than normal. You can test out so many ideas because visitors on your website recognize the traits of a startup and are often accepting of changes. This gives you the freedom to play with A/B testing and move around sections of the site layout. The quicker you can make these changes and learn from them, the quicker you can move onto the next task.

You should have a healthy balance between content marketing and churning out new code. Working with open source code will save you hours of development time. In the long run you can push updates weekly and still learn from these experiences. The only reason you should really slow down with coding is when you?re writing poor bug-riddled PHP or JavaScript, and the startup is suffering as a result.

GitHub octocat logo stickers on MacBook

If you can work with even one other developer it will save you way more time. To have somebody else knowledgeable about the backend who can look over your work is a godsend. You will both have similar goals for the startup and be working in a similar mindset. In my opinion this attitude is why smaller startups can scale so quickly in such a short amount of time.

Plan for Long-Term Management

The initial few months after launching are always gruesome. You?re working constantly to keep up with development, marketing, and managing the website, plus you need to keep track of what should be changed in the future. It?s great if you can step back from the day-to-day and have a plan for where your company should be 1-2 years in the future.

Most startups will end up closing their doors and going offline before even hitting two or three years in development. The best advice I can give to all startups is stabilize yourself as quickly as possible! The service you?re providing is 24/7 access to your website from anywhere in the world. And if you can?t do it then surely somebody else will.

Sunrise over San Francisco Bay, California

Even older social networking websites such as MySpace and Friendster are still bringing in traffic each day. These websites are not as active compared with Twitter or Facebook, and none of them are considered ?startups? either. But you can see how just keeping a website online for 6 or 7 years will come with its own set of benefits. Stability is greatly overlooked amongst younger startups which is a key difference between success and failure stories.

Final Thoughts

Building your own website idea is not the road to be taken for every web designer. It requires dedication to build such a powerful webapp and keep it online for years to grow and evolve. But there are plenty of talented and very ambitious designers out there who can put these tips to good use.

I have always loved researching startups, and there have been so many launches in just a few short years. We can find everything from community websites to eCommerce stores to mobile smartphone apps ? and all of these areas in technology are advancing rapidly. Right now is truly the best time to launch your startup idea and see how far it?ll go!


Source: http://www.sphinxnow.com/blog/2012/08/01/project-management-tips-for-launching-a-startup/

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Technology Integration and the Restaurant Industry ? NEXTEP ...

What is Integration and What Does it Mean to the Restaurant Industry?

There are multiple meanings of the word integration. This is the first:

in-te-gra-tion [in-ti-grey-shuhn]: noun; ?an act or instance of combining into an integral whole.?

If you look at the typical hardware and software to run a concept, you have many pieces of equipment that must function seamlessly to allow the concept to succeed. With all of the day to day operations that are necessary for a concept to run smoothly, the last thing an owner needs to worry about is whether or not the technology that they are using is going to operate as it should. The technology should support, enhance, and enable them to focus on the other important aspects of their concept: food quality, managing labor, marketing, ordering and inventory, and all of the other various (and seemingly infinite) facets of operating a foodservice business.

So what should a restaurateur or manager look for when choosing the technology that will play such an integral role in operating their business? In the Fast Casual and QSR market, there are many components that all need to function flawlessly to keep the business flowing. Every modern concept has a few specific pieces in common: POS systems, some type of order management, a way to design and change menus. With the various concepts in an innovative and diverse market, you may also have other pieces of the puzzle to consider: drive thru, digital signage, online and mobile ordering, and an on premise self-order solution. What these various components, in their individual roles, have in common is the need to operate as an integral whole, in harmony with the other components.

Why Separate Components Struggle To ?Play Nice?

When a concept chooses the components that comprise the technology solution within their walls, the idea that each component will ?play nicely? with the other components is taken for granted. Even the most brilliant owner or operator probably do not possess a rich technological background in software or hardware development. Various vendors and manufacturers develop their products via various mechanisms. The process by which information flows and is shared with other components is different for different manufacturers. The base language may be different, the definitions and rules by which transaction data is sent and received will vary, and more often than not there is another layer of programming that must be inserted to allow these components to ?speak? to others. When you have a POS, order management, and digital menu from three separate vendors, this is often difficult (yet tentatively doable) terrain to navigate. However, the three systems will most likely have three sets of management tools to govern their behavior, and changes will have to be made three times to enable continued integration of the components. Even if there is a management tool offered by one to manage them all, an individual has to keep in mind that these are usually a ?general? solution, and can?t possibly be tailored to every component on the market. There are quirks and anomalies that will occur, and this ad-hoc system is not ideal for businesses who cannot afford any component to ever become inoperable for a period of time.

If that is not enough of a challenge, imagine that your concept evolves and adds (or maybe it already has) a drive thru, online and mobile ordering, and an on-premise self-order solution (such as a kiosk). Now you have three more components and three more sets of management tools that have to be integrated to speak to the POS, order management, and digital menus. Imagine completing the simplest tasks, such as changing an item price or 86ing an item. Now imagine having to repeat the process six times. Now imagine that there is an LTO to promote, or worse yet, a massive change to the menu. How much time do you have to accomplish these tasks AND manage the day-to-day operations of your business? Time equals money, and there are few operators who would rather spend a day doing data entry to bring their system up to speed instead of ensuring that their guests are having a great experience.

The Answer

NEXTEP SYSTEMS offers what has never before been accomplished in the restaurant technology world: one integrated system. Written on ONE robust, stable platform, our Foundation5 Foodservice Technology Solution encompasses ALL of the components to operate your concept smoothly, seamlessly, and quickly. Changes are global and immediate across all components, and management is made easy with cloud-based management tools that govern your entire system. Labor, inventory, item and menu management are all under one umbrella, giving you the time to do what is most important: focusing on delivering a great guest experience instead of managing your technology. Add to this the capabilities to increase revenue and deliver an amazing ROI, and the choice becomes very simple for the operator who wants the most competence and capability from their technology with the least amount of headache and time spent managing it.

in-te-gra-tion [in-ti-grey-shuhn]: noun; ?behavior, as of an individual, that is in harmony with the environment.?

Read more about the benefits of an integrated system here, or learn more about the success that other businesses are achieving through utilizing the best and most innovative technology available on the market.

Source: http://nextepsystems.com/articles/technology-integration-and-the-restaurant-industry?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=technology-integration-and-the-restaurant-industry

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Video: Romney?s international missteps

Road test: Self-driving car heads into city

??Watch a car drive itself through crowded city streets in Berlin, and glimpse the future of autos with the EO Smart Connecting Car, a vehicle that shrinks to fit the tightest parking spots, and can join a highway 'road train' for maximum safety and comfort. NBC News' Andy Eckardt reports from Germany.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036697/vp/48408123#48408123

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Gender Equality Rights,Gender Equality India,Gender Equality NGO

PRLog (Press Release) - Jul 30, 2012 -
IGSSS is an awarded non-profitable Gender Inequality Organization in India that channels ?entrepreneurial spirit, arts and creative talents of immigrant and low-income women of the India. And ?try to implementing their potential into small businesses that create jobs and a new generation of Indian leaders. IGSSS is a non-profit Gender Equality NGO organization established mainly to bring about changes of Gender Inequality In India, specially lives of the desperately poor sections of society especially underprivileged families.

Today, IGSSS offers one of the most-affordable, safe, successful and fastest growing Gender Equality Rights Programs for all women in India. Our Non Profit Organizations has a multidisciplinary team of professionals that helps in capability structure of key functionaries, performs hand holding operations in the field, takes initiatives for appropriate policy changes and carries out field studies related to policy issues.

Indo- Global Social Service Society will enable women and young people to realize their potential and break the inter-generational cycle of poverty. IGSSS also cares about the differences between men,women and other low and high concepts in our society. Our main objectives are to undertake, engage, participate in, assist, support,encourage and provide educational services to weaker sections of society. We works for capacity building and enlightenment of the vulnerable communities across the country through women Gender Equality Rights based framework for their valuable participation in development of our society and initially began as a means to connect other women.

IGSSS is the most preferred non government organization in India for research and training in the context management of Gender Equality in India & women empowering program. IGSSS is straight applying the project titled Gender Equality Rights and Empowering Women. We access and ownership over land and land based activities through education, legal literacy and advocacy in rural India' which is being funded by EU-WHH at Jhabua, Madhya Pradesh. Our Gender Equality NGO also works for the youths and women on their educational rights, promoting their employ ability, promoting harmony among youth in conflict areas.
For more information please visit: http://www.igsss.org/gender-equality-india.php or mail us at:- doc@igsss.net or contact us:- 011-45705000
Contact Us-
Indo-Global Social Service Society
28, Institutional Area, Lodhi Road,
New Delhi-110003
Email: doc@igsss.net
URL: www.igsss.org
Tel: 011-45705000

Source: http://www.prlog.org/11936984-gender-equality-rightsgender-equality-indiagender-equality-ngo.html.html

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Wall Street to open flat as Fed meeting eyed

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks opened flat on Tuesday ahead of the start to a two-day policy meeting by the Federal Reserve at which the central bank is widely expected to unveil new measures to stimulate the economy.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 21.23 points, or 0.16 percent, at 13,051.78. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was down 1.70 points, or 0.12 percent, at 1,383.60. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 0.80 points, or 0.03 percent, at 2,945.04.

(Reporting by Ryan Vlastelica; Editing by Dave Zimmerman)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/stock-index-futures-signal-small-rise-open-083745007--finance.html

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BMW earns fall 28 percent

(AP) ? German luxury automaker BMW AG says earnings fell 28 percent in the second quarter due to higher costs for investments in new technology and personnel. A large one-time plus from the same quarter a year ago affected the comparison.

Despite the fall in profit, the company recorded record sales, held onto its outlook and maintained its high profit margins on automobile sales.

However it cited "intense market competition" and warned that any worsening of Europe's economic crisis or a growth slowdown in China could hurt its business in the months ahead. It is already facing headwinds from Europe's crisis over too much government debt in some countries, which has devastated economies in nations such as Spain and Greece and kept Europe sales flat from the year before.

Net profit fell to ?1.28 billion ($1.57 billion) from ?1.77 billion a year ago. Sales rose 7 percent to ?19.2 billion. The fall in net profit in part results from ?464 million in one-time pluses from the year-ago quarter, which also saw record profits that made it harder for BMW to equal the previous year figure.

BMW said "higher personnel costs, increased expenditure on development and new technologies, intense market competition and the higher baseline of the previous year's record second-quarter earnings all contributed to the lower earnings figures in 2012."

The company reported record sales of 475,000 vehicles and said its profit margins remained at a strong 11.6 percent on car sales. That's a key figure indicating the company is maintaining its ability to generate strong profits from sales.

Earnings were supported by continuing sales increases in China, where they rose 31 percent, and by a 10 percent increase in the U.S. Strong global sales of the X3 sport utility, which jumped 38 percent, helped profits.

"The BMW Group continued to perform extremely well," CEO Norbert Reithofer said in a statement.

The company, which has invested in electric cars and the use of high-tech carbon fiber parts, said it had increased technology and development costs and cited investments in its production network. It also has 5 percent more workers, at 102,000, than it did in the quarter last year.

The company's earnings fell short of the consensus estimate for ?1.38 bill compiled by FactSet. It held onto its earnings prediction for the year of exceeding last year's sales volume and pre-tax earnings, but said those forecasts are "based on the assumption that worldwide economic conditions will not deteriorate sharply. The BMW Group sees risks primarily in a further deterioration of the economic situation in Europe and a slowdown of growth in China."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2012-08-01-Germany-Earns-BMW/id-6c36d8eaf421403bae0361d4e52f44b7

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How do you think wedding and dating/relationships will be in the ...

I'm thinking how dating and marrieage will be in the far future,when most people have achieved immortality and beauty and sensuality will be available for everyone and will be very easy to achieve.

For exemple,if most people are immortal and very beautiful,a person would meet another person and get in love,and as they are immortal,they could live together forever without the fear of getting old.But do you think marriage of long time like in the past will come back in the future?In my opinion,due to change in society and this reason I mentionated,maybe.I think immortality will have such impact on people's lives that this can be a possibility.Imagine if you are immortal and don't age,and you feel attracted/get in love with someone,and you think:"If we are immortal and share similar personality/tastes/interests,we could live together for a long time without the fear of losing the interests for each other.

On the other hand,I think the betrayal of dating and marriage will be an even greater problem than it's today,because of immortality and realizing that beauty and sensuality could be achieved by everyone,with so many attractive people,the chances of a betrayal and dating another person will be much greater.What do you think?

However,I don't know why,but according to many researches,there is a tendency of more and more people being single in the future.The stabilization of the world population could cause this.Well,it's already happening...

Source: http://www.futuretimeline.net/forum/topic/2558-how-do-you-think-wedding-and-datingrelationships-will-be-in-the-future/

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Family Holidays ? The Inclusive and Luxury Holiday with Children

The Holidays become predictable when the people are stressed out up from their confused life. Another group of people are themselves globetrotters or travel enthusiasts. Anything the reason is, vacations revitalize the people and helps them to draw the excitement out of pleasure trip behavior and activities. Each and every one the belongings fall in place pleasantly and all the members of our family are enjoys the vacations. Well, that is surely the case with all inclusive family holidays. The all inclusive family holidays present everything that fills everyone with excitement and pure enjoyment.

All the comprehensive family holidays are full of fun and gambol. These holidays are guided tours, calm by special travel agencies, to give an invigorating know-how to the holiday goers. It is all about spending quality time with your loving family. The vacationers anticipate the majority out of their trips. People wish to have all the fun of beaches, cruises, mountainous adventures, sports etc. because the children are mostly enjoy the family holidays.
The summer holidays are easy to classify and would place you under the comfort of premium suites, resorts and lodges. The family availing these all comprehensive vacations is sure to be amidst some congenial and valuable moments jointly.

These holidays are generally those holidays, which include all the expenses related to boarding, lodging, airport transfers, food and infusion etc. To sum it up, everything that is needed to make a holiday impressive is incorporated in the holiday package deal at subsidized prices. Entertainingly, these offers are available for all the family members. When it comes to put together the whole trip travel easily, try to go for all inclusive family holidays. The luxury family holiday is just the kind of holiday you and your family deserve, and it is also something you can enjoy without the need to remortgage your house.

The sightseer ambition that their holidays must be spent amidst the enjoyable locations, awe-inspiring hotel stays, annoying from abroad international cuisines, adventures and ocean cruises. These prospects are so much from a single trip but all inclusive family holidays cater to travel enthusiast, in precisely the same way. Such vacations are enough for leaving the holiday-goers spell jump. The unfriendliness in such package deals is quite awesome. The luxury heritage hotel stays are in the middle of the added benefits. The Luxury and inclusive family holidays have many advantages, particularly when you take family holidays overseas. Enjoy family fun, bond, sharing and occasion to see and demonstrate your family tourist attractions, courage and contemplation that cannot be duplicated at home.?

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Author is a professional writer and he is writing articles on various topics from last three years. With this post, he wants to share the information on Memorable Family Holidays

Source: http://articlelib.org/family-holidays-the-inclusive-and-luxury-holiday-with-children/

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Democrats look to back gay marriage at convention

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Democratic Party is aiming to include support for gay marriage in its party platform this year for the first time in its history, a Democratic source said on Monday.

The platform drafting committee unanimously approved language on Sunday endorsing same-sex marriage among the policy positions that will be presented to the convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, where President Barack Obama will formally accept the party's nomination in early September to run for re-election.

The approval was first reported in The Washington Blade, which said the language also rejected the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, a law passed by the U.S. Congress in 1996 that defines marriage as only between a man and a woman and denies federal benefits to lawfully married same-sex couples.

The Obama administration said last year it would no longer support DOMA. Obama's Republican opponent, Republican Mitt Romney, is a gay-marriage opponent who supports the statute and promises to defend "traditional marriage" if he is elected on November 6.

In May, Obama became the first U.S. president to say he believes same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. The largest U.S. civil rights group, the NAACP, has also endorsed gay marriage, saying the fight for gay rights is a civil rights issue.

Six U.S. states and the District of Columbia have legalized gay marriage, but 30 have banned it.

The 15-member Democratic Party platform drafting committee met in Minneapolis during the weekend. A draft will be considered in Detroit on August 10, and it will then go to convention delegates for final approval.

Religious conservatives, an important component of the Republican Party base, staunchly oppose gay marriage, but polls show support for the issue rising, especially among younger Americans.

(Reporting By Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/democrats-look-back-gay-marriage-convention-first-time-201116816.html

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