By MATTHEW BARAKAT - Associated Press | AP

FALLS CHURCH, Va. (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday sided with government attorneys investigating the disclosure of classified documents on WikiLeaks, and upheld a ruling that the website Twitter must turn over certain account information to prosecutors.

Lawyers for three Twitter account holders, all of whom have some connection to WikiLeaks, had argued that forcing Twitter to cooperate with the investigation by turning over the data amounts to an invasion of privacy and chills Twitter users' free speech rights.

But in a 60-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Liam O'Grady in Alexandria, Va., affirmed an opinion issued in March by a federal magistrate that the government's tactics were permissible.

Prosecutors have said federal law specifically allows them to seek account information and say it is a routine investigative tool. The law in question— the Stored Communications Act — allows prosecutors to obtain certain electronic data without a search warrant or a demonstration of probable cause. Instead, the government must only show that it has a reasonable belief that the records it seeks are relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation.

The court order does not seek the content of the users' tweets, but instead seeks the IP addresses associated with the accounts. Lawyers for the Twitter users, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, say the government can use those IP addresses as a sort of virtual tracking device to pin down the specific computer used by an account holder and with it the user's physical location.

O'Grady's order also allows the government to keep secret any similar orders it sought from other social media sites. The Twitter users' lawyers have speculated that other websites were targeted with similar orders.

"The government shouldn't be allowed to get information about individuals' Internet communications without a warrant, and it certainly shouldn't be able to do it in secret," said Aden Fine, a lawyer for the ACLU who represents one of the three petitioners, Icelandic parliament member Birgitta Jonsdottir.

In a statement, Jonsdottir said, "With this decision, the court is telling all users of online tools hosted in the U.S. that the U.S. government will have secret access to their data. People around the world will take note. ... I am very disappointed in today's ruling because it is a huge backward step for the United States' legacy of freedom of expression and the right to privacy."

The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, where the case was heard, declined comment on the ruling.

The original order issued in December 2010 at prosecutors' request also sought Twitter account information from WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and Pfc. Bradley Manning, who is being held in military confinement amid allegations that he leaked classified documents about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to WikiLeaks. Neither Assange nor Manning was a party in the lawsuit challenging the legality of the Twitter order.

Source: 

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/twitter-must-user-wikileaks-probe-222212412.html

By DAVID K. RANDALL and MATTHEW CRAFT - AP Business Writers | AP

NEW YORK (AP) — Signs of progress in Europe's debt crisis and an unexpected drop in unemployment claims pushed stocks higher Thursday, a day after the stock market took its worst fall since the summer.

Greece named a new prime minister Thursday and Italy borrowed $6.8 billion at lower interest rates than analysts expected. Italy's benchmark rate dropped below 7 percent after spiking above that level Wednesday.

Investors were also relieved by talk that the economist Mario Monti is likely to replace Premier Silvio Berlusconi, who was seen as an obstacle to meaningful economic reforms. Italy's president pledged that Berlusconi will step down soon.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 112.92 points, or 1 percent, to close at 11,893.86. It plunged 389 points Wednesday after Italy's borrowing rates soared and talks in Greece to name a new prime minister broke down. Traders have been concerned that debt troubles in Italy and Greece could spread to the U.S. and lead to a global financial crisis.

Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital, called the drop in unemployment claims and the news from Europe encouraging. "It's got the markets on the cheerful side," he said.

The S&P 500 index gained 10.60, or 0.9 percent, to 1,239.70. The Nasdaq rose 3.50 points, or 0.1 percent, to 2,625.15. Apple Inc. fell 2.5 percent, dragging down the Nasdaq.

The Labor Department reported early Thursday that the number of people applying for unemployment benefits fell to 390,000 last week. That figure and the four-week average were the lowest since April. The drop is a sign the job market may be improving.

There were also signs of progress in Greece, the other focus of Europe's debt crisis. A day after a breakdown in power-sharing talks in Greece jolted financial markets, senior banker Lucas Papademos was named prime minister of a new coalition government. Papademos, a former vice president at the European Central Bank, is tasked with passing austerity measures being demanded by international lenders.

Cardillo said he didn't believe that the worst predictions about Europe's debt crisis would come true. If things get bad enough, he said, the U.S. would have no choice but to come to the rescue.

"If Italy was to fail, you can rest assured Europe would fail and the global economy would fail," he said. "The U.S. is in a global economy. Whatever happens in one part of the globe is no longer isolated."

In corporate news:

— Cisco Systems Inc. rose 5.7 percent after its quarterly results beat Wall Street's estimates.

— Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. plunged 39 percent after its revenues fell short of analyst expectations.

— Viacom Inc., owner of MTV Networks and Comedy Central, rose 8.2 percent after it earned more than analysts predicted. Most of the increase came from its Paramount Pictures division.

Source: 

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/progress-italy-greece-debt-sends-stocks-160240195.html

Indrani Sugathadasa is on a mission to develop a transparent capital market that
encourages the masses to invest in national development. Yamini Sequeira reports.

The Chairperson, Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) of Sri Lanka, Indrani Sugathadasa does not seem unduly worried about the recent volatility in Sri Lanka’s capital market. She attributes the fluctuations to the global economic scenario and the fact that foreign investors were pulling out of Sri Lanka and other regional markets.

“The foreign investors pulling out was a response to the gloomy financial position in some Western markets which concerned these investors. In this situation, the SEC quickly stepped in by allowing stockbrokers to extend credit on liquid assets. I’m glad to see that market correction is happening gradually. Capital markets by their very nature fluctuate and this is something investors are well aware of,” she points out, adding that post war, the SEC has been trying to do the most it can to boost the capital market and maintain transparency through changes in regulation and closer supervision of transactions.

While talking about the capital market, it is hard not to quiz the SEC chief about recent allegations of market manipulation by some investors and overheating in recent months. Needless to say, sudden buyouts and overnight dumping of shares found investors, companies, regulators and the media searching for answers.
“Yes, the market has spiked upwards recently due to the activities of certain players. Although the SEC has been called to take action, few people realise that our mandate is regulatory and as a legislator by nature; therefore, we do not interfere with market behaviour. However, if there are any such unwarranted movements, we will take firm action after due analysis, which is carried out by the Secretariat,” she assures.

The country’s capital market has had its fair share of publicity this year, both good and bad. A prominent investor was quoted as saying that insider trading without
malintention is acceptable, which set-off a heated public debate. Sugathadasa emphati­cally condemns this statement.

“It is wrong and misleading to make such statements because it will scare-away foreign investors and smaller, more serious investors. Insider dealing is not acceptable in any form in our market or in other capital markets around the world. Often, investors make statements like these for personal gain, without realising the damage it can do to the stock market as a whole,” she stresses.

She admits that certain cases require tough action and that mere enforcement of rules is not adequate. “We are looking at several cases of insider dealing. Once again, it is important to understand that this is a tedious process during which we have to unearth evidence, record statements and so on, which takes time whether it is in Sri Lanka or abroad,” she opines. “However, if proven we will not hesitate to take the strongest possible action against such violators,” she adds.

Her dream is to build a stable, transparent capital market with absolute integrity and to extend opportunities of investing in the stock market to everyone, including people in rural areas. She seems determined to achieve this during her tenure. This determination has prompted the SEC to investigate loopholes and seal them, while bringing in new regulations to establish a market that is above board on all counts.

She confesses that much of the SEC’s rules and regulations are over 25 years old, and keeping in mind the increase in size and sophistication of the market over the decades, these regulations need to be re-examined. This exercise is being carried out in consultation with World Bank officials currently, to allow greater civil and criminal powers to be vested in the SEC, to empower it to carry out market intervention if and when needed.

Meanwhile, the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) plans to expand its presence countrywide, encouraging the investor base to continue to expand. The nature of investors too has changed, along with the fact that investors from the north and east are showing greater interest in the exchange. A branch of the stock exchange is already operating in Jaffna and the SEC expects the CSE to venture to the east.

The SEC and CSE are exploring the possibility of entering into an agreement with the London Stock Exchange (LSE), which will enable almost 500 stockbrokers from regional markets to converge on Sri Lanka to trade on the LSE. Further, the SEC has introduced the ‘Central Counter Party’, which essentially transfers risk from buyers to sellers, serving to extend confidence to foreign investors while reducing the perception of risk in investing in the CSE.

As someone who claims never to have traded on the stock exchange, Sugathadasa is reluctant to offer advice to investors; but she utters words of caution: “Make informed decisions and avoid following others or indulging in the herd mentality when it comes to investing because each investor’s motivation is different. Instead, investors should examine a company’s financial stability and performance before investing in its stock. Most importantly, it is crucial not to consider the Colombo Stock Exchange as a betting ground to make overnight gains, but rather to see the stock market as a vehicle for medium to long-term investment.”

The current profile of the CSE has a greater emphasis on retail, which is not a favourable situation and she affirms that they are expecting greater foreign and institutional investors to return to the market before long. The establishment of a clearing corporation which is being fast-tracked would no doubt support this cause.

Moreover, the impending entry of several large IPOs will boost the market. In the recent past, some prominent IPOs have failed to attract investor interest and Sugathadasa attributes their failure to overpricing and a surplus of IPOs in the market, which has exhausted investors. Almost 50 IPOs were scheduled to enter the market in 2011.

Sugathadasa adds that it is necessary to investigate if funds raised by a company are being utilised for the purpose for which they were raised. This will protect investors further. “The market capitalisation stands at around Rs. 2.3 trillion and keeping in mind the projected doubling of per capita GDP by 2016, we hope to reach the five trillion rupee mark in market capitalisation by then. Though the target might seem ambitious, we are gearing up all our systems and processes to achieve that growth,” she adds.

Only one-third of listed companies were trading actively during the last few years, but she states that this is no longer true, as post war almost 200 companies have traded in some measure, with many ‘sleeping stocks’ being rejuvenated.

The path to the country’s capital market is, we’re told, being paved with good governance and infused with an atmosphere that is conducive to foreign investment. Moreover, the CSE is no longer seen as being expensive, as the PE of the stock market has come down to below 20 against a backdrop of healthy corporate performance, whereas it was over 25 in the past.

“A diverse group of people from totally different walks of life come to me and tell me that they are active investors in the stock market. They range from clerical workers, to medical professionals and housewives. Much of this interest is being facilitated by online trading, which offers complete privacy and convenience. There is also a greater element of middle class investors, which is heartening. Investing in the stock exchange can be fruitful if investors make careful, informed decisions without expecting windfalls overnight,” she concludes.

The interviewee is the Chairperson of the Securities
& Exchange Commission of Sri Lanka.

Source :

http://lmd.lk

Budget 2012 to be presented in Parliament later this month is expected to give relief to the tourism industry.
This was said by Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority Chairman Dr. Nalaka Godahewa to reporters on Wednesday after it was brought to his notice the difficulty the industry is facing to build the necessary infrastructure due to rising costs.

It is estimated that the cost to build a four star hotel room alone is Rs. 16 million.
An industry source told this reporter that as a result of those high costs no new investments are taking place in the East coast though there is land available.
Except for a few top of the line hotels like those belonging to the John Keells Leisure Group, other industry players have been slow to invest in their product due to the island’s previous debilitating 26 year old terrorist war which hit tourism and which only ended two years ago.
As such to take advantage of the post war tourism boom in the island there is a need for the industry to spend on infrastructure development, which however is affected due to the high costs involved in such investments coupled with high borrowing costs.

Relief is also expected in the sphere of electricity tariffs to the industry which is currently a hybrid between industry and commercial rates.
Government of Sri Lanka plans to attract 750,000 tourists by the year end and 2.5 million by 2016.
Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators President Nilmin Nanayakkara said that this year’s target would be met. He also expected the current winter season to witness a 30% year on year (YoY) growth in tandem with the growth the industry experienced in the first nine months of the year of 30.1%, but much lower than the previous winter’s growth of 46.1%.
One of the chief reasons for this slowdown is due to the recessionary fears in the West on account of the euro debt crisis.

The industry’s cash cow is also the winter traffic from the West. Though India from a country perspective is the source of the highest number of tourist arrivals to the island, from a spending and from a “stay” perspective, the tourist from the West easily surpasses his Indian counterpart. The Indians who come here for shopping are low budget tourists, staying for a mere three days, whereas the Western tourist wintering here, generally stays in star class hotels for a minimum of 10 days.

Source: 

http://forum.srilankaequity.com/t12286-budget-boost-for-tourism#81595

Google has overhauled the way it serves up results in response to search queries.

The update is designed to work out whether a person wants up-to-date results or historical data.

The US firm estimated the alterations to its core algorithm would make a difference to about 35% of searches.

The changes try to make results more relevant and beef up features which Google believes set it apart from rivals.

By contrast, Microsoft's Bing search engine emphasises social search.

Fresh spam

"Search results, like warm cookies right out of the oven or cool refreshing fruit on a hot summer's day, are best when they're fresh," wrote Google fellow Amit Singhal in a blogpost explaining the changes.

The under-the-hood changes sought to understand whether a searcher wants results "from the last week, day or even minute" said Mr Singhal.

The update is supposed to offer a better guess of how "fresh" the results should be.

For instance, said Mr Singhal, anyone searching for information about the "Occupy Oakland protests" would probably want up to the minute news.

These need to be distinguished from searches for regular events such as sports results or company reports.

Other types of searches could call on older results, he said. Those looking for a recipe to make tomato sauce for pasta quickly would be happy with a page that is a few months or years old.

The update to improve the "freshness" of results builds on the big update made to the underlying infrastructure of Google's core indexing system in August 2010 known as Caffeine. That change made it easier for Google to keep its index up to date and to add new sources of information.

Writing on the Search Engine Land news site, analyst Danny Sullivan described the changes as "huge". The last big update to the Google algorithm, known as Panda, affected only 12% of searches.

The update could have potential disadvantages, warned Mr Sullivan.

"Rewarding freshness potentially introduces huge decreases in relevancy, new avenues for spamming or getting "light" content in," said Mr Sullivan.

Source: 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15590285

Asia faces increased risks from the ongoing problems in Europe and the slowdown in the US. If the West were to be even weaker than expected – falling into a double-dip recession, for instance – this would take its toll on Asian growth prospects. Across Asia, we anticipate some decline in confidence and a softening in export orders given the challenges facing the US and the Eurozone. Based on annual growth rates, the overall picture in Asia is as before, a region moving from strong to slower but sustainable rates of growth. 

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) now sees growth of 7.5 per cent in both 2011 and 2012, lower than its forecasts five months ago when it expected 7.8 per cent in 2011 and 7.7 per cent in 2012. The message is a positive one, albeit with some concern about the impact from the West. “Continuing growth amid global uncertainty” is the overarching view of the ADB. Despite setbacks in the West spilling over into the region, the ADB says that the economies in developing Asia (i.e. excluding Japan) “are continuing their steady growth” and that “there are signs that growth in the region is shifting to more sustainable sources.” It sees a number of features helping growth so far this year, including stronger domestic demand and intra-regional trade. Domestic demand has been driven by rising income, increasing employment opportunities and investment.

Growth rates across Asia are slowing, but Sri Lanka is an exception. First, we highlight a few key takeaways from the second quarter 2011, which shows that strong domestic demand was a key growth driver. We then discuss an issue that is currently the subject of much debate and discussion – currency and the call for less intervention by the Central Bank in the foreign-exchange market.

Sri Lanka’s second quarter GDP growth rose to 8.2 per cent year-on-year, from 7.9 per cent in the first quarter. First, the agricultural sector rebounded strongly from the adverse impact of floods in the first quarter, recording 1.9 per cent year-on-year growth. This suggests that broad-based growth is back, with both the services and industry sectors expanding sharply – industry by 9.4 per cent and services by 8.8 per cent year-on-year. Second, external demand played a significant role in supporting growth in the second quarter, up 38.9 per cent year-on-year, while private-sector credit growth averaged approximately 33 per cent, reflecting robust domestic demand. Third, industrial growth was broad-based across all sub-sectors. The construction sector grew strongly, by 10.6 per cent year-on-year in the second quarter from 9.3 per cent in the second quarter of 2010, on account of infrastructure-development projects, which continue to be the main growth driver. Finally, wholesale and retail trade – which contributed 23.5 per cent to GDP and grew by 11.4 per cent year-on-year in the second quarter – boosted services-sector growth and was supported by steady progress in transport and communications, while activity in the banking, insurance and real estate was bolstered by the prevailing low-interest-rate environment.

In Asia, pressure on currencies is rising due to dollar demand in non-deliverable forwards, as investors rush to guard against more currency weakness. From the Korean Won to the Turkish Lira currencies are at multi-year or even record lows against the dollar, despite central bank action to stop them falling too sharply. In Asia, the Indian, Thai and Philippines central banks also intervened in the market last month. One thing is certain: emerging central banks certainly have the ammunition to defend their currencies.

Following the conclusion of the IMF’s seventh review for disbursing the next tranche of the USD 2.6 billion Stand-By Arrangement, the main concern raised was the need for less intervention in the foreign-exchange market by the Central Bank, thus allowing for greater exchange-rate flexibility. This IMF policy directive comes at a time when global risks could threaten investor appetite. Greater volatility in capital flows into emerging markets suggests that policy makers should maintain more flexible exchange rates to curb speculative short-term capital inflows. The Central Bank’s response to the IMF’s directive made it clear that its exchange rate policy will remain the same, indicating that intervention in both sides of the market will continue in order to maintain stability while allowing for what the Central Bank called “adequate flexibility”.  

The effectiveness of these actions has been questioned. Such action may succeed in softening depreciation, but it remains to be seen if it can win against the market. Central banks may not be terribly upset at the prospect of weaker currencies, as they provide a welcome boost to export competitiveness. If commodity prices continue to fall and inflation pressures recede, some economies may be more willing to accept a greater degree of currency weakness.

Source :

http://lmd.lk

By PETER SVENSSON - AP Technology Writer | AP

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. Cellular Corp., the country's sixth-largest cellphone company, on Friday said it had the opportunity to carry the iPhone but turned it down because the phone is too expensive.

It's the first U.S. carrier to acknowledge turning down the phone.

Consumers pay $200 for the base model of the iPhone 4S, but Apple charges carriers about $600 for it. Carriers count on making their money back in service fees over the life of the contract.

U.S. Cellular CEO Mary Dillon told analysts on an earnings conference call Friday that "the terms were unacceptable from a risk and profitability standpoint." She didn't provide any details, but said the added load the iPhone could have placed on its data network was not a big consideration.

Chicago-based U.S. Cellular has 5.9 million subscribers, a number that has been shrinking slowly over the past two and a half years. Only a quarter of its subscribers on contract-based plans have smartphones, compared with half at AT&T Inc.

Carriers see the ability to sell the iPhone as a crucial competitive advantage, though its high price means it's not an easy path to profits. Sprint started selling the phone last month and has said it will take two years for it to pay off.

AT&T was the exclusive U.S. carrier for Apple Inc.'s phone for three and a half years, until Verizon Wireless got it in February. Now, tiny Mississippi-based carrier C Spire Wireless is set to add it too.

T-Mobile USA, the fourth-largest carrier, has a data network that isn't compatible with the iPhone.

Source: 

http://m.yahoo.com/w/news_america/us-cellular-turned-down-iphone-180551297.html?back=%2Fallnews%2F&.ts=1320436091&.intl=us&.lang=en&.tsrc=emul

By DANIEL WAGNER - AP Business Writer | AP

WASHINGTON (AP) — The European debt crisis has claimed its first big casualty on Wall Street, a securities firm run by formerNew Jersey Governor Jon Corzine.

MF Global Holdings Ltd., which Corzine has led since early last year, filed for bankruptcy protection Monday. Concerns about the company's holdings of European debt caused its business partners to pull back last week, which led to a severe cash crunch, the company said in its filing.

In a statement, the Securities and Exchange Commission and theCommodity Futures Trading Commission said that they and other regulators had been closely monitoring MF Global's situation for several days "in anticipation of a transaction that would include the transfer of customer accounts to another firm."

MF Global told the regulators early Monday that it hadn't reached an agreement on a deal and it reported "possible deficiencies" in customers' futures trading accounts, the two agencies said.

Corzine, the former head of investment banking giant Goldman Sachs Group Inc., oversaw MF Global as it amassed $6 billion in debt issued by financially strapped European countries such as Italy, Spain and Portugal. Their bonds paid bigger returns than U.S. Treasury debt because bond investors believed that they were more likely to default.

That bet eventually doomed the company. A regulator complained last month that it was overvaluing European debt, forcing it to raise more money, according to the papers it filed with U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.

MF Global's bankruptcy is the eighth-biggest ever in the U.S., according to the research firm BankruptcyData.com. It's bigger than Chrysler LLC's in 2009 and smaller than those of financial-crisis casualties Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., Washington Mutual Inc. and CIT Group Inc.

Last week, MF Global reported its biggest ever quarterly loss, and rating agencies downgraded its debt. Its stock plunged 66 percent. Spooked business partners required it to post more money to guarantee its trades.

Soon short of cash, MF Global looked for outside investors or buyers, but no alternative emerged before regulators' Monday deadline, the company told the court. Trading in shares of MF Global Holdings Ltd. was halted early Monday.

MF Global's bankruptcy shows the danger of investing when the outcome will be determined by government action, said Daniel Alpert, managing partner at the New York investment bank Westwood Capital Partners LLC.

"I don't think it's a canary in the coal mine, but it does show you that it's still a very volatile market," he said. "The nature of this crisis is that events can lead in any number of ways, and markets are trading on news, not numbers."

The SEC and the CFTC said they have determined that a bankruptcy proceeding overseen by the industry-funded Securities Investor Protection Corp., whose mandate is to protect investors when a brokerage firm fails, "would be the safest and most prudent course of action to protect customer accounts and assets." SIPC, which can provide up to $500,000 for each customer of a failed brokerage, announced separately Monday that it is beginning the liquidation of MF Global under its customary procedures.

MF Global's big bet on Europe might not have happened before Corzine joined. Until he joined, the company was known mainly as a dealer in derivatives, which are investments based on the value of some underlying asset. Corzine wanted to build MF Global into a major investment bank.

One method: Trading for the bank's own profit, a practice known as proprietary trading. Corzine made his career at Goldman as a trader, and the company became a trading powerhouse under his watch.

Proprietary trading was responsible for much of MF Global's quarterly loss, it said in court papers.

As of last week, MF had amassed net exposure of $6.29 billion in debt issued by Italy, Spain, Belgium, Portugal and Ireland. Of that, $1.37 billion was from Portugal and Ireland, which already were bailed out by European authorities. More than half was from Italy, whose borrowing costs increased in recent days as investors grew concerned about its finances.

By comparison, Morgan Stanley's net exposure to those countries was only $2.1 billion as of Sept. 30, according to its latest quarterly filing. Morgan Stanley's stock was battered last month because of concerns about its exposure to European debt.

Corzine was hopeful that European leaders would solve the crisis and protect the value of MF Global's holdings before investors grew wary. Last week, he said he expected the firm to "successfully manage these exposures to what we believe will be a positive conclusion in December 2012."

MF Global turned a profit just three quarters out of the past 12.

Corzine also is a top fundraiser for President Barack Obama. Corzine has helped raised at least $500,000 for Obama's re-election campaign since April, according to records released by the campaign.

At worst, MF Global's bankruptcy could roil credit markets and make financial companies reluctant to lend to each other. But the impact on markets will likely be muted, said Karen Shaw Petrou of Federal Financial Analytics.

"It appears their exposure to risk was particularly acute," she said.

MF Global's bankruptcy has prompted comparisons to Lehman Bros., whose 2008 failure touched off a global credit crisis. Even though Lehman was bigger and more intertwined with other companies, investors appeared worried Monday about other financial companies' possible losses, either from deals with MF Global or unrelated losses on European debt.

Bank stocks fell sharply on Wall Street after the bankruptcy filing. Morgan Stanley lost 8.7 percent, Citigroup 7.5 percent, Bank of America Corp. 7.1 percent and Goldman 5.5 percent.

Including its subsidiaries, MF Global has assets of $41.05 billion and liabilities of $39.68 billion, according to its bankruptcy petition.

Petrou said other firms holding European debt might survive the market turmoil if European leaders can convince the world that they are on track to solving the problem.

"It will work as long as the market has confidence in it," she said. "That's what makes this whole situation so spooky — it's all driven by market confidence, or lack thereof."

____

AP Business writers Pallavi Gogoi and Chris Kahn in New York and Associated Press writer Ken Thomas and AP Business Writer Marcy Gordon in Washington contributed to this report.

Source: 

http://news.yahoo.com/mf-global-first-big-us-victim-europe-crisis-204708273.html