EU to decide who pays when banks fail

By John O'Donnell and Robin Emmott

LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - The European Union will seek on Friday to forge rules to force losses on large savers when banks fail, a sensitive reform that could shape how the euro zone deals with its sickly banks.

Finance ministers in Luxembourg will try to resolve one of the most difficult questions posed by Europe's banking crisis - how to shut failed banks without sowing panic or burdening taxpayers.

"The costs of future restructurings can't be wished away," said a senior EU official involved in the talks. "We need a mechanism to shift the burden away from taxpayers."

The European Union spent the equivalent of a third of its economic output on saving its banks between 2008 and 2011, plundering taxpayer cash but struggling to contain the crisis and in the case of Ireland, almost bankrupting the country.

But France and Germany are divided over how strict the new rules should be, with Paris worried that imposing losses on depositors could prompt a bank run.

A draft EU law that will form the basis of discussions recommends a pecking order in which first bank shareholders would take losses, then bondholders and finally depositors with more than 100,000 euros ($132,000) in their account.

That would make the harsh treatment of savers, which was part of Cyprus's bailout in March, a permanent feature of Europe's response to future banking crises. EU countries would be required to follow these rules when closing banks.

Finding a prompt solution is important as Europe tries to put more than five years of financial turmoil behind it and emerge from economic stagnation.

"We must act now while we still remember the crisis," Erkki Liikanen, a member of the European Central Bank's governing council, said in Brussels before the meeting.

RESISTANCE IN LONDON, PARIS

A central element to ensure the euro zone's long-term survival is a system to supervise, control and support its banks, known as banking union.

Common rules in the wider European Union are considered a stepping stone towards the euro zone's banking union.

Agreeing EU-wide norms would address Germany's demand that European rules on closing banks be in place before the 17-nation euro zone's bailout fund can help banks in trouble.

Euro zone finance ministers agreed late on Thursday to set aside 60 billion euros to help banks via the fund, the European Stability Mechanism.

If agreed, the new EU rules would take effect at the start of 2015 with the provisions to impose losses coming as late as 2018.

Still, the idea has divided EU governments.

Britain and France say countries should have the final word in deciding how to close banks and not be tightly bound by any new EU rules.

But Germany, the Netherlands and Austria want regulations that will be applied in the same way across all 27 countries in the European Union. They fear that granting too much national leeway would undermine the new law.

"Some flexibility might be necessary, but it shouldn't be too much," Joerg Asmussen, the German member of the European Central Bank executive board, told reporters, arguing that investors need to know the rules of the game. ($1 = 0.7590 euros)

(Additional reporting by Ingrid Melander and Martin Santa; editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/eu-decide-pays-banks-fail-220544142.html

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MindTouch Delivers For SAP And Salesforce By Turning The FAQ Into A Self-Service Sales Tool

MindTouch is using data to provide context to customer support pages so people can get better answers to the questions they have about a product or a service. The FAQ just doesn't do it anymore.?It's either because the questions don't apply or the answers don't address a customer's issues. MindTouch has won customers such as SAP and Salesforce.com by turning the manual into a contextual data engine that correlates to the individual and the overall customer base. It turns product and service data into a knowledge engine that serves relevant information on a per-article basis. The contextual knowledge base can also be applied to search results. Articles that get the most interest rise to the top.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/TitnMr_i_Rc/

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Bomb kills 9 Afghan children, 2 NATO troops

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) ? A suicide bomber targeting an American military delegation outside a government office in eastern Afghanistan killed 12 people on Monday, including nine schoolchildren who were walking nearby and two international service members, officials said.

The attack comes as the Taliban and other militants step up bombings and raids on police posts nationwide in a major test of the ability of Afghan soldiers and police to hold their ground without international military forces, who are withdrawing.

Gen. Zelmia Oryakhail, provincial police chief of Paktia province, said the bomber on a motorcycle detonated his explosives in Samkani district as American forces passed. He said a local school had just let pupils, who were between 10 and 16 years old, out for the day.

The U.S. military delegation had just attended a security briefing at the district administrative office, said district chief Saleh Mohammad Ahsas, who was in the meeting. He said the bomber appeared to have been waiting for the delegation and struck as the Americans left the compound, and the blast killed people walking nearby including the schoolchildren.

The U.S. military coalition in Afghanistan confirmed that two of its service members died in the explosion. It did not disclose their nationalities.

Officials gave conflicting initial reports on the Afghan death toll, but Oryakhail said late Monday that he had accounted for all the bodies ? many burned beyond recognition ? and the final count was one Afghan policeman and nine dead from the school, along with the two coalition troops.

Seven more Afghan civilians, including two children, were killed Monday in the eastern province of Laghman when their vehicle hit a bomb in the road. A statement from the provincial government said four women and two children had gone with a male driver into the hills to collect firewood. On their way back, their vehicle hit the device, killing everyone inside.

The Afghan army and police are fighting the insurgency this year with little or no help from international forces that have been in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion to topple the Taliban for sheltering al-Qaida's terrorist leadership after the Sept. 11 attacks on American soil.

As the 2014 withdrawal of most international forces looms, insurgents are intensifying their attacks ? using a broad range of tactics from suicide bombings to improvised bombs that are often accidentally detonated by passing vehicles, killing civilians. An assassination campaign against police chiefs and local government officials also has continued.

And in recent weeks, hundreds of Taliban fighters have attempted to take over more territory with attacks on police posts in several parts of the country. Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqi confirmed that Taliban have launched multiple assaults ? assisted, he said, by al-Qaida and the Pakistan-based Haqqani terrorist network ? but he insisted Afghan forces were holding their ground.

"The enemy was not able to get control of a single district, not even a police checkpoint," Sediqi said, noting that in the last week alone, security forces have killed 196 Taliban and arrested 117 others.

The escalation in attacks has cost Afghan forces dearly. At least 441 security forces have died in fighting or bombings in the first five months of this year ? more than twice the number killed during the same period last year, according to statistics compiled by The Associated Press. Hundreds more have been wounded, losing limbs to bombs and suffering other debilitating injuries.

By contrast, the number of U.S. and other foreign troops killed in action through May 15 this year has dropped dramatically to 58, compared with 153 in the same period last year.

Even as the violence spikes, there are tentative parallel efforts to encourage negotiations.

The Taliban confirmed on Monday that it sent a delegation to Iran for three days of talks, signaling that Tehran could be seeking the role of regional mediator in attempts to end its neighbor's 12-year war.

Spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said in an email that emissaries from the Taliban's political office met with Iranian officials over the weekend. He said a separate group of Taliban clerics attended a religious conference in Tehran.

An Iranian news agency said Saturday that Tehran hosted a Taliban delegation ? an unprecedented development, since the Sunni Muslim Taliban have long been enemies of Iran's ruling Shiite clerics.

Ahmadi also said the Taliban's political wing would accept any invitation to conferences, a possible good sign for so-far fruitless efforts to negotiate an end to the Afghan war. Peace talks have sputtered in the past.

___

Associated Press writer Rahim Faiez contributed from Kabul.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bomb-kills-9-afghan-children-2-nato-troops-151107485.html

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NLCS rematch postponed by rain in St. Louis

Programming note: Coverage of Game 1 of the Giants-Cardinals doubleheader Saturday begins at 10:00 PT on CSN Bay Area, followed by Giants baseball at 10:15.

ST. LOUIS ? With tornado sirens blaring, the Giants and Cardinals never got close to throwing the first pitch Friday night.

The series opener at Busch Stadium was postponed and will be made up as part of a split doubleheader on Saturday. The first game is scheduled to start 10:15 a.m. PDT and the second game remains scheduled for a first pitch at 4:15 p.m. PDT.

It?s? a split doubleheader, so the ballpark will be cleared in between games.

Neither of Friday?s scheduled starters, Matt Cain and Shelby Miller, began warming up. They?ll face each other in the first game. It?ll be Madison Bumgarner against Adam Wainwright, as scheduled, in the second game.

There?s more inclement weather in Saturday?s forecast. But as long as the two teams can squeeze in both games, the Giants? rotation plans won?t be affected as they move forward.

Chad Gaudin remains listed as Sunday?s spot starter for the Giants, although manager Bruce Bochy said he reserved the right to use the right-hander in relief in an emergency Saturday.

In the press box, immediately after announcing Friday?s postponement, the Cardinals? public relations staff warned media to "leave the stadium as soon as possible and seek shelter."

Makes you wonder why the heck it took so long to make the decision. The game was postponed roughly 40 minutes after the scheduled first pitch at 5:15 PDT, but before a drop of rain hit the ground. The leading edge of a severe thunderstorm hit the area within an hour of the postponement announcement, meaning fans had very little time to clear the area and seek shelter.

(The storm passed through with no damage to Busch Stadium or injuries reported to fans, according to the Post-Dispatch.)

The Giants would?ve played without third baseman Pablo Sandoval (strained left foot) and center fielder Angel Pagan (hamstring). Second baseman Marco Scutaro was in the lineup despite being ?a little washed out,? in Bochy?s parlance, with an upper respiratory infection.

Sandoval is expected to miss the entire series and Pagan is ?50-50? to start one of the two games on Saturday, Bochy said.

?He still feels a little something,? Bochy said.

It?s possible that Brett Pill or Brandon Belt could see time in left field but neither of them would start in the outfield, Bochy said.

Bochy said the postponement was better than waiting around all night ? something the Cardinals and Kansas City Royals did until almost 3 a.m. Central time while waiting out the storms to complete a game that had been suspended in the ninth inning.

?We had a good BP,? said Bochy, mostly maintaining a deadpan. ?Noonan booted one ball to his left, but otherwise we looked good.?

Source: http://www.csnbayarea.com/blog/andrew-baggarly/giants-cardinals-postponed-doubleheader-saturday

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