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In a major step toward containing a massive Gulf of Mexico oil leak, BP said a mile-long tube was funneling crude Sunday from a blown well to a tanker ship after three days of wrestling to get the stopgap measure into place on the seafloor.

The contraption was hooked up successfully and sucking oil from a pipe at the blown well Sunday afternoon after being hindered by several setbacks. Engineers remotely guiding robot submersibles had worked since Friday to place the tube into a 21-inch pipe nearly a mile below the sea.

Kent Wells, BP’s senior vice president for exploration and production, said during a news conference that the amount being drawn was gradually increasing, and it would take several days to measure it. Read Full Post…

Retailers are priming for a consumer comeback.

Shoppers have started to show they’re willing and able to spend more, and stores are tweaking their merchandise to accommodate them. Cashmere is making a comeback and sellers of everything from wine to toys are seeing shoppers move away from the very lowest price ranges.

The moves signal optimism that the recovery from the Great Recession is picking up steam, but there’s a downside for shoppers: the return of higher prices.

The changes, which have started to crop up this spring, range from bringing back lavish cookware sets that were dumped during the Great Recession to once again stocking big wedges of gourmet cheese instead of cutting them into smaller chunks that cost less.

Toys R Us, which carved out a section in the store to sell toys under $3 during the downturn, is now throwing in $5 toys. Read Full Post…

“Prudential today announces further details of the proposed combination of the Prudential Group and the AIA Group, including the terms of its fully underwritten rights issue to raise approximately 14.5 billion pounds,” a statement said. The British group had delayed by almost two weeks details of the record rights issue needed to fund the insurance sector’s biggest ever takeover, as regulators voiced concerns about the enlarged company’s capital strength.

Prudential announced in March that it had agreed to buy AIA — the Asian arm of troubled US insurer AIG — for 35.5 billion dollars (29 billion euros). It expects

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The government wants to raise 4.4 billion dollars from foreign pension, insurance and sovereign wealth funds and the rest from domestic institutions, the Economic Times newspaper said.

The emerging market giant of 1.2 billion people needs to rapidly boost its urban infrastructure spending to catch up with neighbouring China and other countries and to ease its chronic poverty problems, economists say.

The decision to create the fund was taken at a meeting in New Delhi earlier in the week chaired by Montek Singh Ahluwalia, deputy chairman of India’s powerful Planning Commission, a top government economic body.

A committee will be set up to oversee the fund-raising exercise, which is to be launched next month at an Indo-US forum of chief executives established in 2005 by US president George W. B

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Papandreou told Germany’s daily Handelsblatt that he, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and eurogroup chief Jean-Claude Juncker had written to US President Barack Obama calling for an end to controversial credit default swaps (CDS).

“The G20 countries plan to discuss it,” he said. In March, Germany said it was working with France on rules for derivatives markets including CDS, the lucrative trade in complicated insurance investments against the risk of a debtor defaulting that are favoured by speculators.

They were originally aimed at covering against the risk of a debtor defaulting but Athens has blamed the product for deterioration in its prospects of tackling its massive debt crisis which has threatened to destabilise the eurozone.

“We must reinforce the regulation of the market,” Papandreou said. EU and US

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The £5m liability capacity, provided by AmTrust Group, is available for Lloyd’s brokers and also for UK and International brokers with incomes in excess of £5m.

Jennifer Martin, Underwriting Director at DUAL, commented: “In the past, DUAL has underwritten PI cover for a limited range of insurance brokers but this new capacity opens the doors to much bigger risks. Having personally underwritten Professional Indemnity for Lloyd’s Brokers for over ten years I am pleased to bring DUAL into this market place.”

“Many brokers now place their own cover directly in contrast to using a specialist broker and I have developed a strong connection with many of the brokers in this market over the years. Our approac

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People may be placed in financial turmoil because banks are charging customers higher rates on lending.

This is despite the historically low base rate, according to Darren Cook, a spokesperson for Moneyfacts.

Mr Cook said that there is no direct association between the rate provided by the Bank of England and the amount individuals actually end up paying.

Regarding unsecured loans and credit cards, he commented: “When the basic economic situation is unsettled there is a much higher probability of default and unfortunately that is passed onto the consumer.”

The specialist was speaking in regard to new research disclosed by Moneyfacts that showed overdraft rates to have reached their highest level in a decade.

He added that customers should shop around before choosing a bank as there are substantial differences between rates.

Figures released by Defaqto show that the average rate of an unsecured loan has risen from 8.8 per cent in 2007 to 12.9 per cent in 2010.

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