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Fashion firm Prada raises $2.1bn in Hong Kong stock market floatation but prices shares at lower end of a target range.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Art historians have turned to the science of the space age to probe the secrets of a major set of renaissance tombs.
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Mr Weiner has faced pressure to resign from other Democratic lawmakers US lawmaker Anthony Weiner has told friends that he plans to resign his seat in Congress after an internet sex scandal, US media have reported.
Mr Weiner cited pressure from his Democratic colleagues as the reason for his decision, the New York Times said.
He has been under pressure after lying about a series of online chats with women in which he sent lewd photos.
The move comes days after US President Barack Obama said he would quit if he were in Mr Weiner’s position.
Mr Weiner had been regarded as a rising star in the Democratic Party and a possible prospect for the mayorship of New York City.
He is expected to make a formal statement about his position in New York at 1400 local time (1800 GMT).
The reports of Mr Weiner’s impending resignation come as Democratic lawmakers were to hold a meeting on Thursday to discuss whether to strip the 46-year-old representative of his committee assignments.
Democratic leaders had also called for an ethics probe to find whether Mr Weiner had abused the congressional office he has held for 14 years.
The congressman has said he used his home computer and mobile phone, not government computers, in his exchanges with women.
The investigation is expected to come to a halt following Mr Weiner’s formal resignation.
The lawmaker decided he would resign after having long discussions with his wife, Huma Abedin, an aide to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the New York Times reported.
Mr Weiner’s wife, Huma Abedin, is an aide to Hillary Clinton Ms Abedin is reportedly pregnant with the couple’s first child.
Mr Weiner, who has been at a treatment facility since last weekend, telephoned Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi and Representative Steve Israel of New York on Wednesday evening to tell them of his plans to resign, the Associated Press news agency reported.
Mr Weiner has faced pressure to leave the House of Representatives for days, with Ms Pelosi urging him to spare the party any more embarrassment.
Rumours of Mr Weiner’s conduct came to light at the end of May, when he accidentally released on his public Twitter feed a photograph of his underpants-clad crotch.
For several days Mr Weiner insisted the account had been hacked, but last week he admitted the photo was of his own body and he had intended to send it privately to a university student in Washington state.
Mr Weiner also admitted sending photos “of an explicit nature” to six women in the past three years, including during the time he had been married.
If Mr Weiner submits his resignation, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is expected to call a special election to fill the representative’s empty seat.
Mr Weiner served on the New York City Council from 1992 until his election to the House of Representatives in 1998.
He also ran for New York mayor in 2005 and had discussed seeking the office again.
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Mr Alexander is also expected to criticise unions “hell bent” on strikes The government is to say for the first time that it plans to link the public sector retirement age to the state pension age, which is to rise to 66.
Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander is also due to confirm public sector pensions will be based on workers’ average salaries.
Mr Alexander is expected to criticise unions who are due to go on strike on 30 June in protest at pensions changes.
Up to 750,000 public sector workers are due to walk out on 30 June.
They are angry about changes to the way pensions are calculated and plans to seek higher employee contributions.
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury will confirm in a speech that many of Lord Hutton’s recommendations on public sector reform will be adopted.
He is expected to say most public sector workers – bar the army, police and fire service – will see their retirement age linked to the state pension age.
But he will also say low paid public sector workers on less than £15,000 will not face any increase in pension contributions and those earning less than £18,000 will have their contributions capped at 1.5%.
Mr Alexander will say: “There is an indisputable case for reforming public sector pensions to ensure that they are affordable and sustainable but still amongst the very best available.
“That case is simple. People are living much longer – the average 60 year old is living ten years longer now than they did in the 70s. This advance comes at a price. It is unjustifiable to ask the taxpayer to work longer and pay more so that public sector workers can retire earlier and receive more themselves.”
He will say the changes will put pensions on a “fair and affordable footing” but would ensure they remained “among the very best, if not the best available”.
And he will criticise unions “who seem hell bent on premature strike action before discussions are even complete” – accusing them of a “head-in-the-sand approach”.
Teachers and lecturers are expected to join hundreds of thousands of civil servants in a walk-out on 30 June which the unions predict will see schools and jobcentres shut and queues at ports and airports.
PCS union general secretary Mark Serwotka said civil servants were being asked to work up to eight years longer and accept a three-fold rise in their contributions, while also seeing their eventual payments halved.
“It’s absolute daylight robbery.
“I don’t think it’s surprising that people will want to defend themselves and if you’re going to defend yourselves it obviously makes sense that you make common cause with council workers, health workers and teachers because we all face the same attacks.”
Mr Alexander’s speech comes after former Labour cabinet minister Lord Hutton produced his final report on public service pensions concluding that there was a “clear need for reform” in March.
He rejected any suggestion that public sector pensions were “gold-plated”, but said that in order to make them affordable for the future, millions of employees should work longer, receive less and have their pensions linked to career average earnings, rather than final salaries.
The government accepted his proposals as a basis for consultation with public sector workers.
In the Budget, Chancellor George Osborne also changed the way public sector pensions are “uprated” against inflation – switching from using the Retail Price Index to the, usually lower, Consumer Prices Index to save £11bn a year by 2015-16.
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When is it okay to fall asleep in the theatre?
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The Butlins brand has enticed millions of families to its coastal camps since its creation in 1936. The colourful, organised entertainment – all served with a redcoat smile – became a cultural phenomenon.
For the past two years, documentary photographer Anna Fox has been recording the modern face of Butlins at the company’s site at Bognor Regis, West Sussex. Her distinctive work is to be showcased at Pallant House Gallery in nearby Chichester.
Here, she explains the method behind her work – and how she hopes her colour-filled images will become an important record of social history, just like the black and white photographs of camp life from decades’ past.
Anna Fox: RESORT can be seen at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, from 25 June – 2 October 2011.
Anna Fox assisted by Vicki Churchill, Andrew Bruce and production team. Black and white archive images courtesy Getty Images and PA.
John Hinde Butlins images from Our True Intent Is All For Your Delight, new edition published by Chris Boot, July 2011.
All images subject to copyright. Butlins audio (1940s and 1965) from BBC sound archives. Music courtesy KPM Music.
Slideshow production by Paul Kerley. Publication date 17 June 2011.
Related:
RESORT at Pallant House Gallery
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More audio slideshows:
World view – Travel Photographer of the Year
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US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accuses forces loyal to the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi of using rape as a weapon of war.
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Politicians’ sometimes tricky relationship with photographers
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What is the secret of a perfect cuppa?
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The life of Susan Boyle, who found fame on Britain’s Got Talent in 2009, is to be made into a stage musical, it is announced.
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Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn claimed diplomatic immunity and complained about being handcuffed as he was arrested for sexual assault in New York, official documents reveal.
Transcripts released by prosecutors in New York reveal the detail of the day Mr Strauss-Kahn was arrested at the city’s JFK airport.
He has since resigned from the IMF and is living on bail in New York.
He has pleaded not guilty to charges of sexual assault on a hotel chambermaid.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
ING has the most customers of any online bank in the US Capital One says it plans to buy the US internet banking arm of ING in a move that will make it the seventh largest US bank by assets.
Capital One, best known for its credit cards, will pay $9bn (£5.5bn) in cash and shares – $6.2bn of that in cash.
The deal will also leave the Dutch banking and insurance giant with a 9.9% stake in Capital.
The move is the latest step in Capital One’s plan to branch out from its credit card lending roots.
It will raise $2bn in new capital and $3.7bn in new debt in order to finance the transaction.
ING received a 10bn euro (£8.8bn, $14.3bn) bailout from the Dutch government in 2008.
That was followed by a restructuring plan in 2009 agreed between the European Commission and ING.
One condition of that was that it sell the US internet banking division.
ING Direct launched in the United States in 2000 and is now the largest online bank in the country with 7.7 million customers.
The sale will not affect ING’s internet banking businesses in any of the other countries where it operates.
Capital One said it expects to realize “modest” cost-savings of $90m from the deal, and funding savings of $200 million annually.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
President Fernandez met UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon this week The president of Argentina, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, has called Britain “arrogant” for refusing to negotiate on the Falklands.
She was speaking a day after UK Prime Minister David Cameron said the issue of sovereignty was non-negotiable.
President Fernandez called his refusal to hold talks on the sovereignty of the Falklands, or Malvinas, arrogant and bordering on stupidity.
Britain defeated an Argentine invasion of the islands in 1982.
The Falklands are at the centre of a territorial dispute dating back to the 19th Century.
Argentina has repeatedly requested talks on the islands’ future sovereignty.
Mr Cameron said “as long as the Falkland Islands want to be sovereign British territory, they should remain sovereign British territory – full stop, end of story.”
President Fernandez described his comments as an “expression of mediocrity, and almost of stupidity”.
She said the British “continue to be a crude colonial power in decline”.
Earlier this week a British man became the first Falkland islander to choose Argentine citizenship.
James Peck was handed his national identity card by President Fernandez, during a ceremony to mark the 29th anniversary of the end of the Falklands War.
Mr Peck’s father fought for the British during the conflict.
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One dog in Greece has been a committed protester for years.
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Winning against the odds: The UK performs badly in a league table of “resilience” in school pupils The UK performs poorly in an international league table showing how many disadvantaged pupils succeed “against the odds” at school.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has studied how pupils from poor backgrounds can succeed academically.
It says that “self-confidence” is a key factor in whether such pupils succeed.
The UK comes behind Mexico and Tunisia in the table – with the top places taken by Asian countries.
The study comes amid concerns in the UK about a lack of social mobility.
Source: OECD
The study from the international economic organisation looks at whether there is an inevitable link between disadvantaged backgrounds and a cycle of poor school results and limited job prospects.
The OECD study says that this is not the case for many pupils from poor homes – with an international average of 31% secondary school pupils succeeding even though the “odds are stacked against them”.
These are described as “resilient” pupils, who achieve high standards of attainment by international standards, despite coming from a background that was poor relative to their own country.
Using science test results from the major international PISA study, which compares the performance of different education systems, it shows that there are wide differences in the levels of resilience.
The rankings include both countries and regional school systems, such as Shanghai in China.
Among countries, South Korea, Finland, Japan, Turkey and Canada are the most successful in terms of poorer pupils achieving high results.
Among regional education systems, Shanghai and Hong Kong top this resilience league table – and are top of the overall rankings.
The top five places overall are taken by regional or national school systems in Asia.
The United States, France and Australia are around the average for pupils succeeding against the odds.
But the UK is well below average and at the lower end of this ranking of resilience, with only 24% showing such examples of “resilience”.
Among leading economies, the UK is in 28th place out of 35. Among a wider range of smaller countries and regions, the UK is in 35th place out of 65.
Researchers identified a number of factors which appeared to increase the likelihood of pupils’ resilience.
Among the positive factors are a sense of self-confidence among pupils. Believing that they are likely to succeed in exams is an important part of how they actually perform. The study argues that mentoring schemes can be particularly beneficial.
In UK schools, researchers found low levels of self-confidence among disadvantaged pupils, when asked about their approach to a science topic.
There is also a link between longer hours in class studying a subject and the improved chances of poorer pupils.
It is also says that motivation is important – but in the form of a “personal, internal drive” rather than the promise of a reward or an incentive.
“All of these findings suggest that schools may have an important role to play in fostering resilience,” says the report.
“They could start by providing more opportunities for disadvantaged students to learn in class by developing activities, classroom practices and teaching methods that encourage learning and foster motivation and self-confidence among those students.”
There has been much debate about social mobility in the UK – with concerns that there remains too strong a link between social background and educational achievement.
This week the government announced that it was turning 200 “struggling” primary schools in England into academies – arguing that a low-income intake of pupils was not a reason for poor results.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.