HSBC Set To Cut Thousands Of Jobs Globally: Sky News

By Reuters

A HSBC logo is pictured at a Swiss branch of the bank in Geneva on Feb. 18, 2015. Reuters/Denis Balibouse

HSBC Holdings Plc could announce thousands of job cuts at a strategy day next week, Sky News reported on Monday, part of chief executive Stuart Gulliver's overhaul plan that could also see him sell operations in Brazil and Turkey and take a knife to his investment bank.
An estimated 10,000 to 20,000 jobs will be axed, Sky News said, citing unidentified sources. The number has not yet been finalized and Gulliver will lay out the plans at an investor presentation on June 9, the broadcaster said.
It was unclear how many of those cuts would come from moves already announced by the lender.
HSBC's shares fell 0.5 percent in Hong Kong on Tuesday morning, underperforming the Hang Seng Index.
HSBC declined to comment on the Sky report.
Low interest rates and tougher regulations have hurt HSBC more than most other banks in recent years, meaning Gulliver has missed some of his profit and cost targets.
In response, he has sold or exited 77 business units since

Nigeria First Lady Aisha Buhari Slammed For $52K Cartier Watch Amid Husband's Vow To Crackdown On Government Corruption

By Cristina Silva @cristymsilva c.silva@ibtimes.com

Chief Justice of Nigeria Mahmud Mohammed swears in Muhammadu Buhari (C) as Nigeria's president while Buhari's wife Aisha looks on at Eagle Square in Abuja, Nigeria May 29, 2015. Reuters

The Nigerian media was in an uproar this week over a watch first lady Aisha Buhari wore during her husband's inauguration ceremonies last week. She also wear the accessory described as a Cartier Baignoire Folle 18-Carat White Gold Diamond Ladies Watch in her newly unveiled official portrait. Nigeria media have estimated the watch costs roughly $52,000, or more than what President Muhammadu Buhari earns in three months from his official salary.
The timepiece triggered outrage from some Nigerians as the newly elected president has vowed to crackdown on government corruption, including overpaid public officials. Buhari played up his modest background while on the campaign trail, claiming he

Mozambique To Decriminalize Homosexuality June 29: Southeast African Nation Is Latest Country In Africa To Legalize Being Gay

By Bruce Wright @bctw

Landmark legislation that would decriminalize homosexuality in Mozambique is set to take effect June 29. Above, the central square and market of Mombane, Mozambique is seen during sunset, April 27, 2005. REUTERS

Mozambique is set to become the latest country in Africa to decriminalize homosexuality, breaking away from what was once widely seen as a continent-wide tradition of discriminating against gay people. The landmark legislation was scheduled to go into effect June 29, and would make the southeast African nation the 21st country in Africa to legalize same sex relationships, according to Out.
The country’s penal code has been in the process of being updated, which has taken about six months for the government to agree to revise the existing law that provide for “security measures” to be enforced against those “who habitually engage in vices against nature,” according to Gay Star News. Former President Armando Guebuza signed the law in December of last year.
But with the revision of what constitutes a

Why U.S. billionaires may not be able to buy the 2016 election

NEW YORK | By Emily Flitter

Florida Senator Marco Rubio has one; Texas Senator Ted Cruz has one; even former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, considered a longshot for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, has a billionaire in his corner. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has two.Campaign finance watchdog groups fear heavy spending by these ultra-rich Americans will warp the election - already expected to be the most money-soaked in history. The idea that billionaires can buy elections has taken root in the public imagination.
Those billionaires are now seeing small, early signs of a pushback. Whether these are the beginning of a new trend is far too soon to say, but polls show there is wider discontent about the perceived influence of big money in U.S. politics and a growing gulf between the country's very rich and very poor.

ADVERTISING

These nascent rumblings - along with evidence that the super-rich are inefficient political spenders - raise questions about how effective billionaires will be in the 2016 elections.
Some voters in Philadelphia, for example, were turned off by the billionaires backing a top candidate in the city's May 19 mayoral race. And a Silicon Valley startup, Crowdpac, is hoping to bank on public ire against big political spenders to attract small donations to its new for-profit election campaign crowdfunding platform.
"There's growing public awareness about rich people

Friend of Boston bomber to be sentenced for obstructing investigation

BOSTON | By Scott Malone

A school registry containing information on Dias Kadyrbayev is pictured during an interview with Yuri Dovgal, deputy director of the secondary school which Kadyrbayev went to in 2008 and 2009, in Almaty May 2, 2013.

Reuters/Shamil Zhumatov

A friend of the Boston Marathon bomber who admitted to obstructing the investigation into the deadly 2013 blast, one of the highest-visibility attacks on U.S. soil since Sept. 11, 2001, is set to be sentenced on Tuesday.Kazakhstan national Dias Kadyrbayev was one of three friends to face federal charges for removing a backpack containing fireworks from bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's college dorm hours after the FBI released photos of the suspect and his older brother.
Federal prosecutors are seeking a seven-year prison sentence for Kadyrbayev, who pleaded guilty in August after his roommate and fellow Kazakh exchange student Azamat Tazhayakov was convicted of obstruction of justice.

ADVERTISING

Tsarnaev, 21, was found guilty of killing three people and

U.S. accuses Syria of backing Islamic State's Aleppo advance

BEIRUT

A woman reporter runs with a rebel fighter to avoid snipers at the frontline against the Islamic State fighters in Aleppo's northern countryside October 10, 2014.

Reuters/Jalal Al-Mamo

The United States has accused the Syrian military of carrying out air strikes to help Islamic State fighters advance around the northern city of Aleppo, messages posted on the U.S. Embassy Syria official Twitter feed said.Islamic State fighters pushed back rival insurgents north of Aleppo on Sunday near the Turkish border, threatening their supply route to the city, fighters and a group monitoring the war said.
Fighters from Levant Front, a northern alliance which includes Western-backed rebels and Islamist fighters, said they were worried Islamic State was heading for the Bab al-Salam crossing between Aleppo and the Turkish province of Kilis.

ADVERTISING

"Reports indicate that the regime is making air strikes in support of ISIL's advance on Aleppo, aiding extremists against Syrian population," a post on the U.S. Embassy Syria Twitter account said late on Monday, using an acronym for Islamic State.
Syrian officials have previously dismissed as nonsense allegations by Washington and Syrian opposition activists that the Syrian military has

Greece says offers comprehensive reform plan in debt talks

ATHENS/PARIS | By Lefteris Papadimas and Leigh Thomas

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (C) gestures as he is escorted by Minister for Culture, Education and Religious Affairs Aristides Baltas (2nd L), Deputy Minister for Culture, Education and Religious Affairs Stavros Kontonis (R) and government spokesman Gabriel...

Reuters/Alkis Konstantinidis

Greece said on Tuesday it had sent a comprehensive reform proposal to its international creditors, urging them to be realistic and accept the plan to clinch a long delayed deal to release frozen aid before Athens runs out of cash.The announcement by leftist Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras came hours after leaders of Germany, France and the lending institutions held emergency talks on the Greek debt crisis in Berlin in a sign of top-level concern about the impasse.
It appeared to be an attempt to pre-empt a take-it-or-leave-it offer by the creditors and to show Greek voters that Athens, too, is putting forward proposals.

ADVERTISING

"We have submitted a realistic plan for

Greek uncertainty hits Europe shares, inflation lifts euro

LONDON | By Nigel Stephenson

A general view of the Frankfurt stock exchange March 16, 2015.

Reuters/Ralph Orlowski

European shares dipped on Tuesday while German bond yields rose, with investors scrabbling for clarity over whether a high-level meeting on Greece's debt crisis might herald a significant breakthrough.The euro rose nearly 1 percent against the dollar, which earlier hit a 12 1/2-year high against the yen, but traders said this was related to an above-forecast rise in euro zone inflation rather than to the Greek drama.
U.S. stocks looked set to open lower, according to index futures.

ADVERTISING

The leaders of Germany and France and Greece's international creditors agreed late on Monday to work with "real intensity" as they try to reach a deal that would prevent Athens from defaulting and potentially leaving the euro zone.
Greek Prime Minister Tsipras said Athens had sent creditors a "comprehensive" and "realistic" package of reforms and urged Europe's leaders to accept it.
"The fact that five such political and financial heavyweights met about Greece means they are trying to force a break in the political deadlock and

Hundreds missing, many elderly tourists, after ship capsizes on China's Yangtze

JIANLI COUNTY, China | By Megha Rajagopalan and John Ruwitch

Rescuers fought bad weather on Tuesday as they searched for more than 400 people, many of them elderly Chinese tourists, missing after a cruise boat was buffeted by a freak tornado and capsized on the Yangtze River.The accident on Monday night is likely to end up as China's worst shipping disaster in almost 70 years.
Divers and other rescue workers pulled five people they found trapped in the upturned hull of the four-deck Eastern Star, a fraction of the 458 people state media reported were on board when the ship capsized.

ADVERTISING

Distraught relatives of some of the passengers scuffled with officials in the city of Shanghai, where many of those on board booked their trips, angry about what they said was a lack of information.
Dozens of rescue boats battled wind and rain to

BlackBerry settles patent dispute with Seacrest's company Typo

TORONTO

An attendee takes a photo during the launch event for the new Blackberry Classic smartphone in New York, December 17, 2014.

Reuters/Brendan McDermid

BlackBerry Ltd and television host Ryan Seacrest's keyboard company Typo Products have agreed to settle a patent dispute over the sale of smartphone keyboards of a certain size, the Canadian smartphone maker said on Monday.Under the terms of the settlement, Typo will stop selling keyboards for smartphones and other devices with screens smaller than 7.9 inches, BlackBerry said. It can continue selling keyboards for larger devices.
In February, a U.S. district court sanctioned Typo, co-founded by "American Idol" host Seacrest, for violating an injunction that barred it from selling a $99 iPhone keyboard case that BlackBerry said infringed its patents.
Physical keyboards have remained a key selling point for BlackBerry, loved by many of the company's most loyal fans, as it loses market share to