North, South Korea Reach Agreement To Ease Tensions

North and South Korea agreed early on Tuesday to end a military standoff that sparked an exchange of artillery fire and had ratcheted up tension on one of the world's most heavily-fortified borders.

Under an accord reached in the early hours, following more than two days of talks, North Korea expressed regret over the recent wounding of South Korean soldiers in landmine blasts and Seoul agreed to halt anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts.

North Korea also agreed to end the "semi" state of war it had declared. The two sides will hold follow-up talks to discuss a range of issues on improving ties, the joint statement said.

Both sides began rolling back heightened military postures at noon (0300 GMT), Seoul's defense ministry said.

"It is very meaningful that from this meeting North Korea apologized for the landmine provocation and promised to work to prevent the recurrence of such events and ease tensions," said Kim Kwan-jin, national security adviser to South Korean President Park Geun-hye, who headed Seoul's delegation.

Pyongyang had denied laying the landmines, and in the statement did not explicitly take responsibility for them. However, any expression of regret by the North, better known for its bellicose rhetoric, is rare.

The marathon talks at the Panmunjom truce village inside the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) separating the two Koreas began on Saturday, shortly after Pyongyang's deadline for the South to halt its propaganda broadcasts or face military action.

"They both made compromises. South Korea did not get an apology, they got a statement of regret about the injury, which they can spin as an apology," said John Delury of Yonsei University in Seoul.

"The more important point is maintaining this channel and reopening the relationship. This is hardly going to be easy to implement, but it’s a landmark agreement which lays out a path."

Seoul and Pyongyang have remained technically in a state of war since the 1950-53 Korean war ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.

THAW?

Inter-Korean relations have been all but frozen since the 2010 sinking of a South Korean warship, which killed 46 sailors, that Seoul blames on the North. Pyongyang denies responsibility.

On Tuesday, the two sides also agreed to arrange reunions of families separated by the Korean War during upcoming autumn holidays and in future.

"What's important now is to carry forward specific projects agreed by South and North smoothly through follow-up talks so as to ease tensions between South and North," Park's presidential office quoted her as saying.

Halfway through a single five-year term that has been buffeted by crises and a stumbling economy, Park appears to have gotten a lift from Seoul's tough stance with the North, with her approval rating rising to 41 percent in a Realmeter poll conducted last week.

Improving ties with the reclusive and impoverished North have been largely unsuccessful is one of Park's key goals. But her efforts, so far, have been largely unsuccessful.

Numerous sticking points remain, from the North's nuclear program and Seoul's sanctions following the ship sinking. There have also been comparatively minor sources of conflict, such as South Korean activists distribution of anti-North leaflets and the suspension of South Korean tours to Mount Kumgang in the North.

Asked early on Tuesday about the prospect for a summit meeting between Park and the North's young leader, Kim Jong Un, the South's national security adviser said it was "not the time" to discuss that.The two Koreas have not held a summit since 2007.

LANDMINES AND LOUDSPEAKERS

The rise in tensions began early this month, when the landmine explosions in the DMZ wounded two South Korean soldiers.

Days later, the South began blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda from loudspeakers along the border, reviving a tactic that both sides had halted in 2004.

The standoff reached a crisis point on Thursday when the North fired four shells into the South, according to Seoul, which responded with a barrage of artillery fire.

Pyongyang then made its ultimatum that Seoul halt the broadcasts by Saturday afternoon or face military action, but on that day the two sides agreed to hold talks between top level aides to the leaders of the two countries.

Even as talks were proceeding, North Korea deployed twice the usual artillery strength at the border and had around 50 submarines away from base, the South's defense ministry said. South Korea had also increased its military readiness.

Washington and the United Nations welcomed the agreement, as did Beijing, Pyongyang's main ally.

"We're going to judge the North by its actions," U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby told a briefing. "It was a very tense several days."

North Korea is under U.N. and U.S. sanctions because of repeated nuclear and missile tests, moves that Pyongyang sees as an attack on its sovereign right to defend itself.

 Culled from Reuters News

Living Without Limits By Brian Tracy

The starting point of great success and achievement has always been the same. It is for you to dream big dreams. There is nothing more important, and nothing that works faster than for you to cast off your own limitations than for you to begin dreaming and fantasizing about the wonderful things that you can become, have, and do.

As a wise man once said, “You must dream big dreams, for only big dreams have the power to move the minds of men.” When you begin to dream big dreams, your levels of self-esteem and self-confidence will go up immediately. You will feel more powerful about yourself and your ability to deal with what happens to you. The reason so many people accomplish so little is because they never allow themselves to lean back and imagine the kind of life that is possible for them.

A powerful principle that you can use to dream big dreams and live without limits is contained in what Elihu Goldratt calls the “Theory of Constraints.” This is one of the greatest breakthroughs in modern thinking. What Goldratt has found is that in every process, in accomplishing any goal, there is a bottleneck or choke cord that serves as a constraint on the process. This constraint then sets the speed at which you achieve any particular goal.

What Goldratt found is that if you concentrate all of your creative energies and attention on alleviating the constraint, you can speed up the process faster than by doing any other single thing.

Let me give you an example. Let us say that you want to double your income. What is the critical constraint or the limiting factor that holds you back? Well, you know that your income is a direct reward for the quality and quantity of the services you render to your world. Whatever field you are in, if you want to double your income, you simply have to double the quality and quantity of what you do for that income. Or you have to change activities and occupations so that what you are doing is worth twice as much. But you must always ask yourself, “What is the critical constraint that holds me back or sets the speed on how fast I double my income?”

A friend of mine is one of the highest-paid commission professionals in the United States. One of his goals was to double his income over the next three to five years.

He applied the 80/20 rule to his client base. He found that 20 percent of his clients contributed 80 percent of his profits, and that the amount of time spent on a high-profit client was pretty much the same amount of time spent on a low-profit client. In other words, he was dividing his time equally over the number of tasks that he does while only 20 percent of those items contributes 80 percent of his results.

So he drew a line on his list of clients under those who represented the top 20 percent and then called in other professionals in his industry and very carefully, politely, and strategically handed off the 80 percent of his clients that only represented 20 percent of his business. He then put together a profile of his top clients and began looking in the marketplace exclusively for the type of client who fit the profile; in other words, one who could become a major profit contributor to his organization, and whom he in turn could serve with the level of excellence that his clients were accustomed to. And instead of doubling his income in three to five years, he doubled it in the first year!

So what is holding you back? Is it your level of education or skill? Is it your current occupation or job? Is it your current environment or level of health? Is it the situations that you are in today? What is setting the speed for you achieving your goal?

Remember, whatever you have learned, you can unlearn. Whatever situation you have gotten yourself into, you can probably get yourself out of. If your real goal is to dream big dreams and to live without limits, you can set this as your standard and compare everything that you do against it.

The three keys to living without limits have always been the same. They are clarity, competence, and concentration.

Clarity means that you are absolutely clear about who you are, what you want, and where you’re going. You write down your goals and you make plans to accomplish them. You set very careful priorities and you do something every day to move you toward your goals. And the more progress you make toward accomplishing things that are important to you, the greater self-confidence and self-belief you have, and the more convinced you become that there are no limits on what you can achieve.

Competence means that you begin to become very, very good in the key result areas of your chosen field. You apply the 80/20 rule to everything you do and you focus on becoming outstanding in the 20 percent of tasks that contribute to 80 percent of your results. You dedicate yourself to continuous learning. You never stop growing. You realize that excellence is a moving target. And you commit yourself to doing something every day that enables you to become better and better at doing the most important things in your field. Concentration is having the self-discipline to force yourself to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing, the most important thing, and stay with it until it’s complete.

The two key words for success have always been focus and concentration. Focus is knowing exactly what you want to be, have, and do. Concentration is persevering, without diversion or distraction, in a straight line toward accomplishing the things that can make a real difference in your life.

When you allow yourself to begin to dream big dreams, creatively abandon the activities that are taking up too much of your time, and focus your inward energies on alleviating your main constraints, you start to feel an incredible sense of power and confidence. As you focus on doing what you love to do and becoming excellent in those few areas that can make a real difference in your life, you begin to think in terms of possibilities rather than impossibilities, and you move ever closer toward the realization of your full potential.

How One CEO Went From a Teenage Runaway Living In An Indian Slum To Founding a Billion-Dollar Company

Ambarish Mitra was living in Munirka, a slum in the southwest corner of Delhi. He had been there for seven months when he spotted an ad in the newspaper for an "e-business" competition — what they were calling internet businesses in 1997, Mitra recalls.

The 17-year-old applied to the business-plan contest, submitting his idea to empower women by connecting them to the internet free. His return address was in the slum, near the water tank, he says.

Mitra did not know that this ad would be his exit route.

With one initial public offering under his belt, Mitra now has a billion-dollar augmented-reality advertising company, Blippar. He has been photographed with the British royal family. His newest phone was personally delivered by Xiaomi vice president Hugo Barra, who arrived in a Tesla being driven by an Uber driver.

Mitra is long past the slums, thanks to the ad he spotted that put it all in motion. But in 1997, with that application floating somewhere in the mail, Mitra's focus was on one thing: surviving.

Mitra grew up in a middle-class Indian family, which prioritized education over wealth. His mother was a homemaker, a singer, and a painter. Mitra's older sister took after her and went to study the arts in college. She now runs a successful Indian dance school in an Atlanta suburb.

Mitra's father used to hand him copies of Businessweek and Forbes magazines. The elder Mitra was an inventor in his own right, having found a way to reuse coal slurry in one of the largest Indian coal-mining towns, and he wanted his son to follow in his footsteps to study engineering.

Mitra, though, was captivated by the internet — and not very great at school. While the drawers of his desk were filled with Backstreet Boys and heavy-metal cassette tapes, business books piled up next to his computer. His two favorite books his father ever gave him were on the collapse of IBM and a book on controlling your destiny.

 It's still the same as it was when he ran away from home in 1997.

After witnessing the birth of the internet, Mitra idolized Bill Gates. He read "Business the Bill Gates Way" and Gates' "The Road Ahead." Next to his computer, he kept a framed photo pulled from Fortune magazine, showing Gates and Warren Buffet.

"I was beginning to worship people like Bill Gates, like hardcore idolized him," Mitra said. "I actually had an image of him on my study table while people had Madonna and Samantha Fox and all these people in that generation. I had a picture of Bill Gates."

The lure of the internet put Mitra at odds with his father, who wanted him to study engineering. He had a great childhood and a totally functional, fun-loving family, he says, but he was also a bit of a rebel and wanted more out of his life.

"My parents wanted me to be an engineer, and I wasn't interested in that," Mitra says. "It became so hectic that one day, I just ran away from home and started living in the slum in Delhi.

Living in the slums, Mitra went door-to-door in the city selling magazine subscriptions by day — a lesson in handling rejection, he says now. At night, he worked in a tea stall.

The two jobs netted him around $1.50 a day. He stayed in touch with his sister so she could tell his parents he was alive. Otherwise, he was on his own.

"I became a man as a boy very quickly," Mitra says. "One quality that I acquired, which runs directly in the DNA of Blippar, is that I became completely fearless. Nothing scares me. When you go through violence like I did, and you come out the other side, it makes you stronger."

Seven months into his life as a runaway, Mitra noticed the newspaper ad. He applied to the contest, submitting his plan to connect everybody with the internet to empower women.

It was a "noble topic" for a young person, Mitra said, but it had deep roots in his upbringing.

His grandmother and her four sisters had all received college degrees and rode scooters through the crowded Indian streets. They were a rare sight for 1920s India, but Mitra had grown up realizing how education empowered women. The internet was an extension of that.

Three months later, Mitra found out that his plan to connect the world won.

"Absolutely to my shock and surprise and delight," Mitra says. "It was life-changing."

He won some money and borrowed the rest from a friend's dad who was a banker. Mitra then launched his internet portal: Women Infoline.

The company gave free internet access to women with low wages, subsidizing it with ads.

It soon took off as the tendrils of the tech boom made their way to India. By 2000, a 20-year-old Mitra had grown his company from its newspaper ad start in the slums to an IPO in India.

"When this happened, I did this peace treaty with my father," Mitra says. "I said, 'I will come back, but I will do whatever I want.' They were very proud of me behind the scenes."

Mitra won't reveal how much money he made in the IPO, allowing only that it was insignificant in today's world but a lot of money for the year 2000 in any country. His resignation shortly after the IPO helped him get out before the tech boom collapsed a year later.

At age 20, pockets flush from the IPO, Mitra was lured to London by the glamour of British life and its culture. Four days after arrival, Mitra started working as a retail associate at the Top Shop clothing store on Oxford Street. Then he spent some time helping the British government build out its intranet, and he tried his hands at another couple of startups.

But in 2008, as the financial crisis hit worldwide, Mitra was almost bankrupt. He found himself having to get a "proper job," as he calls it.

Amb

Mitra and Omar Tayeb outside the pub where they came up with the idea for Blippar.

He joined Axa, an insurance company, working his way up to become head of innovation, but he continued to hang out with Omar Tayeb, a friend from a previous startup.

They were at a pub when they made a joke about having the Queen come to life on a pound note, and Tayeb, who was thankfully sober, remembered it, Mitra says.

They turned it into a party trick, where a photo scan on the phone would turn the Queen on a £20 note into an animated photo of their friends. Mitra's "eureka moment" came when he realized that they shouldn't be obsessing over a bank note. Any image could become animated.

Tayeb and Mitra came up with $200,000 to launch, investing all of their money in the new startup, which they called Blippar.

It worked, and the company's latest $45 million round of funding in March 2015 has catapulted the company to a $1.5 billion valuation.

To say Mitra is bullish on Blippar is an understatement. He tells Business Insider he will never sell to Google or even his idol, Gates, and Microsoft, because what he is doing "is bigger than the internet itself."

It's not running away as a teenager, though, that brought him the success — it's the relationships he has formed since and the timing, he says.

"You can never fire a missile from a kayak," Mitra says. "I think I found my warship. I had the right people and the right mix to build this business."

While the teenage runaway college dropout is a great archetype of tech entrepreneurs, Mitra doesn't recommend it — and wouldn't make the choice again.

For one, he knows the decision hurt his mom a lot.

"It's a human behavior to celebrate success coming out of tough environments because it gives us hope," Mitra says. "But at the end of the day, the majority of the time when you make decisions like this, things will go wrong. It's not important to be smart. It's about building relationships around you. It goes a long way in life if you actually truly care about your immediate environment and people who care about what you do."

While Mitra has cycled through wearable devices, there's one bracelet he has never taken off. A random priest with a long beard gave it to him on the street and told him it was for happiness and prosperity. He has worn the same copper bracelet that is carved into snake heads every day since he was 12.

 

Ghana And Japan Overtake Nigeria In Yam Exports

Ghana has overtaken Nigeria in yam exportation as the quality of the produce from Nigeria has dropped due to high dependent on traditional planting system, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture has said.

The institute’s Project Manager, Yam Improvement for Income and Food Security in West Africa, Dr. Nobert Maroya, said this in Ibadan during a meeting of the IITA’s scientists with top seed production companies from different parts of the country.

He, however, said that the project had developed high ratio propagation technologies such as vine cuttings, aeroponics and bioreactor to address the constraints of quality and multiplication in seed yam production.

Maroya told participants that for Nigeria to profit from the huge financial gain in yam exports, it must develop efficient seed production, distribution and quality assurance systems.

These, he stressed, were the steps taken by Japan and Ghana that placed them ahead of Nigeria among the yam exporting nations.

He said, “In Japan, beer and spirit are extracted from yam. Japan is now producing yam by using vine, which the farmers plant with machine. The way they are going, they will soon become the biggest producer of yam even though it originated from Nigeria and other parts of Africa.

“Ghana yam exporters have an association that determine quality and quantity of yam meant for export. Nigeria began the exportation of yam a long time ago when the product was being exported to Europe from Nasarawa State. At a point, the yam was rejected because of low quality.

“Many yam producers in Nigeria now want to go back to that era. But we need organisation. The IITA cannot help in exportation business. Ghana is well organised and they maintain the market. The farmers are getting their foreign currency; Nigeria can do the same.”

Maroya, however, said that the objective of the IITA was to help increase the quality of the produce, adding that there must be quality control in each stage of yam production.

The YIIFSWA coordinator said that yam production and foreign earnings from exportation would improve rapidly if the newly developed system was embraced by farmers.


http://www.punchng.com/business/business-economy/ghana-overtakes-nigeria-in-yam-exports/

China Stuns Financial Markets By Devaluing Yuan

China stunned the world’s financial markets on Wednesday by devaluing the yuan for the second consecutive day, triggering fears the world’s second largest economy is in worse shape than investors believed.

The move sent fresh shockwaves through global markets, pushing shares sharply lower and sending commodity prices further into reverse as traders feared the move could ignite a currency war that would destabilise the world economy.

There were widespread losses in Asia, and in Europe stock markets suffered falls of about 1%, with the FTSE 100 tumbling almost 2% at one stage.

The Chinese currency hit a four-year low on Wednesday after the People’s Bank of China set the yuan’s daily midpoint even weaker than in Tuesday’s devaluation.

With the bank having said that Tuesday’s move was a “one-off depreciation”, the rapid drop in the value of China’s currency – about 4% in the past two days – dealt a blow to appetite for risky assets, and markets across the region plunged amid concerns that Beijing has embarked on a damaging currency war.

The unexpected yuan devaluation saw Chinese stocks slump in Hong Kong, with the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index sliding 2.6%, extending its loss this quarter to 15%. The Shanghai Composite Index lost 1% to 3,886.32 and the CSI300 index of the largest listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen fell 1.2% to 4,016.13 points.

Shares in airlines were hit particularly hard as investors feared a weaker yuan would contribute to higher fuel bills. Air China lost 4.4% while rivals China Eastern and China Southern dropped close to 6%.

Contributing to the slump were worse than expected economic figures with fixed-asset investment falling short of expectations. The crucial gauge on the country’s growth came in at 11.2% for the first seven months from the same period last year, acording to official data. Economists had forecast a rise of 11.5%.

China’s factory output for July also missed expectations, coming in at 6% year-on-year growth instead of the 6.6% expected. Adding to the slew of bad data was retail sales for July, which amounted to approximately 2.43tn yuan, up 10.5% from June, but also short of market expectations of a 10.6% rise.

The Nikkei stock market index in Japan fell 1.6%; South Korea’s Kospi was down 0.56%.

The Australian dollar, often seen as a proxy for the Chinese economy, fell again to a fresh six-year low of US$72.25c, having been sold off heavily on Tuesday. The US dollar, on the other hand, rose strongly again against all Asian currencies. Key industrial and construction materials nickel, copper and aluminium hit six-year lows.

“China’s currency moves will hurt appetite for risky assets such as equities and commodities,” Rajeev De Mello, head of Asian fixed income at Schroders in Singapore, said.

“While it is too early to say whether this is the beginning of a sustained devaluation of the yuan, other central banks may be forced to follow suit and that may trigger a fresh round of currency weakening around the emerging world.” 

Spot yuan fell to 6.43 per dollar, its weakest point since August 2011, after the central bank set its daily midpoint reference even weaker than Tuesday’s devaluation. The currency fared worse in offshore trade, touching 6.57.

The central bank, which had described the devaluation as a one-off step to make the yuan more responsive to market forces, sought to reassure financial markets on Wednesday that it was not embarking on a steady depreciation.

“Looking at the international and domestic economic situation, currently there is no basis for a sustained depreciation trend for the yuan,” the PBoC said on Wednesday.

Tuesday’s devaluation followed a run of poor economic data and raised market suspicions that China was embarking on a longer-term slide in the exchange rate. It was the biggest one-day fall in the yuan since a massive devaluation in 1994.

A cheaper yuan will help Chinese exports by making them less expensive on overseas markets. Last weekend, data showed an 8.3% drop in exports in July and that producer prices were well into their fourth year of deflation.

The International Monetary Fund said China’s move to make the yuan more responsive to market forces appeared to be a welcome step and that Beijing should aim to achieve an effectively floating exchange rate within two to three years.

Beijing has been lobbying the IMF to include the yuan in its basket of reserve currencies, known as Special Drawing Rights, which it uses to lend to sovereign borrowers. This would mark a major step in terms of international use of the yuan.

“Greater exchange rate flexibility is important for China as it strives to give market forces a decisive role in the economy and is rapidly integrating into global financial markets,” an IMF spokesperson said.

Culled From The Guardian

Ted Williams On Development and Sustainance of Self Confidence

Ted Williams is one of the most successful baseball players of all time. Inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame, this major league baseball player was arguably the “greatest hitter in baseball.” However, it’s not just his statistics that make Williams a great inspiration, but what he has to say about his career and how he looks at his career. Learning from his successes and the way he perceives his life can help you transform your life.

Bryan Flanagan uses Ted Williams as an incredible example of somebody who embodies confidence in its purest, truest and most honest form. When talking about the importance of confidence in his bookEncouragement for the Sales Professional, Flanagan points to Williams’ “lifetime batting average of .344 and his 521 home runs” to “qualify him for that distinction” of being the “greatest hitter in baseball.”

He then tells the story of Williams’ 70^th birthday and how a sports writer asked the storied Hall of Famer “Ted, if you were playing in today’s game with the smaller ball parks and lack of quality pitching, what would you hit?” What the write obviously meant to ask is how Williams thinks he would have sized up to the people of today, playing baseball in conditions that differed greatly from the conditions Williams was used to as a professional major league baseball player.

However, the tremendously confident Ted Williams was not about to let a sports writer make him feel as if his age would prevent him from reaching success. “Without hesitating, Williams replied, ‘Oh, I’d hit about .320.’ The writer was taken aback and quickly said, ‘But, Ted, you were the last player to hit .400 and your lifetime average is .344. And, you think you’d only hit .320?’ Williams said, ‘Yeah, but I’m 70 years old!’ Now, that’s confidence!” We would have to agree!

If somebody like Ted Williams can maintain the confidence to say that he could still play baseball at seventy years old with people a third of his age, and not just play – but play well, you might just need to realize the lesson being taught here. You can transform your life if you just remember to be confident in yourself you’re your abilities. “Confidence is maintaining faith in yourself no matter your age,” no matter your situation and no matter your environment. Confidence is what gets you through life when you are feeling down, when you are feeling old, when you are feeling like the cards are stacked against you.

“Confidence makes a difference. Confidence is a firm belief in yourself; it’s a certainty or belief in one’s own abilities.” Flanagan wants people to remember to “never leave home without” confidence because, as Williams shows here, it can not only help you with success – but it can help you when you are beyond your successes and need humor in your life again, or when you just want to get back out there and see what you can do again. Confidence can help you transform your life.

Central Bank Of Nigeria Reduces Daily Withdrawal Limits On ATM's

The battle for defence of the Naira value has widened, affecting existing withdrawal limits on Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) and foreign transactions on all existing Naira debit cards (ATM cards).

In the new arrangement, all ATMs that were hitherto enabled for domestic and foreign transactions have been restructured to limit Naira cash withdrawal at ATMs to N60,000 per day while foreign currency is $300 per day. Hitherto, the domestic withdrawal limit was N150,000 per day.

The new arrangement has separated traditional ATM from MasterCard credit card where the former has now been deactivated and can no longer be used for transactions abroad. Hitherto, a single ATM card serves for transactions for both domestic and abroad.

Also, the restructured cards now have spending limits on POS/eCommerce (online shopping) pegged at $300 (about N60,000) per day. Before this, the limit was N2 million per day.

In the new arrangement, a bank customer with multiple debit cards (ATM cards), only the one linked to the primary transactional account will be enabled for use abroad. Hitherto, such customers could transact with any of the cards that is funded.
However, banks are putting in place alternatives in these adjustments to address the concern of customers who are now being directed by their banks to reapply for a new card arrangement to suit their purposes.

For instance, Standard Chartered Bank has asked its customers to request a complementary ATM card for domestic use only so that the original N150,000 daily cash withdrawal limit can be restored and also reactivate POS/online purchase limit of N2 million per day.

The bank also required their customers to apply for a foreign currency denominated ATM linked to domiciliary account which would be enabled with no daily or annual international transaction limits.
Earlier, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc had informed its customers of its decision to reduce the daily international spending limit on their Naira MasterCard to $300 with effect from yesterday.
In a communication to the customers, the bank explained: “In view of the increased difficulty in sourcing foreign currency to settle international transactions on Naira MasterCards, we have reduced the daily international spending limit on your Naira MasterCard to $300.This means that you can only spend up to $300 daily when using your GTBank Naira MasterCard for international payments via POS and online.

“You will, however, continue to have the option of paying for medical bills, school fees, mortgages and credit cards using Form A, as these are eligible transactions for foreign currency. Simply visit any GTBank branch to complete a Form A along with the required documents to make these payments.”
These developments were coming on the heels of Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) statement on Sunday that all legitimate requests for foreign currency for eligible transactions, normally referred to as “invisibles,” such as remittances for school fees, student maintenance allowances, BTA, PTA, medical and other eligible transactions, shall be fully met at the official/interbank exchange rate.
A statement from the CBN added that already all the legitimate demands for such transactions through recognised channels have so far been fully met by CBN.

The statement stated: “The CBN hereby directs all authorised dealers in foreign exchange in Nigeria to henceforth treat as top priority all legitimate demand for foreign exchange for eligible transactions.

“The CBN once again advises individuals that wish to source foreign currency for such eligible transactions to approach their banks with their legitimate demand as the CBN has made adequate provisions of foreign currency for all such legitimate and eligible purposes.

“Furthermore, holders of Naira denominated debit and credit cards shall continue to have access to the use of their cards at ATMs in any part of the world but subject to the annual limit of $50,000. ATM Withdrawsaws shall continue to be a maximum of of $300 per day.”

Culled from Vanguard News

OPEC Leader Saudi Arabia Is Having To borrow Money

The oil kingdom is facing a big hole in its budget, caused by the slump in oil prices and a sharp rise in military spending. That's forcing the government to raid its reserves, and it may even borrow from foreign investors, analysts say.

Saudi Arabia has already burned through almost $62 billion of its foreign currency reserves this year, and borrowed $4 billion from local banks in July -- its first bond issue since 2007.

Its budget deficit is expected to reach 20% of GDP in 2015. That's extraordinarily high for a country used to running surpluses. Capital Economics estimates that government revenues will fall by $82 billion in 2015, equivalent to 8% of GDP. The IMF is forecasting budget deficits through 2020.

Oil's slump from $107 a barrel last June to $44 right now is largely responsible for the squeeze. Half of the country's economic output and 80% of government revenue is generated by the oil industry.

Yet Saudi Arabia has only itself to blame. Its aggressive fight to defend OPEC's share of the global oil market has led to a massive supply glut.

Riyadh is refusing to cut output, hoping to drive other producers, such as U.S. shale companies, out of business.

At the same time, it is ratcheting up spending. It has intervened in a war in neighboring Yemen, and has been involved in airstrikes against ISIS in Syria. Its military budget grew by 17% last year to roughly 10% of GDP.

King Salman also lavished generous bonuses on public sector workers after his accession to the throne in January. The gesture was popular, but stretched the kingdom's finances even further.

"We will see increased borrowing in the coming months," Fahad al-Mubarak, the governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, told local media last month.

The country's central bank would not comment on how many bonds it might issue.

Analysts suggest the Saudis could issue around $5 billion worth of bonds a month through the end of this year, some of those to foreign investors.

Still, it could quickly revert to drawing on reserves, rather than borrowing, if global interest rates rise.

Its foreign currency reserves, while depleted, still amounted to $660 billion at the end of June.

Culled from CNN

Malaysian Authorities say washed up debris from Missing MH370

Malaysia said on Thursday paint color and maintenance-record matches proved that a piece of wing found on the shore of an Indian Ocean island was part of the wreckage of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370, which vanished without trace last year.

Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said investigators on the French island of Reunion had collected more aircraft debris, including a plane window and aluminum foil, but there was no confirmation they also belonged to the missing plane.

With the first trace of the plane confirmed, Malaysia has asked the governments of neighboring Mauritius and Madagascar to help widen the search area, he told reporters.

Earlier, Prime Minister Najib Razak confirmed that the piece of debris was from the Boeing 777 airliner that was bound for Beijing from Kuala Lumpur with 239 passengers and crew on board when it went missing.

"Today, 515 days since the plane disappeared, it is with a heavy heart that I must tell you that an international team of experts have conclusively confirmed that the aircraft debris found on Reunion Island is indeed from MH370," Najib said in a televised address.

The airline described the find as "a major breakthrough".

The first piece of direct evidence that the plane crashed in the sea closed a chapter in one of the biggest mysteries in aviation history.

But exactly what happened remains unknown and Najib's announcement did not appear to represent any kind of resolution for the families of those on board, most of whom were Chinese.

The fragment of wing known as a flaperon was flown to mainland France after being found last week covered in barnacles on a Reunion beach.

Despite the Malaysian confirmation, prosecutors in France stopped short of declaring they were certain, saying only that there was a "very strong presumption".

Deputy Paris Prosecutor Serge Mackowiak said this was based on technical data supplied by both the manufacturer and airline but gave no indication that experts had discovered a serial number or unique markings that would put the link beyond doubt.

Representatives of manufacturer Boeing confirmed that the flaperon came from a 777 jet, he said, and Malaysia Airlines provided documentation of the missing aircraft.

Mackowiak told reporters more analysis would be carried out on Thursday, and a fragment of luggage also found in Reunion would be examined by French police.

"We appreciate the French team and their support and respect their decision to continue with the verification," Liow said, adding that Malaysian experts were convinced the flaperon was from MH370 because a seal on the part matched a maintenance record and the paint was the same color.

A group of families from China said French investigators and Boeing must also say definitively the wing piece was from the plane.

"We are not living in denial ... but we owe it to our loved ones not to declare them lost without 100 percent certainty!" the families said on their microblog.

China's foreign ministry urged Malaysia to keep investigating and to "safeguard the legitimate rights and interests" of relatives.

Investigators looking at the wing flap at an aeronautical facility in the French city of Toulouse are likely to start by putting slices of metal under a high-powered microscope, to see clues in its crystal structure about how it deformed on impact, said Hans Weber, president of TECOP International, Inc., an aerospace technology consulting firm.

They would probably then "do a full physical examination, using ultrasonic analysis before they open it up to see if there's any internal damage", Weber said.

"That might take quite a while. A month or months."

John Goglia, a former board member of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, told Reuters much could be learned from examining the metal and how the brackets that held the flaperon in place had broken.

However, other experts cautioned that the cause of the disaster may remain beyond the reach of investigators until other debris or data and cockpit voice recorders are recovered.

"Debris such as the flaperon can only increase our understanding of the last seconds of the flight," said Greg Waldron, Asia managing editor at industry publication Flightglobal.

Flight MH370 disappeared on March 8, 2014, and is believed to have crashed in the Indian Ocean, about 3,700 km (2,300 miles) east of Reunion.

Investigators believe that someone may have deliberately switched off the aircraft's transponder, diverted it off course and deliberately crashed into the sea.

An initial search of a 60,000 sq km (23,000 sq miles) patch of sea floor has been extended to another 60,000 sq km.

 Culled from Reuters News

Canada On The Verge Of a Recession

The latest economic data from Canada shows that it is inching toward recession, after its economy posted its fifth straight month of contraction.

Statistics Canada revealed on July 31 that the Canadian economy shrank by 0.2% on an annualized basis in May, perhaps pushing the country over the edge into recessionary territory for the first half of 2015.

"There is no sugar-coating this one," Douglas Porter, BMO chief economist, wrote in a client note. "It's a sour result."

The poor showing surprised economists, who predicted GDP to remain flat, but it the result followed a contraction in the first quarter at an annual rate of 0.6%. Canada's economy may or may not have technically dipped into recession this year -- defined as two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth -- but it is surely facing some serious headwinds.

Attempts to rebound: Canada's central bank slashed interest rates in July to 0.50%, the second cut this year, but that may not be enough to goose the economy. With rates already so low, there comes a point when interest rate cuts have diminishing returns. Consumer confidence in Canada is at a two-year low.

There are other fault lines in the Canadian economy. Fears over a housing bubble in key metro areas such as Toronto and Vancouver are rising.

"In light of its hotter price performance over the past three to five years and greater supply risk, this vulnerability appears to be comparatively high in the Toronto market," the deputy chief economist of TD Bank wrote in a new report.

A run up in housing prices, along with overbuilding units that haven't been sold, and a high home price-to-income ratio has TD Bank predicting a "medium-to-moderate" chance of a "painful price adjustment." In other words, the bubble could deflate.

Housing markets in the oil patch have already started losing value. The Calgary Real Estate Board predicts that the resale value of homes will fall by 0.2% by the end of the year. And total home sales could fall by 22% in 2015. That is a dramatic downward revision from the group's prediction in January that home sales would rise by 1.6%.

It's all about oil: But that's because the economic situation is much worse in the oil patch than many had predicted six months ago. And oil prices have crashed again, a detail not yet captured by the disappointing GDP figures. Crude oil (WTI) is now below $50 per barrel, and Canada's heavy oil trades at a discount to even that low figure due to pipeline constraints and lower quality.

That's bad news for companies like Canadian Oil Sands (COSWF), which owns a 36.74% stake in the Syncrude project, Canada's largest producer of synthetic oil made from Canadian oil sands. The company lost $128 million in the second quarter due to lower oil prices and higher corporate taxes in Alberta.

Recessionary conditions along with low oil prices could lead to "deteriorating" asset quality for some of Canada's largest banks, according to Moody's.

What's next? The grim oil price picture is forcing companies to slash spending and delay projects. Canada's oil sands tend to come from large-scale, multibillion dollar projects. The high cost puts them on the frontlines for cancellations when oil prices sink.

According to the Financial Post there have been 33 major oil and gas projects that have been delayed or cancelled so far this year, and 16 of them are located in Canada's oil sands. Many, if not most, of these cancelled projects will need much higher oil prices in order to breakeven.

For now, it is unclear when that might happen. Oil price predictions should be taken with a large grain of salt, but Again Capital's John Kilduff, appearing on CNBC, said that oil could dip into $30 territory later this year.

"Christmas time we'll probably be rebounding off new lows off of the mid to low 30s," he said on Squawk Box. "We have a lot to go. We're going to take out the March lows of $43 and trade down to the 30s in my view."

And of course long-term projections are not worth much, but Goldman Sachs now says that oil could remain around $50 through 2020.

That is not something Canada's oil producers want to hear.

Culled from CNN

US To Lift Arms Embargo On Nigeria

THERE were strong indications on Monday that the United States would soon lift the current arms embargo placed on Nigeria.

The Head of a Delegation of the US Congress Committee on Judiciary to the country, Mr. Darrel Issa, said this while speaking with journalists after an indoor meeting with the nation’s defence and military chiefs at the National Defence College, Abuja.

Issa said that the US had commenced the process of lifting the restrictions of the Leahy Law on Nigeria because of the recent moves to professionalise the military by the Chief of Defence Staff, Maj. Gen. Abayomi Olonisakin, and the service chiefs.

The Leahy Law is a human rights law of the US, which prevents the US State Department and the Department of Defence from selling arms and ammunition to countries whose military are believed to have committed brazen acts of rights violation.

The refusal of the US government to sell arms to the country because of the Leahy law had made Nigeria under former President Goodluck Jonathan to explore other options, including the Black Market, to get desperately needed arms and ammunition to halt the advances of the Boko Haram insurgents in 2014.

Issa added that most of America’s support for Nigeria in the area of training, technical support and equipment provision was not tied to the Leahy and had not been stopped.

He said that the US was relying on President Muhammadu Buhari and the military chiefs to rebuild the trust of Nigerians in the military as an institution that would protect the citizenry.

The US congressman said that Nigerian military chiefs and the American delegation had discussed the issue of additional support, especially in the area of aerial surveillance critical to the fight against insurgency and the theft of the nation’s crude oil.

He said, “There are a number of things that we discussed today. Basically, there was the need for additional technical support, including overhead surveillance. This is important for Boko Haram but it is also important to stop the theft of this country’s oil by pirates and others.

“The fact is that this new regime with the new general staff has begun the process of ensuring that military professionalism in all post-civilians and combats has been made in a way that we can both be confident that the rule of law is being obeyed.

“So the process has begun to lift the restriction of the Leahy. But let’s understand that the vast majority of support that the US provides and would provide would be provided regardless of those. Our technical support, our training and most of the equipment we supply have never stopped and will continue.

“But we are looking forward to the President, with the new General Staff to work to make sure the people of Nigeria can have the confidence in the professionalism of the military, something the people rely on when the military is trying to clear insurgents and protect civilians.

“That is important to the new President; that is important to our President. So those are some of the areas that we discussed but we are very much looking forward to a great difference in the relationship, a proactive relationship and one in which we can provide a much greater level of support. Many of the items we discussed today are new and enhanced items that would be provided to this government.”

Issa said that the leadership of the military had been showing an understanding that the war against terrorism involved getting the people out of the insurgency and securing the communities as well as creating the environment for them to have trust in the government rather than the Boko Haram.

He stressed that the Boko Haram had not only disrupted the peace of the area, it had also caused famine in the affected communities.

He added that USAID “would be providing assistance as the military close areas and make it safe for communities to be rebuilt.”

The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Defence, Alhaji Aliyu Samaila, said that the visit of the American delegation to the country was a follow-up to President Buhari’s recent visit to the US.

Samaila said that the President’s visit was of great gain to the country and that it rekindled the hopes and aspirations of both the US and Nigeria.

He said, “This is a delegation from the United States Congress; they are on a visit to Nigeria and this is a follow-up to Mr. President’s visit to the US. We have said it again and again that the visit of Mr. President was of great gain to this country. It has rekindled the hopes and aspirations of the two countries.

“The United States believes in Nigeria; they have trust in our President and the government of the people of Nigeria. And they are also very concerned about the security situation in Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin area.

“And that is one of the reasons they are here to discuss with us and the military, that is, the services. We have discussed the issues concerning the insecurity in Nigeria and also the issue of human rights. They are pleased with the discussions. We hope that at least we would continue to build on this. Gaps that had been created before have been identified and they are definitely going to work on them.”

Culled from PUNCH News

A Former US Army Sniper Shares A Trick For Staying Focused

Here’s a question for you: Do you control your day or do you simply react to it? Or to put it another way—how often do you feel like all you did was keep your head above water? 

Nodding along right now? You’re not alone.

When transitioning from being in the army to a 9-to-5 desk job, time management and feeling in control of my work day was one of the hardest challenges I had to overcome.

That was, until I applied a trick from my military training to my office job. The great part about it is that it’s so easy to do, anyone can do it (without holding a a loaded weapon)! 

The trick

Once upon a time, before emails and office life, I was a sniper in the Army. As a sniper, I was trained to go into a dangerous area, collect reconnaissance, and get out without ever being seen. This is the hardest part of the job. Most people think it’s all about shooting from really far away, and while that’s certainly an important skill, it’s not the most difficult.

Staying virtually invisible, while moving from point to point with 75+ pounds of gear in extreme weather, while being completely exhausted, requires a tremendous amount of focus. The fatigue, the discomfort, the racing thoughts are all distractions that can throw off your focus and your cloak of invisibility that keeps you alive. 

So how do you brush off distractions and maintain your focus? 

Well, when the external stimuli take over and you begin to lose focus on your priorities, my sniper instructors taught me an extremely simple and profound trick to regain control. 

SLLS: Stop, Look, Listen, and Smell

They said, “When the heat, weight, and fatigue take your focus off moving in silence and invisibility, take a SLLS break — Stop what you are doing. Look around. Listen to your surroundings. Smell your environment.” 

The purpose of this is to take a timeout and refocus. This allows you to stop reacting to the external stimuli, be mindful of your environment, and focus on what really matters. 

Yes, it works. It helped me be invisible as a sniper. And later on, at my desk job, I discovered that it helped me regain control of my workday when all I was doing was reacting to emails and other people’s priorities.

One particular day, I was attempting to buckle down and knock out several hours of important, but monotonous work. It was crucial I completed it that day, but my mind was struggling to stay focused, and my attention bounced around from other people’s conversations to my phone to anything but what I needed to do. Time for a SLLS break! After five minutes of stopping and refocusing with SLLS, I was able to sit down with resolve and accomplish my work.

Bonus: It even helped me in my personal life to be more mindful and focused. I was able to soak up and fully experience a recent backpacking trip to the Yucatan peninsula.

So, how do you use this trick to immediately make an impact and help you regain control of your workday and personal life?

The challenge

Set a recurring alarm on your phone for every two hours, between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., that simply says “SLLS.” This is your cue to take a SLLS break. Stop whatever you’re doing, look around, listen to your surroundings, and smell your environment. Whether it’s for 30 seconds or five minutes, take as long as you need to regain clarity on the present moment. 

By doing this you’ll stop the reaction cycle and be able to focus on the present — allowing your mind to breathe and enter a higher state of thinking where you decide what’s important and worthy of your time. You’ll regain mindfulness and purpose by taking back control of those elusive thoughts that usually escape you during stressful moments.

The every-two-hour alarm is just a starting point. Practice this until it’s a habit, then turn off the alarm. Use this trick whenever you’re feeling overwhelmed, when you’re just reacting to the world around you, and when you want to take control of your day and your life.