Hump Day Headlines – May 5, 2010

Every Wednesday you will find links and top-line summaries to current events around the globe.

Thai protest leaders object to election timing [Reuters]

- Anti-government protesters in Thailand objected on Tuesday to proposed November elections. Protest leaders, who had demanded an immediate poll, said they had agreed to enter into a reconciliation process proposed by Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, but took issue with his offer for a general election on November 14 and said they were not ready to leave their fortified encampment in central Bangkok
- The red shirts broadly back former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a populist multimillionaire who lives in self-imposed exile after his ouster in a 2006 military coup and subsequent conviction for graft. The timing of when Abhisit dissolves parliament and holds an election is critical. Analysts say both sides want to be in power in September for a reshuffle of the powerful military and police forces, and passing of the national budget
- Earlier on Tuesday, Thailand’s benchmark stock index jumped 4.4% as investors focused on a possible end to a stalemate that shattered tourism and hurt foreign investment in one of Southeast Asia’s most promising emerging markets. An end to the impasse could reignite a rally in Thai stocks, which jumped 15% on a $1.8 billion wave of foreign buying from mid-February to April 9, a day before a gun battle in the heart of old Bangkok that killed 25 people and led to a reversal in stock prices as Thailand’s tourism industry withered

EU, IMF agree $147 billion bailout for Greece [Reuters]

- European finance ministers triggered a record 110 billion euro ($147 billion) bailout for debt-stricken Greece on Sunday after Athens committed itself to years of painful austerity. After weeks of tough talk and procrastination due to fierce public opposition to handouts for the Greeks, German Chancellor Angela Merkel finally threw her full support behind the EU/IMF package, vowing to fight for parliamentary approval by Friday
- Euro zone ministers, meeting in emergency session, approved the three-year package of emergency loans and agreed the first funds would be released in time for Athens to make a big debt repayment to creditors on May 19. In exchange for by far the largest bailout ever assembled for a country, Prime Minister George Papandreou announced further spending cuts and tax increases totaling 30 billion euros over three years on top of tough measures already taken
- The first rescue of a member of the 16-nation euro zone aims to stem a debt crisis that has shaken financial markets, dented confidence in the euro and begun to spread to fellow euro zone weaklings Portugal and Spain. Berlin’s hesitancy has fueled market panic. The chairman of the Eurogroup of finance ministers, Jean-Claude Juncker, said that at Germany’s insistence, all ministers would discuss with their national banking sectors the possibility of voluntary contributions to the aid package

Gulf Oil Spill Is Bad, but How Bad? [New York Times]

- The Deepwater Horizon blowout is not unprecedented, nor is it yet among the worst oil accidents in history. And its ultimate impact will depend on a long list of interlinked variables, including the weather, ocean currents, the properties of the oil involved and the success or failure of the frantic efforts to stanch the flow and remediate its effects. As one expert put it, this is the first inning of a nine-inning game. No one knows the final score
- The ruptured well, currently pouring an estimated 210,000 gallons of oil a day into the gulf, could flow for years and still not begin to approach the 36 billion gallons of oil spilled by retreating Iraqi forces when they left Kuwait in 1991. It is not yet close to the magnitude of the Ixtoc I blowout in the Bay of Campeche in Mexico in 1979, which spilled an estimated 140 million gallons of crude before the gusher could be stopped. And it will have to get much worse before it approaches the impact of the Exxon Valdez accident of 1989, which contaminated 1,300 miles of largely untouched shoreline
- The gulf is not a pristine environment and has survived both chronic and acute pollution problems before. Thousands of gallons of oil flow into the gulf from natural undersea well seeps every day, engineers say, and the scores of refineries and chemical plants that line the shore from Mexico to Mississippi pour untold volumes of pollutants into the water
- After the Ixtoc spill 31 years ago, the second-largest oil release in history, the gulf rebounded. Within three years, there was little visible trace of the spill off the Mexican coast, which was compounded by a tanker accident in the gulf a few months later that released 2.6 million additional gallons, experts said

Suspect, Charged, Said to Admit to Role in Plot [New York Times]

- A Pakistani-American man arrested in the failed Times Square car bombing has admitted his role in the attempted attack and said he received explosives training in Pakistan, the authorities said Tuesday. The man, Faisal Shahzad, 30, was arrested as he tried to flee the country in a Dubai-bound jet late Monday. Hours later, there were reports that seven or eight people had been arrested in Pakistan, as officials in both countries sought to determine the origins and scope of the plot
- American intelligence officials said that while any ties Mr. Shahzad had to international terrorist groups remained murky, investigators were strongly looking at possible links to the Pakistani Taliban in the attempted attack on Saturday. If the role is confirmed, it would be the group’s first effort to attack the United States and the first sign of the group’s ability to strike targets beyond Pakistan or Afghanistan
- The Pakistani Taliban on Sunday released a video taking credit for the Times Square attack, but American officials cautioned on Tuesday that the investigation was still in its early stages, and said it could take days before enough evidence emerged to point to any one group for its role in the plot

Google enters digital books war with launch of Editions [BBC]

- Google is set to launch its own online e-book store in 2010. Google Editions books will not be tied to a specific device, unlike rival e-book company Amazon. The Amazon Kindle is linked to books from the company’s own store and similarly with Apple’s iBookstore
- To date Google has scanned over 12 million books, both in-print and out-of-print, giving it a greater selection of material than either Apple or Amazon. Analysts at the Yankee Group have predicted that the US ebook reader market is “about to catch fire sparking from $1.3bn in revenue in 2010 to $2.5bn by 2013″
- With books accessed through Google Editions readable on any web enabled device from a mobile phone to a netbook and from a tablet to a desktop, the implications are clear for e-book stores tied to a single device.
In particular researchers point to trouble ahead for Amazon which, despite not releasing any specific figures, has been the leader in the market

Farmers Cope With Roundup-Resistant Weeds [New York Times]

- Just as the heavy use of antibiotics contributed to the rise of drug-resistant supergerms, American farmers’ near-ubiquitous use of the weedkiller Roundup has led to the rapid growth of tenacious new superweeds. To fight them, farmers throughout the East, Midwest and South are being forced to spray fields with more toxic herbicides and return to more labor-intensive methods like regular plowing
- The first resistant species to pose a serious threat to agriculture was spotted in a Delaware soybean field in 2000. Since then, the problem has spread, with 10 resistant species in at least 22 states infesting millions of acres, predominantly soybeans, cotton and corn
- Roundup, originally made by Monsanto but now also sold by others under the generic name glyphosate — has been little short of a miracle chemical for farmers. It kills a broad spectrum of weeds, is easy and safe to work with, and breaks down quickly, reducing its environmental impact. Sales took off in the late 1990s, after Monsanto created its brand of Roundup Ready crops that were genetically modified to tolerate the chemical, allowing farmers to spray their fields to kill the weeds while leaving the crop unharmed
- Today, Roundup Ready crops account for about 90% of the soybeans and 70% of the corn and cotton grown in the United States

Picasso painting fetches record $106m at auction [BBC]

- A Pablo Picasso painting has set a new record for the most expensive art work sold at auction, fetching $106m (£70m). The Spanish artist’s 1932 picture Nude, Green Leaves and Bust was sold at Christie’s auction house in New York
- It had belonged to the late Los Angeles collectors Frances and Sidney Brody since the 1950s. The winning bid was made by an unnamed telephone bidder. It breaks the record held by Giacometti’s Walking Man I, which sold in February for $104.3m
- Nude, Green Leaves and Bust had been expected to sell for $70m-$90m. The record-breaking sum, which includes Christie’s commission, is being taken as a sign that the art market has recovered from the global financial crisis

- Microsoft’s Internet Explorer losing browser share [BBC]
- Somali insurgents seize pirate haven [Reuters]
- From Buffett, Thought-Out Support for Goldman [New York Times]
- Pakistan Taliban leader alive, threatens U.S. attacks [Reuters]
- A decade on from the ILOVEYOU bug [BBC]
- In United-Continental Deal, Birth of a Behemoth [New York Times]
- In New York, a Tech Incubator Becomes a Hub of Collaboration [New York Times]

Photograph by Nati Harnik/Associated Press