French President Nicolas Sarkozy has offered his personal support to Jin Jing, a wheelchair-bound athlete after she was scratched & bruised while she clung to the Olympic torch during its chaotic Parisian relay which was delivered by French Senate President Christian Poncelet.
Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing will introduce quarterly earnings reports, but not until 2011 to appease critics who argue that quarterly earnings reports will hurt corporations' bottom lines. Critics to the proposed change to quarterly earnings reports include: HSBC, CLP Holdings, Cheung Kong Holdings & Air China who argue that not only will the move be more costly, but it will also encourage investors to focus on the short term instead of the long run. Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing argues that quarterly earnings reports will increase transparency and give investors more timely information about a company's financial performance. Hong Kong is one of the few developed economies yet to demand companies to release quarterly financial information. The US, Australia, Singapore and the mainland all report financial information quarterly while the UK implemented a 3-month reporting period in 2007. Quarterly reporting has the support of many in the community, including fund managers, institutional investors & analysts. who increasingly demand higher transparency and more frequent financial statements. Large companies will report first with smaller companies switching to this format in 2012.
A test proposed to test potential Hong Kong government employees on the Basic Law has been criticized by both the pro-government DAB and the pan-democrats. Democrats argue that the test is a meaningless exercise with the sole purpose of pleasing Beijing (where have we heard that argument before?) while the pro-China DAB contends that the test would be unfair to less skilled job seekers.
International
Senators Obama & Clinton continue to attack each other in the final hours before the crucial Pennsylvania primary. Obama's mouth has landed him in more hot water recently when he paid the Republicans a backhanded comment by saying that "Either Democrat would be better than Senator John McCain. And all three of us would be be better than George Bush". Clinton angrily reacted: "We need a nominee who will take on John McCain, not cheer on John McCain". Obama still has a clear financial advantage over Clinton in that he had raised US$41 million in March with US$42 million available for the campaign while Clinton reportedly raised US$20 million in March with US$9 million available for the campaign. However, Clinton also had debts of US$10.3 million which ultimately means that she lost money in March.
Implications:
Obama's offhand remark has cost him Pennsylvania, with Clinton winning by a margin of 10 points, 55-45, according to a report released by NBC . Pennsylvania has 158 delegates up for grabs. Within the state, Clinton leads in western Pennsylvania, including Pittsburgh & Scranton, thanks to a high proportion of blue-collar (working class) population whereas Obama leads in a key city, Philadelphia. According to a Yahoo! report, Clinton won 65% of the white women vote, 55% of the white male vote, a key swing vote and 60% of voters who had either decided who to vote for in the last 3 days or the last week, Surprisingly, Obama only won a slight majority of voters with college degrees (Clinton won 60% of the vote from non-college graduates) while winning 60% of voters aged 29 & younger, but this was neutralized by Clinton winning 60% of senior voters while winning a majority of all voters aged 40 or over. Obama's earlier remark about Pennsylvania voters being "bitter" and "clinging to guns & religion" has hurt him on this occasion
The Palestinian militant group Hamas has offered a truce in return for the establishment of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 frontier negotiated by former President Jimmy Carter
