Other financial news
€1.4 billion
The savings that Government cutbacks aim to achieve this year and next to combat falling tax revenues.
€1.8 billion
The amount wiped off the value of the four Irish banks - AIB, Bank of Ireland, Anglo Irish and Irish Life Permanent - on Tuesday as bad news sent investors scurrying for cover again.
QUOTEOFTHEWEEK1
'I think there is a lot more pain to come than they are telling you.'
Swisscanto fund manager Florian Esterer, on the real depth of the subprime fallout, about which, he says the banks are in denial. It's a good job the rest of us aren't then.
QUOTEOFTHEWEEK2
'Even rich people have to be in a good mood to spend money.'
Bang Olufsen vice-president Peter Thostrup, following the high-end TV and sound system maker's third profit-warning this year. So the rich aren't very different from you and me after all
GOODWEEK
The super rich
While interest rates are squeezing ordinary wage slaves, the super rich are throwing cash at art and antiques. Britain's Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said this week that oil-rich Russian, Latin American and Middle Eastern buyers are driving the market for these investments. Chelsea owner and Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich recently paid £17.2 million for Lucian Freud's painting, Benefits Supervisor Sleeping. Abramovich must be getting nostalgic for the boom, when benefits supervisors slept all day.
Nickelback
Promoter Live Nation has signed a $50 million record, tour and merchandise deal with the rockers who brought you Sliver Side Up and The Long Road, giving Nickelback a berth in the same stable as Jay-Z, Madonna and U2. Meanwhile, EMI's new secret weapon in the battle against falling CD sales and booming internet downloads is new chief executive Elio Leoni-Sceti, the Italian marketing man behind such domestic hits as Cilit Bang and Airwick.
BADWEEK
Jerry Yang
The besieged Yahoo! chief executive came under more pressure as billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn unveiled a potential board (including himself) to replace Yang and his colleagues at the internet search company. Icahn wants to re-open talks with Microsoft, whose $47.5 billion offer Yang rejected earlier this year. Obviously, Microsoft is going to offer a premium to a board appointed with the sole aim of selling the company.
Partygaming
The one-time darling of the lucrative online gambling industry said this week it is struggling to keep up with the bonuses and prize money that competitors are offering players on their internet poker tournaments.
Its shares dropped 10 per cent to 223.5 pence on Wednesday as a result. Hmm . . . what if they're bluffing?
