Aelflaed blog

Djokovic tops Fish, reaches Key Biscayne final

Novak Djokovic celebrated a pivotal point Friday by extending his arms and sticking out his chest like a sprinter crossing the finish line.

He's almost there, one win from his fourth title in four tournaments this year.

Djokovic advanced to the final at the Sony Ericsson Open and stretched his winning streak to 25 consecutive matches by beating Mardy Fish 6-3, 6-1.

"I don't feel invincible," Djokovic said. "I don't feel that I can't lose on the court. What I feel is big confidence. What I feel is that I'm playing best tennis of my life."

Even so, the No. 2-ranked Djokovic figures he'll be the underdog Sunday. His opponent will be the winner of the match Friday night between No. 1 Rafael Nadal and No. 3 Roger Federer.

"I obviously wouldn't feel like a favorite," Djokovic said. "For me to win, I will be have to be on the top of my game."

Three-time Grand Slam champion Maria Sharapova seeks her first Key Biscayne title Saturday against 2009 champion Victoria Azarenka.

Fish, who earned the No. 1 American ranking thanks to his run this week, hung with Djokovic for a while but went 0 for 6 on break points. Djokovic erased three with aces and another with a service winner.

The Serb's serve was his biggest weakness only a year ago, but it's much-improved since. He has yet to be broken in 40 service games at Key Biscayne, erasing all 15 break points he has faced.

Djokovic also is dominating long rallies, another reason he has lost only 18 games in five rounds.

"He's moving better than anyone right now, no doubt about it, on a hard court," Fish said. "It's his playground right now."

Rain halted the match at 2-all for 54 minutes, and Djokovic said he found conditions less windy and more favorable when play resumed. He stuck out his chest after he won a grueling baseline rally to break for a 4-2 lead.

Fish's best chance to get back in the match came three games later, but he failed to put away a drive volley on break point and Djokovic served out the set.

It was a runaway from there.

"I didn't win any of the big points," Fish said. "None of them. I left a lot of shots out there today. That's what's disappointing."

His consolation: He'll climb ahead of fellow American Andy Roddick to a career-best 11th in next week's rankings.

Djokovic finished with only 14 unforced errors and 15 winners, the last coming on match point. He celebrated by pounding his chest with his fist — a familiar scene.

He has won three titles this year, including the Australian Open. His record of 23-0 in 2011 is the best record to begin a year since Ivan Lendl started 25-0 in 1986.

"To be a part of history, it's always a big pleasure and honor," Djokovic said.

Kansas City, Kansas, wins Google broadband nod

Google announced on Wednesday that Kansas City, Kansas, had been selected as the site for its first super-fast broadband Internet network.

Nearly 1,100 US towns and cities had competed to be Google's testbed for the ultra high-speed fiber optic network which will move data 100 times faster than what is available in the United States today.

Each home, school, and business in Kansas City will eventually be linked to a "one-gigabyte backbone" for routing digital data. The service is expected to start in 2012.

"We hope to bring this same service to other nearby cities and other markets too," said Google vice president of access services Milo Medin. "This is really the beginning... we are starting here."

Google announced its plan to build an experimental high-speed Internet network a year ago.

Tactics used by cities to be selected by the California technology giant included public rallies, pitches in YouTube videos, creation of Facebook groups, and symbolically taking on the firm's name.

The United States ranked 15th in a study of Internet connectivity in countries worldwide, according to a study released in October by computer networking titan Cisco. South Korea topped the list.

The study affirmed that being ahead of the pack with Internet broadband gave countries an economic advantage and many emerging economies are "leapfrogging" old Internet technologies to go directly to high-speed networks.

The United States was not among the 14 countries that the Cisco-backed study concluded were prepared for the "Internet applications of tomorrow."

Fast and ubiquitous Internet service was described by Google executives as essential to innovation and creativity as well as to connecting people to lifestyle benefits the Digital Age has to offer.

"Speed matters immensely," said Google chief financial officer Patrick Pichette. "We're going to actually experiment to find solutions to make the Internet accessible to everybody."

Google said it planned to offer wired Internet connections to homes at a "competitive price" with people choosing their own service providers.

Reasons for picking Kansas City included being able to efficiently build the fiber network there and the potential for showcasing services that capitalize on ultra-fast data connections.

Kansas City has a population of about 146,000 people, according to recent census figures.

"Over the past decade, the jump from dial-up to broadband has led to streaming online video, digital music sales, video conferencing over the Web and countless other innovations that have transformed communication and commerce," Google's Medin said.

"We can't wait to see what new products and services will emerge as Kansas City moves from traditional broadband to ultra high-speed fiber optic connections," he said.

The Kansas City project is intended to explore new ways to deploy fiber networks as well as to see what kinds of "bandwidth-intensive killer apps" or services it inspires, according to Google.

Oil falls on high U.S. inventory

Oil fell on Wednesday, weighed down by swelling crude inventories in the United States while President Barack Obama was expected to set a long-term goal to cut oil imports.

U.S. crude trimmed earlier losses and North Sea Brent turned positive as U.S. employment data came out in line with expectations and due to support from the civil unrest in North Africa and the Middle East.

Brent crude futures rose 1 cent to $115.01 a barrel at 1310 GMT. U.S. crude was trading 27 cents lower at $104.52, having fallen to as low as $104.13.

The trading volume on both contracts was relatively small, with the end of the first quarter near.

Prices have risen from $93 at the end of December, touching 2-1/2-year highs just below $120 in February.

Christopher Bellew with Bache Commodities cited bulging crude oil stocks in the United States and a dip in fuel demand between the winter heating season and the summer gasoline season as a factor capping any gains in oil prices.

"In the short term we are at the end of the Northern Hemisphere winter, with a seasonal fall in demand," Bellew said.

"The dichotomy is between the world being well supplied with oil in the short term and the uncertainties that loom in the medium term."

In the medium term, prices are likely to be supported by

civil unrest in the oil-rich Arab world and an expected increase in oil and gas demand following a global backlash against nuclear power generation. Nuclear reactors in Fukushima, Japan, continue to emit radioactivity after severe damage caused by an earthquake and tsunami earlier in March.

In the long term, Obama will outline a strategy to cut oil imports by a third over 10 years, focusing on energy security at a time high gasoline prices could stall U.S. economic recovery.

The White House says this is a deliberate turn toward energy security by Obama and will be followed by other events to highlight his strategy. [ID:nN2937048] But the immediate market reaction was limited.

"It sounds like a very ambitious target indeed," said Carsten Fritsch, analyst at Commerzbank.

"It will be difficult to achieve. Perhaps there will be large energy, fuel saving measures or they would need to allow more oil drilling, but after the Gulf of Mexico (spill) it could be difficult."

U.S. INVENTORIES JUMP

U.S. government oil data is expected to show a 1.8 million barrel increase in the week to March 25 when it is released at 1430 GMT, a Reuters poll of analysts showed.

Late on Tuesday, separate data from industry group the American Petroleum Institute showed crude stocks rose by a sharp 5.7 million barrels last week.

In Libya, rebels pulled out of the oil town of Ras Lanuf on Wednesday under heavy bombardment from Muammar Gaddafi's forces, showing their weakness without Western air strikes to tip the scales in their favor.

A conference of 40 governments and international bodies on Tuesday agreed to press on with a NATO-led aerial bombardment of Libyan forces until Gaddafi complies with a U.N. resolution to end violence against civilians.

In Syria, President Bashar al-Assad will on Wednesday give his first public speech since pro-democracy protests erupted in the south of the country.

U.S. ADP employment data showed the private sector added 201,000 jobs in March, in line with expectation.

That followed Tuesday's gloomy reading of U.S. consumer confidence in March due partly to high fuel costs.

(Additional reporting by Alejandro Barbajosa in Singapore; editing by James Jukwey and Jane Baird)

Family Dollar expects strong year after Q2 profit beat

Family Dollar Stores Inc's (FDO.N) quarterly profit edged past analysts' revised estimates as shoppers flocked to its stores for low-priced holiday items and groceries, prompting the discount chain to forecast a strong year ahead.

Family Dollar sells most of its items for $10 or less and caters to consumers with household income of $40,000 and below.

For the second quarter ended on February 26, it earned $123.2 million, or 98 cents per share. Analysts, on average were expecting it to earn 97 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The results come barely a fortnight after Family Dollar raised its second-quarter earnings forecast after its sales jumped in the quarter.

At that time, it had estimated a profit of 97-98 cents a share, while analysts were expecting earnings of 95 cents.

The company said total quarterly sales for the quarter rose 8.3 percent to about $2.26 billion, with sales at stores open at least a year, or same-store sales, up 5.1 percent.

The retailer, which has more than 6,880 discount stores in 44 U.S. states, rebuffed a buyout offer from Nelson Peltz's Trian Group earlier this month, saying his offer "substantially" undervalued the company.

Instead, Family Dollar is continuing to open more stores and renovate older ones as it tries to capture more of shoppers' spending on basic items such as food. The company plans to open about 300 new stores and shut some 80-100 doors this year.

For the full year, the company expects to earn $3.13-$3.23 a share, while analysts were expecting earnings of $3.12 -- with sales up 8 to 10 percent.

Shares of the company were trading up at $53.15 on Wednesday before the markets opened. They had closed at $52.40 on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday.

(Reporting by Nivedita Bhattacharjee in Bangalore and Jessica Wohl in Chicago; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)

JPMorgan fires back in $6.4 billion Madoff lawsuit

NEW YORK (Reuters) – JPMorgan Chase & Co accused the trustee seeking $6.4 billion for victims of Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme of doing an end run around the law in pursuing his case, and said it has a right to a jury trial.

The second-largest U.S. bank said court-appointed trustee Irving Picard is exceeding his authority by suing in bankruptcy court, where a judge rather than a jury would decide the case.

It said the case instead belongs in district court, because it involves "significant" banking and securities law issues.

"The trustee's massive damages action against JPMorgan bears no resemblance to a typical lawsuit commenced by a bankruptcy trustee," JPMorgan said in a court filing late Tuesday.

"In substance, the trustee is trying to pursue an enormous back-door class action," it said.

Kevin McCue, a spokesman for Picard, did not respond to a request for a comment on Wednesday.

A ruling in the case could affect some other lawsuits that Picard has filed to recover money from companies and individuals he believes benefited from Madoff's estimated $65 billion Ponzi scheme, which was uncovered in December 2008.

"JPMorgan has a good claim if laws other than bankruptcy laws are shown to be central," said Jean Braucher, resident scholar at the American Bankruptcy Institute.

"In a major action such as this, which could be independent of the trustee winding up Madoff's brokerage house, a district court could decide to take the case anyway," she added.

RED FLAGS

Picard has filed lawsuits seeking more than $50 billion. Defendants include the owners of the New York Mets baseball team, from whom he seeks as much as $1 billion, and other banks such as HSBC Holdings Plc and UBS AG.

JPMorgan was the main banker for Madoff's firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, for more than 20 years. It has said it did not know about or assist in Madoff's fraud.

"The crux of this lawsuit is that JPMorgan breached its duties as Madoff's banker, and hinges on what a bank's duties are when there are red flags about a customer," said Philip Bentley, a partner at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP.

"The lawsuit is very different from most of Picard's lawsuits, which seek to claw back money from Madoff investors rather than seek damages for aiding and abetting a fraud," added Bentley, who represents some of these former investors.

Picard so far has recovered about $10 billion for former Madoff clients. The trustee is a partner at Baker & Hostetler LLP. JPMorgan's court filing was submitted by John Savarese, a partner at Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.

MANY OPEN ISSUES, JPMORGAN SAYS

In bankruptcy court papers unsealed on February 3, Picard accused JPMorgan of having significant doubts about Madoff but silently acquiescing in his fraud, hoping to preserve its own investments and its business relationship with Madoff.

He said these doubts were known to top bank officials, including a risk officer who said 18 months before the fraud was uncovered that there was a "well-known cloud" over Madoff.

In Tuesday's filing, New York-based JPMorgan said the case requires a "significant interpretation" of federal banking and securities laws, including the Bank Secrecy Act and USA Patriot Act, and a decision on whether Picard has standing to sue.

"The trustee's claims raise fundamental questions, of great importance to the banking industry as a whole, as to whether banks such as JPMorgan have liability to private plaintiffs for fraud conducted by their customers," JPMorgan said. "These issues fall outside the province of the bankruptcy court."

Madoff, 72, pleaded guilty in March 2009 and is now serving a 150-year sentence in a North Carolina federal prison.

The case is Picard v. JPMorgan Chase & Co et al, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York, No. 10-ap-04932.

(Additional reporting by Ben Klayman in Detroit and Santosh Nadgir in Bangalore, editing by John Wallace and Maureen Bavdek)