Eideard

C’mon out to Santa Fe – lots of posh houses still unsold

American consumers and the federal government haven’t been able to bail out the sinking U.S. real estate market. Now wealthy Chinese, Canadians and other foreign buyers could get their chance.

Two U.S. senators have introduced a bill that would allow foreigners who spend at least $500,000 on residential property to obtain visas allowing them to live in the United States. The plan could be a boon to California, which has become a popular real estate market for foreigners, particularly those from China.

Nationwide, residential sales to foreigners and recent immigrants totaled $82 billion in the 12-month period ended March 31, up from $66 billion the previous year…California accounted for 12% of those sales, second only to Florida…

The program would come with several restrictions.

The purchase would have to be in cash, with no mortgage or home equity loan allowed. And the property would have to be bought for more than its most recent appraised value, Senator Schumer said.

The buyer would have to live in the home for at least 180 days each year, which would require paying U.S. income taxes on any foreign earnings. Buyers would no longer be eligible for the temporary visa if the property were sold…

The Visa Improvements to Stimulate International Tourism to the United States of America Act, or VISIT-USA Act, aims to do that by also making several other changes to visa policies.

Among them are allowing Chinese tourists to receive a five-year visa that permits multiple visits. They now must apply for a new visa every year. Canadians would be allowed to stay in the U.S. for more than 180 days without having to obtain a visa…

Senator Lee described it as a free-market way to boost demand in the real estate market after “big-government programs have failed to work.”

I’m not certain if Senator Lee speaks English as his first language back in Utah. Describing this program – the federal government clearing the way for foreign investment in American real estate – as a free market solution is laughable. But, then, as a Congressional Republican he’s probably used to Orwellian re-definition of words as a matter of practice.

Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

Chinese carmaker Zhejiang Geely Holding Group has purchased Volvo cars from U.S. auto giant Ford, the Swedish carmaker announced Sunday.

The $1.8 billion deal represents the biggest ever purchase by a Chinese car manufacturer, but it is considerably less than the $6.4 billion Ford paid for Volvo in 1999.

“We are pleased to have reached this agreement with Ford, enabling us to safeguard and strengthen Volvo’s renowned brand heritage,” said Geely chairman Li Shufu.

“Volvo will be a separate company with its own management team based in Gothenburg, Sweden.”

He added Geely will help Volvo to realize its potential in the Chinese market.

“The agreement provides a solid foundation for Volvo to continue to build its business under Geely’s ownership,” said Alan Mulally, Ford’s president and CEO, in a statement on the company’s Web site. “The sale of Volvo will allow us to further sharpen our focus on building the Ford brand around the world and continue to deliver on our One Ford plan serving our customers with the very best cars and trucks in the world.”

Nice PR lingo which – in fact – I expect to continue along in reality. Geely is in the learning stages of becoming an extra-national brand. Ford is in the learning stages of how to be a global brand in the 21st Century.

National Lottery operator Camelot has been sold to a Canadian teachers’ pension fund for £389m.

The company, currently owned by a consortium that includes Cadbury, has been running the UK’s National Lottery since it began in 1994. The sale will be looked at by the regulator, the National Lottery Commission. One of the factors in its decision will be whether or not the national interest will be served by the sale.

Camelot’s proposed buyer, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan – known simply as Teachers’ – runs the pension fund for more than a quarter of a million Canadian teachers.

It already has a wide range of investments in the UK, including Birmingham and Bristol airports and a 27% stake in Northumbrian Water.

The National Lottery Commission’s chief executive, Mark Harris, said: “We will scrutinise the proposal to ensure that the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is fit and proper to take over the running of the National Lottery and that the commitments we secured for the National Lottery, players and good causes during the licence competition are safeguarded.”

Could have been worse. What if they bought Portsmouth FC?

Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

Dutch luxury sportscar maker Spyker may be the unlikely buyer of Saab but it is set to struggle with the real challenge: converting two loss-making companies into a profitable one.

After months of tortuous negotiations, Spyker sealed a deal with General Motors to buy Saab for $74 million cash and $326 million in deferred shares, sparking celebrations at its headquarters in the small Dutch town of Zeewolde.

Spyker CEO Victor Muller also bought out his largest shareholder, bank tycoon Victor Antonov, as part of the deal…

“It seems like a gamble. They’ve got the new 9-5, the 9-4X coming out next and the new 9-3 should be coming out in 2012, which could be quite lucrative, but whether they can attract customers back to the brand and make it profitable again is the billion-dollar question,” IHS Global’s Ian Fletcher said…

Hans van Rennes, Spyker’s vice president of marketing, said a Saab dealer sent the company a cake and one-time Saab suitor Koenigsegg called with congratulations. Outside, a Dutch television show organised a parade of old and new Saab cars.

“I still have a hangover but it’s a pleasant one because it’s from the champagne,” said Jantje Schaap, 50, a Saab dealer from the town of Lemmer who joined in the impromptu auto show.

And Spyker CEO Victor Muller and Saab head Jan Ake Jonsson were greeted with applause as they met with employees of the Swedish carmaker at a hastily organised rally in Trollhattan, the town in southwest Sweden home to Saab’s main plant and headquarters.

“I am really stunned to see all here today. Nothing prepared me for seeing so many people, so enthusiastic and it only confirms that we did the right thing,” Muller said to the around 3,000 staff crowding the stage.

RTFA for the not-so-boring details on financing. Both Spyker and SAAB have designers capable of both advanced engineering and contemporary industrial design. Yes, that means making stuff sell as well or better than it runs.

There probably are Swedish counterparts to Jonathan Ive hanging around town, looking for a gig.

Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

The United States scrapped 14 million autos while buying only 10 million last year, shrinking the country’s car and light duty truck fleet to 246 million from a record high of 250 million, according to the report to be released today by nonprofit group the Earth Policy Institute (EPI).

The United States, the world’s biggest petroleum user, “is entering a new era, evolving from a car-dominated transport system to one that is much more diversified,” said Lester Brown, the president of the EPI.

While many cities like New York have had to cut mass transit services and raise fares during the recession, Phoenix, Seattle, Houston, Nashville and other cities have expanded or improved mass transit systems.

While we’ve added some expansion to the two major urban systems here in New Mexico – diesel-electric hybrid buses in Albuquerque and natural gas in Santa Fe – the significant addition has been the new rail line running from South of Albuquerque north to Santa Fe. Bio-diesel powered and growing beyond Governor Bill’s wildest dreams.

Cities are taking a variety of steps, like adding rapid bus lanes and light duty rail, to fight traffic congestion and air pollution. Some are raising parking meter prices and cutting down the required parking spaces per building, the report said.

President Barack Obama’s “cash for clunkers” program, which last summer gave consumers a rebate of up to $4,500 for trading in older cars and light trucks, led to the scrapping of more than 700,000 vehicles. But since the incentive was only available to consumers who bought new fuel-sipping vehicles, it did not affect the ratio of scrapped vehicles to new sales…

As more people live in cities, some teens are not even bothering to get driver’s licenses. The number of teenagers with licenses peaked at 12 million in 1978 but is now under 10 million, the report said.

“When I was a kid socializing revolved around getting into a car and going for a drive,” said Brown. “Today kids socialize over the Internet and on smart phones.”

I truly hope this ain’t wishful thinking and a short-term phenomenon. We could use some smartening-up on energy consumption. Cars are a great place to start.

Three-year-old Pipi Quinlan bought a $20,000 Kobelco digger on Trade Me, prompting immediate damage control by her mum when her purchase was revealed…

Parents Sarah and Reid Quinlan, of Stanmore Bay, were astonished to wake one morning to find Pipi had bought the huge excavating digger in a Trade Me auction.

The technically savvy kid had woken early and, with the rest of her family sound asleep, decided to play with the computer.

With a few clicks of the mouse she entered Internet Explorer and the Trade Me site her mother had already logged on to.

After a few more timely clicks, she had won the most recent auction listed on the site’s homepage.

It was for a Kobelco digger, and she had it for $20,000 – money she didn’t have in her piggy bank.

“The first I knew about it was when I came down and opened up the computer,” says mum Sarah.

“I saw an email from Trade Me saying I had won an auction and another email from the seller saying something like ‘I think you’ll love this digger’…”

“It wasn’t until I went back and re-read the emails that I saw $20,000, and got the shock of my life,” says Sarah.

The auction site reversed the sale after Mrs. Quinlan called and explained what had happened.

And the computer is, uh, now kept out of Pipi’s reach.

Daylife/AP Photo

The technology industry is abuzz following a report by the Wall Street Journal saying that IBM, the computer industry behemoth often known as “Big Blue”, is in talks to buy the struggling Sun Microsystems for more than $6.5bn in cash.

Both companies have officially declined to comment on the suggestion, which analysts think would be a powerful boost for IBM in the finance and telecommunications markets, where Sun is especially strong but which have seen dramatic falls in capital expenditure due to the credit crunch.

Even if the deal is all-cash, it would represent a 100% premium on Sun’s market capitalisation at the market close on Tuesday, when the share price was at the same level as it was in 1996.

Sun’s value peaked with the dotcom boom in 2001, but has been sliding since and fell sharply with the rest of the Nasdaq technology-oriented stocks last autumn. IBM’s has remained steady as the company has in the past few years focussed increasingly on selling services rather than hardware; it sold off its PC-making division to the Chinese company Lenovo in December 2004, perceiving that the loss-making division was unlikely to move back into profit in the long term.

IBM and Sun have a common cause in pushing “open source” software based on the Linux operating system and similar products. Sun last year bought the Swedish open source database maker MySQL for roughly $1bn, but has found it difficult to make the spending pay off. Last December it announced a $209m loss for its second quarter, and announced last November that it was cutting its staff by up to 6,000 people – about 15% of its workforce.

Let the waffling begin.

British shoppers could lose their right to a refund on faulty goods if plans by the European Union get the go-ahead.

Consumers can now choose to reject faulty goods, or goods that are not the same as they agreed to buy, and get a refund. But the European Commission wants to water down these rights to harmonise the law – most EU countries only give the choice of a replacement or a repair.

While the Law Commissions and consumer watchdog Which? agree that the law should be harmonised, they have said that UK shoppers should not be left worse off. The Law Commission of England and Wales has launched a consultation on the issue and wants input from shoppers. ‘We believe that retaining the right to reject is crucial for consumer confidence, and our research shows that consumers want this,’ said David Hertzell, the commissioner leading the project.

The commission has suggested tweaking existing law to include making shoppers claim a refund within 30 days of purchase. At present there is no limit, but in practice this is at the retailer’s discretion.

True, in the United States we have diddly-squat for legal rights as consumers. The fine print warrantees offered by manufacturers and retailers typically is the only grounds for suit.

I guess that isn’t the case in Europe and the U.K..