Equities, oil steady; euro dips in holiday-thinned trade

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Oil and equities dawdled on Monday near multi-month highs scaled after robust Chinese trade data last week, while the euro slipped to a two-week low as uncertainty surrounded a political scandal in Spain and a looming election in Italy.

With the Lunar New Year holiday shutting most Asian financial centers, including those in Japan, China, Hong Kong, Singapore and South Korea, trading was light and volatile on many of those exchanges that remained open.

European markets were expected to likewise lack momentum in the absence of major economic drivers and ahead of a meeting of the Eurogroup, where the discussion around the risk of a global round of competitive currency devaluation could re-emerge.

Financial bookmakers called major European indexes <.ftse><.gdaxi><.fchi>to open flat.

Australian shares <.axjo> were flat after closing at a 34-month high on Friday following positive data from China, the most important consumer of Australia's commodity exports.

S&P 500 index futures inched up 0.1 percent after the Wall Street benchmark reached a five-year high on Friday.

Brent crude oil, which touched its highest in nine months on Friday, was unchanged just below $119 a barrel.

Foreign exchange trading was choppy in thin volumes, with what traders interpreted as slightly dovish comments from the European Central Bank last week also weighing on the euro, which has shed around 2.5 percent since reaching a 15-month high above $1.37 on February 1.

The euro briefly fell to $1.3325 on Monday, after stop-loss selling was triggered below $1.3340, traders said, before recovering to stand little changed around $1.3370.

There are growing worries about Spain as a scandal on secret cash payments engulfs the prime minister, while confidence in Italy has been shaken in the run-up to a February 24-25 election. "The euro's upside is likely to be limited and short-lived," said Aroop Chatterjee, an analyst at Barclays Capital.

"Better financial conditions are likely to be offset by rising political risks, market positioning and a weaker economy. We expect the euro to be on a declining trend beginning in Q2."

The yen pared a little of its recent heavy losses after Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said it had weakened more than intended.

The currency, which has been an easy one-way bet for weeks as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe put intense pressure on the central bank to take bold action to revive Japan's fragile economy, also recovered from its recent 4-week trough against the Aussie, the latter changing hands at 95.25 yen AUDJPY=R, compared with a peak of 97.42 set on Tuesday.

(Additional reporting by Ian Chua in Sydney and Vidya Ranganathan in Singapore; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)

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IHT Rendezvous: IHT Quick Read: Feb. 11

NEWS For months, Damascus has hunched in a defensive crouch as fighting raged in suburbs, but a rebel advance has created a new level of alarm and disorder. An employee of the New York Times reports from Damascus and Anne Barnard reports from Beirut.

President Obama will use his State of the Union speech on Tuesday to reinvigorate one of his signature national security objectives — drastically reducing nuclear arsenals around the world — after securing agreement in recent months with the United States military that the American nuclear force can be cut in size by roughly a third. David E. Sanger reports from Washington.

Scotland would have to renegotiate membership in the European Union and other international organizations if it votes for independence in a referendum next year, according to legal advice expected to be published Monday by the British government. Stephen Castle reports from London.

A Hong Kong television series has tapped into the tensions between the city’s residents and mainland Chinese visitors, striking a nerve on both sides of the border and drawing the attention of Chinese censors. Gerry Mullany reports from Hong Kong.

Several journalists who cover Myanmar said Sunday that they had received warnings from Google that their email accounts might have been hacked by “state-sponsored attackers.” Thomas Fuller reports from Bangkok.

The Financial Times is celebrating its 125th birthday Wednesday. While the print editions are fading, The F.T. has figured out how to make money from new outlets. Eric Pfanner reports.

EDUCATION The use of part-time faculty who have little possibility of tenure or permanent employment is increasingly common at U.S. colleges and universities. But European law gives workers more rights, and French workers are among the most protected in Europe — unless, it seems, they work for an American university. D. D. Gutenplan reports from Paris.

ARTS An exhibition at the Museo del Novecento in Milan celebrates Olivetti’s contribution to the design culture of the modern industrial era. Alice Rawsthorn reviews from Milan.

FASHION The blizzard kept Suzy Menkes from getting to the early New York fashion shows, so she pulled out her iPad to watch them online. Suzy Menkes writes from the virtual front row.

SPORTS England was the big winner of a second weekend of the 2013 European Six Nations rugby championship that ended with the perennial power France at the bottom of the table. Huw Richards reports from Paris.

As Gareth Bale of Tottenham and Cristiano Ronaldo of Madrid led their teams to victories this weekend, some wonder if they will be playing together next season. Rob Hughes reports from London.

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Authorities post $1 million reward for ex-Los Angeles policeman

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A record $ 1 million reward was posted on Sunday for information leading to the capture of a fugitive former Los Angeles cop suspected of targeting police officers and their families in three killings committed in retaliation for his 2008 firing.

Los Angeles Police Department Chief Charlie Beck said the reward, raised in part from private donations, police unions and contributions from businesses, marks the biggest sum ever offered in Southern California in a criminal investigation.

The reward was posted as law enforcement agencies across the region pressed their search for the suspect, ex-LAPD officer and U.S. Navy reservist Christopher Dorner, 33, for a fourth day. Beck described it as the largest manhunt ever mounted in the Los Angeles area.

He called the spate of revenge-driven killings Dorner is suspected of unleashing “an act of domestic terrorism,” adding, “This is a man who has targeted those who we entrust to protect the public. His actions cannot go unanswered.”

An LAPD spokesman also said that police would be providing extra security for the recording industry’s Grammy Awards ceremony being held on Sunday at the Staples Center in downtown Los Angles.

The search for Dorner has been focused in the snow-covered San Bernardino Mountains east of Los Angeles since a pickup truck belonging to Dorner was found abandoned and burning near the popular ski resort community of Big Bear Lake on Thursday.

The truck turned up in the mountains hours after police say Dorner exchanged gunfire with two officers, grazing one, and later ambushed two more policemen in their patrol car at a stoplight, killing one and badly wounding the other.

A rambling, multi-page manifesto posted on Dorner’s Facebook page last week claimed he was wrongly terminated from the LAPD in September 2008 and threatened numerous police officers and their families with violent revenge.

A former Navy lieutenant, Dorner also is suspected in last weekend’s shooting deaths of a campus security officer and his fiance, the daughter of a retired Los Angeles police captain singled out for blame in the manifesto for Dorner’s dismissal.

The retired LAPD captain had represented Dorner in disciplinary proceedings that led to his termination after a police inquiry found that he had made false statements accusing a superior officer of using excessive force against a homeless person.

Beck announced on Saturday a reopening of the inquiry to “reassure the public that their police department is transparent and fair.”

The police officer who was shot to death in an ambush on Thursday was publicly identified on Sunday as Michael Crain, 34, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served on the Riverside Police Department for 11 years.

LAPD spokesman Andrew Smith said “an army” of police officers would be providing security for a public memorial service planned on Wednesday for Crain.

In addition to continuing a manhunt in and around Big Bear Lake on Sunday, police were searching areas around the homes of more than 50 Los Angeles police officers whose families authorities believe Dorner has targeted as potential victims.

(Additional reporting and writing by Steve Gorman. Editing by Christopher Wilson)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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How'd They Make Carrie Underwood's Glowing Gown?

Stylewatch
Style News Now

02/11/2013 at 12:25 AM ET

Kevork Djansezian/Getty; John Shearer/Invision/AP (2)

We can’t say we were surprised to see that Carrie Underwood had ditched her form-fitting Roberto Cavalli number for a princess-y silver gown to perform her song “Blown Away” at the Grammys Sunday night. When glowing paisley details began to unscroll across her full skirt, however? We definitely didn’t see that coming.

“We wanted it to be artful and dramatic,” Underwood told reporters backstage. “I just like to stand still and sing sometimes, so this seemed like the best way I could do that and still create something visually attention-capturing.” On the technology behind it, she was a little more tight-lipped, saying “I guess I probably shouldn’t tell my secret, should I?” — but luckily, we’ve already got the inside info.

To perform the song that won her best solo country performance, the superstar donned a custom Theia gown designed specifically for the vivid light show. The line’s creative director Don O’Neill sourced fabric for the 4 feet 5 inches-wide skirt that had to be approved by both Underwood’s stylist, Trish Townsend, as well as the video team creating the special effects.

With only three days to create the gown, O’Neill’s team worked around the clock, stitching together 10 yards of Duchesse satin, 100 yards of tulle and crinoline and thousands of Swarovski crystals onto the bodice. Meanwhile, the production team created the effects that were projected onto her gown, including sparkling stars, rose petals and butterflies.

And was all that work worth it? Judging by your overwhelmingly positive reactions on Twitter, absolutely. And O’Neill was thrilled with the result too, especially because he took the line’s name from the Greek goddess of light. “There couldn’t be a more perfect opportunity to fuse light in a literal sense with one of my gowns,” he says in a statement, “and have it showcased on a national stage by Carrie Underwood, the first celebrity to wear a Theia dress four years ago when we launched.”

Tell us: What did you think of Underwood’s high-tech couture?

–Alex Apatoff

PHOTOS: SEE MORE GRAMMY RISK-TAKERS!

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What heals traumatized kids? Answers are lacking

CHICAGO (AP) — Shootings and other traumatic events involving children are not rare events, but there's a startling lack of scientific evidence on the best ways to help young survivors and witnesses heal, a government-funded analysis found.

School-based counseling treatments showed the most promise, but there's no hard proof that anxiety drugs or other medication work and far more research is needed to provide solid answers, say the authors who reviewed 25 studies. Their report was sponsored by the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

According to research cited in the report, about two-thirds of U.S. children and teens younger than 18 will experience at least one traumatic event, including shootings and other violence, car crashes and weather disasters. That includes survivors and witnesses of trauma. Most will not suffer any long-term psychological problems, but about 13 percent will develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress, including anxiety, behavior difficulties and other problems related to the event.

The report's conclusions don't mean that no treatment works. It's just that no one knows which treatments are best, or if certain ones work better for some children but not others.

"Our findings serve as a call to action," the researchers wrote in their analysis, published online Monday by the journal Pediatrics.

"This is a very important topic, just in light of recent events," said lead author Valerie Forman-Hoffman, a researcher at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

She has two young children and said the results suggest that it's likely one of them will experience some kind of trauma before reaching adulthood. "As a parent I want to know what works best," the researcher said.

Besides the December massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, other recent tragedies involving young survivors or witnesses include the fatal shooting last month of a 15-year-old Chicago girl gunned down in front of a group of friends; Superstorm Sandy in October; and the 2011 Joplin, Mo., tornado, whose survivors include students whose high school was destroyed.

Some may do fine with no treatment; others will need some sort of counseling to help them cope.

Studying which treatments are most effective is difficult because so many things affect how a child or teen will fare emotionally after a traumatic event, said Dr. Denise Dowd, an emergency physician and research director at Children's Mercy Hospitals and Clinics in Kansas City, Mo., who wrote a Pediatrics editorial.

One of the most important factors is how the child's parents handle the aftermath, Dowd said.

"If the parent is freaking out" and has difficulty controlling emotions, kids will have a tougher time dealing with trauma. Traumatized kids need to feel like they're in a safe and stable environment, and if their parents have trouble coping, "it's going to be very difficult for the kid," she said.

The researchers analyzed 25 studies of treatments that included anti-anxiety and depression drugs, school-based counseling, and various types of psychotherapy. The strongest evidence favored school-based treatments involving cognitive behavior therapy, which helps patients find ways to cope with disturbing thoughts and emotions, sometimes including talking repeatedly about their trauma.

This treatment worked better than nothing, but more research is needed comparing it with alternatives, the report says.

"We really don't have a gold standard treatment right now," said William Copeland, a psychologist and researcher at Duke University Medical Center who was not involved in the report. A lot of doctors and therapists may be "patching together a little bit of this and a little bit of that, and that might not add up to the most effective treatment for any given child," he said.

___

Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

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Stocks end higher for sixth straight week, tech leads

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Nasdaq composite stock index closed at a 12-year high and the S&P 500 index at a five-year high, boosted by gains in technology shares and stronger overseas trade figures.

The S&P 500 also posted a sixth straight week of gains for the first time since August.

The technology sector led the day's gains, with the S&P 500 technology index <.splrct> up 1.0 percent. Gains in professional network platform LinkedIn Corp and AOL Inc after they reported quarterly results helped the sector.

Shares of LinkedIn jumped 21.3 percent to $150.48 after the social networking site announced strong quarterly profits and gave a bullish forecast for the year.

AOL Inc shares rose 7.4 percent to $33.72 after the online company reported higher quarterly profit, boosted by a 13 percent rise in advertising sales.

Data showed Chinese exports grew more than expected, a positive sign for the global economy. The U.S. trade deficit narrowed in December, suggesting the U.S. economy likely grew in the fourth quarter instead of contracting slightly as originally reported by the U.S. government.

"That may have sent a ray of optimism," said Fred Dickson, chief market strategist at D.A. Davidson & Co in Lake Oswego, Oregon.

Trading volume on Friday was below average for the week as a blizzard swept into the northeastern United States.

The U.S. stock market has posted strong gains since the start of the year, with the S&P 500 up 6.4 percent since December 31. The advance has slowed in recent days, with fourth-quarter earnings winding down and few incentives to continue the rally on the horizon.

"I think we're in the middle of a trading range and I'd put plus or minus 5.0 percent around it. Fundamental factors are best described as neutral," Dickson said.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> ended up 48.92 points, or 0.35 percent, at 13,992.97. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 8.54 points, or 0.57 percent, at 1,517.93. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 28.74 points, or 0.91 percent, at 3,193.87, its highest closing level since November 2000.

For the week, the Dow was down 0.1 percent, the S&P 500 was up 0.3 percent and the Nasdaq up 0.5 percent.

Shares of Dell closed at $13.63, up 0.7 percent, after briefly trading above a buyout offering price of $13.65 during the session.

Dell's largest independent shareholder, Southeastern Asset Management, said it plans to oppose the buyout of the personal computer maker, setting up a battle for founder Michael Dell.

Signs of economic strength overseas buoyed sentiment on Wall Street. Chinese exports grew more than expected in January, while imports climbed 28.8 percent, highlighting robust domestic demand. German data showed a 2012 surplus that was the nation's second highest in more than 60 years, an indication of the underlying strength of Europe's biggest economy.

Separately, U.S. economic data showed the trade deficit shrank in December to $38.5 billion, its narrowest in nearly three years, indicating the economy did much better in the fourth quarter than initially estimated.

Earnings have mostly come in stronger than expected since the start of the reporting period. Fourth-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies now are estimated up 5.2 percent versus a year ago, according to Thomson Reuters data. That contrasts with a 1.9 percent growth forecast at the start of the earnings season.

Molina Healthcare Inc surged 10.4 percent to $31.88 as the biggest boost to the index after posting fourth-quarter earnings.

The CBOE Volatility index <.vix>, Wall Street's so-called fear gauge, was down 3.6 percent at 13.02. The gauge, a key measure of market expectations of short-term volatility, generally moves inversely to the S&P 500.

"I'm watching the 14 level closely" on the CBOE Volatility index, said Bryan Sapp, senior trading analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research. "The break below it at the beginning of the year signaled the sharp rally in January, and a rally back above it could be a sign to exercise some caution."

Volume was roughly 5.6 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.

Advancers outpaced decliners on the NYSE by nearly 2 to 1 and on the Nasdaq by almost 5 to 3.

(Additional reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Bernadette Baum, Nick Zieminski, Kenneth Barry and Andrew Hay)

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IHT Rendezvous: Sharper Tongues in China's Year of the Snake?

BEIJING — The Snake is determined and smart, according to traditional Chinese beliefs. Today is New Year’s Day in China, the first day in the Year of the Snake, and a good day to ask: Will Xi Jinping, a “snake” set to become president in March (Mr. Xi was born in a Year of the Snake, in 1953) bring change to China?

Whether or not one believes in feng shui – the thought system based on geomancy, astronomy and folk wisdom of which the 12-yearly animal cycle is part – many here swear by it, and that makes the confluence of the man and the year important.

As the rational economist He Fan said last year, at the beginning of the Year of the Dragon: Feng shui may not be rational, but it is “symbolic,” “and that’s important, because that’s how China’s political culture works.”

So as ordinary people across the nation settle into their hard-earned, weeklong holiday amid the thunder of festival firecrackers, some are wondering whether recent calls by Mr. Xi to attack corruption and “criticize sharply” the ruling Communist Party will bring unwelcome shocks to members of the privileged classes in China, including the party, the government and state-run companies, widely seen as too powerful and too corrupt.

Skepticism about real change is rife, for sure, but signs say maybe, at least to some degree. And if that sounds woolly, it is because making predictions in China is notoriously difficult. Yet it is also important as the nation grows in international stature: As Bloomberg News notes, 2012 may have marked the year when China became the world’s largest trading nation. China was last the world’s biggest economy during the Qing dynasty, Bloomberg noted (though back then it didn’t focus on trade, Bloomberg wrote).

Some say the change has already begun, amid a deepening campaign against corruption announced by Mr. Xi after he was appointed general secretary of the party in November. The state’s anti-corruption warnings are being taken more seriously now than at any time in the past decade because they come from Mr. Xi, who is regarded as potentially a strong leader fast establishing his dominance, already the most eminent member of the seven-man Standing Committee of the Politburo, China’s inner circle of power.

One sign: Traditionally lavish end-of-the-year parties thrown by powerful state-owned companies, and thus paid for from the public purse, have been canceled in large numbers, causing great satisfaction among ordinary people as high-end restaurants in Beijing are suddenly available for traditional New Year family dinners. In previous years, getting a booking was impossible. This year, it’s not.

Another sign: a recent call by Mr. Xi for “sharp criticism” of the Communist Party.

“Chinese leader Xi Jinping has urged the Communist Party of China (CPC) to be more tolerant of criticism and receptive to the views of non-communists,” Xinhua, the state-run news agency, reported last week.

“The CPC should be able to put up with sharp criticism, correct mistakes if it has committed them and avoid them if it has not,” Xinhua quoted Mr. Xi as saying, adding that nonparty members should “have the courage to tell the truth, speak words jarring on the ear, and truthfully reflect public aspirations.”

The call has been – what else? – sharply criticized, in fast and furious microblog postings showing just how deep is the well of resentment against the state’s heavy hand in some quarters.

Shortly after 9 a.m. on New Year’s Day, Ai Weiwei, the artist, snapped on his Twitter account: “First sentence of the New Year, release all political prisoners.”

The South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong newspaper, gathered more acerbic responses:

The venture capitalist Kai-Fu Lee: “Will you stop silencing and shutting down microblog accounts?”

Xu Xiaonian, an economics professor: “Will you stop censoring books and media reports?”

Chen Tongkui, an academic: “Will you stop press censorship?”

Wang Xiaoyu, another academic: “Can you not delete the comments on this microblog post?”

The real estate magnante Ren Zhiqiang: “Will you stop criminalizing people’s speech and sentencing them to re-education through labor?”

Cui Weiping, an academic: “Will you put an end to police harassment” of activists and netizens?

And yet, for many ordinary Chinese, there is hope. Incomes are rising, and there is a whiff of, yes, change in the air. In a recent, colorfully presented survey by TNS, part of Kantar, an information and consulting group, 88 percent of people surveyed in China were positive about the Year of the Snake, the company said.

As Mr. He said of last year, which saw the dramatic downfall of the political scion Bo Xilai, seen by some as a contender for Mr. Xi’s position, amid a murder and corruption scandal: “Something happens in every Dragon Year, even if it’s just a turning point.” Often, the real action begins a year or two later.

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Insight: Apple and Samsung, frenemies for life

SAN FRANCISCO/SEOUL (Reuters) – It was the late Steve Jobs’ worst nightmare.

A powerful Asian manufacturer, Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, uses Google Inc’s Android software to create smartphones and tablets that closely resemble the iPhone and the iPad. Samsung starts gaining market share, hurting Apple Inc’s margins and stock price and threatening its reign as the king of cool in consumer electronics.

Jobs, of course, had an answer to all this: a “thermo-nuclear” legal war that would keep clones off the market. Yet nearly two years after Apple first filed a patent-infringement lawsuit against Samsung, and six months after it won a huge legal victory over its South Korean rival, Apple‘s chances of blocking the sale of Samsung products are growing dimmer by the day.

Indeed, a series of recent court rulings suggests that the smartphone patent wars are now grinding toward a stalemate, with Apple unable to show that its sales have been seriously damaged when rivals, notably Samsung, imitated its products.

That, in turn, may usher in a new phase in the complex relationship between the two dominant companies in the growing mobile computing business.

Tim Cook, Jobs’ successor as Apple chief executive, was opposed to suing Samsung in the first place, according to people with knowledge of the matter, largely because of that company’s critical role as a supplier of components for the iPhone and the iPad. Apple bought some $ 8 billion worth of parts from Samsung last year, analysts estimate.

Samsung, meanwhile, has benefited immensely from the market insight it gained from the Apple relationship, and from producing smartphones and tablets that closely resemble Apple‘s.

While the two companies compete fiercely in the high-end smartphone business – where together they control half the sales and virtually all of the profits – their strengths and weaknesses are in many ways complementary. Apple‘s operations chief, Jeff Williams, told Reuters last month that Samsung was an important partner and they had a strong relationship on the supply side, but declined to elaborate.

As their legal war winds down, it is increasingly clear that Apple and Samsung have plenty of common interests as they work to beat back other potential challengers, such as BlackBerry or Microsoft.

The contrast with other historic tech industry rivalries is stark. When Apple accused Microsoft in the 1980s of ripping off the Macintosh to create the Windows operating system, Apple‘s very existence was at stake. Apple lost, the Mac became a niche product, and the company came close to extinction before Jobs returned to Apple in late 1996 and saved it with the iPod and the iPhone. Jobs died in October 2011.

Similarly, the Internet browser wars of the late 1990s that pitted Microsoft against Netscape ended with Netscape being sold for scrap and its flagship product abandoned.

Apple and Samsung, on the other hand, are not engaged in a corporate death match so much as a multi-layered rivalry that is by turns both friendly and hard-edged. For competitors like Nokia, BlackBerry, Sony, HTC and even Google – whose Motorola unit is expected to launch new smartphones later this year – they are a formidable duo.

THE WAY THEY WERE

The partnership piece of the Apple-Samsung relationship dates to 2005, when the Cupertino, California-based giant was looking for a stable supplier of flash memory. Apple had decided to jettison the hard disc drive in creating the iPod shuffle, iPod nano and then-upcoming iPhone, and it needed huge volumes of flash memory chips to provide storage for the devices.

The memory market in 2005 was extremely unstable, and Apple wanted to lock in a supplier that was rock-solid financially, people familiar with the relationship said. Samsung held about 50 percent of the NAND flash memory market at that time.

“Whoever controls flash is going to control this space in consumer electronics,” Jobs said at the time, according to a source familiar with the discussions.

The success of that deal led to Samsung supplying the crucial application processors for the iPhone and iPad. Initially, the two companies jointly developed the processors based on a design from ARM Holdings Plc, but Apple gradually took full control over development of the chip. Now Samsung merely builds the components at a Texas factory.

The companies built a close relationship that extended to the very top: in 2005, Jay Y. Lee, whose grandfather founded the Samsung Group, visited Jobs’ home in Palo Alto, California, after the two signed the flash memory deal.

The partnership gave Apple and Samsung insight into each other’s strategies and operations. In particular, Samsung‘s position as the sole supplier of iPhone processors gave it valuable data on just how big Apple thought the smartphone market was going to be.

“Having a relationship with Apple as a supplier, I am sure, helped the whole group see where the puck was going,” said Horace Dediu, a former analyst at Nokia who now works as a consultant and runs an influential blog. “It’s a very important advantage in this business if you know where to commit capital.”

Samsung declined to comment on its relationship with a specific customer.

As for Apple, it reaped the benefit of Samsung‘s heavy investments in research and development, tooling equipment and production facilities. Samsung spent $ 21 billion (23 trillion won) on capital expenditures in 2012 alone, and plans to spend a similar amount this year.

By comparison, Intel Corp spent around $ 11 billion in 2012, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) expects to spend $ 9 billion in 2013.

But component expertise, cash and good market intelligence did not assure success when Samsung launched its own foray into the smartphone market. The Omnia, a Windows-based product introduced in 2009, was so reviled that some customers hammered it to bits in public displays of dissatisfaction.

Meanwhile, Samsung publicly dismissed the iPhone’s success.

“The popularity of iPhone is a mere result of excitement caused by some (Apple) fanatics,” Samsung’s then-president, G.S. Choi, told reporters in January 2010.

Privately, though, Samsung had other plans.

“The iPhone’s emergence means the time we have to change our methods has arrived,” Samsung mobile business head J.K. Shin told his staff in early 2010, according to an internal email filed in U.S. court.

Later that year, Samsung launched the Galaxy S, which sported the Android operating system and a look and feel very similar to the iPhone.

STANDOFF

Jobs and Cook complained to top Samsung executives when they were visiting Cupertino. Apple expected, incorrectly, that Samsung would modify its design in response to the concerns, people familiar with the situation said.

Apple‘s worst fears were confirmed with the early 2011 release of the Galaxy Tab, which Jobs and others regarded as a clear rip-off of the iPad.

Cook, worried about the critical supplier relationship, was opposed to suing Samsung. But Jobs had run out of patience, suspecting that Samsung was counting on the supplier relationship to shield it from retribution.

Apple filed suit in April 2011, and the conflagration soon spread to courts in Europe, Asia and Australia. When Apple won its blockbuster billion-dollar jury verdict against Samsung last August, it appeared that it might be able to achieve an outright ban on the offending products – which would have dramatically altered the smartphone competition.

But Apple has failed to convince U.S. judges to uphold those crucial sales bans – in large part because the extraordinary profitability and market power of the iPhone made it all but impossible for Apple to show it was suffering irreparable harm.

“Samsung may have cut into Apple‘s customer base somewhat, but there is no suggestion that Samsung will wipe out Apple‘s customer base, or force Apple out of the business of making smartphones,” U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh wrote. “The present case involves lost sales – not a lost ability to be a viable market participant.”

Samsung, meanwhile, came under pressure from antitrust regulators and pulled back on its effort to shut down Apple sales in Europe over a related patent dispute.

A U.S. appeals court recently rejected Apple‘s bid to fast-track its case, meaning its hopes for a sales ban are now stuck in months-long appeals, during which time Samsung may very well release the next version of its hot-selling Galaxy phone.

THE WORLD IS OURS

The legal battles have been less poisonous to the relationship than some of the rhetoric suggests.

“People play this stuff up because it shows a kind of drama, but the business reality is that the temperature isn’t that high,” said one attorney who has observed executives from both companies.

Still, the hostilities appear to have put some dents in the partnership. Apple is likely to switch to TSMC for the building of application processors, according to analysts at Goldman Sachs, Sanford Bernstein and other firms. But analysts at Korea Investment & Securities and HMC Securities point out that Apple will not be able to eliminate Samsung as a flash supplier because it remains the dominant producer of the crucial chips.

Apple declined to comment on the details of its relationships with any one supplier.

Meanwhile, both companies are deploying strategies out of the other’s playbook as they seek to maintain and extend their lead over the pack.

Samsung has developed a cheeky, memorable TV ad that mocks Apple customers, and dramatically ramped up spending on marketing and advertising, a cornerstone of Apple‘s success. U.S. ad spending on the Galaxy alone leaped to nearly $ 202 million in the first nine months of 2012, from $ 66.6 million in 2011, according to Kantar Media.

For its part, Apple is investing in manufacturing by helping its suppliers procure the machinery needed to build large-scale plants devoted exclusively to the company.

Apple spent about $ 10 billion in fiscal 2012 on capital expenditures, and it expects to spend a further $ 10 billion this year. By contrast, the company spent only $ 4.6 billion in fiscal 2011 and $ 2.6 billion in fiscal 2010.

But Apple and Samsung retain very different strategies. Apple has just one smartphone and only four product lines in total, and tries to keep variations to a bare minimum while focusing on the high end of the market.

Samsung, by contrast, has 37 phone products that are tweaked for regional tastes and run the gamut from very cheap to very expensive, according to Mirae Asset Securities. The company also makes chips, TVs, appliances and a host of other products (and its brethren in the Samsung Group sell everything from ships to insurance policies).

Apple devices are hugely popular in the United States; Samsung enjoys supremacy in developing countries like India and China. Apple keeps its core staff lean – it has only 60,000 employees worldwide – and relies on partners for manufacturing and other functions. Samsung Electronics, part of a sprawling “chaebol,” or conglomerate, that includes some 80 companies employing 369,000 people worldwide, is far more vertically integrated.

It is those differences, combined with the formidable strengths that both companies bring to the market, that may render quiet cooperation a better strategy than all-out war for some time to come.

Said Brad Silverberg, a former Microsoft executive who was involved in the Mac vs. Windows wars, “Apple had learnt a lot of lessons from those days.”

(Reporting by Dan Levine and Poornima Gupta in San Francisco, and Miyoung Kim in Seoul; Editing by Jonathan Weber, Tiffany Wu and Peter Cooney)

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Tiger Woods & Lindsey Vonn Are 'Spending More Time' Together: Source

Buzz

By Steve Helling

02/09/2013 at 06:00 PM EST

Tiger Woods and Lindsey Vonn

Mick Tsikas/Reuters/Landov; Luis Guerra/Ramey

It was quite the gesture.

After Lindsey Vonn suffered a devastating injury during the Alpine World Championships in Austria, she got a bit of help from Tiger Woods. Walking on crutches, Vonn – who tore two ligaments in her right knee and fractured her shin when she crashed on Tuesday ­– boarded Woods's private jet to return home.

Is it a sign that the rumored relationship between Woods and Vonn is heating up?

"Tiger and Lindsey have been friends for a while, and nothing started out romantically at all," a source tells PEOPLE. "But they really have a lot in common and got closer and closer. He still refers to her as 'my very good friend,' but he's been spending more and more time talking to her – and talking about her."

Last month, Vonn's reps kept mum about the rumored relationship, telling PEOPLE that her "focus is solely on competing and on defending her titles and thus she will not participate in any speculation surrounding her personal life at this time."

But the source close to Woods tells PEOPLE that Woods, 37, and Vonn. 28, talk and text frequently.

"Tiger really does want a woman who he can have good conversations with," he says. "He wants shared interests and outlooks. He is finding that with [Lindsey]."

Woods made international headlines in 2009 when he was linked to dozens of women while still married to his ex-wife, Elin Nordegren.

Since then, he has dated sporadically, but struggled to find someone who wanted a relationship for the right reasons.

"She's not freaked out by his past, and that's really appealing to him," says the source. "He really does deserve to be happy. He has been flogging himself for three years, and it's good to see him moving forward."

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After early start, worst of flu season may be over

NEW YORK (AP) — The worst of the flu season appears to be over.

The number of states reporting intense or widespread illnesses dropped again last week, and in a few states there was very little flu going around, U.S. health officials said Friday.

The season started earlier than normal, first in the Southeast and then spreading. But now, by some measures, flu activity has been ebbing for at least four weeks in much of the country. Flu and pneumonia deaths also dropped the last two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

"It's likely that the worst of the current flu season is over," CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.

But flu is hard to predict, he and others stressed, and there have been spikes late in the season in the past.

For now, states like Georgia and New York — where doctor's offices were jammed a few weeks ago — are reporting low flu activity. The hot spots are now the West Coast and the Southwest.

Among the places that have seen a drop: Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest in Allentown, Pa., which put up a tent outside its emergency room last month to help deal with the steady stream of patients. There were about 100 patients each day back then. Now it's down to 25 and the hospital may pack up its tent next week, said Terry Burger, director of infection control and prevention for the hospital.

"There's no question that we're seeing a decline," she said.

In early December, CDC officials announced flu season had arrived, a month earlier than usual. They were worried, saying it had been nine years since a winter flu season started like this one. That was 2003-04 — one of the deadliest seasons in the past 35 years, with more than 48,000 deaths.

Like this year, the major flu strain was one that tends to make people sicker, especially the elderly, who are most vulnerable to flu and its complications

But back then, that year's flu vaccine wasn't made to protect against that bug, and fewer people got flu shots. The vaccine is reformulated almost every year, and the CDC has said this year's vaccine is a good match to the types that are circulating. A preliminary CDC study showed it is about 60 percent effective, which is close to the average.

So far, the season has been labeled moderately severe.

Like others, Lehigh Valley's Burger was cautious about making predictions. "I'm not certain we're completely out of the woods," with more wintry weather ahead and people likely to be packed indoors where flu can spread around, she said.

The government does not keep a running tally of flu-related deaths in adults, but has received reports of 59 deaths in children. The most — nine — were in Texas, where flu activity was still high last week. Roughly 100 children die in an average flu season, the CDC says

On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.

According to the CDC report, the number of states with intense activity is down to 19, from 24 the previous week, and flu is widespread in 38 states, down from 42.

Flu is now minimal in Florida, Kentucky, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

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Online:

CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

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