Greece too slow to address mounting debt, says president of EU commission

Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission has criticised the sluggish pace of progress in talks over Greece’s mounting debt.

In meeting with Greece’s Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, Mr. Juncker said he was not satisfied. The Greek PM is in dire need of EU support for reforms in order to unlock vital funds for his country and avoid the possibility of bankruptcy and being ejected from the Eurozone.

Mr. Tsipras has pledged to end austerity measures in Greece, such plans have been opposed by Greece’s EU creditors. Greece managed to negotiate a four month extension on its bailout terms last month after heated talks with creditors.

Hoping to persuade EU leaders of its promise and worthiness of credit, Greece has announced a series of reforms, but it would still like the EU to agree new, more lenient terms for the repayment of its debts.

In the eventuality that no agreement is reached, Greece risks being unable to meet its agreed payments. In the next two weeks alone it will need to find €6bn to pay its creditors.

Mr Juncket also said that he was “not satisfied with the developments in recent weeks”.

“I don’t think that we have made sufficient progress, but we’ll try to push in the direction of a successful conclusion of the issues we have to deal with.”

“I am totally excluding a failure, I don’t want a failure. I would like Europeans to go together. This is not the time for division,” he said.

Speaking alongside Mr Juncker, Mr Tsipras said he remained optimistic. “If there is political will, everything is possible,” he said.

Cloud is slowly gaining popularity within the financial sector, but many companies have been slow to adopt it…

Cloud is slowly gaining popularity within the financial sector, but many companies have been slow to adopt it and put in place a proper strategy for cloud. Unsurprisingly, the main concerns are over the security of cloud systems.

Speculation of $60 anchor for oil

Another jump in US crude stockpiles pushed the price of oil down to $61 a barrel on Thursday, going against indications that there was to be an imminent rise in global demand.

The United States government’s latest supply report shows that domestic inventories of oil rose last week to 434.1 million barrels, setting a record high for the seventh consecutive week.

Brent crude LCOc1 fell 40 cents to $61.24. US crude CLc1 fell 96 cents to $50.03. “At present, it would appear that Brent is bottoming out at $60 per barrel,” said Carsten Fritsch, analyst at Commerzbank. “The renewed sharp rise in U.S. crude oil stocks … points to a market that is still oversupplied.”

Burgeoning crude supplies in the US is further increasing the discount at which US crude is traded to Brent. The spread reached $11.81 on Thursday, the widest gap in over a year.

Brent collapsed in 2014, falling from the $115 high reached in June due to global oversupply. The decline worsened after OPEC (Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) chose to defend their market share against rival sources, rather than slash its own output.

The price has come back 35 percent from a six year low of $45.19 reached in January, supported by signs that lower prices are starting to negatively impact the investment in US and other supplies outside of OPEC.

Just two months into 2015 and oil prices have bounced back from the January low of just $45 a barrel, much faster than the Saudis had hoped after convincing OPEC members in November not to cut output to defend market share against shale.

Veteran Saudi Oil Minister ALi al-Naimi said that he was happy with the current state of the market, and that he saw oil demand growing in the future.

“The Saudis are saying – look, everything is happening the way it needs to happen. Others are cutting capex, production growth is slowing and low prices are stimulating demand,” said OPEC watcher Yasser Elguindi from economic consultants Medley Global Advisors.

“Of course, the main unknown is how resilient U.S. oil production will be. It may take more than just two quarters for markets to adjust to new patterns. It may take a year or two to sort out what is fair value for crude,” said Elguindi.

“Price may need to be at $60 to allow for a rational supply-demand trajectory. It doesn’t mean of course that we can’t temporarily go to $40 or $80 under certain circumstances,” he added.

Shale oil output in the US is not expected to start slowing in growth until the second half of 2015. This will put oil prices under even more pressure as global stockpiles continue to mount.

If the price of oil does stay around the $60 mark for an extended period this could be troublesome for Saudi Arabia, let alone the poorer oil-producing nations.

“It is interesting that Naimi says he doesn’t like to talk about oil because he wants calmness,” said Olivier Jakob from Petromatrix consultancy.

“After the OPEC meeting…we had the oil ministers of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE going to the newswires to talk the market down. They did like to talk oil then and (Naimi’s current remarks) is probably another indication that they have reached their objective,” said Jakob.

British Gas reports slump in profits

Owner of British Gas, Centrica has reported a 35 percent slump in profits, prompting speculation that energy prices will remain low, with the possibility of further cuts coming this year.

The company reported that profits had fallen to £1.7 billion in 2014 due to the drop in gas and oil prices worldwide. Customers used a fifth less energy last year, the warmest on record, causing further problems for British Gas.

Iian Conn, chief executive of parent company, Centrica, said: “lower wholesale prices will persist for all of 2015 and potentially 2016 and into 2017”.

“If prices do stay low then, as we are buying ahead, the average price we have been buying ahead will also fall and if it stays low there is the possibility of further reductions we could pass through to our customers.”

He also said it was “absolutely feasible” that we would see further cuts in the price for oil and gas this year. Mr Conn announced Centrica would be cutting its dividend payments as well as writing down £1.4 billion post tax in the value of its power plants and assets in the North Sea. Centrica will also drastically reduce investment in the North Sea, by 40 percent.

Shares in the company fell eight percent, worse than analysts expected. Mr Conn said: “2014 was a very difficult year for Centrica and the recent fall in oil and gas prices creates further challenge. We are cutting investment and costs in response.” British Gas, which is still the UK’s largest energy supplier continues to lose customers to rivals offering very competitive deals. The problem has been exacerbated by reports from the Competition and Markets Authority, finding millions of hosueholds could save up to £234 a year by switching supplier.

“The market remains highly competitive, with recent reductions in standard tariffs and most suppliers also offering a range of fixed price products,” said Centrica.

The FTSE fell from a 15 year high as a result of the sharp decline in the share price of Centrica. “Centrica is another energy company that is suffering from a low oil price. Also, the fact that they’ve cut their dividend by such an amount will mean that some investors will now look elsewhere for better yields,” said Dafydd Davies, partner at Charles Hanover Investments.

The wholesale price of gas is currently down 20 percent on last year. The big six energy firms, (SSE, Scottish Power, RWE Npower, Centrica, EDF and E.on) which together account for 95% of the UK energy market, insist that the gas price only accounts for 45% of the final bill for consumers, the rest accounting for administration, network maintentance, supploy costs and profit.

Government plans to improve UK infrastructure by opening up vast public network

The British government is opening up over 13,000 miles of publicly-owned digital networks in a bid to help improve access to high-speed broadband in areas of the country that are not well served by existing providers.

The government, realising the necessity of high speed internet in the modern age has pledged to spend at least £1.5 billion of taxpayers’ money on public sector networks and infrastructure each year.

Until recently the government didn’t even possess comprehensive information on the expanse of this infrastructure. It is only in recent times that the extent of it has been fully documented. Much of its capacity has simply gone to waste while public sectors built their own networks – at great expense.

Under the new scheme, the government will publish a map of public sector communications and digital infrastructure, revealing the true extent of the networks currently owned and leased by the government.

These networks include fibre that span the railway networks and motorways in the UK, as well as the high security defence network, the N3 network used by health and social care services and JANET, used by research and education institutions.

The government has said that it has the capacity to expand and improve access to high speed broadband, particularly in many rural areas that are currently undeserved.

“In some cases we may not need to build further infrastructure, or we may find we are able to use spare capacity to supplement and enhance existing provision and connectivity,” the Cabinet Office said. “We’re going to collaborate to get this done. The review has focused on central government, but there will be other networks that the government owns out there and we would like to use this opportunity to invite other public sector bodies to identify their infrastructure and contribute to extending coverage.”

“We want to take full advantage of this existing capacity, avoiding wasteful duplication when buying additional resource,” Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude and culture minister Ed Vaizey said in a joint foreword to the report.