THIS WEEK'S IDIOMS

To turn out (to be) means : to prove to be
To be up to (the job) means: to be capable of doing it
To be heading (for) means : to go in the direction of/be destined to

Examples :
"We were unsure whether Mike would be up to the job, but in fact he has turned out to be an efficient and motivated worker."

"This market was thought to be heading for a slump but it has turned out to be quite resilient."

STOCK MARKET ANALYSIS : WEEK 20

Listen to this analysis of last week's US stock market performance. Key vocabulary, expressions and jargon are highlighted below.



"(it) capped-off a great week"
"that forty-week moving average"
prior level
to be cautiously optimistic
to the upside
to break past
to hold back
two days in a row
a daily time-frame
"this inverted head and shoulders position"
to outline
a little bit of weakness
a recovery
the height of
an upward objective
"to stay focused on where the action is"
"a lot of people are geting tripped up in this market"
to soar past
it doesn't make sense
back and forth
to regain control
"sneaking higher" (to sneak)
to hold above
"we would likely expect to see"
to generally be aware of
"basically, a waste of time"
"that's enough said about that for now"
to grind higher
reason for concern
signs of trouble
to breathe easy
it turns out to be
to fail
to be taken by surprise
"to give a bit of room (to)"
a pull-back
innocent until proven guilty
the benefit of the doubt
to reverse
"too much of a good thing"
the healthiest

VIDEO : BUSINESS THIS WEEK

Watch the video without looking at the transcript below. Watch it again while reading the transcript in order to be sure that you have understood everything. Check, in particular, the meanings of the vocabulary and expressions highlighted in bold.


Transcript
Microsoft ended its tentative $47.5 billion bid for Yahoo! after negotiations between the companies broke down over the price. Microsoft wanted to pay around $33 per Yahoo! share, lower than the $37 the internet company insists each share is worth. Jerry Yang, the chief executive of Yahoo!, came under pressure from disgruntled investors who had been hoping for a sale.

Sprint Nextel, America's third-biggest mobile-phone operator, unveiled an alliance with Clearwire, an internet-service provider, to create a network based on WiMax, a technology that delivers fast wireless-internet access. Other companies, including Google, Intel and Time Warner, are investing in the venture. The deal may allow Sprint Nextel to steal a march on AT&T and Verizon Wireless. Its larger rivals are backing a different wireless technology that will not be ready for two years.

Countrywide Financial's share price took another dive, after an analyst advised that if Bank of America went ahead with its proposed $4.1 billion takeover of the stricken mortgage lender it would be saddled with massive writedowns. Although the analyst recommended it “completely walk away” from the deal, BoA gave assurances that it would proceed.

UBS announced it would cut 5,500 jobs by the middle of next year (2,600 of them in its investment-banking business) as part of an effort to repair its tattered balance sheet. The Swiss bank, which has written down $38 billion during the credit crisis, one of the largest sums of any financial group, also said it had sold billions of dollars of subprime debt at a discount to BlackRock, an asset manager.

Disney's quarterly net income rose by 22% compared with a year ago. Despite the economic slowdown, the company recorded brisk trade at its theme parks and resorts, where revenue increased by 11%. The weak dollar was said to help, by making it more expensive for Americans to travel abroad and cheaper for foreigners to visit the parks.

The price of oil pushed past $123 a barrel. Arjun Murti, an analyst at Goldman Sachs who three years ago forecast that oil would breach $100, estimated that prices could rise to between $150-200 a barrel within two years.

India's finance minister said that biofuels and speculators were responsible for soaring food prices and criticised the practice of converting land use from food to palm oil production. India has placed a ban on trading futures in some crops and is considering extending it to other commodities. Earlier, George Bush upset some Indian politicians by suggesting that the country's increasing prosperity was a factor behind rising prices.

HSBC : FINANCIAL TIMES ARTICLE

WHAT DO THE WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS IN BOLD MEAN ?

HSBC on Monday predicted the US housing market downturn could last for at least another year as the banking group revealed it had set aside $5.8bn (£3bn) as a result of the credit turmoil in the first quarter.

The bank, one of the first to suffer from the meltdown in the US subprime mortgage market, said any recovery in the US housing market was unlikely this year.

”We don’t think this is a 2008 event, it’s a 2009 event,” said Michael Geoghegan, chief executive.

HSBC’s position as a large lender to US customers with poor and patchy credit histories means its results are closely watched by other banks looking for any signs of an improvement in the markets. Many bankers believe securities backed by US mortgages will only stabilise once US house prices stop falling.

The bank said its US business had set aside $3.2bn in bad debt provisions in the first quarter. This is double the amount it provided in the first three months of last year, but lower than the $4.6bn set aside in the fourth quarter of 2007.

About half the provision was for the bank’s mortgage book, while the remainder reflected increased defaults in its portfolio of credit cards and car loans.

The turmoil in the capital markets in the first quarter also affected HSBC’s investment banking division, which wrote off another $2.6bn against the value of debt securities held on its balance sheet. Nevertheless, first-quarter profits in the business were higher than they have been in the previous two quarters.

Despite the increased provisions, HSBC said total profits in the first quarter were higher than in the same period of 2007, helped by booming markets in Asia, the Middle East and Latin America.

Mr Geoghegan said the bank’s strong balance sheet had allowed it to win business from weaker rivals, and said it had no intention of following rivals such as Citigroup and UBS by selling assets.

“We’re well positioned to take business from others. We have no need to slim down,” he said.

In mid-morning trading in London, HSBC shares were up 15½p at 881½p.

Aside from the write-downs, HSBC’s investment banking arm reported strong growth in foreign exchange, interest rate trading and cash management as rivals reduced their risks and shifted business to stronger counterparties. However, it warned that this performance would not be sustained if the market turmoil continued.

HSBC also said it had benefited from a $2.7bn one-off gain in the quarter, reflecting the reduced value of the bank’s own debt, though much of this gain had been reversed as markets recovered in April.

Nevertheless, Douglas Flint, finance director, said the recent revival in the markets had not extended to more complex mortgage-backed securities.

“Though there was a contraction in credit spreads in the corporate and financial institutions space, there was not the same recovery in relation to asset-backed securities where there continues to be significant illiquidity,” he said.