Facebook's Zuckerberg now richer than Google founders

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has become richer than Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page , thanks to GSV Capital Corp's stake buy which values the popular social networking site at about USD 70 billion.

GSV Capital Corp, earlier this week, bought 225,000 shares in Facebook at an average price of USD 29.28 each.

This stake buy values the popular social networking site at about USD 70 billion.

Based on the new investment, Zuckerberg in turn is worth approximately USD 18 billion, a report in Time magazine said.

"With the new valuation, Zuckerberg has one-upped Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, whose fortunes are estimated to have dropped," the Time report said.

This estimate makes Zuckerberg the third-richest man in the technology sector in the world, only behind Microsoft's Bill Gates and Oracle's Larry Ellison .

While Gates is estimated to be currently worth USD 56 billion, Ellison is the world's fifth-richest billionaire at USD 39.5 billion.

Earlier this year, Zuckerberg's net worth stood at USD 13.5 billion.

He had already shot past Apple's Steve Jobs last year and has now passed Google's Brin and Page, whose fortunes are now estimated to have dropped to USD 17 billion from USD 19.8 billion in March.

Eight lane bridge cost $2.3 billion

The world's longest cross-sea bridge -- the 36.48-km eight-lane Qingdao Jiaozhou Bay Bridge in China -- opened for traffic on Thursday.

The opening ceremony of the cross-sea bridge, spanning Jiaozhou bay of Qingdao city in Shandong province, was held on Thursday morning, according to reports.

The bridge, connecting the urban district of the city to its Huangdao district, cost 14.8 billion yuan ($2.3 billion). Construction of the bridge began in May 2007.

The bridge will shorten the distance between the two places by 30 km, cutting travel time down from over 40 minutes to around 20 minutes, said Han Shouxin, deputy director of the city's traffic management committee.

Previously, the longest cross-sea bridge in the world was the 36-km Hangzhou Bay Cross-sea Bridge that connects the cities of Jiaxing and Ningbo in east China's Zhejiang province.

Invest like Warren Buffett

Letting a colleague front-run his stock purchases wasn't Warren Buffett's best idea -- but few can touch his results.

Faster

Buy Sequoia (SEQUX) (three-year annualized return: 5.1%). Founded by Buffett's late friend Bill Ruane, this fund chooses its 25 to 35 stocks (including Buffett's own Berkshire Hathaway) according to The Man's principles -- like low prices and trustworthy management -- and has "a great track record," says Morningstar analyst Michael Breen.

Time it takes: Minutes.

How much it costs: The expense ratio is 1.0%.

Cheaper

Check out value ETFs. You could buy Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) -- but Buffett, 80, won't be at the helm forever. For a long-term play, investigate ETFs that buy bargain-priced stocks, as he does. One example: Vanguard Value ETF (VTV), which tracks the MSCI U.S. Prime Market Value Index of 750 companies.

How much it costs: Vanguard Value's expense ratio is 0.12%.

Better

Find Buffett-like stocks yourself. It's hard -- but doable. Go to the premium screening tool on Morningstar.com's stock page and click on the preset screen for "Warren Buffett stocks." You'll get a list of more than 300 companies with strong competitive advantages, consistent free cash flow, and high returns on equity. Narrow down the list by using more of Buffett's criteria (learn about them by reading his letters at berkshirehathaway.com). Dig into analyst reports to finalize your picks. Three candidates turned up by Paul Larson, Morningstar's equity strategist: Exelon (EXC, Fortune 500), Wells Fargo (WFC, Fortune 500), and Western Union (WU, Fortune 500). All trade at discounts of 30% or more to what Morningstar thinks they're worth.

Time it takes: How does infinity sound?

How much it costs: $185 a year for a premium Morningstar membership.

Greece: Back from the brink

Greece has pulled itself back from the brink, by agreeing to a painful austerity package aimed at reducing the country's giant budget deficits.

On Thursday, the Parliament voted to implement those unpopular reforms. The vote set the stage for the nation to secure the final $17 billion of a $156 billion international relief package.

The latest cash infusion means Greece will be able to stave off an immediate default and pay its bills for the next three months.

But Greece is not out of the woods. The country still needs to put the unpopular reforms into practice, negotiate with creditors and privatize big public institutions.

Passage of the austerity plan "will certainly give some short-term relief to markets," said IHS Global senior economist Diego Iscaro. "But concerns about the long-term feasibility of Greece's fiscal plans still remain in place."

Greece is now expected to begin negotiations with the European Union and International Monetary Fund for another bailout, said Wolfango Piccoli, a director at the Eurasia Group in London.

The next round of emergency aid is expected to range between $172 billion and $216 billion, which would cover Greece's expenses through 2014, he said.

As with the previous deal, the new package will come with conditions. The terms are expected to include some concessions by Greece's creditors and the transfer of state assets to the private sector.

But providing more short-term support for Greece "is just kicking the can down the road," Piccoli said.

Officials in Europe are hoping to keep Greece solvent long enough to allow other troubled European nations to strengthen and put pressure on Greece to enact the painful reforms passed Wednesday.

At the same time, the European Union is working with Greece's main creditors -- French and German banks -- to roll over some of the nation's debt into longer-term bonds.

"It's unclear how that will be done, though there seems to be some willingness there," on the part of the banks, said Piccoli. "But that's just another measure to gain time, it doesn't diminish the amount of debt that Greece will be left with."

The bottom line is that Greece's ability to repay its debts remains in question.

"For all economic intents and purposes, Greece has already defaulted," said Sandeep Dahiya, professor of finance at Georgetown's McDonough School of Business. "There's no way Greece can repay all the money it owes."

The big worry is that other debt-laden nations in Europe -- particularly Ireland, Portugal, Italy and Spain -- would be dragged down if Greece were to default in a disorderly way.

But the threat to the U.S. economy, for now, remains remote.

That's mainly because U.S. banks have relatively little Greek debt on their books and the financial markets have largely priced in Greece's fiscal problems, which have been playing out for over a year.

Nevertheless, the situation remains highly uncertain.

Greece austerity: Cure or poison?

"We're still not sure how much exposure there is," said Gus Faucher, an economist at Moody's Analytics. "There is certainly the potential for a big problem in the U.S. if Greece were to default unilaterally."

While he believes that's unlikely, Faucher said an outright default by Greece could cause a financial shock similar to the one that occurred after Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008.

The investment bank's implosion roiled global financial markets and caused a severe credit crisis.

Analysts say U.S. money market funds, which hold an estimated 40% of their assets in various forms of European debt, would be the most vulnerable in such a scenario.

The pain of Greece's crisis

Ben Bernanke, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, said last week that the central bank is looking into how exposed U.S. money market funds are to Greece. He acknowledged that the indirect exposure could be "very substantial," but sounded hopeful that the worst won't come to pass.

In addition, some U.S. investment banks and insurance companies could be on the hook if they own credit default swaps linked to European debt.

These complex derivatives, which crippled US insurance giant AIG after Lehman fell, could also yield big profits for investors betting against Europe.

However, the market for credit default swaps is opaque and analysts say it's impossible to pinpoint how exposed U.S. institutions may be to them.

European stocks surge on Greek austerity vote

European stock markets extended strong gains on Thursday following Greece's approval of austerity measures needed to unlock critical bailout funding and stave off a debt default.

London's benchmark FTSE 100 index of top shares jumped 1.53 per cent to 5,945.71 points, while in Frankfurt the DAX gained 1.13 per cent to 7,376.24 points and in Paris the CAC 40 climbed 1.48 per cent to 3,982.21 points.

"The recent rise in European markets has continued today as markets end the month, quarter and first half of 2011 on a positive note, with oil and banking sectors leading the gainers as fears about an imminent Greek default get pushed out beyond the release of the next tranche of bailout funds," said CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson .

The Greek parliament approved Thursday measures to implement 28.4 billion euros ($41 billion) in unpopular budget cuts and tax hikes despite street protests that turned violent this week.

The EU quickly said in response that Greece had now met conditions for the release of the next installment of 12 billion euros of bailout funds under under its 110-billion-euro EU-IMF bailout package agreed last year.

Athens faced the prospect of default in July if the bailout funds had been held back.

The Greek vote will also allow talks to proceed on a second bailout package expected to total a similar amount to ensure Athens has sufficient funding for the next three years.

News that German banks will take part in a second Greek debt rescue package also helped improve market sentiment, as did moves by Portugal and Italy to further tighten their budgetary belts.

Brussels ended the day up 0.97 per cent, Amsterdam rose 1.3 per cent, Milan climbed 1.62 per cent, Madrid jumped 2.13 per cent and Lisbon soared 3.03 per cent.

London was also supported by news that Lloyds bank will axe 15,000 more jobs and that the London Stock Exchange is once more a likely takeover target.

Lloyds, which is 41-per cent state-owned after a massive bailout, said it will axe 15,000 jobs in a drastic cost-cutting plan that will halve its international base and save £1.5 billion (1.66 billion euros, $2.4 billion) per year by 2014.

In response, LBG rocketed to the top of the FTSE 100 index, gaining 9.73 per cent to 49 pence as investors welcomed news of the measures.

Off the FTSE 100, the London Stock Exchange saw its share price jump 10.98 per cent to 1,061 pence, one day after The LSE and Toronto's bourse scrapped plans to merge after failing to win support from two-thirds of their shareholders.

"Shares in the London Stock Exchange rallied .. as investors speculated that the firm may become bid prey to Nasdaq OMX, having seen its multi-billion bid for Canada's TMX fall by the wayside," said analyst Giles Watts at City Index.

Nasdaq failed to take over LSE in in 2006 and 2007.

"Investors are now speculating that the firm's failure to secure a deal with the Canadian Exchange operator at a time of huge competition and subsequent consolidation within the sector makes it vulnerable," Watts added.

Wall Street also rallied on the Greek vote, with the Dow Jones Industrial average gaining 1.18 per cent to stand at 12,406.05 points at 1600 GMT.

The broader S&P 500 rose 0.94 per cent to 1,319.74 points, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.19 per cent to 2,773.21 points.

Asian stock markets closed higher on Thursday after Greek lawmakers gave preliminary approval on Wednesday to the key package of spending cuts and tax hikes aimed at helping Athens avoid a catastrophic default.

Hong Kong gained 1.53 per cent, Tokyo added 0.19 per cent, Shanghai was up 1.23 per cent and Sydney rose 1.73 per cent.

Uncle Sam calls out steepest college tuition hikes

Roughly 530 colleges across the country will soon have to submit special reports to Uncle Sam, explaining why their tuition and student fees have recently surged.

For the first time ever the Department of Education released a list Thursday morning, ranking colleges with the steepest tuition hikes.

The report lists the top 5% of schools with the sharpest tuition increases over a three-year period for several categories. By law, the worst offenders will now be required to submit special reports to the government, explaining why costs have gone up so dramatically, and how they plan to address rising prices.

The nation's largest public university, Arizona State University is among those listed, after it hiked tuition 38% from $4,971 in the 2007-2008 school year, to $6,844 just three years later.

All three of Arizona's public universities were on the list -- not coincidentally, after the state government imposed some of the nation's harshest cuts on higher education. Since fiscal 2008, the state has slashed its university funding by 50% or $428 million. More statewide tuition hikes are on the way in the fall.

Extreme tuition hikes ahead

Among the other large public universities that made the list, Georgia State University hiked tuition 46% and Alabama State University increased tuition 43%. About two-thirds of California State University's 23 campuses were also listed, for each hiking tuition between 37% and 46%.

Ranking the schools by net prices -- which includes tuition and other costs minus financial aid -- Tennessee State University and Colorado State University were among the offenders who will have to submit special reports explaining their price hikes.

Arts and music schools made up a large portion of the private schools listed, as did for-profit colleges from publicly-traded companies DeVry University (DV), Education Management (EDMC) and Corinthian Colleges (COCO).

So far, neither Congress nor the Education Department have laid out actual repercussions facing the schools -- but in a call with reporters Wednesday, spokespeople for the report indicated additional regulations could be considered in the future.

My degree isn't worth the debt!

The Department of Education also released a new interactive tool Thursday, listing the most expensive and cheapest colleges by both their published sticker prices, and their average costs after financial aid and scholarships are taken into account.

Required by the Higher Education Opportunities Act of 2008, it's the first time the government has ranked American universities by affordability, in a list for consumers to easily search online.

"We hope this information will encourage schools to continue their efforts to make the costs of college more transparent so students make informed decisions and aren't saddled with unmanageable debt," Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said in a release

Extreme Tuition Hikes Ahead in USA

Attention college students: Get ready for one heck of a fatter tuition bill.

As state governments face one of their toughest fiscal years yet, higher education is on the chopping block, and public colleges are being forced to pass on more of their costs to students.

Earlier this year, 25 governors proposed slashing college funding, marking $5 billion in potential cuts nationwide, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers.

While many of those cuts have since been tweaked through budget negotiations, most of these tough decisions have to be finalized this week as the fiscal year comes to an end.

Already, staggering reductions in funding are leading colleges in some states to boost tuition as much as 22%.

Tim Geithner considering leaving White House

Tim Geithner is considering leaving his post as Secretary of the Treasury after a deal to raise the debt ceiling is reached, a source familiar with the discussion told CNN Thursday.

Geithner is the lone remaining member of President Obama's original economic team.

Asked by former President Bill Clinton on Thursday at a Clinton Global Initiative event about his future plans, Geithner said he would be doing his job "for the foreseeable future."

A Treasury official said that Geithner will not make any decisions while he's focused on negotiations over the debt limit and deficit reduction.

Another source familiar with the discussions between Geithner and the White House said it could be a while before Geithner's ultimate departure. "You have to have somebody lined up for the job -- you can't just leave," this source said. "And there's a relative scarcity of people who would fit the bill."

Obama nominated Geithner to be the 75th Secretary of the Treasury, and the Senate confirmed him on Jan. 26, 2009.

Geithner went on to spearhead the administration's response to the financial crisis that threatened to unravel economic growth around the globe.

That response included a bailout of the U.S. auto industry, a massive economic stimulus package and a landmark Wall Street reform effort. So-called stress tests of the nation's largest banks in early 2009 also helped shore up confidence in financial markets.

Geithner's first days in the administration were not without stumbles, as markets met his efforts to support the banking industry with skepticism, and giant bonuses paid to executives at bailed-out insurer AIG sparked public outrage.

But Geithner emerged as one of the strongest voices on Obama's economic team.

"I think he has done a great job in a backbreaking position," Clinton said Thursday.

Another member of Obama's original team, Council of Economic Advisers chairman Austan Goolsbee, has said he will leave the administration in August to return to the University of Chicago.

That leaves the administration with two holes to fill in the months leading into the 2012 presidential race, where the economy is expected to be issue No. 1.

National Economic Council director Lawrence Summers, and Office of Management director Peter Orszag left the administration last year. Christina Romer, the original chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, has also left.

Before joining the administration, Geithner held the top post at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, where he played a crucial advisory role during the financial crisis of 2008.

Before joining the Fed, he held posts at the IMF and worked in the Clinton administration Treasury Department.

New unemployment claims barely improve

The number of Americans filing for first-time unemployment benefits slipped only slightly last week, falling short of economists' expectations for a bigger drop.

There were 428,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended June 25 -- 1,000 fewer than the week before, the Labor Department said.

It marked the 12th straight week initial claims have stayed above the 400,000 mark -- and was worse than the 420,000 claims economists surveyed by Briefing.com had expected.

"Another week, another disappointing U.S. initial claims report," Jennifer Lee, senior economist with BMO Capital Markets said in a note to investors.

Lee pointed out that claims have been hovering at a level that offers little confidence that the job market's recovery picked up substantially in June. Slower auto manufacturing following Japan's earthquake could still be taking its toll, she said, and will hopefully let up later this summer.

The four-week moving average of initial claims, calculated to smooth out volatility, increased to 426,750, up 500 claims from the week before.

Fewer jobs for unemployed workers

Continuing claims -- which include people filing for the second week of benefits or more -- fell to 3,702,000 in the week ended June 18 -- also falling short of economists' forecasts for 3,700,000 ongoing claims.

California, New Jersey and Florida saw claims rise the most in the week ending June 18, the most recent data available.

Meanwhile, Ohio saw the biggest drop in unemployment claims, with 2,769 fewer people filing claims in that state. Illinois and New York followed, each with drops of 2,000 or more.

The Labor Department will release its closely watched monthly jobs report next Friday, detailing how many jobs the U.S. economy created in June.

May's report showed the economy added a disappointing 54,000 jobs that month -- far too low to bring down the unemployment rate.

Stocks end the first half with a bang

Stocks ended the first half of the year solidly higher Thursday, as investors put a turbulent six months behind them.

All three major indexes rallied for the fourth day in a row, helped by a strong economic report on business activity in the Midwest and the latest positive developments out of Greece.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) added 153 points, or 1.3%, led by Intel (INTC, Fortune 500), Caterpillar (CAT, Fortune 500) and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ, Fortune 500). Shares of all three companies rose about 3%.

The S&P 500 (SPX) rose 13 points, or 1%, and the Nasdaq composite (COMP) gained 33 points, or 1.2%. First Solar (FSLR) and eBay (EBAY, Fortune 500) were among the best performing stocks on both indexes.

All three major indexes reached the mid-year mark on a high note. The Dow is up more than 7% while the S&P and Nasdaq are up 5%.

Meanwhile, Wall Street's most widely cited measure of volatility and fear, the VIX (VIX), has dropped nearly 7% during the first six months of the year.

Interactive: A stormy year for stocks

The second quarter has been difficult, however. Stocks struggled over the past two months amid jitters about Europe's sovereign debt problems and an economic slowdown in the United States.

The Dow ended the quarter up 0.8%, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished about 0.3% lower. That quarterly performance was the worst in a year for all three indexes.

Economy: The Chicago purchasing managers index, which measures business activity in the Midwest, jumped to 61.1 in June from 56.6 the prior month. Economists were expecting the measure to slip to 54.

"Based on the series of poor economic reports we've had the last several weeks, expectations were low, so this was a nice surprise," said Joseph Saluzzi, co-head of equity trading at Themis Trading.

Don't fear the commodities bear

Strong regional data is especially welcome news ahead of the national Institute for Supply Management manufacturing index due Friday, but it's only one data point, Saluzzi cautioned.

Adding to the welcome news, Greece voted in favor of implementing the austerity measures approved on Wednesday. The measures aim to keep the debt-ridden country from defaulting.

But as anti-government protests grow worse, some investors worry that Greece's problems are far from over.

There's still a lot to sort out with Greece and we're not out of the woods yet," Saluzzi said. "There are a lot of major global economic concerns, and I think markets will be choppy for the rest of the summer."

The Labor Department reported that weekly jobless claims edged down slightly in the latest week, but fell short of economists' expectations for a bigger drop.

Currencies and commodities: The dollar fell against the euro, the British pound and the Japanese yen.

Oil for August delivery rose 65 cents to settle at $95.42 a barrel.

Gold futures for August delivery slipped $7.60 to settle at $1,502.80 an ounce.

10-year yield at one-month high

Bonds: The price on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury edged down, pushing the yield up to 3.16% from 3.11% late Wednesday.

Companies: Shares of eBay (EBAY, Fortune 500), which owns PayPal, jumped more than 4% a day after the Federal Reserve imposed caps on debit card swipe fees that weren't as high as expected.

Shares of the First Solar (FSLR) gained more than 2%, after the company won $4.5 billion in loan guarantees from the Department of Energy.

World markets: European stocks ended higher. Britain's FTSE 100 gained 1.5%, the DAX in Germany added 1.1% and France's CAC 40 rose 1.5%.

Asian markets also ended the session higher. The Shanghai Composite jumped 1.2%, the Hang Seng in Hong Kong gained 1.5% and Japan's Nikkei rose 0.2%

Popular Mobile Browsers

With the invention of different types of mobile technology, the use of mobile internet has also increased in the current gadget oriented society. So what are the top mobile browsers in the Indian mobile market?

Opera Mini J2ME web

This mobile web version is completely meant for java based phones. It is the most popular mobile browser of the nation. It is famous because it the first ever mobile browser space in India. And in India almost 80% of the people use java based phones.

UC browser

This is the mini mobile version of Firefox. This browser is fast and light. It provides you with a powerful search, a super stable network, it has multitabs. It also boasts of compression technology which gives faster loading, download manager. It has good pre loaded time. Its file manager is also worth mentioning. You can work on this pretty well in small screen and slow networks.

Bolt browser

It is 3rd most downloaded web browser in India. It offers fast browsing and HTML5 support in case of video playback. It boasts of a long list of web applications that it supports like- Google Docs, Mafia Wars, and even Twitter and Facebook apps.

Spice Transformer Phone price in India

Spice mobile which is popularly known as S Mobility has recently launched a phone by tying up with the movie franchises giant Transformers 3- Dark of the moon. This phone will be popularly known as the Transformer phone.

The most exciting part of this phone is that it can transform from a bar to a touchscreen phone. The phone will come as a keypad equipped phone but if you want you can remove it and make it a touch screen phone. So, use it as per your wish.

Spice Transformer phone’s features:

• The phone will sport a 2.4 inch touchscreen
• It will have a moderate resolution camera of 1.3 megapixel.
• The memory is expandable up to 8 GB
• You can enjoy FM & MP3 player
• It provides connectivity like Bluetooth, GPRS, WAP and Java
• It can be spotted in yellow, red and white colours
• It is quite reasonable phone that costs Rs 4,600

LG Optimus Black Feature Price

The monsoons are here and its raining Android based devices everywhere in the Indian continent. Well, the latest phone that had joined the bandwagon of android phones is LG Optimus Black.

The phone is high –end smartphone which is fully packed with exciting new features. The best thing is the unbelievable low price tag (as compared to other high end smartphones, of course!!) i.e. Rs. 19, 990.

LG Optimus Black Features

• 4-inch capacitive touchscreen
• Display resolution of 480×800 pixels
• Scratch resistant smartphone makes for a great viewing experience
• The device is equipped with earlier Android 2.2 OS but promises to bring a Gingerbread update by next month
• 1GHz ARM Cortex A8 processor
• 512MB of RAM, and 2GB of internal storage.
• rear-facing 5 mega-pixel camera with auto-focus and LED flash
• A secondary front-facing 2 mega-pixel camera for video chats,
• Connectivity options like the GPRS, EDGE, 3G, Bluetooth 2.1, Wi-Fi and DLNA

10 inch BlackBerry Playbook to launch in India

RIM recently launch its PlayBook and since then the tablet promoting work has been actively performed. The recent rumors state that the plans for producing the 10 inch PlayBook is now have taken a backseat. The company has totally planned to focus on the smartphones and its QNX operating system.

The strategy for the production of 10 inch PlayBook has been scrapped. This has been done only because RIM wants to focus on the upcoming smartphone that runs on the QNX operating system. The USP of the smartphone will be its 1.2 GHz processor and 4.3 inch captive touchscreen.

The plan of production of this smartphone was announced ling time back (December 2010) and now all we can assume is, the company is in a hurry to launch the phone as soon as possible. The satisfying point is- the tablet market of India is yet to be recognized hence, the company still has the chance to make its mark on the tablet market. The device may release in October this year.

Christine Lagarde chosen to lead IMF.

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde has been chosen to lead the International Monetary Fund . She will become the first female managing director of the global lending organization.

Lagarde's selection became all but assured when the Obama administration endorsed her earlier Tuesday. Hours later, the IMF's 24-member board voted to appoint her to the position. She had also won support from Europe, China and Russia.

I am deeply honored by the trust placed in me,'' Lagarde said in a statement after the vote. ``I would like to thank the fund's global membership warmly for the broad-based support I have received.''

Lagarde will face immediate challenges once she begins a five-year term next week.

She'll have to prod fellow European officials to take painful steps to prevent a default by Greece. She'll face pressure from emerging nations that want a greater voice at the IMF. And she'll be looked upon to restore the organization's reputation, which was tarred by a scandal involving the man she replaced.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn resigned last month after being charged with sexually assaulting a New York City hotel housekeeper. He has denied the charges.

She was chosen by consensus, the IMF said in a statement. Mexico's Agustin Carstens challenged her, but his candidacy never caught fire.

Lagarde's exceptional talent and broad experience will provide invaluable leadership ... at a critical time for the global economy,'' U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said.

Lagarde, 55, will be the first person to lead the IMF who isn't an economist. She led the Chicago-based law firm Baker & McKenzie before entering French politics in 2005. She speaks impeccable English and spent much of her career in the United States.

As one of the longest-serving ministers under French President Nicolas Sarkozy, she made the country's labor market rules more flexible. Forbes has listed her among the world's most powerful women.

Her appointment puts two women in prominent leadership roles at the organization. In April, Nemat Shafik, an Egyptian economist and former World Bank official, was appointed a top deputy at the fund. Shafik said last month the IMF is boosting its efforts to recruit women. The fund wants 25 percent to 30 percent of its management positions to be held by women by 2014, Shafik said.

In addition to the most recent charges, Strauss-Kahn was reprimanded in 2008 for having a brief affair with a subordinate, though he faced no disciplinary action.

Lagarde told the IMF's board last week that the managing director ``has to lead by example.'' She promised to ``restore staff pride in working at the IMF'' as part of a "healing process.''

Lagarde will be expected to help stabilize Europe's debt crisis.

That's likely one reason why even some developing countries, such as China, supported her candidacy, Lombardi said. China owns billions of dollars in euro-dominated bonds and has little interest in seeing the European debt crisis worsen.

Deve Gowda having assets worth over Rs 1,500 cr

Taking the fight to the JDS camp, a combative BJP today released what it called the "charge-sheet" against the opposition party, alleging that the estimated worth of the known assets of the family of former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda alone was over Rs 1,500 crore.

The 55-page booklet, the party said, attempts to provide a snapshot of the "large-scale amassment" of wealth and assets by JDS supremo Deve Gowda, also a former Karnataka Chief Minister and his family members.

"It also briefly brings out the irregularities committed by them to acquire such wealth. The list of assets cited in this booklet is only indicative, and by no means gives a complete picture of the actual wealth of the Gowda family", it said.

The "charge-sheet" was released by BJP national spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman, in the presence of President of the state unit K S Eshwarappa and the Miniser for Energy Shobha Karandlaje, among others, at a press conference here.

Sitaraman said the BJP found it necessary to release it as the "frustrated" opposition had been repeatedly levelling "false allegations" against the first BJP government in south, and was not allowing it to function.

She said the State government was spending majority of its time to answer "false allegations" against it. "It is very disheartening".The booklet has "credible and substantive evidence" on the misdeeds of the Deve Gowda family, she said.

Debt ceiling delay would be 'chaotic'

Here's what Americans can look forward to if lawmakers fail to raise the debt ceiling in time: Treasury would not be able to pay between 40% and 45% of the 80 million payments it needs to make every month.

That's the estimate from a new analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a think tank in Washington founded by four former Democratic and Republican Senate majority leaders.

A delay in raising the debt ceiling could affect Social Security checks, food stamps, federal worker and military paychecks, government contractor bills and payments to Medicare and Medicaid providers.

"Handling all payments for important and popular programs (e.g., Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense, active duty pay) will quickly become impossible," the report's authors noted.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has said that by Aug. 2 he will no longer have enough money on hand every day to pay all the government's bills in full and on time. The government reached the legal borrowing limit on May 16 and has been taking "extraordinary measures" since to keep the country out of default.

To ensure it has enough cash on hand to make a $29 billion interest payment to investors on Aug. 15 -- among other payments -- the government would have to defer 44% of federal spending, and that would affect the broader economy, according to the BPC study.

Treasury is expected to update its estimate of the so-called "drop dead date" at the start of July, but no one expects the date to change much.

It's impossible for anyone to know exactly how much the government will take in and have to pay out on any given day in August. The BPC based its estimates on the revenue and outlays reported by Treasury from August 2009 and August 2010.

Bond experts to Congress: Don't mess it up

It's also impossible to say yet just how the government would prioritize payments. It's fair to assume, however, that picking who gets paid and who gets put off will be a mess technically and socially because it's never been done before.

"The reality would be chaotic," the report states.

The going assumption is that Geithner will do everything he canto pay bond investors, so the country doesn't go into a formal default.

"The Treasury Secretary will squirrel away money like -- well, a squirrel. He may have to delay some payments starting days or weeks early to prepare for big important payments later," said Joe Minarik, who served as the chief economist of the White House Budget Office in the Clinton administration.

And as the BPC study noted, the whole event could cause a public uproar and market unrest, the outcomes of which is anyone's gues.

Delisting of Patni will require over $200 mn

In an interview with ET Now, Phaneesh Murthy , CEO of iGATE Patni , talks about the restructure of the merged entity and their plans. Excerpts:

There were some talks of delisting Patni and reverse merging with iGATE to list on the Indian bourses as well. What is the listing plan and would you prefer just being listed on NASDAQ?

I would like to continue to see whether we can come up with the model by which we can affect this in a reasonable period of time. However, the fact is that the delisting of Patni would require north of $200 million, may be $250 million or whatever it is at current prices. It requires an order of magnitude of money in the hundreds of millions of dollars and not money that we currently have and therefore while we continue to explore multiple options to do this to try and arrive at the one stock solution, I am not entirely sure how quickly we will be able to come up with that one stock solution and I think we had anticipated that we may have to live with this problem for the next couple of years and I think that is what may actually end up happening that we live with the problem of two stocks in two different countries for a couple of years.

It is a fair point, but your current holding in Patni is at about 83%. So there are only two options available, you ramp up your stake and de-list Patni or you bring your stake down from 83% to 75%?

Yes, whatever are the current norms from a SEBI, BSE perspective etc, we will comply with that and one of the norms like you said, one of the guidelines is very clear that we have to try and bring it down to 75%. You typically get a year to plan that out and do that. So we do not anticipate that we will be running foul of any of the regulators.

The combined company has nearly about a billion dollars in terms of revenues. Is there more client traction now as a result of this, are clients showing more confidence?

I had a good meeting with a number of CIOs from both the companies a few weeks ago and it was actually a very very good meeting because we had about 20 CIOs on the table and we were just discussing and it was good to see the iGATE CIOs, the Patni's CIOs all interacting very well together. Overall, almost everybody is very supportive this transaction, understand exactly what we are trying to do. The only statement which I heard from all the clients was please stay focused on us, please stay focused on our business and some feedback that we got from some of the Patni customers just reduced the attrition a little.

iGATE is a IT company which has a strong presence in the BFSI space, the insurance and the banking vertical. Patni is an IT company which has a marginal presence in the BFSI space. So how do you plan to marry both these businesses?

Very clearly we have laid out a new vision for ourselves which is going down the path of innovation, which is going down the path of ensuring that we are changing the rules constantly and we want to deliver high impact outcomes to our clients. So the strategy is very similar to what iGATE was trying to do from that perspective, though some of the vertical-oriented strategies are very close to what Patni was doing earlier. So at the broadest vision level we are going down the path that we want to change rules, we want to impact business outcomes which was really what the iGATE world was and then at the vertical level given the IPs that the lot of the teams had created both an iGATE and Patni we are going down that micro-vertical strategy which Patni had embarked on quite nicely.

So how have the recent deal wins been like, which geography and verticals are showing the strongest traction?

We are getting some good deal wins in EMEA, that is a new region which is showing growth, but remember it is a smaller percentage of our business. We are also seeing a good set of deal wins in North America, but that is an 80% of our business anyway. So we expect to continue to see traction there.

I know you have got your handful, you have debt of about $1 billion, but are you still hungry for more acquisitions?

The need of the hour right now is to integrate and start driving value from here and based on how well we integrate and how we drive value, certainly we will decide for ourselves whether acquisition is an interesting growth strategy for us or not.

Any target for growth and revenue and profits for FY12?

Nothing specific for FY12, but I think we want to go back to the old model of iGATE of being earnings best in class growth in the industry

California Budger with Deep Cuts

California lawmakers approved a $86 billion budget late Tuesday that imposes deep spending cuts but does not extend tax hikes.

The budget is a disappointment for Governor Jerry Brown, a Democrat who spent months trying to convince Republican legislators to put an extension of personal income and sales tax increases before the voters.

Unable to do so, Brown and Democratic legislative leaders cobbled together a plan that calls for a total of $14.6 billion in cuts.

"Putting our state on a sound and sustainable fiscal footing still requires much work, but we have now taken a huge step forward," Brown said in a statement.

Much of the bloodletting was agreed to in March, but this week's deal would add at least $2.5 billion in additional reductions.

Overall the Department of Health and Human Services would be slashed by $5 billion, while the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation would see a cut of $1 billion. The state's two university systems would each lose $650 million in funding.

The budget hinges on the state bringing in $4 billion in more in tax revenues in the coming year than was initially expected. The improving economy has pushed the state's tax collections billions of dollars above estimates in recent months. Brown expects the windfall to continue into fiscal 2012, which starts Friday.

If tax revenue comes in lower than expected, the budget also would impose an additional $2.6 billion in cuts to higher education, corrections and in-home support services for the elderly and disabled.

The proposal would slash billions in spending for children, the sick, and the elderly, said Senate President pro Tem Darrell Steinberg. And it would hurt the state's economy, he said.

"This budget is the most austere fiscal blueprint California has seen in a generation," Steinberg said.

Since the budget does not call for tax increases, it requires only a majority of the Democratic-led legislature to approve it. However, Governor Brown and his fellow Democrats said they plan to put a tax measure on the ballot in November 2012 through a voter initiative -- bypassing the requirement for Republican consent.

Though they fended off Brown's tax extensions, Republicans immediately attacked the proposal, saying California needs a budget that will revitalize the economy and create jobs.

"This latest budget is based on the hope that $4 billion in new revenues will miraculously materialize, but does absolutely nothing to change government as usual," said Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton.

The proposal is a major shift for Brown, who has said for months that the state's $26 billion budget's gap should be addressed with a mix of spending cuts and tax extensions. He also was determined to fulfill his pledge to put the extension of personal income and sales taxes before the voters.

However, he could not convince four Republicans to join him so he could get the measure on the ballot. A budget containing a tax hike needs the support of two-thirds of lawmakers.

Republicans have refused to go along unless the budget also contained a spending cap, as well as pension and regulatory reform.

The latest proposal was put together less than two weeks after Brown vetoed a budget approved by the legislature, saying it was chock full of gimmicks and contained legally questionable maneuvers.

California lawmakers lose pay until they pass balanced budget

Lawmakers had raced to pass a spending plan by June 15 to meet a voter-imposed deadline that required the legislature to pass a balanced budget or forfeit their pay.

However, state controller John Chiang determined that the budget was actually unbalanced. So lawmakers, who earn $95,291 a year and $142 per diem for each day they are in session, have gone without pay since mid-month.

Fuel price hikes brighten market outlook: Brokers

The government's decision last week to raise prices of diesel, kerosene and cooking gas has brightened prospects of Indian equities . The move has sparked hopes among investors, fretting over the impact of paralysis in policy-making on India's economic growth, that the government may be serious about pushing ahead the next wave of economic reforms, said broking firms.

"The government's decision to hike retail fuel prices in spite of the decline in crude oil prices suggest the government is shaking off its decision-making inertia," said Parul J Saini, strategist, Royal Bank of Scotland. "This should be a positive catalyst for the Indian equity markets," said Saini, in a report.

The Sensex has gained over 5% in the past four trading days. The government announced decision to increase petroleum product prices on Friday evening.

"The move is also a powerful signal to markets that the government is still able to make difficult decisions, in the light of a stalled reform process," said Tushar Poddar and Vishal Vaibhaw of Goldman Sachs. "This move, along with global oil prices coming off and monsoons on track, are positive signs for the economy and for the equity market," they said, in a report.

Analysts perceive India's discussion paper last week, questioning the need for equity caps for foreign direct investment (FDI), as the government's intent to streamline the country's FDI policy.

Investors are hoping that the fuel price increases will result in inflation peaking out over the next few months and signal the end of policy rate tightening by the Reserve Bank of India. Analysts estimate wholesale price inflation will surge 70-100 basis points from 9.06% in May because of higher fuel and cooking has prices.

"From a medium-term perspective, we see the hike in fuel prices as a positive step to incentivise Indian households and companies to ration energy demand, but the near-term inflationary impact," said Sonal Varma and Aman Mohunta of Nomura India, in a report. Economists warn, however, the India's fiscal deficit could widen as the cut in excise and customs duties on diesel and cooking gas will more than offset the benefit of price increases to the government's finances.

"Lower revenue collection owing to slower GDP growth, smaller-than-budgeted disinvestment proceeds, and higher expenditure could potentially push the deficit to 5.8% of GDP, hurting market sentiment, unless the government seeks other ways to raise revenues," said Standard Chartered economists led by Anubhuti Sahay, in a report. India is targeting a fiscal deficit of 5.1% of GDP for 2011-12. Brokers said higher-than-estimated fiscal deficit, especially when the economy is slowing, may not go down well with foreign investors.

Indian markets may underperform in near term

In an interview with ET Now, Manishi Raychaudhuri, MD & HoR, BNP Paribas Securities, shares his views on their latest strategy report and talks about the market. Excerpts:

If I look at your latest strategy report and if I look at the fine print there, you have slashed your Sensex target for the year, you expect Indian markets to underperform and according to your report, there are high inflationary concerns which currently could hit Indian economy going forward. So, rather a bearish report?

You did not ask me a question, but I would still summarise what we have tried to say. In the near term, the Indian market is likely to underperform and by near term, I really mean about maybe 3-4 months, possibly till the October-December quarter. And yes, we have cut the Sensex target because there were a couple of variables on which we went wrong. We were clearly anticipating peaking out of inflation by some time in March-April, which did not happen. Inflation turned out to be a lot more stickier than we had anticipated and as a consequence, even the end to the RBI's tightening cycle, which we were expecting some time in the first quarter of this year, it now seems to be prolonged to sometime in the July-September quarter, maybe till around September.

So to that extent, we actually expect the RBI to tighten about twice more, maybe 25 basis points each. And to have the desired effect on inflationary expectations, it should perhaps be done in rapid fire succession in July and then again in September, which could obviously lead to some degree of underperformance. On top of that, we must not also forget that earnings estimates have been declining.

Our own EPS estimates for Sensex have declined about 4% since the beginning of the year, and we think that there could be another 3-4% downside to the Sensex EPS estimate for fiscal 2012-2013. Combined that with the valuations of India, which compared to India's own history or somewhere in the middle of the road, somewhere close to just lower than the average, but compared to Asia ex Japan and compared to China, they are at about 25-30% premium, which means that valuation premium has to compress.

This is our hypothesis behind arguing that in the near term there could be some underperformance by India. Having said that, I must also argue that by the time, we are in the last quarter of this year, some of these macroeconomic headwinds would be behind us. If the market does come down to a valuation level of close to maybe 12.5-13 times one year forward, that would be the right time to load into the high beta stocks among private banks, infrastructure and autos.

But what's your call, the prognosis is generally once inflation peaks out, the market bottoms out and since that process is now elongated with the recent fuel price hike, inflation is not going to becoming down in any hurry. So what's your call on banks and the entire rate sensitive basket? Would you be a buyer?

First of all, yes, inflation has been elongated. The longevity of high inflation is possibly till about September-October. Till then WPI inflation would remain in the present range that we are seeing that maybe in the range of 8.5-9.5%. Secondly manufactured product inflation, which has been increasing now over last 2-3 months, will be possibly on an upswing till about September-October. After that, the effect of recent decline in commodity prices would begin to catch in and possibly manufactured product inflation would be peaking out by sometime in October.

Now as a consequence, we are kind of neutralist, we are kind of fence-sitters on the rate sensitive pack. Now here again it is essentially stock-specific weight which add up to the sector weight. So we are neutral on both banks and automobiles. In banks, we prefer the private sector banks. In fact, we have closely about 25% weight on the banking sector as a whole and out of that, about 80% of that is in the private sector banks with much smaller weight on the public sector banks. Because we think the private sector banks have relatively lower concern about asset quality and among them the high CASA banks, which have a very strong liability franchise or possibly those, which would be able to weather the storm of net interest margin compression a lot better than the sector average. We are also neutral on the auto space where we have actually cut down weight significantly. We only have the consumer autos in the portfolio, the companies that are engaged in two wheelers and the passenger cars not so much in the commercial vehicle space.

Given the way how commodity prices have corrected in last 10-15 days, is that not a positive but more like a short-term negative for Indian markets because that will also hit earnings and profitability for commodity companies?

Yeah. Paradoxically it is a positive for Indian economy, but perhaps in the short-term a negative for the Indian markets because that's the peculiar structure of the Indian equity market. While the economy tends to benefit from commodity price decline, both metals and oil because we are large importers and as a consequence, both fiscal deficit and current account deficit tends to decline. But if you look at the equity market, close to about 30-35% of earnings stream is somehow related to the global commodity prices, be it in metals, oil or petrochemicals. So paradoxically the commodity market declining tends to lead to some underperformance of Indian equities. This is something that we had seen in 2008 as well. The oil and metal prices came down so sharply by late 2008 and early 2009 that the Indian equity market faltered and it fell by almost 60% from the peak, but actually the economy was not doing all that badly at that time.

What's your call on ONGC post the latest news from Cairn and Vedanta and how it may be beneficiary to companies like ONGC?

We think that there are signs of the Cairn-Vedanta deal getting finalised now. We think it is positive for ONGC. So for ONGC, essentially two positives have kind of got coupled in a matter of a couple of days both the government's decision to increase the oil and other oil product prices. And the possibility of the Cairn-Vedanta deal getting finalized. So we are actually positive on ONGC after these two developments.

Give two high conviction investment ideas?

I would suggest that under the current circumstances, No. 1, one should stick to the consumption theme because pretty much everything, be it income stability or the government's programmes, seems to be supporting consumption a lot more than supporting investments. As a consequence, I would recommend Bajaj Auto under the current scenario. The stock has underperformed because of the concerns relating to the longevity of the DEPB scheme, but we think the fundamentals of that company are much stronger. So Bajaj Auto would obviously be one of the choices at this point.

I would also in a similar vein recommend Bharti, Bharti Tele-Ventures, because revenues in the telecom space are becoming a lot more visible and stable. On top of that, the domestic pricing war scenario, which we had encountered a few months back, seems to have almost come to an end and as a consequence, the revenue growth and earnings growth of the companies are getting more linked to subscription, the number of new subscribers and so on. So the telecom space and the two wheeler space look good under the current circumstances.

Why Bharti now? The stock has already appreciated by 52% in last one year.

First of all I must say that we have had Bharti in the portfolio not now but for quite some time, almost for more than a year. We have captured a significant part of the upside. Having said that even after this upside, Bharti remains one of the best cash generators in this business. Bharti remains a stock where the earnings stream and revenue stream are possibly visible. Under the present circumstances where you have a degree of uncertainty about capex and the investments, it is possibly better to look at the consumption-orientated stocks. So in the present uncertain phase of the market as long as this continues, stocks of this type, of the kind that Bharti represents, would possibly continue to be outperformers.

Congress moves forward on free trade deals

The Senate will officially take up three trade deals and a scaled-back version of a jobs retraining program for laid-off workers on Thursday.

Senate negotiators will have to start pounding out the details of the trade deals, as well as

funding for the jobs retraining program -- whose funding ran dry in February.

"This was truly a bipartisan negotiation on all sides ... we think this is a strong package that reflected the different priorities," said one senior administration official on a call with reporters Tuesday.

But final passage on all the measures is not a done deal. Republican support depends on how closely the trade deals and jobs retraining program are linked together.

Republicans want to vote on the trade pacts, and have agreed to consider the new compromise that would extend the jobs retraining program, according to congressional aides. But they refuse to have the issues stuck together on the same bill, in a way that would prevent them from making changes to the jobs retraining program.

"I would strongly urge the Administration to re-think this action, and urge them to send up all three pending trade agreements without delay -- and without extraneous poison pills included," said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in a statement Tuesday.

If Congress were to pass the trade pacts without the jobs retraining program, President Obama would face a tough choice as he had previously said he couldn't have one without the other.

At issue is the Trade Adjustment Assistance program, which got a big funding boost with the 2009 economic Recovery Act.

The program gives unemployed workers financial help and job training when employers move jobs overseas. White House officials had previously said that more than 435,000 workers would be eligible for the program if it were reinstated. But Republicans have said they are concerned about funding such stimulus programs, because of the big deficits the nation faces.

A White House official outlined a compromise made on the program, saying it would be scaled back. He added that it wouldn't add to the deficit, thanks to cuts in unemployment insurance; and due to a new proposal that would penalize tax preparers who have "bad records," claiming tax credits for those who don't qualify.

But the White House couldn't give a final tab on Tuesday for the scaled back Trade Adjustment Assistance program.

An additional roadblock is that even though House Ways and Means Chairman Rep. David Camp was involved in the compromise, it's unclear whether even a scaled-back version could pass the GOP-controlled House

"We're pleased the President may finally send us the three job-creating trade agreements we've requested, but we have long said that TAA -- even this scaled-back version -- should be dealt with separately from the trade agreements," said Brendan Buck, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner.

The one thing many congressional Republicans and Democrats can agree on is wanting to pass the trade deals to help boost the U.S. economy, particularly since some say the treaties could add as many as 250,000 jobs.

Despite Obama's effort to tie the trade pacts to something the unions want, the AFL-CIO and other labor groups continue to oppose the treaties -- which they say don't do enough to protect workers' rights.

But business groups from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the Business Roundtable applauded the move forward.

"With our economic recovery stalling, the time is now for Congress to act on these deals," said Thomas J. Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber. "We simply cannot afford to put American jobs at risk any longer."

Saab can finally pay workers... to do nothing

Saab has secured a tentative short term financing deal that should allow the Swedish automaker to pay its factory workers. But they still won't be building any cars, at least not until other financing deals are reached.

Saab's parent company, Swedish Automobile N.V., announced last week that it had run out of money to pay hourly workers. Saab's Trollhattan production facilities were already halted because the company couldn't reliably get parts to build cars.

In a transaction valued at about 28 million Euros -- or about $40 million -- an investment consortium led by Hemfosa Fastigheter AB will buy a 50.1% stake in Saab Automobile Property AB.

Saab will then enter into a 15-year lease agreement for the production site.

The deal still requires the approval of the Swedish government, the Swedish National Debt Office and the European Investment Bank, all of which have been involved helping to finance Saab's operations since the Swedish automaker split from former parent company General Motors in early 2010.

On June 9, Saab announced it was suspending production at its factory in Trollhattan "pending more stable inflow" of auto parts.

On June 13, Saab announced tentative deals with two Chinese companies, distributor Pang Da Automobile Trade Co., Ltd. and auto manufacturer Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile Co., Ltd., that could provide longer-term financing. Those arrangements still must be approved by the Chinese government and they would not help with Saab's immediate cash problems, a Saab spokeswoman said.

The best Smartphone in World

If you are looking to invest in a smartphone maker, your choices at first seem limited to Apple and a bevy of also-rans that are taking turns auditioning for the dubious distinction of becoming the next Palm.

Shares of Motorola Mobility (MMI), maker of the Droid phone and Xoom tablet, have fallen 22%. Nokia (NOK) has plunged 41% this year as investors worry that the Finnish company's partnership with Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) won't reverse the company's earnings and sales woes.

And then there's Research in Motion (RIMM). The Canadian maker of the BlackBerry and PlayBook tablet has lost more than half of its market value (and much of its credibility) this year as one earnings warning after another has investors fleeing for the exits.

But even Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) hasn't had that great of year. The stock is up only about 4%. That leads me to the best-performing smartphone maker, one that you may not be as familiar with because it doesn't trade in the United States: HTC.

HTC is based in Taiwan and trades on Taipei's stock exchange. But shares have been, much like the company's marketing tag line, "quietly brilliant." The stock is up more than 15% this year in Taiwan.

The company has enjoyed strong sales around the world with phones running on Google's (GOOG, Fortune 500) Android operating system. In the U.S., HTC's Thunderbolt 4G phone for Verizon (VZ, Fortune 500) has been a particularly big hit.

Motorola's uphill battle

According to a consensus of analysts that follow HTC's Taiwan shares, earnings are expected to increase at an average of nearly 30% a year over the next few years. Compare that to Apple, whose profits are expected to grow at a clip of 21% annually.

Even though HTC has more robust growth prospects, the stock trades for only about 12 times 2011 earnings estimates, a discount to Apple's P/E of about 14 times fiscal 2011 profit forecasts.

So should investors consider trying to cash in on HTC's success? And if so, how?

As fate would have it, HTC is a top holding in a relatively new exchange-traded fund of smartphone stocks: the First Trust NASDAQ CEA Smartphone Index Fund, or FONE (FONE).

That fund tracks a smartphone index which includes a large array of global companies in the mobile device business. In addition to the big smartphone makers, it also owns wireless chip companies, carriers and companies that operate cell phone towers.

But if you are looking for a way to own HTC that's more diverse than a collection of tech and telecom companies, several savvy global-themed mutual funds own the company as well. Two big holders are the Oppenheimer Developing Markets Fund (ODMAX) and Thornburg International Value Fund (TGVAX).

Lei Wang, a portfolio manager with the Thornburg International Value fund in Santa Fe, N.M., said that HTC should be growing more rapidly than Apple right now since the Android operating system is still relatively new compared to Apple's iOS.

HTC shipped about 25 million phones worldwide last year. Wang said that he thinks that number could increase to 100 million within the next two years.

"HTC has done a fantastic job. Nobody had heard of this company in the U.S. three years ago and now the brand is widely recognized," he said.

So the smartphone business isn't just about Apple. And while it's still probably best to steer clear of Nokia, RIMM and Motorola -- which may or may not need to reach out to a savior like Palm did with HP (HPQ, Fortune 500) -- having some exposure to funds that own HTC is a nice way to play the Android trend.

Fed set to buy $300B more Treasuries

QE2 is just about done. But the Federal Reserve will still be buying massive amounts of long-term Treasuries.

In fact, the Fed's purchases over the next year will likely be at least $300 billion. That's half the size of QE2 -- even if QE3 never takes place.

While the Fed's efforts to pump about $600 billion of new cash into the economy over the last eight months comes to an end this week, the program, known as quantitative easing or QE2 for short, was not the only way the central bank was an active buyer of Treasuries.

Since last August, the Fed purchased $250 billion in long-term Treasuries in addition to the QE2 purchases. That's because it was reinvesting the principal from other securities that matured.

Assuming the Fed keeps reinvesting, as it said it would earlier this month, it will continue to be a very big buyer of bonds in the months to come.

"We still see the Fed being a major buyer of Treasuries, and giving the market some support," said Kim Rupert, managing director of fixed income for Action Economics.

But those purchases may not push yields, which move in the opposite direction of their price, lower for that much longer.

Rupert said she expects bond yields to rise even with the Fed's continued purchases. She said some investors who bought Treasuries recently in a flight to quality will unwind those positions. If the economic outlook improves later in the year, that could also lift interest rates.

The additional Fed purchases will have an impact though. Rupert said it should "slow the updraft in yields in a measurable way."

The Fed still has more than $1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities, debt issued by government-sponsored firms Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and other long-term bonds on its balance sheet.

While not all of this debt is set to mature in the next few months, the Fed still has a lot at its disposal to roll over into new bond purchases.

Of course the Fed could decide to stop reinvesting the principal of maturing securities. But that could almost have the same effect of actually raising interest rates. It would take significant amounts of cash out of the economy.

Even though some Fed policymakers are worried about the impact the bond buying has had on the dollar and inflation, the Fed does not seem ready to remove all its stimulus just yet. After all, the central bank did just issue a gloomier forecast for growth and unemployment through the end of 2012.

"Most of us can agree the economy is not going gangbusters and it's not a self-sustaining recovery yet," said David Coard, director of fixed income sales and trading for The Williams Capital Group. "For the foreseeable future, the Fed will have to maintain an accommodative stance. It's the only game in town."