The film offers a look into the effects of China's massive Three Gorges Dam. It paints an "upstairs, downstairs" portrait by contrasting the comfortable existence of oblivious western passengers on a Yangtze River cruise with the difficult lives of the young Chinese crew — some hailing from families displaced by the flooding of the dam.

Fox Searchlight paid an estimated $5 million US for the rights to the black comedy Choke this week. Adapted from the 2001 novel by Fight Club author Chuck Palahniuk, the film features Sam Rockwell as a huckster who feigns choking at restaurants to scam money from his unsuspecting rescuers.

Using CCI and Stochastics For Long and Short Term Forex Trading

Sam Seiden brings over 15 years experience of equities and futures trading which began when he was on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. He has traded equities, futures, interest rate markets, forex, options, and commodities for his personal interests for years and has educated hundreds of traders and investors through seminars and daily advisory services both domestically and internationally.

Sam has been involved in the markets since 1991 both on and off the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. He has served as the Director of Technical Research for two trading firms and regularly contributes articles to industry publications. Sam is known for his trading, technical research, and educational guidance.

Software instructions HotComm is the multimedia communication tool we will be using to host our New Live Market and Education Sessions.

Panel II: Iran and the Gulf

At first glance a free trade agreement seems an odd format. Neither the GCC states nor Iran can offer each other much economically. All are energy exporters and importers of manufactured goods. There are few opportunities for synergies. For Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain, the GCC states that have large Shi'ite populations and so are terrified of Iran's rise, the deal could serve as a sort of political tribute, a kind of pledge of cooperation with the region's superpower. Such a deal might be hard to swallow for these states but open defiance could invite Iran to make more direct efforts to influence its neighbors.

Elsewhere in the GCC, Qatar, the UAE and Oman are more likely to view the FTA offer with legitimate interest. None of these states has appreciable Shi'ite interests and so all feel less threatened by Iran than the states that do.

Sensex slips in early trade

At 10:05 am, the Bombay Stock Exchange's Sensex was down 216 points or 1.19 per cent at 17,859.92

Bharti Airtel (down 2.53%), BHEL (2.48%), ICICI Bank (2.2%), HDFC (2.08%) and NTPC (1.91%) were the biggest index losers. Bajaj Auto (up 1.61%), Satyam Computer (1.61%), Infosys Technologies (1.17%), Wipro (1.02%) and Tata Consultancy Services (0.47%) were the major gainers. The National Stock Exchange's Nifty was down 61 points or 1.15 per cent at 5220.25.

“We had a gap up opening Tuesday, but lost around 1 per cent from the day's high. The discount in the Nifty February futures also widened to 20 points from 4 points. We will see profit booking coming at these levels, but Nifty might find support at 5150 levels," UTI Securities said in a note.

The brokerage recommends buying HCL Tech, Mphasis, Sasken, and Tech Mahindra expecting them to outperform the market in the near term.

Le rogue trader

TROUBLE had been expected but nothing like this. Widespread concerns that Société Générale, France’s second-largest bank by market capitalisation, had more subprime-related woes to reveal were proved right on Thursday January 24th, with the announcement of a €2.05 billion ($3 billion) write-down on its exposure to mortgage-related investments and to creaking bond insurers. But those numbers were a sideshow to something far more shocking.

Pork producers have opportunities to lock-in profits

With feed prices high and headed higher, pork producers may continue to see losses at least through the first quarter of 2008. That's according to USDA's Livestock, Dairy and Poultry Outlook, which the Agency released Friday. But a noted hog marketing expert says the futures market is providing opportunities for pork producers to avoid red ink next year.

The USDA report said for the first quarter of 2008, hog prices are expected to average between $38 and $40 dollars a hundredweight, more than 15% below a year ago. USDA estimated production costs in the low-to-mid $50's per hundredweight and also said most hog producers are likely to lose money in 2008. But University of Missouri livestock economist Glenn Grimes told Brownfield taking advantage of strength in lean hog futures at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) may help pork producers avoid that prediction.

CME bid spurs fears of merger monster

THE commodities boom is intensifying the merger mania among the world's financial exchanges. But the $US11 billion ($12.4 billion) bid by CME Group to acquire Nymex Holdings may fuel worries that consolidation is leaving the survivors with too much power.

The deal also highlights some unsettling consequences of the global scramble for alliances and market share in trading financial securities.