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BUSINESSWednesday 13 January 2016

 Canada mining firm                 Stocks rebound after early slide; techs lead gains
 suspends most work,
  cuts jobs in Greece               ALEX VEIGA                      percent this year.             kets has also kept traders                                        trading.
                                    AP Business Writer              “We saw a little bit of weak-  on edge after sharp losses                                        “You’re seeing very over-
D. GATOPOULOS                       A volatile day on Wall          ness in oil and the selling    last week.                                                        sold conditions,” said Phil
Associated Press                    Street ended in upbeat          just continued,” said J.J.     The steep downturn in                                             Blancato, CEO of Laden-
ATHENS, Greece (AP) —               fashion Tuesday as a late-      Kinahan, chief strategist at   crude oil prices has also                                         burg Thalmann Asset Man-
Canadian mining com-                afternoon rally led by tech-    TD Ameritrade.                 weighed on the market.                                            agement. “People here
pany Eldorado Gold said             nology stocks pushed the        All told, the Dow Jones in-    The three major U.S. stock                                        are basically buying the
Tuesday it is suspending            market to a modest gain.        dustrial average gained        indexes are all down for the                                      dip.”
work at a site in Greece                                                                                                                                             Eight of the 10 sectors in the
and laying off 600 workers          Specialist Stephen Naughton, right, works with traders at his post on the floor of the New York Stock                            S&P 500 index rose. Tech-
following protests by local         Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2016. A volatile day on Wall Street ended in upbeat fashion Tuesday                                  nology companies gained
residents and a spat with           as a late-afternoon rally led by technology stocks pushed the market to a modest gain.                                           1.2 percent.
the country’s leftwing gov-                                                                                                                                          Health care and consumer
ernment.                                                                                                                                    (AP Photo/Richard Drew)  discretionary stocks also
The Vancouver, Canada-                                                                                                                                               notched gains of 1 per-
based company said it               The turnaround helped           117.65 points, or 0.7 per-     year, with the Dow and S&P                                        cent. Utilities and telecom-
was halting operations at           snap an eight-day trad-         cent, to 16,516.22. The        500 index off about 5 per-                                        munications services stocks
a gold mine at Skouries, on         ing slump for the Nasdaq        Standard & Poor’s 500 in-      cent, while the Nasdaq is                                         fell.
the Halkidiki peninsula, one        composite, which is heavily     dex added 15.01 points,        down 6.4 percent.                                                 Chipmaker Intel added
of four major Greek sites           weighted with technology        or 0.8 percent, to 1,938.68.   Trading looked to take a                                          62 cents, or 2 percent, to
where the company is in-            stocks.                         The Nasdaq composite           more positive turn early                                          $32.68, while and Apple
volved.                             Energy stocks slumped as        climbed 47.93 points, or 1     Tuesday as the major U.S.                                         gained $1.43, or 1.5 per-
CEO Paul Wright said a              much as 2 percent during        percent, to 4,685.92.          stock indexes opened high-                                        cent, to $99.96. Among
further 500 jobs were also          the day, then recovered         Investors have been wres-      er and oil prices rose. That                                      health care compa-
likely to be cut later in the       in late trading to eke out a    tling with fears about a       trend didn’t last, as oil pric-                                   nies, UnitedHealth Group
year.                               slight gain.                    protracted slowdown in         es turned lower once more,                                        climbed 2.4 percent, the
Wright accused the gov-             Crude oil prices declined       China’s economy and the        weighing on energy stocks.                                        biggest gainer in the Dow
ernment of holding up per-          for the seventh day in a        potential fallout for corpo-   The market looked like it                                         Jones industrial average. It
mits and using the mining           row, the longest losing         rate earnings. Uncertainty     was headed for a lower                                            added $2.68 to $112.26.
project as a “political toy”        streak since July 2014. Oil     about Beijing’s ability to     close before it reversed                                          Energy stocks rose 0.4 per-
but insisted the company            has now fallen nearly 18        manage its financial mar-      course in the final hour of                                       cent. The sector remains
had no plans to pull out of                                                                                                                                          down 8.5 percent this year.
Greece and hoped to re-                                                                                                                                              U.S. crude oil fell 97 cents,
start work at Skouries at a                                                                                                                                          or 3.1 percent, to $30.44 a
later date.                                                                                                                                                          barrel in New York. Brent
“It’s not dissimilar to build-                                                                                                                                       crude, a benchmark for in-
ing a kitchen and putting                                                                                                                                            ternational oils, fell 69 cents,
in the floor and furniture                                                                                                                                           or 2.2 percent, to $30.86 a
but not being allowed to                                                                                                                                             barrel in London.
put in a wall and roof over                                                                                                                                          Traders continued to take
it. It’s a bit silly,” Wright told                                                                                                                                   their cue from oil prices by
a news conference in Ath-                                                                                                                                            parting with stocks in ener-
ens.                                                                                                                                                                 gy and mining companies.
Wright said his company                                                                                                                                              Freeport-McMoRan lost 20
had invested $700 million                                                                                                                                            cents, or 4.6 percent, to
(645 million euros) and cre-                                                                                                                                         $4.11. Consol Energy shed
ated 2,000 jobs, but added                                                                                                                                           30 cents, or 4.3 percent, to
that it was willing to nego-                                                                                                                                         $6.70.
tiate royalty payments for                                                                                                                                           “The trading in oil is particu-
gold being extracted that                                                                                                                                            larly precarious, and be-
were not included in the                                                                                                                                             cause of that, everybody
original agreements made                                                                                                                                             is selling energy-related
with the Greek state.                                                                                                                                                stocks,” Kinahan said.q
Elected a year ago, the
leftwing government has             Wal-Mart’s Asda:
expressed support for pro-
test groups near Skouries           More price cuts to come as grocery wars heat up 
who oppose the project
on environmental grounds            A. D’INNOCENZIO                 vestment ($1.44 billion) in    Tesco PLC, Sainsbury’s and                                        means that we must take
and fear it will hurt tourism.      AP Retail Writer                price cuts begun in 2013       Morrisons —have been cut-                                         radical action to win back
The protests included road          NEW YORK (AP) — It’s going      that Asda planned until        ting prices to respond to                                         our customers,” said Andy
blockades, violent con-             to be another challenging       late 2018.                     the increased competition                                         Clarke, Asda’s president
frontations with police and         year for supermarket retail-    Wal-Mart’s Asda also said      from Germany-based no-                                            and CEO in a statement.
a 2013 arson attack on El-          ers in the United Kingdom.      Sunday it has joined the       frills discounters Aldi and                                       ASDA is expected to re-
dorado facilities at Skou-          Wal-Mart’s United Kingdom       European Marketing Dis-        Lidl. The German discount-                                        lease fourth-quarter figures
ries.                               operation Asda, is investing    tribution, which pools the     ers offer sharp discounts                                         next month when Wal-Mart
Environment Minister Panos          another 500 million pounds      collective buying power of     every day but with limited                                        announces results. Asda
Skoutletis said Wright had          ($721.9 million) in price cuts  250 supermarket chains, so     assortment.                                                       saw a key sales figure —
made the announcement               as the grocery discount         it can realize the savings.    “There is currently no                                            revenue at stores open at
after rescheduling meet-            wars escalate.                  The moves come as Asda         growth in the food market,                                        least a year — fall 4.6 per-
ings with the government            The investment is on top of     and the country’s other top    and the rise of the limited-                                      cent in the third quarter.q
for later in the week.q             the one billion pound in-       traditional grocery rivals —   assortment discounters
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