World’s most durable material

South Korea’s Samsung General Chemical Co. Ltd. said recently it has developed a new material for high pressure water and gas pipes which is claims is the most durable and economical in the world.

The new polyethylene material, classified as PE 112 by international standards, can last more than 50 years and costs 60 percent less than steel and 30 percent less than existing plastic pipes, it said.

Samsung said it would register 11 patents worldwide for the material.

“Even the major petrochemical companies such as Hoechst of Germany and Solvay of Belgium have not yet achieved this class of material,” it said.

G7 publishes tax haven league table

The Group of Seven industrialised nations and four other countries have released a league table of the world’s tax havens, classifying them according to the quality of their financial regulation and supervision.

Hong Kong, Luxembourg, Singapore and Switzerland came out top of the list, judged as having a legal framework, level of supervision and cooperation with other authorities “largely of a good quality and better than in other offshore financial centre,” the Basel-based Financial Stability Forum (FSF) said recently operation as quickly as possible.”

Britain could join the Euro by 2002

The British economy is covering with the euro-zone and could be ready to join in two years, and the government is starting to move to sell the idea to business and the public, British media reported recently.

The reports followed a key study by the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) which said Britain was on course to become a more suitable member of the single currency than several countries already belonging to the euro-zone.

The sings of economic convergence have prompted a new message from Downing Street urging certain ministers to start putting the case more forcefully in favour of joining the single currency, newspaper reported.

The developments could bring vital new impetus to the stagnant debate on the euro in Britain. Prime Minister Tony Blair has hedged his bets on the issue thus far, while his Chancellor Gordon Brown has remained ultra cautious.

The Financial Times cited Treasury insiders as saying that if the current trend continues, Britain could be ready economically to join the euro by autumn 2002 early in the life of the next government.

British unemployment falls to new 20 year low

British unemployment fell for the 18th month in a row in May when 8,600 people left the jobless register, which now lists 1.109 million people, or 3.9 percent of the active population, official figures showed.

The office for national statistics also reported that average earnings in the three months to April increased by 5.1 percent, which was considerably lower than the 5.8 percent rise reported the previous month and below market forecasts of a 5.6 percent increase.

Analysts said that the data confirmed predictions that he Bank of England was likely to leave its interest rates unchanged for at least one or two months.

‘9% of software jobs in US to go unfilled’

About nine percent of software industry jobs in the United States will be unfilled this year, according to a survey of industry chief executives released recently.

The Business Software Alliance, made up of 18 tech companies including Microsoft, IBM and Intel, said its survey highlights chronic shortages faced by the industry that affect the overall economy.

“Not only is this a workforce problem but it also has a significant impact on the US ec dollars in prospective annual sales. For every job that goes unfilled, revenue to the company is lost, as well as the corresponding tax revenues.”

Master Card, Visa violate antitrust laws: US

The US government accused the Visa and MasterCard credit card networks of violating antitrust law and blocking competition through exclusionary tie ups with banks.

The outcome of the long anticipated trial that began recently could alter the shape of the massive US credit card industry, shake up the structures of Visa and MasterCard, and alter the way rivals like American Express do business. Visa and MasterCard, which control more than 75 percent of US credit card sales, do not truly compete with each other, Melvin Schwarz, the US Justice Department lawyer, told a packed courtroom in New York. They also thwart rivals, barring them from working with their member banks, he alleged.

In late 1998, the Justice Department sued Visa and MasterCard, which are owned and governed by major banks, accusing them of squelching product innovation and obstructing competition.

“The defendants’ exclusionary rules effectively bar banks and their customers from access to the other two competitors in the United States, thereby denying consumers access to credit and other products,” Schwarz said, referring to rivals American Express and Discover, a unit of Morgan Stanley.

“The government will show defendants have not bothered to innovate or have been slow, and continue to do so,” he added. Visa and MasterCard said they compete fiercely with each other, and that their policies have not stopped their rivals from reaching potential customers.