Germany's GSW sees some merit in Deutsche Wohnen tie-up

1 of 2. The logo of the GSW property firm is seen at its headquarters in Berlin, August 20, 2013. Deutsche Wohnen offered to buy rival property group GSW Immobilien for 1.75 billion euros ($2.3 billion) to expand in Berlin's booming real-estate market, as a tentative pick-up in Europe's economy attracts international investors.

Credit: Reuters/Thomas Peter

FRANKFURT | Mon Aug 26, 2013 5:07am EDT

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German residential landlord GSW Immobilien (GIBG.DE) said a proposed $2.3 billion takeover by rival Deutsche Wohnen (DWNG.DE) could make sense and it will make a decision after full details are published.

Deutsche Wohnen made the all-share offer for GSW last week to expand in Berlin's booming rental market and tap nascent interest from international investors.

The bidder plans to publish full offer documents after its extraordinary shareholder meeting scheduled for September 30, which will vote in the issue of new shares to fund the takeover.

The tie-up would increase Deutsche Wohnen's portfolio of flats by around 63 percent to more than 147,000, pushing it into second place behind market leader Deutsche Annington (ANNGn.DE) with 179,000 apartments.

"A combination of GSW and Deutsche Wohnen could make sense from an operational and an industry point of view," GSW said on Monday.

GSW, which is scrambling to rebuild its leadership after a shareholder rebellion forced out the chairman and chief executive last month, said the all-share nature of the bid required a particularly detailed assessment.

Some analysts have said Deutsche Wohnen may struggle to win GSW investors' support for a non-cash offer.

"GSW will thoroughly analyze the bidder's strategy and intentions, which have not yet been made public but which will need to be set out in the bidder's offer document," GSW said.

Deutsche Wohnen and GSW traded 0.1 percent lower at 0732 GMT. GSW has added 5.2 percent since the offer was made public, while Deutsche Wohnen has fallen 5.3 percent.

GSW said it hired Goldman Sachs (GS.N), Citigroup (C.N) and Dutch bank Kempen & Co to advise on the offer.

The company appointed its remaining executive board members Joerg Schwagenscheidt and Andreas Segal as co-CEOs on Friday. ($1 = 0.7493 euros)

(Writing by Ludwig Burger; Editing by Erica Billingham)

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Huge shortage of caregivers looms for baby boomers, report says

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Military’s handling of sex assault cases on trial at Naval Academy rape hearing

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Military’s handling of sex assault cases on trial at Naval Academy rape hearing By Melinda Henneberger and Annys Shin, E-mail the writers

She was too drained to go on, she said.

After four days and more than 20 hours of relentless questions about her medical history and motivations, her dance moves and underwear, the 21-year-old midshipman who has accused three former Naval Academy football players of raping her pleaded on Saturday for a day off from testimony. It was granted by the hearing’s presiding officer but not before the request triggered more skepticism from defense attorneys, who said the young woman was faking her exhaustion.

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“What was she going to be doing anyway?” asked Ronald “Chip” Herrington, one of the defense attorneys for Eric Graham, a 21-year-old senior from Eight Mile, Ala. “Something more strenuous than sitting in a chair? We don’t concede there’s been any stress involved.”

At a time when the military is under attack for how it handles sexual violence in its ranks, the proceedings underway at the Washington Navy Yard offer a case study on why women in uniform are so reluctant to report sexual assaults. The hearing highlights significant disparities between the way the military and civilian world treat accusers and the accused.

As many as 26,000 service members said they were the targets of unwanted sexual contact last year, but only 3,374 incidents of sexual assault were reported, the Pentagon said in May.

Those numbers were accompanied by several high-profile scandals earlier this year, including the decision of an Air Force general to overturn the conviction of a fighter pilot on sexual assault charges and the arrest of the Air Force officer in charge of sexual assault prevention in the alleged groping of a woman outside a Crystal City bar.

The result has been demands by some lawmakers to turn sexual assault investigations and prosecutions over to civilian authorities instead of leaving them in the hands of the military chain of command — a proposal that is expected to be debated in the Senate this fall.

Last month, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel approved new regulations aimed at providing more support to alleged victims of sexual assault, standardizing how each service handles cases, and making sure senior commanders learn about every reported incident. Hagel’s reforms will require that every presiding officer at what is known as an Article 32 hearing — the legal proceeding in the Naval Academy rape case — be a lawyer. But that won’t necessarily change how alleged victims are treated during those hearings.

An Article 32 is sometimes compared to a civilian grand jury proceeding because its purpose is to determine whether a trial, or court-martial in military parlance, is warranted. But legal experts say it differs in a number of ways, with looser procedural rules and open-ended cross-examinations that can be trial-like in nature and scathing in tone.

Roger Canaff, a former prosecutor who has helped the military improve its handling of sexual assault cases, said that no civilian court in any state in the country would allow the kind of questions that are routinely permitted at Article 32 hearings. The legal proceedings are so hard on women who allege sexual assault that “a lot of cases die there as a result,” said Canaff, who now works at End Violence Against Women International. “You hear questions that would be highly objectionable in a court-martial or any civilian hearing.”

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India's fiscal deficit target getting more challenging: Fitch

A clock is seen inside the lobby of the headquarters of Fitch Ratings headquarters in New York, February 6, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Brendan McDermid

MUMBAI | Mon Aug 26, 2013 3:56am EDT

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Fitch ratings said it was getting more challenging for India to meet its fiscal deficit target in the current fiscal year ending March 2014 with revenues slowing.

The rating agency is also monitoring India's growth, inflation, public finances and the current account deficit and its funding, analyst Art Woo said in a teleconference on Monday.

Fitch has a stable outlook on the 'BBB-' sovereign credit ratings. BBB- is the last rung on the ratings ladder above the so-called "junk" status that mainstream investors tend to avoid.

Last week, Fitch said India and Indonesia are not at immediate risk of credit rating downgrades, but warned it could act if the governments of these countries fail to calm current financial market tensions.

(Reporting by Suvashree Dey Choudhury and Neha Dasgupta; Editing by Prateek Chatterjee)

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India's ONGC to buy $2.64-billion stake in Anadarko Mozambique gas block

A worker examines the valve of a pump on an Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) well on the western Indian city of Ahmedabad March 1, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Amit Dave

MUMBAI/NEW YORK | Mon Aug 26, 2013 6:09am EDT

MUMBAI/NEW YORK (Reuters) - India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC.NS) has agreed to buy 10 percent in a gas field offshore Mozambique from Anadarko Petroleum Corp for $2.64 billion, as the explorer looks to offset diminishing supplies from domestic gas fields by buying overseas assets.

The purchase of U.S. oil company Anadarko's (APC.N) stake is the latest in a handful of overseas assets that ONGC Videsh, the overseas business unit of state-controlled ONGC, has bought in the last couple of years to boost India's energy needs.

In June, ONGC and state-run Oil India Ltd (OILI.NS) signed a deal to buy a 10 percent stake in a Mozambique gas field from Videocon Group (VEDI.NS) for $2.48 billion.

"There is a lot of energy demand and whatever volumes of gas we are able to bring to the country are of utmost significance," A. K. Srinivasan, ONGC's group general manager for finance, told Reuters. "Mozambique will be a big LNG hub for the future."

Anadarko said it would remain the operator of Area 1, with a working interest of 26.5 percent in the block, which is located in Mozambique's deepwater Rovuma Basin.

Recent discoveries have turned the Rovuma field into a major draw for global energy producers and boosted Mozambique's natural gas reserves to around 150 trillion cubic feet or enough to supply Japan, the world's top LNG importer, for 35 years.

Rovuma has the potential to become one of the world's largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) producing hubs by 2018, and is strategically located to supply gas to India at competitive prices.

SEEN CLOSING BY MARCH 2014

ONGC, which expects the cash transaction to close by March 2014, is likely to finance the deal through internal cash balance and fresh borrowings, Srinivasan said, adding that financing details would be finalized over the next few months.

The company's bonds were trading at marginally wider spreads on Monday, underperforming tightness in the market, and shares fell as much as 3.8 percent in the Mumbai market .NSEI that was trading flat, on worries about its higher debt levels.

Analysts expect ONGC's two recent acquisitions to lead to higher debt levels, although a credit downgrade is unlikely.

"Given current market conditions and uncertainty about India, financing may be a challenge and we think most of it will come from the bank market. That said, a potential bond activity cannot be ruled out," a U.S. bank said in a note.

STARVING FOR GAS

ONGC, which has struggled to maintain output from its ageing wells off India's west coast, will be interested in buying more overseas assets to feed the energy needs of Asia's third-largest economy, Srinivasan said, but declined to give details.

"The country is starving for gas, for our power development and any other development," he said.

Demand for gas in India far outstrips consumption, but prices have been kept low for strategic industries, deterring investment in the sector. India has few energy resources other than coal and is the world's fourth-biggest importer of fuel.

After Anadarko, which has been looking to focus more on its domestic assets, Japan's Mitsui & Co Ltd is the second-biggest holder in Mozambique's offshore Area 1 block, with a stake of 20 percent.

Indian state refiner Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL.NS) owns 10 percent while Thai state oil company PTT Exploration and Production PCL PTTE.BK has an 8.5 percent interest and Mozambique's state-owned ENH 15 percent.

Outbound announced deals involving Indian companies so far this year stand at $35.8 billion, compared to $62 billion last year and a record $70.3 billion in 2008, Thomson Reuters data shows.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAC.N) advised ONGC Videsh and Citigroup (C.N) advised Anadarko on the transaction.

(Reporting by Sumeet Chatterjee and Michael Erman; Additional reporting by Umesh Desai and Denny Thomas in HONG KONG; Editing by G Crosse and Clarence Fernandez)

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Perry ups ownership stake in J.C. Penney to 8.6 percent

n">(Reuters) - Hedge fund manager Richard Perry, already a big owner in J.C. Penney Co Inc (JCP.N), bought additional shares in the retailer on Friday, according to a regulatory filing made just days after the largest investor announced plans to sell his stake.

Perry Corp said it bought an additional 3 million shares of Plano, Texas-based Penney in a secondary offering for $12.90 a share and that it now owns 8.62 percent of the company.

Perry now ranks as Penney's second-largest investor after George Soros. Perry Corp did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

The announcement comes four days after William Ackman, whose Pershing Square Capital Management had been the largest shareholder, said he was exiting his entire 18 percent stake. Citigroup Inc (C.N) was offering the shares in the secondary market at $12.90 in a deal scheduled to close on Friday, Ackman said on Monday.

Penney shares were flat at $12.40 on Friday afternoon, having tumbled 37.3 percent since January as the company struggles to attract new customers after former chief executive Ron Johnson alienated many shoppers with plans to upgrade merchandise and streamline pricing strategies.

(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss in Boston; editing by Matthew Lewis)

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