OMV Petrom proposes its shareholders a dividend worth a minimum 30% for this year, says a release sent to Bucharest Stock Exchange. “OMV Petrom currently targets, subject to adverse developments in the external market, a proposed dividend from the 2016 net earnings of a minimum of 30% in the case it is fully covered by the Company’s free cash flows before dividends,” reads the release. ”The above should not be considered an amendment of the Company’s existing Dividend Policy, which will remain unchanged, but only a further detailing of the general principles with respect to 2016 only.” Starting the 2017 financial year and beyond, unless otherwise approved, the general principles under the Company’s existing Dividend Policy will remain unchanged and applicable, as follows: “OMV Petrom S.A. (the Company) is committed to deliver a competitive shareholder return through the business cycle, including paying an attractive dividend, subject always to maintaining a strong balance sheet that will enable the Company to finance its investment needs and to the shareholders’ approval.” OMV Petrom recorded a consolidated net profit of EUR 26 million in the second quarter of this year, down by 83% compared to the same period of 2015. The group’s consolidated sales declined by 20% in the three months ended June 31, 2016, to EUR 807 million.

 French president, Francois Hollande, will inaugurate the Airbus plant in Ghimbav on September 13th, according to sources close to the investors. According to Serge Durand, the CEO of Airbus Helicopters Industries, the first helicopter made in Ghimbav will only be delivered at the end of 2017, but starting with September 2016, the plant will become functional and operational. The company intends to bring in other projects to Braşov if the H215 project proves to be successful.   Serge Durand said: "For now, we have concluded a protocol with Romanian airlines- IAR Ghimbav, Aerostar, Aerotech and Turbomecanica - to become suppliers for the helicopter that will be manufactured in Romania, which will be entirely made out of parts manufactured in Romania".   Serge Durand also stated that Ghimbav will first of all manufacture the civilian version of H215, with production of the military version to be transferred in a few years from the factory in France to the one in Braşov. Moreover, in 2019, Durand hopes that over 30 Romanian engineers will be working on the design of the helicopters that will be manufactured in Ghimbav, with the company intending to develop an R&D center in Romania. The amount of the total investment in the new Airbus Helicopters project in Ghimbav is 55.7 million Euros, of which the aid of the Romanian state is a maximum of 5.2 million Euros. "We will reach 350 employees at the plant of in 2019, when we are going to start manufacturing 15 H215 helicopters a year", Durand further said.   Guillaume Faury, CEO Airbus Helicopters, said that in Ghimbav will be assembled the H215 helicopter, the latest member of the H aircraft family of the German French group, the "smaller" brother of H225. H215 is an advanced variant of the former AS332 Cie/L1e helicopter, which would be sold at "accessible prices", because "the costs are low".  Airbus Helicopters, a division of Airbus Group, offers solutions for civilian and military helicopters all over the world. The company has an operational fleet of approximately 12,000 helicopters operated by over 3,000 customers in approximately 154 countries. Airbus Helicopters has over 22,000 employees all over the world and has generated a revenue of 6.8 billion Euros in 2015. 

Fiica cea mica a fostului presedinte Traian Basescu, Elena Basescu, si Bogdan Ionescu au divortat, anuntul fiind facut pe contul de Facebook al Elenei Basescu, scrie News.ro. Cei doi au precizat ca separarea s-a facut "de comun acord si de maniera amiabila".

"Familia Ionescu - Basescu, de comun acord si de maniera amiabila, a decis sa puna punct casniciei incepute in 2012. Separarea se produce prin procedura notariala. In acest moment, locuim deja separat", se arata intr-un mesaj postat pe contul de Facebook al Elenei Basescu, dar semnat atat de ea, cat si de catre Bogdan Ionescu.

Ei isi exprima speranta ca reprezentantii mass media "vor da dovada de intelegere" si le vor respecta "intimitatea si dreptul la viata personala".

"Acesta este singurul comentariu pe care il vom face pe acest subiect", mai precizeaza cei doi.

Elena Basescu si Bogdan Ionescu s-au casatorit pe 1 septembrie 2012. La exact un an de la casatorie, s-a nascut primul lor copil, Sofia Anais Ionescu Basescu.

In 31 ianuarie 2015, s-a nascut al doilea copil al cuplului, un baietel, botezat Traian, dupa numele bunicului sau. 

You can see the oil industry's woes for yourself, at anchor in the Firth of Forth. Very Large Crude Carriers are parked off the coast of East Lothian until the price rises, full of North Sea oil recently loaded through the Hound Point terminal.  Onshore storage facilities are full. You can see other tankers at rest and laden with the crude stuff off the coasts of Suffolk and Cornwall.   The gamble made by oil traders is that the cost of storing oil in these tankers - two million barrels in each of the larger ones - is less than the gain to be made out of waiting to sell it.  But industry hopes of a rise in the oil price have been dashed time and time again over the past two years.  Other consequences can be seen over the horizon, on Shell platforms, where Wood Group maintenance workers are back on strike this coming week, in protest at the sharp cut to their pay.  Others have protested at the change to rotas, shifting from two-week turnarounds to three-weeks. The consequences were also clear from another grim week for the oil and gas industry, as the majors unloaded their half year results.  The message was consistent, and no reassurance to those offshore workers facing diminished pay and conditions - the cost-cutting goes on.  As the results were published, the oil price fell yet again. Brent crude fell below $43, down 20% from a peak it reached in early June.  With global supply still buoyant, the short-term expectation is for a continued fall, even if those tankers at anchor in the Forth are a sign of expectations that the price will pick up again before too long.  In Britain, it is no compensation for the oil industry that the dollar value appear more attractive in pounds, following the weakening of sterling. The industry thinks, invests, accounts and reports in US dollars. The exchange rate becomes an issue when it reaches the customer.  That rise in the sterling price for a given dollar rate represents the increased cost, for those who earn and invest and buy their fuel in pounds - businesses and households alike.

Six investors, including American funds Apollo Global Management and KKR, are interested in the platform that will manage non-performing loans of approximately 9 billion Euros of the portfolio of "Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena" SpA, sources quoted by Reuters claim. They also state that "Monte dei Paschi" has informed the potential bidders that the deal concerning the platform will go ahead, even though with slightly different terms than initially. The oldest bank in Italy is selling its 27.7 billion Euros non-performing loan portfolio as part of a complex scheme for the securitization of loan, as part of its complex rescue plan.
"Monte dei Paschi" is working together with Italian investment bank "Mediobanca" on creating a platform that would manage the NPL portfolio and to bring in a partner that would improve the debt collection activity. "Monte dei Paschi" has announced on Friday that the platform would manage 9 billion Euros in NPLs, meaning one third of the loans sold as part of the aforementioned scheme. According to sources, the bidders for the "Monte dei Paschi" platform are Cerved Credit Management, KKR in tandem with Varde Partners, Apollo Global Management, Cerberus, Prelios - together with Christofferson Robb & Company - and Lone Star. The "Monte dei Paschi" officials and those of the other parties mentioned made no statements about the report by Reuters.

The reaction of NBR counselor Cristian Bichi, who posted on the NBR website the following clarifications, is increasingly important for BURSA's readers, because the "bail-in" subject (which BURSA has been debating since 2013) has been heavily debated in the comments section. One of the readers who stands out among the commenters on the bursa.ro website (through his competence and information), who uses the nickname Cristi C, argues, (with documented evidence) that the "bail-in" operation will not be applied in Romania. Cristian C. Bichi, is also about to convince us, right now, that the transposition in the Romanian legislation of the European Directive for the Resolution of Banks and Investment firms - in short the "Bail-in law" - does not endanger small depositors, neither Romanians nor those in other European countries: 
"The equivalence between the internal recapitalization and the seizure of the bank deposits of the population (the retirees' money is also being mentioned in this context, claiming that it is at risk) is also incorrect. Such an approach is mistaken, because nothing would happen to guaranteed deposits (those below 100,000 Euros - per depositor and per bank - protected by the Fund for the Guarantee of Bank Deposits), regardless of whether they belong to individuals or to companies".

The US Federal Reserve’s retreat from four rate rises this year has had a catalytic effect, reviving the fortunes of emerging markets and once again lifting the Sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of those who have borrowed $11 trillion in dollars outside US jurisdiction.

The Fed is in effect acting as the central bank for the whole world, giving a shot in the arm to an international financial system that is has never been so tightly-linked to the dollar or to US borrowing costs – at least since the end of the Gold Standard.  The Japanese are launching a giant fiscal package – in theory 5.7pc of GDP – while France, Italy, and other eurozone states have taken advantage of the Brexit scare to end austerity more quickly than planned and to prime pump their economies. The net effect is double-barrelled monetary and fiscal stimulus across the world probably overwhelms any of the inchoate and mostly political worries stemming from Brexit – at least in the short-term. It is hard to see what can now justify Morgan Stanley’s decision to raise its risk probability of global recession over the next year to 40pc after the referendum.

Counter Balance and its partner CEE Bankwatch have launched a new report exploring corruption cases in Romania’s third largest company. The Oltenia Energy Complex (OEC) is a key player in the energy sector in Romania and today operates ten lignite mines and four power plants. Supposed recipient of a EUR 200 million loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD),  OEC stands out for a long list of corruption scandals collected in the last decade. Focusing mainly on the dodgy contracts signed by the company with the Șova and Associates law firm, the report shows a repeated history of state capture practices, involving prominent figures of the Romanian political panorama such as Dan Șova and Victor Ponta, members of the national Parliament, but also local officials.  Although, after fierce protests by civil society, the EU public money did not reach the Romanian company, it is worth remembering the Oltenia Energy Complex case as one to draw some lessons from. Alexandru Mustață, author of the report, claims: “It is crucial that large infrastructure financiers better investigate companies before doing business with them, and monitor them from that moment onwards”. Xavier Sol, director of Counter Balance, underlines: “Such cases of state capture should alert infrastructure financiers like the EBRD to aim for transparency of both the loaner and the loaned as an essential part of the due diligence practice public banks have to conduct”.

A suitcase filled with multiple passports?  That’s not just the stuff of spy movies anymore. Increasingly, a growing number of high-net worth individuals are looking to have a passport portfolio. This has led to a proliferation of so-called citizenship-by-investment or economic citizenship programs that allow individuals from all over the world to legitimately acquire passports. The wealthy, especially in emerging market economies, see buying citizenship or residency rights as a means of greater global mobility (visa free travel in many countries), tax planning, and family security.  In exchange, countries administering such programs receive significant financial inflows into their economies.  Indeed, offering citizenship in return for investment has been a “win-win” for some small Caribbean states. The substantial inflows of funds from these programs have helped boost employment and growth. Inflows to the public sector alone in St. Kitts and Nevis had grown to nearly 25 percent of GDP as of 2013. Now more and more countries have joined the game. While all well and good, these countries face the critical challenge of preserving the credibility of their citizenship programs and weeding out the risks to governance and sustainability. In addition, small countries may also confront sizeable macro-challenges in managing large inflows.

Co-financing has represented the main issue in accessing European funding between 2007 and 2013, Agriculture minister Achim Irimescu said, and he stressed that it is essential for Romania to focus on resolving this issue.  He said: "We should have focused on what could be done when it comes to the absorption of European funds, since back in the 2007-2013 period. Romania has already uncommitted almost one billion Euros, as well as many hundred million Euros in corrections and penalties. Even though we have had a good absorption rate, I cannot say that I am pleased with the way things have evolved. We have done all we can for things to improve where absorption is concerned. I have made it may goal to simplify the accession procedures as much as possible". The Minister of Agriculture has mentioned that the Agency for the Financing of Rural Investments (AFIR) has made a big mistake in being "too forgiving" with the beneficiaries of funds, and thus they have canceled projects amounting to 800 million Euros last year as they did not have the money for co-financing. "I think we shouldn't have been so lenient", the minister said, and he added: "Our beneficiaries have not had money for co-financing. In this context, the AFIR shouldn't have been so lenient on those who did not pay on time. The agency should have terminated the contracts of those who have been late in the payment of co-financing and allow other applicants to access the funds".

 Having come into effect almost a month ago, the Law of giving in payment continues to produce tensions, controversies, as well as hilarious situations, as officials of respectable institutions continue to contradict over its effects.  After the uncertainty on whether debtors would need to pay taxes on giving away their homes under the giving in payment procedure, contradictory statements over the number of notifications that the customers have sent to banks have appeared. A major blunder, which would be funny if it weren't pathetic, was made yesterday by the National Bank of Romania itself, which distanced itself from the statements made by Eugen Rădulescu, the head of the NBR's Financial Stability department - according to whom about 4,000 notifications have been made so far -, and stated that those were his personal estimates.  In other words, Mr. Rădulescu should be praised for being the only one who succeeded in doing, using his "personal" tools, what banks, notaries and lawyers couldn't - estimate how many giving in payment requests have been made. Congratulations for personally having what to make these measurements with and also congratulations for personally being in charge of making these estimates, because the Central bank doesn't have that in its job description, according to the response it sent us, through the Mass-media Division, the Communication Office. The clarifications made yesterday by the NBR, after the conference in which Eugen Rădulescu spoke, are as follows: "The number of notifications sent to banks by customer based on the Law no. 77/2016 mentioned today, 08.06.2016, by Mr. Eugen Rădulescu represents his personal estimate. That data is not official data from the NBR.  It bears mentioning that according to the law, the NBR is not tasked with processing data about the notifications filed by debtors.  We also mention that the National Bank of Romania doesn't currently hold data concerning the extinguishment of the obligations undertaken through loans as a result of the application of the Law no. 77/2016".  Mr. Florin Dănescu, the executive chairman of the Romania Banking Association (ARB), said: "We do not have, we have not requested or received information about the giving in payment notifications. We have our own concerns. We hope that this law will not embolden far too much those who can pay, but no longer want to. Only the NBR has these statistics, which it monitors, but it is premature to make them public. We are carefully watching the communication of this issue, because we do not want to increase the risk, through our statements".

     The head of the Financial Stability Department of the NBR yesterday said, in a seminar which was held at the Romanian Banking Institute (IBR): "Since 2013 we have reentered a positive trend, both when it comes to real estate assets, as well as net financial assets. I am afraid that 2016 will not continue that trend. I expect that in the second half of the year the value of real estate assets will continue to drop, if we are going to still have the Law of giving in payment in effect. The market will be depressed, it will go into a compression process, which will lead to the drop of the value of all the real estate assets. Not everyone is looking to sell their home right now, except there is a psychological factor that matters and which unfortunately will continue to manifest itself, meaning that we will notice that we are less rich because all the apartments and all of the real estate assets which we have aren't worth what they were. It won't be a significant compression. We anticipate that it will stop between 5-10%, but think that this means quite a lot compared to the total of the real estate assets. So far, the number of those who have asked to hand in the keys to their homes under the Law of giving in payment is about 4,000 people. 4,000 versus 10 million holders of real estate assets. This is the major achievement of this law".  According to Mr. Rădulescu, this legislative initiative will cost all of us dearly: "Someone may win some elections based on these things, assuming by the time the elections come around people don't wake up and realize they stand only to lose from this".

Romania will certainly see its sovereign rating downgraded, if another "wacky thing" like the law of giving in payment shows up, the head of the NBR said, and he went on to say: "A potential cut of the rating will put additional pressure on the borrowing cost. We are currently doing very good in that regard, because we have both a favorable international situation with high liquidity, as well as a favorable position in the eyes of investors, of the Romanian economy. If we get close to the 3% public deficit threshold this year, and we will, then that will mean a warning signal for investors and if measures to reverse that trend aren't taken immediately after the elections, then things may not look good at all. If we pass the 3% level in 2017, then we will do so by a lot, because the refinancing of the foreign debt will cost us a lot". Romania has a BBB-/BBB rating, with a stable outlook, from Fitch, a Baa3 rating (investment grade) from Moody's and a BBB minus with a stable outlook from StandardPoor's. (sourcebursa.ro)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

Delegates from Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Montenegro, Netherlands, Spain, Romania and the United Kingdom descended on Barcelona on the 26th of May for the 2nd edition of the Euromat Gaming Summit. The international audience were treated to insights from some of Europe's leading operators as well as a panel discussion with regulators from Spain, Italy, Belgium and the European Commission.  Commenting on the event, Eduardo Antoja, President of Euromat said: "My main conclusion from today's panel discussions is that land-based gaming continues to be the bigger segment of the gaming industry, representing almost 70% of players' expenditure. It will continue to be the first choice for many years provided that regulation keeps pace with technological, social and economic reality. Today Euromat confirmed that it's not just a great representative body for our industry, it's a think tank for our sector". Euromat confirmed that the next edition of the Euromat Gaming Summit will take place in Berlin, Germany in 2017. 

The GDP growth of emerging markets is set to fall from 4.4pc last year to just 4.2pc in 2016, before rising to 4.8pc in the following year. These economies have in recent years served as the engines of global growth.  Moody’s said weak oil commodity prices and falling demand for exports could also  drag on the world economy.  Growth forecasts for Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Turkey have been slashed. All are emerging market economies which have been at the sharp end of the commodities rout. It is thought that their weakness will have knock-on effects for the world’s advanced economies.

Despite the effective tax cut offered by low oil prices to importers of the commodity, the turmoil that engulfed financial markets at the beginning of the year will be enough to prompt a slowdown among advanced G20 markets this year, Moody’s believes. 

The rating agency expects the GDP of advanced major economies to rise by 1.7pc this year, compared with a 1.9pc increase in 2015. Elena Duggar, a Moody’s associate managing director, said advanced economies had failed to return to the growth rates enjoyed before the recession, as they have done historically following economic busts.  Ms Duggar said that the factors pulling down on global growth “may prove to be enduring, and global real GDP growth will remain low for some years”. She added that while “financial market volatility from earlier in the year has abated, it showed that the risks of weaker growth scenarios have become more tangible”.  “The global recovery has weakened further and prospects across countries remain uneven and generally weaker than over the past two decades. In addition, global trade remains subdued, while spillovers from emerging markets shocks to financial markets globally have increased substantially.” Moody’s anticipates that oil prices, currently just below $50 a barrel, will average $33 across 2016, before rising to an average of $39 in the following year. Alongside the commodity slump, the ratings agency warned that the possibility of higher US interest rates and the risk of a more severe slowdown in China could further darken the outlook.

 

Austrian authorities pushed to extend their internal border control checks to include all of Italy but were shot down by other EU states.  The Council, representing member states, on Thursday (12 May), agreed to extend existing border control checks in Austria, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway for another six months. Member states approved a recommendation by the EU commission to extend existing checks because of "deficiencies" in the protection of EU external borders in Greece.  The recommendation authorised Austria to continue checks at its borders with Hungary and Slovenia.  Two EU officials confirmed Vienna had at an EU ambassadors meeting on Wednesday attempted to expand the scope of its existing controls to also include Italy. "The question came from Austria: 'What about all of our borders, what about our border with Italy? Can we not use controls there?' The commission said ‘No' and the council said ‘No'," said the EU official.  Another EU official said Austria had also attempted it "but didn't get support".  A diplomat in Brussels said the Austrians had wanted to have some flexibility, but the EU commission insisted the extension would only apply to checks already in place.

Austria's interior minister Wolfgang Sobotka in April had threatened to seal the border at the Brenner Pass with Italy over fears refugees would seek to enter from Italy.  Plans are in place to erect a 370 metre chain-link fence with four checkpoints on the Alpine highway that links the two nations.  The plan is to be ready to put into practice a border management like between Austria and Slovenia, if necessary," noted a diplomat.  Italy's prime minister Matteo Renzi has critised any barrier along the pass by the Austrians as "flagrantly against European rules, as well as against history, against logic and against the future".  But the move by Austria point to growing fears in Vienna that a sudden influx of people will cross from Libya into Italy over the summer months. Austria can invoke a different set of rules under the Schengen Borders Code to impose controls with Italy, should it so choose.   "They [Austria] can unilaterally introduce controls for eight months if they are proportionate and justified by the evidence," noted the EU official. EU law allows member states to impose a two-month control in unforeseen circumstances if there is an emergency. It can then impose another six months for foreseen circumstances. The EU commissioner for migration Dimitris Avramopoulos has no desire to see any controls at the Brenner pass.  Last week, he sent a letter to the Austrian authorities outlining EU rules on the matter. I have sent a letter that we do not agree with the introduction of border controls or border checks," Avramopoulos told euro-deputies in Strasbourg on Wednesday.  The existing internal controls in Austria, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway will be maintained despite a dramatic drop in the flow of refugees into Europe when compared to April and May last year. The move to extend the checks was launched following an unannounced visit by experts from the EU border agency Frontex to verify Greek border controls last November.

They said Greece had "serious deficiencies" on how it manages its borders, posing a larger existential threat over the entire passport-free Schengen area. The threat gave the EU the legal basis to prolong the checks. Greece, for its part, denies that it cannot manage its own borders and notes it has met some 43 out of 50 recommendations from the EU commission to plug the gaps.

 FT notes that even though China's debt generates fears, more worrisome is the speed it has been accrued at. If it has now reached 237% of the GDP, at the end of 2007, China's debt was 148% of the GDP. "Every major country that has rapid increases in debt has faced either a financial crisis, or an extended slowdown of the growth of the GDP", says Ha Jiming, chief investment strategist at "Goldman Sachs".  The IMF has recently warned that the Asian country is posing an increasingly higher risk to the developed economies, due to the size of its debt and the ties it has with the global financial marketing.  According to specialists, it is difficult for any economy to productively use such a volume of capital over the short term, due to the limited number of profitable projects.   As the investments' returns decrease, even more loans are at risk of becoming non-performing, according to FT.   Economists feel that China's health is at risk, but their opinions on the country's future vary. One of the extreme scenarios is an acute crisis - a "Lehman" moment which will resemble the one in the US in 2008, when that bank collapsed, and other lenders crashed, paralyzing the market. Other economists estimate a chronic slump in China, as has been happening in Japan, where economic growth has been stagnant for years.

The EPP Group has called on the European Commission to strengthen an effective trade defence instrument to guarantee the protection of EU industry from dumped imports from China. The Group's Resolution stresses that as long as China does not meet the five criteria required by the EU to qualify as a market economy, the EU should use non-standard methodology in anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations on Chinese imports in the determination of price comparability.  At the same time, during today's plenary debate on China's market economy status, the EPP Group Spokesman in the International Trade Committee, Daniel Caspary MEP, called on the European Council to stop the blockade on the Trade Defence Instruments legislation: "The strategic partnership with China is extremely important to us, regardless of whether China is considered to have a market economy or not, because it obviously doesn't. At the same time, there are hundreds of thousands of European people working in the steel industry who are very worried about their jobs. We must act urgently for them to make sure that EU trade instruments are boosted. Jobs are important for the EPP Group; the European industry is important and we want to protect it", said Caspary.

"I am surprised that the European Commission has not yet presented a solution as to how the EU should comply with WTO rules already agreed on 15 years ago. This is not five minutes to twelve, it is five minutes past and we are still waiting. The big question is if there is any chance of passing new laws before it is too late", stressed the EPP Group's Deputy Spokesman in the International Trade Committee, Christofer Fjellner MEP, responsible for the Trade Defence Instruments legislation.

The European Parliament Standing Rapporteur on China, Iuliu Winkler MEP, stressed that the EU strategic partnership with China must be based on reciprocity and mutual benefits: "Any decision on the market economy status of China in anti-dumping investigations should be in full compliance with WTO norms. Automatic recognition of the market economy status of China is not a valid option, so we ask the European Commission to identify viable trade defence instruments that can be applied to protect the steel industry and other industries against unfair competition and dumping. We believe that dialogue with China and other partners in the WTO will lead to identifying the best solutions to be applied to strategic partners in the mutual interest of the EU and China."

Scientists now believe that many diseases and conditions, are triggered or exacerbated by changes in gut bacteria.  A decade ago, Washington University discovered that adding gut microbes from obese mice to thin mice caused huge gains in weight, a finding which has been replicated many times.  “Being able to cast light on this microbial 'Dark matter' has implications for the whole of biology and how we consider health.”   But the new research suggests that those microbes can live outside of the body and be ingested, potentially upsetting populations of healthy bacteria in the gut and triggering disease.  Intriguingly it could explain why some illnesses run in families. Far from being simply genetic, family members could be picking up conditions through close contact or sharing bathrooms.  Spores are a form of bacterial hibernation which allow species to remain dormant for long periods of time. It is the first time that scientists have considered that transmission of disease might be possible through gut bacteria…Dr Trevor Lawley, who led the new study at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, said the conditions like obesity and Inflammatory Bowel Disease, which includes Crohn’s Disease and Colitis, could be passed on.  “I think there are definitely disease that are caused by an imbalance in microbiotia. If you look at something like Inflammatory Bowel Disease. Or obesity, that’s a possibility.

Hopes the Opec exporters' club and other major producers including Russia would agree to freeze output at Sunday's talks in Doha helped scrape oil prices off the 13-year lows they touched in February.  But the commodity tanked this morning after kingpin Saudi Arabia walked away from the talks, which many hoped would ease a huge surplus in world supplies, because of a boycott by its rival Iran.  US benchmark West Texas Intermediate for May delivery was down 4.9pc at $38.37. Brent crude, the global benchmark, lost 4.6pc to $41.13.  Energy firms were the biggest losers, with Sydney-listed mining giant BHP Billiton down 3pc, Rio Tinto off 1.6pc and Woodside Petroleum down 1.4pc.  "Expectations for the talks to end with an agreement were high, and the lack of one damaged the credibility of future meetings to support the oil market," said Bernard Aw, market strategist at IG Markets Singapore.  Sanjeev Gupta, an oil and gas analyst at EY, told AFP that failure in Doha "revived price collapse fears especially after Saudi Arabia hardened its stance and threatened to raise production quickly if no freeze deals were reached".  Peter Lee, an oil and gas analyst BMI Research, warned oil price losses could reach 15pc.  "What is clear coming out of this is that Opec would no longer be the main driver of oil prices," Mr Lee told AFP.  Angus Nicholson, also of IG Markets, said geopolitics was behind the failure of the talks.  "With Saudi Arabia fighting proxy wars with Iran in Yemen and Syria/Iraq, it is understandable that they had little inclination to freeze their own production and make way for newly sanctions-free Iran to increase their market share," he said.  Major exporters from Nigeria to Venezuela, and even Saudi Arabia, have suffered billions of dollars in lost revenue as prices have slumped from levels above $100 touched in mid-2014.

But Iran, which only recently returned to world oil markets after the lifting of nuclear-linked Western sanctions in January, has ruled out capping its own production as it seeks to regain market share.

"The market share battle is expected to rage on as the failure of the oil-freeze pact could set off another price drop," Mr Gupta said.  Opinion had been split over whether a deal on Sunday would be enough to tackle the global oversupply, which is also due to slowing demand in major consumer China and burgeoning US shale production.

Ever since the first Greek 'bailout' program was signed, in May 2010, the IMF has been violating its own "primary directive": the obligation not to fund insolvent governments. As a result, the IMF's leadership has been facing a revolt from its staff members who demand an exit strategy arguing that, if the EU continues to obstruct the debt relief necessary to restore the solvency of the Greek government, the IMF should leave the Greek program.  Five years on, this IMF-EU impasse continues, causing a one-third collapse of Greek GDP and fuelling hopelessness to a degree that has made real reform harder than ever.   Back in February 2015, when I first met Poul Thomsen (the IMF's European chief) in a Paris hotel, a fortnight after assuming Greece's finance ministry, he appeared even keener than I was to press for a debt write off: "At a minimum", he told me "€54 billion of Greece's debt left over from the first 'bailout' should be written off immediately in exchange for serious reforms."  This was music to my ears, and made me keen to discuss what he meant by "serious reforms". It was a discussion that never got formally off the ground as Germany's finance minister vetoed all discussion on debt relief, debt swaps (which were my compromise proposal), indeed any significant change to the failed program.

The EU has grown steadily from its six founding members to 28 countries. Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands signed up to the EEC, or Common Market in 1957. Britain, Ireland and Denmark joined in the first wave of expansion in 1973, followed by Greece in 1981 and Portugal and Spain five years later. Eastern Germany joined after unification and Austria, Finland and Sweden became part of the EU in 1995. The biggest enlargement came in 2004 when 10 new member countries joined. Romania and Bulgaria joined in 2007 and Croatia was latest to sign up in 2013. The EEC started out as a trading bloc - with free movement of goods and services within the Common Market - now its interests include reducing regional inequalities, preserving the environment, promoting human rights and investing in education and research.

The EU is Britain's biggest trading partner. British citizens are free to work in any EU country and EU funding is spent on supporting farmers, boosting jobs in the UK, redeveloping rundown areas, and grants for university research. The EU has contributed to cheaper travel by challenging monopolies and boosting competition. It has reduced the cost of mobile data roaming and set water quality standards in Europe.  But giving subsidies to farmers led to over-supply of some crops and so the EU was forced to rethink its agriculture policy. Critics say the EU has taken too much power from the member governments, its regulations are costly to the members economy and without them, Countries like Britain would be able to sign other trade deals with growing economies like China and India. They also say that the EU wastes taxpayers’ money on excessive bureaucracy - citing MEPs monthly trips to Strasbourg which cost 180m euros (£136m) per year.