Archive

BY PHILIP FINE

THE US Sarbanes-Oxley Act has netted its first company, a small-town Virginia bank holding firm Cardinal Bankshares, ordered to hire back its chief financial officer. It sacked David Welch after he raised concerns over the company’s alleged practices of insider trading, faulty internal controls and financial reporting irregularities.…

BY PHILIP FINE

THE RECENT announcement of an investigation of Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company by US security regulators can be traced to faulty implementation of new accounting software, says the company. The Securities and Exchange Commission launched a formal investigation February 5 into the company’s accounting problems.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
A USA Court of Appeals decision has dealt a blow to California’s wine industry by ruling that the state of New York may ban out-of-state wine producers from selling directly to local residents. The ruling, which reverses a previous lower court decision, says New York could require wineries to establish a local distributor, (even if it is just a shop), before being allowed to ship wine to consumers.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has launched a formal state aid inquiry in Germany, examining the waiver of Euro 5 million on loans paid to GfW (Palatinate Wine Marketing Company) by the Reconstruction Fund for the Rhineland-Palatinate winegrowing area (WAK).…

BY MONICA DOBIE
AMERICAN spirit producers are toning their marketing muscles these days because of the broader scope for advertising they have enjoyed since the end of a prohibition-hangover induced 50-year self-imposed ban on electronic media advertising.

It has only been since 1996 – when this Seagram defied this moratorium – that distillers have been able to realise this advertising potential.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE
DRAFT safety regulations regarding the production of all carbonated drinks have been agreed by India’s Central Council of Food Standards (CCFS). The move follows concern sparked last year about the detection of pesticide residues in colas. The council said that the new draft covered soft drinks, with separate standards being drawn up for fruit juices and other beverages.…

BY ALAN OSBORN, IN LONDON
expressions” to sell their products in the EU provided they meet a number

of conditions including a requirement that the traditional expression is

“distinctive”, is recognised and governed in the third country and has been

used for at least ten years.…

KEITH NUTHALL
AN ACTION plan has been launched by the European Commission to help African developing countries export cotton and cope with price fluctuations in the market. The scheme involves Brussels supporting new financial instruments and commodity risk insurance schemes, to supply investment and cushion price changes, amongst other measures.…

KEITH NUTHALL
AUSTRALIA and the United States have agreed to mutually remove tariffs on textile and clothing traded between them, with duties on products meeting set rules of origin standards being phased out within 15 years. This, said a US Trade Representative Office note on a new American-Australian free trade deal, would “promote new opportunities for US and Australian fibre, yarn, fabric and apparel manufacturing.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED States and Australia have struck a free trade deal that will ease access into the US market for Australian wool exporters. A note from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said: “For our wool industry, an industry priority of zero tariff for greasy wool, a premier Australian export industry, will be achieved within four years, and for other wool items within 10 years.”…