Search Results for: Swiss

BY KEITH NUTHALL
SWISS pharmaceuticals giant Novartis’ acquisition of German generic medicine producer Hexal can go ahead, but only after a series of conditions imposed by the European Commission are met. Brussels has been concerned the takeover could cause competition problems regarding prescription calcitonins treating osteoporosis in Poland, over-the-counter topical anti-rheumatics in Germany and prescription anti-gout preparations in Denmark.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE SURVEILLANCE Authority of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA) has launched its own competition inquiry into business insurance services, in parallel with the investigation launched earlier this month by the European Commission. The EFTA probe will examine whether there are competition problems requiring immediate legal action or long-term reforms within the business insurance sectors of its member states Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
WHY have there been so few cross-border mergers and consolidations in the European Union (EU) insurance industry? According to a recent report by the European Commission, cross-border deals accounted for only about 20% of the total value of deals in the financial sector, including insurance, between 1999 and 2004.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice (ECJ) has thwarted an attempt by pharmaceutical manufacturers to crush a legal technicality that has prevented them enjoying full supplementary patent protection rights across the European Union (EU). The problem arose when Novartis AG and Cor Therapeutics Inc (now Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc.)…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE HOT topic in Gibraltar’s financial circles at present is Spain’s accusation that the Rock’s authorities have not been co-operating in the fight against money laundering. This is not an unfamiliar charge in the perpetual diplomatic row between Madrid and the British territory, but the latest airing of it has gained extra bite because of the enormous scale of the alleged crime, according to local newspaper reports, to run up to Euro 600 million and maybe more.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has moved to plug a gap in aviation safety rules that could have helped allow last year’s Flash Airlines disaster at Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, which killed 148 people, mostly European tourists.

It has proposed a regulation telling European Union (EU) member states to publish a list of air carriers they have banned from their airspace over safety concerns, or whose movements are restricted for the same reason.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

TRADE ministers have imposed a tight deadline on World Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiators to agree detailed goals of the industrial goods section of its Doha Development Round of liberalisation negotiations – April 30. This is the date by which an overall "modalities" agreement must be struck, which will say how much particular bands (by value) of tariffs must be reduced by all WTO member countries.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE INSTITUTIONS of the European Union (EU) always say they are getting a handle on the fraud that riddles their operations, but are they? Keith Nuthall looks at the latest annual report from EU fraud-fighters OLAF.

MEASURING fraud is notoriously difficult, given that the aim of this crime is to be as undetectable as possible.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE JOINT Aviation Authorities (JAA) has a new chief executive, following with departure of Klaus Koplin on October 31. He has been replaced with former director general of the Swiss Civil Aviation Authority André Auer, 56, who served as president of the European Civil Aviation Conference (ECAC) from 1997 to 2000.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
IS there a role for the insurance companies of rich countries to play in developing “micro finance” in the world’s very poorest regions? The question has become relevant following the launch earlier this month (November) of the International year of Microcredit 2005 by the UN’s Agricultural Fund for Development (IFAD).…