Japan Shuts Firm: Billions Lost

TOKYO—Japan's financial regulator said it has halted operations of a little-known Tokyo money-management company after finding it has allegedly lost billions of yen in client money.

Shozaburo Jimi, the minister responsible for regulation in the financial-services industry, said that the Financial Services Agency, will scrutinize operations at all 263 investment management firms in business in Japan as a result of the AIJ case.

In one of the biggest cases of its kind in Japan, Japan's FSA Friday said investigators have been probing 120 cases involving clients of AIJ Investment Advisors Co., which manages corporate pension funds. Investigators found that AIJ has lost "most of'' the ¥183 billion, or about $2.3 billion, in pension-fund assets it had under management, FSA officials said.

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Japan Real Time: Missing Funds: Watchdogging Japan

The FSA said it couldn't comment on details, including why the money was missing or the exact amount of losses found. The agency has ordered the firm to suspend operations for a month.

Phone calls to AIJ's office in central Tokyo were directed to a voicemail system that told callers to try again later. The firm's Internet site says it was founded in 1989, capitalized at ¥230 million.

Microchip testing equipment maker Advantest Corp. and industrial robot maker Yaskawa Electric Corp. confirmed that they are among the clients that placed pension money with AIJ, but declined to specify how much.

A Yaskawa spokesman described the company's investments with AIJ as "very minor," accounting for less than 2% of all its pension fund investments.

—Atsuko Fukase contributed
to this article

Write to Takashi Mochizuki at takashi.mochizuki@dowjones.com and Kenneth Maxwell at kenneth.maxwell@dowjones.com

AIJ Investment Advisors Co., AIJ, FSA, Financial Services Agency, Japan, Yaskawa Electric Corp., Advantest Corp., pension money, FSA officials, corporate pension funds

Online.wsj.com

Dow throws investors a tease party

A frustrated Wall Street was left on the verge of hitting its best blue-chip high in nearly four years after the Dow Jones industrial average peeked through the 13,000-point mark twice, only to withdraw both times to ruin the long-awaited moment.

Buoyed by Europe’s all-night saga of hardball talks for solving its debt crisis, investors here jumped into a buying spree at the opening bell with high hopes of the Dow closing above 13,000 for the fist time since May 19, 2008.

It twice hit the magic moments briefly after lunchtime to an intraday high as 13,005.04, but fell back to end the session at 12,965.69, up 15.82 — still about 34 points shy of the symbolic milestone.

But the session wasn’t a total letdown.

The market value of the 30 stocks on the Dow showed a revived value of $1.71 trillion, a solid comeback from their $1.29 trillion value the last time the Dow closed above 13,000, at 13,028.16 on May 19, 2008.

The broadly traded Standard & Poor’s 500 Index ended little changed yesterday at 1,362.21, its highest close since the June 5, 2008 session of 1,404.05. The S&P is up 8.32 percent this year, and the Dow is ahead 6.12 percent.

The Nasdaq is up 13.81 percent since January, but slipped 3.21 points yesterday to close at 2,948.57.

Some investors lost interest in flirty stocks and put their cash into a crude oil rally. The commodity surged here 2.5 percent to a nine-month high of $105.84 a barrel amid profit-taking and worries about Iran’s new saber-rattling, and gold closed the New York spot session at $1,760.30, up 1.5 percent, or $26.20 an ounce.

Dow Jones, Dow online

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Remembered as warrior on the field

PORT ST. LUCIE — Howard Johnson remembers Gary Carter standing on the dugout steps in the 10th inning of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series before he sparked the Mets’ famous rally against the Red Sox.

“He said, ‘There’s no way I’m going to make the last out of the World Series,’ ” Johnson said after the Hall of Fame catcher died yesterday at 57. “And with Gary, more than just about anyone else, you believed him. He was the ultimate competitor.”

And it was that fighting spirit that he brought to his battle against the brain cancer.

“If you could mold yourself after one person, both as an individual and an athlete, it should be Gary Carter,” said another former Mets’ teammate, Wally Backman, now the manager at Triple-A Buffalo. “He was the guy. He was the perfect combination of a great player but an even better person. There was no one I would rather have as a teammate. … He was like a big brother to me.”

Backman, who will wear Carter’s No. 8 in his memory this season, talked with Carter for half an hour at Carter’s charity fundraiser in Florida just a few weeks ago.

“You knew how sick he was, but he was still himself,” Backman said. “He never changed.”

Those thoughts were echoed many times yesterday.

“The baseball world lost one of its gladiators today, and I have lost a friend,” Ron Darling said in a statement. “Gary Carter was everything you wanted in a sports hero: a great talent, a great competitor, a great family man, and a great friend.”

MLB Commissioner Bud Selig said Carter was “driven by a remarkable enthusiasm for the game” and “one of the elite catchers of all-time. … Like all baseball fans, I will always remember his leadership for the ’86 Mets and his pivotal role in one of the greatest World Series ever played.”

And those who played with him on that 1986 team credited the catcher with being the key reasons they beat the Red Sox.

“Gary was a one-man scouting system,” manager Davey Johnson said. “What people didn’t know was that he kept an individual book on every batter in the National League. He was the ideal catcher for our young pitching staff.”

But his importance included more than just what he brought to the field.

“What he added to the team was character,” said Darryl Strawberry, who also told WFAN: “I wish I could have lived my life like Gary Carter.”

“He battled his fight to the end,” Dwight Gooden said. “[That] gives me a lot of strength and faith to battle mine. We will always be connected at the hip.”

danmartin@nypost.com

Gary Carter, Gary Carter, Wally Backman ebook download, World Series, Howard Johnson, the Mets, manager Davey Johnson, Darryl Strawberry

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NYSE Euronext 4Q profit dips, hit by failed merger costs

Stock exchange operator NYSE Euronext said Friday that it was well positioned for 2012 and beyond despite a tough near-term outlook for trading volume and currencies, as it reported an almost 19 percent fall in fourth-quarter net profit.

Net profit for the period fell to $110 million from $135 million a year earlier, hit by merger costs and a tax settlement charge. Fourth-quarter revenue rose to $628 million from $613 million.

Results for the fourth quarter of 2011 and 2010 include $46 million and $18 million, respectively, of pretax merger expenses and exit costs, the company said.

After its failed tie-up with German bourse Deutsche Borse, NYSE Euronext is launching a two-year plan aimed at lifting profit and promised to give investors details in April.

"We are continuing to focus on those areas of our business model that we control to create value for shareholders. We are targeting a two-year plan that, with only modest improvement in the operating environment, will drive higher levels of earnings per share growth through a combination of targeted revenue growth initiatives, accelerated cost efficiency efforts and disciplined deployment of capital," Chief Financial Officer Michael Geltzeiler said.

Details of the two-year plan will be provided in April on investor day, he said.

Fourth-quarter net revenue from the exchange's derivatives unit was $186 million, marginally lower than in the same period last year, including a $1 million hit from currency fluctuations. The company attributed the slight revenue fall to lower European derivatives trading volume, partially offset by higher average net revenue per contract.

Revenue related to information services and technological solutions rose 11 percent in the fourth quarter to $127 million. The result includes a $9 million gain from currency fluctuations, NYSE Euronext said.

NYSE Euronext now needs to lay out a new standalone strategy following the collapse of its blockbuster merger with Deutsche Borse.

The EU Commission blocked NYSE Euronext's merger plans with Deutsche Borse earlier this month on antitrust grounds, as the combined company would have had a dominant 93 percent share of Europe's on-exchange derivatives business.

NYSE Euronext, Deutsche Borse, Chief Financial Officer Michael Geltzeiler, revenue growth, merger costs, derivatives trading

Nypost.com

Chip Pan Trailer - T6

Chip Pan Trailer - T6

Avon Fire & Rescue Service, Southmead, seen here at Yate.

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Russian Islamist Chief Calls for End to Attacks

MOSCOW—The Islamist leader who has claimed responsibility for the deadliest terrorist bombings in Russia in recent years is calling for an end to attacks on civilians now that they are protesting the 12-year-old rule of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

In a video posted on an Islamist website, the fugitive rebel leader Doku Umarov said that recent street protests show that Russians no longer support Mr. Putin and that they are hostages of his regime.

"So I order all special groups that are carrying out operations or planning operations in Russia to limit these if it means peaceful civilians will suffer," said Mr. Umarov, head of the Caucasus Emirate group. "This population definitely does not support Putin."

Mr. Umarov's group has claimed responsibility for a string of atrocities over the years, including a suicide bombing of a Moscow airport terminal in 2011 that killed 37 and two suicide bombings on Moscow subway platforms in 2010 that killed 40.

The attacks have done little to dent Russia's resolve to rule the North Caucasus, where rebels in Chechen rebels have twice fought wars since the collapse of the Soviet Union to create a separate state. Russian security services have lately tracked down rebels living abroad and assassinated them, and Mr. Umarov's own whereabouts are unknown.

Mr. Putin's popularity has been shaken by mass protests in recent months. More protests are planned in Moscow and across the country in the run-up to the March 4 presidential elections in which he is seeking a third term as president.

Before the last wave of terror attacks in Moscow, Mr. Umarov promised Russians that "the war will come to your street, God willing, and that you will feel it in your own life and on your own skin." He declared himself emir of the Caucasus in 2007, declaring his aim to impose Islamic rule across a swath of mostly Muslim Russian regions in the area.

Mr. Umarov's turnabout appears to be an attempt to curry favor with some of the protest movement, as well as cave into demands among fellow Islamists for an end to terror acts, said Grigory Shvedov, editor of the Caucasian Knot news service, which covers the region.

"There is a powerful group in the Chechen rebellion that wants to fight more within Chechnya and Northern Caucasus, and less outside of it," Mr. Shvedov said. Mr. Umarov, he added, "has been on the side of international jihad."

In the videotape released Friday, Mr. Umarov appeared in military fatigues in a snowy wood and was flanked by two bearded comrades. "If this peaceful population does not take part in the war against Islam, our religion tells us to take care of this peaceful population and not to touch them," he said.

Write to Alan Cullison at alan.cullison@wsj.com

Doku Umarov, Russia, Prime Minister Vladimir, peaceful population, terror attacks, Moscow, Caucasus, Islamist website

Europe.wsj.com

NYC,.Chinatown parade,.Happy New Year,.!

NYC,.Chinatown parade,.Happy New Year,.!

youtu.be/H4dk-104yNY

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