Commonwealth Bank of Australia CEO apologies for financial planning scandal

Thursday, July 3, 2014

Ian Narev, the CEO of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, this morning “unreservedly” apologised to clients who lost money in a scandal involving the bank’s financial planning services arm.

Last week, a Senate enquiry found financial advisers from the Commonwealth Bank had made high-risk investments of clients’ money without the clients’ permission, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars lost. The Senate enquiry called for a Royal Commission into the bank, and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

Mr Narev stated the bank’s performance in providing financial advice was “unacceptable”, and the bank was launching a scheme to compensate clients who lost money due to the planners’ actions.

In a statement Mr Narev said, “Poor advice provided by some of our advisers between 2003 and 2012 caused financial loss and distress and I am truly sorry for that. […] There have been changes in management, structure and culture. We have also invested in new systems, implemented new processes, enhanced adviser supervision and improved training.”

An investigation by Fairfax Media instigated the Senate inquiry into the Commonwealth Bank’s financial planning division and ASIC.

Whistleblower Jeff Morris, who reported the misconduct of the bank to ASIC six years ago, said in an article for The Sydney Morning Herald that neither the bank nor ASIC should be in control of the compensation program.

Saturday, February 3, 2007

According to news reports from Turkey, a number of the members of the Turkish security forces, though unofficially, are treating Ogün Samast, the assassin of Hrant Dink as if he were a national hero.

For instance, after being taken into custody, Samast was filmed shoulder to shoulder with the Turkish police, in front of a Turkish flag and a quote from Turkey’s founder Atatürk: “The nation’s land is sacred. It cannot be left to fate.”

On January 24th, Ogün Samast was transferred to the Bayrampa?a prison, Istanbul’s largest prison. Before the transfer, inmates from a section of the prison were temporarily moved to another section, which, as a result, housed more than 100 inmates, 80 more than its maximum capacity. Then, the now-vacant section, often subject to inmates’ complaints regarding bedbugs, was cleaned and disinfected. Finally, the walls were painted, a brand new cotton bed was put in, and red carpet was laid out on the floors of the section.

When Samast was brought to the Bayrampa?a Prison, inmates witnessed that he was welcomed with cheers and applause by the jail management, soldiers, and the guards. Witnesses also report that Samast was given two guards to serve him. He ate kebab, a luxury food compared to the food given to other inmates.

After four days, Samast was transferred to the Kand?ra F-type Prison.

Ultra-nationalist elements of the Turkish society seem to have penetrated into the Turkish security forces. These events resulted major Turkish newspapers such as Sabah, Radikal, and Vatan to accuse the Turkish security forces and the Turkish state of supporting, endorsing, and cooperating with the killers of the journalist.

A 52 year old Turkish-Armenian journalist, Hrant Dink was assassinated in front of the Agos newspaper office, at the Istanbul district of Osmanbey, where he worked as the editor and a journalist. Dink, a brave journalist who was not afraid to discuss one of Turkey’s most controversial issues, clearly called what happened to Armenians in 1915 when the land was being governed by the Ottoman Empire the Armenian Genocide.

Following her father’s assassination, Dink’s daughter, referring to the fascist obsession with pure blood, said:

Large numbers of people marched protesting the killing of Hrant Dink on the day of his funeral, carrying placards that read “We are all Armenian” and “We are all Hrant Dink”.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

American corporation DivX, Inc. announced on Monday that it will shut its Stage6 website that hosts videos made by users. The shutdown will take effect on February 28, 2008 and is because the firm no longer have the resources to keep it online.

“Why are we shutting the service down? Well, the short answer is that the continued operation of Stage6 is a very expensive enterprise that requires an enormous amount of attention and resources that we are not in a position to continue to provide. There are a lot of other details involved, but at the end of the day it’s really as simple as that,” said Tom, who is also known as ‘Spinner’ in the statement on the website and an employee of DivX, Inc. the San Diego, California-based host of the webservice.

In October 2007, Universal Music Group filed a federal lawsuit against DivX, Inc. for copyright infringement after users posted hundreds of music videos on Stage6.

Chief Executive Kevin Hell said in a statement: “By no longer expending resources on Stage6, we sharpen our focus on creating a global standard for digital video.”

Videos can no longer be uploaded, but will be able to be watched and downloaded until February 28. Stage6 made its debut in 2006. It hosted movie clips, television shows and music videos along with content made by the site’s users in the popular DivX codec.

Monday, December 11, 2006

A major purchase transaction is being prepared in the diamonds’ industry: Samuels Jewelers started a discussion with a sightholder from Diamond Trading Company (DTC). The latter is to acquire the majority part of retailer’s shares.

There is still not much information about this particular sightholder, except for the fact that it is based in India. The present majority shareholder of Samuels Jewelers is DDJ Capital Management. The representatives of the company do not give any information concerning the potential buyer.

Randy McCullough, the President and CEO of Samuels Jewelers, stated that it would be a great opportunity for the retailer to start a partnership with a DTC sightholder, thus Samuels would be able to re-capitalize its balance sheet, to acquire newer inventory and guarantee itself stable growth in the future.

As for Samuels Jewelers, which is officially called “Samuels, Schubach and Samuels Diamonds”, possesses a network of 97 jewelry stores in 18 US states since October 1 this year. The incomes of the retailer at the end of the previous year are estimated to be around $100,000,000.

The current shareholder of Samuels Jewelers, DDJ Capital Management, is a company, which specializes itself in private equity and debt financings. This managing firm began its activity in 1996 and since then has grown to operate capitals of 79 institutional clients (estimated in approximately 3 billion dollars).

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Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Various questions have been raised about the choice of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as Senator John McCain’s choice for Republican vice presidential running mate. There have been doubts over how thoroughly McCain had examined Palin’s background before announcing that he had selected her to be his running mate on August 29. McCain’s advisers insist that Palin was “thoroughly vetted,” a process that would have included a review of all financial and legal records as well as a criminal background check.

Palin is the Republican Party’s first female candidate for Vice President. In 1984, Geraldine Ferraro was Walter Mondale’s running mate on the Democratic Party ticket.

Yesterday, Palin and her husband issued a statement saying that their 17-year-old unmarried daughter Bristol is five months pregnant and that she intends to marry the father of the baby. The statement came after media speculation and internet rumours that Palin’s 4-month-old son, Trig, was in fact her grandson, and that the mother is Bristol.

Senator Barack Obama, McCain’s opponent in the 2008 election, was asked to comment on Palin’s family situation:

“Let me be as clear as possible… I think people’s families are off-limits, and people’s children are especially off-limits. This shouldn’t be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Governor Palin’s performance as governor or her potential performance as a vice president,” said Obama.

Obama further told reporters to “back off these kinds of stories” and noted that he was born to an 18-year-old mother himself. Obama became annoyed when asked about a news report that quoted an unnamed senior McCain campaign aide saying that Obama’s name appears in liberal blogs speculating about Trig’s parentage. “I am offended by that statement… There is no evidence at all that any of this involved us.”

“We don’t go after people’s families; we don’t get them involved in the politics. It’s not appropriate, and it’s not relevant,” Obama added. “Our people were not involved in any way in this, and they will not be. And if I ever thought that there was somebody in my campaign that was involved in something like that, they’d be fired.”

The McCain campaign said that Senator McCain was aware of Bristol Palin’s pregnancy before he asked her mother to join him on the ticket. McCain reportedly did not see the pregnancy as a detriment to Governor Palin’s selection as the vice presidential candidate.

McCain told reporters that he was satisfied with his campaign’s vetting process: “The vetting process was completely thorough and I’m grateful for the results.”

Governor Palin has hired a private lawyer in a legislative ethics investigation in Alaska into whether she abused her power in dismissing the state’s public safety commissioner, Walter Monegan. The investigation is checking into whether Palin dismissed Monegan for his reluctance to fire Palin’s former brother-in-law, Mike Wooten.

There is no sign that Palin’s formal nomination this week at the Republican National Convention was in jeopardy. The controversy adds anxiety to Republicans who are worried that Democrats would use the selection of Palin to question McCain’s judgment. Republicans were quick to note that Palin has “more executive experience” in elected office than does Obama and have gone on the offensive.

McCain’s choice of Palin came as a shock to some, after it was expected that McCain would choose Joe Lieberman, Tim Pawlenty, or Tom Ridge for the vice presidential nomination. McCain had reportedly met Palin only twice before her selection, and had his first face-to-face interview with her on August 28. McCain offered Palin the vice presidential spot just moments after their meeting concluded. The two appeared at a campaign rally event the following morning in Dayton, Ohio.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Businessman Rocky De La Fuente took some time to speak with Wikinews about his campaign for the U.S. Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential nomination.

The 61-year-old De La Fuente resides in San Diego, California, grew up in Tijuana, and owns multiple businesses and properties throughout the world. Since getting his start in the automobile industry, De La Fuente has branched out into the banking and real estate markets. Despite not having held or sought political office previously, he has been involved in politics, serving as the first-ever Hispanic superdelegate to the 1992 Democratic National Convention.

De La Fuente entered the 2016 presidential race last October largely due to his dissatisfaction with Republican front-runner Donald Trump. He argues he is a more accomplished businessman than Trump, and attacks Trump as “a clown,” “a joke,” “dangerous,” and “in the same category as Hitler.” Nevertheless, De La Fuente’s business background begets comparisons with Trump. The Alaskan Midnight Sun blog described him as the Democrats’ “own Donald Trump.”

While receiving only minimal media coverage, he has campaigned actively, and according to the latest Federal Election Commission filing, loaned almost US$ 4 million of his own money to the campaign. He has qualified for 48 primary and caucus ballots, but has not yet obtained any delegates to the 2016 Democratic National Convention. Thus far, according to the count at The Green Papers, De La Fuente has received 35,406 votes, or 0.23% of the total votes cast. He leads among the many lesser-known candidates but trails both Senator Bernie Sanders who has received nearly 6.5 million votes and front-runner Hillary Clinton who has just shy of 9 million votes.

With Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn?, De La Fuente discusses his personal background, his positions on political issues, his current campaign for president, and his political future.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Researchers have found a crucial genetic difference between humans and chimps that could help explain our language and speech abilities. The difference lies in a gene called FOXP2 which encodes for a protein of the same name. This acts as a transcription factor, controlling the activity of other genes.

The human and chimp versions of the protein differ in only two of their 740 amino acid components, but when researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, replaced the human gene with the chimp version in neurons grown in the laboratory, they found it affected the expression of at least 116 other genes.

The results are detailed in a paper published on Thursday in the scientific journal Nature.

Author of the study Dr. Daniel Geschwind, of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, said the gene had a “major role” in differences between chimps and humans. “We showed that the human and chimp versions of FOXP2 not only look different but function differently too.”

Some of the affected genes control the formation of connections in the brain, whilst others relate to facial movements. Several have already been found to be involved in language disorders. Mutations in FOXP2 itself were also known to affect speech and language; the gene was first identified in members of a family suffering from language problems who were found to share a genetic mutation.

Frances Vargha-Khadem at University College London has studied patients with FOXP2 mutations, and agrees with the new research. As well as language problems, some of her subjects have changes in the shape of their jaws, mouths and tongues. She thinks that chimps may also have these differences.

“We believe FOXP2 is not only important for the higher order cognitive aspect of language but also for the motor aspect of speech and language,” said Genevieve Konopka, one of the authors of the paper at UCLA.

Previous research indicates that the changes in FOXP2 occurred around 200,000 years ago with the rise of modern humans. Geschwind also suggests that several of the related genes may have evolved together. Preliminary studies have shown signs that they too emerged relatively recently.

Scientists are now keen to further study FOXP2 and the genes that it affects. Geschwind believes this could eventually lead to breakthroughs in treatment for disorders such as autism and schizophrenia, which affect language skills.

The study was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the A.P. Giannini Foundation and the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression.

Friday, January 4, 2008

A new study amongst doctors in the United States on the use of placebos—pills with no medical effect—shows that almost half of the questioned practitioners prescribe placebos, most of them within the last year.

The majority of 466 faculty physicians at Chicago-area medical schools interviewed by a research group of the University of Chicago stated that placebos are useful to calm a patient down or to respond to demands for medication that the doctor disagrees with, i.e. “to get the patient to stop complaining”.

96 percent of the physicians surveyed believe that placebos can have therapeutic effects. Close to 40 percent stated that placebos could benefit patents physiologically as well as mentally.

Twelve percent of surveyed physicians think that placebos should be banned from clinical practice. Among the doctors who prescribed them, one in five said they outright lied to patients by claiming a placebo was medication. But more often the physicians came up with ways to explain like that “this may help you but I’m not sure how it works.”

The American Medical Association (AMA), the largest association of U.S. doctors and medical students, tells its members that “[p]hysicians may use placebos for diagnosis or treatment only if the patient is informed of and agrees to its use.” The research, published in Journal of General Internal Medicine this week, is the first major U.S. study of doctors on the use of placebos since 1979.

Monday, October 7, 2019

Yesterday morning, English drummer Ginger Baker died in a hospital at the age of 80. The news came from the Twitter account in his name and was independently confirmed by Associated Press with his daughter Nettie Baker. On September 25, it was reported Baker was hospitalized in critical condition. Baker was widely known as the drummer and co-founder of the rock band Cream, an early supergroup.

Baker, a life-long smoker and former heroin addict, suffered from health problems for years. The list of ailments included hearing loss, osteoarthritis, emphysema and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, as well as heart problems for which he had surgery in 2016. Although known to have lived his latter years in South Africa, his daughter said he died in Britain without elaborating.

Ginger Baker was born Peter Edward Baker in Lewisham, London, in 1939. His father was killed in combat in 1943 during World War II. Baker — who was reportedly nicknamed Ginger due to his red hair — began playing drums in his teens. In a story he sometimes told, he had a habit of tapping on school desks. When an opportunity arose at a party, his classmates encouraged him to sit down at a drum set. “I’d never sat behind a kit before, but I sat down — and I could play! One of the musicians turned round and said, ‘Bloody hell, we’ve got a drummer’, and I thought, ‘Bloody hell, I’m a drummer’?”, he recalled in a 2009 retelling of the story to the The Independent.

Baker began his career as a drummer in jazz bands. He played with Acker Bilk and Terry Lightfoot. In 1962, when fellow drummer Charlie Watts was leaving Blues Incorporated for The Rolling Stones, Watts recommended Baker to be his replacement. Later, Baker found early success with rhythm and blues band The Graham Bond Organisation where he met bassist Jack Bruce.

In 1966, Baker, Bruce and singer/guitarist Eric Clapton, who was known from The Yardbirds, formed Cream. The rock trio was a massive success, selling tens of millions of records, including the first ever platinum certified album Wheels of Fire. Cream recorded four albums, then in 1968 disbanded with Baker and Bruce having developed a volatile relationship. Clapton and Baker were subsequently in another supergroup Blind Faith with Steve Winwood and Ric Grech. Blind Faith recorded only one studio album but notably played before a crowd of a hundred thousand at a free concert in London’s Hyde Park.

In the 1970s, Baker moved to Nigeria where he established a studio and began playing polo. Here he collaborated with Fela Kuti and worked on Wings’s album Band on the Run with Paul McCartney of The Beatles fame. Later, he recorded with John Lydon’s Public Image Ltd.

Cream was inducted in 1993 into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The band reunited in 2005 for several London and New York concerts. Afterwards he moved to South Africa, and still lived there when the 2012 documentary Beware of Mr. Baker was filmed. Baker’s last recording was 2014’s Why? solo album. Baker retired from live performances in 2016 due to his ill health.

Paul McCartney wrote on Twitter, “Ginger Baker, great drummer, wild and lovely guy. We worked together on the ‘Band on the Run’ album in his ARC Studio, Lagos, Nigeria. Sad to hear that he died but the memories never will.”

“A very sad loss, and my condolences to his family and friends. A loss also for his contribution to music. He was well-grounded in jazz from very early on,” wrote Steve Winwood in a statement. “Beneath his somewhat abrasive exterior, there was a very sensitive human being with a heart of gold. He’ll be missed.”

Mick Jagger of The Rolling Stones also reacted on Twitter, “Sad news hearing that Ginger Baker has died, I remember playing with him very early on in Alexis Korner’s Blues Incorporated. He was a fiery but extremely talented and innovative drummer.”

Friday, November 6, 2009

A 1965 Volkswagen minibus that was stolen in 1974 has been recovered by customs agents in Los Angeles. The vintage minibus was in pristine condition, valued at $25,000, and was found during a routine inspection of a shipping container scheduled for departure to The Netherlands. A routine computer database search on its vehicle identification number flagged it as having been stolen from a vehicle upholstery shop in Spokane, Washington on July 12, 1974. A custom restoration business in Arizona was attempting to deliver it to overseas clients last month when authorities intercepted the vehicle.

The theft appeared on the National Insurance Crime Bureau database, which is used by border authorities and contains all stolen vehicle records. Most police databases remove unsolved vehicle thefts after five years.

The California Highway Patrol does not suspect the restorer of wrongdoing, according to investigating officer Mike Maleta. Possession of the vehicle apparently changed several times. Police in Spokane have not yet located the rightful owner, whose identity has not been released to the press. Maleta hopes that a trail of registration documents and interviews will uncover the thief.

The Allstate insurance company paid $2500 shortly after the theft occurred and wants to take possession of the vintage minibus. Allstate spokeswoman Megan Brunet expects that after the necessary paperwork is processed the firm will sell it at auction.