Government may be announced today. Welcome to countdown. I am mark barton. Edwards. Nna we are standing by ready to deliver the stories that will drive your day. Caroline hyde has the latest on samsungs newest products. Whatsapps facebook and , another tech deal brewing in japan. Back in the studio, Ryan Chilcote is looking ahead to a key vote in ukraine. Hans nichols will break down the proposed deal from berlin. We are getting earnings from the Worlds Largest chemical maker, the aff. Baff. It looks like fourthquarter earnings have beaten estimates. Lets start with matt kemp net income. 4. 4 billion euros. That is ahead of estimates. The core metric, earnings before interest and taxes, including items, 1. 45 is up from 1. 23 and ahead of the estimate of 1. 34. The Company Expects sales in 2014 to decline slightly. Noason as of yet reason as of yet, but the company says that sales will fall this year. This is a company that is working towards a Revenue Target of 110 billion euros to the end of the decade. Theyre cutting jobs in europe, adding production in asia to account for increased competitions in areas like paper and pulp additives. Ceo has been shifting the company towards additives to health foods and other highermargin Specialty Chemicals to help shield it from economic swing. The big news is that earnings are decent for the Fourth Quarter but sales for 2014 will decline slightly. Stay with bloomberg this morning because the ceo of baff will be on on the move. Biggestorlds smartphone maker, samsung, has unveiled its latest galaxy product in barcelona. Us now. Hyde joins what is the new product that was unveiled . A roster of new products were unveiled. , the newe s5 smartphone galaxy s4. Of the have to be aware galaxy gear. The smart watch was updated. Galaxy gear fit, to measure your heart rate and pulse. The takeaway is nothing groundbreaking, nothing that extraordinary. Perhaps that is why they started mobile worldse at congress. In previous years they have been in new york, Madison Square garden. They said that they responded to what consumers wanted. They have a better camera. It is better looking. B xfone has a sort of leather background, almost. You can drop it in water that is my personal favorite. It can be in water and survive for 30 minutes. Technology as the apple iphone 5 has. It is all about consumer experience, so said an executive jimmy. It is not just about features anymore. It is about what people use their devices for. For us, it is about people inside innovation and helping them do new things. Theme, im going to love to ultra power saving mode. On that mode and get another 24 hours out of my battery when it is below 10 . Meal rory owned ale oneal. Caroline, you could take your as five with you s5 with you when you go snorkeling. And they boosted sales and fight back against the apple iphone five . That is the big question. We have seen samsung starting to lose out in terms of their fourthquarter sales at the iphone 5 came in with their new products. It is playing a bit of catchup, it feels to me. The Fingerprint Technology iphone 5 had that already. How quickerst about new the technology is, it is what you can do with it that counts. Is importantat that we proved we can innovate in many ways. The Fingerprint Technology is great, but what is important to us is the other technology. Lets not just use our fingerprint to open the phone, lets use it to instantly recognize it and so we can pay or something. Forse our fingerprint things like two factor authentication while we were at work. It is not just about the finger print itself. It is much more important about how it is being used. At has already signed up to take advantage of this new Fingerprint Technology with samsung. We could start seeing payments quite quickly, perhaps quicker than the iphone 5. Amount for these phone. It will be at least in april. We have no idea what the new technologies will cost. 200200 50. Nd 250. Back to you. Is important for you that your mobile phone can withstand 30 minutes underwater. That was specifically in one meter of water. Dont try diving. That would be a nono. Facebook buying whatsapp has oninated dosh dominated news the tech scene. There is another story about japans second richest man and a popular mobile messenger. Good morning. A lot of news on this. Users, they are at 40. 9 lien dollars. The plan is to have an ipo. That has been slowed down because of the cost of interest. After facebook paid 19,000,002 whatsapp,lion to buy they have seen shares rise 9 . Softbank has risen 4. 5 . Why would you want to buy this . Softbank has all of these games. If you allow softbank to market these games over the platform remember, 340 million users. That is why softbank is very interested. Not confirmed, it is purely on sources. We are not getting names. It continues the trend continues. Thank you very much. John dawson in hong kong. Ukrainian parliament is expected to vote on the later the Campaign Later today. Residential elections are excited to take place on may 25. Politics returns to the forefront of ukrainian discretion. Discussion. The president ial campaign is kicking off today. Exactly three months before the ambitious day, may the 25th. They set for themselves to have the president ial election them. The acting president of the country and the speaker of the parliament has said that he expects to see this government form today and voted on in a parliament today. Very colorful guy. He wrote the screenplay of ukraines Academy Award submission, illusion of fear. Is a creative flair but behind the on to that, he is known as a technocrat, a guy who can get things done. Once the government in place is because the first thing that needs to happen is they need to talk to the imf about funding. He is also known of being a now of julia tolly measure to she cannot on friday and gave up speech to about 50 million people. Situate run for president and seemed to flipflop over the weekend. Said she would run for president and seemed to flipflop over the weekend. Vladimir quits coal has also said that he does not want the Prime Minister job Vladimir Klitschko is also said he does not want the Prime Minister job. Speaking of changes at the top, a new central bank chief. He is 51 51 years old. Interesting guy. He was a commandant, a mayor, if you will, of the protest cap camp on independence square. He made sure they had all of the supplies they needed. No stranger to banking. He was the head of the Banking Commission and parliament and can of the Ukrainian Bank sell for eight years. He has a difficult job. We heard the Prime Minister say that their concern of russias interest in ukraine i point out that the statement came from the Prime Minister and not the president. A lot of people saying russia may sit this one out and watch what happens. When this president ial election happens, whether it is , they now need to win the support of the entire electorate in ukraine if there are going to be democratic elections. That includes a lot of ethnic russians, people that have concerns about the political views of the opposition that is coming to power. Russia in the end may win out if they can sort of keep a cool head. Get a preview of what else is coming up on countdown. Hans nichols is in berlin. We are watching vendee. We are getting their earnings and we will see how desperate the vendee is to sell its mobilephone operating unit sfr i will pronounce this the way you pronounce it to a cable group. I think you know the pronunciation. Im just relying on market his status command of i am relying on my marvelous french. Thank you, hans. Is aext guest says there risk the country could split between east and west. Time per days company news. Jpmorgan may announce several thousand more job cuts in its mortgage unit today. The reductions come in addition 13,000third teen 15,000 job cuts announced a year ago. Ap morgan is the biggest bank in the United States. Jpmorgan is the biggest bank in the United States. Bowling is struggling to find buyers for 11 of its 787 dreamliners. Dropped orders for them. Partially competed completed change planes have a lower value. Is 6 16 in london. Could ukraine itself rake apart . The risk of an eastwest split israel. Split is real. How big is the risk . I think it is something we have to consider for the mediumterm. Term, absolution managed by the imf, the eurozone, and maybe russia. Butut a lead on the problem if you look at the math and the latest election and what people actually think and how they feel towards the west or the east, the country is basically split into. In two. If you look at what people in the Eastern Province since provinces think, they probably like the idea of having more russian involvement or if air is an invasion by russia. It is a bigger and more difficult situation. It is something that they can think, they can accept. At the same time, it is not something that is acceptible to the western provinces. Have been surprised how resilient ukrainian bonds market has been. We have been monitoring those bond markets for quite some time. We have been involved in ukrainian bonds since 20102011. Very recently, it was an interesting market because of the situation. The result is we did not see at any time the weakness to be Strong Enough for us to get involved, to try to speculatively by very low levels. I think the lowest cash price was around 78, 80. Were talking about less than 12 in the longer part of the , and there can be many reasons, but there is at least one big technical reason in this market. Re is one asset manager that is right. If the ownerat does not sell, the market is basically very calm. Thate other hand, it means for whatever reason, redemption or Risk Management or other reasons he has to sell, then the current market for us is meaningless. Is it tough to buy ukrainian debt . Not yet. The currency is not the worst performer in the world. Since the beginning of the year. There is always time to do worse. Thank you. Welcome back. Is 6 22. Me in london lets take a moment to bring you up to speed in the global markets. The s p the United States refleet touched an alltime high. Stock is doing well on the back of changes to medicare. Highest in ae month overnight. Well onstocks are doing the back of m and a speculation. Hsbc bank missing estimates and that stock was falling. We will see of positivity will pick up another day and European Equity trade. Lets talk italy. Big day yesterday. Overcomeor problem one , the senate vote. The figures were interesting. Only 169139. The new Prime Minister has a slightly less majority them the last one. Is that significant . 173, the majority. I dont think it makes a big difference. We know that the majority of the seen, and always been that is at least one of the they have aause different strategy. Before was to go for Institutional Reforms and after they have been passed, a new election and if we win with the majority, go for Economic Reforms. Maybe some more Institutional Reforms. Now the Institutional Reforms are in the backseat. Is toeally counts for him deliver on Economic Reforms the italians recession is not over yet. Unemployment is still very high and there are lots of problems in italy. The expected growth for this year is coming mostly from export. You think the fact that he has not reached power because of democraticraphic ash mandate, because he has not faced election and intellect and based collection and been elected, do you think that we consume the face of the italian weakens him in the face of the Italian Economy . There are going to be parts of things that do not well go down well in parts of the society. The attitude is more liberal for a party that is basically a communist route. Negotiation for example, you do not have the i won the election card to play. This is what the people want, because you cannot say that. Your power is somehow limited. He is notmeans that able to turn around in the Economic Growth that we all want to see, then when there are new bections, it will probably lower than it is now. People are saying as a hundred days at most to shop the political system. With deals that eight year lows, how compelling are they . I think they would remain where they are. See a lot of productivity for the time bidding being and we will enjoy the spread or the boom. There are other problems in the they dont like the unp and there is this kind of thank you very much. I am mark barton. These are the Bloomberg Top headlines. Urgesrainian president those two vote for a unified government. He wants to move quickly to fill the government vacuum. Italian Prime Minister has won a confidence vote in the senate. This is the first indication the new Coalition Government has backing in argument. The 39yearold leader laid out his legislative priorities. Italy desperately needs to regain confidence in order to this is a blighted country restraint by a suffocating bureaucracy. Google chairman has been speaking to charlie rose. The revelations from edward snowden. What happened was a program that was called prism used a series of information that came from the British Security and according to the snowden documents, they figured out a way to get between our computer systems. We have no evidence that information was misused, but we. Aw the protocols, we closed you can see that interview at 10 00 u. K. Time tonight. Welcome to countdown. We are getting the earnings from vivendi. The adjusted net profits came in better than estimate. Oft was against an estimate 1. 4 5 billion. A lot of focus is going to be on the future of the telecoms unit for this business. They are actively exploring all opportunities. This comes a day after we heard controlled, company we heard from that business of they were trying to set up some type of alliance with sfr. They are exploring all opportunities. No decision has been reached. No formal deal was on the table as of yesterday. Vivendi had been skeptical about whether a deal, any kind of deal , any kind of alliance with any other Cable Company can offer the kind of returns they want for this business. Was the company would be spun off or sold in some way. A lot of focus going into the numbers for the cash returns. They would be more money going back to investors. We are keeping and i out for any comments the Company Gives an eye out for any comments the Company Gives. In terms of their net debt, they brought it down. To 11. 1 been cut billion euros against the previous level of 13. 4 billion euros. Better than estimated numbers coming through from vivendi. They are exploring all opportunities for sfr. In barcelona, the giants of tech and telecom are gathering for a second day at the mobile world congress. Caroline hyde joins us from barcelona with the first of a number of big interviews today. I have a great guest for you now. Lenovo is the worlds biggest pc maker, but a very big player in smartphones, particularly in china. I am joined by the cfo. He is the man behind helping orchestrate a bit of a trailblazing in terms of acquisitions. Ibm server business, motorola mobility. T why so much for joining us. Much thank you very much for joining us. Do it this want to weekend and in a sustainable way. We start off with a smart phone business in china. Within two years, we become number two. That will give us a very Good Platform for us to grow. Brand,a is a very strong a very well known brand. Product,hnology, great great business relationships with the carrier. Together with our existing smartphone business, we will achieve what we set in our strategy. Did you have a personal target . Lot. E world changes a pc, i think we just want to be a major player in the device business. Smartphone is obviously one of the devices. Do it as soonto as we can and do it in a sustainable way. Top me about the integration talk to me about the integration. Technically it we are working with regulators. On the other hand, we have to prepare ourselves. Thinking about how we can improve the business, how we have grown the business. Bikes are you looking at ways to cut costs . Are you looking at ways to cut costs . You have any view on how much can be stripped out of that . I do not agree with that. I think the cost is very high. When i look at motorola, when i look at the business, you start with the profit margins. It depends on your cross margins. The absolute money that you spend. Byhink we can improve improving the revenue. We launched it about six months last year. Be one of theto greatest brands in the world. We will grow it even bigger. I growing the revenues significantly and there are some you improve your efficiency. The gross margin is pretty healthy. You can turn the business from a loss to break even and then a profitable business. It is very much focused on having great products. How do you incentivize better products . The likes ofeating samsung . How do leapfrog beating the likes of samsung . How do you leapfrog . Your fundamental capability. Motorola is a great company. It is probably one of the longest brands. The first one that had a mobile phone. And they have a very strong capability who both hardware and software. We will be seeing many more products coming from you as a combined unit. We have a lot of experience in getting products in the emerging markets like china. We have a great engineering team. Spend more could time speaking with you. T why very much indeed. Cfo of the nono thank you very much indeed. Cfo of lenovo. Back to you in london. Program, labon the works takes a gamble. We will see how the betting firm is taking new measures to prevent gambling addiction. Justin bieber is recent trouble with the law has Many Americans questioning his visa status. Time for todays company news. A lowerpricedd smartphone in barcelona. Growth withg cheaper handsets. It will be available in china in march. Founder told bloombergs caroline hyde. We are very openminded. Willing that is good, we consider it. What about in terms of buying back shares . Will you continue to do that . Has that been beneficial . If it is right, we will do it. Criticized the online marketplace for lapses in corporate governance. Montclair has reported a profit that beat analyst estimates. It has strong growth in the United States and in asia. Earnings were at 19 . Welcome back to countdown. Vivendi has been preparing to spin off its phone business sfr. Withs received an approach a possible alliance between its Cable Provider. We got earnings from vivendi a few moments ago. Lets go to hans nichols in berlin for the numbers. Lets start with the numbers. Beat. Income was a it was up ever so slightly. Revenue was a slight miss, even though it is up from 2012. Thething they did go in earnings, they confirmed that the event he is pursuing actively exploring all opportunities vivendi is pursuing, actively exploring all opportunities for sfr. The mobilephone unit. That is where they have seen some real competition. 2012. Around 39 in they have gotten into a price war. All this talk has driven up shares of all of the companies involved. Will they have some sort of merger with the french Cable Provider . There are great synergies there. One of the challenges is how they actually get the data to mobile phones. A kayak makes a lot of sense. Makesonfirmed a tie up a lot of sense. They confirmed yesterday. Are they talking more beyond a simple joint tie up or are they talking about an outright sale . And november, they talked about having to be a Standalone Company in 2014. This is all about the telecom wars. There is consolidation in the industry. M a still seems to be heating up. It is going to be a real battle. Hans nichols in berlin. The u. K. Betting firm will announce numbers within the hour. A drop in earnings expectations. John, what are we expect in . We are expecting to tell the valuable part of the story. Machines. Ine gambling i am not talking about these fruit machines in the local pub. These touchscreen touchscreen games where you could lose billions of pounds every single minute. They count for half of the cash bookies make. There is this very thing happening in u. K. Politics. Cross Party Support to tackle the problem. They all want to address this issue and as soon as they become both stocks plunged off the back of it, down 10 on the day. Over a barclays has done some great work covering these stocks. There depended on those terminals. Regulation could lead to a 30 cut in full year earnings for brokes. Es lad what are they trying to do to preempt regulation . Is once again another area they are way behind william hill on. , a lot ofating side fuss yesterday about all letter sent to the u. K. Government on how they might address this issue. Here is the interesting part. They may link executive compensation to the success of tackling problem of gambling. How will they do it . I do not know. Truepeculation is probably so we should expect some details in about 15 minutes. I think it is fascinating. Wonder ifer if i there are Different Industries that will take a slightly different approach. Clearly, they want to take responsibility. Had some bieber trouble with americas criminal Justice System lately. At whatakes look happens when foreigners break the law while they are in the u. S. And what can happen if Justin Bieber goes a step too far. Justin bieber, the 19yearold canadian pop star has sparked a debate about immigration law. Recent reports have him on bad behavior rampage. Tagging his neighbors house, drugs found in his california arrest in florida for driving under the influence, and an assault charge in toronto. What does Justin Bieber have to do to get deported . More than 250,000 people actually signed the petition asking the Obama Administration to revoke his green card and deport him. That is enough to get an official response. Cat stevens, boy george, and Amy Winehouse were all denied entry. In the 1970s, Richard Nixon tried to deport John Lynch John lennon. Hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals are deported every year. Visau are here on the o1 like Justin Bieber is. Unlikely toare revoke it unless he is convicted of a Violent Crime or sentenced to more than a year in prison. Not the time of offenses he has been accused of. Should we really be in such a rush to kick him out . About two thirds of the shows were in the u. S. , he sold more than 5 million albums and he is investing millions in u. S. Startups. Feel aboutof how you his music, unless his bad behavior continues and he is convicted of more serious crimes, you can believe he will be around for a while. Belieber . U a i am not sure i am ready to confess. He is extraordinary, people tell me. Hollywood says goodbye to one of its greatest comedic talents. Welcome back. Time for the newspapers. I am just going to get cracking. Harold robbins has died. Not only did he star in ghostbusters, he cowrote it. , directed ground hog day caddy shack. He cowrote animal house. I saw them i have seen them and we love them. Is n sondheims oleary the lyricist asked if he could make groundhog day into a musical because it was impossible to improve on perfection. Is hans nichols with us . Ask can you reminisce about harold ramis . Mind if i just lay through . Play through . Lex i will do Crime Statistics in berlin. Murder down 27. 9 . 14 . Ent thefts up only 106 murders in berlin. We will not talk about chicago. Probably wise. I want to talk about tax. Bridge is not a sport. What is and what is not a sport. Not sport according to the tax authorities. Apparently, the authorities have said it does not involve physical activity to qualify as a sport. I have one word for you, darts. Kudos to the new york times. Everybody has wanted to know who elevator. gs that was the Goldman Sachs employee that was revealing everything that was being set at the elevator. 34,orked at citigroup, raises questions about the authenticity of what you are reading. I have not been hacked. Everything has been written by me. Onthey have lifted the ban talking in elevators. We will get earnings from the u. K. Homebuilder. He says he got a deal, Mark Zuckerberg talking about his latest purchase in barcelona. Worth more than 19 billion. They have so little revenue compared to the number, but the reality is there are very few services that reach one billion people in the world. Galaxy x5, the fingerprint reading smartphone is showed off. Thande up profit of more 1. 5 billion euros. With a manhunt still underway , ukrainesyanukovych new government may be announced today. Welcome to countdown. Am mark barton it is the uks biggest buildup by mark about you. 257. 2 million pounds. That is an improvement on the yours earlier figure. Fullyear net income has beaten estimates. The average selling price last year was four percent. The average pretax profit was 323 billion pounds. Those are the headline metrics from the u. K. s largest homebuilder. Lets hear from the chief executive. Jack joins us here on bloomberg alive from the stock exchange. Thank you for joining us. Good morning. All of your metrics point to a stronger. Sales up. Volume up by 16 . Net income for the full year has beaten the average selling price, up four percent. That begs the question, is the question, is this sort of performance sustainable in 2014 . We are pleased with the performance. Clearly, we saw significant improvement in the marketplace off the back of the government possible plan. That continued through the rest of the year. I am pleased to say we enter the new year. That pattern is continuing. We are very pleased. We anticipate seeing further , probably withr a similar increase to what we saw last year. Is it time to buy, or reduce the cap . No. I think it is working very well, actually. An affordableg entry point to the marketplace, particularly for first time buyers. That stimulating the whole market. Good, from the purchasers point of view. It is good for employment. We are employing a lot more people to build these houses. That is having a good effect on the economy. If the Housing Market continues at the rate that it is performing at, and had its best year last year since 2006, rising by eight percent on a national level. Would you expect the bank of england to start tinkering, maybe introducing some tools to take away a bit in the london and the southeast . The good thing is that theyre looking at that carefully. Our experience is that prices have remained steady through the years. I do not think we have any concerns about house Price Inflation running away. From our perspective, we like to see steady pricing. That enables people to buy houses. If Interest Rates do go up, and im sure, at some point, that will be required, but it has not gone up yet, then i think that there is a place in the marketplace for affordability. You think the market can withstand an increase in Interest Rates . You think borrowers can withstand not . I think the lenders that we have seen are very disciplined in their policies now. There affordability criteria is quite strict. Anybody who is getting approved levelsortgage has good of disposable income to afford to pay the mortgage. Tot will enable them increase things sensibly over time. Is london in a bubble . We do not operate in central london, but certainly parts that we experience in the southeast in the london area, there are areas where there is a price growth. From the office of National Statistics last year, we saw this. Fromrices remain the same december 12 to december 13. We are seeing some increases in some parts of the country. Think, overall, new build prices are remaining steady. Is enough being done to boost supplies . We need 250,000 new homes to satisfy demand through november. 108,000 homes were built. Is enough being done to him at the building of new homes . Tot more could be done, not get to 250,000, but, at least, to move in the right direction. The important thing is, at the present time, that we meet the demand that we see in the marketplace. Increasing, accelerating our construction programs to respond to this. As i mentioned, our volume has increased by 30 last year. We are doing everything we can to respond to the demand, which i am very pleased with. Employment is a positive effect of that, as well. I think, really, the main constraint, which has been for many years is the planning system. We are pleased with the revisions, over recent times, with the National Planning policy framework. That is starting to work. We are seeing more being issued. We would like to see that speeded up. We could start a lot more quickly if that was achieved. Youve been on the job for almost one year now. What is been the biggest challenge of being the chief executive of britains the least the biggest homebuilder . Very excited by what ive seen in the last year. The Housing Market is in recovery. We are just very keen to respond to it. I am very pleased with the response of the team, particularly, construction wise to have taken such an improvement, really, in the real that we have managed to increase the amount of houses that were built. That has been very challenging. Obviously, we have issues in the supply change, both the skills and materials, but i think that we will see that directed over the course of this year. We are training an awful lot of people, as well. Or my perspective, and has been an exciting time. I am looking forward to this year. The chief executive officer of du ks biggest homebuilder. Just reporting results. Lets get the latest. Down. Revenue over one billion pounds. Theoure looking at fullyear operating profit, and down almost 33 . ,his, compared to william hill is a firm with a much bigger presence, in terms of percentage of revenue on the high street, in stores. Presents in u. K. New locations. The Biggest Challenges is to get new revenue from online. There are significant regulatory headwinds coming their way on the high street. I am talking about crack cocaine, gambling machines. Thoses what they call betting terminals. Adbrokes are much more reliant on that than the likes of william hill. Obviously they tried to preempt it. You cannot see what a lot of people suspected would happen. There would be a Board Committee dedicated to the problem of gambling in 2015. They will put in responsible gambling measures into executive for numeration. How they intend to do that remains to be seen. I think it is potentially fascinating. How do you link problem gambling to the likes of compensation . That is the big challenge. We have to measure the correct with a socially responsible approach. That is going to be difficult. Thank you very much. World posco secondlargest maker of construction materials. The numbers are coming in for a full year. It came in at 1. 48 billion euros. That is in line with expectations. Will get some updates from the business, and just a moment on what that is about. They are increasing their top saving target. In terms of how they are performing, they say the road to remain challenging. We will get more details on that. And more detail on the operations in ukraine, as well. Worked there,has as well. And we will be talking to crh. We will take a short break. To countdown. The company said a 2014 will be a year of profit growth. Manifold now in the studio. Albert, thank you for coming in. If we can look back for a moment on 2013, tell us how trading now is different than how it was. What we saw in the second half of 2013 was an unusual new trend coming forward. States, we saw a continuation of the recovery. That allows us to make that statement that we see this being a year of growth. What are you worried about still, in terms of the growth you are seeing . You are seeing some different pictures in different parts. Easier tou. S. , it is read. It is more sustained recovery there. In europe, it is a patterned coat. Are challenged. There are riffs on the downside. Their issues in regards to unemployment and high debt levels. Some of the main areas are seeing stabilization. Germany, the netherlands. And you are present in emerging markets, arent you . 15 comes from emerging markets. Tell us about what is happening in china and india . We put them together for different dynamics. That we should not take out of consideration. The for to better coming home now. They have not made the changes in their economy over the last four years. Tapering and federal evening, that is a difficulty. You could be talking about and emergingmarket there. Indeed. There is a fraction that makes it more challenging. We will see what happens after the elections. China is a different story. China is more of a carefully managed storage. Theyre trying to reign in spending, and at the same time, keep us going. They seem to be managing it well. It seems to be under control. He needs to be watched. You want to take out 450 million in savings between 2012 and 2015. What is next . Where else are you taking out costs . We increased our target to 535 million, which is as a result of what we saw on your plaster. We are now moving ahead. We will keep tight control and growth Going Forward. Lets talk about another emergingmarket. Not far from the headlines, for obvious reasons. You have a serious presence in the ukraine. What are the impacts there . We have 1500 employees in the ukraine to make sure everybody safe. And they are. Buildings are still being built . Supplies are being delivered . At this moment, yes. I think will be sometime before we understand the impact of what was going on last week. It is a very uncertain time. We have to see the picture of bobs. Youre planning to possibly sell some part of the business. Youre conducting a Strategic Review to work out which businesses you will be selling. You are in the preliminary stages of that. Can you let us in on a little bit of your thinking on where the business is headed and not headed . Were looking at growth Going Forward into the next cycle. Most of the businesses we built are wellpositioned for us. Some of the businesses we acquired were for different time. The is mrs. No longer exist. We have decided to exit those businesses. We think that we can turn to growth. Any clues yet, do you know yet which businesses uis it . We do know. But it does not make sense to go into that right now. Optimize for our shareholders. Can you give us an idea of your assessment of the Irish Economy . I know that is only 4. 5 of your what, but we want to hear you have got to say about the economy, and in particular, the Housing Market. A challenging situation five years ago to where they are now. The challenges still remain. There is the overhang of debt, which is a break in Economic GrowthGoing Forward. We are doing the right things. As a large open economy, there will be general economic recovery in europe and the United States. Talk about the Housing Market in the u and whether theres a bubble here. This is a much discussed topic. Do you have anything to say about whether we are saying construction in the market . With a big rig business here, which is exposed to the sector. Going on a good thing the pulse here. Theyre controlling things quite well. There is good strong growth good it is not excessive. You are new to the job, of course. How is it going . Fine. Enjoying it greatly. What is the hardest thing about the new job . What is the easiest . There is no hard thing. We work hard in our lives. We follow on great opportunities to run a great business. Great to get your thoughts, albert. Thank you for coming to speak to us. Crh. T manifold the ceo of his keynoteg and speech. Welcome back. This is countdown. Am mark barton. I am anna edwards. Mark Zuckerberg Talks about how to run Internet Access broaden Internet Access. Did Mark Zuckerberg give us any hints of his plans . He said consistently that nothing was going to change. The area was crowded. I cannot tell you how long the lines were. There were around the entire area here. Crowded out. But all they wanted to hear was about the 19 billion deal. He saidsistently that nothing is going to change. . 99 a year for free messages and calls. Zuckerberg seem to agree. One of the important pillars of the deal is that it is going to continue to operate can clearly of thomas lee. They will use the services from facebook, other that is different tools and infrastructure, or help using the people at our company to grow different functions of the organization. Whatever he wants to use, he will have the ability to use, but the vision is to keep the service exactly the same. Work autonomously, that is what Mark Zuckerberg was saying. About noas saying gimmicks. No games. That is why the 19 billion valuation make sense. Look at line, the japanese equivalent. They are charging two dollars or three dollars per person because they have games. If stickers you can buy. They have payments he you can make. Facebook, and many businesses like them, have a vested interest in getting as many people as they can connected to the internet. How Mark Zuckerberg hope this can be achieved . They want billions of people to access the internet for free. They want them to officers as such as facebook for free. Something drastic has to change. On an iphone for two years 2000 in the u. S. We are on cap to connect everyone. Past to connect everyone. Access the data to begin with. It will be a loss for the phone operators. Eventually, it will start to be profitable. There are they offer facebook for free. It is called facebook zero. You pay when you drill down into facebook. We are talking about access in the emerging markets to the internet. Plenty more, as caroline says, to come. She will be speaking to the ceo. We will take a break on countdown and return with that interview. I am mark barton in london. Today the acting president says that he expects the vote today. Quickly to fill the government backing so that officials can fend off default. The italian Prime Minister has won he confident vote in the senate did this is the first indication that they have backing in the parlance. The 39yearold leader laid out his priorities. Italy desperately needs to regain confidence in order to access the critical situations. This is a blighted country, stuck in a swamp, restrained by suffocating bureaucracy. Rose, theg to Charlie Google executive chairman, talks about the internet giants actions after eric edwin snowden. A way toad figured out get between our computer systems, as they tracked information. We have no evidence that information was misused of any kind. But when we saw that, and we saw the protocols, we closed it. That airs in full on charlie 8 00 and 10 00. Welcome to countdown. I am mark barton. I am anna edwards heres the interview we mentioned earlier. Caroline. Indeed. I am joined by joe london. They exposure to the emerging markets. Thank you for joining us this morning. With the announcement we got for Mark Zuckerberg yesterday, warning the next 5 billion people do join the internet, how to zero commented that . Ofebook zero is a way accessing facebook for free. Great, isson it is that i think it can be done. Any to be a real cooperation between the government, telephone companies, and their lookalikes. Other ready doing some things that he talks about yesterday. We are having trouble songs for our subscribers, so that they can test the internet for free. The idea is to move them onto plans at a later stage. Wikipedia. We have over 100 million subscribers using wikipedia for free. Are operating in is to make information and look up. Available for people. It is great. We are behind this. It will require a lot of cooperation effort. And effort. Bangladesh, these are enormous geographical units. Do you need help from some websites to provide the internet . This is what im talking about. Globals to be a big, project. Regulations may need to change. They need to participate, one where the other. And the devices. Otherwise, it will be hard to roll up the infrastructure and provide the breakthrough. The opportunity is there now. The ecosystem is established. You can do it. It requires some changes. We are seeing political turmoil in ukraine at the moment. How does that affect the business like yours . Do you see a wave of need to get on the internet and use voice and messaging . Where the biggest mobile company in the ukraine. We have been there for many, many years. Of course we have a special relationship to the country, so right now, of course, we have been following the situation very closely here and we have been crossing our fingers for a peaceful solution. You care about the people, first of all. Our effort has not been destructive did we are operating with no problems. We will continue to that. People always come first. Demand is higher . Butt is somewhat higher, not exploding, as you expected to be. What about russia . What about the weakening of current in russia . Does that affect you in any way . Of course it does. It affects us all that it is weakening. That is a general trend that we see. Some of this we can do. Some of this we cannot do. At the beginning of the local currencies theres always a challenge for the players in the markets. Plan onvery longterm russia. We feel very bullish on russia. Theyre rolling out a plan right now. If you will see growth coming out of russia. Markets,e emerging pakistan, bangladesh, algeria, what about the more developed nations you are in . My canada and italy . We have a very small operation in canada. And there is a big company in italy. Canada is a special situation. Those an auction there now on the spectrum. That is a different company. They acquire the spectrum package. We decided not to do that. Right now, we need to look at what other options we have. We are looking into that. We are seeing the same trend as the rest of europe is seeing. Because of regulations, because revenues are going down, and it is being heard, theres a huge uptick on data. The biggest challenge is to get the pricing models right, going growing and to stop make it possible to catch up with the u. S. Behind, and long pricing terms. Highspeed, highquality data first. Talking about the emerging market, can we see those people being brought onto the internet, with your help . Yes. We are absolutely ready to play a role. I think it needs to be a big cooperation between all stakeholders in the valuation. The timeframe is hard to predict, i think. E are always underestimating in my go much faster than we expected. What country are you most excited about worries you the most potential . In pakistan is encouraging. These are the nextgeneration services. Is really great reyna. Once again, thank you very much indeed. Of chief executive vimpelcom. Telling us all about the emerging markets. Telling us how they work together. Back to you. Carolyn, thank you very much. They have been preparing to spin off the french mobile business. Now i may be even more likely. The latest earnings showing rising on the sale of activision blizzard. Hans is in berlin. Hans, take it away. If you want to understand why vivendi much is trying to stride them, look at their income from the last year up 10 , almost 2 billion because, as you mentioned, they shed those assets. Vivendi is a company in transition. They want to have a core identity, not all kinds of different products in different markets. This is what they were talking about. And they confirmed it in their earnings report. Theyre looking at all available options to sell andy tingle itself from the mobile phone network. All this talk has centered on a French Company that only she knows how to pronounce. And whether or not that French Company will buy a steak and have control of it. What theyre looking at is having kind of core functionalities. So you would have a mobile company. He would have a telecom company. Will they come together and have more synergy . And look at their earnings. It makes all the sense of the world. They just have to agree on a price. He is a man of the world. I do not know why he is so hesitant. Give it a try next time. Very good. Hans nichols in berlin. Square, who gets to be the lucky woman who hangs hundreds of feet above the ground . Time for hotshots, a look at some of the most compelling images of the day. Sense into marks square. It is part of the citys annual carnival celebration. She is lower to the waiting crowd. Who gets to be the lucky woman to hang 262 feet above the ground . The winner of the previous years carnival. Pandaslds giant gathered in one place. This is how it would look. These paper pandas are in place of city hall. This is how many are living in the wild. It is meant to raise awareness of the need to protect the endangered species. A grueling experience. Covered to the spot are in birch, oak, and eucalypt the branches in a room heated by an iron oven. Celsius. 70 degrees it is a little early in the morning for all of that kind of thing, isnt it . Count down here. I am an edwards. He loves that theory. Being beaten by eucalyptus trees. Tell the truth. Did aink that anna stunning job. It is ryans russia. You will see anything you ever wanted to see. Well said. On the move did a big interview coming up. She gets the great eggs, doesnt she . A bridge. She . Gs, doesnt a bridge. I love that bridge. Zeitgeist. E everything is technology. A cracking interview coming up. Im going to drive the bus. Francesco from Goldman Sachs is the head of Macro Research for Goldman Sachs. A lot of issues to discuss. What is happening in italy . How do you take all of the information that is happening in italy . How you begin to understand it . What does it do to markets . What is it due to your investments . Eight years ago. Ask about it relative to spain . And the juxtaposition to china . What is going on currently . And this pullback to the real economy or two developers . We will keep an eye on the markets. A big finish just today. Equities. T u. S. A record high yesterday. Paper is in play. Thank you. On the move and 14 minutes. Thank you very much. Jonathan is here with a look at the macro. Picking up on the conversation on where we have been with equities and where we are heading. Of 1999. The s p 500 hit a record high, coming back little bit toward the end. There are missing forecasts. Look, if this is the weaker economy, is it that way because of the weather or bad forecasting . No one knows right now for sure did there are concerns about china as well. Are these highs justified . If you look at the s p 500 today, dead flat. This isnt a big deal. Maybe in isolation it is. A look at the last year. It is about where the momentum is right now. The 1990s i was sitting right here, not literally in this room, but it was december 31, the next day was the alltime high, it went up 65 points. You know what happened after december of 1999, for the next 27 months the market fell 37 . The bubble burst. Quite interesting historically. I wanted you to put on your headphones and play but of music. It would have to be extreme. Words. Than lets hope the music isnt coming back anyway. Thank you very much. We will have more on the markets in just a few moments. Question to ask is whether u. S. Policy makers are still on course for a multibilliondollar taper. Back after a short break. Welcome back to countdown today. Barton. K brunton lets get into your thoughts. What has taken your i . Eye . The event he story has taken my eye. Essentially, it is the mobile company that vodafone sold. The event he is now looking to offload it. Im thinking to myself, today it is about content. It is about services. It is about content. We talked about vodafone a lot. Vivendi, they are media company. They own universal universal. Why dont they buy it and then they will have the whole line . They have the cable. They are suffering. That would automatically know that in the bud. They could really expand the essence our service, expand that offering. I think that is the way to go. The late 1990s, early 2000s, they wanted to start acquiring again. Tricking, i think the fact that they are diverse, they should take advantage. Certainly a company Like Vodafone is looking to secure this. The event he doesnt have to do that. It has the assets already. What he can do is train more of the content into sfr. And we dont know what this alliance would look like. We dont know what that would be. We will he to see whether that transpires. Persimmons hot on their heels. Gain in stock price in the last couple of years. Theyre almost sustainable. Theyre almost back to do thousand seven. 2007. The golden years. I think it is almost sustainable. What will be interesting is the land rank aspects story. The problem with property developers, at the moment, is putting of talent before they can get land. Floods that we had, where they going to build next . Maybe their stuff they have in the lending. Planningy will get permission for it. A lot of it is on flood land. There is a demand issue. We know the demand is there. It is the supply. Some questions we can answer in the remaining few minutes of the show. Lets turn our attention to you. Surprises here did i think we might see an adjustment because of the numbers that we saw. We had a little bit of a paring back. More than the headline number. It is always the same with a business expense and and investment. We need to see it this year. To the consumer to push the gdp higher for this year. The high since december 30, 1999, do you see comparisons between now and the end of the tech bubble . 19 billion. It does remind me able but of that bubble. Overzuckerberg paid way the top of that, in my opinion. I am worried that it is the beginning of a significant change in expectations. He said, i could be wrong. Questions about the markets expecting billions. I think we will see more tapering, after that. Is aboutconvinced that the weather. Look at the trajectory of retail sales over the last four months. Michael, thank you. See you tomorrow. Byebye. Welcome to on the move. I am manus cranny in for francine lacqua. We are moments later moments away from the start of the european trading day. We have everything covered. We also have got a couple of great interviews for you. Us right here. Later we speak to the managing director hans christoph, but first our international alsospondent hans nichols standing by. Ryan, lets get to you. Ukraine, what is in the agenda. Its all about politics. He are expecting this is what the acting head of the so they canants vote. It vote on it in the parliament. They need that in place if they want to negotiate with the imf. Its definitely boring. The big one around this. Headwinds, you have a rare thing. Cross Party Supports. Want tond conservatives crack down on gambling. Its a thing they want to address. They provide a vast amount of revenue. We will have a chat