Lakshmi Mittal richest business tycoon in South Africa

JOHANNESBURG: Indian steel magnet Lakshmi Mittal remains the richest business tycoon in South Africa for the sixth consecutive year despite hit hard by the global financial crisis.

Mittal heads the 'Rich List', a ranking of the 100 wealthiest businessmen in South Africa released here by the weekly 'Sunday Times', even though he is not living in South Africa.

Mittal's listed holdings of R 21.5 billion ($3.4 billion) in Arcelor-Mittal, which was born out of state-owned steel manufacturer Iscor, got him the top slot as the three richest men in South Africa remained unchanged from last year.

Mittal first provided technical assistance to turn the ailing Iscor around before buying it out in 2001 as he expanded his global steel empire.

The 'Rich List' is based on an analysis of holdings of all companies listed on the Johannesburg Securities Exchange, thus being only the South African portion of Mittal's wealth, as he has huge interests worldwide.

Last year, Mittal narrowly beat South African businessman Patrice Motsepe of African Rainbow Minerals, whose stake in listed companies was R19.9 billion. Their nearest rival, Nicky Oppenheimer, narrowed the gap in his stake from just R5.3 billion last year to R10.7 billion in 2010.

Only three South African Indian businessmen made the list of 100, mostly at the bottom end. Ragavan Moonsamy dropped from 61 to 68 with holdings of R339 billion; Mustaq Brey's R227 billion got him the 96th position; and Harish Mehta was at 99th position with his R216 billion.

With South Africa having largely survived the global economic crunch, the number of local billionaires almost doubled from 16 in 2009 to 31 this year.

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Rupee gains 15 paise against dollar in early trade

MUMBAI: The Indian Rupee on Monday opened 15 paise up at Rs 44.95 a dollar at the Interbank Foreign Exchange market, tracking gains in most other Asian currencies.

Forex dealers said strong opening of the stock exchanges and dollar's losses against other Asian currencies kept the rupee sentiment firm.

Rupee has been appreciating against the US currency for the fifth straight session now. It had on Friday gained 18 paise to close at three-week high of Rs 45.10/11 against the US dollar amid exporters and banks selling the US currency.

Meanwhile, the Bombay Stock Exchange index Sensex was up by 135 points at 20,101.93 level in the opening trade on Monday.

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Sensex up 145 points in morning trade

MUMBAI: A benchmark index of Indian equities on Monday was ruling 145 points higher in early trade.

The 30-share sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 20,038.25 points, was ruling at 20,112.48 points, up 145.55 points or 0.73% from its previous close at 19,966.93 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the 50-share S&P CNX Nifty was trading at 6,036.7 points, up 0.73%.

Broader markets were also in the green with the BSE midcap index ruling 0.89% up and the BSE smallcap index trading 0.84% higher.

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Ulfa ideologue released from jail

GUWAHATI: Ulfa's political adviser Bhimkanta Buragohain (79), who was released from jail after seven years on Sunday, said the outfit's commander-in-chief, Paresh Baruah, would come to the negotiating table after Ulfa's jailed executive members are freed.

"Baruah never said that he'll not come for the peace talks. We'll discuss the matter at our general council," Buragohain, the fifth top Ulfa leader to be released on bail in the past six months, told reporters. "I'll try everything for a permanent solution to the decades-old conflict." Later, hundreds of his supporter, including some surrendered Ulfa militants, welcomed him at Sonapur outside Guwahati.

The state government has been urging the Ulfa leadership to come to the table, but made it clear that it can't wait indefinitely for Baruah to start the talks. Barring him the outfit's entire top brass was in jail till recently.

The government decided against opposing the Ulfa leaders' bail applications as the demands for releasing the outfit's jailed leaders for the sake of talks gathered momentum. Earlier, Pradeep Gogoi, Mithinga Daimary, Raju Baruah and Pranati Deka were allowed to walk free. Ulfa general secretary Anup Chetia is in Bangladesh since his arrest in 1997, while Baruah is believed to be somewhere along the China-Myanmar border.

Royal Bhutan Army captured Buragohain during 'Operation All Clear' — an offensive carried out to flush out over 3,000 militants belonging to Ulfa, NDFB and other banned outfits — in December 2003. He was later handed over to Indian authorities.

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Indians No. 2 in emigrating, top in sending money home

NEW DELHI: India continued to be the largest recipient of remittances in 2010, with the figure rising from $49.6 billion in 2009 to $55 billion. It was also the country with the second largest number of emigrants (those migrating abroad) after Mexico, according to the World Bank's just-released Migration and Remittances Factbook 2011.

Interestingly, even as 11.4 million people from India went abroad, 5.4 million came into the country, making India No. 10 in the list of nations attracting the most immigrants -- and No. 2 in Asia, behind only Saudi Arabia.

India and China, which received $51 billion in remittances, account for almost a quarter of the worldwide remittance flows of $440 billion in 2010, the report estimated. High-income OECD countries account for just $107 billion of the global remittance flow.

Not surprisingly, it is the developing countries that receive the bulk -- $325 billion, an increase of 6% from 2009. Middle-income countries including China, Russia, Mexico, India, Pakistan, Egypt, and Turkey receive the lion's share of over $301 billion, while low-income countries including Bangladesh, Tajikistan, Nepal, Uganda and Cambodia receive just $24 billion. Bangladesh alone accounts for over $11 billion.

The true size of remittances, including unrecorded flows through formal and informal channels, is believed to be significantly larger. Interestingly, even recorded remittances in 2009 were nearly three times the amount of official foreign aid and almost as large as foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to developing countries.

The factbook estimated the total number of international migrants or people living outside their country of birth in 2010 to be 215 million persons, or 3% of the world's population, only a marginal increase over the levels recorded in 2005.

Meanwhile, the World Migration Report 2010, brought out by the International Organization for Migration said that about 57% of all migrants live in high income countries, up from 43% in 1990. Migrants now make up 10% of the population of high-income regions, up from 7.2% in 1990.

The US remains the top migrant destination country in the world, with 42.8 million migrants in 2010 compared to 34.8 million in 2000, according to the World Bank report. However, just over 2.2 million Americans live outside the US, less than 1% of the country's population. Besides the US, other top destination countries are Russia, Germany and Saudi Arabia in that order.

The US also recorded the largest outflow of remittances in 2009 -- $48 billion -- followed by Saudi Arabia with an outflow of $26 billion and Switzerland and Russia accounting for less than $20 billion of outflows each.

Many of the big destination countries are also origin countries like Germany, the UK, Ukraine, Russia and India. The top immigration countries relative to population are Qatar where migrants make up 87% of the population, Monaco (72%), the United Arab Emirates (70%), Kuwait (69%) and Andorra (64%).

The Migration Report said that for Asia too, the US was the main destination with 7.9 million Asian emigrants going to that country. Asians are the second-most numerous group of migrants in the US, next to Mexicans, with over 10 million people a 27% share of the total migrant population -- made up of nearly 2 million Chinese, 1.7 million Filipinos and 1.6 million Indians.

Interestingly, India happens to be among the most important destination for Asian migrants, second only to the US, going by the number of migrants -- 6.1 million. However, this is primarily from Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan. Approximately 37% of Asian migrants move to OECD countries, 43% migrate within the region and the rest migrate to other countries outside the region.

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