Earn Etisalat eyes mobile remittances in Gulf

Earn Etisalat eyes mobile remittances in Gulf Companies: AFN RELATED QUOTES Symbol Price Change AFN 0.00 0.00 Related Content A man walks past a sign at the headquarters of telecommunications company Etisalat in Dubai October 25, 2011. REUTERS/Jumana El HelouehView Photo A man walks past a sign at the headquarters of telecommunications company Etisalat in Dubai October 25, 2011. REUTERS/Jumana El Heloueh By Matt Smith DUBAI (Reuters) - UAE telecoms operator Etisalat (ABD:ETISALAT), which saw $1.8 billion moved over its network last year via money transfers, has sought regulatory approval to expand its financial services offerings in the Gulf region, home to millions of expatriates. Mobile money services allow customers to pay bills or make remittances using SMS text messages, often at a cheaper cost than through banks or money transfer firms. 'Remittances are a huge business opportunity,' George Held, director of products and services at Etisalat, told Reuters. 'The cost base for telecoms operators is much different than for banks and exchange houses. We do not need bricks and mortar branches, so our costs are lower and we can pass on this saving and offer better exchange rates and transaction fees.' The former monopoly was expected to focus on its home market and Saudi Arabia. Both countries have large expat populations and inbound annual remittances were worth about $36 billion combined in 2010, Held said. About 89 percent of the UAE's 8.3 million population are expatriates, while in Saudi Arabia just over a fifth of the 27 million population are foreigners. Etisalat's Egypt unit could also profit from an estimated $8 billion of inbound remittances from Egyptians working abroad. Etisalat has tied up with Western Union and MoneyGram International to allow money sent by mobile customers in the Middle East to be collected anywhere in the world. Aside from remittances, the operator hopes to offer salary payments, peer-to-peer domestic funds transfers and utility and shop payments. 'Remittances will be an extremely important part of our mobile money services. But it is not enough alone to drive service adoption, so we will offer a mix of services to make it very hard for customers not to get involved,' said Held. Etisalat already offers some of these services in six countries, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Tanzania and plans to expand this to the 17 countries in which it operates in Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 'We want to introduce mobile money in the rest of our markets as soon as possible. It is not a technical issue, but ticking all the boxes from a regulatory, compliance and customer education point of view,' Held said. LESS MONEY, MORE LOYALTY Mobile money has taken off in parts of Africa, where a minority of people hold bank accounts and the banking infrastructure in rural areas remains limited. About 8 percent of Tanzania's gross domestic product is thought to go through mobile banking. Text-based financial services will not help stem a decline in global SMS revenues - seen dropping up to 40 percent over the next three years as users opt for alternative text services such as BlackBerry Messenger or WhatsApp - but it can improve customer loyalty. 'When people have a mobile wallet ... we believe they will stay with us for a long time,' Held said. 'When was the last time you changed your bank account?' Etisalat will face challenges in convincing customers in the Gulf region, who have easy access to banking and exchange houses, to switch. 'In this region, people are used to going to the bank for transactions - they like to get a receipt. It is not a game-changer for telecom operators' revenues,' said a regional telecoms analyst. Pedro Oliveira, partner at consultant Oliver Wyman, said telecoms operators face a tough task competing with conventional exchange houses. 'Low income workers in the Gulf count every penny. So, it is not convenience that matters, but cost,' he said. 'For expats with prepaid contracts wanting to send money home, they would have to buy prepaid cards to top up their phone balance and then send a text.'

Signals Warren Buffett Weekly News

Signals The latest news about Warren Buffett, head of Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) (BRK-B).

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For a free list of Warren Buffett stocks, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Signals Facebook trading sets record IPO volume

Signals

Facebook trading sets record IPO volume

Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg rang the opening bell remotely, from company headquarters in California.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Facebook's stock market debut finally came and went -- but for all the breathless hype, shares ended right near their offering price.
On Thursday night, Facebook (FB) set its final IPO price at $38 a share. When the stock began trading at 11:30 a.m. ET on Friday, the first trade came in at $42.05 per share -- a gain of nearly 11%.

What is an IPO?

But the stock quickly reversed course, dropping down to hover right around the $38 IPO price for much of midday trading. Though shares rose modestly for short bursts of time throughout the day, they ended the session at $38.23.
While the price itself didn't move much, trading was fast and intense. More than 80 million shares changed hands in the first 30 seconds of trading. By the end of the day, volume had spiked to around 567 million shares.
That easily set a new volume record for IPOs, smashing the previous record that automaker General Motors (GM, Fortune 500) set in 2010 with trading of around 450 million shares.
Facebook's trading had been expected to start around 11 a.m. ET, but the opening was delayed.
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg rang the Nasdaq opening bell remotely, from the company's headquarters in California. Facebook celebrated its public debut by gathering its staff Thursday night for an all-night hackathon.
At the $38 IPO price, Facebook is on track to raise $16 billion -- making it the largest tech IPO in history. It's the third largest U.S. IPO ever, trailing only the $19.7 billion raised by Visa (V, Fortune 500) in March 2008 and the $18.1 billion raised by automaker GM in November 2010, according to rankings by Thomson Reuters.
Underwriters have the option to purchase an extra 63.2 million shares to cover any so-called over-allotments for excess demand. If that happens, Facebook will sell 484.4 million shares in total. That would bring the amount raised to $18.4 billion.
How much Facebook is worth: At $38 per share, Facebook's market capitalization would be around $81 billion on IPO day.
Many Facebook employees and executives hold unexercised stock options. If all of those shares were exercised, Facebook's outstanding share count would rise to around 2.8 billion -- pushing the company's total valuation closer to $107 billion.
Among all global companies, Facebook has the third-highest IPO-day valuation in history, according to data from DealLogic.
SecondMarket, an exchange on which people can buy and sell stock in private companies, posted data on Friday about Facebook's private-trading history.
It wasn't until 2010 that SecondMarket's Facebook trades racked up significant volume, so Facebook's trades before that tended to be one-off deals at a low per-share price. In April 2010, Facebook fetched an average price of $9.82 per share on a monthly average basis. One year later, the rate jumped to $31.46.
As of April 5, Facebook shares were trading for an average of $42.72 each -- nearly $4 higher than the IPO price.
Who's selling shares: Zuckerberg plans to sell 30.2 million shares in the IPO offering. That will net Zuckerberg about $1.1 billion.
But Zuckerberg won't be hanging on to his cash. Facebook said he will use the 'substantial majority' of the windfall to cover the massive tax bill he'll be hit with, thanks to his plan to exercise a large stock-options grant that will increase his ownership stake in the company he founded.
After the offering, Zuckerberg will still hold 503.6 million shares, or about 31% of the company. That stake is worth $19.1 billion at the IPO price.
Venture capital firm Accel Partners, which is the largest shareholder outside of Zuckerberg, is selling 49 million shares in the offering. That's about a quarter of its Facebook holdings.

Forex DUTV - More Gains Ahead?

Forex

A great chart, this stock was left for dead and has risen from the ashes.  Just how much higher can this stock go.  Since we have no recent data the chart doesn't help much other than to show great gains for those in at the lows.

What we do have today is a nice rally on light volume.  Look at the initial burst higher, it was on heavy volume.  In my opinion this bodes well for further gains.   It is taking less buying pressure to move the stock.  Let's see what happens from here.  Recent news is below:


Digital Utilities Ventures Partners With iCB Live to Establish 'Vizzage' as the First Open Source Network
Will Use Smart TV as the Delivery Vehicle Connecting Your Content to the World
NEW YORK, Apr 19, 2012 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) -- Digital Utilities Ventures, Inc (Stock Symbol:DUTV), an innovator in Internet Protocol video transport systems, announced this week its planned launch of the First Open Source Media Network that will empower media viewers to create and broadcast their own programming for the Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) market. Today the company is pleased to announce it will release details in the upcoming weeks of new broadcast network called Vizzage which will allow users to develop their own content and upload it to our IPTV platform. This will unleash the full power of individuals as the ultimate content creators, broadcasters and Smart TV producers. Now everyone will be able to produce programming with an unlimited range of subjects covering live broadcasts of concerts, Independent Films, Web series, Multiline news shows, showing all broadcasting for all walks of life.
iCB Live offers a broad range of sophisticated analytic tools, which record viewer habits and statistics for every channel. This feature makes monetizing content and brand building easy. For advertisers this means targeted commercials dedicated to people's interests in real time based on what they watch, buy, and read about.
'This platform will allow for live streams of video games, championships and Xgames style sports. Not to mention live theater, comedy, learning shows, music, painting, cooking and more. The sky is the limit here, ending the TV industry's virtual monopoly of content and energizing an untapped treasure trove of global talent,' said Garry McHenry, CEO of DUTV. 'Think of our new broadcast channel as the 'World Studio' for the Internet. Anyone will now be able to upload and showcase their talents on the Vizzage Network and be seen globally on TV!
We have partnered with InCommand Broadcasting, LLC (iCB Live), which will enable us to establish our brand worldwide. This partnership will change the way broadcasting has been done traditionally for the last 80 years.
'We expect to showcase our brand logo and business plan and projections in the coming weeks via our corporate website and other investor and consumer mediums,' concluded McHenry.
About Digital Utilities Ventures, Inc -- Digital Utilities Ventures is an intellectual property company and advanced technology incubator incorporated in the State of Delaware in June 2006. The Company was formed to utilize its innovative, Internet to TV and Cell Phone Communications System for the domestic and international Quad-Play/Convergence services market. The Company went public on March 26, 2009. Website: www.DUTV.US
ABOUT inCommand Broadcasting (iCB Live)
InCommand Broadcasting, LLC, also known as iCB Live, is a Dallas, Texas-based Corporation providing an Internet Television network and/or Internet TV channels for anyone desiring to broadcast or distribute audio/video content over the internet. inCommand Broadcasting also specializes in customizing software solutions for those entities with a desire to offer a unique experience or applications for broadcasting and streaming.
inCommand Broadcasting provides a hosted 'cloud based' platform that allows customers to easily broadcast (stream) audio/video programs Live over the Internet. Customers can also store content onto their channel(s) for On-Demand viewing. inCommand's platform provides a user friendly, fully customizable branded website (or page) for each of its customers to host their own Internet channel, store and manage their content libraries, and capture revenue from viewer subscriptions, or individual program viewings via pay-per-view or pre-paid ticketing technology. All broadcasting origination and viewer reception is accessible worldwide anywhere an Internet connection is available, and fully-functions on any computer device or smart phone.

Oil Greece, creditors laboriously piece together debt deal

Oil Greece, creditors laboriously piece together debt deal ReutersReuters – 1 hour 26 minutes ago Companies: Thomson Reuters Corporation RELATED QUOTES Symbol Price Change TRI 27.82 -0.10 By Renee Maltezou and Lefteris Papadimas ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece and its private creditors head back to the negotiating table on Saturday to put together the final pieces of a long-awaited debt swap agreement needed to avert an unruly default. After weeks of muddling through round after round of inconclusive talks, the negotiations appear to be in their final phase, with both sides hoping to secure a preliminary deal before Monday's European Union summit. Prime Minister Lucas Papademos was expected to meet bankers' chief negotiator Charles Dallara at around 1330 GMT (8:30 a.m. EST) on Saturday, before meeting inspectors from the 'troika' of foreign lenders pressing Athens to step up painful reforms. 'Today will be another tough day,' said George Karatzaferis, leader of the far-right LAOS party, one of three parties in Papademos's emergency coalition government. 'We will see whether we can bear the burden that lies ahead.' The debt swap, in which private creditors are to take a 50 percent cut in the nominal value of their Greek bond holdings in exchange for cash and new bonds, is a prerequisite for the country to secure a 130-billion-euro rescue package. Papademos told Reuters in an interview on Friday he expected the debt talks to be concluded within days. 'We made significant progress over the last few weeks and in the last few days in particular. We are trying to conclude the discussions as quickly as possible. I am quite optimistic an agreement will be reached in the coming days,' he said. But concern has grown that the deal may not do enough to get the country's debt reduction plan back on track, and that Greece's European partners will be forced to stump up funds to cover the shortfall. The German news magazine Der Spiegel reported on Saturday that Greece's international lenders thought Athens would need 145 billion euros of public money from the euro zone for its second bailout rather than the planned 130 billion euros. The magazine said the extra money was needed because of the deteriorating economic situation in Greece, echoing a Reuters report on Thursday. Athens also faces problematic talks with the 'troika' of foreign lenders - the European Commission, IMF and European Central Bank - who have warned it needs to do more to drive through painful reforms before they dole out any more money. 'It's all very dense, difficult and crucial,' a Greek finance ministry official said. 'There is optimism because the country needs to survive and we need to protect its citizens because they have suffered a lot.' Athens and its creditors have broadly agreed that new bonds under the swap would probably have a 30-year maturity and a progressive interest rate. The deal is aimed at chopping 100 billion euros off Greece's crushing 350-billion-euro debt load. But they have wrangled for weeks over the interest rate Greece must pay on the new bonds and pressure has grown in recent days on the European Central Bank and other public creditors to accept a cut in the value of their Greek bond holdings like the private sector creditors. A debt deal must be sealed in about three weeks as Greece has to repay 14.5 billion euros of debt on March 20. Otherwise Greece will sink into an uncontrolled default that might spread turmoil across the euro zone. Papademos promised on Friday this would not happen. 'Greece will not default,' he said. International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde said on Saturday that euro zone members were making progress to overcome their crisis but must do more to strengthen their financial firewall, adding that the IMF was ready to help. 'There is progress as we see it,' Lagarde told a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos. 'But it is critical that the euro zone members actually develop a clear, simple, firewall that can operate both to limit the contagion and to provide this sort of act of trust in the euro zone so that the financing needs of that zone can actually be met.' Senior euro zone officials have expressed optimism on the Greek debt deal, though previous predictions of an imminent agreement have failed to become reality. Greece is in its fifth year of recession, and hopes of an end to the crisis in the near term have virtually gone, because of the combination of squabbling politicians, rising social anger and its inability to get its debt load under control. Germany is pushing for Greece to relinquish control over its budget policy to European institutions as part of discussions over a second rescue package, a European source told Reuters on Friday. Greece said such a move was out of the question, adding that a similar proposal had been made in the past by a Dutch minister without getting anywhere. 'There is no way we would accept such a thing,' a Greek government official told Reuters. (Additional reporting by Renee Maltezou, Writing by Deepa Babington; editing by Tim Pearce)

Signals IMF leads global push for euro zone to boost firewall

Signals IMF leads global push for euro zone to boost firewall The head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Christine Lagarde attends a session at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, January 28, 2012. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann The head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Christine Lagarde attends a session at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, January 28, 2012. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann By Paul Carrel and Emma Thomasson DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde led a global push on Saturday for the euro zone to boost its financial firewall, saying 'if it is big enough it will not get used.' Lagarde, supported by the British finance minister, George Osborne, said the IMF could boost its support for the euro zone but pressed its leaders to act first. Some attendees at the Davos Forum still doubted the viability of the currency union. Countries beyond the 17-country bloc want to see its members stump up more money before they commit additional resources to the IMF, which this month requested an additional 500 billion euros ($650 billion) in funding. 'Now is the time - there has been a lot of pressure building in order to see a solution come about,' Lagarde told a Forum panel discussion on the economic outlook from which euro zone leaders - most notably Germany - were conspicuously absent. 'It is critical that the euro zone members develop a clear, simple firewall that can operate both to limit the contagion and to provide this sort of act of trust in the euro zone, so that the financing needs of that zone can actually be met,' she said. Lagarde's comments rounded out a crescendo of calls at the Davos Forum for the euro zone to boost its financial defenses. The annual five-day conference began with German Chancellor Angela Merkel deflecting pressure to do so. In a carefully worded keynote address, Merkel suggested doubling or even tripling the size of the fund may convince markets for a time, but warned that if Germany made a promise that could not be kept, 'then Europe is really vulnerable.' On Friday, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner pressed Europe to make a 'bigger commitment' to boosting its firewall. Two bankers who attended meetings with Geithner at the Forum said on Friday the United States was looking for the euro zone to roughly double the size of its firewall to 1.5 trillion euros. There was no immediate comment from the U.S. Treasury. Osborne said the currency bloc must beef up its firewall before other countries increase their funding to the IMF. 'I think the euro zone leaders understand that,' said Osborne, the only European minister on Saturday's panel discussion on the global economic outlook in 2012. 'There are not going to be further contributions from G20 countries, Britain included, unless we see the color of their money,' he added, calling for the euro zone 'to provide a significant increase in available resources.' MORE OPTIMISM...FOR SOME Japanese Economics Minister Motohisa Furukawa echoed Osborne's comments, saying: 'Without the firm action of Europe, I don't think the developing countries like China or others are willing to pay more money for the IMF.' On condition that the euro zone boosts its own defenses, he said Japan and other countries were willing to additional support via the IMF. Lagarde said, however, that if the international lender's resources were boosted sufficiently, this would raise confidence to such a degree that they would not be needed. 'If it is big enough, it will not get used. And the same applies to the euro firewall for that matter,' she added. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, speaking to the Forum by video link from Tokyo, said Japan was working with South Korea and India to reduce the risk of the euro zone crisis spreading to Asia. 'Japan stands ready to support the euro zone as much as possible,' he added. Mexico's central bank chief, Agustin Carstens, said on Friday he believed a consensus was building on boosting the IMF's resources to help European countries and others that might need aid from the global lender. There has been a palpable sense of hope at the Davos Forum that the euro zone is pulling back from the brink of catastrophe, though business leaders are equally worried that Europe's woes will hold back a global recovery. Osborne saw some signs of optimism. 'People have commented on the mood of this conference being quite somber but having been here for a couple of days people have also pointed out that actually people are slightly more optimistic at the end of the week than the beginning,' he said. However, Davos 2011 also ended on upbeat note about the euro zone and a feeling that worst of the crisis was over - only for the situation to deteriorate and financial markets to turn their fire on Italy, the bloc's third biggest economy. 'The euro zone is a slow-motion train wreck,' said economist Nouriel Roubini, made famous by predictions of the 2008-09 global banking crisis. He expected Greece, and possibly Portugal, to exit the bloc within the next 12 months and believed there is a 50 percent chance of the bloc breaking up completely in the next 3-5 years. Hong Kong's Chief Executive, Donald Tsang, said no matter how strong the euro zone's firewall is, the market will look at the nature of the economies it is protecting. 'If it is protecting insolvent economies...no matter how strong the firewall is, it won't survive,' he said. (Additional reporting by Ben Hirschler; Editing by Jon Boyle)

Signals Stocks Going Ex Dividend the Third Week of April 2012

Signals Here is our latest update on the stock trading technique called 'Buying Dividends'. This is the process of buying stocks before the ex dividend date and selling the stock shortly after the ex date at about the same price, yet still being entitled to the dividend. This technique generally works only in bull markets. In flat or choppy markets, you have to be extremely careful, and may need to avoid the technique during those times.

In order to be entitled to the dividend, you have to buy the stock before the ex-dividend date, and you can't sell the stock until after the ex date. The actual dividend may not be paid for another few weeks. WallStreetNewsNetwork.com has compiled a downloadable and sortable list of the stocks going ex dividend during the next week or two. The list contains many dividend paying companies, all with market caps over $500 million, and yields over 2%. Here are a few examples showing the stock symbol, the market capitalization, the ex-dividend date and the yield.

Vale ADR (VALE) ex-div date: 4/16/2012 yield: 5.2% market cap: $72.4B

Comtech Telecomm. Corp. (CMTL) ex-div date: 4/18/2012 yield: 3.3% market cap: $628.1M

Western Asset Emerging Markets Debt Fund Inc (ESD) ex-div date: 4/18/2012 yield: 6.7% market cap: $629.2M

Western Asset High Income Fund II (HIX) ex-div date: 4/18/2012 yield: 9.8% market cap: $854.3M

Western Asset Managed Municipals Fund (MMU) ex-div date: 4/18/2012 yield: 5.8% market cap: $572.7M

The additional ex-dividend stocks can be found at wsnn.com. (If you have been to the website before, and the latest link doesn't show up, you may have to empty your cache.) If you like dividend stocks, you should check out the high yield utility stocks and the Monthly Dividend Stocks at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com or WSNN.com.

Dividend definitions:

Declaration date: the day that the company declares that there is going to be an upcoming dividend.

Ex-dividend date: the day on which if you buy the stock, you would not be entitled to that particular dividend; or the first day on which a shareholder can sell the shares and still be entitled to the dividend.

Monthly Dividend Stock List
Record date: the day when you must be on the company's books as a shareholder to receive the dividend. The ex-dividend date is normally set for stocks two business days before the record date.

Payment date: the day on which the dividend payment is actually made, which can be as long at two months after the ex date.

Don't forget to reconfirm the ex-dividend date with the company before implementing this technique.

Disclosure: Author did not own any of the above at the time the article was written.

By Stockerblog.com

Forex Top Airline Stocks

Forex During the last month, airline stocks have outperformed the Standard & Poor's 500. The Dow Jones U.S. Airlines Index was up 5.5% versus 4.5% for the S&P 500. This in spite of the recent news about pilot and flight attendant meltdowns, which you think might scare off a few passengers.

However, if the economy has hit bottom and is starting to to turn around, it might be worth taking a flier on airline stocks, as they may take off. According to the free list at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com, there are about twenty airline stocks, several of which pay dividends. Not all of them are in great financial shape, and you may have to look outside the United States for the better quality airline companies.

For example, Lan Airlines (LFL) is a Chile based airline that provides passenger and cargo air transportation services. The company has over 120 passenger planes and offers its primary services in Chile, Peru, Argentina, Colombia, and Ecuador. The stock trades at 20.5 times forward earnings and pays a yield of 2.3%. Revenues for the latest reported quarter were up 19.3%, however, earnings dropped 31.6%.

Domestically, there is the Dallas, Texas based Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV), which operates about 700 aircraft throughout the United States. The stock has a forward price to earnings ratio of 8.2 and even pays a small dividend of 0.2%. Quarterly earnings wer up 16% on a 32% boost in revenues.

For a free list of approximately 20 airline stocks which includes information about the price-to-earnings ratios and yields, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Disclosure: Author didn't own any of the above at the time the article was written.

By Stockerblog.com

Signals Lloyds chief executive skips annual bonus

Signals LONDON (AP) -- The chief executive of Lloyds Banking Group, which was rescued by British taxpayers during the credit crisis, says he won't take his annual bonus for 2011. Antonio Horta-Osorio said Friday he's doing that because he took a leave of absence, not specifically in response to Prime Minister David Cameron's recent call for restraint on executive pay. Horta-Osorio took two months off last year as he suffered from sleeping problems. He did not disclose the amount in a bonus that he is turning down, but said future payments should take into account Britain's 'tough financial circumstances.' His pay and bonus entitlement will be disclosed next month in the group's annual report. British taxpayers still hold a 40 percent stake in the bank.

Signals France loses AAA-rating in blow to eurozone

Signals PARIS (AP) -- France's finance ministry says Standard & Poor's has cut the country's credit rating by one notch to AA. France's loss of its AAA-rating deals a heavy blow to the eurozone's ability to fight off its debt crisis. The country is the second-largest contributor to the currency union's bailout fund. S&P in December put 15 eurozone countries on creditwatch and other downgrades were expected later Friday. The cut in France's creditworthiness could also hurt President Nicolas Sarkozy's re-election chances. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below. ROME (AP) -- Europe's ability to fight off its debt crisis was again thrown into doubt Friday when the euro hit its lowest level in over a year and borrowing costs rose on expectations that the debt of several countries would be downgraded by rating agency Standard & Poor's. Stock markets in Europe and the U.S. plunged late Friday when reports of an imminent downgrade first appeared and the euro fell to a 17-month low. The fears of a downgrade brought a sour end to a mildly encouraging week for Europe's heavily indebted nations and were a stark reminder that the 17-country eurozone's debt crisis is far from over. Earlier Friday, Italy had capped a strong week for government debt auctions, seeing its borrowing costs drop for a second day in a row as it successfully raised as much as euro4.75 billion ($6.05 billion). Spain and Italy completed successful bond auctions on Thursday, and European Central Bank president Mario Draghi noted 'tentative signs of stabilization' in the region's economy. A credit downgrade would escalate the threats to Europe's fragile financial system, as the costs at which the affected countries — some of which are already struggling with heavy debt loads and low growth — could borrow money would be driven even higher. The downgrade could drive up the cost of European government debt as investors demand more compensation for holding bonds deemed to be riskier than they had been. Higher borrowing costs would put more financial pressure on countries already contending with heavy debt burdens. In Greece, negotiations Friday to get investors to take a voluntary cut on their Greek bond holdings appeared close to collapse, raising the specter of a potentially disastrous default by the country that kicked off Europe's financial troubles more than two years ago. The deal, known as the Private Sector Involvement, aims to reduce Greece's debt by euro100 billion ($127.8 billion) by swapping private creditors' bonds with new ones with a lower value, and is a key part of a euro130 billion ($166 billion) international bailout. Without it, the country could suffer a catastrophic bankruptcy that would send shock waves through the global economy. Prime Minister Lucas Papademos and Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos met on Thursday and Friday with representatives of the Institute of International Finance, a global body representing the private bondholders. Finance ministry officials from the eurozone also met in Brussels Thursday night. 'Unfortunately, despite the efforts of Greece's leadership, the proposal put forward ... which involves an unprecedented 50 percent nominal reduction of Greece's sovereign bonds in private investors' hands and up to euro100 billion of debt forgiveness — has not produced a constructive consolidated response by all parties, consistent with a voluntary exchange of Greek sovereign debt,' the IIF said in a statement. 'Under the circumstances, discussions with Greece and the official sector are paused for reflection on the benefits of a voluntary approach,' it said. Friday's Italian auction saw investors demanding an interest rate of 4.83 percent to lend Italy three-year money, down from an average rate of 5.62 percent in the previous auction and far lower than the 7.89 percent in November, when the country's financial crisis was most acute. While Italy paid a slightly higher rate for bonds maturing in 2018, which were also sold in Friday's auction, demand was between 1.2 percent and 2.2 percent higher than what was on offer. The results were not as strong as those of bond auctions the previous day, when Italy raised euro12 billion ($15 billion) and Spain saw huge demand for its own debt sale. 'Overall, it underscores that while all the auctions in the eurozone have been battle victories, the war is a long way from being resolved (either way),' said Marc Ostwald, strategist at Monument Securities. 'These euro area auctions will continue to present themselves as market risk events for a very protracted period.' Italy's euro1.9 trillion ($2.42 trillion) in government debt and heavy borrowing needs this year have made it a focal point of the European debt crisis. Italy has passed austerity measures and is on a structural reform course that Premier Mario Monti claims should bring down Italy's high bond yields, which he says are no longer warranted. Analysts have said the successful recent bond auctions were at least in part the work of the ECB, which has inundated banks with cheap loans, giving them ready cash that at least some appear to be using to buy higher-yielding short-term government bonds. Some 523 banks took euro489 billion in credit for up to three years at a current interest cost of 1 percent. ___ Steinhauser contributed from Brussels. AP Business writer David McHugh in Frankfurt contributed.