20/11/2015 BBC Business Live

This is Business Live from BBC News with Aaron Heslehurst and

Crypto currency crackdown - could Bitcoin become a victim

Live from London, that's our top story on 20th November.

One week on from an attack that rocked a nation - Ministers will

meet in Brussels today to discuss what they can do to tackle terror

Also in the programme....

A diamond nearly the size of a tennis ball has been found

in Botswana - the second-biggest ever unearthed.

And all eyes will be on the ECB President Mario Draghi and his

thoughts on the prospects of a Eurozone recovery. It is all go in

the studio! With three billion barrels

of oil now sitting in storage and the price falling to record lows

this week - we look at how long the industry can go on producing more of

the black stuff than anyone needs. So now Facebook says

its trialing new tools to make it less painful when you break up with

someone by altering what you can see of them, but without them knowing

you've done anything. If you've broken up do you

care what your partner does? We start with the virtual currency

bitcoin - we are asking whether it could become a victim

of the fight against terrorism. Later today EU interior

and justice ministers will meet to discuss how to combat the militant

group IS and the way it's financed. According to reports -

they are planning a crackdown on virtual currencies

and anonymous payment methods, the Users can buy bitcoins at

exchanges using Once purchased,

the bitcoins can then be transferred online to other users quickly and

anonymously - without verification That has made them attractive to

users ranging from drug dealers to those trying to get around capital

controls in Greece or China. Jonathan Levin,

Co-Founder of Chainalysis. It provides anti money laundering

software for digital currencies. Great to have you in the studio, do

we have any evidence that so-called Isis and other terror organisations

are using bitcoins to fund activities? We have no evidence so

far that bitcoins have been used to fund any incidents relating to last

week. We do have evidence that there have been bitcoin routing numbers

posted on the Internet to raise funding from the crowd, but none of

them have had significant funding today. I was reading this late

afternoon yesterday, saying that the EU would sit together at this

emergency meeting and I was wondering, I can't imagine Isis are

using bitcoins and buying weapons that way, cash is king. Some would

say that cash is what we have to keep an eye on and could be the

issue? The UK Government put out a report last month on

money-laundering risks and terror financing risks of different

systems. Banks come on top of that with cash as well rating highly.

Digital currencies were at the bottom of the risk factor. That is

due to liquidity but also slightly to do with how trace of bitcoin is.

Arab business is predicated on tracing bitcoins from different

service providers. -- our business. We are talking about prepaid credit

cards and gold and different many services that are going to be looked

at in terms of regulation. It is important to read past the headline,

the clamp-down is to do with the EU putting out guidelines regarding

KYC, know your customer requirements. They rely on banking

infrastructure. It is about record-keeping and enhancing their

effective controls that these money servicing businesses have to do. If

it is a collective agreement can the EU working with banks to put some

sort of control on all of this? In the US they have very good

legislation which digital currency businesses have to register with the

regulator. It is a very collaborative relationship with

Loren Portman and regulators and digital currency businesses. -- law

enforcement. It has to be a balance of knowing your customer

requirements and also not driving it underground which could be the case

if you overreact. We appreciate you coming in. Have a great weekend. We

appreciate that. Thanks very much. In other news...

The Dutch government is expected to raise around 4 billion euros this

Friday with the flotation of a 23 per cent stake in ABN Amro.

It's the biggest initial public offering of a European bank

since the financial crisis - and investor interest has been strong.

ABN was bailed out in 2008 at a cost of 22 billion euros -

Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem has admitted the Dutch taxpayer is

unlikely to get the full amount back.

Shares of mobile payments company Square surged on their Wall Street

The flotation had been heavily discounted

amid market concerns over the high valuations of tech startups.

It was a welcome birthday present for its founder, Twitter CEO Jack

He's still the largest shareholder in Square - his 21 per cent stake is

Volkswagen has until today to tell US regulators how it plans to fix

almost half a million diesel cars sold in the US that are involved

Experts say it will have to fit most of them with either new exhaust

systems or chemical treatment devices - both likely to be very

expensive - and it may prove cheaper to simply buy back older models

Let's take a look round the world at what's business stories are

Check out the site. It's a great site. It's a cracker! A hefty fine

for the South African mobile operator. $5.2 billion. Greece

passes the bailout bill. That of course paves the way for the state

to be able to pay its debts and recapitalise the banks. This has

been the big issue for Greece, the banking system, making sure they

have enough liquidity. Only in recent weeks there have been lots of

austerity protests going on in Greece at the moment. More protests

on the streets. It looks as though they will get their next chunk of

money and importantly money for the banks. Let's take a look at some of

the other stories and go straight over to Asia. Here is a cracking

story, Charlotte is in Singapore. Regulators

in Australia have scuppered a vast land sale that would have

been the country's biggest ever. Kidman and Company operates ten

cattle ranches over 101,000 square kilometers - an area

about the size of South Korea. It is indeed, a vast portfolio of

properties spread over four Australian states. The government

said that the property cannot be sold to Chinese investors. The

decision was announced on the basis that selling the land in its current

form would be contrary to the national interest. Specifically that

is because it is too close to a remote area used for weapons

testing. This is causing also observed confusion because Chinese

investors are allegedly linked to the Chinese government and they were

allowed to lease the port of Darwin giving them a look at the movement

of US troops stationed at the top end of Australia. That was judged to

pose no security problems. The Australian government says it is

open for foreign investment but a Shanghai -based real estate expert

has said that the latest decision trashes that claim. I am sure we

will keep across that. Let's have a quick look at the markets.

Closing higher for the fourth session in a row while the rest of

Asia was mixed. Taking on a weak lead from Wall Street where shares

were choppy at the prospect of higher interest rates and the theory

is gaining momentum. They have been rallying on federal reserve hints

that it may raise rates in December but that is a mixed blessing. Stocks

are climbing amid investor optimism in Europe. They will also be looking

at consumer confidence data and the speech from the ECB President Mario

Draghi for further indications of the health of the region of the

economy. What is making the headlines in the US?

On Thursday the US Treasury put in place further rules to discourage

US companies from buying smaller foreign rivals

in order to move their headquarters abroad and escape US taxes.

Wall Street will certainly be looking at how these rules could

affect a reportedly close deal between Pfizer and Allergan.

The deal could see the US drug giant relocate to Ireland.

And Volkswagen will have to explain to US regulators how they plan to

bring their nearly half of diesel cars, fit with pollution

cheating software, into compliance with emission standards.

Volkswagen president in America Michael Horne said he

And teen clothing chain Abercrombie and Fitch is expected to report

three quarters profits below analyst estimates, sales have

Joining us is David Buik from Panmure Gordon Co.

That is a familiar face! Good morning. Good morning. The markets,

driving the perception of the markets is that commodities are not

good but copper is fascinating. That is the one to watch. They are an

indicator? Slightly better than tea leaves. On a serious note, all of

the big rallies we have had, 1921, 32, 86, have been triggered by the

price of copper going up which is astonishing, think about gold or oil

or something of that nature, but it is copper. It made as to be a

coincidence. Copy used in everything. Yes, every kind of

manufacturing. Gold is very specific and often used for hedging and other

reasons. It is interesting. The other thing I found fascinating this

week is that we are now significantly below where we were 15

years ago with the price of all commodities. It is off by about a

since 2008 when they hit a high. People are starting to look at

mining shares which have been trashed since China put up the red

flag. Sorry, that is misleading! It was terrible. They put it up in

January, and the first quarter in China is when they looked as though

they were falling off the precipice but now it is panned out. China is

another barometer for commodities and it looks better. We have seen

people in the last week, not just putting their toe in the water to

buy some of this trash, but quite a lot. Not long ago Australian

companies where the beneficiaries and they had an upswing of three or

4%. We have run out of time but we will come back. We will talk to you

very shortly. With oil dropping below $40 a

barrel this week and global stockpiles at record

levels we ask if cheep oil is here Upgrades to Britain's aging rail

network will take longer than planned and cost more than expected,

according to a cross-party group And it may be passengers

who are left to pick up the tab. Ben is in Salford and is

following the story for us. You get around! Some of the highest

rail fares in Europe already, this will not go down well with train

passengers? No, and those passengers could end up picking up the tab.

Good morning to you both. Going back two years, ?38 billion was set aside

to upgrade the ageing infrastructure on the railways in the UK. A lot of

the money was destined for things like Crossrail and the Thames Link

in London but also the electrification of the Midlands

mainline and also the trans-Pennine route. All of those projects are at

various stages of completion, some more than others but the issue is

whether they will overrun in terms of cost and time. The cross-party

group of MPs have been saying that this is unacceptable, taking too

long and the money could rise even further. Just one example, the great

Western mainline from London to Cardiff was originally supposed to

cost ?1.6 billion and it could be close to ?2.8 billion. That is a

significant increase. I was talking to the chair of the committee and

she told me that the cost overruns and delays are unacceptable. An

acceptable for passengers and taxpayers. It will not be delivered

on time and to add insult to injury, the trains that are supposed to run

will arrive before the line is built. There are wider issues about

the overall management by Network Rail. The role of the regulator and

whether it is fit for purpose in the modern world.

The implications are for passengers, whether they will be asked to pick

up the that for that funding. We should say that from Network Rail's

point of view, they have delivered 5000 projects and they said they did

that on time and budget but they point to the West, there are a lot

of implications to the cost they will have to pay to get these

railways up and running. My secret! No time for the Facebook test! --

nice haircut! The EU prepares to clamp down

on Bitcoin and other anonymous payment systems as it tries to

tackle terror funding routes. Ministers are meeting in Brussels

today one week after those deadly Paris attacks that killed 129 people

and injured so many others. The price of oil dropped below $40

a barrel this week as supply Although this is great news

for consumers, many producers are Figures out today in the US

are expected to confirm this. The Baker Hughes Rig Count looks

at the demand for products used in With me to get more

on this is our Economics Can you explain what we have just

said. This is an American oilfield services company, Baker Riggs, the

provides a kind of active oil rigs and has international figures and it

is principally used by businesses in the oil business to get some sort of

assessment as to what demand they are likely to get for the product

used in getting oil out of the ground. It is a useful thing for

businesses that are actually in the industry so they have some kind of

flavour from what demand they will expect. It gives some overall

flavour as to what is going on in the wider industry although there is

no drag read from these figures into what oil production will be because

one of the reasons the oil price has stayed low is that despite what has

happened to the price in the last year, oil production in the US is

slightly up on what was compared with the big price back in June last

year. We know that the Saudi Arabians are still struggling to cut

output, some say they are playing a price game, they are not -- trying

to knock off these American fractures but at this price must be

a point where it is not cost-effective for some of those US

frackers. At the very least it is taking longer for that effect to

come through and the Saudis were expecting and the individual rigs

have a relatively short life span, not like one of these oilfields in

the Middle East, we're talking about if you years and even less in some

cases so we might eventually see some of these particular operations

finishing off the oil that is readily accessible and then a

slowdown in your ones coming on stream but that is the kind of game

that the Saudis are playing, it is not coming through quickly and they

can survive for a while with prices so low but it is reckoned they will

break even. The oil priests they need to balance the budget is about

more than double what it currently is. -- oil price. They have reserves

but the IMF reckons the Saudis will be running a deficit in the

government budget unless you are one of more than 20% of GDP. And this is

not just Saudis, when you look at Nigeria and Venezuela, everyone is

struggling? Venezuela is another striking example of the deficit, the

IMF is addicting 24% of GDP, reflected in their dreadful

inflation problem. There are lots of males being bitten in lots of

countries, particularly Nigeria, Venezuela and Iran, they don't have

the kind of reservists to fall back on that the Saudis and Russia have.

Saudi Arabia, we're hearing it is already dipping into its wealth fund

just to keep everybody happy and you cannot keep doing that. We get the

sense that the commodities, including oil, were in the lower

area, we could stay here for some time? That might well be the case,

commodities are driven by demand factors to a large extent and the

aftermath of big investment and new capacity in the last decade but with

oil there is the specific element of shale in North America and is the

possibility that might run down in the next couple of years, which

might take some of the edge off this. But I don't think anybody is

really expecting a big turnaround in the near future. We always

appreciate your time, thank you. It has been a busy week and have a good

weekend. We will look to the business pages but here is a quick

reminder of how to get in touch. The web page is where we can keep you

up-to-date with the latest details. Insider analysis from the BBC team.

And we want to hear from you get involved on the Business Live web

page, Twitter and Facebook. Whenever you need to know... David is back.

Another amazing story. This is in the Wall Street Journal and the

Telegraph, everywhere, this is a diamond the size of a tennis ball

found in Botswana and apparently it is so big they cannot get it into

the scanner to work out how clear it is, how many carats, it has to go to

Antwerp to be assessed. I understand that Antwerp and India, the other

major centres in terms of finding the sort of thing out, as it is

staggering, I think the last time anything of the size was when the

Crown Jewels were made 100 years ago. And in Botswana, which I did

not know, it is the second largest producer of diamonds in the world

next to Russia. I had no idea! There you go! Quite staggering and how

anybody is going to learn how to clean it and make it commercially

viable... We wait! We do know the carat. What do you have? 813? This

one is 1111 carats! That is grown-up! 1000 times the size of

your average engagement ring! Erm... Yes! The Crown Jewels, the great

star of Africa. Yes. We can talk about this story in the Financial

Times about the London property market, the prime property market

and lots of the buyers are deserting it, a combination of the emerging

market world and stamp duty? And we need to go back on if you recall,

starting dropping against the dollar at the time of the financial crisis

by 20% and they were flooding in here, Asians, Russians, Greeks,

everybody. It was a safe haven? It was, but the irony is, old gits like

me, we are looking to downsize and this is why you links and actins,

they have become ridiculously expensive and transactions, as a

result of what you said, basically, the emerging market downturn, and

when you pay 5% stamp duty on a house with ?5 million, that is quite

a large sum. Transactions are down 19%, which is quite considerable,

and there are other reasons. The Chinese, which 9%, Asians 26%

overall, Russia, only 1% and domestic buyers, in central parts of

London, Kensington, Knightsbridge, 42%. Which did surprise me. When

this create a correction? We're only talking about high-end properties

will this trickle-down? Give us some correction? The only thing that will

move house prices is cheap land and money and as a big estate agents are

saying, but prices are not going down, it is just business. We have

20 seconds. Star Wars has made 50 million pounds in predicted sales.

Yes, 200 and ?19 million in the first week. The show ?219 million. I

remember the first one, 1977. You will twinkle in your father's eye,

and I took my young son. Lovely to invite me! That izzard, plenty

business news throughout the day on the web age. Goodbye. -- web page.

It will be colder today than yesterday and will get colder still

over the weekend. Short, sharp bursts of cold air coming down from