05/12/2017 BBC Business Live

This is Business Live

from BBC News with

Sally Bundock and Ben Bland.

Deal or no deal - the UK

Prime Minister has just days to get

Brexit talks back on track as issues

over Northern Ireland's border

scupper the prospect

of moving on to trade talks.

Live from London, that's our

top story on Tuesday

the 5th of December.

The British Prime Minister pulled

out of a deal with Brussels

after the Irish DUP,

which props up her government,

said it wouldn't accept a deal that

treats Northern Ireland differently

from the rest of the UK.

Also in the programme,

Mr Trudeau goes to Beijing.

The Canadian Prime Minister has

signed three trade agreements

with the Chinese premier,

covering food and energy.

Here is how the European markets

look at the start of the trading day

and we will take a look at Wall

Street.

Also in the programme, many of us

believe we have an idea for a hit

novel inside us.

Well we'll meet

the man who could help

you realise your dream

with an algorithm that he says

will help spot the next

publishing sensation.

And as Facebook launches a messenger

app for children under

the age of 13, we want

to know how young is too

young for social media?

Let us know.

Just use the hashtag BBCBizLive.

Hello and welcome to Business Live.

Talks between the EU

and the UK were derailed

in the last 24 hours,

just as it looked like a deal might

finally be on the table.

The negotiations came to a halt

after the DUP, the political party

in Northern Ireland who are propping

up the Conservative government,

rejected a proposal to avoid a hard

border between Northern Ireland

and the Republic.

The DUP objected to a clause

in a draft agreement with the EU

that would guarantee "regulatory

alignment" between Northern Ireland

and the Republic of Ireland,

effectively keeping the country

in the EU's customs union and single

market in all but name.

Elsewhere a deal is believed to be

very close on EU citizens' rights

and the so called "divorce bill".

The UK is understood to have

recently increased its offer,

which could be worth up

to 50 billion euros.

The problem for the UK

is that the EU will only move

on to talk about future issues

like trade when "sufficient

progress" has been made

on these subjects and is due

to decide whether this

has happened at a summit

on the 14th and 15th December.

Joining me now from

Westminster is our Political

Correspondent Iain Watson.

Theresa May has quite a day ahead,

talk us through the Cabinet meeting

and beyond.

That's right, she has to

tell the Cabinet what went wrong

because 24 hours ago things looked

positive and deal looked within her

grasp, that's no longer the case. I

would be very surprised if she

doesn't meet face-to-face with

Arlene Foster, the leader of the

DUP. As you know, the DUP is

effectively propping up the minority

government of Theresa May so their

views are crucial and she will need

to get them on board if

she's to return to Brussels, perhaps

tomorrow and later this week, to try

to get talks going again and win the

prize of trade talks which are so

crucial to her. When she meets the

DUP, one of the things they will

talk about, using technical terms

but important terms, possibly the

difference between regulatory

alignment which would see the same

regulations in place in Northern

Ireland and the Republic of Ireland

after Brexit, something the DUP not

want to see, and regulatory

equivalence - good we effectively

have the same standards but not

necessarily the same exact rules. If

the DUP could get on board with that

wording that could be the key to

unlock the talks but at the same

time any change in wording in the

draft agreement would have to be

acceptable to the Irish government.

If it isn't, they have the power to

veto the trade talks starting when

the leaders meet at the end of next

week.

Thank you.

Andrew Walker is our Business

Correspondent and joins me now.

The pressure is really on, they are

hoping to get this sorted by the end

of the week.

Next week we have a

summit of the European Union where

the Prime Minister here is hoping

she will get a declaration that

sufficient progress has been made on

the three initial areas of

negotiations to allow them to move

onto trade negotiations which is an

essential element in getting the

kind of Brexit deal that would be

best for the British economy. So

absolutely the pressure is on to

iron out a set of difficult

technical issues.

And it just goes

to show, doesn't it, how confusing

this is to iron out. When you take

into account all of the other issues

as well that need to be ironed out,

it shows how tricky this Brexit

process is.

Indeed, we need to get

at least the interim agreement

nailed down on the other two issues

of the financial settlements and

citizens' rights. I think one point

worth making here is where you might

see some room for progress in the if

you like internal British political

issue is it appears that one version

of this statement about regulatory

alignment or regulatory

non-divergence, whatever form of

words you want to use, was

specifically about areas needed to

support North-South co-operation and

the protection of the Good Friday

Agreement. That doesn't necessarily

mean absolutely everything, to

complete regulatory alignment across

the board, and there are number of

sectors where it is particularly

important in maintaining day to day

business on the border.

And all of

this has come to the fore to a great

degree because of the snap election

and the fact the Conservative

government is aligned with the DUP.

We also have Scotland watching this

extremely closely because they do

not want a hard Brexit is at work,

they are pushing strongly. Nicola

Sturgeon, the head of the SNP,

thinking what about us.

Absolutely,

and whatever the outcome of the

previous election would have been,

the Prime Minister no doubt would

have been consulting carefully with

the political parties in Northern

Ireland and wanting to have them on

board as much as possible but the

fact they are in a position to

withdraw support and the ultimate

threat of bringing it down doors put

her in an acutely difficult

situation.

It keeps us all very

busy. Thank you for your time.

Let's take a look at some of

the other stories making the news...

UK cinema operator Cineworld

is buying its US rival

Regal Entertainment Group

for $3.6 billion.

Combined the two firms will have

more than 9,500 screens in the US

and Europe which would make it

the world's second

biggest cinema operator.

Cineworld plans to sell

shares and take on more

debt to fund the deal.

Facebook has

launched its first app

which is specifically

aimed at children.

The new service is starting

in the United States and parents

will have control over

who their children message

and what they see.

Facebook says the data it gathers

won't be used by the main Facebook

app, which those under 13

are not supposed to use.

We are asking you about this in

terms of our Twitter question, how

young is too young for social media?

The online retail giant

Amazon has finally launched

in Australia after weeks

of speculation about exactly

when it would do so.

Australia's online shopping

market is already worth

more than US $15 billion

and is expected to grow by 50%

in the next five years.

Canada's Prime Minister Justin

Trudeau is in Beijing.

He's due to meet President Xi

Jinping in the next few hours

and trade is expected

to be top of the agenda.

Leisha Santorelli is in Singapore.

Trade is actually turning out of

the...

We are not sure where she is,

better late than never! So what can

we expect from these talks?

I was

actually just saying that trade is

turning out to be a sticky issue for

Justin Trudeau. Canada is looking to

reduce its reliance after Donald

Trump threatened to pull out of

Nafta so Justin Trudeau made the

flight to China hoping to launch

formal trade talks but that appears

to have fallen flat. Both Canada and

China are saying they will stick to

exploratory talks. The stumbling

block seems to be Mr Trudeau's push

for a progressive trade deal, which

will assess gender, environment and

Labour issues, but he's finding it a

tough sell in China. But he's not

going home empty-handed because

Canadian beef and pork producers

will now have greater access to the

Chinese market and Canadians and

Chinese appear to be working on

resolving a big dispute over canola

exports.

Thank you.

Tech giants

including Samsung and Tencent sank

in Asian trade on Tuesday,

tracking a sell-off in their US

rivals and dragging most

regional markets lower.

Investors rotate out of tech

shares to financials.

Sterling has come off

a two-month high after

the lack of a Brexit deal.

This is how the European markets

looked at the start of the trading

day.

The Dow

closed at a record high

on Wall Street but the Nasdaq

tumbled more than

1% as dealers shifted

out of the tech sector,

which has enjoyed a healthy

rally through the year,

and into financial firms.

Investors welcomed news that the US

Senate had finally passed

controversial tax reforms.

And Samira Hussain has

the details about what's ahead

on Wall Street Today.

And improving job market continues

to support the demand for housing in

the US and that could mean luxury

home-builder will see a rise in

revenue and profit. But the lack of

skilled labour continues to have an

impact on the supply of homes so

investors will be looking for

forecasts for the next fiscal year.

Finally, the global airline industry

body the International air transport

Association is expected to give an

update on airline profitability for

2017, and a look ahead to next year.

Joining us is Nandini Ramakrishnan,

Global Market Strategist at JP

Morgan Asset Management.

Let's talk about the pound

initially, no surprise to see the

reaction to what we thought was a

done deal being no deal by lunchtime

yesterday and the pound reacting.

Yes, some weakness there. As we've

seen since the referendum, the pound

sterling rate against the dollar is

very reactive so not a huge surprise

we have seen weakness and on the

flip side of that, we could see the

100 million because of the inverse

relationship. That's what we are

seeing on the screens at the moment.

Another trend we saw over the last

24 hours, investors moving away from

tech and more towards financials,

reflecting the optimism they have

about the tax cuts that Donald Trump

has for so long been trying to get

through although they are not there

yet completely.

Yes, this rotation

from the tech stocks into

financials, which have traditionally

not been as big a performer since

2008 has been a huge deal for

markets and investors because it is

signifying this element of raising

interest rates. You have the Bank of

England raising interest rates, the

ECB pulling back support for bonds

and monetary policy, which is all

good for the financial sector.

Also,

does it reflect people's view that

tech stocks have had an unbelievable

year and have gone a little bit too

far now?

Yes, that is a concern,

just a handful of stocks that have

such high prices, there is risk

aversion now saying I don't know if

I want to be in those stocks which

are so expensive, trying to buy some

cheap stocks that have the potential

to rally up. Everybody loves

technology, its innovation and

moving things forward, but there are

ways to access technology as a trend

which is not just a handful of

stocks.

Thank you. You will be

coming back to discuss things like

the new Facebook messaging service

as well as other stories out there.

Yes, whether you want to or not!

Still to come...

Hit books are the lifeblood

of the publishing industry.

But how can you tell

a hit from a miss?

We'll meet the man who thinks his

algorithm has the answer.

You're with Business

Live from BBC News.

This week the Bank of England said

only a third of secondary schools

in the UK offer economics education

and launched a pilot project

to teach GCSE students

about everyday economics.

Some campaigners say it should it be

statutory to teach it at primary

school level as it is at secondary.

Steph McGovern has been in a primary

school in Gorton today.

Hello. This is a centre for

excellence when it comes to teaching

young people about money and there

is a lot of talk at the moment about

whether financial education in

schools should be compulsory. So

let's find out what these guys are

doing. Jane, tell us what you have

been doing?

We have been learning

about currencies and when you go on

holiday which currency to use.

That's helpful, isn't it, for when

you are on your holidays. Gloria,

what else?

How to spend different

things equally in supermarkets and

how to spend in different

supermarkets.

That you're getting

value for money and what else have

you been learning about?

Credit card

and scams when we go on websites to

know what we are buying so it's not

fake.

You know loads. We have got Mr

Miles your teacher here. Why is it

so important that these young people

are learning about all of this stuff

now?

We start teaching them as early

as nursery. We want to encourage

children to be enthusiastic about

money because then they can have

aspirations for later in life

because they are not actually that

far away from being independent. So,

if they can see that money is not

something to be scared of, it is

something they can be enthusiastic

about and make work for them, then

it sets them up really well for

life.

Do you think it is a good idea

to learn about money.

ALL:

Yes.

Shall we say bye to

everyone. That's it from us.

ALL:

Bye.

This is the top story on our

business pages today. Rail fare

rise. Train fares in Britain will be

going up by 3.4% from 2nd January.

That's the biggest increase since

2013. It covers regulated fares and

including season tickets and

unregulated fares. So those one-off

journeys. There is more detail and

reaction as you can imagine on the

BBC website. Take a look including

analysis from our transport

correspondent, Richard Westcott. So

do take a look when you have time.

You're watching Business Live.

Our top story - Britain

and the European Union have failed

to agree on moving onto the second

phase of their

negotiations on Brexit.

Negotiations came to a halt

after the Democratic Unionist Party

rejected a proposal to avoid a hard

border between Northern Ireland

and the Republic of Ireland.

That means a flurry of negotiations

between now and the end of the week.

A quick look at how

markets are faring.

The FTSE in London, outperforming

the others. Benefiting from the

pound weakening slightly after that

failure to do a deal on Brexit.

Spotting the next best

seller can be tricky.

Harry Potter was famously rejected

by 12 literary agent before

finally being picked up.

However, one firm thinks

they have the answer.

German publisher Inkitt claims that

by using a sophisticated algorithm

and the power of the crowd

to measure reader engagement,

they can identify potential best

sellers and they seem to be writing

a successful business story.

In the last 12 months,

they have published 19 books that

have made the Amazon top 100.

Ali Albazaz is the boss

of Inkitt and joins us now.

He is with one of the books. An

example of something that went into

the top 12 on Amazon, this one?

Exactly. It was ranked number 12

ahead of Harry Potter a couple of

months ago.

Tell us what happened.

Did the writer approach you and you

then measured the success of that

with an algorism?

Exactly. We have

an online platform on Inkitt.com.

All authors can upload their

manuscripts and over one readers who

can read the books for free. While

the readers are reading, we analyse

their reading behaviour. We see do

they stay up all night to continue

reading? Do they read today,

tomorrow, the day after and so on

and based on this feedback or data

points that we get we can predict if

a book has the potential to become a

best seller.

So we are talking about

best sellers, ie popular reads. Not

necessarily a good read?

Well, let's

say, like things that the majority

of the population like.

So things

that are going to sell by the

millions?

Abslaotly. Harry Potter

and Fifty Shades Of Grey.

Did you

come to it from the book writing

side or the tech side?

I am a coder

and it goes back to five years ago

where you know I also liked writing

and five years ago I started Inkitt

as a hobby project. I started this

platform where auth Ours could

upload their manuscripts and readers

give and give feedback. About a year

later, I discovered this statistics

at JK Rowling was rejected by 13

publishers and the 14th publisher

only published her because the

eight-year-old daughter of the

editor liked it and figured out that

Twilight was rejected by 14

publishers and James Patterson

rejected by 31 publishers. I was

like wow, this is so insufficient

and at the same time the publishers

are crushing these people's dreams

and I found that unfair and I wanted

to build something better.

Forgive

me, is it better? Is it a different

way of bringing to the attention

people, you know, books that are out

there because some might argue

actually publishers do a great job

of finding what might be a really

good read, not necessarily a very

popular read ie Amazon top ten like

Fifty Shades Of Grey. But a

fantastic book to read like

Wuthering Heights.

We are

democratising and the majority of

top five publishers, they only

publish authors with track record.

People who have already made it

before, who have a fanbase. They

would rather publish the next book

from Obama than take on a new debut

author. They publish very few debut

authors and we believe in debut

authors because we can measure the

reading behaviour and invest in the

debut authors. Our belief is that

every author in the world should

have an equal chance to succeed, be

it the 15-year-old girl who has

written an amazing story or JK

Rowling, they should have the same

equal chance to succeed. That's what

makes Inkitt different to other

publishers.

Ali, thank you.

Have you written a book?

Yes, I did,

yes.

And...

It's on Inkitt.

How is

it doing?

I have written the

beginning. The rest is still in

draft mode.

It sounds like my book

it is!

Thank you.

You know what they say about a good

journalist?

Go on.

Inside every good

journalist is a bad book!

All right, let's move on.

In a moment we'll take a look

through the Business pages,

but first here's a quick reminder

of how to get in touch with us.

Stay up-to-date with all the day's

business news as it happens

on the BBC's Business Live page.

There's insight and analysis

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and we want to hear from you.

Get involved on the

BBC's Business Live web page

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And you can find us

on Facebook at BBC Money.

Business Live on TV and online,

what you need to know,

when you need to know.

Nandini Ramakrishnan

is Global Market Strategist at JP

Morgan Asset Management.

We have been asking about the story

that's in the FT, about Facebook

launching a messaging app for under

13s. Why are they doing it? It has

got parental controls.

It is an

interesting way toll compete with

Snapchat that people are using.

Again, I don't know personally, but

the lesm of usage is meant to be for

anyone around the early age of six

and older. So it's an interesting

one. They have made it clear they

are not going to have any

advertisements and it will be

parental controlled so perhaps it's

a way for Facebook app and Facebook

company generally to get in with

competing with some of the other

social media platforms.

That's been our talking point on

Twitter. Lots of you getting in

touch as you can imagine P go for

it, Ben.

Simon saying such is the

invasive business model of Facebook

they want to get young children

hooked on the addictive and damaging

platform. Rosie says, "I thought you

had to be 13 to use Facebook."

Jerome says and this is good point

that for FB, Facebook, is this just

pointless PR because it is

impossible to verify somebody's age.

People pretend they are all sorts of

things on social media. I know from

personal experience, people's

friends who have said they are over

13 in order goat on Facebook when

they are not. All that kind of thing

is going on, isn't it?

This move to

get younger users eliminates that

deceitful of signing up, but the

bigger question you have young

people messaging perhaps rather than

doing what children maybe were doing

in the past in as going outside and

playing. Yeah, I think it would be a

contentious issue for parents or

teachers or anyone who is looking

out for children, but if other apps

are allowing kids to use it then

perhaps this is Facebook jumping on

that as well.

It is interesting at the same time

you have got Google announcing a

10,000 strong army to tackle

extremists. This is on Google. Part

of that is to protect children who

are so, who are on YouTube so much?

Yes, one fact that struck out to me

500,000 hours of content are posted

on YouTube and the commitment from

Google and YouTube to have people

review the content to make sure

there is no extremist or disturbing

things is going to be quite

impressive.

It is. Interesting to

see. Thank you. Good to see you.

Thank you too. We will see you again

soon.