15/02/2013 World Business Report

court on Friday the 27th. Those are the latest headlines from BBC World

News. Time now for the money news with Aaron and World Business

Bad-tempered exchanges. Currency wars to top the agenda for G20

finance chiefs when they meet in Moscow later today. Plus why a

recession in Europe is fuelling a labour unrest in South Africa. We

take a look at the problems facing Welcome to the programme. A quick

look at the latest in the world of business and money. Looking at the

expected Eardley numbers from Anglo-American this morning later.

-- ugly numbers. Let's start with the G20, the leaders meet in Moscow

later and there's no doubt what will be topping the agenda.

Currency wars. Accusations have been flying that certain developed

economies have been competitively trying to devalue their currencies

to boost their exporters and also give their struggling economies a

bit of a leg up. Japan has been cast as the chief villain. It has

seen the end slump around 20% against major currencies since

November -- the yen. But as Rupert Wingfield Hayes reports from Tokyo,

many in Japan feel they are being singled out unfairly.

The dramatic fall in the value of the yen has been very good news

here, especially for Japanese carmakers. Big exporters like

Toyota, Nissan and master are all predicting much higher profits both

this year and next as the value of the yen slides towards 100 to the

US dollar -- Felipe Massa there. The fall of the yen is a direct

result of Shinzo Abe's promise to hugely increase monetary easing. In

simple terms he has pledged to force the Bank of Japan to keep

printing money until prices in Japan start rising by at least 2% a

year. The result has been a huge yen sell-off. Some, especially the

big US carmakers, are already complaining that Japan's

deliberately forcing down the value of its currency to make six exports

cheaper. But others are more sympathetic to Tokyo -- its exports.

They point out that since 2008, the US Federal Reserve, Bank of England

and European Central Bank have all been printing money even faster

than the Bank of Japan. Since the 2000 an aide Lehman collapse, Japan

has also suffered from having a so- called safe haven currency -- 2008.

From an average value of 115 to the US dollar the yen shot up hitting a

high of 76 to the dollar in 2011. By the end of last year Japanese

exports were shrinking fast and Japan was heading back into

recession. That, they are arguing, is good for no one.

Let's get more on this and go over to the Asia office. Great to see

you. Some may say the Japanese have a valid point because they are

saying, hang on... The Europeans and the United States and the Bank

of England have all been printing money hand over fist. I guess the

Japanese yen has been very very strong for many years now, even

after that awful natural disaster that hit the country in March, 2011.

The Japanese yen remained very strong, uncomfortably strong, for

exporters then. They are the backbone of the Japanese economy.

Only since the most recent election was called in the middle of

November we started to see the Japanese yen weakening. Now the new

Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, has been very vocal about printing more

Japanese yen and trying to set the inflation targets so that the

falling prices, known as deflation, will be tackled properly. Since

then we have seen the Japanese yen weakening almost 20%. While it is

quite a significant weakness that we have seen in recent months, you

can imagine people in Japan saying, "But we had to put up with a strong

Japanese yen for many years". Absolutely. How is it doing today?

Yesterday I was looking at the markets and the Nikkei closed down

1% because it had notched up a little bit in value? That's right.

The end today is trading at around 92. -- the yen. It has strengthened

quite a lot compared to Monday when the Japanese currency hit the

weakest level in almost three years, 94.47 yen against the US dollar. It

is all because of mixed messages we have been getting from various

officials. On Monday the reason the Japanese yen weakened was because

of a comment from a US Treasury official who said he supports

Japan's monetary policies and setting of inflation targets, but

then we got some confusing targets from the G7. In the end the group

had to clarify their statement, saying that they are concerned

about excessive moves and the Japanese yen will be in the

spotlight in Moscow at the G20 summit. The Japanese yen might get

a boost in terms of the new governor by keeping the value down.

This could go favourably to what the government wants to see. Indeed.

The current governor was supposed to step down, he wasn't supposed to

step down until April. He announced that he will step down a few weeks

earlier before the term is up on 19th March. Now the government is

trying to come up with another governor. It seems like we will get

somebody who is in line with the Government's policy of printing

more money, setting inflation targets. It's quite likely that we

will get a new governor who is going to support the Government's

policies of monetary easing. glad you said his name because I

wasn't going to attempt it! Thank you for joining us. Talking about

the mining giant Anglo American. Their annual numbers are out later

and they will reveal profits plunged around 40% over the past

year. Times are getting harder for these mining companies. Why?

Demands for commodities are at a ten-year low. For Anglo-American,

by far the biggest worry is its platinum business in South Africa

where the downturn has been causing growing tensions with its workers.

Nigel Cassidy has this report. Parling Platinum into profit has

become a struggle for Anglo American -- turning. Job losses

could reach 14,000. The company said it lost over 3500 since last

summer. With 80% of the world's proven reserves, South Africa has

borne the brunt of the industry downturn. So far talks with workers

and the ruling African National Congress have failed to quell the

resistance. Unions in Rustenburg near Johannesburg are prepared for

what they described as the mother of all strikes. Wildcat action has

already put the group into the red. It's a grim reminder of the

violence in the region that killed over 50 last year. And all this,

say analysts, while producers struggle to bring costs and

supplied -- supply in line. That has yet to be arranged with the

Ministry in South Africa to see how they would go about doing that.

for future demands, one of the common uses for platinum is in car

catalytic converters. This leaves producers still exposed to the

economic crisis in Europe and hoping prices recover in line with

any rise in global demand. Let's take a look at the markets in

the Asian region. It is not an Asian story driving these markets

lower. It is the same old European story. In particular those