Aviation sector under scrutiny as US-FAA begins safety review

A TEAM from the United States (U.S.) Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) arrived the country at the weekend to begin the process of re-certifying the Nigerian aviation industry, which it started in 2010.

The safety status of Nigeria’s aviation sector is being reassessed by the United States-Federal Aviation Administration (US-FAA) as the ‘Category One’ status awarded it about four years ago comes under review. The review operation, which started yesterday, will last for one week.

The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) and other aviation agencies said yesterday that they were ready for the audit. According to a release by the acting NCAA Director General, Benedict Adeyileka, the four-man team will assess NCAA’s compliance with

Top 10 performing stocks

The top 10 performing stocks last week were Learn Africa Plc, University Press Plc, Ashaka Cement Plc, Guinness Nigeria Plc, Costain (West Africa) Plc and International Energy Insurance Plc.

Others were Cutix Plc, Total Nigeria Plc, Sterling Bank Plc and UPDC Real Estate Investment Trust.

Learn Africa gained 19.87 percent or N0.31 to lead the top gainers chart. It opened the week at N1.57 and closed at N1.87 per share. Two years ago, the two majority shareholders – Pearson Education Limited and Longman Group (Overseas Holdings) Limited -divested their combined 51 percent holdings in Learn Africa Plc. (formally Longman Nigeria Plc by way of gift to the minority shareholders. According to the deal, which was executed on a pro-rata basis, the donees were not

U.S. Senate panel to grill Caterpillar executives at tax hearing

Executives for Caterpillar Inc will defend the company's offshore tax strategies at a U.S. Senate hearing on Tuesday held by a panel known for shedding light on corporate tax avoidance.

In a 99-page report released on Monday, the Senate the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said Caterpillar avoided paying $2.4 billion in U.S. taxes from 2000 through 2012 by moving profits from sales of replacement parts through a low-tax unit it set up in Switzerland.

Democrat Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the subcommittee and one of Capitol Hill's most dogged questioners, said

Yellen strongly defends easy Fed policies, cites U.S. labour slack

Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, on Monday said that given the halting pace of the recovery and a still moribund job market, the Federal Reserve will continue to bolster the U.S. economy

She also gave a strong defence of the central bank’s easy-money policies on Monday, saying its “extraordinary” commitment to boosting the economy, especially the still struggling labour market, will be needed for some time to come.

In her first public speech since becoming Fed chair two months ago, Yellen cited the struggles of three American workers in backing the policies of low interest rates and continued bond-buying. She said there remains

Russian oil firms lock horns over lucrative OML29

OML 29, which holds the site of Nigeria’s first oil discovery, Oloibiri field in addition to Nembe Creek field, Santa Barbara and Odeama Creek fields, all producing is now at the center of a brawl between two Russian firms; Lukoil and L1 Energy.

Lukoil is Russia’s second largest oil company. The company was formed in 1991 when three state-run, western Siberian companies merged. That meant vertically integrating the three branches of the industry – exploration, refining, and distribution that were strictly

Nigerian crude values rise on higher refining margins

Nigerian crude values for April 2014 are beginning to rise steadily on higher refining margins and healthy demand from Europe.

Spot trade in Nigerian cargoes has increased with some high offers and deals done for cargoes in the April loading program.

Refining margins in Europe and Asia have both increased significantly compared with

NCC records 64.2m GSM subscribers as at last quarter of 2013

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), on Friday said it had recorded 64, 229, 097 subscribers on its various Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) networks.

This is contained in the Internet Subscriber Data released by the NCC on its Website, as at the last quarter of 2013.

The Data also indicated that an additional 8, 150, 259 subscribers have joined the existing 56, 078, 838 customers in the third quarter, to browse the Internet.

The data, however, showed that