In Short

A round-up of today's other stories in brief

China and Hong Kong unveil measures to curb inflation

Beijing and Hong Kong have unveiled a raft of measures to curb rising prices as both governments struggle to curb inflationary pressures and real estate speculation in their fast-growing economies.

The Chinese central bank yesterday raised capital reserve requirements for its banks for the fifth time this year to control credit and liquidity. Meanwhile, the Hong Kong government raised the stamp duty on residential property transactions in order to dampen property speculation.

The People's Bank of China said the proportion of deposits to be set aside by banks should increase by 50 basis points to 18.5 per cent for large banks, the highest ever. - (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010)

Lactalis bid for Yoplait rejected

Yoplait SAS shareholders PAI Partners and Sodiaal have rejected Groupe Lactalis's €1.4 billion bid for the yogurt maker, saying it undervalues the company and would prevent Sodiaal retaining its stake.

PAI plans to sell its Yoplait holding and has hired bankers to advise on the disposal, the private equity firm and Sodiaal said in a joint statement.

Asked before yesterday's statement what Lactalis would do if its bid was rejected, spokesman Luc Morelon said the French firm would pursue the purchase.

Lactalis said it would seek to expand the Yoplait brand globally. - (Bloomberg)

Some Nokia N8 phones have fault

Mobile phone maker Nokia said yesterday that some of its flagship N8 smartphones were sold with a power fault that meant they switched themselves off.

The success of the N8 - Nokia's first real challenge to Apple's iPhone, more than three years after its launch - is seen as crucial to Nokia's profit margins in the current quarter, analysts say.

Nokia sales chief Niklas Savander said "a limited number of N8 users" had had the problem of phones switching off and they were unable to turn them on again.

A spokesman said the fault was due to a problem in production, which had since been corrected. - (Reuters)