In Short

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

Profits up at Jameson distributor

PERNOD RICARD, the owner of Jameson Irish whiskey and the world's second-largest distributor of wines and spirits, reported a 15.3 per cent rise in operating profits to € 966 million in the six months to the end of December.

The French company, which last month revealed a 16 per cent jump in the sale of the Irish whiskey worldwide, said emerging markets had been a strong contributor to the growth in first-half profits.

German utility giant's U-turn

GERMAN UTILITY giant E.ON said it would sell parts of its power grid if the EU dropped two antitrust cases against it, in a shock reversal likely to anger the German government.

Until now, Germany's four largest utilities and chancellor Angela Merkel's government have been united in opposing EU demands for energy companies to divest their networks to boost competition.

Germany and seven other European countries that oppose the so-called unbundling have proposed a "third way" which would allow energy companies to keep ownership of their networks, while taking steps to make them more independent.

E.ON, Europe's largest utility, appeared to have undermined that strategy, announcing it was ready to sell its electricity grid and some generating assets - a move welcomed by the EU but described as "astounding" by a senior German official. - (Reuters)

Strong growth for tech firm

FIRST DERIVATIVES, the Dublin- and London-listed technology provider to the capital markets sector, yesterday said it was "enjoying strong revenue growth" and that trading for the year which ends today will be "ahead of current market expectations".

SocGen chief in rescue bid

DANIEL BOUTON, chairman of Société Générale, has invested €1.5 million to take up rights in the rescue € 5.5 billion capital increase that was launched by the French bank to repair the damage done by the industry's biggest rogue trading scandal.

The gesture comes as Mr Bouton faces severe public and political pressure to step down from SocGen after the scandal revealed weaknesses in the bank's control systems and led to a €4.9 billion loss. - (Financial Times service)

Trader loses $141.5m

A WHEAT trader at MF Global, one of the world's biggest commodities brokerages, lost $141.5 million (€94 million) after betting "substantially" more than he was allowed, the company reported yesterday, in the latest bout of suspected rogue trading to hit global markets.

"This is embarrassing for us and it's upsetting," said Kevin Davis, chief executive of MF Global, which said it had "terminated" the employee, whom it identified as Evan Dooley from the group's Memphis office. - (Financial Times service)

Google's health service plan

GOOGLE YESTERDAY laid out plans for one of its most anticipated new services, a digital health records system. The plans would put Google's database of health records at the heart of a broader health information system, potentially giving the company a central role as the health industry moves towards greater use of information technology. - (Financial Times service)

Ryanair opens second base in Scotland

Ryanair has opened up its second "base" in Scotland after announcing it will operate two new Boeing 737-800s from Edinburgh.

The airline said yesterday it would now serve 19 European and UK destinations from the city.

Ryanair operates flights from Edinburgh to Dublin and Shannon, but this would be the first time it had based planes at the airport.

New destinations from Edinburgh include Alicante, Berlin, Warsaw, Marseille, Bratislava and Pisa.

DZ reveals subprime loss

Another German financial group yesterday fell victim to the US subprime mortgage crisis when DZ Bank, the country's fifth-largest, revealed a writedown of more than €1.3 billion in its securities portfolio and warned that 2008 would be a volatile year.

The writedown spread the effects of the crunch into Germany's co-operative banking sector. DZ acts as a central bank to most of the sector, which is a force in German banking with about a fifth of domestic retail and small business customers. - (Financial Times service)

Panel rule on Premier move

The UK Takeover Panel has ruled that recruitment firm Premier Group has to clarify a possible takeover offer for Imprint, the UK recruiter in which Denis O'Brien has a stake.

Dublin-based Premier said this week that it was considering a possible offer for Imprint. Premier must clarify the statement by March 4th, the panel said yesterday in a statement. -(Bloomberg)