Wall Street Closes Up After Volatile Session
Another wild session for Wall Street stock ended in positive territory on Tuesday after the market earlier flirted with a fresh five and a half year closing low. Rare upbeat earnings forecasts outweighed deepening concerns over the fate of the country’s automakers and grim data in the housing sector. The benchmark S&P 500 index finished 1% higher at 859.11 points, the Dow Jones Industrial Average 1.8% stronger at 8,424.75 points and the Nasdaq composite Index 0.1% up at 1,483.27 points.

Singapore Food To Set Up Co-Governmental JV In Jilin PRC
Singapore Food Industries has, through its unit, SFI Manufacturing, signed an agreement with Jilin City government to explore the viability of establishing a safe food production zone in Jilin, PRC. The immediate ensuing activity would be a jointly-funded agronomic study to identify products of commercial value which can be produced with competitive advantage within the zone.

Lian Beng Secures $84m contract From DSTA
Lian Beng has, through its unit, Lian Beng Construction (1988), secured a construction contract worth approximately $84m for the development of camp facilities at Kranji from Defence Science and Technology Agency. The contract, which begins in November 2008 and lasts 22 months, is expected to have a positive financial impact on its YF09 results ended May 2009.

Noble Receives A$117.7m From Disposal Gain
Noble Group has successfully sold its entire shareholding stake in listed Australian iron ore producer Portman, resulting in a gain of approximately A$117.7m. The disposal gain is expected to have a positive impact on the company’s quarterly results ending 31 December, 2008.

HG Metal Issues Profit Guidance
HG Metal Manufacturing has advised that it will report a net loss for its 4Q08 results due to write down of inventory and foreign exchange losses. However, the company is still expected to report record net profits and turnover for FY08.

Global Voice Signs Agreement With iBrowse To Provide Ethernet Connectivity
Global Voice, Europe’s foremost provider of mission-critical, high performance data services, has concluded an agreement with business-to-business Internet Service Provider, iBrowse. The company will deploy ether|nex, an Ethernet based networking solution to connect two of iBrowse’s datacenter locations in London and Frankfurt.

SPH Obtains Term Loan Facilities From OCBC And DBS
SPH has signed agreements with DBS and OCBC for unsecured term loan facilities totalling $150m for a tenure of 3 years. The loans will be used for working capital and general corporate funding purposes.

NOL Announces Cost Reduction Initiatives
Neptume Orient Lines (NOL), the parent company of container shipping line APL and of APL Logistics, has announced a package of cost reduction measures to bring the company in line with the reduced capacity that the company will be operating. The measures, which entails a cut of 1,000 jobs, including 50 at its Singapore office, will save costs by about US$200m in 2009.