shareholding icosahedra: June 2012

Thursday, June 28, 2012

Boehner: House will go ahead with contempt vote

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Speaker John Boehner says the House will move forward with a contempt of Congress vote Thursday against Attorney General Eric Holder over the botched gun-tracking operation known as Fast and Furious. The White House said Republicans are seeking to score political points.

The Ohio Republican told reporters Wednesday that last-minute talks with the White House about releasing documents had failed to avert the vote. President Barack Obama has asserted executive privilege to keep the documents secret, but Republicans say there's no basis for that.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Wednesday that the public would view the vote as "political theater" and "gamesmanship."

Carney said the Justice Department and the White House on Tuesday had shown House Republicans a representative sample of the documents they were seeking. He said the administration's offer would have provided "unprecedented access" to internal communications about how it responded to congressional inquiries into the Fast and Furious program.

The issue has political implications this election year. The National Rifle Association is keeping score, prompting some Democrats to join Republicans in voting for contempt. Such a citation would not cause the release of more documents on the operation, in which guns were allowed to "walk" from Arizona to Mexico in hopes they could be tracked.

Associated Press

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What the Supercool Arctic Ground Squirrel Teaches Us about the Brain's Resilience

Features | Mind & Brain

During hibernation, the ground squirrel's brain loses many vital neural connections, but it has evolved a way to recuperate. Understanding that process might help scientists treat Alzheimer's

By Ferris Jabr ?| June 26, 2012?|

arctic-ground-squirrel REBOUNDING BRAINS: Hibernating mammals offer scientists a unique way to study the brain's plasticity, as well as neurodegenerative diseases. Image: Alan Vernon, via Wikimedia Commons

In this groundbreaking adventure into the worlds of psychopaths, the renowned psychologist Kevin Dutton argues that there is a fine line between a brilliant...

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Every September arctic ground squirrels in Alaska, Canada and Siberia retreat into burrows more than a meter beneath the tundra, curl up in nests built from grass, lichen and caribou hair, and begin to hibernate. As their lungs and hearts slow, the rivers of blood flowing through their bodies dwindle and their core body temperatures plummet, dipping below the freezing point of water. Electrical signals zipping along crisscrossing neural highways vanish in many areas of the brain. Seven months later the squirrels wake up and return to the surface?famished, eager to mate and perfectly healthy.

How hibernating mammals survive for so long at such low temperatures without any food or water beyond what they have stored in their own fat fascinates scientists for many reasons. Hibernation is an amazing biological feat and an opportunity to learn new ways of pushing the human body beyond its ostensible limits, as well as healing it when it breaks down. The arctic ground squirrel's brain, in particular, seems to be incredibly resilient. When ground squirrels hibernate their neurons shrink and many connections between neurons shrivel. But their brains periodically compensate for this loss with massive growth spurts, multiplying neural links beyond what existed before hibernation. Learning how the ground squirrel's brain recuperates could not only help scientists understand the brain's plasticity, but also suggest new ways to reverse or prevent cellular damage in neurodegenerative diseases. In particular, recent research on hibernating brains is changing the way some scientists think about misshapen tau proteins, which are a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease.

Brain freeze
Most small hibernating mammals?hamsters, hedgehogs, bats?turn down their body's thermostat during hibernation, relinquishing one of the defining features of all mammals: warm blood. Arctic ground squirrels are the most extreme example. In August 1987 Brian Barnes of the University of Alaska Fairbanks (U.A.F.) captured 12 arctic ground squirrels and implanted tiny temperature-sensitive radio transmitters in the animals' abdomens. He transported the squirrels to outdoor enclosures in Fairbanks?wire cages with borders reaching more than 1.2 meters belowground. By September the ground squirrels had dug burrows within the enclosures and begun to hibernate. Their body temperatures dropped to ?2.9 degrees Celsius, almost three degrees below the freezing point of freshwater and probably the lowest core body temperature ever recorded in a living mammal. Despite this, ground squirrel blood remains liquid, most likely through a phenomenon known as supercooling.

In laboratory experiments, Barnes also measured the temperature of various body parts as the squirrels hibernated in a chamber kept at ?4.3 degrees C. Although their colons, feet and bellies dropped below zero C, their necks never grew colder than 0.7 degree C, suggesting that the brain remains a little warmer than the rest of the body. Most mammals would die within hours if their brains were cooled so low, yet ground squirrel brains survived near freezing temperatures for weeks at a time. Every two to three weeks the squirrels shivered themselves back to their typical body temperature of 36.4 degrees C, which they maintained for 12 to 15 hours before becoming frozen pop-squirrels once more. Later, scientists would confirm that these intermittent periods of arousal are crucial to the ground squirrels' survival?without them their brains would wither long before spring's arrival.

Doom and bloom
Hibernation devastates the ground squirrel brain, wilting thousands if not millions of vital connections between brain cells, known as synapses. But its brain has evolved impressive resilience, repeatedly renewing itself at astonishing speeds, like a forest erupting through the scorched earth in a matter of days. Victor Popov of the Institute of Cell Biophysics in Russia discovered some of the earliest evidence of this plasticity. In the early 1990s Popov and his colleagues captured wild Siberian ground squirrels and kept them in temperature-controlled enclosures as they hibernated. The researchers sacrificed different animals at three distinct stages?during hibernation; two hours after one of the intermittent arousal periods; or one day after emerging from hibernation?and removed their brains to stain and examine the neurons within the hippocampus, an area crucial for memory. Neurons from squirrels that were in the middle of hibernation were shrunken and had far fewer dendrites?branches that receive signals from other neurons?compared with brain cells from fully awake and aroused squirrels. The dendrites in hibernating brains also had fewer dendritic spines, which jut out from the main branch like thorns on a rose stem and increase the number of possible synapses with nearby cells.

Whereas neurons in hibernating brains looked like barren tree limbs in the dead of winter, brain cells from squirrels that had just emerged from hibernation into a period of arousal sported dense crowns of overlapping dendrites. In only two hours the squirrels' brains had not only compensated for all the synapses lost during hibernation?their brain cells now boasted many more links than those of an active squirrel in the spring or summertime. One day later, however, their brains had pruned many of these ties, probably recognizing them as superfluous, much the way the developing mammalian brain shears its blooming neural forest.

Since Popov's study other researchers have observed similar loss and recovery of synapses in the brains of hibernating hamsters and hedgehogs. In a 2006 study Craig Heller of Stanford University discovered that the hibernating brain is incredibly plastic overall, not just in the hippocampus. Heller thinks that squirrels and similar hibernators lose dendrites during hibernation because their metabolism is too slow and their brains too cold and idle to keep those living wires in working condition.

Perhaps it's more efficient to let them shrivel, like a houseplant withering from neglect, and quickly nurse them back to life during those intermittent bouts of arousal. That way the mammals save as much energy as possible yet still preserve vital neural connections. Even so, researchers have estimated that many small hibernating mammals devote between 80 and 90 percent of all energy used during hibernation to keeping their brains alive.

Protective proteins?
Although scientists have documented structural changes to cells in the hibernating squirrel's brain, they do not yet understand what triggers the brain's recovery. Thomas Arendt of the University of Leipzig in Germany thinks the answer may involve a protein named tau. Normally, tau proteins help stabilize long, ropelike components of a cell's scaffolding called microtubules; tau keeps the many threads in the rope tightly bundled. When, for unknown reasons, tau proteins become hyperphosphorylated?that is, burdened with too many phosphate groups?they change shape and start clumping together inside neurons. As a result, microtubules grow slack and cells lose their shapes and stop functioning properly. Researchers know that misshapen tau proteins build up in the brain cells of people with various neurodegenerative disorders?notably Alzheimer's?but it is not yet clear whether distorted tau proteins in part cause such disorders or whether they are a side effect of the true causes.

Arendt and his colleagues discovered that hyperphosphorylated tau accumulates in the brains of hibernating European ground squirrels (Spermophilus citellus). The more synapses the rodents' brains lost during hibernation, the more hyperphosphorylated tau accrued in their neurons. Within a few hours of emerging from hibernation into a period of arousal, however, the squirrels somehow scoured tau from their brains. As one way of revealing this process Arendt stained slices of brain tissue from hibernating and aroused squirrels with a dye that binds specifically to tau proteins that carry extra phosphate groups. The difference was startling. Brain tissue from hibernating squirrels was generally dark and as black as ink in some areas, whereas tissue from aroused and non-hibernating animals was completely unblemished. Arendt thinks that hyperphosphorylated tau proteins accumulate during hibernation to prevent neurons from losing even more synapses than they do and, possibly, to play a role in the swift recovery of synapses during arousal. Hyperphosphorylated tau also accumulates in the developing mammalian brain, but largely disappears soon after birth, when the brain is pruning unnecessary connections. Perhaps, Arendt proposes, tau usually protects neurons, but malfunctions in the brains of people with Alzheimer's, analogous to an overreactive immune systems in people with autoimmune disorders.

Recently, Arendt and Barnes collaborated on a study that further investigated tau proteins in hibernating ground squirrels, hamsters and black bears. Clumps of hyperphosphorylated tau gathered in the bear brains during hibernation, even more reminiscent of the clusters of misshapen proteins observed in the neurons of people with Alzheimer's. Unlike ground squirrels and hamsters, black bears do not drop in body temperature much during hibernation nor do they enter periodic bouts of arousal. Rather, they remain in mild continuous hibernation all winter. Without intermittent arousals to clear hyperphosphorylated tau from their brains, Arendt proposes, hibernating black bears tiptoe perilously close to neurodegeneration, but somehow manage to reverse the damage when they wake up in the spring. Although these ideas about tau are controversial, Arendt and other scientists are pursuing related research because hibernating animals offer an opportunity to study Alzheimer's and related disorders in ways that would be unethical to replicate with the human brain.

Hibernating mammals may also give scientists a way to study the brain's untapped potential. Throughout history, neuroscientists have learned a lot about how typical brains work from brains that were unusual or damaged?organs that lacked the usual bridge of neural tissue between the two hemispheres or had large holes in a particular region. The hibernating brain, in contrast, reveals the extraordinary talents hidden in the typical mammalian brain. Some recent studies by Kelly Drew of U.A.F. and her colleagues suggest that even when a hibernating mammal is awake in the spring and summer its brain remains resistant to the kind of oxygen deprivation and neuronal damage that often result from heart attacks and stroke. When small mammals first evolved hibernation, their energy-hungry brains were put in an impossible situation: survive half the year with almost no oxygen or nutrition and emerge from the whole ordeal unscathed. Evidently, hibernation did not kill the brain?it only made it stronger.

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Saturday, June 16, 2012

"Forest boy" made up story: German police

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Support Site For Hospital Respirators Found Riddled With Malware

Possibly - but the most malware-infected sites are sometimes the ones you wouldn't expect. Charities. Churches. Fraternal organizations. Anyplace where the servers are operated and maintained by volunteers who don't have a financial stake in the organization's operations, and who don't have a good background in security.

Porn sites, on the other hand, are run by businesses who expect repeat business, and can't afford to scare customers away with malware. Their sites are much LESS likely to be infected,

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Ch2KTUU: Sunday flight finds possible debris and bone fragments from a vintage military aircraft crash in the Knik Glacier area: http://t.co/wJcCqNoS

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Friday, June 15, 2012

U.S. proposes tighter rules on soot pollution

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Richard Ford: Why writing is an act of optimism

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Ford talks about his new novel "Canada," his memories of the late Raymond Carver, and how art makes life.
???

By J.P. O? Malley / June 14, 2012

?Canada,? Richard Ford?s seventh novel to date, is the story of Dell Parsons, a teenage boy whose parents are sent to jail for robbing a bank, leaving him and his twin sister, Berner, to fend for themselves. "Canada" illustrates the way that one foolish decision can destroy a family.

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Richard Ford published his debut novel ?A Piece of My Heart? in 1976.? But it was ?The Sportswriter? (1986) ? the book which introduced the world to Frank Bascombe, and other marginalized characters trapped on the edge of the American Dream ? that distinguished Ford as a preeminent voice in literary fiction. The two books that followed, ?Independence Day? (1995), which won him the Pulitzer prize in fiction, and ?Lay of The Land? (2006), completed the Frank Bascombe trilogy.

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R. Kelly Owes Nearly $5 Million In Back Taxes

Singer owes millions in taxes from 2005-2010.
By Gil Kaufman

R. Kelly
Photo: Donna Ward/Getty Images

Add R. Kelly to the list of celebrities who have gotten in hot water with the Internal Revenue Service for not ponying up their fair share of taxes. Joining the likes of Lil Wayne  and Lauryn Hill in the IRS doghouse, TMZ reported that Kelly owes more than $4.8 million in taxes dating back to 2005.

A rep for the singer said, "R. Kelly is in the process of working everything out with the government and is confident that all his obligations will be satisfied."

The breakdown of the alleged non-payments includes: $1,472,366.77 (2005), $710,520.51 (2006), $376,180.11 (2007), $1,122,694.90 (2008), $173,815.18 (2009) and $992,495.24 (2010). The total bill comes to $4,848,072.71.

After taking some time off to recover from emergency throat surgery  last year, Kells is expected to make his music return later this month with his 11th studio album, Write Me Back.

The lead single from the disc, "Share My Love," was released in February and a second song, "Feelin' Single" hit late last month. The disc is the follow-up to 2010's Love Letter, an ode to Kelly's favorite music from the 1950's and '60's.

In December, Kelly shocked fans when he announced that he would be adding 32 chapters to his popular "Trapped in the Closet" series, and in March it was confirmed that the series would be aired on IFC later this year. Twenty-two chapters exist thus far in the soap opera series that begins with a one-night stand and weaves into an extended tale of sex and lies, starring Kelly's alter ego, Sylvester.

Related Artists

R. Kelly

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Thursday, June 14, 2012

Carly Rae Jepsen's 'Call Me Maybe,' By The Numbers

As the singer's inescapable smash reaches #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, we break down its rise to the top.
By James Montgomery

Carly Rae Jepsen
Photo:

It was probably inevitable, but now it's official: Carly Rae Jepsen's ubiquitous "Call Me Maybe" is the #1 song in the country, overtaking Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know" atop the Billboard Hot 100.

It's been quite a voyage for the Canadian-born Jepsen, one that's featured cameos by Justin Bieber, unwitting assists from Barack Obama, and more cover versions that we can possible count. Still, there are plenty of other measurable statistics, so here's a look at the rise of "Call Me Maybe" to the top of the charts, by the numbers.

108 million: Number of views the "Call Me Maybe" video has racked up on YouTube since debuting on March 1, 2012. The clip is currently the most popular music video on the site.

12 million: Number of views the Barack Obama "dub" of the song has garnered on YouTube, making it the most-watched of the innumerable "Call Me" covers.

3.3 million: Number of digital downloads "Call Me Maybe" has sold to date, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

269: Number of days since September 20, 2011, when "Call Me Maybe" was officially released on iTunes. It is currently the Music Store's most-downloaded single.

.269: Current batting average of New York Mets second baseman Justin Turner, who has used "Call Me Maybe" as his at-bat music.

193: Total length, in seconds, of "Call Me Maybe." Jepsen sings the hook 11 times over the course of the song, or once every 17.5 seconds.

157: Number of days since Justin Bieber first tweeted about "Call Me Maybe," posting a video of former "Swag Coach" Ryan Good and "Pretty Little Liars" star Ashley Benson singing along to the tune and officially beginning Jepsen's Stateside ascent.

118: Number of days since Bieber's "Call Me Maybe" video first premiered on YouTube, featuring cameos by Selena Gomez, Ashley Tisdale and Big Time Rush's Carlos Pena. The clip has been viewed more than 42 million times to date.

16: Number of weeks since "Call Me Maybe" debuted on the Billboard Hot 100, entering the chart at #38 behind Big Sean's "Dance (Ass)."

13: Number of countries in which "Call Me Maybe" has reached #1, including Australia, Hungary, Ireland and Jepsen's native Canada.

11" Number of U.S. charts "Call Me Maybe" currently resides on, including Pop Songs, Dance/Club Songs and Adult Contemporary.

8: Number of weeks Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know" held the top spot on the Hot 100, before being dethroned by "Call Me Maybe."

1: Number of full-length albums Jepsen has released to date: 2008's Tug of War remains her sole LP (she also released an EP, Curiosity, in February).

Related Artists

Carly Rae Jepsen

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Pew survey finds China seen as top economic power

BEIJING (AP) ? For the first time, people responding to a global survey are more likely to view China and not the United States as the world's leading economic power.

The results of the Pew Research Center survey do not reflect reality: America's economy remains well ahead of its closest rival. But it does highlight China's steadily rising public image amid rapid growth, as well as the erosion of the United States' status as the global superpower, especially after the 2008 financial crisis left it struggling with recession and high unemployment.

The 21-nation poll found that 41 percent of people said China was the world's economic power, while 40 percent favored the U.S. Among the 14 nations that were asked the same question in 2008, the margin was wider: 45 percent placed the U.S. on top four years ago, with just 22 percent for China, but in the latest poll China was favored 42 percent to 36 percent.

The trend was especially strong in Europe: 58 percent of people in Britain saw China as the leading economy, versus just 28 percent for the United States. Even in the U.S., respondents were about evenly divided on the question. Turkey and Mexico were the only countries where more than half of people consider the United States the leading economic power.

"Over the last few years, perceptions about the global economic balance of power have been shifting," Pew said in the report.

China passed Germany as the biggest exporter in 2009 and has overtaken Japan as the world's second-biggest economy. But its situation is complex: It is relatively poor by income per person, while the United States is among the richest. The United States is the global center for the auto, computer, finance, aerospace and other industries.

China's competitive edge is its large pool of low-cost labor, but that is shrinking as wages rise and the Chinese population ages. The World Bank and the communist government's own advisers warn it must make basic changes to its economic strategy to boost productivity and keep incomes rising.

Those nuances are reflected in the Chinese public's more tempered views of their country in the Pew survey. Only 29 percent of people interviewed saw it as the leading economy, versus 48 percent for the United States.

The polls were nationally representative surveys conducted in March and April by 26,210 telephone or in-person interviews in 21 countries, including Brazil, Japan, India, France, Egypt, Tunisia, Pakistan and the United States.

The survey also found that China's image has grown more negative over the past year in the United States, Japan and parts of Europe.

Across the 21 nations surveyed, the median percentage with positive views of China and the United States were about the same, at 49 percent and 52 percent, respectively. But Pew noted that overall figure concealed big differences in some countries. In Japan, 72 percent saw the U.S. favorably, versus just 15 percent for China. In Pakistan, 85 percent saw China favorably while just 12 percent said the same for the United States.

Associated Press

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The Other Side of New York

What happens when four upper class rebels are thrown into the slums of NYC?

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This topic is an Out Of Character part of the roleplay, ?The Other Side of New York?. Anything posted here will also show up there.

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Forum for completely Out of Character (OOC) discussion, based around whatever is happening In Character (IC). Discuss plans, storylines, and events; Recruit for your roleplaying game, or find a GM for your playergroup.
This is the auto-generated OOC topic for the roleplay "The Other Side of New York"

You may edit this first post as you see fit.

? Life's not the amount of breaths you take; it's the moments that take your breath away. ?

Read my new novel (in progress) on Wattpad! ~ Cupid's Bow

Imagine That!: Member for 3 years

>.> I'll take Ashley Greene. If I can..

Couldn't save your lonely heart
It cried loudly to my soul
You've got to find a way to forgive
And silence all your great mistakes
Before time passes by

Dreamwaker: Member for 0 years

Love the look of this Dee

can I reserve Claire Holt pleasee??

Calvazara: Member for 1 years

HAH! xD I knew you'd take Claire, Gem... I just knew it. *Is in love with, but slightly scared of my zen-like abilities*

Also, yay, Sarah. =D

Life consists of choices. If you wish to change your life, all you have to do, is choose to...

Mela: Member for 0 years

I was really torn between her and Crystal Reed...you know, I may just change my mind...oh I don't know ;(

Calvazara: Member for 1 years

They've all got really good little storylines weaved into the big situation, which I will say, I'm quite proud of :D
If you want to change honey, you can :)

One's secretly pregnant and wants the really sweet guy to herself, and the other is superficial and vain, and everyone hates her because she's a slut, yet they like her for being so well connected :')

Imagine That!: Member for 3 years

Is A-Team Member Three taken yet? If not may I take her? I love you guys and I am getting less busy and I just wanna join. xD

Sorella: Member for 3 years

okay i'll stick with Claire :) thanks hunnie..

Calvazara: Member for 1 years

Oookay... I see a serious lack of male characters here.. not that I'm surprised. It's always like that. xD Either that, or half the boys turn out to be gay. *cough* OADFG *cough* xD

Mela: Member for 0 years

Can I take Other #3 please??? This looks really cool! :)

November_Rain_18: Member for 0 years

We'll find some males... don't worry... -.-
Yes, the strange amount of gayness in OADFG is quite funny. I blame Nova and Peter, to be fair.

Right, all females taken!

Edit;; sure - go for it :D We've never RP'ed together so I'll have a browse over your general posts and what not after a character bio is posted :)

Imagine That!: Member for 3 years

Mehe. Hey, I'm not the one who needs them. xD My character has all he needs. Well.. almost. xD

And yeah, I blame those two too. You're no saint though, what about Robbie, I ask? Like he isn't a little (lot) gay? =P

Mela: Member for 0 years

Almost, eh? :P He's having a baby, so shush.

Well.... you leave Robbie out of it. He's innocent in all of this. He has mixed feelings! "Bisexual" has not emitted from his mouth yet!

Imagine That!: Member for 3 years

Haha xD Robbie could totally pull off being gay but seriously.. have him "bisexual" best of both worlds ;D Lol. Yea we actually have more than two gay guys on OAFDG..We have like four or five...

I will get working on my charrie as soon as I post in OAFDG. (:

Sorella: Member for 3 years

A baby who he won't give a shit about. He absolutely hates upper-class people. The fact that he's the father of one would only serve to piss him off further. He'd probably tell her she should've gotten a fucking abortion 'cause he ain't paying shit. xD He's nice to his own group, though. Ehe.

Nooo... but he'd told Alex about having feelings for guys, so he's definitely bi, and he knows it. xD I agree with Ashy.

Meh, lucky you, Ash.. I'm dying here. I can't figure out a proper name for him. *Deep sigh* I have issues! xD

Mela: Member for 0 years

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Mark Wahlberg heads back to high school

Gabriel Bouys / AFP - Getty Images

By Bruna Nessif, E! Online

Imagine trying to pay attention in class with a hunk like Mark Wahlberg sitting next to you -- yikes! The actor, who dropped out of school in the ninth grade, announced that he's going back to high school starting later this month in an effort to get that diploma.

But you won't be catching him walking down the halls (sorry).?

READ: Steve Carell sends off Princeton University graduates: "You should have to suffer!"

Wahlberg will be continuing his education courtesy of a new online program based in New Orleans.

"It's an actual diploma," Wahlberg told David Letterman on "Late Show" Tuesday night. "I've got to take up all the courses that I missed, and I'm a little nervous."?

"They're going to give me whatever credits I already have, which is probably like one or two," he joked. "But I'm going to make it happen."?

PHOTOS: Graduation gallery?

Seeing that he has "a lot of downtime on sets in the trailer and stuff," the actor hopes to "just ... blast through it -- hopefully do it within six to eight months."?

Are we the only ones that find Mark Wahlberg getting in touch with his inner nerd supersexy? Didn't think so.?

Thumbs up for Mark! What do you think? Tell us on Facebook?and follow us on Pinterest!

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Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Exclusive: Manchester United drops Asia IPO for U.S.

(Adds background, details about syndicate)

SINGAPORE/HONG KONG, June 13 (IFR) - Manchester United, the world's best-supported soccer club, has ditched its plans for an Asian stock market flotation and is preparing to list in the United States, according to sources with knowledge of the deal.

After first eyeing a Hong Kong IPO, the former English soccer champions had planned a $1 billion listing in Singapore in the second half of last year before putting plans on hold because of market turmoil.

United, which has been English league champions a record 19 times and features players such as England's Wayne Rooney, declined to comment.

The U.S. listing would come either on the New York Stock Exchange or its electronic rival Nasdaq, which is under scrutiny after its systems bungled the debut of social media giant Facebook Inc last month, causing customer losses estimated of at least $100 million.

A person familiar with the New York Stock Exchange, owned by NYSE Euronext, said an exchange decision is expected soon. Nasdaq, owned by Nasdaq OMX Group Inc, was not immediately available to comment.

The club's American proprietors, the Glazer family, are well known in the United States as owners of American football team the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, as well as First Allied Corp, which owns and leases shopping centers.

However, they have faced opposition from United fans after taking over the club in 2005 in a leveraged buyout that left it saddled with hefty debt repayments.

Adding to fans' unease, United lost their Premier League title to local rivals Manchester City last month, a club bankrolled by Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, one of Abu Dhabi's ruling family.

As a result of its change of listing location, Manchester United is expected to make changes to its bookrunning syndicate for the deal. Credit Suisse, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and Morgan Stanley were originally mandated as bookrunners for the Singapore listing, but sources said this line-up might change.

Jefferies Group Inc, which was not part of the original syndicate, has also joined the deal, the sources said.

Credit Suisse, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley declined to comment. Jefferies could not be reached for a comment.

ASIA SUFFERS

A recent survey by Forbes rated United as the world's most highly valued sports team. Unlike many English clubs, United is profitable, though earnings were dented last season by their failure to win a trophy for the first time since 2005.

A study commissioned by the club showed its global fan base had doubled to 659 million people between 2007 and 2012.

Underlining the club's global commercial appeal, it signed a sponsorship deal with General Motors, the world's largest automaker, last month and has commercial partners in more than 70 countries.

United built a big fan base following its recovery from the Munich air disaster in 1958 when eight members of its gifted young team perished. Within a decade, United had won the European Cup for the first time with a team featuring Bobby Charlton and George Best and managed by Matt Busby, who was badly injured in Munich.

The news will be another blow to equity capital markets in Asia, where deal volumes have fallen sharply this year, excluding Malaysia.

Manchester United's decision is particularly bad news for Singapore, where motor racing company Formula One delayed its planned $3 billion IPO in June, sources told Reuters.

Bankers in Asia were skeptical about Manchester United's IPO prospects in the United States given volatile markets.

"It is a brave move for Man U to try to list in the U.S. Good luck to them," said an investment banker in Asia.

One of the sources said Manchester United had always planned to position itself as a global media business rather than a sports franchise, suggesting that a U.S. listing would make more sense.

U.S. investors are also familiar with the dual-class share structure that was under discussion for Manchester United's Singapore listing, having seen it used by household names such as Google and Facebook.

The Glazers are understood to have wanted to sell Class B shares with limited or no voting rights to maintain a level of control of 95-100 percent.

That structure was said to be one reason why they opted for Singapore in the first place, as, unlike Hong Kong, the exchange was happy to agree to the format, and for the club's Class A shares to be quoted but not traded.

However, the issuer is understood to have become frustrated with long delays in approval from Singapore, even after it had indicated it would have no problems with a dual-class share issue.

A U.S. listing is unlikely to achieve the original goal of putting shares in the hands of a wide base of United fans. A separate source said the original aim of the Singapore listing was to create "a pan-regional platform for retail investors".

Singapore had seemed the ideal location, as it provided a way to reach retail investors in one of its biggest fan bases, Indonesia. When the Singapore listing was still under consideration, the importance of Asia to the company, with much of its growth coming from Asian merchandise sales, had been heavily emphasized during marketing to investors.

(The International Financing Review is a Thomson Reuters publication. http://www.ifre.com)

(Additional reporting by Saeed Azhar in Singapore, Keith Weir in London, and Olivia Oran and John McCrank in New York; Editing by Will Waterman, Alwyn Scott and Bernard Orr)

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Video: Can You Make Money in Muni Bonds Now?

Hector Negroni, Fundamental Credit Opportunities co-CEO, explains why now is the time to take advantage of inefficiencies in the municipal credit market and how to profit from it.

Being heavy may help men with one type of cancer: study

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