Sydney, Australia's unemployment rate fell 0.1 percentage point to 5.1 percent in January, lowest since July 2011, data from Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed Thursday. The ABS reported the number of people employed increased by 46,300 to 11.46 million in January. The increase in employment was driven by increased part-time employment, up 34,000 people to 3,400,800, and an increase in full-time employment, up 12,300 people to 8.06 million, the ABS said. The number of people unemployed fell by 15,300 people to 614,200 in January, reported Xinhua. Most economists expected just 10,000 jobs to have been added in January with the unemployment rate at 5.3 percent. Australia's financial services provider CMC Markets chief market strategist Michael McCarthy told the Australian Associated Press (AAP) that the ABS figures suggested Australia's job market was trending strongly. "That the unemployment rate dropped to 5.1 with an expansion in the participation rate says good things about the economy," he said. McCarthy said the two official interest rate cuts in November and December may have boosted employer confidence. ...
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New Delhi, In the first official Indian figure ever mentioned on black money parked abroad, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Monday said an estimated 500 billion USD, which is equivalent to about Rs 24.5 lakh crore, of illegal money is stashed away in foreign tax havens by the Indian depositors. CBI director Ambar Pratap Singh made the disclosure at the inaugural function of the First Interpol Global Programme on Anti-Corruption and Asset Recovery. "India in particular has suffered from the flow of illegal funds to tax havens such as Mauritius, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, British Virgin Islands, etc. It is estimated that around 500 billion dollars of illegal money belonging to Indians is deposited in tax havens abroad," Singh said. "Largest depositors in Swiss banks are also reported to be Indians," he said. "Development of new methods of financial flows and communication technology have made it easier for the corrupt to conceal and stash away stolen wealth. On the other hand, differences in legal systems, high costs in coordinating investigations, inadequate international cooperation and bank secrecy laws have made the task difficult for the ...
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