BGN Entrepreneur

According to Thomas Cook, it is said that turmoil of the company at the tour group late last year did not appear to have driven away significant numbers of customers, with the company’s UK share of winter and summer bookings “broadly stable”.
However, political unrest in the Middle East and the influence of weak European economies on consumer spending contributed to a underlying operating loss of £91m in the quarter, in accordance with the expectations of the analyst but more than double the loss of £37m a year ago.

Due to the increase in oil prices, Norway’s largest oil and gas company–Statoil just reported fourth-quarter adjusted net income of 14.5bn Norwegian crowns, which makes a 34% increase on 2011.
According to Statoil’s chief executive–Lund, it is stated that Statoil delivered record financial results, further improved safety and made important strategic progress in last year. The company is said to have a good year for exploration in 2011, with discoveries in the North Sea as well as the Barents Sea.

After a slow start due to a lack of payments infrastructure, the credit card market in China has started to grow more dramatically in the recent years. Sccording to Citi, it is said that the number of cards in issue recorded by the Chinese central bank reached 268m by last September, which was over 5 times the level at the end of 2006.
The market is restricted to a single card-processing company–Union Pay. Consumers’ use of credit cards lags behind the number in issue. However, according to the bank, the market’s growth potential is enormous, as processing improves and more merchants accept the cards. According to the 2010 annual report from the People’s Bank of China, it is revealed that all card-based transactions grew by more than 50% by value to Rmb10.4trn.
Citigroup will become the first western bank to issue credit cards in mainland China under its own brand. The move become another foot in the door for Citi on the mainland after it also won the preliminary approval in January to launch a joint-venture securities company with Orient Securities.

The world’s fourth biggest smartphone maker by shipments–HTC, is getting prepared for another big fall in its sales in the first quarter of 2012 as the company scrambles to find its next hit phone.
The Taiwanese smartphone maker had already seen its sales fell by 22% from the third to the last quarter of 2011. According to the company, it is announced today that it expects the revenues to drop by a further 35.5% in the first quarter of the year.
HTC’s operating margins will drop to 7.5%, compared to 14.8% for the full year last year.

A common tactic employers draw upon is to ask you how different people may rate or describe you. The knack in answering this question during a job interview is to talk up the positive remarks that others may say or have said about you while playing down some of the negative comments.
Always remember not to lie to the interviewee. If your previous boss or colleague at work says that you are really bad at certain skill, avoid mentioning it during the interview. Remember that employers often check references as a condition of offering you a job. A reference that describes you as the complete opposite of how you have described yourself will definitely be a really deal breaker.

Nobody wants to take on an argumentative employee who is resistant to authority. However, depending on the nature of the organization, expected answer to the question of “how well do you respond to authority” could vary.
In traditional and hierarchical organizations, employees are expected to know their own place and defer to people more senior. Then, it is important for the interviewees to jobs in such organizations to show their keen appreciation of the need to defer to authority in their answer.
However, if you think you are having an interview with a progressive organization, position yourself as a more freethinking candidates is recommended. It shows that you will be able to fit into the free organizational culture much easier.

The maker of Dove soap and Magnum ice cream–Unilever, said that the company was facing a tougher trading environment in Russia and Brazil as it posted a pre-tax profit of €6.25bn for 2011.
The emerging markets operations of the group has witness the underlying year-on-year sales growth drop from 13% in the third quarter of the year to 12.3% in the last quarter, driving the annual growth rate to be 11.5% in these territories.
According to Unilever, it is said in the annual result statement that emerging markets in particular have seen a moderation in volume growth, albeit from high levels, whilst developed markets remain broadly flat.