iNews Briefs, More & Community Events
Community Events
MAY 22
Water Authority Work On Bodden Town Road
The Water Authority is doing roadwork along Bodden Town Road. Portions will be closed from 9am until 4pm daily. All other traffic will be diverted around the work area via Anton Bodden Drive.
DCI Closure
The Department of Commerce and Investment will close on Friday (22 May)
MAY 23
Chill Out for Exam Time
Exam time is approaching and many young students are overwhelmed and anxious. Lifestyles invites you to a chill-out mindfulness-based stretch and relaxation session at the South Sound Community Center on Saturday, May 23rd. – 12:30 – 1:45 pm.
This is a specially designed relaxation session for releasing stressful feelings about exams and creating a relaxed and positive view of exams. A special once-a-year offer at exam time…$5.00 per student. Please let us know if you plan to attend. Drop in at last minute also welcome. Please bring a large beach towel.
Talent/Spring Fashion Show fundraiser
West Bay Girls’ Brigade Company is hosting a Talent/Spring Fashion Show fundraiser on Saturday (23 May) at John Gray Memorial Church Hall at 630pm
Purple Dragon Road Warriors 5 & 10K Run
The Purple Dragon Road Warriors 5 & 10K Run is Saturday (23 May) at 7am at the Holiday Inn.
Do It For the Kids 5K Walk Run
The Do It For the Kids 5K Walk Run is Saturday (23 May) at 630am at Prospect Primary School
Drum Circle
Drum Circle is Saturday (23 May) at 5pm in Gardenia Court at Camana Bay.
12th Annual Chalkfest Competition
The 12th Annual Chalkfest Competition is Saturday (23 May) from 10 — 1pm at the Town Center in Camana Bay.
MAY 24
Symphonic Wind and String Ensemble Performance
The Symphonic Wind and String Ensemble from God’s Bible School & College in Ohio will be performing at the Church of God (Holiness) Red Bay on Sunday (24 May) at 6 PM
Walk for a Child 5K Fun Run
The Walk for a Child 5K Fun Run is Sunday (24 May) at 6am at Holiday Inn Resort
MAY 25
National Conservation Council Meeting
The National Conservation Council will hold a general meeting on Tuesday (25 May) from 2pm to 5pm in the ground floor meeting room of the Government Administration Building . The Agenda of the meeting is available on the Department of Environment’s website: www.doe.ky
MAY 28
Cayman Islands Facility Management Association meeting
The Cayman Islands Facility Management Association would like to invite you to a regular meeting on May 28 at Camana Bay. Please accept the invite to RSVP for this meeting. Guests are always welcome.
Date: May 28, 2015 Time: 9am-11am
Location: The Grand Cayman Marriott Beach Resort
Regular Meeting before and networking afterwards
Admission: Free
MAY 30
Businessmen’s breakfast
The Grand Cayman chapter of the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship International is having its monthly breakfast on Saturday May 30th at 7:30am, at The Upper Crust restaurant in Camana Bay. Our speaker is Allan Turner
Come out to hear the how God is making a difference in the life of men like you, right here in Cayman.
Cayman Islands Money Services Law (2010 Revision)
The Cayman Islands Money Authority wishes to remind the public that the pooling of monies for remittance constitutes money services business as such, this practice requires a licence pursuant to the Money Services Law (2010 Revision).
Section 4 (1) and 4 (2) of Money Services Law (2010 Revision) states –
“Subject to sections 3(2) and 31, any person who carries on money services
business without first obtaining a licence under section 5, is guilty of an offence.
A person guilty of an offence under subsection (1) is liable on summary conviction to a fine of ten thousand dollars and to imprisonment for one year and, in the case of a continuing offence, to a fine of one thousand dollars for each day during which the offence continues.”
For further clarification contact the Banking Supervision Division of the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority at [email protected]
Exxon Mobil makes ‘significant’ offshore oil find near Guyana
By Lance Murray From Dallas Business Journal
IMAGE: Exxon Mobil announced a major oil find off the coast of Guyana.
TIM RUE/BLOOMBERG
Exxon Mobil announced a major oil find off the coast of Guyana.
Irving-based oil and gas giant Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) said Wednesday that it has made a significant oil discovery off the coast of Guyana.
The find is in the Stabroek Block about 120 miles offshore from the country of about 800,000 on the Caribbean coast of South America.
Exxon said that the well was drilled by an affiliate, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Ltd. and that it encountered more than 295 feet of high-quality oil-bearing sandstone reservoirs.
The well was drilled to 17,825 feet in 5,719 feet of water, Exxon said.
“I am encouraged by the results of the first well on the Stabroek Block,” Stephen M. Greenlee, president of ExxonMobil Exploration Co. said in a news release. “Over the coming months we will work to determine the commercial viability of the discovered resource, as well as evaluate other resource potential on the block.”
Exxon said that Esso Exploration and Production Guyana holds 45 percent interest in the well. Hess Guyana Exploration Ltd. holds 30 percent and CNOOC Nexen Petroleum Guyana Ltd. holds 25 percent.
Kanye West: I was ‘grossly over-censored at the Billboard Music Awards’
By Dee Lockett From Vulture
Kanye West was picked to close out Sunday night’s Billboard Music Awards, but it was hard to tell from the show’s live broadcast. ABC heavily censored his performances of “All Day” and “Black Skinhead,” making large sections of his medley unintelligible. (Kanye’s over-the-top pyrotechnics also didn’t help.) Fans complained, and now Kanye has released a statement, via his publicist, ripping the broadcast for its treatment of his performance:
“Kanye West was grossly over-censored at the Billboard Music Awards. Non-profane lyrics such as ‘with my leather black jeans on’ were muted for over 30-second intervals. As a result, his voice and performance were seriously misrepresented. It is ridiculous that in 2015, unwarranted censorship is something that artists still have to fight against.
Although West was clearly set up to face elements beyond his control during the live broadcast, he would like to apologize to the television audience who were unable to enjoy the performance the way he envisioned.”
According to TMZ, the show’s producers say they were unaware he’d perform the explicit versions of his songs because he skipped the dress rehearsal. Their reaction: “He’s Kanye. What are we supposed to do?” If Kanye stops appearing at awards shows altogether (as he’s often threatened to boycott the Grammys), we wouldn’t be surprised. Watch his “grossly over-censored” performance below.
Kanye West. Photo: Jeff Kravitz/Getty Images
Cadwalader partner arrested for disorderly conduct
By Nell Gluckman, From The Am Law Daily
Mecklenburg County police in North Carolina arrested Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft capital markets partner Robert Ughetta on Sunday, charging him with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest, police records show. Bond was set at $3,000.
Ughetta works in asset securitization, structured finance, derivative products, fund formation and secured lending in New York and Charlotte, according to his profile on Cadwalader’s website. The firm declined to comment, and Ughetta did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday afternoon.
The news of Ughetta’s arrest was first reported by the legal blog Above the Law.
Ughetta, a graduate of Princeton University and Albany Law School, has had run-ins with Mecklenburg County police before, police records show. In 2014, he was arrested for felony possession of cocaine and possession of drug paraphernalia.
After graduating from law school, Ughetta worked as an associate at Nixon, Hargrave, Devans & Doyle before joining Cadwalader in 1997, according to his LinkedIn profile. (Nixon Hargrave merged with Peabody & Brown in 1999 to form Nixon Peabody.) He made partner in 2005.
Ughetta is fairly active on social media, maintaining a personal website, a blog and a Pinterest page, where he promotes topics that range from the young human rights activist and Cadwalader client Malala Yousafzai, to a video from a recent vacation in Italy.
He’s a frequent poster of news about Princeton University and other organizations such as United Way, the Alzheimer’s Association and Safe Alliance, which supports victims of abuse, rape and domestic violence. He also used his blog to draw attention to his efforts to raise money for senior dogs in shelters.
FTC warns RadioShack not to sell off private data
By Chris DiMarco, From Legaltech News
Commission says that auctioning off private data should only be done under strict guidelines, and has called on court to consider its concerns.
In February, RadioShack declared bankruptcy, ending a 94-year run as one of the most recognizable electronics dealers in the world. As with many bankruptcy proceedings, in an effort to pay down its debt the chain agreed to sell of a variety of assets. Now the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is asking that some of those assets be left off the auction block, warning that documents containing sensitive information about RadioShack’s former customers should be treated with care.
According to a letter penned by Federal Trade Commission Consumer Protection Director Jessica Rich, which was directed to a court appointed consumer privacy ombudsman, “Substantial amounts of personal data collected by RadioShack, including consumers’ names, addresses, e-mail addresses, and purchase histories, are among the assets being put up for auction to settle the bankruptcy. Documents indicate information from tens of millions of consumers may be among the assets for sale.”
In the same letter, the FTC asked that RadioShack commit to promises it made to former customers about how their information is shared and distributed. The Commission has requested that information only be sold in certain bundles, and only to entities with business profiles similar to RadioShack’s that can commit to the same level of privacy protection.
The FTC has previously intervened in cases in which it deemed customer data privacy was at risk. In its letter, the Commission cited a case from 2000 in which it prevented Toysmart.com from violating its agreement with customers that it would not disseminate private information, stopping the sale of pending information as a result.
The RadioShack bankruptcy case is currently undergoing analysis from a consumer privacy ombudsman to evaluate the risks of selling private information and determine who would be considered qualified buyers under the current plans. The FTC has requested that a copy of its letter be included with the remarks of the ombudsman.
Lance Armstrong fights ex-teammate over documents in fraud case
By Zoe Tillman From Legal Times
The last time we checked in on the fraud case against famed cyclist Lance Armstrong, his lawyers were engaged in a war of words with prosecutors over what documents each side had to hand over.
Now, Armstrong is feuding with his teammate-turned-adversary Floyd Landis.
Armstrong on Wednesday filed papers in the federal district court in Washington that accused Landis of withholding documents about his “own false denials of doping during his cycling career,” as well as Landis’ communications with reporters.
Without the documents, Armstrong says, he can’t depose Landis.
“Although relator Floyd Landis initiated this qui tam action and hopes to recover $20 million or more, he refuses to produce to defendant Lance Armstrong fundamental categories of documents,” Armstrong’s lawyers write.
Landis shot back the same day, arguing in a separate filing that Armstrong failed to justify his objections to categories of documents that Landis wanted. Landis wants to see communications between Armstrong and witnesses and copies of agreements between Armstrong and Capital Sports & Entertainment Holdings Inc., which served as Armstrong’s agent and business manager and did other work for the U.S. Postal Service cycling team that Armstrong rode for.
Regardless of any agreement with government lawyers over which communications Armstrong should have to produce to the feds, Landis says he wasn’t part of those talks and that Armstrong never “substantiated his arguments regarding relevance or burden.”
Elliot Peters of Keker & Van Nest, one of Armstrong’s lawyers, declined to comment on the latest spat. Robert Luskin, who moved to Paul Hastings from Squire Patton Boggs earlier this year, also represents Armstrong.
A lead attorney for Landis, Paul Scott of the Law Offices of Paul D. Scott in San Francisco, said in an email to the NLJ, “We are attempting to develop evidence and stay focused on matters of relevance to the case. We will be responding to Mr. Armstrong’s motion shortly.”
Disputes over information have dominated the case since last summer, when Judge Robert Wilkins—now a member of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit—denied Armstrong’s bid to dismiss claims that he defrauded the government by using banned performance-enhancing drugs while he was a member of the Postal Service team. The case was reassigned to U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, who has refereed the document fights over the past year.
Landis, who has admitted doping while he was a member of the Postal Service team, brought the False Claims Act case against Armstrong in June 2010. The federal government in 2013 announced it was joining the case.
IMAGE: Lance Armstrong, left, and Floyd Landis, right, of the U.S. Postal Service cycling team, smile while riding side-by-side during the second stage of the 5-day Tour of the Algarve cycling race in Algarve, southern Portugal. February 19, 2004.
Photo: Miguel Riopa/AP
Why a healthy prostate is essential for your sex life
From Men’s Health
The latest research: 93% of men suffer sexual side effects and erectile dysfunction after common prostate surgeries
New research reveals that it’s rare for men to regain normal erectile function after the most common prostate operation, radical prostatectomy. The procedure, in which the prostate gland removed, is designed to prevent the spread of cancer has become increasingly common over the last few years. However the efficacy and safety of this treatment has been called into question once again. The latest research shows that the operation has a high chance of leaving the patient impotent. 93 percent of respondents involved in a study reported experiencing regular failure and an inability to perform, after their surgery. This is a much higher figure than previous research suggested and it is likely that many patients who were offered the treatment where misled as to its risks. In 2014, an estimated 233,000 men in the United States were diagnosed with prostate cancer, and that number is set to exceed a quarter of a million men in 2015.
The lead doctor of the study Mikkel Fode said: “The occurrence of sexual dysfunction after prostate cancer surgery is well known but our method of evaluating it is new… the vast majority of men, more than 93% in our sample, experienced some problems after surgery”
I sat down with Prostate health expert Ben Ong for his analysis of the study, and what the latest research meant for men.
Hi Ben, thanks for joining us, what is your take on this latest study?
Previous studies into the side effects of having a radical prostatectomy put the percentages of men experiencing impotence in the high 70% or 80%. So these numbers are not new, they just reveal that the risks that we already thought was high were even higher. We in the medical community have to make sure that we are keeping men informed of their options and the risks associated with treatments.
So does this study mean that a radical prostatectomy is a bad option?
This study…no.
Are there other studies that suggest men shouldn’t be having a prostatectomy?
Plenty, but that is the wrong question. There are two issues here firstly when should men seek invasive treatment and is a prostatectomy the best treatment option?
It’s a disturbing fact that ill-informed patients and doctors have resulted in a rise in the numbers of unnecessary prostate surgeries. Invasive treatments for the prostate all carry risks, if a man has BPH or a Gleason score of under 6 or 7 he is probably better off seeking non-invasive, integrative treatment. Only when a Gleason score is 8 or 9 should a man consider surgery, you should always work with a specialist to find out what your best option is and you should always get a second opinion.
It is a rare and very bad day for someone if I recommend a radical prostatectomy, simply put the surgery is a bad option and the last resort. Surgeons will often tell patients that sexual dysfunction is a short term side effect. What they don’t tell you is that they define short term as between 1-2 years! The Harvard annual prostate disease report states that some men go as long as 3 years without experiencing any erections, following a prostatectomy. 20% of men suffer persistent erectile dysfunction. and never recover full normal.
What about other side effects?
Incontinence and urinary infections tend to be the other side effects that patients highlight.
So what are the good options men concerned about their Prostate Health or prostate cancer?
That is a whole other discussion, I will link in one of my VIP videos that discusses just that. Normally this video is only available to my private patients and paying medical experts or professionals who work in the naturopathic and medical fields, but actually its vital viewing for most men.
That’s very kind of you, thanks for taking the time to speak with us Ben.
It was my pleasure
To watch the video and learn more go to: http://www.bensprostate.com/news/health/?utm_source=newsmax&utm_medium=cpm&utm_term=male50plus-native-conservative&utm_content=in-story&utm_campaign=Newsmax-Native-May-15
In land of fakes, Chinese e-commerce giant sells trust
By Joe Mcdonald, AP Business Writer from Chron
BEIJING (AP) — Before he became a billionaire in e-commerce, Richard Liu was a failure.
As a student, Liu started a restaurant in Beijing but went bankrupt. He blames employees who he said stole from him, and when he took a second stab at business by opening an electronics store in 1998, Liu insisted on honesty. After seeing other shops overcharge customers and pass off counterfeit goods, he says he sold only genuine merchandise.
“I felt this was an opportunity to establish a new kind of business,” said Liu in an interview. He said his shop became the first in northwestern Beijing’s Zhongguancun neighborhood, a center for technology companies, to use price tags to avoid haggling with buyers.
After Liu went online in 2003 and expanded into selling home appliances, clothing and other goods, that focus on reliability helped his company, JD.com, grow into China’s biggest Internet-based direct retailer. It is a powerful selling point for Chinese consumers who have endured repeated scandals over fake and sometimes deadly milk, medicines and other products.
In contrast to China’s dominant e-commerce brand, Alibaba Group, which provides platforms for companies and consumers to sell directly to each other and leaves the handling of goods to outside delivery companies, JD.com operates like a department store, buying goods from suppliers and re-selling them to shoppers. The Beijing-based company controls the flow of merchandise from the supplier to the customer’s door. It operates its own distribution network of more than 100 warehouses and a fleet of thousands of bright red delivery vehicles emblazoned with its logo of a grinning dog named Joy.
Liu, 41, said his disastrous experience operating a restaurant while studying at People’s University in Beijing in the mid-1990s taught him a painful lesson about the role of honesty in business. He said pilfering and phony receipts were common.
“An employee would pay 2 yuan for bean sprouts but tell me he paid 4 yuan,” said Liu, whose name in Chinese is Liu Qiangdong. “The cashier and other employees would sneak money into their own pockets.”
Liu is part of a wave of Chinese business leaders in fields from e-commerce to tourism and mobile phones who are helping to drive the rapid evolution of the world’s second-largest economy.
Most prominent is Alibaba founder Jack Ma, who became a media star in the West after a record-setting $25 billion U.S. stock offering last year. Another is Wang Jianlin, chairman of Wanda Group, which acquired U.S. cinema chain AMC in 2012.
China accounted for 213 billionaires on Forbes magazine’s global rich list last year, more than any other country except the United States with 536. And while many of the Americans inherited their riches, nearly all the Chinese are self-made. And young, too: JD.com’s Liu and some others passed $1 billion in net worth before turning 40.
JD.com has emerged as Alibaba’s strongest challenger in a Chinese e-commerce market that consulting firm Forrester says could grow to $1 trillion in annual sales by 2020.
Its rise reflects the rapid emergence of more affluent and demanding Chinese consumers. Online shoppers used to look only at price and took their chances with counterfeit or shoddy goods. Today, they are willing to pay for quality and are shifting to merchants that control their supply chain and will help resolve complaints.
Last year, JD.com raised its profile abroad with a U.S. stock market debut that raised $1.8 billion ahead of Alibaba’s IPO. Liu’s net worth has risen to $8.8 billion.
JD.com’s workforce of 68,000 includes inspectors who check product quality. A call center with a staff of 7,000 fields customer complaints. The company also operates an online mall with about 60,000 merchants that include clothing brands Uniqlo and The Gap. It screens sellers before they are allowed onto the site and those caught dealing in counterfeits can be fined 1 million yuan ($160,000).
Liu keeps a lower public profile than Alibaba’s Ma.
Each June, Liu marks the anniversary of JD.com’s founding by working for a day as a delivery driver. Chinese news reports say customers often fail to recognize him when he shows up at their door.
In person, Liu exudes quiet confidence rather than the exuberant energy of many Chinese entrepreneurs his age. He has a personable manner and boyish face but an older man’s unwavering gaze. During an interview in his wood-paneled office in a tower adjacent to the site of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, he chuckled at a question about how he chose Joy the dog as JD.com’s mascot.
“Don’t you think it’s cute?” he said. The logo, he said, symbolizes JD.com’s loyalty to customers and is meant to make a company founded on selling to male tech nerds more welcoming to female shoppers.
JD.com is a fraction of Alibaba’s size but growing faster.
The total value of goods sold across Alibaba’s platforms in the first quarter of this year was more than six times JD.com’s level of 87.8 billion yuan ($14.2 billion). But JD.com sales rose 99 percent, more than double Alibaba’s 40 percent growth.
For its part, Alibaba has responded to pressure to help stamp out China’s rampant trade in fakes by increasing spending and assigning more than 2,000 employees to keeping counterfeits off its sales platforms.
Other Chinese online retailers need to set up similar distribution and quality control systems if they want to get out of the “no-win game” of competing on price alone, said Angela Wang, an expert in retailing at the Boston Consulting Group.
Liu moved online after the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome in 2003 kept shoppers away from stores, sending Chinese retailing into a tailspin. As it grew, the company was renamed 360buy Jingdong Inc. and became JD.com in January 2014.
JD.com has yet to report a profit but says its loss narrowed to 710.2 million yuan ($114.6 million) in the first quarter, equal to about 1.9 percent of revenue.
Its network is being expanded into the populous Chinese countryside.
“By the end of this year, we will be ready to enter nearly 100,000 villages,” said Liu. “A logistics network covering the whole country will have been completely built.”
And JD.com is extending its model abroad.
In February, it launched a French Mall that allows Chinese customers to order wine, cosmetics and clothing directly from France. It launched a Korean Mall in March and Liu says it plans similar direct sales links to suppliers in the United States, Australia, Italy and Spain.
The company plans one day to sell in other markets, Liu said.
“As Chinese brands go abroad, we want to take the JD.com sales model to the whole world.”
IMAGE: In this photo taken April 2, 2015, Richard Liu, founder of JD.com talks during an interview in this office in Beijing. After going bankrupt running a restaurant, Liu took a second stab at business by opening an electronics store that insisted on honesty. After seeing other shops overcharge customers and pass off counterfeit goods, he says he sold only genuine merchandise. Photo: Ng Han Guan, AP / AP
Slow Latin America growth leads to foreign direct investment fall
By Courtney Fingar From Financial Times
Foreign direct investment into Latin America and the Caribbean declined sharply last year as corporate investors chasing growth markets looked elsewhere.
The region saw a 39 per cent decline in capital investment and a 16 per cent decline in the number of greenfield FDI projects in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to fDi Markets, an FT data service.
All of the top 10 regional FDI destination countries had decreases in project numbers in 2014 except for Panama. This is in contrast to North America, where fDi Markets tracked a 7 per cent increase in the number of FDI projects and a 3 per cent increase in capital investment.
Economic growth in Latin America and the Caribbean all but ground to a halt in 2014, registering at only 0.8 per cent according to the World Bank.
A decline in commodity prices and slowing growth in China, a major trading partner, hit the major economies of South America and combined with domestic factors to drag down regional growth.
Gross domestic product growth in Mexico hovered well under 3 per cent last year, in a safe but far-from-stellar performance, and the Brazilian economy dipped into recession before seeing a small rebound to post near-zero growth.
FDI into Latin America and the Caribbean by capital investment, 2014
Mexico is the regional leader for inward investment. It nabbed the largest market share of capital investment into the region, at 36 per cent, thanks in part to its enduring appeal as a manufacturing destination for US companies. Mexico was the leading location for FDI from North America last year, with $16bn of announced FDI, which included $2bn investments in both the wind power and automobile industries.
Mexico also led for number of projects attracted, at 365, but this was a 15 per cent decline on the previous year’s figure.
Brazil posted a 4 per cent decline in projects, while Colombia suffered a 41 per cent drop. The smaller economies — barring Panama — are having a tough time catching investors’ eyes, with the heavyweights of Mexico and Brazil capturing the lion’s share of investment into the region; together they accounted for 56 per cent of capital investment into Latin America and the Caribbean in 2014.
FDI into Latin America and the Caribbean by project numbers, 2014
Of the top 10 destination countries, Panama was the only one to witness a growth in number of FDI projects, with a 19 per cent increase. Estimated total capital investment into Panama quadrupled to $8bn, following a $6bn copper mining project from Canada’s First Quantum Minerals.
The country is feeling the effects of excitement over expansion of the Panama Canal and the trade boom it stands to bring, and is one of the fastest-growing economies in the region.
Regional prospects for the short to medium term are mixed, with the World Bank predicting regional GDP growth of an average 2.6 per cent in 2015 to 2017 assuming that China’s growth slowdown is not worse than expected and commodity prices do not plunge substantially lower.
Panama looks to continue to flout the curve, though, and is expected to see expansion in its economy of 7 per cent this year.
