Asia

It is estimated that India has in excess of 50 million active internet users, with around 40 percent of those having previously made purchases online, making it a market of huge potential value for the online retailer.

Initially Amazon will only sell books, films and TV shows but plans to offer mobile phones and cameras within weeks. In addition, third party retailers will sell their goods through Amazon's site using a "marketplace" model, a familiar retail concept in India.

Bilateral trade between the two countries is worth $26 billion through imports and exports of watches, medicines, textiles and dairy products.

The deal marks China’s first free-trade deal with a continental European economy and is one that it hopes will be felt beyond Switzerland's borders.

Analysts talk of Vietnam becoming the fastest growing Asian economy, reaching a ten percent growth rate within the next twelve years with one of the main drivers being its natural resources. The country has significant known deposits of many bulk and niche minerals, including bauxite, rare earths, tungsten, titanium, phosphate, coal and iron ore but with the exception of its coal most current mining operations are on a small scale.

At a time when the yen continues to weaken, thus boosting the earnings potential for exporters, the benchmark Nikkei index rose two percent to 15,096, with carmaker Toyota and consumer electronics giant Sony leading the gains.

Since 2005, Tridum e-Security has been providing high quality services and solutions to all manner of industry fields including the finance, enterprise, telecommunications, transportation, logistics, mining and government sectors.

Today the company is recognised for offering information and communication systems security and professional network infrastructure services, as well as being an expert provider of planning, implementation and maintenance solutions that are linked to banking software and hardware.

According to a regulatory filing by shareholder Yahoo, which holds a 24 percent stake in the company, Alibaba’s net profits for the three months to December 2012 rose to $642 million from $237 million the previous year. Meanwhile revenues were more than 80 percent higher during the same time period.

Costing $1.3 billion to build, the news of the plant approval is a major boost for GM, coming at a time when it has expressed its interest to increase its share of the luxury car market in China. Currently dominated by Audi and BMW, this market has been steadily growing in recent years as people’s income levels have increased.

In 2012, MAXAM celebrated its 140th birthday. Founded by Alfred Nobel in 1872, the group today stands recognised as being one of the leading service and industrial organisations operating on a global scale, with a yearly turnover of approximately one billion euros.

Specialising in the development, manufacture and commercialisation of civil explosives and initiation systems for mining, MAXAM boasts a presence in all of the world’s major and developing mining areas.

The news was made official after Glencore agreed to sell its stake in Xstrata's copper mining project in Peru, thus clearing the final hurdle in the completion of deal that will form one of the world's biggest metals and commodities firms.

For its part, Glencore also agreed to terms that state that it must supply a minimum volume of copper concentrate to China for a period of eight years.