IN BRIEF (Page 17)

UK producer price

UK producer prices rose in March at the highest annual rate since 1991 because of record increases in raw material costs, adding to the danger that faster inflation becomes embedded in the economy.

Prices at factory gates climbed 6.2 percent from a year earlier, compared with 5.9 percent in February, the Office for National Statistics said.

Danone sales rises

Groupe Danone SA, the world's largest yogurt maker, reported a 19 percent gain in first-quarter revenue after increasing sales.

Sales rose to 3.76 billion euros ($5.8 billion) in the three months through March from 3.17 billion euros a year earlier, the Paris-based company said yesterday.

Turkey revamps economy

Economy Minister Mehmet Simsek said Turkey will soon overhaul its pensions system and draw up a five-year economic plan. Parliament will approve legislation raising the retirement age in the "next week or so", and the government is putting the "finishing touches" to a medium-term fiscal plan that aims to cut the ratio of gross debt to economic output to 30 percent by 2012 from about 50 percent now.

Disappointing results

The first-quarter US earnings season has kicked off with an "awful" start that is a "harbinger of things to come" and will push stocks lower, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

A team led by New York-based David Kostin, Goldman's US investment strategist, wrote in a report yesterday: "We expect generally disappointing results and a swath of lowered profit guidance that will drive the Standard & Poor's 500 Index lower in coming weeks."

Agencies

(China Daily 04/15/2008 page17)