MUMBAI, Aug 3: A benchmark index of Indian equities markets on Friday closed 26 points down, recouping losses made early in the day. Metal, auto and banking stocks were the worst performers.

The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,164.48 points, closed 17,197.93 points, 0.15 per cent or 26.43 points down from its previous day’s close at 17,224.36 points.

The BSE metal index was down 170.39 points, followed by auto index, down 75.45 points, and banking index, down 73.81 points.

The index had touched an intra-day low of 17,026.97.

The wider 50-scrip S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange closed 0.25 per cent down at 5,214.50 points.

The main Sensex losers were Sterlite Inds, down 2.62 per cent at Rs 102.05; Tata Steel, down 2.20 per cent at Rs 396.95; Hindalco Inds, down 2.06 per cent at Rs 116.70; ICICI Bank, down 1.98 per cent at Rs 939.70; and Jindal Steel, down 1.91 per cent at Rs 396.45.

The major Sensex gainers were Wipro, up 2.04 per cent at Rs 347; NTPC, up 1.84 per cent at Rs 166.30; Dr Reddy’s Lab, up 1.62 per cent at Rs 1,672.05; ONGC, up 1.34 per cent at Rs 280.45; and Gail India, up 1.29 per cent at Rs 356.75.

Other Asian markets closed mixed. Japan’s Nikkei closed 1.13 per cent down, while the Shanghai composite index ended 1.02 per cent up. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 0.12 per cent. At closing bell here, European markets were trading in green after Thursday’s sell-off. France’s CAC was up 2.32 per cent while Germany’s DAX and Britain’s FTSE 100 were trading higher, up 2.03 and 1.34 per cent, respectively. (IANS)

ISLAMABAD, Aug 3: Stronger trade ties with India are “clearly a new track that expands the potential for positive contact”, said a Pakistani daily, noting that trade creates a traction all of its own.

There is a sense that “relations with India really are improving, and that the Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) that started their life as paper proposals are gaining substance and reality”, said an editorial in the News International on Friday.

India has now overturned its ban on foreign investment from Pakistan.

“Laid alongside the relaxation in the Indian visa regime vis-a-vis the people of Pakistan this creates a window of opportunity that can only be to the benefit of both nations,” it said.

The daily added that “trade creates a traction all of its own, and once it is institutionalised becomes cemented by person-to-person contact and the trust that is an essential ingredient of any business relationship”.

The editorial pointed out that as business contacts develop, so does “a new arm of the peace process - this one driven by private initiative and investment rather than via the traditional diplomatic channels”.

The daily shied away from calling it ‘trade diplomacy’, but stressed that it is “clearly a new track that expands the potential for positive contact”.

“Moves such as this have no direct bearing on embedded points of friction such as Kargil and Kashmir, but they can be seen as a way-paving move that allows these intractable problems to be approached more tangentially.

Officially, bilateral trade is valued at $2.7 billion, but the unofficial trading that goes on via third-party countries is said to be worth $10billion or more.

India can now export 6,800 items to Pakistan thanks to the Most Favoured Nation status “we will have accorded India by the end of the year”, said the daily. “As has been observed before, reciprocity is the name of the game. For these moves to bear fruit, and that fruit be harvested as a peace dividend, there must be an equitable share of the benefits and a realisation that we need one another as partners, not adversaries,” it added. (IANS)

WASHINGTON, Aug 3: Spurred by growth in Brazil, India, and Indonesia, Facebook increased its user count to 955 million, but the popular social network said over 83 million of them were fake accounts it wants to disable.

Facebook said it had 59 million monthly active users in India as of June 30, 2012, an increase of 84 per cent compared to the same period in 2011.

In an updated regulatory filing released on Wednesday, Facebook said users in Brazil, India, and Indonesia represented key sources of growth in the second quarter of 2012 leading to an increase of 29 per cent in its monthly active users over 2011. The company said that 8.7 per cent of its 955 million monthly active users worldwide are actually duplicate or false accounts, but did not say how many of them were in India.

Duplicate accounts make up 4.8 per cent (45.8 million) of Facebook’s total active member tally. Misclassified non-human personal accounts that have been made for companies, groups or pets make up another 2.4 per cent (22.9 million). These accounts can be converted into approved pages without losing information.

The third group is the smallest-just 1.5 per cent of all active accounts-but most troublesome. There are 14.3 million undesirable accounts that Facebook believes have been created specifically for purposes that violate the company’s terms, like spamming.

“We believe the percentage of accounts that are duplicate or false is meaningfully lower in developed markets such as the United States or Australia and higher in developing markets such as Indonesia and Turkey,” the company said in the filing.

Worldwide daily active users too increased 32 per cent to 552 million from 417 million with growth across major markets including Brazil, the United States, and India.

Mobile active users who accessed Facebook via a mobile app or via mobile-optimised versions of Facebook website increased by 67 per cent from 325 million to 543 million with users in the United States, India, and Brazil representing key sources of growth.

Facebook said it faced significant competition in almost every aspect of its business, including from companies such as Google, Microsoft and Twitter with Orkut owned by Google providing strong competition in Brazil and India. (IANS)

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 3: A record-setting unit shipments of Apple’s iPad led to a better-than-anticipated growth for the tablet market during the second quarter of this year, a market research report said.

According to preliminary data from market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC), worldwide tablet shipments for the second quarter of 2012 are estimated at 25 million units, representing a quarter-over-quarter increase of 33.6 per cent from 18.7 million during the previous quarter and year-over-year growth of 66.2 per cent from 15 million units at the same time last year.

IDC will release final shipment numbers for the second quarter later this month, reported Xinhua.

“The vast majority of consumers continue to favour the iPad over competitors, and Apple is seeing increasingly strong interest in the device from vertical markets – especially education,” Tom Mainelli, IDC’s research director for mobile connected devices, said in a statement.

“While iPad shipment totals are beginning to slow a bit in mature markets where the device saw early traction, growth in other regions is clearly more than making up the difference,” he added.

Besides Apple, the other four of the top five tablet vendors, namely Samsung, Amazon, Asus and Acer, also experienced solid growth on a yearly basis during the second quarter.

Apple shipped around 17.04 million iPads during the quarter, followed by Samsung with 2.39 million units.

For the second half of 2012, IDC expects competition in the tablet market to continue to heat up as new products like Microsoft’s Surface and Google/Asus co-branded Nexus 7 hit the store shelves.

However, IDC said new products could further secure Apple’s position, rather than reshaping the market.

“If anything, there’s a real risk that people will have too many options from which to choose this holiday season,” said Bob O ’Donnell, IDC vice president for clients and display, in the report.

“Consumers baffled by the differences between Amazon and Google versions of Android, or Windows 8 and Windows RT, may well default to market leader Apple. Or they may simply choose to remain on the sideline for another cycle,” he said. (IANS)

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 3: Apple has applied for a patent on iPad Smart Cover with an embedded secondary display designed to enhance the functionality of the tablet computer.

“Thin flexible display technology can be integrated into the cover without affecting the overall form factor of the cover or tablet device,” Apple said in a patent application.

“Adding the integrated display to the flexible cover greatly enhances the overall functionality of the tablet device,” Xinhua on Thursday quoted the document as saying.

The embedded display could be used to show extra icons, operate as a separate media control interface, the document released by the US patent office said.

A battery could be incorporated within the cover to cut down recharging, and the battery could take many forms like solar panels and radio frequency energy collection antennas.

Resembling Microsoft’s new Surface tablet cover that has a keyboard, parts of Apple’s flexible flap in the future may include a keyboard or serve as a separate touch pad.

This would bring the tablet experience closer to a conventional laptop computer.

Analysts noted that patents like smart cover can offer a glimpse into Apple’s fancy ideas for its future products, although they don’t always lead to a final product. (IANS)