Crimea has held a referendum on the session, overwhelming majority in favor of joining russia. Washington says the vote is illegal and has threatened sanctions. Vote, 95. 5 of the ballots are counted. This is quite controversial because it does violate International Law and the ukrainian constitution. , 220 thousandpact Russian Troops on the border. The eu and the u. S. Are threatening sanctions on russia. Crimeas leader will look like today to join russia. Hat may lead to a boycott the wall street journal russia is pulling u. S. Treasury bills out of the u. S. Because of concerns about the sanctions. Three times the record before. This crimea vote, hugely controversial. What is the reaction from the west . Obama telling Vladimir Putin he will never accept this crimean vote, ever. Merkel has been quite vocal about this. Listencain speaking to what he has to say. Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country. Nation that is really only dependent upon oil and gas for their economy. Economic sanctions are important. U. K. Imea relies on the 425 of their gas, 90 of 25 of their gas, 90 of their electricity. Bills, no dramatic reaction. The next stage as troops on the ground from both sides in ukraine and russia. Asia see how markets in are reacting. The asx 200 is looking like this amid the tension ratcheting up in the ukraine. It is down a quarter of one percent. The aussie dollar is slightly strengthening, 90 u. S. Japan is just opening and this is the look right now. It is down a fifth of one percent. The dollaryen is weakening. Over in korea, the cost be the yuan is strengthening. The search for the missing malaysian airliner is entering its 10th day. 25 countries involved. That bring in our Southeast Asian correspondent. , includingvelopment the thought that perhaps it was intentional. What is the latest . Bigger every gets single day. 25 countries now involved. What has changed is large strikes of land being looked at. Deep remote oceans being explored as well. Among countries being asked for assistance, pakistan, bangladesh, india. The plane operated almost seven hours after the lost contact with Traffic Control. Transmits data to and from planes was disabled just before the plane left malaysias coast. It was a deliberate act. It then flew in a westerly direction back over the peninsula of malaysia before turning northwest. Point at which it coverage,ary radar this movement is consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane. That is why the focus is now on the crew. Police searched the homes of the pilot and copilot trying to find out why the plane was deliberately flown off course. Motive, noon of a one has claimed responsibility. What do we know of the pilots . Pilots, theye two did not ask to fly together. Own flights simulator. He is also quite a handyman. Religious inclinations, a friend of his said he is a moderate muslim and performed his daily rituals. His youtube page did have links to atheism. After the Boston Marathon bombing, he expressed condolences for the victims. It seems like he was a jovial man. Expect more volatility from the yuan starting from this morning. Chinese authorities to double the daily trading dan. Stephen engle is on the story and joins us from beijing. How significant is this . Good morning. Make theave pledged to Exchange Rates more marketbased. This is another step in achieving not. In that sense, it is significant, but chinese authorities like to take these things in a stepbystep manner. This does not mean that full convertibility is right around the corner. They depegged from the dollar in 2005. In 2007, they widen the band. April, 2012, they widened it again to one percent. Now they have widen it again from one percent to two percent. Timing seems to signal from authorities that the currency is no longer considered just a oneway bet to appreciate. That has been the general direction. It has appreciated to around six to the dollar. U. S. Now 6. 15 to the dollar. Growth in china is slowing and we have seen recent weaknesses. It has slid against the dollar, 1. 8 since reaching a 20 year high on january 14th. What we have seen is the widening of the band from one percent to two percent. Maybe the yuan and can trade every day within two percent either side of this daily reference rate. In theory, it could rise or fall as much as two percent each day. The key here is authorities still set that daily fixing right, which is probably more important than the band itself. We should expect more you wantdollar volatility yo uandollar volatility. Meaningful reform is to change the rule on citing the daily fixing rate. Some other stories making headlines, no Hong Kong Ipo from alibaba. They are said to be working with investment banks. It is being valued as much as two hundred billion dollars, the secondbiggest Internet Company behind google. Alibaba turned its back on hong kong. Is sheddingrale some of its businesses in asia. The buyer is dbs. Nearlys recalling 900,000 odyssey cars. Could causeoblems gasoline leaks. It concerns vehicles produced between 2005 and 2010. Checking honda, it is down a fifth of one percent. Turnaroundmarket after the worst week so far this year . We will find out what is in store. Time now for a look at the stories we will be following for you this week. China is out with property prices tomorrow. The Real Estate Market has been holding up. Supplier japan display makes its debut wednesday in tokyo. After pricing at the bottom of the range, the Company Raised 3 billion. China mobile report earnings on thursday. Profit was little changed last quarter. Of the the opening week world 2020 cricket tournament featuring hong kong for the first time. They play bangladesh on thursday. ,f hong kong gets out of pool a they will face australia and west indies in the next round. With me now is principal Global Investor folio manager. Thank you fort joining us. Thank you for joining us. Tensions are ratcheting up in ukraine once again. How is that going to continue to worry investors . What actions on on the west contemplates. If you go by the exit polls, people have voted to join russia. The process may not have been the best process, but the peoples vote is clear, right . It is this the facts on the ground are transparent. Right now, they are not and it looks like it is under Russian Military influence. Russians mayic have been shipped into crimea for the vote. We also have the group who have it said we will not legitimize this in any way. That is an open question. It depends upon how severely the west reacts to the results. Hopefully, they will be able to get to some kind of were week where they can work for the work with the russian authorities. How much dominance does ukraine focus for you as you look at your portfolio . It will have a bigger impact on the european influence on our portfolios. If it becomes a big political or if there is a sign of war, it it might impact europe negatively. At this point, it is ok. More ofou worried sector plays in europe or is it more broad than that . Reaction toased profitability estimates. Europe seems to be coming out of a prolonged recession. It might mean that if Natural Gas Prices go up because they have to import gas from else where it will be a broadbased impact. Lets talk about the asian part of your portfolio. China is widening the trading band. I think this was expected. Howve reached a stage it plays out depends upon how it moves in the next two to six months. It is an except in so greater market volatility. What is the one thing in this region that you are focused on . Guess, what will happen in europe. You have seen the yuan weaker. It is baked into expectations. You need to watch out what happens in russia and crimea and ukraine. What is the one thing that would were you the most and are you worried about your position in europe . What is the geopolitical move . If western policymakers announce sanctions that impacts and curtailed flow. Thank you so much. Next, a look at the currency markets after crimea votes to join russia. More on the biggest eastwest crisis since the cold war. A very good morning to you. It is monday, march 17. Lets start things off with the big news on the weekend. China has doubled the trading band and its currency and starting today, it will be able to trade as much as two percent on either side of the central bank daily reference rate. A little more legroom. The referendum and crimea, exit polls suggest a clear majority, more than 93 of voters, prefer the crimea he comes part of russia. Becomes part of russia. The rest will not the west will not recognize the results of this. A strategists says a further raises risk aversion, it the chances of what they call broadbased economic sanctions against russia. Go long on the japanese yen. Safe haven trades will be in focus today. The japanese yen, further risk aversion. Watch out for government yield on the 10year. Watch that as well. Highly correlated to the yen. This is a onemonth chart youre looking at. Majors. Check on other the euro, where are we now . 1. 5 over one month. 1. 39. A tad over that is what we are focusing on right now. Those were the stories surrounding your forex markets. A quick check of the equity markets in asia. The nikkei started the day in the red and is extending those losses. Kospi isreas cos gaining this morning. Tensions right now, crimeas vote to rejoin russia. Nasa is appealing for help in saving the planet. It is offering some serious money to anyone who can spot an asteroid whizzing towards us on earth. Sam grobart has more. Important forre two reasons. They contain lots of valuable Natural Resources and we have the power to kill everything on earth. Reasons, nasaese has created the asteroid hunter. You can win ready 5,000 if you come up with a new and improved orithms to track asteroids 35,000 if you come up with a new and improved algorithm to track asteroids. There could be a world killing asteroid heading for us right now and we would not even know it. Of closead a couple calls recently. In 2013, it missed us by only 1000 miles. On the very same day, an asteroid over russia exploded with the force of an atomic bomb. That was 50 feet across. ,n asteroid onemile wide things are about to get cataclysmic. The asteroid hunter contest, it would be better to find these things before there is a planet gripping event. Contest isner in the hunting asteroids for an entirely different reason. It turns out many asteroids are loaded with precious minerals, which means crowd sourced asteroid detection is not only a good way to prevent extinction, but a good way to make a buck. You can get more on that here on earth and all of the days top stories on our website. Bloomberg. Com, check it out. You can follow me on twitter. Still to come, it is not Hong Kong Alibaba has chosen. It is 8 30 a. M. In hong kong this morning. Another cloudy, smoggy day. A live look outside the torilla harbor. Victoria harbour. You are watching first up. Confirming the news, alibaba is to list, but it will not be here in hong kong. The mystery of the missing link, day 10 of the search with no clues. The worst eastwest crisis since the cold war, crimea votes to join russia. An ipo years in the making is headed for, not here, new york instead. David is here with the latest on alibaba. We could be looking at the biggest the last one of the size was facebook. Wasone here in hong kong 20 billion. They have gotten the process started of listing in the u. S. Softbank jumping on the news over the weekend, up five percent. Japan. N 43 of yahoo a big valuation for ali baba is good news for the likes of these big shareholders. What is the size going to be . What we know based on these estimates is how much alibaba entire firm, 150 3 billion. The highest one says it is worth 200. We do not know and it has not been decided yet how much it plans to raise or how big of a stake. That will determine pricing in all of these other things. On the issue of whether or not why it shows the u. S. Over hong kong, the Sticking Point was do we go to hong kong or do we list in the u. S. . The statement on the weekend put little bit of context into this when they said, should circumstances permit in the future, we will be constructive towards extending our public status in the Chinese Capital market. We will revisit this possibility in the future. It still needs to change the rules. Hong kong stock exchange, it would need to change the rules if they want to participate. It was the Sticking Point of alibaba wanted its partnerships and executives to nominate the majority of the board. That is not allowed in hong kong. Different shared classes. That is allowed in the u. S. If they do come here, that is obviously well into the future. They have not even listed to begin with. The lawyers will be busy on the banks. And the banks. That is the list of those who will be analysts going home at other things have yet to be decided. When they will actually file for the listing. The prospectus may be released as early as next month. Another part of this is alibaba has online payments exposure. Over the past couple of days, will that impact . They want to be stricter. They are looking at Virtual Credit cards. Free to buy things online. It is not only online payment methods. They sell a lot of things online. If you cannot pay for it or if you take away one channel, that impacts trade. We were down 11 into friday last week. David, thank you. Lets take a look at some of the other stories making headlines. May be in talks to go public. Therson familiar with matter says the company could be valued at 1. 7 billion. Payinge is said to be 10 million 10 billion for a spanish cable operator. The transaction preamps and ibm preamps and ipo. The Worlds LargestMining Company is planning a multibillion dollar share buyback. The ceo has told the times of london that it could happen by the middle of the year. The share buybacks will only happen when is reduced to 25 billion. Those are the company headlines. Move toibaba looks to the u. S. , one chinese videogame maker is doing to the game being bought for 3 billion. To you. Morning 3 billion is a lot of money in the online game space, hugely popular. Take giantto Interactive Group private. It has been listed in new york since 2007 on the nyse. I shouldve let my report with the game that most people are familiar with. A bit of research into this. It means journey in chinese. Online multiplayer roleplaying game. It specializes in these multiplayer games. People pay for services in the games and that is how it makes its money. This is the topselling game in china. Why are they doing this . Any Chinese Companies in the u. S. Going private because of very restrictive accounting rules. Of thesescrutiny Chinese Companies for their accounting standards. Even the cfo of this company said last august that it had been caught up in this probe into irregularities. The negative publicity that came as a result led the shares to be undervalued by 60 . To your earlier guest and he said this is a stock to watch. A lot of private equity groups are interested in this. One of the key investors as they take this private. The search for the missing malaysian airliner is entering its 10th day with 25 countries now involved. The operation has been widened considerably. Authorities say could have flown as far as catholics dan or to the southern indian ocean could have flown as southern as far as the southern indian ocean. It flew in a westerly direction back over peninsula malaysia before turning northwest. Point at which it coverage,ary radar consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane. Back itsm is scaling search for the missing plane saying it has found nothing in its waters. Hanoi said it is willing to help out swear if asked. Last known location was midway across the gulf of thailand just before it was due to enter vietnamese airspace. Pilot is 50 three years old. Friends describe him as an aviation addict. He and his copilot had not requested to fly together. The two men are being investigated and police have searched their homes and question their families. Ground staff are also being checked. From to come, the threat all the debt on where the bad loans are. It is monday, march 17, and these are the top stories. The government of ukraine has moved troops near to the border as the region voted to join russia. Exit polls show more than 93 of the voters want to leave ukraine. The deepening crisis is the worst between west and russia since the cold war. In the autonomous republic of crimea, there is a circus going on. The socalled referendum, 21,000 electric personnel are safeguarding the socalled referendum. Wants to pour money into rundown urban districts to spur growth. 100government will invest 63 billion in pour shantytowns this year. 163 billion dollars in poor shantytowns this year. China is on the radar of my next guest. He sees Downside Risk because of rising debt. He has been looking at leverage asia wide. What does leverage mean . You could tie up the two, the fact that there is a debt problem. Have someo ensure you type of monetary easing as well as a weaker currency. We have seen what has happened in the u. S. And we know what japan is trying to do. You have to have the currency that is supportive and not dynamic. In that dynamic. A weaker yuan helps with exports, right . That is also an extraneous benefit. Pmi has slipped, exports have been week, chinas market share trying to match the weak economy and you want to try to help that would weaker currency. In the background, you have pbi diffraction ppi differentiation. Are you forecasting a weaker yuan . We do think that kerry is still there in chinese Interest Rates we do think the carry is still there in chinese Interest Rates. Waye have seen from the they have moved, it will not be dramatic. Interest rates in china are higher than the u. S. That leads us to the original problem of shadow banking on this high leverage debt situation that china finds itself in. Its for and its first bonds default or seven. March 7. What it will mean is the debt to gdp has increased a lot. The debt load that you can do to support your domestic demand will be much slower. It has moved up dramatically in the last six years. To ensure that you do not have going forward, they will try to slow the debt. Implications on medium growth numbers. Are the potholes to watch out for from china . The most important numbers to , if you look at japan and the u. S. , when you are trying to manage the dynamic and you slow your debt growth. There will be downsize risk to domestic demand. The second one is ppi. When you print the credit and you throughout the system the nominal gdp growth, it has been lower in china. A, the economic numbers are telling you the credit multiplier is weak. The second number that will tell you how things are going. The borrowing cost in china is seven percent. Your real borrowing cost is nine percent. This is telling you the debt is compounding at a pace faster than income and that is never a. Ood side good sign try to bring that up to positive territory. The widening of the trading for gives some will go room the pboc and the government of china. What else can they do . They can cut lending rates. That is another way to manage your real borrowing costs to ensure the corporate sector is not burdened too much. It will ensure the good the private sector should be able to take back and service it more efficiently. Cost,s level of borrowing you need to work out and ensure that you bring down your borrowing costs to manage the debt dynamic. A lot more work to be done by the pboc. They are promising reform. Chief asia economist morgan stanley. Banking on success, a special report. Fort is a busy week ahead u. S. Policymakers. They will meet for the first time under new chairman janet yellen. Lawmakers may be out of town this week, but we still have a big week of washington news. Yellens First Press Conference on wednesday after the federal open market meeting concludes. She has pledged to continue the fed paper as long as the economy continues to strengthen. Point tos say signs seesmo see producing smo fmoc. We will hear more from the fed on thursday to assess whether the nations largest banks can weather another financial crisis. Such prospects will be far from investors mind as we hear from meg whitman, ceo of a stronger hewlettpackard. We will await earnings from the likes of oracle, fedex, general mills, nike. All stocks are expected to report higher earnings per share. As those companies turn in their scorecards, the u. S. Or release them received a few grades of its own with existing home sales , leading indicators. A downgrade by fitch would mean that two of the three biggest ratings firms would grade the u. S. Lower than aaa. The highoctane world of finance is stressful enough. A lot of people know that. Spend theirg banker downtime anymore demanding environment. They represent the davis cup. They are totally focused. Is work hard, play hard. For two bankers in hong kong, their play is 100 work. They dedicate their downtime to tennis. American spends the week plugged into the high gain world of trading. At the end of the day, they go their separate ways. It is forehand, backhand, serve and volley. Again. In, and again, and the aim is davis cup glory for hong kong. With all of the time in the world to practice. Were at a bit of a disadvantage, but that is life. We do the best we can and we are the best in hong kong. We have to take it for what it is. We have less hours to dedicate towards trading training. We try to squeeze five hours into three. Last year, their hard work paid off. He is a former pro himself, on tour for three years before opting for a career in finance. He is equity researcher for susquehanna. I am lucky to be doing what i do. He is a twotime u. S. Junior champion and fourtime allamerican. In his youth, he faced a man who would become a tennis legend, pete sampras. After the triumph, this year is already cap. Hong kong lost the first round match. It is indonesia, the Opening Weekend of april, and for both teams, it is a must win. We know our strengths and we know our weaknesses. We try to exploit our strengths. The next time youre winding down with a cold one after work, then go to bankers sweating it out over a tennis net intent on victory. You can watch john play tennis again or report on it on our website. It is your online source for business and market news. We will do a quick check of the markets. Over in tokyo, the nikkei is in the green. It just fluctuated past the red stage. In sydney, there it goes again, back into the red. Escaped the loss of this morning. Light in is a brief this sea of red. At the heart china of market concerns come a string of weak economic figures. That is bleeding into this week. We also had chinas first bond defaulting on march 7. Tensions in ukraine as things ratchet up. Singapore is starting to trade in just over 15 minutes. Futures are pointing to a lower open. That is it from us. On the move is coming up next. Good morning, everybody. We are live in hong kong. This is on the move. Alibaba makes the decision on listing. Shoringf softbank are are soaring in japan. The new week opens with the same question, where is that malaysian aircraft . The search for the missing airliner entering its 10th days with 25 countries involved. Still no news. What have we learnt over the weekend . 25 countries now involved and they are looking all the way into the waters of australia. The nature of the operation has changed. Ge crossing 11, crossing 11 countries and deep remote oceans as well. The plane operated seven hours after it lost contact with air Traffic Control. Crew. Cus is on the police searched the homes of the pilot and copilot. Authorities say the plane may have been on the ground when some signals were sent, satellite handshakes, no suggestion of a motive. No one has claimed responsibility. You mentioned the pilots. What do we know about the crew . What do we know about the pilots . , theyknow the two pilots did not make any specific requests to fly together. Go to facebook, youtube, you get the idea that the pilot is passionate about flying. He built his own simulator. He has posted videos offering home repair tips. Is a moderatehe muslim. He performed his daily rituals. His youtube page did have links to videos on atheism. That is a bestseller defending atheism. Are exploring the possibility of hijacking, sabotaged, personal and psychological problems as possible causes. Our next guest has spent more than three decades in aviation safety. Thank you very much for joining us. In your opinion, where are we with all of this . This is truly unprecedented. Thank you for having me this evening from tampa. From the information that i have, it is obvious this was not distraction of the aircraft. Someone took the aircraft, for whatever reason, and i would agree the jury is still open as to who did it and not necessarily the crew. They may have had an intruder in the cockpit that took over. It could have been one of the passengers. I would not discount the two iranians with a fake passports. At this time, it is an open book. Easy to makethat yourself invisible. You can turn the transponder off, but what about the other systems . Of who might be the person who did it, obviously, it would be a person with a great deal of aviation knowledge, Technical Knowledge of the aircraft, the capability to navigate and evade radar from military controllers. High on the list of the suspects or persons of interest would be the pilot, obviously. That is not to say there was someone else on board who had at least comparable knowledge. Do tot would they need to hide themselves . Do you mean the aircraft or the passengers . The aircraft itself. They turned off the aircraft communication reporting system. Off the, they turned transponder, which is a secondary radar system that feeds air Traffic Control information. Themselves,ings, by is enough to start making them invisible. Further, if they had knowledge of where the military radars could attract them could track them and not track them and the altitudes that military radars were vulnerable to, they could change out the tubes, dissent low they could change altitudes, descends low. Information, i would say whoever did this knew what they were doing and were very wellinformed and technically knowledgeable. Very quickly, we have the search going as far south as australia. Suggest they would have to go through indian airspace and that is incredibly well it just when it comes to radar and being able to see anybody entering airspace. There are two aspects. One is the Public Information we receive versus information that governments are not willing to make public. Although countries may officially say they did not see know really do not what happened or if there radars even saw them in the first lace. In the first place. Audio] apparently, some technical issues. Just talking about what could possibly have happened. What some would have to do to make an aircraft invisible. Lets get back to this monday trading day. Tokyo. F a weakness in if we look at the regional benchmark, we are seeing stocks extending the longest weekly losing streak since may 2012. The tensions in ukraine contributing to the markets. He west warning russia you have this disputed vote with. Rimea wanting to rejoin russia having a bit of an impact in the currency market. Lets check out the equity session as stocks get underway across the asiapacific. Kospi is advancing. It is on the back of that rising yen. Were also tracking the vix volatility index. The taiwan indexes virtually flat. Precious metals, lifting some of the miners today. The asx 200 looks like this. Leading therse, is rise we are seeing out of precious metals. I want to give you a sense of one of the key movers to watch. The japanese yen, as i mentioned. We have softbank, very active today with stocks rising on this news that alibaba will pursue that ipo in the united states. 37 it owns of alibaba. The stock is up about 5. 6 in tokyo. , thensions in the ukraine worst eastwest crisis since the cold war, crimea holding a referendum. An overwhelming majority in favor of rejoining russia. Washington says the vote is illegal and threatened sanctions. It did seem that it was going to fly to mir putins way it was going lot america prudent it was going Vladimir Putins way. The west says it was cast under duress. They say it is against International Law and against the ukrainian constitution. The Ukrainian Government not happy at all about this. Cry me as leader will apply today to join russia crimeas leader will apply today to join russia. Here is the ukrainian Prime Minister giving his reaction. In the autonomous republic of crimea, directed by russia, there is a circus going on. The socalled referendum, 21,000 military personnel are safeguarding the socalled referendum. The white house called it be stabilizing. Called the destabilizing. Why is it illegal . It violates the ukrainian constitution. No options to overturn the vote, not legal. Legalesident putin, it is because he feels it is his country. Thank you for that, john dawson. More on the mystery of flight 370. The head of asiapacific airlines and his thoughts on the way the search is being handled. Are involved,s the operation being widen considerably with reports that the flight was still communicating with satellites hours after losing contact with air Traffic Control. The Prime Minister said the transponder and other systems had been deliberately turned off. Director general of the association of asiapacific airlines. Thank you for joining us. A lot of criticism against the statements coming out of kuala lump or. Kuala lumpur. In the internet age, we expect and demand immediacy. Of course, answers are not forthcoming. 10 days after the event, we only have a rudimentary timeline. Were only just starting to unravel what the timeline as to when something occurred and what happened, how did it happen, why did it happen. The search is being conducted in physical space. In essence, this search is being conducted in cyberspace. The only reason we have the timeline is because of data from cyberspace from the original air Traffic Control, military radar, piecing together the handshaking with satellites. Think the search, we need to focus on cyberspace search. Andrew, people talk about the handshakes. Can you tell us what they actually are . Onboard the aircraft, you have a satellite to medications module which communicates with satellites. In order to establish those connections, there are protocols that keep the systems linked and transmit data backandforth. The system had been switched off as far as the data transmission. Is roughly not know svery hour, the satellite exchange a very brief signal, which keeps the contact established. Theyve been able to deduce from that something about the trajectory, draw a circle around one satellite. If you had more than one satellite, you would be able to triangulate and get a fix the way you do with gps. That would take us a step forward. Until such time we can narrow the search, the physical search of ocean and land is going to be very difficult. At the end of the day, we talked about the mixed signals coming from the malaysian authorities. Contradictory statements being made. One has to recognize this is unprecedented and you cannot really plan for Something Like this, can you . Normally, what happened and where, you have the crash site because of the debris. You know where it happened and what happened. Try to establish the facts and piece together why it happened and who, if anyone, was responsible. In this case, we do not have any physical evidence, no debris. We are really working in cyberspace and that is unprecedented. No routine for in six. No routine forensics. Some have talked about the possibility of it being one of the greatest aircraft heists ever. It would be impossible to resell a plane like this. Scenarios construct for a film script or a book and you cannot rule them out as possibilities, but it seems a remote possibility, landing it with 239 people on board and concealing the fact 10 days later. An extremely unlikely scenario. One has to think about the people waiting on the ground, the relatives and friends of people on board. It is not fair for them. It is worse than unfair. It is agonizing. One can only imagine the horrors of what they are going through. The problem for the families and the relatives is there are no answers, and no information, and that is extremely frustrating and leads to extreme tension. That is normal in the aftermath of any accident or tragic loss of life. 10 days have elapsed and we are only taking tentative steps forward. With the grief they are in during injuring, hopefully, one day this mystery will be unraveled, but are there already recommendations being made about how we track aircraft looking ahead . Indeed. The normal source of any information after an accident is the black box. Does tell us a lot about what happened. Lot about what a happened. There has been discussion about whether those black boxes should be transmitting in real time or some other way of identifying unusual events and triggering a data burst. We do have air to Ground Communications and we could transmit that data. There will be a question as to how we are able to disable the systems intentionally for whatever purpose and how difficult it has made this investigation. Andrew, good talking to you. Let me show you what we have coming up. A look at the currency market. Crimea voting to join russia. One of the biggest eastwest crises since the cold war. A very good morning to you. It is monday, march 17, and these are your headlines. Lets start things off with a referendum in crimea. The exit polls suggest that more than 90 of voters prefer the crimea becomes part of russia. The west has maintained it will not recognize the results of this vote. The outcome will lead to more risk aversion as this raises chances and the likelihood of broadbased economic sanctions against russia. China has doubled the trading. And of its currency the currency has more room to move and will be able to trade as much is two percent on either side of what we call the Central Banks daily reference rate. Will it actually trade that much on a regular basis . How often will the do so . Vietnamral bank of sending reminders to the market. Online trading of foreign currencies in the country is illegal. Anyone who does so can be fined. Do not panic. That is about 4700 u. S. Dollars. Lets check in on how the currency markets are trading right now. The outcome of the referendum in crimea may lead to more risk aversion in the markets. Go long on the japanese currency. Some losses on the japanese equity market. What else can we show you . Currency, more risk on longterm. Those were the stories driving your forex market this morning. When it comes to equities, coming up in four minutes, start of the hang seng. Friday showed declines and looking we will see a few more and looking like we will see a few more. We have more on china coming up next as it loosens its grip on the yuan. Confirming the news, alibaba is to list, but it will not be in hong kong. China loosens its grip on the yuan. Where on earth is Malaysian Airlines flight 370 . Lets take a look at what is going on. Just getting hong kong under way. More. Find out good morning. An important day as china widens the trading band for the chinese currency. It has doubled its trading band. We will be watching the Market Impact today. Perhaps in the impact you might see on credit default swaps as well. We will be watching those. Underway,sion gets this move by china to double the trading band 22 , it is critical and it the trading band to two percent and it is critical. Theaba has had a bit of tangential effect on shares of softbank. Lets take a look at the initial indications. The hang seng starting to stay lower. You are seeing some of the major bluechip Chinese Companies listed. Property shares among the financials advancing. Alibaba,news with china barring them from offering Virtual Credit cards. The yuan to trade more like the g 10 currency. At least that is what Standard Chartered is saying. Lets see if we can get some kind of indication on how the yuan is moving right now full up the initial numbers that we have , you want to be watching some of these credit default swaps. 72 is the current level we have. The overall benchmark in asia ,oday, extending a weekly slump we have not seen that since may of 2012. We were talking about this last week. They had denying anything in the works. They announce they are filing, they have not filed yet, but now we know it will be in the u. S. Involved that will be six banks, credit suisse, goldman sachs, deutsche bank, organ stanley, j p and morgan stanley, and jpmorgan. They have not signed it yet, but these are the banks expected to be involved. Based they could come back to Mainland China in the future if circumstances allow it. Provide a. Does fairly compelling argument to list. Investors who understand the tech base, more institutional investors. The most important point is that hong kong was not able to satisfy they want to maintain more androl over their the board let their partners nominate the candidates. This goes against the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The Hong Kong Exchange did stick to its guns. Has not managed to list any ipos since 2010 october former than 4 billion u. S. Dollars. Definitely a blow. The Hong Kong Stock Exchange will continue to go forward with a consultation to see whether they should change their listing rules in the future. Some ongoing process there as well. Thank you for that. Getting into some breaking news. Effective march 18, according to the vietnam centralbank administrator. Refinance rate cut to 6. 5 . Lets take a look at some of the other news. China is to put more money into run down urban districts. It will involve 5 million. The government also planning to invest in railways, roads, and airports. ,ore flexibility for the yuan china has doubled the limit for its grantees daily moves against the dollar. The Exchange Rate is more market based. They can be traded as much as two percent on either side of the daily reference rate. Bankng us is deutsche senior currency strategist. How big of a deal is this . It is sooner than expected, pbocverybody took the governor at face value and did expect it to happen this year. I was looking for something in the second half of the year. It was a bit of a surprise, but it shows some confidence on the part of the policymakers. Is about the Interest Rates as well. Orwe are on a oneyear twoyear time frame, but expect to see more to the fixing mechanism. A lot more of marketbased dynamics. Gomost people come and because of the recent weakness. This is not a oneway bet. Inspeculators were pouring and a little bit too confident. They established a bit more balance in the market and that has allowed them to open up the Exchange Rates. Give that impression. Percent currencies rarely trade even a high volatility like the aussie dollar. It is unlikely you get to see Something Like that, but it is an important signal that they are willing to allow this. What about down the road . We have a lot to see before that. You will need to see more of a reform in interestrate markets. You will need incentives for Foreign Investors to want to hold government assets. A lot yet to be done before the currency becomes a truly open convertible reserve asset. One of many things they have to do before this connection works. It will be crucial. Lets talk about the currency markets as a whole right now. Does this have any impact . The application is given what , you wouldppening have expected this to have a bit of a weakening implication for some of the more prime trade currencies with china. Malaysia. Wan, think the pboc tried to instill a little bit of calm in the market and cap some of that negativity. Does the dollar continue its trajectory . We see what is happening in the ukraine. Cold war tensions. That leads people to gold. So long as Vladimir Putin remains in his role of a cold warrior of the past, you will see a lot more u. S. Dollars support. If things start kicking off in europe, it might shake the euro. Is atro as that 1. 40 right now. Time beforeatter of obviously, the euro going lower we have broadbased to the u. S. Dollar. What are you looking at . Do you have one particular bet . I am not saying that you are gambling. I like dollar korea hire myself. Higher myself. That is still a good call. I like what is happening in india. I am not bullish to currency, but i think it is a very good carry target. Great having you on the program. Thating news, a read on uan since china loosened limits on how much it could move. 12 . China doubling the limit. It is day 10 and we have the search for the missing malaysian character entering its 10th days. The operation is being widened considerably with reports that the flight was still communicating with satellite seven hours after losing contact with air Traffic Control. It could have flown as far as the southern indian ocean. The transponder and other systems had been deliberately turned off. Vietnam is scaling back in its search for the plane sank it has found nothing in its waters. Saying it has found nothing in its waters. The last known location was midway across the gulf of thailand. Reports the debris had been spotted in the waterproof faults. Provedted in the water false. The Authorities Say the the pilot and copilot had not requested to fly together. The two men are being investigated and police have searched their homes and question their families. Indonesia shares by three percent. Polls indicated he is favored to become the countrys newest leader after july elections. It is coming up at 6 00 hong kong time. Hike causesales tax shoppers to clamp down on spending . Will get a little pricier in japan as the new sales tax kicks in. This begs the question, can the japanese consumer cope . Rising wages in the land of the rising sun. We have started to see more the last twoover weeks, firms have wrapped up some of these talks they have had with their unions and have agreed to give more pay. And lookke a step back at why this is important. Three reasons. Inflation. O jack up and keep it at two percent. Tax kicking ines , april 1, of course. The currency effect, the week japanese yen weak japanese yen. A diagramand we have for you, corporate japan put more money into the pockets of employees to help them cope with that. It will go to the supermarket and buy more things. From what has been announced so far, we are looking at an average wage of 19 u. S. Dollars a month. Some numbers and names for you. Average increase is 28 u. S. Dollars per month. Some Electronics Makers have also announced their version of wage increases. Hitachi and panasonic in the region of about 20 u. S. Dollars a month. Other firms across industries, this is not exclusive to carmakers and electronic makers. We have Convenience Store operator, 30. Electric, 20 u. S. Dollars. These increases do not include bonuses, which some firms have agreed increasing as well. It is across several industries. This will only work if more companies, both big and small, heed the call of the government. It will only do that if they think it will be good. Whiskey isnt enough. We will show you how to invest in it as well. Looking to expand the nikkei newspapers. The company is planning to boost capacity to 30 . It would be the first such a move and three decades. Hong kong this to be the site of the first whiskey fund. Focusing on rare premium single malt. David robertson is the cio. You are also the flavor guy. How did this work . It is a very simple private equity fund. We are looking to raise 10 million u. S. Dollars to invest in rare limitededition whiskey. What has the market been like for whiskey . Wine market has exploded. Whiskey has been on the same track. You have the same supply and demand dynamics. What you see is even more demand growth in the whiskey sector. In the last three years, you index. E igs i did not know that it existed. At a u. K. E looking auction data, the prices of whiskey. The top 100 bottles alone have increased over 230 . David, people have been and theing to bordeaux big named vineyards. What about whiskey . There is a range of whiskey. Kind of like the fine wines in france. Different vintages, different ages. One of my favorites, a 1958. This looks so different in the bottle. 1958 . As in it was distilled in 1958. It was bottled 25 years later. The presentation has changed quite dramatically. This looks fairly rudimentary. Back in the day, we always knew that whiskey was delicious in scotland, though we had not taken into the world. Sales have exploded in the last 20 years. The first market which whiskey got into. Some of those in japan are beating the scots. It was taiwan in 1997 where we first saw the explosion of whiskey. We are seeing some interest in Mainland China. It is much broader than wine. What this comes down to is very simple. The supply that was planned back in the 1980s did not take into account the growth we are seeing in asia. We are running out of rare vintage whiskey and that is what our funds will be investing in. What are we looking at in terms of returns . The fund life looks at seven years. We will talk about these whiskeys that we have. Lets start off with a fantastic distillery built in the 1800s. Owned by the William Grant family. Never too early. It is always 6 00 in the evening somewhere in the world. You should be looking for fruit. Of spicy, this is a very small batch limitededition. 500 or 1000 pounds a bottle. It depends on the number of bottles they release. Supply, the price will be soft and softened. This is one of my favorites as well. This closed in 1983. The industry has seen some ups and downs in scotland. In 1983, a number of distilleries were closed. Last 20 yearse that single malts have come to prominence. It is really the last couple of decades that single malts have accelerated. Nose is quite different. It comes from the malted barley. We only have 40 seconds left. Are you actually opening that . Always nice to share the nice whiskey with new friends. This was distilled 10 years before i was born. This is a chance to try liquid gold. We are officially launching the campaign today. This is the beginning of it and we hope to launch the fund in june. Great. Thank you for coming in. We will have to take a break. Kong, alibaba decided where it is going to now list. It is, tell you where coming up after the short break. Hello, everybody. We are live in hong kong and this is on the move. Another breakout from emerging markets, this time vietnam. China is losing its grip on the currency. The weakest in a nearly a year. The referendum and crimea. Most want to join russia. The tensions between the ukraine and perhaps the east west crisis. Andea holding a referendum polls showing an overwhelming and support of rejoining russia. It threatens sanction. We will hear about the latest. For crum iu crimea to join russia. The west is saying it is against International Law. Of minority represented 12 1. 5 million ukrainians. As of pledged to serve in crimea. The reaction. Mark is holding up fairly well. Before it destabilizes. President obama said he would never expect the vote. At one point essentially . E west yes, it is against International Law