Chemical maker, facing corporate casualties in russia. Welcome to countdown. Coming up, nigel garage speaks to bloomberg. We will tell you what he has been talking about immigration and the upcoming general election. 6 00 in london and we are getting breaking news from airbus. Right now it gets two thirds of its sale from making airliners. 2014 sales came in at 60. 7 billion euros, a touch ahead of the estimate. The dividend has come in at 1. 20 euro per share. And estimates they are looking at a slight increase. They are proposing a riaseaise of 1 euro per share. They say they will live the family production rate to 50 from 2017 and increase against previous rates of production. The order intake that measure of how quickly the orders come in 1. 667 billion euros. We are getting various metrics coming through. Their monthly production rate for the a330 will be six per month. The a320 up. The a380 is still a target and that is one of the areas of question around this particular business. How committed are they to that superjumbo project . That is a question that has been raised. Various updates coming through about their production rates. Interesting to look at the overall profitability of the business. 4. 70 billion euros, ahead of the estimate. Those are the headlines so far. This is a story we will be following throughout the day. Airbus tossed chief Strategy Officer will be joining us for his first interview. A little later, we will speak to bloomberg, so dont miss that. Basf, the worlds biggest chemical maker be there earning estimates. Sales beating. This Company Matters on a number of fronts because of that but its revenues come from oil and gas, and it expects an average of between 60 and 70. Hans nichols is in berlin. Talk us through the numbers. Your early assessment . The 5270 is the most interesting part that is what they expect the average price to be. They expect a lot less revenue, or a lot lower price. Another important thing we will be looking at is what the company cost exposure to russia is. The fact that they had such a good quarter could indicate it is in that high. Last night, this big Chemical Association in germany forecast for 2015 that chemical sales will decrease. Three months ago they were talking about an increase. It is just a slight increase, but on the chemical front, not expecting a whole lot of profit. On the oil friend looks like they are expecting the price of oil to stave low to stay low. That is what the ceo had said was a good breakeven point. We will be looking into these numbers a little more and what their war in exchange to russia is. Anything on the charge for that proposed asset swap . It fell through in december over what it called a difficult political environment in ukraine. I will be looking for that here in two seconds the estimate was for 300 Million Euros. This is the unit that in 2013 had sales of 12 billion euros. It is a joint venture right now so they will have some revenue coming in. But we want to get a precise number on what the charge was weather greater or less. Are international correspondent, hans nichols. A vote on the bailout extension in the German Parliament. It is expected to pass, but not without some dissenters. Lawmakers want approval that comes with the expectation that greece will meet its commitments. President obama front swing thean economic commissioner says that while they elected and antiausterity government the Economic Situation is under control. My conviction since the beginning it is always that when you face elections, and there is a democratic choice the choice must be heard and respected. It is normal that there will be some changes. If the changes are how to fight the social crisis, if these changes are about better administration, better rule of law, a stronger fight against tax evasion and fraud, a fairer tax system everybody showed and im sure will agree. We know that reforms have to be free funded and they have to be respected. This is what the discussions will be about. We went through a possible crisis and avoided that. We now have a Common Ground of discussion and lets move on. My only plan since the beginning is greece in the eurozone. I refuse to consider other solutions or other issues. It is our common interest. I think everyone in the eurozone knows that and the greek government knows that, too. It will be difficult for a lot of ground to pursue together, but we must do it. You dont like speculating. Why would anyone have money in a good bank in a greek bank . I am not a speculator. Again, we want a strong greece. We want a greece that is capable of creating growth, creating jobs a country on which everyone can rely. I have a lot of people that ask me will greece need a third bailout. They say what do you think of the solution for the longer term because we are not talking about debt neutralization. What would you tell them . Well we are going to discuss those in order to define the next step, the newer arrangement. Some call it a new program, a new contract. We have got time to do that. But we know how to do that. The difference with the previous period is that now that it is stable and solid, it resists any kind of shock. We must in four months i dont have to answer that but i know where we are going. We will be covering this story throughout the morning. Another interviewed you wont want to miss is john santosclaude trichet. Lets turn to japan. Inflation rose less than inspected than expected last month. We are joined from hong kong. Good morning. Some of these numbers are disappointing. How significant is that . Good morning. We are talking about the inflation heading really high. We also got the weaker yen hurting consumers in terms of those rising import prices driving the inflation down. Consumer prices came at 2. 2 compared to a year ago. Core inflation came in at 0. 2 of far cry from what they are aiming for. But he stood his ground keeping the confidence held that they will make it to the 2 inflation goal. He reiterated what he said, that further measures are not needed at this time. He says the effect of the oil prices will eventually fade away. The good side is the exporters doing very well. Industrial output rose the most in more than three years, up 4 . That may flow through the economy there, a good driver for growth. Economists surveyed said added stimulus could be happening by the end of october. What does all of this mean for the outlook for domestic consumption . Weakness in the yen may be helping some exporters, but is it helping consumers . How do wages play in . It hasnt looked too good. Household spending fell 5 nine months through january. That really missed estimates partly due to inflation and partly due to the sales tax increase. We are not seeing a japanese economy on track for that solid growth. Take a look at the economy 60 of gdp comes from that consumer spending. We are not going to see the effect of better wages and better exports. It is going to be hard to see the growth the government is hoping for, achieving that 2 inflation target could be very difficult. Trouble on the horizon for the prime minister. Thank you very much. The top story on bloomberg at this hour a spot in the British Parliament in the general election. We are going to win seats. How many . I dont think anyone knows. Be sure to cash aprils edition of bloomberg markets. Farage will be speaking to Stephanie Baker, who wrote the story, later in the show. These are the main parties. These are the main parties who will be contesting that may 7 election. We will be talking to all these parties in the coming months. The chances of britain leaving the eu at 17 . The open Europe Research group created a gauge based on the potential makeup of the next u. K. Government the likelihood of a referendum. The bank of england is pushing for transparency after being dragged into manipulation scandals in the Foreign Exchange market. Central bank announced it will strengthen policies on how Market Information is handled and will set up a new market and Fellowships Division to manage the changes. One of the most vocal critics of the Federal Reserve richard fisher, spoke in london last night, playing for his british audience, saying policy has created market distortion. We are in the fourth fact of a shakespearean drama. We are not sure if it is a tragedy or comedy. Comedies and in marriage. In our case it would require the marriage of good fiscal policy and Monetary Policy so i am skeptical. Join the conversation on twitter, we are all there. I popped out a couple of bloomberg. Com stories. The stage is set for another crisis in the bonds market, where the banks no longer hold the risky assets. I tweeted something about the worlds biggest chemical maker, expecting average oil between 60 and 70. We will take a short break. Coming up, concerns over greece. Investors fearing a new crisis flareup in the eurozone. We hear more from the eu economic commissioner, coming up. There is no problem with the economy of greece lets not try to raise concerns which have nothing to do with the present situation. Nobody fears that. Everybody knows that, feels that we are looking for solution, doing it in a calm way, doing it strongly. I see no movement at all of panic during this. That is the eu commissioner saying there is fundamentally no economic problem with greece, no reason for markets to panic. At the markets are listening. To bring in our next guest, the director of research at ibm. Great to have you with us. The europeans are developing firewalls but markets have not really been overly rattled by greece. I think there is a sense that a deal will be done by the politicians, that they love the drama, they love to get a lastminute deal. That the end of the day, the greeks and europeans dont want the euro to break up. They dont want greece to exit. The next couple of months, well see various mini dramas but the end story will be that they will get a third bailout. That is the market expectation and they are looking at the feds and the ecb. Any reasons to worry about greek liquidity . I dont think there are major worries. There is some technical reaching they need to do. They probably need to raise some more money to pay for some payments, but for the market the focus is elsewhere. Elsewhere in the bond markets its negative through seven years. How long before we see negative for 10 years . Where is this taking us . I dont think you will see negative persisting. The ecb press conferences next weekend they will have a constructive story. They will revise their growth forecasts, close to 2 . We dont need qe . [laughter] we just need the promise of it. We do need qe, however there is a more positive background than the dark days of winter. Youve got low oil prices, the low euro, and some effects from qe. 2 growth for europe is pretty reasonable. You look at germany, we are already seeing signs that oil prices are filtering through. If you look at the european numbers, they have looked a bit better in recent months. It is not all doom. I think bond yields in europe are too low, even with qe. Once we see a shift of economic expectation, we could see yields lifting a little bit. About the u. K. We are gearing up for a chaotic poll, which puts the u. K. Leaving at a one in six chance. Is the market positioned for this chaos . Kno. What is happening is because there is so much focus on greece and the fed, the markets havent really looked at the u. K. Election. It is going to be like the scottish referendum. A few weeks before people say wait a minute, we have an election and the outcome doesnt look clear. Various permutations dont look appetizing. I think you will see a u. K. Asset selloff sterling and other u. K. Assets in april. It is going to come on like a bit of a storm. Corporate bond markets you are concerned. Generally, if you look at the way quantitive easing has pushed a search for yield, is that are saying this you have a real profession of yields. People chasing risk. Corporate bonds have gone into highyield. When the music stops, are you going to see a lifting yields . Wed like to see a portfolio shake off. We could see a magnifying effect for even thank you very much for joining us. Coming up what happens when bloomberg sat down with the ceo of ge. Welcome back. Caroline hyde has been talking i am about to go out. 85,000 people descending of barcelona. We got to speak to one of the key players. The chief executive. We talked all things consolidation, expansion investment we heard from him that reducing competition, staying in the negative are misplaced. Consolidation can unleash investment. I am confident that with the integration that we will be able to create this even better mobile and fixed infrastructure here in the u. K. Here is someone saying, by having fewer players, you can push out the investment and networks, and have more competition by having more wholesale agreement. Will have a short break. You are watching countdown. Exchange markets are trading the dollar is running, up for a straight months. This is yesterdays. I think whats interesting is that the market was all positioned for fairly muted conserver pricing. Consumer pricing. It came in at. 2 , which rocked the market and took the dollar higher. Today we will get the Fourth Quarter gdp numbers and that is where the market is going to wait. They are all beginning to talk slightly more hawkish lee. Hawkishly. Williams saying the market cant wait for 2 inflation the voices from the fed are beginning. I want to show you the chinese yuan. This is the weakest in almost two years. You can see that rising, the the yuan over the. All through last year. Another weakening to calm. Thats whats on the cards. Thanks. Top stories on bloomberg india posts stock market will remain open when the finance minister posts the 20152016 to parliament. It is the first full year budget from Narendra Modis government. They have driven the benchmark up nearly 20 since he took office. The u. S. Federal Communications Commission has voted in favor of new rules that they burnett neutrality. The u. S. Regulator voted to approve the measure that prohibits companies from blocking or slowing online traffic or offering Faster Services in return for payment. It brings wireless internet under the law. The American Pharmaceuticals company is avoiding billions of dollars in taxes by booking profits overseas. The Company Reported foreign income of over 8. 2 billion since 2014, more than reported in sales. That is the latest example of tax planning by american multinationals. You can find more details on bloomberg. Com. The whistleblower at the locks leak tax scandal faces up to five years in jail. They triggered an International Scandal and he spoke to top mckenzie. Taught mckenzie. You could end up in jail. You are preparing yourself that it could be an eventuality. I smoke for my health. He may not strike you as a renegade, but in 2010 this client account and copied thousands of documents containing confidential tax agreements. I dont have any idea what are didnt have any idea what i would do but i knew it was important. They expose secretive deals between luxembourg and multinational corporations. Deals which allow those firms to cut their tax bills, sometimes to as little as 1 . It became known as the lux leak scandal. They pay taxes and why shouldnt corporations do the same . What surprised people was the sheer scale of what was happening. More than 300 multinationals set up subsidiaries and luxembourg a country with a population of just over half a million. Luxembourg is not overly industrial. But there are lots of companies. Trillions of euros are not taxed. Sometimes below 1 . They funneled hundreds of billions of dollars into the country, saving billions in tax. It is great to have this information out there. To quentin is a barrister. We can say this is obviously due to something we can do. This pressure on policymakers to say that these competitors are not taxed it is not really competitors. Its luxembourg has done its best to make itself replace make itself a place to avoid tax. Luxembourgs government refused to comment but has set the system is being reformed. We set out to find some of the subsidiaries central to this allegation. The brandnew offices, a huge complex and overhear one of these is this Office Service agencies, home to dozens of subsidiary companies. Many multinationals based themselves here, almost in name only. Look at this list. This was home to dozens of subsidiaries. Meanwhile, on another street across town this is a. This is disneys home and luxembourg. There is no sign outside. Disney is one of a number of Companies Often based out of a single office. We are looking for apples luxembourg subsidiary. Itunes, this is it. Not really shouting out their presence. The grand duchy is under pressure to reform and the European Parliament is set to investigate the deals. The scandal has cast a shadow over the president of the european commission, jeanclaude juncker. Most of the deals were done when he was luxembourgs prime minister. Back on the streets of the city he insists his actions were justified. The fact that the European Parliament created a special committee proves that there is displeasure. That hasnt stopped him being charged with that and violations of business secret. It is found guilty, he faces up to five years kind bars. How are you feeling . Happy tried walking toward the courthouse . Last time i came here it was to get my papers. He doesnt know when or even if his case will come to trial. But he remains convinced he did the right thing. You can join the conversation on twitter and let us that what you think of this show. We have had a few tweets today. The u. K. Election is going to come upon us like a storm and right now investors arent too worried about they will be. Im tweeting out a story about swiss watches finally making a smart watch. Coming up is the uks Economic Growth in jeopardy . By fixing the productivity problem should be a top priority, according to our next guest. These are the Bloomberg Top stories. The deputy head of markets is part of the global probe to currency rigging allegations, according to two people with knowledge of the matter. He was