hello, i'm monita rajpal. voters handed vladimir putin's party big losses. it looks like united russia may not get 50% of the vote. 100 countries at international organizations are meeting in bonn to talk about how to help afghanistan move forward. foreign combat troops are expected to withwithdraw from there. one country absent is pakistan.

its officials are boycotting it in protest over an american air strike that killed 24 pakistani soldiers. state media report it was a death drone. nato says a reconnaissance aircraft was lost last week over western afghanistan which borders iran. iranian media say the drone was only slightly damaged. i'm monita rajpal. "world business today" starts right now. hello and welcome to "world business today." i'm andrew stevens in hong kong. >> i'm charles hodson in london. thanks for joining us. top stories on monday, december 5th, it's make or break in europe. leaders have five days to save the single currency, it seems. >> beijing's fears about social

unrest grow as more signs emerges that the economy is cooling. and a dozen supercars are smashed to smithereens in japan. amazingly, no one is seriously hurt. well, the countdown continues. five days remain to save the eurozone as it approaches a raft of key meetings are in the diary. the british prime minister said many years ago is a long time in politic, andrew. >> i suspect it'll feel like it's endless. let's take a look at some of those meetings ahead. in a little over three hours, the french president sarkozy and german counterpart chancellor merkel will meet in paris under

pressure to impose new budgetary constraints on the eurozone problems. on tuesday, mr. sarkozy will speak to tim geithner, who is also flying over. the u.s. president barack obama described it as a series threat and europe drawing to a close with meetings of leaders from each and every one of the eu's 27 nations. they'll gather in brussels thursday and friday. what is expected to be the final meeting of the council in a year that's seen more than its fair share of these sorts of summits, charles. >> certainly has. a bit fatigued. there is a lot on the cards.

it'll start a little under 3 1/2 hours with a luncheon in paris where our nina dos santos is. nina, it would seem, anyway, this particular meeting between mrs. merkel and mr. sarkozy has been prepared. feels almost as if the groundwork has been done. >> reporter: yeah, we often have this when we have one of those big powwows to sort out of situation while the two strong men of europe, angela merkel and nicolas sarkozy have their own summit to hammer out what they'll put forward earlier on in the week. that's what we're seeing. as you said before this kicks off a really pivotal week with all those series of meetings, even the u.s. treasury secretary tim geithner arriving here later on in europe. now, we should talk about exactly what they'll discuss and

they've often clashed on various things in particular how to try to change those rules, it governs how much other countries, germy and france just two of those. how deep will the changes go and will they trigger referenda in various countrys? hopefully not because it could take months, if not year, to be ratified. >> i think that's the point. all very well for those two to get together over a cozy lunch at the palace elysees. particularly as popular is not their strongest suit in either case. >> reporter: the interesting thing about these two heads of government, charles, is that they're both going to be facing re-election in the next year or two. and exactly how they steer

europe through the crisis will also have let's say be very much in the forefront of their electorate's minds, having to serve two constitution, the euro sewn and world to source out the problems and their own electorate so sick of perhaps sending more to bail out, for instance, the greece and also portugal, ireland and now maybe even italy. that really is a big issue for these. never t nevertheless having said that, the german newspaper said they thousand merkel despite all of the criticism she has been generating for germany's role, well, apparently they are on her side as she is the best person they think to run the country and, indeed the eurozone problems going forward at least for the moment. >> you mentioned italy there, nine have, and clearly the prime minister there has announced an

extra 30 billion euros in austerity measures and his political fortunes will be watched closely and no doubt come up today. >> reporter: yeah, that's right and, in fact, what's interesting is that this particular summit that's going on in paris, this bilateral summit has been pitted, let's say, as the start of a pivotal week but started with those austerity measures being passed through in italy. they will be painful ones. mario monti is a number of technocrats in place across some of those countries and that is being viewed particularly by the markets as a good thing and know how to manage these book, but, again, italy will be one of those countries if we do see treaty change but we'll have to be told you have to stop spending and have to pass austerity measures soon, otherwise given the legislation

they're proposing here they could get a slap on the wrist here. >> nina dos santos joining us from an autumnal and christmassy champs-elysees. >> the pressure has been mounting on europe's leaders. now for months. cut, resignations and tears. italy's wil fair minister broke down as she outlined big cuts for the economy. >> certainly tough times. i travel lann lawmakers are proposing $40 billion worth of higher taxes and spending kurts over the next two years and for some, charles, clearly it's a very hard task indeed. but it's interesting, you know,

we are seeing so much, so much focus on the eurozone, the number i saw friday, charles, was something like $2.5 trillion added to global stock markets based on optimism that europe will sort itself out. i just wondered is there a sense or danger of overexpectations here? >> well, i think we've been here before and we've seen an awful lot of buying of rumors and selling on the fact. even when there has been a little bit of progress, every meeting seems to have been built up particularly between merkel, mrs. merkel and actually built up to this is the occasion on which we will save the euro and come up with either small agreements or no agreements at all. i think an awful lot of investors are wondering whether they're not skating on very thin ice ear. you said 2.5 billion -- $2.5 trillion. that's extraordinary. more than, for example, the

entire output of the uk in a year. let's go on to other as pickets. probably fair to say with hindsight, italy may have done things differently including right back when the eurozone was conceived which jim boulden looks at a series of failures causing them to be divided. >> reporter: it's easy to visualize europe. just show a hoard of euro coins being minted, the simple of unity for the 17 countries that share one currency, why is the same currency tearing at the very fabric of the euro-zone. this skeptic has said the euro was a mistake. >> when the euro was set up, a lot of people said it's very good, you have a currency without a government. that's a plus point, not a minus

point. but actually it's turned out to be a minus point but no one is in charge. >> reporter: the euro did come with its own central bank, based in frank frankfurt to placate a german citizenry given up their strong deutsche mark. but the euro meant monetary union, not fiscal union. each country retained their own tax policies, budgets, banks, finance ministers, et cetera. and each country sells bonds. greek bonds always gave a little back to investors allowing greece to happily increase its debt. after all, greece shared the same currency as the germans and certainly couldn't go bust. not true. once the economic crisis hit in 2008, the euro cracks started to appear. and europe's politicians are still trying to find the patch. >> that has taken too much time. it will take a bit more time.

fortunately the bank has given us more time by intervenes and providing a protective shield while the political process can work to bring about the decisions that are necessary. >> reporter: and it's clear time is running out. >> this is a crossroad for europe and there are some very heavy political decisions that we have a long impact that will have to be made. >> reporter: it appears europe has a stark choice. let the countries leave the euro or go the whole way and create a fiscal union, in other words, one big budget or at least a budget czar that could veto spending in any country. >> i think there are two alternative, bluntly put, cough up for break up. >> reporter: clearly muddling through is not an alternative.

jim boulden, cnn, london. >> time for decisions, so all told, incredibly crucial week for those tackling the european debt crisis. we'll tell you how the events are moving the markets after that $2.5 trillion populace week. what's going on today. [ male a] still getting dandruff? neutrogena® t/gel shampoo defeats dandruff after just one use. t/gel shampoo. it works. neutrogena®.

who need it works. imagine... one scooter or power chair that could improve your mobility and your life. one medicare benefit that, with private insurance, may entitle you to pay little to nothing to own it. one company that can make it all happen ... your power chair will be paid in full. the scooter store. hi i'm doug harrison.

we're experts at getting you the power chair or scooter you need. i didn't pay a penny out of pocket for my power chair. with help from the scooter store, medicare and my insurance covered it all. call the scooter store for free information today.

live from hong kong welcome back to "world business today." >> well, european markets are now more than 75 minutes into monday's trading and new week showing a certain amount of optimism. a meeting obviously between messrs. sarkozy and merkel in paris could prove a resolution and there is a lot of hope that there will be some kind of agreement there and that will then be ratified by the european council so we're seeing, for

example, the paris contaac quar up by 1%. same sort for the dax only up by 2/3% and some cashing in going on here and certainly i think that's been reflected where you are, hasn't it, andrew? >> yeah, that's right, charles. pretty strong start to the week. green arrows which does say strong in this climate. positive perhaps unspectacular start but consider a lot of these markets up between 6% and 8% yesterday. so following on when there could have been profit-taking. sneak key setting the tone for the banking stocks as well as exporting companies. energy companies in australia, s&p up by 0.73%.

shanghai did back the upward trend that demonstrated the company's service industry growth is slowing. the pmi number came at a 52.5, still an expansion but anything under 50 is a contraction and saw an under 50 number for the official government services growth which came out on saturday so there's still quite a lot of concern in china about exactly what the state of the economy is and is it now slowing too fast? charles? oop, no, it's me. sorry, look at how u.s. futures are doing. with five hours to go before trading start, the picture loo s s positive. here's where they stood up around 1% gains. we have a few hours as i said before it starts but certainly looking positive so far, charles. >> well, i wonder what actually is behind those numbers. how solid, how confident investors are in these gains?

certainly we seem to be edging closer to a lasting resolution but the five days leading up to decision day could be rife with indecision joined by etx capital. i suspect we are seeing these gains. we could see them melt away, couldn't we? >> absolutely. but then the market is up and has been up so this is our feel good factor from the liquidity measures announced by central banks late last week, as well and rightly so if we don't see any firm resolution coming out of the euro-zone this week, we could see the gains given back and this rally, this christmas rally fizzle out fairly soon. >> if there's two meetings, the merkel and sarkozy meeting and european council meeting prove to be either a fiasco or immediamediocre we could see t n

gains melt away. >> no, i think you're fairly correct there, charles. but everything does rely quite heavily on what is announced from the euro-zone and need to see fairer measures made in the direction of more fiscal integration and reducing the independence of the ecb or certainly moves towards allowing smaller european nations to exit the euro-zone more efficiently than has been previously proposed, so we need to see some firm decisions being made this week otherwise there will be pressure on bond price, yields continue to increase and although there's some distance away from the 7% levels we have seen, there's no reason if we see no -- if we don't see firm decisions made this week those bond prices or yields creeping above back into dangerous territory. >> let's have a look at the united states. it was interesting. obviously last weekend it ended

high as far as the real economy was concerned. 120,000 jobs being created in november outside the u.s. agricultural sector. to what extent does the market take heart from the fact it doesn't look as if the u.s. economy is slipping back into recession? >> well, the market is relying quite heavily on the u.s. economy pushing higher and higher but then also china looks to be slowing down in certain area, as well, although 9% growth is it not a bad thing with manufacturing slowing down with services slying down in china, we could see the growth comes back down to more reasonable levers but, again, with regard to the u.s., although we've seen a blip higher in jobs being created and moved down in unemployment, we need to see a figure of around about 150 to 200,000 new jobs being created month in and month out for at least six months before we start to see unemployment move back down to 5%, 6%. >> manoj joining me, many thanks

to you. >> still ahead on account wbt." aficionado of sports cars, you may not want to watch this. a multimillion dollar smashup in japan, enough to bring tears to your eyes.

another quick look at crude. crude is up above $110 moving up

to 111. clearly worries about the christ nis in iran and news of perhaps a stronger reader on the real economy at the end of last week building up expectations that perhaps we will not see a renewed recession in some of the major western economies and come whack to "world business today." an andrew. >> we don't normally talk about car crashes on "wbt." a multimillion dollar repair bill. 14 damaged cars, ferraris, mercedess, even a lamborghini, ramy inocencio has been following this eye-watering story. >> this amazing accident over the weekend definitely has the motoring world abuzz. that fleet of luxury cars was driving from kyushu to hiroshima and the crash happened on the

expressway between the two islands. this is what the scene looked like on sunday morning. police say the cause was a ferrari which was a lead car. witnesses say they saw it going more than 150 kilometers an hour and lost control on the wet road and smashed into a center divider. the cars behind it could not top in time and piled into the ferrari one after the other. in total, eight ferrari, three mercedes, a lamborghini, wyndham and prius were involved. ten were taken to the hospital, but luckily no one was seriously hurt. insurers for those 14 cars are probably shaking their head. one auto analyst in tokyo told me the price come comes to about this, $3 million and makes it one of the world's most expensive car crashers on record. >> the owners might be in the market for some rent aal vehicl.

how is the import market doing? >> it seems to be doing pretty well. one auto analyst at clsa at tokyo told me sales of imported brands were up more than 30% last month and these are dominated by the luxury car market like ferraris here. that's compared to overall sales up about 20%. the sales growth in luxury cars is due in part to the stronger yen. as much as that hurts exporters, it's helping japan based buyers of foreign cars. basically a stronger yen makes those cheaper. looking to 2012 that clsa analyst told me momentum is in their favor. where might we see buyers? well, the japan auto importers association, the jaia says volkswagen is the most popular foreign car that made up 18% of the imported vehicle market as

of october 2011 followed by mercedes-benz and bmw. >> how does a prius get that this group? >> i have to say i am not sure. >> nor am i. >> nor am i. luxury, maybe not quite so much. charles? >> certainly not cheap either. ahead on "world business today," tackling the euro-zone's debt crisis. >> the pipes were getting clogged so we needed something but just unplugged the pipes for a few days and weeks. pimlico's ceo says short-term fixes won't solve the problem.

ahead on "world business today,s

hodson. >> and i'm andrew stevens at cnn ho hong kong. you're watching "world business today." >> this may be for some economic import, these are live pictures of the afghan president hamid karzai speaking in bonn, germany. a hundred countries there gathered to talk about how to keep his country, afghanistan, moving forward. we'll update you with anything notable from that later on either on this program or during our cnn programming later on. an due kr. >> charles, let's get back to our top story, the race to save the euro. five days ago, this man, the european commissioner ali renn announced they had ten days to

fix it. with five dis to go it's now or never, nicolas sarkozy will meet his german counterpart, the chancellor angela merkel in paris in a few hours from now as they try to flash out proposals for a tighter budgetary constraint. on tuesday mr. sarkozy will sit down with tim geithner in paris. the big one comes at the end of the week. the european commission holds its final summit with the debt crisis once again topping the agenda and investors are looking for very definitive action, too. >> certainly. well, let's have a look at europe, where the markets are now 90 minutes or so into the trading day. obviously the meeting between the german chancellor and the french president is likely to dictate events later. we are seeing a little bit more caution coming into the markets. all, taking for example the dax

and paris cac 40, they've been wavering and there is a sense that kind the numbers we could see quite a bit of caution, andrew. >> yeah, a bit interesting in this part of the world by the end of today's trade. at least a little support coming from those strong jobless number or going down to 8.5% friday. take a look at the numbers there. baking stocks and exporters boosting many of the markets here and they were boosted in turn by what was going on in italy together as a say with that decrease in the jobless rate, china, the exception is the services sector shows growth is starting to slow. that comes hot on the heels of news that the manufacturing sector actually contracted last month. let me show you what's handing on india down.

retailers among the worst performers ahead of an announcement this wednesday on plans to bring foreign supermarkets into the country. a key government ally now says that legislation allowing the retail reform will be put on hold as protests against measu e measures spread. this u-turn could put pressure on the prime minister who is overseeing slowing economic growth there india crucial to singh's leadership and some say he's not acting quickly enough and haven't dealt properly with the scandals that racked his administration. 4$450 billion industry letting foreign investors in will be another black market internationally for him because a lot of people looking at investing in india are going to start can we trust his government to deliver on what it

stated originally was attempts to try to open up the market to more international competition. >> it is a very, very exciting market, isn't it, india and all of us hope we could see rapid growth and everyone wants to be involved. the history of corruption and difficulty and failure to tackle reform is there and that's very much part of the image. let's take another look at how u.s. futures are doing right now. and the overall picture still pretty positive. here's where the numbers stood just a moment ago. and basically that is 1% gains when it opens in a few hours' time. >> they call that action by the central banks sent markets surging as we've been talking about but the rally wasn't particularly long-lived as investors focus their attention back on europe's future. poppy harlow talked about it and

critical choices facing leaders. >> all this comes down to a vision for what they want the euro-zone to look like. second, they must agree on credible and durable circuit breakers. and finally they must get buy-in so there is a lot of things they are working on and it's critical they deliver in time for the december 9th summit. >> now, you have been for months now hinting at coordinated action, and it's the only way to get the euro-zone out of it. what we saw it skyrocketing was a temporary band-aid in terms of what's happening right now in europe, ecb president has been hinting that if euro-zone leaders take the necessary actions, the ecb will step up what it's doing. is that the right approach and do you have confidence we'll see what we need to from the ecb. >> it's the right sequence so

first european governments must move and provide enough assurances for them to go all-in. i stress it has to be all-in which is another way of saying the ecb must use its balance sheet as a bridge but has to be a bridge to somewhere and if we get these two actions then other things can fit in. so it's important. and the band-aid is absolutely correct, we did have a massive intervention last week. it was important because the functioning of the market, poppy, was getting problematic, the pipes were getting clogged so we needed something but we've just unclogged the pipes for a few days and weeks and must fix the building. >> this week, dragi stopped unlimited buying and have merkel who is basically saying no easy path out. we have to make the toughest decisions and take the toughest past to change the euro-zone as

you mentioned earlier. is that the right approach or such a crisis that we need to say, well, we don't need to have such strict guidelines? >> i think mrs. merkel is right on this. so we have three different views that we've haefrd. mrs. merkel say, look, it has to be tough. it has to be an chochored by le and institutional changes and dr. draghi is talking about compact and mr. sarkozy is saying do we need this stuff? i think merkel is right. but there is a consequence to that which is it's not clear all 17 members will be able and willing to sign up. >> mohamed el-erian co-ceo of pimco. in terms of where they should be putting their moment el-erian

says the u.s. should be part of that and we should avoid taking major risks, sound advice, charles. >> and very sound indeed. i'm sure he won't be the only one to be saying that. certainly me who are less inspired but could have told us that. in monday imf officials are sitting down to discuss what progress greece has made in improving its financial situation. the bank has to decide whether athens has done enough to deserve its next loan payout. that was put in jeopardy by former prime minister george p papandreou. he's been telling fareed zakaria the wider situation is uncertain. >> i think we're at a crossroads. it is the mrilg will that is necessary to decide on whether

we will move forward to a deeper union and therefore not only protect the euro-zone but i would say everything we have accomplished in europe which is peace and greater prosperity, very different cultures and languages and people living together in cooperation. we are a model aftof a global s and these are huge accomplishments and very important i think with what's going on around in our neighborhood with the arab spring, with our neighbors to the east also, we are a model. we will lose this if we don't move into deeper union and the crossroads is that if we don't is that political will i think we will be seeing maybe slow, maybe quick breakup of the euro-zone. >> george papandreou and words of caution from a man who knows about struggles involved in trying to secure political unity, andrew. >> still ahead here on "world business today," china's economic engine is losing steam

and that's fueling fears of potential unrest. beijing reportedly is taking no chances. ahead of new economic data out later this week. we'll explain in just a moment. imagine... one scooter or power chair that could improve your mobility and your life. one medicare benefit that, with private insurance, may entitle you to pay little to nothing to own it. one company that can make it all happen ... your power chair will be paid in full. the scooter store. hi i'm doug harrison. we're experts at getting you the power chair or scooter you need. i didn't pay a penny out of pocket for my power chair. with help from the scooter store, medicare and my insurance covered it all. call the scooter store for free information today.

live from cnn hong kong in london welcome back to "world business today." china's economic slowdown can making investors nervous at the moment. we'll get more information on the state of the economy in china this week. industrial production, retail sales and inflation figures all due on friday. this is all after a government reporter showed that china's services sector is now shrinking in line with china's factory output. two key measures of chinese manufacturing in recent weeks have shown that particular sector contracted in november and factory output is at its lowest level since 2009. what does it all mean, andrew?

>> yeah, growing number of economists are saying the chinese economy showing signs now, charles, of slowing down too fast and certainly a big economic slowdown would spell trouble for beijing. the financial times newspaper is reporting that chinese officials are now increasingly worried that a weak economy could lead to protests even riots. in comments published by the state-run news agency xinhua zhou yondkang says "when facing the negative effects of the market economy, we still have not formed a complete mechanism for social management." his comments follow a rise in economic related unrest in china. we have at beijing correspondent

for "the financial times." what does mr. zhou mean when he says we have not formed a complete mechanism or social management? >> when the chinese leaders talk about social management they know everything from censorship of the internet to control of riots, to police tactics to deal with unrest, so when he says we haven't formed a complete system, he means that they need to improve the way that they deal with various challenges to communist party power. >> why is it he saying this now? what is he seeing that particularly concerns him? >> well, china's communist party leaders look at economy and society as a bicycle that they need to keep pedaling at a fast rate in order to stop from falling off and figure if growth drops and there's actually

estimates from top think tanks and top leaders that say that if growth drops below 7% annual gdp growth then they will not be able to deal with the level of instability with riots, protests that will result from the layoffs and the just general slowing in the economy so they actually have a fix the number. it's 7% to 8% is the figure they worry about. if growth drops below that they think that things may become unmanageable. >> and if that did happen, jamil, and if it slow sod that level is beijing able to quickly and effectively change economic policy to ramp up growth, can they do that or likely more to crack down harder on protesters? >> most likely they'll do boat and tie to ramp growth back up and also try and keep any sort

of growth, any sort of protests or unrest from spreading throughout the country. but the problem there, they have now is that they've in 2008 they put in a huge stimulus package and hard to repeat such a hard one if growth sdloes. >> it's very difficult obviously to get numbers on the level of social unrest around the country at the moment. but what is your best estimate of just how unhappy are people in china at the moment? >> we really have no idea. like you say it's hard to get numbers. even if there are numbers there it's sure to be secret. government numbers they would never release. the best estimates in the last few years something like 90,000 or maybe 120,000 a year of these mass incidents. it's a strange term but basically means anything where a group of people have protested

or gone on strike or caused a disturbance so 90 to 120,000 a year has been growing rapidly in recent years so the thing they worry about is in a slowdown with lots of people losing their jobs and very weak social safety net for the most people, they worry that that could grow even more. >> okay, jamil, thank you very much for that. jamil andolini. that is an extraordinary number, up to 120,000 perhaps. what was the mass market unrest. that's a lot. >> it is, certainly indeed and in a nation like china. well, still ahead on "world business today" what's black and white with a tartan twist? the arrival of sweetie and sunshine on a sleety day in scotland. [ male announcer ] still getting dandruff? neutrogena® t/gel shampoo defeats dandruff after just one use.

t/gel shampoo. it works. neutrogena®.

welcome back. you're watching "world business today." now, 5,000 miles and a lot of political maneuvering two special chinese guests touched down on scottish soil sunday for an extended stay. ♪ we can't confirm if this is the first time pandas have been piped off a plane, but it certainly made foran unusual spectacle at eden bow roar

airport. the anticipated arrival oftien tian tian and yang guang as they strive to boost numbers. it is not proving popular with animal rights activists who argue even successful breeding would not help the status of pandas in the wide. well, pandas in the wide may be scarce but it seemed panda-based merchandise is anything but at the zoo as the city welcomes its new inhabitants. we want to show you some of the purchases you can make. >> i certainly have. i was laughing because you can imagine those little panda he t hearts must have been sinking when they saw the weather there in edinboro. let's get back to things you can buy at edenboro zoo. we'll start off the panda soft

toy. but you can buy your own sack. check out those designs. for the dentally optimistic, there's candy that's more difficult to chew. probably have the same amount of goodness in it, as well. finally if all you've ever wanted is to hear music out of a plastic panda's eyes, these speakers are for you. charles? >> i must rush out and buy some straightaway. resorts are getting what they need in the a pchlps. ivan cabrera is there. >> they're getting it and we've been sharing the pictures of a barren landscape. the french alps getting into some snow. important because it is very

expensive to make snow so we need the free snow that falls from the sky, in fact, it costs 155,000 per hectarery and we haven't been able to make it that way. december 1st, this is at a resort in france, fresh alps, and they have not received any significant amount of snow, snowing heavily now and they'll get significant accumulation. we'll share that map, the swiss alps will get in on that accumulating 25 to 30 centimeters of snowfall. >> okay, ivan, thank you very much. well, that's it from us. i'm charles hodson in london. >> i'm andrew stevens in hong kong. thanks for joining us. we'll see you later in the day.