lenny, you're also an extraordinary talent. it's been a great pleasure meeting you. really has. i really enjoys it. i look forward. >> all right, man. >> thank you very much. hello, i'm monita rajpal at cnn london. here are the top stories, actually one story we want to focus on, that's violence in baghdad as iraq's political crisis deepens. there are several explosions that rocked the capital today. arwa damon is monitoring situation from cnn baghdad. she joins us now. arwa, we continue to understand the death toll continues to rise. >> it most certainly does, monita. at least 63 people have been killed. at least 185 wounded in a series of explosions that rocked the capital. some of them were so powerful that our location actually

shook. these explosions were suicide bombings, roadside bombs and car bombs. they were targeting busy intersections, marketplaces, one of them exploding in front of the integrity commission located in the heart of the capital. another explosion taking place very close to a school, just as children were arriving. these attacks taking place in a two-hour time frame from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. exactly when the streets would have been at their busiest. people right now absolutely terrified. many of them fearing the situation is potentially going to worsen. we just spoke with the minister of finance who said that the current political crisis lends itself to these types of attacks in the sense that the extremists in society that are going to be carrying out violence look to the political chaos, the government disintegrating and they will continue to carry out acts of violence because they will say politics is not the solution, quite simply terrorism is, monita.

>> okay, arwa, thank you. arwa damon at cnn baghdad. you're watching cnn. "world business today" starts right now. good morning from cnn london, i'm nina dos santos. >> and good afternoon from cnn hong kong, i'm pauline chiou. this is "world business today". the top stories on thursday, december 22nd, will the racism accusations against england football captain john terry have sponsors shying away from the star? >> as the russian parliament opens for business, many rumblings of protests. they'll speak to one of the country's super rich citizens about what happens next. in these hard economic times, spaniards have taken to the streets hoping to win big in the country's largest lottery. first up, let's go straight

to the trading pattern here in europe. there's been a bright start to trading over the course of today, just the first hour or two of trading as you can see, these markets still holding up, especially the euro zone, the paris and frankfurt markets up in excess of 1%. we have bright sparks here in particular coming from the airlines industry with news that aig has agreed to buy bmi. those two airlines will be merging and that has been giving things a bit of a boost. also let's remind you about that significant first of many operations when the ecb, the european central bank offered an unprecedented amount of cheap long-term financing to some of the euro zone banks. that's helping to lift banks across the region for a second day in a row. ftse 100 still up almost 1% and the weaker point is zurich smi. the success of the ecb's liquidity push relies on the bank's willingness to lend their their money again, particularly to european governments

struggling to get cash on the world bond markets. as richard quest was told, there are still flaws with that particular strategy take a listen. >> this is a variation of easing. what's happening here is the ecb lends to the banks and then the banks go out and buy sovereign bonds. >> provided they do, of course. >> well, it's not guaranteed that they will. >> which do you think is the most efficient form? >> i personally feel if it was direct purchases of sovereign bonds, that would be much more effective in the market in easing the sovereign problem in europe. we have a sovereign problem and a bank problem and those two problems are twinned. >> the european central bank has so far resisted calls to substantially increase its direct purchases of government bands, particularly if the secondary market because it can't do so in the primary marketing with pauline. the issue here is, what they've

done is, given a lot of long-term financing to some of these banks, hoping they'll park it in the government bond markets. a lot of people say that just reinforces a vicious circle. >> and that dilemma of not issuing more bonds in europe and the news that more than 500 european banks lined up for loans from the ecb weighed on the markets here in asia. most of the major indices end the the session down in negative territory. hang seng was down by 0.2% and the shanghai composite down by the same amount. i do want to focus on the nikkei right now. they ended down by more than 0.75%. there was important information that came out of japan today. japan cut its growth forecast today for the fiscal year from april of this year to march of next year saying it will shrink 0.1%. they cited the tsunami back in march and the strong yen as reasons. toyota released sales number

that suggested it may lose its crown as the largest auto company in the world. toyota estimates that global sales will have fallen 6% by the end of the calendar year. and down in sydney, the main aussie benchmark ended down by more than 1%, even more moody's struck with australia's aaa credit rating. for the first time this year, australia has gotten aaa ratings from all three major ratings agencies. nina? >> very different kind of perspective to the one we saw here. so when closing bell rang at the new york stock exchange on wednesday, we saw a number of these indices down. the dow jones industrial average and the s&p were barely in positive territory but really the kind of heaviest losses came from the nasdaq. it couldn't shake off the software blues.

here's how the numbers settled. the tech-heavy nasdaq closing down about 1. -- at least 1% as you can see. let's have a look at that again. yes, nearly 1%. we saw the dow adding about 4 points, s&p 500 only about 2 points is what it added. flat for the other two but a downbeat day for the technology industry. we'll take a look at u.s. futures right now. it looks like there's holiday cheer to be had from u.s. market futures on this thursday. mainly following on what's going on in europe right now. as of a few moments ago, all the major indices are looking at a higher start at the opening bell. nina? >> pauline, let's turn to something now that's not getting off to quite such a good start. we're talking about the england football team's preparations for the euro 2012 tournament. the latest disruption is this, the disruption to the plans is a criminal case against this man,

john terry, the team captain, over racist remarks he allegedly made to this fellow footballer, anton ferdinand. terry was put under police station investigation on november 2nd, just a month or so ago following the alleged incident which apparently took place at a match between chelsea and ferdinand's queen park rangers back on october 23rd. terry was interviewed by police officers several weeks later. on wednesday we finally found out visitors visited his home and told him he'll be given an offense on february 1st. terry and his club vigorously refuted the allegation in this statement. the chelsea player says he's disappointed with the decision to charge him and wants to clear his name. this is exactly what john terry has said, as you can see, it says i have never aimed a racist remark at anyone and count

people from all races and creeds among some of my closest friends. he also says i will fight tooth and nail to prove my innocence. as a result of this. the chief crown prosecutor for london says, quote, again, after careful consideration of all of the evidence, she says i am satisfied that there is sufficient evidence for realistic prospect of conviction here. and she also says it is in the public's interest to prosecute this particular case. >> whatever the outcome of terry's case, it won't help his career or reputation on or off the pitch. umbro, a british sports brand, owned by nike that provides the england team's uniforms has removed its photo from its usual prominent the place on its website. that may be just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the damage done to terry's marketability as a celebrity footballer.

we're joined live in the studio to explore that, ray rudowski. he's with edelman, the world's biggest p.r. firm. with these charges we just learned about, how deep is the damage to terry's reputation and his marketability? >> this is going to come out as the allegations are brought forward. what i think is a bigger question is what is the impact on the game? already this is the second set of allegations or incident of its kind. we had the fifa president make some rather insensitive remarks a month ago suggesting that racism on the pitch could be settled with a handshake. that caused him a lot of reputational damage. we have a situation where the sport itself has been tainted, regardless of the outcome of this situation. >> the sport itself is tainted and lots of corporate sponsors are sitting there, probably feeling nervous. if you're advising them, what do you tell them to do? >> i think the wider question for sponsors is how do we use our influence, our leverage, our

association with the game to change the conversation towards making this a constructive conversation about eliminating racism? pulling out is a business decision. that may be short term. wider and longer term, they know there's a problem. how do we change the conversation? how do we make this a focus of zero tolerance and move towards eliminating these attitudes on the pitch? >> let's approach this from two different angles. one with the individual, the athlete and the other as the sport of football. what's the best way for john terry to clean up his image? everyone knows about the tawdry affair from earlier, the whole world knows about that, then you have this racism allegation. how do you clean up his image and how do you clean up the image of the sport of football? >> let me take the second question. cleaning up the image of sport has to be admitting there's a problem and working towards how does the industry, the game, work with its sponsors, suppliers, players, governments, ngos to come up with a solution

of what's our policy on this? and how do we deal with it when it comes up? as for an individual, i mean, leaving aside any one individual, anytime that something like this comes forward, it's complicated. and it's complicated by the fact that there's local proceedings and somebody not wanting to admit that things may have happened when there may be evidence to the contrary. i think, again, the easiest strategy is to admit there's a problem, to move forward on what the fix is and to try to reframe the conversation around ending racism as a stain on the game. >> is there anything that corporate sponsors can learn from the whole tiger woods scandal? when that broke a few years ago, i remember a lot of his sponsors didn't act in the beginning. they sort of sat on the fence because it was tiger woods. they didn't really want to move right or left. >> there's a lot at stake. >> right. there's a lot of money at stake. what can we learn from that incident from a corporate sponsor's point of view that could be applied in this

incident? especially if you want to get ahead of the problem? >> i think you have to have those conversations early and in a scenario-planning discussion. if "x" happens what's your reaction? if "y" happens what's our reaction? to suddenly learn about tiger woods in this tawdry scandal and say what do we do about it doesn't actually go towards fixing the problem, it actually drags it out and draws atension to the issue. a better way would be to say, here's our policy, if you breach this policy we will withdraw or we will take responsible action. in the case of racism, the leverage and the influence here, since sport provides a platform for brands to go global, they do have a real opportunity here to talk about racism as a stain on the game and how do we eliminate this? because we're talking about an attitude here. and it's something that, again, sponsors because they're global, have a real opportunity. >> actually have a positive impact in the end? >> sure.

the united colors of benetton. >> let's learn from this. >> let's learn from this, what can we do to fix it. >> ray rudowski, thank you very much. we appreciate your insight. >> thanks, pauline. just ahead on "world business today," russia's president delivers his final state fof the address. and spaniards pin their hopes on lady luck in the world's biggest lottery drawing. we'll be right back. a range of coverages to choose from. who is she? that's flobot. she's this new robot we're trying out, mostly for, like, small stuff. wow! look at her go! she's pretty good. she's pretty good. hey, flobot, great job. oops. [ powers down ] uh-oh, flobot is broken.

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hello and welcome back. you're watching "world business today" live on cnn. russian president dmitry medvedev has been giving his address in the duma, the country's parliament.

in his address he's lashed out at attempts by what he calls extremists to, quote, manipulate russians. he planned a speech speaking more on the government's reform agenda but after a parliamentary election that was marred by widespread reports of vote rigging earlier this month and the huge protests that followed it, medvedev criticized what he calls interference from outside. despite all of this political turmoil, there are those in rush who believe the country has a bright economic future before it. especially as it looks to markets in the east. matthew chance said down with one of the so-called richest oligarchs. >> in what way do you see russia moving more towards.emerging

economi economies of the east? >> they will be highly attached to europe but it's only 20% of our territory. even if it's 80% of population, maybe 85 of preparation. but you would see huge development in asian part of russia. it will be tremendous investment in infrastructure, to unlock a lot of resources, russia will bring more foreign investors and big projects will be started and be beneficial. >> isn't it unrealistic, though, to expect -- you mentioned the time scale of seven or eight years, there will be a lot of investment but the kind of infrastructure development we're talking about could potentially take decades, a generation. >> it's about demand. we have demand and we can, you

know, utilize the resources and experience. we have a lot of experienced people in russia, capable to deal with it. we have a huge development in china. and industrialization creates tremendous opportunity. now we have component that's much, much cheaper than the european component, grains, all type of equipment and the basic industrial equipment which is a great opportunity. >> do you see a time when the markets in the east will be more important to russia's economy than those in the west? >> european and asian. we just -- i think we can benefit from the position to, you know, where we are at the moment. we can create a lot of opportunity. technically you can ship from

shanghai to germany in 14 days by railway. it's much safer, cheaper than by ships. and to, of course, we need to seek operation. it's not just japan, korea, taiwan, we have a competition with mongolia, kazakhstan. i'm still very optimistic. still to come on "world business today," imagine waking up more than $5 million richer. it will be a dream come true for one lucky spaniard today. we'll take you live to madrid for the latest in the country's lotto drawing. and from stockbroker to st. nick, we meet a professional santa in today's edition of "your world at work." stay with us. nyquil (stuffy): overachiever. anncr vo: tylenol cold multi-symptom nighttime relieves nasal congestion... nyquil cold & flu doesn't.

-why? -why? -why? [ female announcer ] we all age differently. roc® multi-correxion 4 zone moisturizer with roc®retinol and antioxidants. lines, wrinkles, and sun damage will fade. roc multi-correxion. correct what ages you. welcome back. you're watching "world business today" live on cnn. spain's new conservative prime minister has selected a new austerity focus cabinet. they'll be sworn in in just under an hour from now. his popular party won by a landslide on november 20th elections, largely on the back of promises to tackle the country's growing economic problems. spain's unemployment rate is one of the highest in the euro zone, starting at 21.5% at the moment. the prime minister says that he's aiming to boost jobs and also to cut spain's budget

deficit next year by 16.5 billion euros, that's nearly $22 billion. while times may be tough at home it's no wonder a record number of spaniards are pinning their hopes on el gordo, spain's christmas lottery draw. it has a top price of 4 million euros, about $5.2 million. and total prizes actually run well into the billions. hundreds of people have been lining up outside lottery outlets right across the country to get their hands on what could be that lucky ticket. amid the lottery buzz live in madrid, al goodman joins us. al, we should talk about how this fits in with the economic picture in spain. el gordo has been famous for years but that money is badly needed now, within isn't it? >> reporter: it sure is, nina.

the gordo has already come. let me show you my lottery ticket right here. this is not the winning ticket for the gordo. we were inside the convention center when it was drawn. it's come to a town in the north of spain, in the pyrenees. it's worth about $500,000 per ticket, about $5 million for the various people in that town who would have likely had those tickets. that's the initial report. and yes, the people we've talked to inside and all around the country have been buying the lottery more because of the deep economic crisis. nina? >> but it's going to take more than, let's say, a lottery to get spain out of its current economic woes, particularly for the new government. we now know the new cabinet has been selected. it will take them a long time to get any luck on their side, won't it?

>> indeed it will. the new cabinet is to be sworn in in less than an hour in front of key figures there, the economy minister who was previously the deputy economy administer at lehman brothers and then pricewaterhousecoopers. the prime minister says there may not be a budget in place where we may not know the actual depth of those cuts that you mentioned about $21 billion in cuts to meet the deficit targets for next year. we may not know those until late february, early march. he wants to do the budget and that's when the pain of this new government is really going to be known. nina? >> okay. some mixed fortunes for spain there. but fortunes for people up near the pyrenees or it seem, the winning ticket may well have been sold. al goodman joining us from

madrid. pauline? dishing up dinner for a dictator. we talk to a man who traveled the world to seek out delicacies for kim jong-il's dinner table. we'll explain. stay with cnn.

from cnn london, i'm nina dos santos. >> i'm pauline chiou at cnn hong kong. let's take a look at how we're faring as we wrap up the festive season week later 0en. volume is pretty light as you'd

expect, ahead of holiday time. as you can see on one hand we have markets pushing quite a bit higher, last time we looked at them, 20 minutes or so they were up 1%. they're pushing even higher than that. this is largely on the one hand thanks to the fact that the ecb has made available an unprecedented amount of money in the form of cheap long-term banks and keep money circulating. also hoping perhaps they will be buying up euro zone bonds and trying to give the government bond markets a bit of a lift with the excess to extra cash. we've had news of mergers and acquisitions that has been lifting the market, in particular, this transaction, aig, the parent of british airways. it has prevailed in its takeover battle for british midland, the regional carrier in the united kingdom, bmi. the company agreed to pay

leftanza. restructuring will be required to bring bmi into profit and that may indeed incur or involve job losses at the company. in the meantime, that's the big mergers and acquisitions deal. considering mergers and acquisitions have dried up given the euro zone crisis of late, this is being seen as a bit of a shot in the arm for markets, let's say. >> yes. i would say so, especially as a lot of companies are closing books for the end of the year. you showed us promising numbers on the european markets. no such gains here on thursday. stock markets closed lower. still the losses were muted except in sydney with the s&p asx finished down by more than 1%. you see its red arrows across the board, the nikkei down by 0.75 and the hang seng and

shanghai composite down by the same amount, mainly because of slowing growth in china. brief light at the end of the tunnel for the u.s. housing market was moved further down the track, thanks to an accounting error. felicia taylor has all the news from wall street. stocks pulled back following a major rally on tuesday and finished mixed on wednesday. the daily dose of news out of europe raised concerns about the region's debt issues and weaker-than-expected earnings from oracle sent tech stocks deep into the red as investors feared poor performance in the overall sector in the next couple of months. the dow industrials edged up 4 points to close at 12107. the nasdaq lost 1% and the s&p also edged a small gain. on the housing front, sales of previously owned homes rose 4% in november, an encouraging sign for the still-battered housing market. the number of homes on the mark set decreasing, now at a

seven-month supply. along with the monthly data, the national association of realtors issued a revision of all existing home sales dating back to 2007. the group reduced their calculations by more than 14%, blaming fewer for sale by owner transactions and some accounting errors for the mistake. it makes an already dire housing situation even worse. but recent data shows both home sales and prices are beginning to recover. wall street will get another round of important economic data on thursday, whihighlighted by final revision of second quarter gdp. it's secreta it's expected to hold steady at a 2% rate. that's a wrap of the day on wall street. i'm felicia taylor at the new york stock exchange. ratings agency fitch has put the united states on notice saying it will most likely cut the country's aaa credit rating in 2013 unless legislators come up with a good plan to reduce the budget deficit.

now fitch projects the u.s. federal debt will exceed 90% of gdp by the end of decade and the rising burdenen is not skin the with the u.s. retaining its aaa status. the u.s. congress, of course, has struggled to agree on measures to cut federal spending. ratings agency s&p has downgraded the united states from aaa to aa plus. let's now take a check on some of the other top business stories we're following here on "world business today." bank of america will pay $335 million to settle a probe over racial discrimination at its country wide financial unit. while the u.s. government investigation found that the company steered 200,000 african-american and hispanic borrowers into high interest mortgages even though they qualified for better rates. in a statement, bank of america said that the discriminatory practices before had been taking place before it bought country wide back in 2008.

claims first reported by "the wall street journal" say that hackers in china successfully infiltrated computer systems of the u.s. chamber of commerce. the sophisticated attack which reportedly took place in 2009 and also in 2010 may have compromised information belonging to some of the u.s. business lobbies 3 million members. news about the alleged incident did the adds to growing u.s. concerns about cyberespionage emanating from china. and yahoo! rose by 6% in wednesday's session, that was on the back of reports that it's considering selling off valuable asian assets to focus on the core u.s. business. the company reportedly is weighing a plan to cut its large stake in the chinese e-commerce sight alibaba and sell out of japan. such a deal would allow yahoo!

to narrow in on its u.s. advertising business which is seen as lagging rivals google and facebook. it's been four days since we learned of the death of former north korean leader kim jong-il and new details continue to emerge. south korea's news agency has reported that kim jong-un has given orders before kim jong-il's death. meanwhile, in a meeting with south korean leaders take, president lee myung-bak said this is men to the show it holds no animosity. uncertain future still has investors a bit cautious, though, seoul's kospi closed slightly lower today at the end of the session on thursday.

north korea has been notoriously guarded and very private but since kim jong-il's death, some people are actually coming out and sharing their stories, including his former personal sushi chef. he tells us what it was like working in the kim household. >> reporter: as north korea mourns the loss of its dear leader, the world is anxiously waiting for his youngest son, kim jong-un to reveal what sort of successor he will be. one man with a personal insight is kenji kfujimoto. he would be invited to kim jong-il's private parties and drink with him. he would ask me do you like me? i would tell him i loved him and kiss his cheek.

they shared a passion for fine food. while many north koreans were starving, kim jong-il would send him around the world to buy ingredients for lavish dishes. he traveled to thailand for mangos and papayas as well as other countries. on a trip to japan i bought a whole tuna for 40,000 u.s. dollars, he told us. i would do this a few times a year. while in pyongyang, he spent time with young kim jong-un. he described him as a chip off the old block, believing this teenager would one day succeed his father. he would always take the lead over his brothers says fujimoto. he was always going to succeed his father. kim jong-un has inherited a country with nuclear capabilities, a crippled economy and a humanitarian crisis. the u.n. estimates a quarter of the population is facing starvation. while many are concerned that

kim jong-un will follow in his father's footsteps, fujimoto believes this swiss educated leader is worldly and very aware of what his country does not have. "i believe he is aiming at reform and open society" explains the chef. he will look to china so the country can move forward. while there are fears that kim jong-un and those around him may act to prove his leadership, fujimoto is hopeful he will lead his country out of the wilderness and into the international arena. anna coren, cnn, seoul. the southern chinese village of wukan may have settled grievances with officials but in a town 120 kilometers away and fairly close to hong kong, things are heating up. i-cable tv says police have used

tear gas. they say that plan the will put their health at risk. witnesses say around 2,000 police officers were brought in overnight and they've set up checkpoints all over the area. police are reported to have beaten and retained demonstrators since they took to the streets on tuesday. pauline, something slightly different. i do hope you've got your christmas shopping done. if this man has found time there's no excuse for the rest of us. we'll hear from the u.s. president a little later on in the program as he hits the shops. ard for their clients' futures. never taking a bailout. helping generations achieve dreams. buy homes. put their kids through college. retire how they want to. ameriprise. the strength of america's largest financial planning company. the heart of 10,000 advisors working with you, one-to-one. together, for your future. ♪

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there's a harbor shot of victoria harbor and the skyline of hong kong there. i wish i could say that was fog or clouds there but unfortuna

unfortunately for the most part it's pollution you're looking at. welcome back to "world business today." let's take a look at the global weather picture. we are joined from the international weather center. things not really feeling fresh here in hong kong. no surprise that a lot of people are jumping on planes and heading to europe. how is the weather there, guillermo? >> europe is going to see the cold air, especially in the east, we are dealing now with a lot of snow and the prospect of significant snow for bulgaria. so sofia may see 40 sent meters of snow in the next few days. the lows are greece, turkey, istanbul may see snow. antalia will be mostly rain and clouds. in britain, things will cool

down but we do not expect so much rain anymore. take a look at germany. we see some snow now. it's because we have a jet here, the jet stream. it's like a highway for storms. so the storms sit on it and ride along and that's why right now over germany we see all that snow. but in general from germany all the way to spine and portugal, we are going to see good conditions. i'm not talking about this only, all the way up in porto, for instance. and the east unstable, all the way up into norway, into sweden, st. petersburg, russia, the czech republic, the alpine region. you see this dip over here, it will be cold, snow and rain. that's here to stay. it's here to stay at the beginning of week as well. we get sofia, the prospect of snow, 30 to 40 centimeters.

skopje awill see that, too. on christmas day, london, not that cold. 6 degrees with some clouds. and then new york, the rain, here in the states, the snow in the west and the rain in the south and it's moving all the way into northeast. but the note in europe is how the cold air is dipping down and staying, being emphasized, especially pauline, in the east. back to you. >> it seems strange that hong kong is just a little bit warmer than london. >> absolutely. i know. yes. >> how bizarre. how bizarre. >> it is. >> oh, well, that's weather. there are always these surprises. thanks so much guillermo. >> see you later. >> nina, bring me holiday cheer as i shiver on sunday here in

the hong kong cold. >> i'm not complaining if we're getting balmy conditions over here, it will be ai change for once, won't it? it may be the most wonderful time of the year but for a shopping mall santa, it's another day at the office. santa shares the secret of life in the iconic red suit. that's when we come back here on "world business today," after this break. it's me? alright emma, i know it's not your favorite but it's time for your medicine, okay? you ready? one, two, three. [ both ] ♪ emma, emma bo-bemma ♪ banana-fana-fo-femma ♪ fee-fi-fo-femma ♪ em-ma very good sweety, how do you feel? good. yeah? you did a really good job, okay? [ female announcer ] to nurses everywhere, thank you, from johnson & johnson.

welcome back. live from cnn hong kong and london, this is "world business today." if you think you're too busy to get all of that shopping done over the holiday season, well, spare a thought for this man. u.s. president barack obama has quite a bit to do. even he found the time on wednesday to pick out a gift or two. >> in case you guys are wondering, just dance for the wii, the girls beat me every time on these various dance games. i'm going to -- you guys will never get a picture of me doing it. because i get graded "f" every time. >> his wife and two daughters are already in hawaii on the family's annual vacation but bo the first dog still remains at the white house with the president. perhaps just to keep him company. >> yes, a little bonding time there. well, we all know that santa's job is to deliver presents to

good little children all around the world but what if it's your zwrob to be santa? in this week's "world at work" we meet a stockbroker turned professional father christmas. >> first thing we do is put on the jingle boots. >> my real name is ty dunson. i'm from los angeles, california. they call me santa ty. >> i've always had a long beard. it gets caught on things, power windows. not the kind of thing you want to work on machinery with. i'm ready for work. ♪ >> ho, ho, ho. merry christmas. >> my friends and relatives, they -- i always got nominated to be the santa claus at

christmastime for events. and then from there it was children's hospitals, charitable events. i grew into it. hair turned a little whiter, came out a little further. i ended up liking it. this is santa's house. this is write live. this is where i work. this is where i greet all the boys and girls that come to pacific place to see santa. i was a stockbroker for ten years, stock and commodity broker. i still have a job at the convention center in los angeles. i do this in the wintertime. in the fall months, i be santa claus. i travel all over the united states, puerto rico, japan, this year it's hong kong, jamaica one year. so i never know, it's always a surprise. it's like christmas for me, too. a puppy? a real puppy? >> a toy puppy. >> i'll bring you a real puppy.

>> oh, no. >> mom would love that. this is the easiest job there over could be. sit on your butt, hand out candy and make children life and smile. it's just magic. sometimes they're tired and cranky but you try to get them comfortable. we always try to bribe them with candy. once you put the uniform on, you are actually santa. and with the real beard, people believe you. >> merry christmas. merry christmas. ho, ho, ho. >> let's take a look at how the markets are faring at the moment. the ftse 100 is powering ahead in comparison to how it was trading before. this is largely because in just the last 25 minutes of trading we have had news that the uk gdp for the third quarter has now been revise upwards, just slightly better than expected,

0.6% from 0.5%. as we see in these statements, the mixed messages further down in the small print. the second quarter gdp growth for the quarter before the one that's been rised upwards has been revised downwards from 0.1% growth to flat lining zero growth. we've had m & a activity and some sizable deals in the last few days of the year with news that aig, the parent company of british airways has clinched a deal now to buy bmi off luftenza for a price tag of $270 million. nina, that's it for this edition of "world business today." we hope to see you in about four hours, just before wall street opens. i'm pauline chiou in hong kong. >> i'm nina dos santos in london. you're watching cnn, the world's news leader.