http://bit.ly/qOGYln National Small Business Week Day 1

The U.S. Small Business Administration's National Small Business Week was held in Washington, D.C., marking the 56th anniversary of the agency, and the 46th annual proclamation of National Small Business Week.

More than 100 small business owners from across the country gathered at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel along with keynotes and panels fro leading speakers including Karen Mills,Administrator , U.S. Small Business Administration and Michael Porter
Bishop William Lawrence University Professor,based at Harvard Business School

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Investors who hold retail stocks are nervously looking towards the weekend when it is understood High Street giant Tesco will launch a price war among the country’s grocers.Shareholders ordinarily become nervous when the words ‘price war’ are mentioned in such a mature and competitive sector as retailing. They hurt margins and it is unclear whether short-term revenue gains can be held over the long term.But Tesco is no ordinary retailer – it accounts for £1 out of every £7 spent on the High Street. And despite Tesco chief executive Philip Clarke’s comments earlier this summer that some of its UK products are looking tired, it still remains a formidable force.



Asda, owned by US retailer Wal-Mart,
has been price-cutting for a while and market watchers say Tesco has
decided to offer more price cuts to consumers as a way of more clearly
showing the savings inside its stores.Tesco is also seeing its market share squeezed by discount retailers such as Aldi, Lidl, Waitrose and Marks & Spencer (up 1.1p at 336.7p) at the top end.Analysts
at Shore Capital say Tesco seems keen to ‘stimulate mellow UK trading
set against a demonstrably tough UK consumer economy’.
 



FTSE CLOSE: Stocks fall ahead of US news; BoE gives hope of new stimulus

But any price cuts Tesco does make also have a significant knock-on effect on under pressure grocery delivery business Ocado. Ocado’s
prices match Tesco on 7,400 products, and if it has to lower prices on
hundreds of items, that will hurt its profitability. The business was the biggest faller in the FTSE 250 on these concerns, sinking 13.2p to 102.5p. On
Monday Ocado saw its shares take a 10 per cent hit after it warned of
slower quarterly sales growth in a trading statement. Panmure Gordon
analyst Philip Dorgan said price-cutting by ‘Tesco will hurt Ocado’s
sales numbers for the rest of the year and in future years’.If Tesco does launch a price war, it is likely to cast a large shadow right across the British High Street.       The FTSE 100
slid 75.30 points to 52888.41, as a cautious market noted the latest
minutes from the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee discussed
quantitative easing – boosting the flow of money circulating though the
flagging economy. Though only Adam Posen, of its nine members, thought
this should be done now.In
New York the Dow Jones index fell 36.97 points to 11,371.69, in early
trading as investors waited on a statement from America’s Federal
Reserve, due after the bell, on plans to extend stimulus measures to
boost the US economy in a move known as Operation Twist.‘The
opening of the market in Wall Street was as flat as a pancake,’ said
Hargreaves Lansdown head of equities Richard Hunter. ‘Volumes were not
that high on both sides  of the Atlantic as traders largely sat on 
their hands in advance of the Fed announcement.’Financials bucked the trend as Lloyds Banking Group climbed 1.93p to 36.16p, Royal Bank of Scotland gained 0.29p to 23.38p, and Barclays slipped 1p to 153.25p.UBS
published research which sought to measure companies’ exposure to the
faltering euro. As a result the bank added insurer Aviva to its list of
‘least preferred’ stocks in the sector, due to its ‘significant
exposure’ to the eurozone.‘Aviva
generates over 50 per cent of profits and has circa 45 per cent of
capital invested in the eurozone,’ said UBS analyst James Pearce. Aviva dropped 12.7p to 295p, one of the biggest single fallers on the FTSE 100.Within the same sector, UBS moved Prudential on
to its ‘most preferred’ list,  mentioning ‘its ability to benefit from 
economic expansion in Asia’ as well as its ‘lack of exposure to the
euro’. Prudential rose 3p to 597p.A
range of housebuilders remained solid on news that the MPC is
considering boosting QE, which would lead to further asset purchases.Bellway was boosted 21.5p to 627.5p, Bovis Homes was up 13p to 418.6p, and Taylor Wimpey advanced 1.1p to 34.52p.     After being bolstered by bid talk over the last few weeks, satellite launch company Inmarsat lost 13.3p to 490.2p as the market began to lose faith in a suitor for the firm coming forward.Analysts
from Citigroup warned of regulatory concerns in America and the
uncertain prospects for its core mobile satellite services business. And
Morgan Stanley also downgraded its recommendation to ‘underweight’ from
‘equalweight’, due to concerns about the US side of the business.
Shares in Dillistone closed
flat at 74.5p after the Aim-listed firm that makes specialist software
for recruitment companies bought rival Woodcote Software for £1.89m in
cash and shares.

The London-based business placed
644,445 shares with institutions at 72p to raise £500,000. Dillistone
also posted first-half pre-tax profits up 8 per cent to £551,000, on
strong trading. Its dividend remains at 1.2p.