CALDEIRÃO DE BOLSA

Israel's Harel Insurance Investments said on Tuesday it had acquired a 20 percent stake in a project to build a light railway in Jerusalem.

Eyal de Paauw, manager of private equity and real estate at

Harel, told Reuters the firm had acquired the shares from Israeli companies Ashtrom Group and Polar Investments and expects to invest about 40 million shekels ($8.9 million) in the project.

"We bought 10 percent stakes from shareholders Ashtrom and Polar, which previously had each held 37.5 percent in the project," he said, declining to disclose how much Harel had paid.

The two firms are part of the City Pass consortium, which won a tender to build and operate the light railway project in Jerusalem with atotal investment estimated at around 2 billion shekels.

The consortium's holdings now comprise Ashtrom Group with 27.5 percent, Polar Investments with 27.5 percent, French heavy engineering firm Alstom with 20 percent and European transport firm Connex with 5 percent.

"Alstom and Connex have not reduced their shares. Perhaps in the future there may be some development in this area but for now there is no change," de Paauw said.

Harel is one of Israel's largest insurance firms. Its Tel Aviv-listed shares were up 0.9 percent in early afternoon trading, compared with slight gains on the broader bourse.

"(Harel's) whole investment will be from profit sharing policies. The total exposure of profit sharing policies in regard to the investment is expected to be around 40 million shekels," de Paauw said.

($1 = 4.45 shekels)

((Reporting by Jonathan Saul, editing by Josephine Ng; Tel Aviv newsroom +972-3-537-2211 ext 233; email:jonathan.saul@reuters.com))

Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- ABB Ltd., the world's largest maker of
factory robots, remains ``open and ready'' for closer ties with
Alstom SA's power-turbines business, Aargauer Zeitung reported,
citing Chief Executive-designate Fred Kindle.
``Juergen Dormann raised this possibility,'' the paper cited
Kindle, who succeeds Dormann as chief in January, as saying in an
interview. ``It's a good thing. It is a shame that ABB divested
the power-turbines business. We are open and ready to examine
whether there's any way of going back.''
Alstom of France bought ABB's power-generation business four
years ago. Given the opportunity of a ``big expansion'' in either
power generation or one of the two main businesses of power
technologies and automation, Kindle said he ``wouldn't know yet
if power generation would be the best for ABB,'' without being
more specific.
The likeliness that ABB will be able to meet its profit
margin target of 10 percent at the power technologies division
has ``slightly declined,'' the Aarau, Switzerland-based paper
cited Kindle as saying.

(Aargauer Zeitung 11/05 p.13)

Alstom: sur les rangs pour un super Queen Mary II.


(Cercle Finance) - A en croire le quotidien la Tribune, qui confirme l'information révélée hier par Ouest France, les Chantiers de l'Atlantique (Alstom Marine) sont sur les rangs pour la construction d'un 'super Queen Mary II' qu'envisagerait de commander le croisiériste américain Carnival.

En compétition avec l'italien Fincantieri sur ce contrat majeur, la filiale d'Alstom Marine peut se prévaloir de la livraison il y a quelques mois à Cunard (groupe Carnival) du plus important paquebot du monde, le célèbre Queen Mary II.

Pour l'heure, Alstom Marine a prévu de baptiser aujourd'hui, en présence du Ministre de l'Economie et des Finances, Nicolas Sarkozy, le premier méthanier qui sera livré à Gaz de France à la fin de l'année.

RB.