Word: benchmark
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...case, warnings had been sounded for some time, including from inside the company. In an internal memo published in Australia's Fairfax newspapers in August, a disgruntled executive complained of a "culture of greed." In other companies, he wrote, "acquired projects are actually required to generate a certain benchmark return before bonus payouts take place. Instead, we have created an environment where senior people are rewarded for ... ginning up rosy projections to justify their rewards...
...proficiency tests, such as Wisconsin or Mississippi, had few schools that failed to meet testing standards. States that were hardest hit were those with difficult proficiency tests, like South Carolina, where 83 percent of schools failed to meet their targets. The sharp disparity provides further proof that a nationwide benchmark of total proficiency by 2014 is an unworkable deadline. Beyond the inconsistencies and idiocies of the testing regime, schools are also having a hard time reaching mandated proficiency standards because No Child Left Behind still suffers from severe underfunding. While it’s true that funding...
...Despite interest-rate cuts last week in the U.S., Europe and Asia, businesses throughout the world are finding it nearly impossible to borrow and money-market rates remain abnormally high. In Hong Kong, for example, the one-month interbank offered rate, the benchmark for short-term bank lending, rose to 5% last week even as the city cut its policy rate from 3.5% to 2.5%. Banks remain leery of lending in the face of further financial-industry failures...
...cure the constipated credit markets that are stalling the global economy. Under normal circumstances, interest-rate cuts by central banks would promote interbank lending. But Wednesday's coordinated rate cuts in the U.S., Europe and Asia have failed to restore lenders' confidence. The London Interbank Offered Rate, the benchmark for short-term interbank lending rates, actually rose to 4.75% Thursday, its highest level of the year. In Hong Kong, interbank lending rates have doubled in the past month. Banks remain gun-shy about resuming lending, in part because they remain unclear about the scope and details of a proposed...
While Gressly agreed that the current situation in Sudan is unstable—noting the probable delays in the upcoming January 2009 elections—he said the 2011 referendum is a necessary benchmark that cannot be delayed...