LONDON ? Stock markets around the world were closing out 2011 on a subdued note Friday, with many of the world's major indexes posting big declines for the year in the wake of Europe's debt crisis, a faltering U.S. economy and signs that China's economy is no longer sizzling.
Markets have also been rocked by natural disasters, trading scandals, political upheavals, sharp fluctuations in commodity prices, and the up-and-down price of oil amid the turmoil in the Arab world.
In Europe, the trading backdrop has been particularly grim, with many of the main markets poised to post their worst year since 2008. That's perhaps unsurprising given that most of the attention of the financial world has centered on the debt crisis, which has already seen three relatively small countries bailed out and is threatening much-bigger Italy.
Trading in Europe on Friday was fairly quiet with many traders using the opportunity to close out their books for the year. The FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was down 0.2 percent at 5,556, while Germany's rose 0.3 percent at 5,868. The CAC-40 in France was 0.3 percent higher at 3,136.
With policymakers failing to convince markets that they can deal with the crisis and the eurozone widely-predicted to slip back into recession next year, the euro is ending 2011 softly around the $1.2934 mark after falling to a 15-month low against the dollar on Thursday at $1.2857. The euro started the year at $1.3345.
Wall Street was expecting a flat opening. As things stand, U.S. markets are going to record modest gains for the year, largely on the back of a year-end run following stronger than anticipated U.S. economic data.
Though the performance of the U.S. economy has played second fiddle to Europe for much of the year, it has the potential for shoring up confidence in 2012 if the recent positive news continues.
"Crystal ball-gazing can begin in earnest over the weekend but I am tempted to conclude ? more of the same in Europe, easier policy in China, and further asset reflation in the U.S., which finally gets life back into the housing market and thereby drives optimism about the 2013 economic outlook," said Sebastien Galy, an analyst at Societe Generale.
Asian markets have already closed out the year and most markets had a year to forget. Japan's Nikkei 225 index, after three straight days of losses, managed to eke out a 0.4 percent rise Friday to end the year at 8,429.45. However, that was its lowest closing since 1982.
Meanwhile, China's benchmark gained 1.2 percent to close at 2,199.42 ? still, a 21 percent loss for the year as the impact of Beijing's multibillion-dollar stimulus faded and the government tightened curbs on lending and investment to cool blistering economic growth.
Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index gained 0.2 percent to close at 18,434.39 ? a precipitous slide of 19.7 percent from a year ago. Singapore's Straits Times Index closed down 1 percent at 2,646.35 ? a 17.5 percent dive.
Australia's benchmark S&P ASX 200 ended the year at 4,140.4 ? down 0.4 percent on the day and 14.5 percent lower for 2011. A day earlier, South Korea's benchmark Kospi closed at 1,825.74 on Thursday ? 11 percent down on its last trading session of the year Thursday.
Oil prices meanwhile were poised to close out the year around the $100 a barrel mark ? benchmark crude for February delivery was up 30 cents at $99.95 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
____
Pamela Sampson in Bangkok contributed to this report.
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After the wonderful action game Hyperlight, Catfishblues games has come up with their latest multi platform game Tiny Comet. In the game you play as a comet which has been captured by the earth?s gravity and you need to get back where you belong by collecting energy to avoid fading away while remaining away from obstacles.
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Public release date: 27-Dec-2011
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There is discussion and chatter at WebmasterWorld around a possible Panda update that started on December 19th.
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Dry turkey and overcooked steaks don't have to be a staple of your holiday dinners or homemade meals. Sous-vide is a cooking method that uses immersion in hot water to cook food over long periods, low and slow, resulting in some of the most succulent and tender meat you've ever tasted, and an easy, hands-off cooking process that anyone can do. Sous-vide has gotten a bit trendy but it's for good reason. It's surprisingly easy, not nearly as fussy as it might appear, and the results speak for themselves. Here's a primer to what sous-vide cooking is, why it's incredible and you should try it, and how you can get started on the cheap. 
Pros: 
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My first sous-vide recipe closely followed the beer cooler steak hack performed by Serious Eats' J. Kenji L?pez-Alt back in 2010, and their sous-vide steak how-to. I picked up a 5-quart personal cooler from Amazon for $16, and thawed out a pair of thin (less than a quarter-inch) strip steaks I had in the fridge. I seasoned the steaks and dropped them into a pair of sealed plastic bags along with a little canola oil for a little fat in the mix. In a separate pot, I brought some water up to 145 degrees, and poured it into the cooler. I got as much air as possible out of the bags by dipping them in the water and letting the air come out before sealing them shut, added them to the cooler, shut the lid, and walked away for just over an hour. Since I was using a typical beer cooler, traditionally designed to keep cold in and warm out (now converted to work in reverse), I couldn't heat the water in the cooler to keep temp. Instead, I relied on the cooler to retain heat, which it did (mostly, I lost a few degrees, but not much) for the duration of the cooking time. When I took the steaks out, the results were incredible, and some of the juiciest steak I'd ever eaten.
Just as L?pez-Alt discovered, I found that even though the personal cooler loses heat much more rapidly than a commercial sous-vide cooker or water oven, the heat loss is definitely slow enough to keep the water at temp for long enough for a few thin cuts of steak, or a couple of ribs, or a pair of fish fillets, seasoned with oil, spices, and aromatics. However, the heat loss is enough that if you want to try a whole rack or ribs, or thick ribeyes or full New York strip steaks, or if you want to try cooking the perfect turkey the way my friend Dr. Terry Simpson does every Thanksgiving and Christmas (and on other occasions, too), you'll need better equipment than a small beer cooler and some simple freezer bags.
Regardless of what you plan to cook in your water oven, a 10-liter model will do you just fine when it comes to cooking just about everything, from large, thick steaks to thin fillets of fish, and it does it all safely. Simply program the oven with the cooking temperature, and the oven makes sure the water stays at the right temperature for the duration of your cooking time. It's definitely a steep admission price to get into the world of sous-vide cooking, so even though we think the food is worth the cost, it's a good idea to try our cooler method before you buy.