BizChina

Increased use of gold in making jewellery in growing markets such as India and China has pushed up the yellow metal's prices, according to a study by Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry study based on the Dubai Multi-Commodities Centre (DMCC).

Besides, the demand for gold as reserve and hedge against inflation and investment and speculative demand for gold with the intention to profit from the continuing uptrend also contribute to the uptrend in gold prices, the study said.

The investment demand is not the only reason for the price rise of gold, higher demand for converting it into jewellery in countries like India and China, as gold plays an important role in their cultures, also led to the rise in gold prices, the report said.

The World Gold Council (WGC) estimates that jewellery and investment demand from these Asian countries represented about 40 per cent of total global demand in 2010, and that demand from India is expected to grow overtime.

Chinese search engine Baidu.com announced that is plans to make a USD306 million investment in Qunar.com, a Chinese travel search engine.

The investment will make Baidu the majority shareholder of Qunar, which offers Chinese consumers real-time searches for air and rail tickets, hotels, and tour packages.

The parties currently expect that the transaction will close in the third quarter of 2011. After the investment, Qunar will continue to operate as an independent company, while both companies will cooperate in certain areas of online travel search. Baidu plans to finance the investment through obtaining a third-party loan facility.

Tencent Holdings Ltd, the world's third largest Internet firm, aims to be China's Facebook, Twitter and Google -- all rolled into one.

While the company's market value has quadrupled to $50 billion over the past 2- years, its revenue and profit growth is expected to slow over the next few years, forcing the company to rethink its future.

Tencent is aggressively diversifying away from the highly competitive online gaming industry and into China's social networking, e-commerce and mobile search engine sector.

The company, an investor darling whose mascots are a pair of chubby penguins with wraparound scarves, faces many risks, including managing its partners, content regulations and strong competition from rivals such as Baidu Inc, SINA Corp and Alibaba.com.

China's economic planner is mulling policies that would boost the development of seawater desalination facilities in order to supplement the country's supply of freshwater.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), together with 11 other departments, are working on guidelines to accelerate the development of the country's seawater desalination facilities, said Li Jing, deputy director of the Environment and Resources Department under the NDRC.