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Billabong International Ltd., the biggest publicly traded surf wear retailer in the world, posted a decline in the net income for the first half of the current fiscal. The company reported today that the net income for the first half decreased by 15%.

The company said that the decreased profit was reported mainly because of the slowdown in the U.S. and also the strong Australian dollar made an impact on company’s earnings.

National Australia Bank reported its first quarter results today.  Though, the profit reported by the bank is in line with the company guidance, but it is far behind when compared with the results of the rivals like Westpac and Commonwealth Bank of Australia who posted a better first quarter profit. The first quarter profit for National Australia Bank remained almost same comparing to the same period last year.

Dell topped HP’s sale in the notebook PC segment for the first time in India. The world’s top PC maker also grabbed the No. 1 spot in India, in the particular segment, for the first time in the last quarter. Dell’s market share for the quarter remained at 26.3 per cent.

Murray Goulburn Co-operative Co Ltd, still has faith that its bid to buy Warrnambool Cheese and Butter Factory Company Holdings Ltd (WCB) will be beneficial for it. The views of the company about the takeover remain intact, even though WCB has refused the offer.

Talking about the $173 million bid, Murray’s Managing Director, Stephen O'Rourke said that even though he was ‘disappointed’ with the decision, he is keeping his faith alive.

On Wednesday Microsoft strengthened Outlook's connections to social networks. Microsoft had introduced Outlook Social Connector (OSC) in last November. And now it is emphasizing on its social network programs. Industry experts believe that technology major Microsoft has acted faster after Google's rocky integration of Gmail and social networking.

Outlook Social Connector (OSC) is now used by Microsoft as a way to make social networking contact information available in Outlook, Microsoft announced the public beta of LinkedIn for Outlook and partnerships with Facebook and MySpace as well.

The fiscal first-quarter profit of Hewlett-Packard Co.'s (HPQ) has climbed 25% higher than the previous quarter. So now its technology major Hewlett-Packard Co.'s which has shown a tremendous potential in worldwide sales and profit growth of its products, which can be seen as a strong indicator of recovery in certain markets.