On Monday, database software giant, Oracle announced that Mark Hurd had joined the company as a president and a director. Hurd was fired as CEO from HP after an affair with  a porn actress who had been hired as a contractor.

Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, a personal friend of Hurd’s, criticized HP’s board last month in an e-mail message to The New York Times, saying it was “the worst personnel decision since the idiots on the Apple board fired Steve Jobs many years ago.”

Hurd has joined Oracle as president and has been named to Oracle’s board of directors.

“Mark did a brilliant job at HP and I expect he’ll do even better at Oracle,” said Oracle CEO and c-founder Larry Ellison. “There is no executive in the IT world with more relevant experience than Mark. Oracle’s future is engineering complete and integrated hardware and software systems for the enterprise. Mark pioneered the integration of hardware with software when Teradata was a part of NCR.”

“Mark is an outstanding executive and a proven winner,” said Oracle President Safra Catz. “I look forward to working with him for years to come. As Oracle continues to grow we need people experienced in operating a $100bn business.”

“I believe Oracle’s strategy of combining software with hardware will enable Oracle to beat IBM in both enterprise servers and storage,” said Hurd. “Exadata is just the beginning. We have some exciting new systems we are going to announce later this month at Oracle OpenWorld. I’m excited to be a part of the most innovative technology team in the IT industry.”

Charles Phillips an Oracle president has resigned. To add to the drama, the New York Times reports that Phillips acknowledged having an affair after a woman he had been seeing put up a web site and billboards detailing his extramarital relationship.

It's not known if that was a factor in parting company with Larry Ellison.

Aer Lingus: Aer Lingus today announced its passenger numbers in August fell by 7.1% to 1,012,000.

During the month, Aer Lingus said its long haul passenger numbers plunged by 14.7% to 99,000, while its short haul numbers dipped 6.2% to 913,000.

The airline said that its overall load factor in the month rose to 85.7%, an increase of 2.7 points compared to August 2009. It said that capacity was cut on a planned basis resulting in a capacity drop of 13.3%.

Its long haul load factor rose by 10.2 points to 89.9% with capacity dropping by 27.3%. Its short haul load factor eased by 1.2 points to 83.9% with capacity decreasing by 4.5%.

For investors looking for strong yields, Tim Murphy, managing director at IP Global, recommends looking at the UK property space. He speaks to CNBC's Martin Soong about the impact of government cooling measures on Asia's real estate sector:

Barclays: The UK bank today announced that American Bob Diamond is to be the next chief executive.

Diamond, who is estimated to be worth £95m sterling, will take over from John Varley after he steps down next year. The 59-year-old  Diamond, one of the world's highest paid bankers, joined the group in 1996. He currently serves as Barclays' president and chief executive of Barclays Capital, the firm's investment arm. He handled the acquisition of the US operations of Lehman Brothers after the spectacular collapse of the investment bank in September .

Economic View: A 2020 vision for Anglo windown; Goodbody chief economist, Dermot O’Leary, comments - - "While it has not been confirmed as yet, the indications coming out of the Irish Finance Minister’s meeting with Competition Commissioner Almunia in Brussels last night are that Anglo Irish Bank will now be wound down over a period of ten years. Anglo’s management had been pushing for a good bank/bad bank split, but sources in Brussels have expressed their doubts about this particular course of action. As part of these discussions, the Minister is reported to have requested and extension of the state guarantee for large deposits so that there is not an outflow when the initial government guarantee, which was first introduced two years ago, is removed at the end of this month.

Furthermore, to remove the chances of capital flight between institutions, it is reported that the guarantee would have to be extended to all institutions, although it is likely that the EC would be sceptical of such a wide-ranging guarantee given the anger expressed at the time of the initial guarantee in some quarters. All now rests with the European Commission and while its final decision may be some way off, it is likely to provide a preliminary ruling in the near future. This is a recognition of the urgency of the issue and the need for certainty."

Countries have to accept those workers who are willing to move across borders, Larry Hatheway from UBS, told CNBC, adding that worker productivity reforms are needed in Europe.

BIS study of post-crisis debt levels: 'What goes up tends to come down'; Davy's Aidan Corcoran comments  -- "Research published yesterday by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) addresses the question of what happens to debt levels after credit-fuelled bubbles burst. A possible outcome in such cases is entry into an ever-increasing debt spiral; however, the BIS research shows that this is uncommon. Instead, a period of debt reduction follows 17 out of the 20 systemic banking crises the authors study. On average, debt-to-GDP ratios fall by 38 percentage points.

A 38% fall in private sector debt-to-GDP is a huge adjustment, especially bearing in mind that the denominator, GDP, is presumably also falling for some part of the adjustment period. The authors are wary of giving figures for the effect on GDP of the debt reduction, but suggest that a well functioning banking system is key to mitigating the effect.

Seemingly one step ahead of the BIS, Irish households have been busy de-leveraging for the last year. In July 2010 alone (the latest month for which we have data), the net flow of household lending was minus €716m, according to data from the Central Bank. Loans for house purchases, consumption and other purposes have all been in secular decline. Several factors are at play here. Lower interest rates and lower house and other prices mean less lending is required. The crisis-induced shock to employment prospects also dealt a shock to credit demand. But supply may also be constrained, with the domestic banking system still in a state of flux. Between bank re-financing and greater clarity on the future of Anglo, this month will be key to resolving the supply side."

US Markets

US markets were closed on Monday for Labor Day.

Asia Markets

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index fell 0.3% Tuesday having gained 1.5% Monday.

The Nikkei 225 dipped 0.81%; China's Shanghai Composite is off 0.08%; Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 0.05% and India's Sensex Index advanced 0.32%.

Julia Gillard who supported a party coup against Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd in June, is set to form a government after two independent lawmakers agreed to support her minority government after the closest election in 70 years.

The Reserve Bank of Australia left interest rates on hold at 4.5% for the fourth month today, with the central bank saying inflation was close to its target and the global outlook uncertain.

Asia benchmarks

In Europe, the Dow Jones Stoxx 600 fell 0.21% Tuesday.

The ISEQ has dipped 0.34% in Dublin.

CRH is off 0.07%; Elan has dipped 3.30%; AIB  has declined 0.65% and BoI has dropped 0.87%.

Aer Lingus also lost 0.87%.

Elan (Reduce, Closing Price $4.50); Rifts in the board: Goodbody's Ian Hunter comments - - "Yesterday afternoon, Elan was granted an interim injunction until next Monday (13th September) in the Irish High Court against 'two dissident directors of the board' preventing them from establishing a parallel investigation into concerns about corporate governance in the company. The two directors, who are also shareholders in the company, are attempting to engage a firm of lawyers to look into corporate governance issues, after they had made a complaint at a meeting of the audit committee in May 2010.

Elan instigated an independent investigation immediately after that meeting, the results of which are due to be presented to the board on 15th September. The dissident directors, however, are threatening to commence litigation in the US, demanding that they be given interim access to all the investigation materials and be permitted, at Elan's expense, to conduct their own review. The Elan proceedings allege that the action of the directors: (i) breaches the provisions of a settlement agreement when the two directors joined Elan's board; (ii) breaches Elan's Code of Governance; (iii) was in Elan's name without its authority; and (iv) would interfere with, prejudice or undermine the on-going, independent, investigation. The two directors involved, Jack Schuler and Vaughn Bryson, were active investors who had raised a number of concerns with Elan management before being invited to join the board in June 2009. A number of issues have recently been raised in the public domain by another investor and we presume that the current rift in the board is around those issues and the company's response to them. It can only be hoped that these difficulties in the boardroom do not detract management too much from the day to day running of the company."

European Benchmarks

Irish Share Prices

Irish Stock Market Capitalisation by Company

Key Index Performance Statistics

Euribor Rates

AIB Daily Report

Bank of Ireland Daily Report

Irish Financials; Bank Guarantee: Goodbody's Eamonn Hughes comments  -- "In recent weeks, there has been some speculation that the Department of Finance has been enquiring with the EU about a possible extension of elements of the existing bank guarantee, with the main focus on corporate deposits. Press reports overnight indicate that the DoF is looking to extend the guarantee to provide protection for large deposits in Anglo, but given this may cause inequality in the marketplace, it may have to be extended for all the banks covered by the existing guarantee. Both large banks have significant eligible collateral – AIB has €48bn and BOI €41bn – at end June and that gives us comfort on their ability to roll-over debt in September, though the market is probably watching the deposits figure a little closer. Presumably, all will be revealed in the coming weeks given the main guarantee expires end this month."