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TODAY IN PERSONAL JOURNAL

The ‘No Makeup’ LookMARKETPLACE Airlines Tighten Friends and Family Perks

CONTENTSArts in Review.......... D5Corporate News B2-4,7Global Finance............ C3Heard on Street..... C10In the Markets.......... C4Money & Investing C1,2

Opinion..................... A9-11Sports.............................. D6Style & Travel....... D1-4Technology................... B5U.S. News................. A2-4Weather Watch........ B7World News..... A6-8,12

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What’sNews

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World-Widen TheWhite House and Con-gress clashed over Iran sanc-tions, with lawmakers vowingpunitive measures despiteObama’s veto warning. A1nRebels in Yemen agreed torelease the president in ex-change for more influence inrunning the country’s affairs,the state news agency said. A6n France unveiled plans tobolster security and intelli-gence in the wake of violencethat left 17 people dead. A12n Germany’s anti-Islammovement suffered a blowwith the resignation of oneof its central figures. A12n Biden said he might enterthe presidential race even ifit would mean facing offagainst Hillary Clinton. A4n Treasury Secretary Lewstruck an optimistic note onprospects for a business-taxcompromise with the GOP. A4nAn Argentine judge re-leased a complaint alleging thepresident conspired with Iranto sabotage a terror probe. A12nThe Supreme Court dividedinto ideological camps as itconsidered so-called disparateimpact fair-housing suits. A3n A Palestinian manstabbed and wounded ninepeople on a bus in Tel Aviv. A6n The government proposedpoultry-testing standards totarget salmonella. A3n California officials warnedabout ameasles outbreak linkedto the Disneyland Resort. B3nDied:Melvin Gordon, 95, rancandymaker Tootsie Roll. B1

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The ECB’s executive boardproposed a $58 billion

monthly bond-buying programto spur Europe’s economy. A1 European stocks closedhigher, with Germany’s DAXsetting a record. The Dow rose39.05 points to 17554.28. C4 Italy’s premier said he wel-comed the euro’s decline andwished the currency tradedat parity with the dollar. A7nGoogle is preparing to sellwireless service directly to con-sumers after striking deals withSprint and T-Mobile US.A1nMicrosoft unveiled aWin-dows version to run on gadgetsbeyond PCs and said it wouldbe free for many users. B1, B5n Canada’s central bank cutinterest rates, becoming thefirst G-7 nation to do so in re-sponse to the oil-price fall. A7n Kinder Morgan is paying$3 billion to buy a new oilpipeline and other energy as-sets in the Bakken Shale. B1n KKR refundedmoney toinvestors in some of its buy-out funds after regulatorsfound it overcharged them. C1n American Express said itwould cut 4,000 jobs as it re-ported a rise in expenses. C1n S&P softened bond-ratingstandards to win business,regulators said as they an-nounced a settlement. C1n P&G named senior execu-tive David Taylor to run itsbeauty business, putting himin the lead for the CEO job. B2n EBay is cutting 2,400 jobsand agreed to add Icahn part-ner Christodoro to its board.B4

Business&Finance

WASHINGTON—The Obamaadministration collided withCongress Wednesday over Iransanctions, and both sides weregirding for a brawl that appearedlikely to stretch through theyear.

Lawmakers from both partiesvowed at a Senate hearing topress ahead with legislativeplans for new punitive mea-sures—over President BarackObama’s veto warnings. Top ad-ministration officials, meanwhile,disclosed at the hearing that theinternational talks over Iran’snuclear program may extend be-yond an end-of-June deadline.That would be the third such ex-tension.

Deepening the chasm, HouseSpeaker John Boehner (R., Ohio)invited Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu to addressCongress on Feb. 11 about threatsfrom Islamic extremism and Iran.The Obama administration calledthe move a breach of diplomaticprotocol because neither Con-gress nor Israel consulted firstwith the White House.

“We found out from Boehner’sstaff this morning—no heads upfrom the Israelis, and no discus-sion with Boehner’s staff in ad-vance either,” said a senior ad-ministration official.

The decision to invite Mr. Ne-tanyahu to the U.S. to back a po-sition supported by many Repub-licans came after Mr. Obama lastweek hosted U.K. Prime MinisterDavid Cameron, who urged Con-gress not to adopt new sanctionsagainst Iran during the talks and

PleaseturntopageA6

By Jay Solomon,Michael R. Crittenden

and Carol E. Lee

Obama,CongressClashOn Iran

FRANKFURT—The EuropeanCentral Bank’s executive boardproposed buying roughly €50 bil-lion ($58 billion) a month inbonds for at least a year, accord-ing to people familiar with thematter, but markets largelyshrugged as investors ponderedwhether the ECB will do enoughto stoke Europe’s fragile economy.

The board’s proposal for thebond-purchase program, knownas quantitative easing or QE,forms the basis of deliberations

by the entire 25-member govern-ing council on Thursday onwhether to embark on a path al-ready forged by the U.S. and theU.K. but mostly avoided in Eu-rope. The final number and de-tails of the program couldchange after the full board hasits say.

The initial reaction to detailsof the ECB’s plan in the financialmarkets on Wednesday wasjumpy, betraying nerves amonginvestors who have racked uplarge bets on aggressive actionby the central bank. The euro

fluctuated before ending thetrading session in Europe a littlelower, showing that traders andinvestors see the proposals as asign that large asset purchasesare coming, and there was amodest price decline in govern-ment bonds in the U.S. and theeurozone. Stocks rallied after aninitially volatile reaction, withGermany’s DAX index closing ataround an all-time high.

Despite those gains, the mar-kets showed a less-than-dra-matic response, signaling thatexpectations for more easy-

money policies from the ECB arealready factored into stock, bondand currency prices.

Investors are counting on theECB to unveil a program that willshock and awe the market, saidChristopher Sullivan, who over-sees $2.45 billion as chief invest-ment officer at the United Na-tions Federal Credit Union in NewYork. But “from what we haveseen today, it seems investors areanything but confident theyshould expect that outcome.”

“More details are neededfrom [Thursday’s] official an-

nouncement” and ECB PresidentMario Draghi’s news conference,said James Kwok, head of cur-rency management at AmundiAsset Management, which man-ages $1 trillion.

The lack of a stronger marketresponse also reflects the suc-cess the ECB has had in recentmonths in convincing investorsthat they were prepared to act.In that sense, the bank has got-

PleaseturntopageA7

BY BRIAN BLACKSTONE

Europe’s Bank Signals Stimulus PlanECB Board Proposes $58 Billion in Monthly Bond Buying, but Draws a Tepid Response From Markets

Giann

isPa

panikos/AssociatedPress

Google ReadyTo Jump IntoMarket forCell Service

ATHENS—Greek Prime Minister AntonisSamaras, under pressure at home to end hiscountry’s financial bailout regimen, soughthelp last spring from German ChancellorAngela Merkel about relieving some ofGreece’s debt.

Ms. Merkel asked an interpreter to trans-late the phrase “debt relief,” according topeople familiar with the meeting. Then shetold Mr. Samaras: “It doesn’t sound as goodin German.”

The retort was an early sign Greece couldexpect little clemency from its German-ledcreditors.

Greece, the eurozone’s most troubledeconomy, remains tethered to an unforgiv-ing bailout machinery, built at Berlin’s be-

BY MARCUSWALKER AND MARIANNAKAKAOUNAKI

AUSTERITY OFF-RAMP

Failed Europe Talks Steer Greeks Left

Google Inc. is preparing to sellwireless service directly to con-sumers after striking deals withSprint Corp. and T-Mobile USInc., a move likely to prod thewireless industry to cut pricesand improve speeds, according topeople familiar with the matter.

It isn’t clear how widely theInternet search giant plans to of-fer wireless service, how much itwill cost or when it will go onsale. Google might start small bylimiting the new service to cer-tain U.S. cities or to users of itsGoogle Fiber broadband Internetservice.

The move is one of the stron-gest signals yet that Google,based in Mountain View, Calif., isstretching its ambitions far be-

Pleaseturntothenextpage

BY RYAN KNUTSONAND ALISTAIR BARR

If you think you are going tofind a foot-tall strawberry whenyou pop open the yogurt con-tainer in your hand, Dannonwants to disabuse you of thethought.

On big trucks fea-turing three giantcups of the company’sOikos brand Greek yo-gurt in Times Squarerecently, there was amessage repeated inseveral places: “Notrepresentative ofproduct.”

Swedish retail giantIKEA stresses on sev-eral-foot-high signsthat hang from the rafters ofsome stores that the mammothpicture of its beef hot dog is “notactual size.” And online ads forDermitage, a skin product thattouts “less wrinkles in only min-

utes,” have shown half the face ofa woman with smooth skin andthe other half with serious wrin-kles, noting that it was “simulatedimagery.”

No, they don’t think you are anidiot.

Companies are sup-posed to avoid depict-ing their products inways that are poten-tially misleading toconsumers, but insome cases, their dis-claimers seem prettysilly.

Dannon, a subsid-iary of food and bev-erage conglomerateDanone SA, wanted toemphasize the fruity

flavor of the product so it de-signed oversize fruit for the yo-gurt-cup vehicle, says MichaelNeuwirth, a Dannon spokesman.

“When you see that truck, andPleaseturntothebackpage

BY SHIRLEY S. WANG

Warning: The Article You’re AboutTo Read Might Make You Laugh

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These Days, Advertising Hyperbole Is BestFound in the Disclaimer; Giant IKEAHot Dog

Not actual size

hest, that issues financial aid in exchangefor reforms and regular inspections.

The system’s iron rules helped push theGreek government to snap elections Sunday,with an outcome that could return the coun-try to the brink of exit from the euro. Inpolls, Mr. Samaras’s ruling conservativestrail the radical-left opposition party Syriza,which promises to end the austerity Europehas imposed on Greece as the price of res-cue loans.

Syriza could find it even harder to swal-low the market-oriented overhauls thatproved too much for Mr. Samaras’s govern-ment. Unless it agrees to overhauls, Germanofficials say, Greece won’t get the loans itneeds to avoid default by the summer.

Even if Mr. Samaras manages to win Sun-day, the mounting conflicts between Athens

and its creditors show how hard it will befor any Greek leader to satisfy Europe andthe International Monetary Fund withoutcausing political convulsions at home.

Germany’s stringent recipe for makingthe eurozone more frugal and competitive isputting such pressure on weaker euro mem-bers that 2015 threatens to be a year of po-litical upheaval. Across Europe’s depressedSouth, rising political upstarts such asSyriza and Spain’s left-wing Podemos partyare challenging unpopular ruling establish-ments.

The renewed Greek drama illustrates howEurope’s long economic malaise is increas-ingly turning into a political and social cri-

PleaseturntopageA8

A worker checks ballot boxes in Thessaloniki ahead of Sunday’s national elections in Greece. The radical-left party Syriza leads in polls.

Italy backs weaker euro........... A7 Canada cuts interest rates..... A7

New era for Windows................ B1

Political kingmaker emerges in vote............. A8

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