Eurozone Crisis: In the Eye of the Storm
The Eurozone crisis has been in retreat since the introduction of the European Central Bank’s (ECB) three-year long-term refinancing operations (LTROs) in late December 2011. At the European Council Meeting in early March, journalists who cover the crisis fretted that boredom loomed. The current lull does not indicate that the Eurozone is in the clear, but rather it is simply in the eye of the storm, and more drama inevitably awaits. Extend and pretend So far, there are three key mechanisms the troika — the European Commission, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and ECB — has employed to buy time for the Eurozone’s weaker countries to regain competitiveness and return to growth. Each of these could fail over the next few years, prompting a renewed intensification of the crisis. The first of the Eurozone’s time-buying mechanisms is the bailout programs that have been provided to Greece, Portugal and Ireland.
Beyond Brics
China: first global “megatrader” since the British empire China’s weak March trade numbers today rattled markets and raised new questions about both the extent of the economy’s slowdown and just how reliable any trade data ex Beijing is in itself these days, given the huge distortions seen last year due to over-invoicing. But then all of that is testament to the fact that China’s monthly trade data are, for good reason, the most closely watched of their kind in the world today. Why? Standard Chartered offers a good reason in a new report, also out today: China is the first “megatrader” the world has seen since the fall of the British empire.
Archive
Contact Us: Andrew Huszar Sunday, August 3, 2014
Alphaville
Elsewhere on Wednesday, - The real problem with HFT. - Summers’ inverse Say’s Law. - The impolitic wisdom of Simon Kuznets. - Buying the future. Read more
GOLDEN JACKASS.COM - The Golden Jackass Knows Gold, Currencies & Bonds"
Welcome to Golden Jackass website -- SUBSCRIBE today for Login access trouble, use Login Finder feature to retrieve passcodes (back to 2004) (recent work) April 7th: on Japanese in a monetary vise, the Petro-Dollar demise in the face of tight Russian & Chinese teamwork, and the
The Diplomat Magazine
China has made dramatic economic progress during the last five years, weathering the global financial crisis and becoming the world’s largest exporter and second largest economy, surpassing Japan. By James A. Dorn for The Diplomat
Blog
Blog Crumbling fundamentals in both the short term & long by Chris Martenson Wednesday, February 26, 2014, 8:21 PM
Weblog and Essays
Let's Clear Up One Confusion About Bitcoin November 3, 2017 If bitcoin can be converted into fiat currencies at a lower transaction cost than the fiat-to-fiat conversions made by banks and credit card companies, it's a superior means of exchange. One of the most common comments I hear from bitcoin skeptics goes something like this:Bitcoin isn't real money until I can buy a cup of coffee with it.
International ETFs
Investment case US Stocks When you step back and take a look at US Equity performance for this decade, you pretty quickly come to the conclusion that there's gotta be a better way. After the dot com bubble burst, the S&P 500 has taken its time to climb back to year 2000 levels, finally getting there in October 2007. Then, just when we thought we were above water, along comes 2008. So the 2000s have not been kind to US stocks.
JamesTown Foundation
PLA Joint Operations Developments and Military Reform April 9, 2014 During recent high-level political meetings, Chinese leaders have made repeated calls for “military reform.” While these speeches have given little detail about the content of such reform, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), in... Category: China Brief, Home Page, Military/Security, China and the Asia-Pacific, China Facing Grain Shortfalls, China Asserts Self-Sufficiency Policy
Teach/Me Data Analysis
Scaling of data may be useful and/or necessary under certain circumstances (e.g. when variables span different ranges). There are several different versions of scaling, the most important of which are listed below. Scaling procedures may be applied to the full data matrix, or to parts of the matrix only (e.g. columnwise). Range Scaling Range scaling transforms the values to another range which usually includes both a shift and a change of the scale (magnification, or reduction).
Macro Business
For a long time, we have suggested that because of China’s GDP growth being driven primarily by investment, the end result will inevitably be over-capacity. This has been apparent in industries such a ssteel, machinery and others (now even Caterpillar is exporting overcapacity in China, so to speak). We also believe that the construction boom after the 2008/09 stimulus has already led to over-building of residential real estate. The only problem we all have is that there are no accurate official statistics in China (like those in the US) that we are aware of for capacity utilisation.
