Showing posts with label real economy. Show all posts

Wednesday, 5 August 2015

Chinese Real Economy Faces Extreme Pressure, & More

Downward Pressure on China Economy to Persist in 2015

BEIJING: Downward pressure on China’s economy will persist in the second half of the year as growth in infrastructure spending and exports is unlikely to pick up, a senior central bank official was quoted as saying.

Chinese companies are not optimistic about business prospects according to the central bank’s second-quarter survey, Sheng Songcheng, the director of the statistics division of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), was quoted as saying by the National Business Daily on Saturday.

China Caixin manufacturing PMI falls to 2-year low

BEIJING--The Caixin China manufacturing purchasing managers' index, a gauge of nationwide manufacturing activity, fell to a two-year low of 47.8 in July, compared with 49.4 in June, Caixin Media Co. and research firm Markit said Monday.

A reading below 50 indicates a contraction in manufacturing activity from the previous month, whereas a reading above that level indicates expansion.

"July data signaled that the downturn in China's manufacturing sector intensified at the start of the third quarter," said Caixin in a statement. "Renewed falls in both total new work and new export orders led manufacturers to cut production at the fastest rate since November 2011."

The final reading was lower than the Caixin preliminary July PMI of 48.2 which was a 15-month low. The preliminary figure is based on 85% to 90% of the responses to its PMI survey.

Puerto Rico just defaulted for the first time

"This was a decision that reflects the serious concerns about the Commonwealth's liquidity in combination with the balance of obligations to our creditors and the equally important obligations to the people of Puerto Rico," Puerto Rico's Government Development Bank president Melba Acosta Febo said in a statement.

The default is a historic moment in Puerto Rico's economic "death spiral," a term the island's governor, Alejandro Garcia Padilla, has used. The island is struggling with about $70 billion in total outstanding debt, and its economy is in recession.

EIA Capitulates Under Cover Of Darkness

To be clear, the EIA, on a weekly basis, uses a proprietary model to estimate U.S. oil production and then on a monthly basis uses actual data to revise those figures. Thus, what we were witnessing from Texas RRC data and Bakken output appears to be spot on in estimating that actual production was well below EIA estimates.

Run away melting of Laurentian ice sheet when C02 increased

There was a shift in the ice 9,000 years ago when the ice sheet began to melt away. Surface melt drove final deglaciation. The level of CO2 that triggered the melt was much less than it is today.

The FDA & Big Pharma Alliance: Lethal Cover Ups

It is undeniable that the FDA has a controversial relationship with the pharmaceutical industry. Not a single psychiatric drug is released into the market for administration until the FDA gives its safety a legitimate stamp of approval. But how legitimate is this stamp and are these drugs truly safe? The medical cartel formed by the matrimony between the FDA & Big Pharma must come under scrutiny and both parties must be held accountable for their inexcusable corruption.

Five Tips To Improve Memory And Boost Brain Power

Memory loss has become a problem from stress, unhealthy diets, smoking, drugs, alcohol; and memory loss is a common result of this type of lifestyle. Without having a long-term memory, we could not remember the basics of life and who we are. The prospect is frightening! Memory loss used to be considered only linked to aging but that has changed.

Methane Leaks May Greatly Exceed Estimates, Report Says

The problem, according to the author of the paper, Touché Howard, is that the backpack-size tool uses two sensors: one for low levels of methane emissions and one for higher levels. As methane levels rise beyond the capacity of the first sensor, the device hands off to the second, high-level sensor.

Why A Carbon Tax Would Be The Ultimate Energy Game-Changer

Critics of renewable energy, seemingly blind to the massive subsidies devoted to fossil fuels and nuclear energy, complain that solar and wind energy depend upon subsidies. It is true that they have, in the past; it is also true that subsidies are no longer necessary. Consider these two recent projects tied to power purchase agreements: At the end of 2014, Saudi based ACWA Power bid 5.98 cents per kWh, for a project in Dubai, below the cost of natural gas in the region (which is 9 cents per kWh), without any subsidies, expecting double digit returns. Michael Liebreich, the founder of Bloomberg New Energy Finance says “This is the shot that will be heard around the world.

Model Shows How Surge In Wealth Inequality May Be Reversed

"The greatest significance of the work is that we succeeded in quantifying the relative effects of different factors contributing to wealth inequality," Berman told Phys.org. "The inequality surge is not due to a single factor.

Therefore, in order to understand it better, such a quantification is important. I also think that a very interesting finding is how important personal savings are. Though other elements may be equally important in general, the dramatic decrease in personal savings is probably the single most important ingredient contributing to the increase in wealth inequality in the past 30 years."

Learning Success:

APPLY Tips From The Best

Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway – He is a deeply conservative trader during the times that everyone around him is moving from one extreme to the other to the tune of huge losses and gains. Warren Buffett is a perfect example of patience, proving that slow and steady generally wins the business race. (Although I continue to press my own desire to spur Fishbowl’s inventory software business to race!)

Top Weekly Ideas and Insights

An Inconvenient Truth:

What Happens When Top Economists Realize Physical Growth Constraints?

EXISTENTIAL REALITY

"Humanity's Coming of Age"

- The Last Days of Economic Growth -

Friday, 24 July 2015

LOOK OUT - Now Greece's Real Economy Crashing, Jim Rogers -"Greece Not Fixed" & More

Platinum Wealth Partner's Insights

The real engine of any economy is its small and medium-sized business sectors. They are fragile entities that can only afford 3 to 6 months of poor sales, thereupon the slide to closure or bankruptcy begins - taking millions of domestic jobs in the process that do not come back quickly, if ever.

Greece's problems will be intensified by these events, plus the serious shortfall in resource capacity per capita. Greece' s real solution therefore is depopulation or degrowth per capita to bring its physical input and outputs relationships back into a sustainable relationship.

Old economic thinking is never going to work for Greece, and the many more Greeces in the pipeline, until policy-makers solve the physical economic issues. That's the new reality when nations pass "peak everything" on a country to country basis hitting the slippery downward slope..

Stay tuned - there is much more to come!

Good Luck, Be Careful Out There.

Mechanic Giorgos Prasinoudis stepped out of his closed motorcycle repair shop in Athens, as a ‘For Sale’ sign was posted on the front window, on Wednesday.

On Greek streets, grim talk and empty storefronts

ATHENS — Giorgos Prasinoudis ran his motorcycle repair shop in Athens for three decades, through good times and bad. Now a ‘‘For Sale’’ sign hangs outside the window.

Empty storefronts are again a feature of Greece’s towns and cities as spending dries up in a crisis that puts Greece’s future in the euro in doubt. The tales of hardship are repeated up and down the country of nearly 11 million people.

Jim Rogers on Fox Business Discussing the Greek Debt Deal & Oil Prices

Jimmy Rogers sees little hope to solve Greece's issues and he thus confirms and shares our views. Next year we will be back at the bargaining table with this puppy. Time to let go of Greece before it brings down the whole house of Eurozone cards, with a devastating impact on the global economy.

Either way, we are in for a massive global credit crunch, at some point, when the Bank's start writing down this debt.

Greece Clears Final Reform Hurdle Before New Bailout Talks

The number of disaffected Syriza lawmakers, who see the reforms as a betrayal of the anti-austerity platform that brought their party to power in January, shrunk slightly compared to last week's similar vote — from 38 to 36. But that is still roughly a quarter of all party lawmakers.

Addressing parliament before the vote, Tsipras said the reforms were a necessary price to pay to keep Greece alive after stormy talks with its creditors nearly collapsed earlier this month.

Economic slump, not natural gas boom, responsible for drop in CO2 emissions

Between 2007 and 2009, when U.S. emissions plummeted by 10 percent, there were changes in how much Americans consumed, what types of products they consumed, the balance of manufacturing and service industries, and the quantity of energy used per dollar of products produced. Together, these changes account for more than three-quarters of the decrease in emissions between 1997 and 2013, with changes in the mix of fuels used to generate energy accounting for just 18 percent, Davis said.

Economy main factor in US emissions decline

Davis and his co-authors conclude that without new policies that limit CO2 emissions, it may be difficult to keep emissions down as the U.S. economy continues to recover. And in fact, U.S. CO2 emissions rose in 2013 and 2014.

Missing Gold, Unpayable Debts, Financial Crises, Bail-Outs and Bail-Ins… There Must Be a Better Way

To Congress and the Administration: Give Bail-UPS and Bail-DOWNS a chance. Clearly bail-outs and bail-ins have been problematic, so let’s progress in a new direction that benefits taxpayers and debtors.

New York Plans $15-an-Hour Minimum Wage for Fast Food Workers

Flavia Cabral, 53, a grandmother from the Bronx who works part-time in a McDonald’s for $8.75 an hour, pointed out the scars where fry baskets had seared her forearms. “At least they listened to us,” she said, referring to the panel. “We’re breathing little by little.”