Der USA Bären-Thread
It's crystal clear that Florida real estate is in a recession. It should also be clear that Florida in general is in a recession. Those who disagree can give Mike Morgan a buzz at Morgan Florida. He can fill you in on some of the details.
Michigan is in Recession
The state of Michigan is also in a recession. As proof I offer 42,000 jobs lost in state since August 2006.Statewide August seasonally adjusted unemployment rates rose four-tenths of a percent from this time last year, with three-quarters of the 56,000 payroll jobs lost in Michigan since August 2006 occurring in manufacturing and construction sectors, according to the Dept. of Labor and Economic Growth (DLEG).
While the national jobless rate remained unchanged at 4.6 percent, Michigan’s 7.4 percent unemployment rate in August increased over July’s 7.2 percent rate. The August rate was the highest monthly rate for the state since September 1993.
Total employment fell by 28,000 over the month as unemployment rose by 12,000 and the state’s labor force declined by 16,000 in August. “Michigan’s labor force in 2007 has declined in six out of eight months,” said Rick Waclawek, director of DLEG’s Bureau of Labor Market Information and Strategic Initiatives.
What About California?
Inquiring minds might be saying "Who cares about Florida or the Midwest rustbelt, what about California?" That's a good question.
Let's take a look starting with this headline: Californians not optimistic about economy.
A mood of gloom has settled on California in the past few months, with foreclosures and tightening credit causing more residents to see bad times ahead than at any time since 2003. The sagging confidence in the economy also is influencing voters' opinions of their elected leaders, the Public Policy Institute of California reported Thursday, with distrust in state government "near an all-time high." Most of those polled said they think state government is run by big interests and wastes taxpayer money.
Could it be that California Foreclosures are up 200% from Last Year?
The 2nd Quarter National Delinquency Survey, released recently by the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), shows that California mortgage loans entering foreclosure have reached 25-year highs, with subprime borrowers bearing the brunt of the storm. The MBA linked market factors such as declining home prices and an increase in housing inventory to the grim foreclosure situation in California, but failed to acknowledge the risky products and deterioration of lending practices in their own industry. “Brokers and lenders pushed risky products that maximized their profits, but lost sight of the basic fundamentals of lending,” said Paul Leonard, director of the California office of the Center for Responsible Lending. “Subprime borrowers were set up for historic levels of failure.”
.....Who cares if Michigan is in a slump? Ohio, same thing. After all both Michigan and Ohio are do nothing rust belt states. Florida? The demographics argument that everyone wants to move to Florida is now turned upside down as boomers exit Florida.
It's debatable whether or not California is a recession now. But it soon will be. And as each state slips into recession, simply click your heels together three times and repeat after me, "I'm not worried: all recessions are local."http://www.minyanville.com/articles/...S-foreclosures-C/index/a/14213
If the Fed keeps rates as they are, the dollar may stabilize and start trading in a narrow range against some major currencies, like the euro and the Japanese yen, in Mr. Yardeni’s view. That could change the fortunes of investors who have been using a spate of new exchange-traded funds to bet that the dollar will keep falling. These E.T.F.’s have made it much easier for individuals to buy and sell the British pound, the Swiss franc or even the Mexican peso. And some E.T.F.’s allow investors to bet that the dollar will rise or fall against a basket of currencies......
Although the dollar has fallen against a broad range of currencies this year, Mr. Yardeni said the picture might soon become more complex. The dollar could rise against some major currencies over the next six months, while falling against others, he said, depending on economic conditions and interest rates in each country.
For example, the Japanese yen, which has been floundering for years, has surprised investors by rallying against the dollar recently. But Mr. Yardeni said the yen could level off — or even reverse course — unless Japan’s central bank raised the country’s razor-thin interest rates. With fresh signs of deflation in Japan, he said, that may not happen soon.
As for the euro, which traded above $1.40 for the first time this month, Mr. Yardeni said he could imagine it going as high as $1.45 but not $1.50. And he predicted that the British pound, now trading at more than twice the value of the dollar, could fall to around $1.85 over the next six months.
“We might see a little divergence, where the dollar weakens against the euro and strengthens relative to the pound,” Mr. Yardeni said, because Britain’s economy has a lot of the same risk factors that the American economy does now — including a shaky mortgage market.The currencies with the best outlook are the Australian and Canadian dollars, he said, “because they have what the world wants now, which is raw materials.”Earlier this month, the Canadian dollar reached parity with the American dollar for the first time in more than 30 years. But Mr. Yardeni said he thought both the Canadian and Australian dollars might rise an additional 5 percent or so against the American dollar.
Michael Metz, the chief investment strategist at Oppenheimer & Company, said it was too late to buy the British pound or the euro, calling both currencies “grossly overvalued.” He said the Japanese yen was still attractive but not as much as it was in February, when Rydex introduced the CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust.“When that E.T.F. was created, the yen was the cheapest currency around,” Mr. Metz said. “But if you want an alternative to the dollar now, I think it’s the Swiss franc.” He said that the Swiss currency had not appreciated in tandem with the euro, largely because Switzerland has lower interest rates.......
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/business/...rldbusiness&oref=slogin
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Investment industry giant John Bogle says that as more and more money managers take control over corporations on Wall Street, Main Street is paying the price.
"My estimate is that the financial sector takes $560 billion a year out of society," Bogle explains to Bill Moyers. "Banks, money managers, insurance companies, certainly annuity providers. They're all subtracting value from the economy."
BILL MOYERS: What do you mean?
JOHN BOGLE: Well, let me say it very simply. The rewards of the growth in our economy comes from corporate, largely - from corporations who are a very important measure, from corporations that are providing goods and services at a fair price innovating and bringing in new technology — providing a higher quality of life for our society and they make money doing it. I mean, and the returns in business in the long run are 100 percent the dividends a corporation pays and the rate at which its earnings grow.
That still exists. But, it's been overwhelmed by a financial economy. The financial economy, which is the way you package all these ways of financing corporations, more and more complex, more and more expensive. The financial sector of our economy is the largest profit-making sector in America. Our financial services companies make more money than our energy companies — no mean profitable business in this day and age. Plus, our healthcare companies. They make almost twice as much as our technology companies, twice as much as our manufacturing companies. We've become a financial economy which has overwhelmed the productive economy to the detriment of investors and the detriment ultimately of our society.
BILL MOYERS: By the financial sector, you mean?
JOHN BOGLE:Banks, money managers, insurance companies, certainly annuity providers. They're all subtracting value from the economy. They have to subtract. To be clear on this now — I don't want to overstate it. To be clear on this, they have to subtract some value. But, the question is--
BILL MOYERS: What do you mean they subtract some value?
JOHN BOGLE:In other words, — you've go to pay somebody something to provide a service. It's just gotten totally out of hand. My estimate is that the financial sector takes $560 billion a year out of society. Five hundred and sixty billion.
BILL MOYERS: Where does it go?
JOHN BOGLE:It goes into the pockets of hedge fund managers, mutual fund managers, bankers, insurance companies. Let me give you this just one little example. If you didn't make a $129 million last year — I'm presuming that you didn't. You don't rank among the highest paid 25 hedge fund managers. A $129 million doesn't get you into the upper echelon.
BILL MOYERS: And on the way here this morning, I saw a story that now a $1 billion will not get you in the FORTUNE 400. A $1 billion!
JOHN BOGLE:Well, I spend a lot of time thinking about that. I mean, you kind of asked the question, which I've asked in some of my work. What is enough here? And the society is out of control. I mean, in THE BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF CAPITALISM, I talk about the frightening similarities between the American economy in America, our nation, at the beginning of the 21st century and Rome all those centuries ago around the 4th century.
BILL MOYERS: What are the comparisons?
JOHN BOGLE:We have an idea that we are the world's value creator and leader. And I'm talking not just about economic value, but, we like to think of America as having the best values of integrity and citizenship in the world. We're getting a little bit too much self interested. We have our own bread and circuses. And they're a little different than the bread and circuses they had in Rome. But, we surely have our circuses whether it's sports teams or casino gambling or the lottery in the states. And we see this not just in our economy, in our financial system. This very short-term focus on everything. You see it, sadly, in our government.
Everybody knows social security is going to run into crisis. We can't run these federal deficits forever. But, everybody looks out two years and says, "Will I be elected two years from now or a year and a half from now?" And, the short term focus ultimately betrays the very values that we have come to be used to in this great nation of ours.
BILL MOYERS: You said the other day to someone that we think we can fight the war in Iraq without paying for it.
JOHN BOGLE:Well, we borrow the money to fight the Iraq War by some estimates and they're not absurd estimates is running now towards a $1 trillion. We could be doing what the British empire did. We could be bankrupting ourselves in the long run. And--
BILL MOYERS: You see us as an empire?
JOHN BOGLE:Well, of course it's an empire. We reach all over the world. We thought of ourselves in many, many respects as the policemen of the world. God knows we know we're the policemen of the Middle East. And there are those say, even from Alan Greenspan on up or down, that oil is the root of that. I mean, these are great societal questions. Protecting oil, which is in turn polluting the atmosphere.
We have problems as a society. And we don't have to surrender to them. But, we have to have a little introspection about where we are in America today. We've go to think through these things. We've got to develop a political system that is not driven by money. I mean, these are societal problems for us that don't have any easy answers.
But you don't have to be an economist to know that a great deal of or a minimum in our economy is coming from borrowed money. People are spending at a higher rate than they're earning, and we're starting to pay a price for that now. Particularly in the mortgage side. But, eventually, that could easily spread and people won't be able to do that anymore. You can't keep spending money you don't have. It gets a lot of it, you know, and it wasn't that many years ago — maybe a couple of generations ago — that if you wanted something, you saved for it. And when you completed saving for it, you bought it. Imagine that. And that wasn't so bad. But, now, we know that we can have the instant gratification and pay for it with interest payments, of course, over time, which is not an unfair way to do it. We're going to pay a big price for the excessive debt we've accumulated in this society both in the public side and the private side.
And it's no secret that this lack of savings in our economy — just about zero — is putting us at the mercy of foreign countries. China owns — I don't know the exact number — but, let me say about 25 percent of our federal debt. China does. What happens when they start to buy our corporations with all those extra dollars they've got there? I mean, I think that's very-- these problems are long term, are very much worrisome and very much intractable.
BILL MOYERS: Your book is called THE SOUL OF CAPITALISM. Tell me what you mean by the soul of capitalism.
JOHN BOGLE: Well, I try in the book a little definition from Thomas Aquinas about the core of being — he's talking about the human soul, of course — but, the core of being,the elements that give you meaning, the values that you have-- the whole kind of wrap up of what makes a human being a human being.
And that happens in a much more, you know, a much less profound way in a corporation. There is in a good corporation and in capitalism a core of being of providing goods and services, at raising the standard living. And it's done a very good job at that. I don't want to demean that. You know, we went from the beginning of time, to around 1800, — the way people lived barely changed at all. And since 1800, the Industrial Revolution, and capitalism around that time has taken us to standards of living that are just — that would have been unimaginable to anybody of that day. We have all the perquisites and ease and freedom and safety of modern life. And so I salute capitalism for doing that. It's just we've taken it too far. Today's capitalists are different from yesterday's capitalists-
BILL MOYERS: How so? What's the big difference?
JOHN BOGLE:Well, I think much more they're operating on their own. Instead of for the interest of whose money has been entrusted to them. It's an element — it's what we call a bottom-line society, again. But I think it's the wrong bottom line. I want to come back to the difference between the financial system and the productive system. The productive system adds to the value of our economy. And, by and large, the financial system subtracts. And, yet, it's growing and growing and growing. And this short term thing where short term orientation in which trading pieces of paper is regarded as a social value. It is not a social value. Some of it has to happen, don't mistake me.
BILL MOYERS: Right.
JOHN BOGLE: But not as much as we have.
BILL MOYERS: What does it say to you that people seem so indifferent to the fact that one tenth of one percent of the population owns most of the wealth in this country?
JOHN BOGLE:Well, in the long run, I believe it's unsustainable. You know, this is not going to be, you know, a country like France, say, at the time of before the French Revolution. You know, the lords of France, the kings had probably the same kind of distribution of wealth we had today come by through long generations. Their own castles. We have those castles in America now. But it says to me that, in this society, it's not sustainable. There will be an outcry.
Even Allen Greenspan says in his book he's worried, new book-- he's worried about this division in the society. He's worried about dissatisfaction. He's worried about violence in our society. You can only have so much of an advantage to those at the top of the pyramid, and so much disadvantage that's at the bottom of the pyramid, before you start to get some very difficult things going on.
BILL MOYERS: This seems to me to be your great concern, that this self correcting faculty that is built into both democracy and capitalism is in jeopardy?
JOHN BOGLE:Actually, I think it's fair to say it's in jeopardy. But there's one sense that it's not in jeopardy. And that is, ultimately, the system will correct. The bigger the boom, I fear, the bigger the bust. In other words, you pay the price. It's not a self sustaining system at this kind of a level.
BILL MOYERS: Do we need new rules?
JOHN BOGLE: One thing is, I believe, to have a federal standard of fiduciary duty for money managers. They've come from eight percent ownership of American business to 74 percent ownership of American business. It's staggering, over unbelievable change. Without any rules as to how they're supposed to behave. We have state laws of proven investing and fiduciary duty and things of that nature. But they don't seem to be working. And our founding fathers actually thought about having a federal statute-- a federal corporate chartering statute. I think we probably need one because if some of the states step up and say improve their governance provisions, corporations will move to another state. So the state system I don't think can prevail.
So a federal standard of fiduciary duty which demands that our pension trustees and our mutual fund directors make sure that those pension funds and mutual funds are operated in the prime interest of those who have entrusted their money to them. And that includes responsibility for corporate governance. And it will ultimately turn to be focused more on long term investing.
When I came into this business in the 1950's, it was a business focused on the wisdom of long term investing. We changed in that period to a business that is focused on the folly of short term speculation. And think about this for a minute. If you're a true investor holding a company for the long term, you're well aware that the value in that company is company's earnings compounded over time, developing new products and services, developing efficiencies-- trying to size up the proper corporate strategy, you know, making the company more valuable. But, in the folly of short term speculation, you're just thinking will that stock be worth more or less six months from now or a year from now?
Give you a very specific example. In the first 15 years I was in this business, the average mutual fund held the average stock for seven years. Call that long term investing. Now, the average mutual fund holds the average stock for one year. That's short term speculation. So, if you're a speculator, you don't care much about ownership interest. You don't care so much about corporate governance. Why vote a proxy, for example, if you'll not even be holding a stock in three months?
The other part of it is,and this is really makes it a very difficult problem to solve. And that is a little about of — I guess it's Pogo — we have met the enemy and they are us. These mutual fund companies-- these management companies are now owned largely by corporate America. Or international corporations — Deutsche Bank — AXA, big international companies who have bought their way into the US financial system, which is-- don't mean to demean that. But, they own these public corporations-- giant public corporations like insurance companies, big banks-- foreign insurance companies and banks own 41 of the 50 largest mutual fund managers.
Now, what is the job of a corporation when they buy into a mutual fund management company? It's to earn a return on the capital they invest in that company. It's not to earn a return on the capital of the investors who invested with that mutual fund. Now, in fairness, they want to earn as much money as they can for the fund shareholders. But, not at their own expense.
What we've done is have you know, what I call in the book, a pathological mutation of capitalism from that old traditional owners' capitalism to a new form of capitalism, which is manager's capitalism. The evidence is quite compelling that today corporations are run in a very important way to maximize the returns of its managers at the expense of its stockholders.
BILL MOYERS: Its CEOs.
JOHN BOGLE:Its CEOs, well, the upper level of five or six top officers. And they get enormous amounts of pay for actually doing very little. I'm a businessman. Listen, we all-- we chief executives get an awful lot of credit that we don't deserve. Real work in companies is done by the people who are getting themselves together and doing the hard work of making companies grow--
BILL MOYERS: And, yet, these--
JOHN BOGLE: every day.
BILL MOYERS: These are the people who most often get laid off, right?
JOHN BOGLE:They get laid off. And, of course, the ironic part of that is they often get laid off — used to be called downsizing. But, of course, in today's America, it's called right sizing. They get laid off. That reduces expenses. That increases earnings and that means the CEO gets more.
Just think about the country for a minute. For an agricultural economy, 95 percent, 98 percent agricultural when this country came into existence. And even by 1850, half agricultural. Now it's about, they moved from agricultural economy, to a manufacturing economy, to a service economy. And now to a financial service economy. And the financial service economy is what troubles me. Because it's diverting resources from the investors to the capitalists. To the entrepreneurs. To Wall Street. To the investment bankers. The hedge fund managers. To mutual fund managers. And that is a negative to our societal values.
Where agriculture and manufacturing and services, I mean, I'm perfectly willing to give a high value, for example, to art and poetry and literature. They add value to society. It may not be easy to measure it in a society that measures too much of what's not important. And not enough of what is important. As the sign in Einstein's office says-- "There are some things that count that can't be counted. And some things that can be counted that don't count."
BILL MOYERS: John Bogle, thank you for joining me.
JOHN BOGLE: My pleasure.
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09282007/transcript1.html
Derzeit befindet sich das Bonitätsprofil amerikanischer Industrieunternehmen auf seinem historisch niedrigsten Stand. Die Rating-Agentur Standard & Poor's erwartet, dass sich der Abwärtstrend nach einer vorübergehenden Korrektur noch weiter fortsetzt, da minderwertige Neuemittenten und die bestehenden, in punkto Rating zunehmend glückloseren Unternehmen die Zahl der Emittenten mit Bonitätsnoten im spekulativen Bereich weiter vergrößern.
….. Einige Hinweise lassen jedoch darauf schließen, dass sich innerhalb der kommenden drei Jahre mehr als die Hälfte aller bewerteten amerikanischen Unternehmen in der Kategorie 'B' einfinden werden.
Noch aussagekräftiger dürfte die Tatsache sein, dass sich sogar innerhalb der Kategorie 'B' die Kreditqualität verschlechtert hat. Das neutrale B-Rating stellt nun erstmals die größte Rating-Bezeichnung von Standard & Poor's, nachdem es 2007 sogar die Bezeichnung 'B+' übertrumpft hat. Neutrale 'B'-Ratings nehmen nun 46 Prozent der gesamten Kategorie 'B' ein, während 38 Prozent auf die Bezeichnung 'B+' entfallen.
Ausfälle nehmen zu
In Abwesenheit eines nachhaltigen Konjunktureinbruchs dürfte jeder Höhenflug in Richtung steigender Kreditqualität wohl eher einem - kurzen und flachen - Sprung in seichte Gewässer gleichen. Wir glauben, dass der Markt nach einer zu erwartenden Korrektur seinen langfristigen Trend zu höheren Bonitätsrisiken fortsetzen wird. Des Weiteren erwarten wir im kommenden Jahr eine starke Zunahme an Ausfällen infolge der minderwertigen Schuldtitelemissionen der vergangenen Jahre…….
Quelle: Faz.Net
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Vorsicht [antworten]
Vielen Dank für die Kommentare. Es geht nicht darum zu sagen, dass "nichts passiert", und es steht auch nirgends, dass die Sache definitiv gut geht. Es scheint mir nur umgekehrt auch nicht seriös, aus der derzeitigen Lage unweigerlich gravierende realwirtschaftliche Folgen oder Rezessionen abzuleiten. Zitat aus der Kolumne: "Weshalb schlaue Prognostiker sich mit Festlegungen derzeit lieber zurückhalten" - das gilt natürlich in beide Richtungen. Da halte ich mich derzeit auch dran, finde es in diesem Rahmen aber legitim, auch einmal auf einige beruhigende Indikatoren hinzuweisen, die im Strom der Mutmaßungen gerade stark vernachlässigt werden.
Was die Verwirrung angesichts anderslautender Kommentare bei uns angeht, ist Ihr Hinweis darauf wichtig und gerechtfertigt. Aber es gilt bei uns einfach auch das ausdrückliche Motiv, dass wir ein Forum für unterschiedliche Meinungen sein wollen - und es dem Leser ein wenig auch überlassen, welche Argumente ihn mehr überzeugen.
Thomas Fricke | 28/09/2007, 15:10
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Sie sind "fundamental höchst zweifelhaft", weil eine Blasenwirtschaft, die durch zu niedrige Zinsen künstlich aufgepumpt wurde, nicht durch weitere Zinssenkungen "gerettet" werden kann. Das Ganze ähnelt vielmehr dem Versuch, mit Beelzebub den Teufel auszutreiben.
Dieses Zauberkunststück wird der Fed nicht gelingen. Denn mit den Zinssenkungen tritt sie eine Inflation los, die schnell "galoppieren" lernen und längerfristig zu einer schweren Wirtschaftskrise wie der in den 1970-ern führen könnte. Dann können - bei den zweistelligen Inflations- und Zinsraten, die Greenspan bereits jetzt vorhersieht - die verbeamteten Schönrechner von den Statistikämtern auch keine niedrig einstellige Kerninflation mehr "herbeirechnen", außer sie nehmen nicht nur Öl und Nahrung aus den Erhebungen raus, sondern Alles, was steigt.
Eine Rezession, die bei der eigentlich fälligen Zinserhöhung der Fed gekommen wäre, wäre temporär geblieben und nur ein Teil des normalen Wirtschaftszyklus. In einer galoppierenden Inflation hingegen wie in den 1970-er werden die Notenbanken jahrelang machtlos: Die Lohn-Preis-Spirale verselbstständigt sich und gerät außer Kontrolle. Die Spielchen mit der Zins-Pfeife, nach der die Märkte - zurzeit noch - tanzen, funktionieren dann nicht mehr. Die Messer der Fed würden stumpf, sie gäbe ihr Werkzeug aus der Hand.
http://www.ftd.de/boersen_maerkte/marktberichte/...banken/259529.html
We have long argued that CPI Inflation Data is a "Lie". For the most part, the media has dutifully reported the nonsensical CPI data as if it were scripture. This drumbeat of criticism -- both here and elsewhere -- has begun to penetrate the MSM. We've seen a few critical columns over the past year or so. But I never expected to see this kind of critical reporting in a mainstream outlet such as Bloomberg. See also Speechless on Core CPI
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/
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By Daniel Gross
Newsweek
Oct. 8, 2007 issue - Imagine that a cardiologist told you that aside from the irregular heartbeat, the stratospheric cholesterol count and a little blockage in your aorta, your core heart functions are just fine.
That's precisely what the government's cardiologist—Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve—has just done. The central bank is supposed to make sure the economy grows fast enough to create jobs and make everybody richer, but not so fast that it produces inflation, which makes everybody poorer. "Readings on core inflation have improved modestly this year," the Federal Open Market Committee said in justifying its 50-basis-point interest-rate cut last month, while conceding that "some inflation risks remain."
Catch that bit about "core inflation"? That's Fedspeak for: inflation is under control, unless you look at the costs of things that are going up. The core rate excludes the prices of food and energy, which can be volatile from month to month. Factor them in, and inflation is about as moderate as Newt Gingrich. In the first eight months of 2007, the consumer price index — the main gauge of inflation — rose at a 3.7 percent annual rate. That's more than 50 percent higher than the mild 2.3 percent core rate. The prices of energy and food are soaring, at 12.7 percent and 5.6 percent annual rates, respectively, and have been doing so for years. As a result, the CPI—including food and energy—has risen 12.6 percent since July 2003, for a compound rate of about 3 percent.
Signs of inflation are evident throughout the economy. When investors fear a rising inflationary tide, they latch onto the driftwood of gold. The day Bernanke cut rates, the price of the precious metal soared to heights not seen since 1980, when inflation ran at nearly 12 percent! I read about this in The Wall Street Journal (whose newsstand price rose 50 percent in July), which I picked up in the lobby of a New York hotel (where the average nightly rate soared 12.5 percent in the first seven months of 2007 from 2006, according to PKF Consulting) while sipping on a Starbucks Frappuccino (whose price has risen twice since last October).
There are sound macro-economic reasons to believe higher inflation may be a fact of economic life, according to former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, who discusses the topic in his new memoir, "The Age of Turbulence." (Apparently, the editors killed the original title: "The Dotcom Bubble Wasn't My Fault. Nor Was the Housing Bubble.") Greenspan notes that vast anti-inflationary forces in the 1990s — especially China's emergence as a low-cost producer of goods — helped tamp down prices. But China's rampant growth and rising living standards could encourage inflation. "China's wage-rate growth should mount, as should its rate of inflation," he writes.
Indeed. China's CPI leapt forward 6.5 percent between August 2006 and August 2007, the highest rate in 11 years. One of the main culprits? An 18.2 percent year-over-year increase in the price of food. In still-poor China, food expenditures account for 37 percent of the CPI, compared with 14 percent in the United States. In a recent paper, Albert Keidel of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace warns of China's "gathering inflation storm," powered in part by "explosive price increases in key consumer categories" like noodles and pork.
China is bound to export its inflation—it exports everything else, after all—either in the form of higher prices for toys, or in the form of higher global prices for the commodities it consumes in increasingly huge gulps. The Wall Street Journal noted that iron-ore producers are about to ask for a 50 percent price increase for 2008, thanks to rising demand from Chinese steelmakers. Chinese car sales are up 25 percent through August, which helps support oil prices.
In the United States, companies are passing along high-er commodity and fuel costs by boosting prices, slashing portions and tacking fuel surcharges onto things ranging from deliveries to lawn service. And because food and energy prices are so visible—the prices are posted in public, and consumers buy these goods frequently—price increases have a disproportionate impact on perceptions of inflation. Each month the Conference Board asks consumers what they expect the rate of inflation will be for the next 12 months. The figure has been above 5 percent since April.
China's government is trying to deal with its inflation in predictably Orwellian fashion. "Beijing has instructed local provincial and urban statistical bureaus in a subtle form of denial—they are not to use the word 'inflation' to describe what is happening," notes Keidel. It's easy to mock Beijing's clumsy bureaucrats. But by focusing on core inflation, the Federal Reserve—along with the legions of investors who reacted ecstatically to the interest-rate cut—is practicing its own subtle form of denial.
2007 Newsweek, Inc
China's $200 Billion Sovereign Fund Begins Operations (Update1)
By Belinda Cao
Sept. 29 (Bloomberg) -- China Investment Corp., the nation's $200 billion sovereign wealth fund, starts operations today as the government seeks to boost returns on the world's biggest foreign-exchange reserves.
The investment agency will come under the direct supervision of the nation's cabinet, the State Council. Lou Jiwei, former vice finance minister, will act as director and Gao Xiqing, former deputy chairman at the National Council for Social Security Fund, will be general manager, according to information disclosed at an opening ceremony in Beijing.
China set up Asia's biggest state-owned investment company after surging trade surpluses helped push the nation's currency reserves to a record $1.33 trillion. The agency's creation has spurred speculation of a flood of Chinese investments into overseas companies and resources such as oil and metals.
``Such a company is very necessary in the context of China's increasing trade surplus and trade frictions with other countries,'' said Li Yang, who heads financial research at the Chinese Academy of Social Science in Beijing. ``China needs to shift its exports from manufactured goods to capital, and also from the old model of relying on foreign investments for growth.''
The new fund made its first investment with the $3 billion purchase of a stake in Blackstone Group LP in May, suffering a loss as the New York-based private equity firm's stock dropped 19 percent since listing on June 22.
Investment Strategy
China's government hasn't disclosed in detail an investment strategy for the agency, to be funded by a total of 1.55 trillion yuan ($205 billion) special government bond sale that will be used to buy foreign-exchange reserves from the central bank. By Sept. 28, 700 billion yuan has been raised by 10-year and 15-year bonds issues. The finance ministry will sell more long-term bonds by the year-end to meet the budget.
The company ``will be prudent in its foreign exchange business, keeping in mind tolerable risks while also aiming to maximize investment returns in the longer term,'' it said in a statement handed out today before the opening ceremony.
Fred Hu, a managing director at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in Hong Kong, said the company should hold a global portfolio, including stocks, bonds, commodities and special assets in private equity, real-estate and hedge funds, according to a report in the official China Securities Journal on Sept. 10.
The company may also help major state-owned companies expand overseas, the Shanghai Securities News reported, citing Li Rongrong, director of the China State Asset Management Commission, the agency that oversees government assets.
Safety First
The sovereign fund should be cautious in the beginning and put safety before seeking high returns, said Li Yang at the Social Science Academy, who had been an invited advisor for the set-up of the company.
``The two agencies charged with investing China's currency reserves need to coordinate to prevent potential conflicts,'' Li said. China has been partly outsourcing its reserves investments since 1998 to international investment firms, and will continue to do so after the new company starts, according to Li.
Hu Huaibang will be in charge of supervising internal audits, the company statement said.
The State Administration of Foreign Exchange, a regulatory branch under the central bank, is still managing most of the nation's foreign currency reserves, which are largely invested in low-risk assets such as U.S. government debt.
Bigger Than Temasek
China owns $405 billion, or 18 percent, of foreign-held U.S. Treasuries, the second-biggest amount in the world after Japan.
The reserves management firm's assets will exceed those of Singapore's Temasek Holdings Pte, which had $107 billion under management as of March. Norway runs a $327 billion global pension fund to preserve the country's oil wealth for future generations.
The new company incorporates the former investment arm of the central bank, Central Huijin Investment Co., which holds controlling stakes in the nation's four biggest Chinese banks.
Central Huijin has injected $60 billion of its foreign reserves to boost the capital of Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Bank of China Co. Ltd and China Construction Bank Corp. since January 2004. The Agricultural Bank of China, the only state-owned bank not to sell shares to the public, may receive a $40 billion capital injection from Huijin, China's official Xinhua News Agency reported in August.
``The new investment company will continue to boost the capital of state-owned financial institutions,'' said director Lou Jiwei at the ceremony.
To contact the reporter on this story: Belinda Cao in Beijing at
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In China wird jetzt sozusagen eine Investment-"Firma" - eben jener Super-Fond - als juristische Person vorgeschoben, um den Staat rechtlich außen vor zu halten.
Denn China als Staat kann mit seinen Dollars kaum was in USA kaufen. Ein früheres Begehren, amerikanische Hafenanlagen zu kaufen, wurde von den USA abgelehnt. Dem Superfond würde ein solcher Kauf evtl. gestattet.
aus Euro am Sonntag:
"Ein guter Indikator für die Bereitschaft der Konzerne, Technologie zu kaufen, um ihre Effizienz zu verbessern, war die Quartalsbilanz des Datenbankspezialisten Oracle vor wenigen Tagen. Der Softwarekonzern mit weltweit 300000 Kunden schaffte im ersten Quartal des Geschäftsjahrs 2007/08 rund 26% mehr Umsatz soie mit insgesamt 840 Million Dollar 25% mehr Gewinn.
Das schlug ein: "Mir ist etwas schwindelig nach dieser Bilanz. Oracle ist das erste Technologieunternehmen, das nach den Turbulenzen im Kreditmarkt Zahlen vorlegt - und dann gleich so ein Hammer-Ergebnis", staunt Goldman Sachs-Analystin Laura Conigliaro.
Bei Airbus ist es umgekehrt. Die zahlen europäische Löhne und müssen ihre Flugzeuge traditionell in Dollars anbieten (wegen Boeing). Bei einem Dollarkurs von 1,45 würde Airbus Milliarden zusetzen bzw. verlieren.
So kann man US-Probleme auch lösen - indem man sie "nach Europa schiebt". Wie fein das klappt, zeigt ja auch der Kollaps der SachsenLB und der IKB, die in amerikanische CLO-Papiere gegriffen haben.
In Euro am Sonntag kann man in der Fortsetzung des Artikels lesen: "Oracle-Chef Larry Ellison genoss das Staunen der Experten: "Es war ein rundherum spektakiläres Quartal für uns". Auch für das laufende Quartal sind die Perspektiven des Software-Hauses gut: 15 bsi 25 Porzent mehr Aufträge im Vergleich zum Vorjahr stehen in den Büchern."
Folgerung: USD stark überverkauft und kurzfristig bullish auf 1,38; mittelfristiges Ziel jedoch weiterhin 1,60 EUR/USD. Die Fundamentals sind zu bearish.
http://www.sentix.de/pressearchiv/BZ_20070926.pdf
liefert die St. Louis Fed Charts der vom Bureau of Labor Statistics erhobenen Beschäftigungsdaten für einzelne Sektoren in Kalifonien mit letztem Stand von Juli 2007. Bei deren Studium fällt Folgendes auf:
Im produzierenden Gewerbe hat sich die Zahl der Beschäftigten nach der letzten Rezession nicht wieder erholt und ist weiterhin rückläufig (2000: 1,9 Mio, 2007:
< 1,5 Mio). Bei den Educational and Health Services und im öffentlichen Dienst ist ein permanenter Anstieg der Beschäftigungszahlen zu verzeichnen. Die Beschäftigtenzahlen im gut bezahlten Financial Sector stagnieren seit 2006 auf hohem Niveau und sind seit Mai 2007 sogar leicht rückläufig. Interessant auch ein Blick auf die Beschäftigungsentwicklung im ebenfalls gut bezahlten Construction Sector (Anhang!).
Fazit: Die meisten Jobs wurden in den vergangenen Jahren im Bildungs- und Gesundheitsbereich sowie im öffentlichen Dienst geschaffen. Diese sind jedoch i.d.R. nicht sonderlich gut dotiert.
Angehängte Grafik:
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Libuda, meinst du nicht "irren" wäre eine besseres Verb als "lügen" in diesem Zusammenhang? ;-)
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dass am ende keine steigerung erzielt wurde.
oracle umsatzverteilung
"By geography, the Americas produced first quarter revenue of $2.37 billion followed by Europe, Middle East and Africa with $1.53 billion in revenue. Asia Pacific accounted for $624 million in revenue."
macht einen auslandsanteil richtung globusosten von 47%
wenn man die knapp 9% dollarabwertung (dollarindex) mal simple herausrechnet, haben wir immernoch einen umsatz von ca 4,35 und eine umsatzsteigerung von ca 21%.
um #7042 entgegenzukommen können wir aber auch mit 20% rechnen,
wären's knapp 4,2 milljarden und steigerung von 16%.
träfen wir uns wie auf dem basar in der mitte wären es 18,5%. :-))
Bezogen auf den Kurs von Jan. 2006 (1,19) ergibt sich zum aktuellen Kurs ein Anstieg von 19,82 % (was dem von mir genannten Wert von 20 % nahekommt).
Da der Dollar stetig abwertet, summieren sich die Effekte über längere Zeiträume. So hatten wir Anfang 2003 noch einen EUR/USD-Kurs von 1,00. Auf diesen Kurs bezogen ergibt sich zum heutigen Kurs bereits ein Aufschlag von 42,5 % - in nur vier Jahren. Für eine (ehemalige?) Hartwährung wie den Dollar ist eine derartige Verwerfung eine mittlere Katastrophe. Für europäische Firmen, die mit US-Firmen im Dollarraum konkurrieren (da zählt auch China zu wegen des quasi-festen Peg und Japan, da der Yen zum Dollar seit 2001 per saldo seitwärts läuft), entstand durch die schleichende Dollarentwertung ein Wettbewerbsnachteil in dieser Größenordnung.
Fazit: Amerika stößt sich auf Kosten der Europäer gesund, wie ich schon in # 7042 anmerkte. Die Chinesen profitieren wegen des quasi-fixen Yuan-Kurses mit, und die Japaner halten den Yen-Kurs durch absurd niedrige Zinsen im Keller, wodurch der Yen zum Dollar ebenfalls kaum stieg.
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1) wie hoch schätzt ihr die wahrscheinlichkeit ein, dass die börsen in den usa noch dieses jahr einbrechen werden?
2) und wie hoch (%) schätzt ihr die anstehenden kursverluste generell ein?
3) wann gehts los?
damits nicht bloss beim meinungsaustausch bleibt, wäre ein resume der aktuell ausschlaggebenden gründe willkommen.
vielen dank auch schon für die beiträge und liebe grüsse - poh