The Great Debate UK
from The Great Debate:
Speculators and China win big on yen move
What does $4 trillion a day in business, never sleeps and sees Japan's Ministry of Finance as just one more patsy?
The foreign exchange market, of course, which is licking its collective lips as Japan embarks on another round of unilateral intervention to sell the yen in an effort to drive down its value and protect its export-oriented economy.
There are going to be two big winners in this, and neither begins with a "J."
Speculators will, as ever, benefit from having a deep-pocketed trading partner who has been so kind as to draw a bull's-eye on his own forehead and tell everyone at what level he will act. For Japan, that level appears to be just below 83 yen to the dollar and the Ministry of Finance has already spent $20 billion moving it back to above 85 to the dollar.
Not a bad first day's effort but let us recall that the last time Japan decided to mess around in currency markets without international support it ended up spending well over $300 billion between 2003-2004, a period when the yen actually appreciated by more than 13 percent.
Switzerland engaged in a similarly painful exercise in driving down the value of its franc earlier this year, shelling out something on the order of $210 billion but seeing the currency actually increase in value against the euro , its main trading partner, by about 14 percent.
from Breakingviews:
China’s yuan: a guide for the perplexed
By John Foley and Wei Gu
China's plans to make its currency global could change the world -- if they get off the ground. More international use of the yuan might increase China's trade clout, unseat the mighty U.S. dollar and make a lot of financiers very rich in the process. But it can be hard to separate the facts from the fable. Here are some questions answered.
Why are people talking about an international yuan?
China is the world's second-biggest economy. But its currency doesn't nearly match its size. For most international dealings, China relies on the dollar, which leaves it beholden to the United States. Beijing wants more influence on the global stage, so it has been taking baby-steps to turn the yuan into an internationally used currency.
from MacroScope:
What are the risks to growth?
Mike Dicks, chief economist and blogger at Barclays Wealth, has identified what he sees as the three biggest problems facing the global economy, and conveniently found that they are linked with three separate regions.
First, there is the risk that U.S., t consumers won't increase spending. Dicks notes that the increase in U.S. consumption has been "extremely moderate" and far less than after previous recessions. His firm has lowered is U.S. GDP forecast for 2011 to 2.7 percent from a bit over 3 percent.
from Global Investing:
What fund managers think
Bank of America-Merrill Lynch's monthly poll of around 200 fund managers had a few nuggets in the June version, aside from the usual mood-taking.
Gold is too expensive. A net 27 percent of respondent thought it overvalued, up from 13 percent in May. Then again, the respondents to this poll have reckoned gold is too pricey since September 2009.
Pranab Bardhan on the economic rise of China and India
In its May economic outlook, the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development projected upward growth outlooks for BRIC countries Brazil, Russia, India and China — the world’s four largest emerging economies.
Strong growth in those economies is helping to pull other countries out of recession, the OECD said. The Paris-based organisation projects that China’s GDP growth will exceed 11 percent for 2010, and anticipates that India’s real GDP growth will be 8.3 percent. Russia‘s GDP growth is expected to be 5.5 percent, and Brazil‘s is projected at 6.5 percent. By comparison, the OECD projects that the Euro area will see 1.5 percent real GDP growth, while the UK will see a 2.2 percent growth.
Resilience in the luxury market amid downturn
- Ben Hughes is deputy CEO and global commercial director at the Financial Times. The opinions expressed are his own. -
Last month Italian luxury fashion house Fendi unveiled a handbag made of python leather and dipped in 24-carat gold. Price? A cool $36,000.
from The Great Debate:
Goodbye America, Hello China? Think again
For the growing number of Americans who see China heading for inevitable global dominance, nudging aside the United States, a brief walk down memory lane helps put long-term predictions into perspective.
Not so long ago, Japan was seen as the next (economic) number 1. American executives studied the 14 management principles of The Toyota Way, developed by the automobile manufacturer that grew into the world's biggest car maker and is now recalling millions of defective vehicles.
from The Great Debate:
Tightening underway, Fed a passenger
A tightening in financial conditions is under way but its principal architect won't be the Federal Reserve.
Far from it, the Fed will be pinned down by powerful disinflationary, perhaps even deflationary, forces, making it very unlikely to be willing to raise interest rates any time soon.
from The Great Debate:
At least U.S. has Japan to fall back on
(James Saft is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own)
The bad news for holders of U.S. debt, in case you missed it, is that China has sold so many Treasuries that it is no longer America's leading lender.
The worse news is that there is a new creditor-in-chief, and it is Japan, an aging country with its own government debt bubble to contend with.
from Breakingviews:
First Shanghai IPO of 2010 is an encouraging flop
Shanghai has had its first new issues disaster. XD Electric fell 1.4 percent on its first day of trading. That might not sound so bad, until you consider that Chinese initial public offerings in the last six months rose an average 80 percent on their first day. It might be a welcome sign that China's stock market investors are become more discerning.
XD Electric, the first IPO of 2010, suffered from two headwinds. One was a general market pull-back on fears China will begin monetary tightening. The Shanghai Composite Index has fallen 5 percent since the electrical equipment maker priced its shares a week ago, with heavy equipment firms down 8 percent. XD Electric was priced at the top of its indicated range, a 26 percent price-to-earnings premium to the market. Taking that into account, XD Electric's performance is not as bad as it looks.
