Belt Tightening Spurs Malaysia, Indonesia Currencies

Oct 28, 2013

Belt Tightening Spurs Malaysia, Indonesia Currencies

By Ewen Chew

Budgets that emphasize spending cuts to curb current-account deficits announced in Indonesia and Malaysia ahead of the weekend are already paying off with stronger currencies. Both the rupiah and the ringgit fell sharply this summer on fears that their growing current-account deficits would trigger credit-rating downgrades. Since May 1, the Indonesian currency had fallen by as much as 16%, while Malaysia’s currency fell as much as 8.8%, though the Malaysian currency had clawed back some losses: it was down 3.7% since May 1 as of Thursday. Read more of this post

From Big Foot to Bluto, Gulf of Mexico set for record oil supply surge

From Big Foot to Bluto, Gulf of Mexico set for record oil supply surge

Sun, Oct 27 2013

By Kristen Hays and Terry Wade

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (Reuters) – The Gulf of Mexico, stung by the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history in 2010 and then overshadowed by the onshore fracking boom, is on the verge of its biggest supply surge ever, adding to the American oil renaissance. Over the next three years, the Gulf is poised to deliver a slug of more than 700,000 barrels per day of new crude, reversing a decline in production and potentially rivaling shale hot spots like Texas’s Eagle Ford formation in terms of growth. Read more of this post

US Dollar Notes Still Highly Coveted in Indonesia

US Dollar Notes Still Highly Coveted in Indonesia

By Dion Bisara on 10:01 am October 28, 2013.
The US Federal Reserve reiterated its commitment to meet demand for US dollar notes in Indonesia, currency that many Indonesians still highly regard as an instrumental of storing value. “Our role in the Federal Reserve is simply to meet the demand. It does not matter if it comes from domestic or abroad,” Michael J. Lambert, the Fed’s associate director for reserve bank operations and payment systems division, told the Jakarta Globe in an interview last week. Read more of this post

Yakuza Bosses Whacked by Regulators Freezing AmEx Cards

Yakuza Bosses Whacked by Regulators Freezing AmEx Cards

By Terje Langeland & Takahiko Hyuga on 9:37 am October 27, 2013.
Tokyo. The yakuza, Japan’s organized-crime syndicates that have reaped billions from activities ranging from extortion to human trafficking, are finding their ranks decimated by authorities employing methods similar to those used to jail Al Capone: going after their money. Japan’s Financial Services Agency delivered the latest blow, last month ordering Mizuho Financial Group to improve compliance and then demanding that top executives report by Oct. 28 what they knew and when about a consumer-credit affiliate found making loans to crime groups. Read more of this post

Small-Caps Double Dow in Signal Economy Is Gaining Speed

Small-Caps Double Dow in Signal Economy Is Gaining Speed

The smallest stocks are rallying almost twice as fast as bigger companies in the U.S., a bullish economic signal from businesses whose profits are most dependent on domestic demand. Shares of companies from Rite Aid Corp. to Teledyne Technologies Inc. in the Russell 2000 Index (RTY) have advanced 32 percent in 2013, compared with 19 percent for the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The spread is the widest for any year since 2003, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Three of the last four times small-caps outperformed by this much, the economy grew faster the next year and stocks stayed in a bull market for another year or more. Read more of this post

Reagan Revolution Misses Tax Fiefdoms Flourishing in U.S.

Reagan Revolution Misses Tax Fiefdoms Flourishing in U.S.

Nothing thrives in Illinois like local government — almost 7,000 units that tax, spend and drive up debt in a state struggling to pay off vendors and cover almost $100 billion of unfunded pension liabilities. More than any other state, Illinois illustrates how local taxing bodies flourish across the U.S., whether urban or rural, Republican or Democrat. The governments duplicate services and burn tax dollars at the same time states slash money for education and Washington cuts discretionary spending. Read more of this post

Hong Kong Home Prices to Drop 30% as Barclays Joins UBS, Merrill

Hong Kong Home Prices to Drop 30% as Barclays Joins UBS, Merrill

Barclays Plc joined UBS AG and Bank of America Corp. in forecasting a Hong Kong property slump, predicting home prices will fall at least 30 percent by the end of 2015 as income growth stalls and supply increases. A “downward spiral of home prices is likely” as developers and homeowners adjust expectations, analysts Paul Louie and Zita Qin wrote in a report today. They assigned a “negative” rating to the Hong Kong property sector and said office prices will drop 20 percent. Read more of this post

Danone-Backed Project Provides Water at Cost to Cambodia

Danone-Backed Project Provides Water at Cost to Cambodia

When Francois Jaquenoud knocked on Danone’s door seven years ago seeking clean-water funds for Cambodians, the maker of Evian turned him down. Two years later, Danone reversed course. Just how did the Paris-based company that’s the biggest yogurt maker get involved half a world away in Cambodia? Credit dates to when the founder of “1001 Fontaines pour demain,” French for “1,001 Fountains for tomorrow,” crafted a business plan to provide 2 liters (a half-gallon) of safe water a day to each Cambodian. From not a drop in 2004, the former Accenture Plc (ACN) consultant’s enterprise now sells water to 100,000 Cambodians at cost: less than a euro cent (1.38 U.S. cents) a liter. Read more of this post

BIS sees risk of 1998-style Asian crisis as Chinese dollar debt soars; The world’s banking watchdog warns that foreign loans to companies and banks in China has tripled over the last five years and may be large enough to set off financial tremors in the West

BIS sees risk of 1998-style Asian crisis as Chinese dollar debt soars

The world’s banking watchdog warns that foreign loans to companies and banks in China has tripled over the last five years and may be large enough to set off financial tremors in the West

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

9:30PM GMT 27 Oct 2013

Foreign loans to companies and banks in China have tripled over the last five years to almost $900bn and may now be large enough to set off financial tremors in the West, and above all Britain, the world’s banking watchdog has warned. “Dollar and foreign currency loans have been growing very rapidly,” said the Bank for International Settlements in a new report. “They have more than tripled in four years, rising from $270 billion to a conservatively estimated $880 billion in March 2013. Foreign currency credit may give rise to substantial financial stability risks associated with dollar funding,” it said. China’s reserve body SAFE said 81pc of foreign debt under its supervision is in dollars, 6pc in euros, and 6pc in yen. Read more of this post

Wikipedia China Becomes Front Line for Views on Language and Culture

October 27, 2013

Wikipedia China Becomes Front Line for Views on Language and Culture

By GRACE TSOI

HONG KONG — The Chinese-language version of Wikipedia has become more than an online encyclopedia: it is a battlefield for editors from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong in a region charged with political, ideological and cultural differences. Wikipedia editors, all volunteers, present opposing views on politics, history and traditional Chinese culture — in essence, different versions of China. Compounding the issue are language differences: Mandarin is the official language in mainland China and Taiwan, while the majority in Hong Kong speak Cantonese. But mainland China uses simplified characters, while Taiwan and Hong Kong use traditional script. Read more of this post

Army of Chinese fast food firms challenge McDonald’s, KFC and other foreigners in China

Updated: Monday October 28, 2013 MYT 8:22:21 AM

Army of Chinese fast food firms challenge McDonald’s, KFC and other foreigners in China

SHANGHAI: Bearing rice burgers and lotus roots, an army of Chinese fast food firms is cooking up a challenge to McDonald’s Corp and Yum Brands Inc, tempting cost-conscious diners with healthy, homegrown fare and causing a drag on growth for the U.S. chains in the country’s $174 billion fast food market. McDonald’s said last week it was thinking of slowing expansion in China as diners are tempted by local rivals. KFC-parent Yum warned this month economic weakness in China would drag on a recovery in sales dented by a food safety scare at the end of last year. Read more of this post

Forging an Art Market in China; In China’s growing art market, now the second largest in the world, outsize auction results often overshadow false sales data and forged art

Forging an Art Market in China

By David Barboza, Graham Bowley and Amanda CoxAdditional Reporting by Jo Craven McGintyBEIJING, October 28, 2013

点击查看本文中文版 | Read in Chinese »

When the hammer came down at an evening auction during China Guardian’s spring sale in May 2011, “Eagle Standing on a Pine Tree,” a 1946 ink painting by Qi Baishi, one of China’s 20th-century masters, had drawn a startling price: $65.4 million. No Chinese painting had ever fetched so much at auction, and, by the end of the year, the sale appeared to have global implications, helping China surpass the United States as the world’s biggest art and auction market. But two years after the auction, Qi Baishi’s masterpiece is still languishing in a warehouse in Beijing. The winning bidder has refused to pay for the piece since doubts were raised about its authenticity. Read more of this post

China Won’t Lose Its ‘Voice’ Despite New TV Restrictions

October 25, 2013, 10:22 AM

China Won’t Lose Its ‘Voice’ Despite New TV Restrictions

Fans of ”The Voice of China,” have no fear. The show is staying put.

Broadcaster Zhejiang Satellite TV has confirmed it will continue airing the hit show despite new regulations that take aim at broadcasts based on formats developed abroad, and said it is tweaking other shows to make sure they conform with the new restrictions. “The Voice of China” is based on a Dutch show, “The Voice of Holland,” that has done well in its international iterations, including as “The Voice” in the U.S. Read more of this post

Debt: A deceptive calm: Investors are wary that the tranquility in eurozone bond markets could breed complacency

October 27, 2013 7:55 pm

Debt: A deceptive calm

By Ralph Atkins in London

Investors are wary that the tranquility in eurozone bond markets could breed complacency

James Carville, an adviser to former US President Bill Clinton, wanted to be reincarnated as the bond market, complaining that it was more powerful than presidents or popes. “You can intimidate everybody,” he moaned. He should have moved to Rome. This year, Italy has had an inconclusive election, a government often on the brink of collapse and an economy struggling to leave a deep recession. But the bond markets have been noticeably quiescent. Rather than Rome’s borrowing costs rising as investors worried about the security of Italy’s public debt, the difference – or “spread” – between the yield on 10-year Italian and German government bonds has fallen to levels unseen since the eurozone crisis hit the country more than two years ago. Read more of this post

Beijing’s caution on reforms: China does not have the luxury of deferring all changes until conditions suit, says Eswar Prasad

October 27, 2013 6:57 pm

Beijing’s caution on reforms makes sense – for now

By Eswar Prasad

But China does not have the luxury of deferring all changes until conditions suit, says Eswar Prasad

Cataloguing China’s economic risks has become a popular parlour game. In the past decade, a steady drumbeat of warnings has predicted imminent collapse. Rising state and local government debt, a weak financial system and multiplying inefficiencies in the economy certainly pose big risks. The reforms needed to maintain growth and improve its quality have been painfully slow. Read more of this post