China’s cautious land-reform tests cast doubt on big urban vision

China’s cautious land-reform tests cast doubt on big urban vision

4:13pm EST

By Kevin Yao

CHENGDU, China (Reuters) – Tan Yingyu is one of China’s 200 million migrant workers and like many he is stuck: he does not want to return to his village but also cannot become a legal resident in the city of Chengdu, where he has worked for nearly 20 years. His dilemma highlights a key issue for China’s reformist leaders as they look for ways to encourage more people to move to cities to help turn a credit- and investment-driven economy into a consumer-powered one. Read more of this post

China’s Building Push Goes Underground

China’s Building Push Goes Underground

Party Leaders Signal Subway Expansions Are About Urbanization, Not Infrastructure Binging

JAMES T. AREDDY

Nov. 10, 2013 7:57 p.m. ET

KUNSHAN, China—Twenty years ago, China’s Communist Party leadership earmarked money for an expressway network modeled on the U.S. interstate highway system. A decade ago, they spent big on bullet trains. As a fresh team of Chinese leaders gathers this week in Beijing to lay out broad economic goals, the effort to keep China moving has shifted underground, with dozens of cities spending billions of dollars on subway systems. Read more of this post

Abenomics Faces Emerging Pressures

Abenomics Faces Emerging Pressures

Trouble in Developing Markets Blurs Growth Picture

TAKASHI NAKAMICHI

Updated Nov. 10, 2013 5:31 p.m. ET

Japan is expected to report this week that its economic-revival experiment hit a speed bump over the summer, with growth for the three months through September likely slowing to less than half the pace recorded in the first half of the year. That doesn’t necessarily mean Abenomics—Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s master plan involving weakening the yen and temporarily boosting infrastructure spending—is faltering. Read more of this post

Japan Inc Weighing Pay Hikes? Little Sign So Far

November 11, 2013, 9:34 AM

Japan Inc Weighing Pay Hikes? Little Sign So Far

By Yumi Otagaki

In what are perhaps the world’s biggest, most public, and protracted labor negotiations, Japan’s top policymakers – from Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Bank of Japan Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda on down – have for weeks been pressing the country’s executives to give employees their first base pay increases in years next spring. How’s it going so far? If weekend reports are any sign, not so good. Read more of this post

Kospi Rally Leaves Brokers Behind as Profits Drop: Korea Markets

Kospi Rally Leaves Brokers Behind as Profits Drop: Korea Markets

South Korean brokers are missing out on a rally that sent the nation’s benchmark stock index to its highest level since 2011, as slumping trading volumes contribute to the weakest profits in eight years. Samsung Securities Co. (016360), the country’s biggest brokerage by market capitalization, and five of its local peers are valued at the lowest levels since at least 2007 after falling an average of 15 percent in Seoul this year. Industry earnings have shrunk to the smallest since the first half of 2005, while trading on the Korea Exchange (KOSPI) fell to a six-year low, data compiled by Bloomberg and the Financial Supervisory Service show. Read more of this post

‘Long-Only’ Funds Lose Their Hedge’Long-Only’ Funds Lose Their Hedge

‘Long-Only’ Funds Lose Their Hedge’Long-Only’ Funds Lose Their Hedge

JULIET CHUNG

Nov. 10, 2013 7:02 p.m. ET

What do you call a hedge fund that doesn’t hedge? The latest growth area for the industry. On the heels of a multiyear market rally, a slew of hedge-fund firms are launching “long-only” funds betting that at least some stocks have further to climb. The moves come amid a brutal stretch for short bets against companies, traditionally a key strategy for hedge funds. Read more of this post

Flurry of Stock, Bond Issuance Is a Danger Sign for Markets

Nov 10, 2013

Flurry of Stock, Bond Issuance Is a Danger Sign for Markets

E.S. BROWNING

Just as financial markets were recovering from the Washington turmoil, a new danger signal has started blinking, in the form of a flood of stock and bond issues. Many people see no problem. They find the new-issue action exciting, as the hoopla over last week’s $2.1 billion offering by Twitter Inc.TWTR -7.24% showed. The process fuels entrepreneurship and securities issues are mother’s milk for brokerage firms, generating enormous profits. Read more of this post

Signs Multiply That Sentiment Is Too Upbeat; Surveys of Retail Investors, Advisers, Point to Froth

Signs Multiply That Sentiment Is Too Upbeat

Surveys of Retail Investors, Advisers, Point to Froth

SPENCER JAKAB

Nov. 10, 2013 5:44 p.m. ET

For those worried that irrational exuberance is back, Twitter Inc. TWTR -7.24% ‘s hyped initial public offering provides yet another bit of anecdotal evidence. More quantifiable measures of investors’ mood going into the end of 2013 may support that view, too. A particularly worrisome one is the Investors Intelligence gauge of adviser sentiment. Its last reading showed that 55.2% of respondents were bullish and just 15.6% bearish, tying the highest difference between the two this year. The last time the gap was bigger was April 8, 2011, which preceded the sharpest stock-market correction of the current bull market. Read more of this post

Big Law Mergers Turn Off Clients; Amid a Wave of Megamergers, Legal Experts Say Expertise—Not Size—Matters Most

Big Law Mergers Turn Off Clients

Amid a Wave of Megamergers, Legal Experts Say Expertise—Not Size—Matters Most

JENNIFER SMITH

Updated Nov. 10, 2013 7:42 p.m. ET

When it comes to law firms, bigger may not always be better. A wave of legal tie-ups has created a fleet of supersize law firms with offices around the world, and more are in the works this fall. Partners at cross-border entity Dentons and U.S. firm McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP, for example, are poised to vote on a union that would produce one of the top three global law firms by head count. Recent merger talks between two big U.S. firms—Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP and Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP—could lead to the creation of another big player. But law firms with the urge to merge might check with their clients first. Read more of this post

GM Labels Lose, But So Does Big Food

GM Labels Lose, But So Does Big Food

For the second time, blue-state voters have defeated a ballot initiative to require labeling of genetically modified foods. In 2012, it was California; this week, it was Washington, where a labeling referendum lost 55 percent to 45 percent. Advocates of labeling may as well suspend similar efforts in other states, because it’s clear that, when it comes to persuading voters, they’re no match for Big Food. In Washington, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, Monsanto Co., DuPont Co. and others raised $22 million to fight the measure, almost triple the $8.4 million collected by Whole Foods Markets Inc., Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap, the Center for Food Safety and other advocates of labeling. In California, the food industry similarly outspent its opposition $46 million to $9 million. Read more of this post

Sitting on farm fence in global bidding war for Warrnambool Cheese & Butter; While big business battles for control of the Warrnambool dairy producer, farmers are undecided.

Sitting on farm fence in global bidding war for Warrnambool Cheese & Butter

While big business battles for control of the Warrnambool dairy producer, farmers are undecided.

November 9, 2013

Jared Lynch

Nick Renyard’s farm is far from the clang and clatter of city traffic and investment bankers’ offices. Bush and bird song line the road to the third-generation dairy farmer’s property nestled in the rolling green hills south of Timboon, in Victoria’s Western District. Mr Renyard’s association with Warrnambool Cheese & Butter is more than just that of a supplier and processor. His father John was director at the company, and Mr Renyard, 39, has owned WCB shares longer than he can remember. ”I’ve had them since I was a little kid,” he said. ”I can’t remember exactly how long I’ve had them but when I got them they were $2 ordinary shares and there were 500.” Almost all of Australia’s main milk processors, including NSW’s Bega Cheese and the country’s biggest milk processor, Murray Goulburn, have entered a global bidding war for WCB, which until recently was little known outside its home base in south-west Victoria. Read more of this post

New China Cities: Shoddy Homes, Broken Hope

November 9, 2013

New China Cities: Shoddy Homes, Broken Hope

By IAN JOHNSON

HUAMING, China — Three years ago, the Shanghai World Expo featured this newly built town as a model for how China would move from being a land of farms to a land of cities. In a dazzling pavilion visited by more than a million people, visitors learned how farmers were being given a new life through a fair-and-square deal that did not cost them anything. Today, Huaming may be an example of another transformation: the ghettoization of China’s new towns. Read more of this post

Forest Misuse Costs Indonesia $7 Billion in Revenue, Report Says

Forest Misuse Costs Indonesia $7 Billion in Revenue, Report Says

Illegal logging and mismanagement of Indonesia’s forestry industry may have prevented more than $7 billion flowing to state coffers from 2007 to 2011, costing the government more than its health budget, Human Rights Watch said. In contrast, the Indonesian government’s 2011 revenue from timber royalties and reforestation fees was $300 million, said Emily Harwell, the lead author of a report released by Human Rights Watch. Read more of this post

‘Western concept’ Chinese shares see US resurgence

‘Western concept’ Chinese shares see US resurgence

Staff Reporter

2013-11-10

Chinese companies seeking a stock listing in the US have seen a resurgence in 2013, but most US investors are not pursuing China concept shares but rather seeking Chinese companies with an “American shadow,” the Shanghai-based First Financial Daily reports. On Oct. 31, 58.com, a Chinese local classified-ad website, launched an IPO with a price of US$17, giving it a market value of more than US$1.4 billion. The company’s share price jumped 42% on debut. Read more of this post

Only 6% of employees in China ‘engaged’ in their work, less than half the average of 13% in other countries

Only 6% of employees in China ‘engaged’ in their work: poll

Staff Reporter

2013-11-10

Only 6% of people in China’s workforce are fully engaged in their jobs, less than half the average of 13% in other countries, according to a Gallup poll which surveyed 142 countries and regions between 2011 and 2012. The company asked employees to answer 12 questions including whether they learned new things on the job, whether their efforts were recognized and whether they made friends in the workplace. The employees were divided into three categories: “actively disengaged, “not engaged” and “engaged.” The report suggests engaged employees will bring benefits and innovation to their companies but their efforts could be sabotaged by those that are actively disengaged. Read more of this post