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Japan lost more than a million millionaires last year

Japan lost more than a million millionaires last year

By Roberto A. Ferdman and Lily Kuo October 11, 2013

The greatest consolation to being kicked out of the millionaire’s club may be knowing that your rich friends went down with you. Nowhere is that truer than in Japan, which lost 1.3 million millionaires between June 2012 and June 2013, according to Credit Suisse’s Global Wealth report (pdf) released earlier this week. No other country lost anywhere near that amount of wealth. In fact, no other country lost more than 12,000 millionaires (millionaires, of course, refer to households with $1 million or more in assets). The country with the second highest loss in millionaires—100 times fewer than in Japan—was Brazil. The drop is a stark contrast to last year when Japan saw its millionaire population increase by almost half a million. What’s been obliterating millionaires has to do with ”Abenomics,” the aggressive economic reform plan to defeat deflation spearheaded by Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. The policy has driven the yen/dollar exchange rate down by 22% over the past year, which has in turn driven down household wealth by $5.8 trillion over that time period. That’s roughly 20% of the country’s total net worth, according to the report. (The policy also led to a 52% surge in the Nikkei over that time period, but stocks account for less than 10% of household financial wealth.) Read more of this post

Australian millionaires: Why we are not as rich as we look; About 59 per cent of our wealth is held in property, second only to Norway. In the US, it’s 38 per cent.

Andrew Heathcote Rich Lists editor

Australian millionaires: Why we are not as rich as we look

Published 10 October 2013 11:49, Updated 11 October 2013 07:48

The average wealth per person in Australia is $426,222, according to a report by Credit Suisse on personal wealth. Photo: Louie Douvis

There was great excitement yesterday when investment bank Credit Suisse gave us some good news. Apparently, Australians are the richest people in the world. Credit Suisse’s new Global Wealth Report shows that Australia has the highest median wealth per adult for the third year in a row. According to the figures, there are 11 million Australians worth more than $232,489 and 1.1 million millionaires. Read more of this post

China will launch a pilot program next week aimed at shattering a widespread assumption among Chinese investors that products, even high-yield ones, provide guaranteed returnswhen offered by state-owned banks

Wealth management products’ yield ‘not guaranteed’

Updated: 2013-10-11 10:27

( Agencies) Read more of this post

DIY investment – a crisis in the making?

October 11, 2013 5:38 pm

DIY investment – a crisis in the making?

By David Oakley, Investment Correspondent

It was nearly seven years in the making. It has been the dominant theme in the retail asset management industry for much of the past few years. Now, the effects of the retail distribution review are being felt by the people it is meant to safeguard: consumers. For most of them, RDR was just another obscure rule change. Survey after survey found that, ahead of its implementation on December 31 2012, few ordinary investors had even heard of it. At a recent presentation to analysts, Hargreaves Lansdown noted that just one in a thousand customer service calls relates to the rule change. But RDR could yet transform the way people invest and save for their retirement or their children’s education. Read more of this post

Debt impasse exposes Achilles’ heel of finance: Risk of an accident in $2tn tri-party repo market is rising

Last updated: October 10, 2013 11:44 pm

Debt impasse exposes Achilles’ heel of finance

By Gillian Tett

Risk of an accident in $2tn tri-party repo market is rising

Who is getting spooked by Halloween bonds? That is a question which many traders are wondering. Little wonder. A week ago, I (like most people) blithely assumed that Congress would find a way to resolve the budget and debt ceiling impasse before the crucial October 17 deadline, when the Treasury claims it will start running out of funds. Now I am less sure. For the situation seems to have fallen into a pattern which defies neat, game-theory solutions: the White House does not want to give the Tea Party any victories, for fear of encouraging more hostage-taking; John Boehner, Republican House Speaker, cannot offer concessions for fear of losing his position; and the Tea Party now regards the fight as a “do-or-die” stand and also fears it cannot back down. Read more of this post

BlackRock, the world’s biggest asset manager, said its money-market mutual funds have sold all Treasuries maturing in late October and early November

BlackRock’s Money Funds Have Sold Vulnerable Treasuries

BlackRock Inc. (BLK), the world’s biggest asset manager, said its money-market mutual funds have sold all Treasuries maturing in late October and early November. BlackRock joins Fidelity Investments and JPMorgan Chase & Co., the two largest U.S. money-fund providers, in declaring its money funds are free of the debt most likely to be affected by a default as the government approaches its borrowing limit. “We continue to take prudent actions in preparation for all potential outcomes, despite our belief that Congress and the President will likely act to prevent a U.S. default,” Tara McDonnell, a spokeswoman for the New York-based company, said today in an e-mailed statement. President Barack Obama and House Republican leaders moved yesterday toward an agreement to extend the nation’s borrowing authority as they remained at odds over terms for ending the partial government shutdown. House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio yesterday said he would offer as soon as today a measure to postpone a potential U.S. default to Nov. 22 from Oct. 17.

To contact the reporter on this story: Christopher Condon in Boston at ccondon4@bloomberg.net

Italy Loses Its Taste for Pasta; Consumption Has Dropped 23% in Past Decade

Italy Loses Its Taste for Pasta

Consumption Has Dropped 23% in Past Decade

MANUELA MESCO

Oct. 11, 2013 2:27 p.m. ET

MILAN—When Sara Chiauzzi was growing up in Naples, pasta had pride of place on the family table, and she and her family often ate it twice a day. But now that she has a family of her own, the 38-year-old mother of two wouldn’t dream of serving so much pasta. Worried about its fattening effects, she and her husband eat it no more than a few times a week, favoring couscous, meat and vegetables instead. “Metabolism changes when you approach 40,” she says, “and pasta is out of the question.” Read more of this post

Number of Chinese Billionaires Skyrockets

October 11, 2013, 8:30 AM

Number of Chinese Billionaires Skyrockets

Asia sprouted a new crop of millionaires over the past year, with growth of wealth in China topping the charts. According to a report this week by Credit Suisse, the country now has 6% of the world’s total of ultra-high-net-worth individuals, or those with fortunes in excess of $50 million. That’s second only to the United States, which commands nearly half the world’s total.

Read more of this post

Billionaire’s Metro Builder Downgraded in Crunch: India Credit

Billionaire’s Metro Builder Downgraded in Crunch: India Credit

Indian corporate debt ratings are deteriorating at the fastest pace since 2010 amid a cash crunch created to buoy the rupee and a deepening economic slowdown. Billionaire Anil Ambani’s Reliance Infrastructure Ltd., which holds 69 percent in a venture building a metro network in Mumbai, and Apollo Tyres Ltd., which plans India’s largest acquisition in North America, were among 478 companies that had their rankings cut in the last six months at Crisil Ltd., the local unit of Standard & Poor’s. Only 417 firms were upgraded, a ratio of 0.87 against downgrades that was the lowest since September 2010. Read more of this post

Mondi Tracks Pampers to China in Bet on Packaging Boom

Mondi Tracks Pampers to China in Bet on Packaging Boom

Mondi Ltd. (MND), the South African packaging company that joined the U.K.’s benchmark FTSE 100 Index last month, is opening factories in China and Iraq as it follows clients into emerging markets to boost earnings. Customers including Procter & Gamble Co. (PG) and Nestle SA (NESN) are tapping booming local demand for products such as diapers and microwaveable food and Mondi has to stay close to meet specific requirements in each market, Chief Executive Officer David Hathorn said in an interview in Johannesburg. Mondi this year inaugurated a plant in China’s Jiangsu province to supply stretchy films for P&G’s range of Pampers diapers, he said. Read more of this post

China to install GPS in government cars to track misuse

China to install GPS in government cars to track misuse

6:29am EDT

BEIJING (Reuters) – China will install GPS systems in government cars to thwart personal use by officials, domestic media said on Friday, citing the Communist Party’s anti-corruption watchdog, as it cracks down on the profligate lifestyles of corrupt officials. Almost 200,000 government cars have been misused for private purposes, the Beijing Times newspaper said, citing the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection. Read more of this post

Lavish nights at Club Godfather opened door to Japan pension fund bribery case

Lavish nights at Club Godfather opened door to Japan pension fund bribery case

Thu, Oct 10 2013

* Pension fund exec handed suspended 18-mth jail term

* Two KTOs fund execs also given suspended sentences

* Regulator cracking down on excessive client entertainment

* Regulator also probing unrelated cases at investment banks

By Nathan Layne

SAPPORO, Japan, Oct 10 (Reuters) – When a Tokyo-based investment manager set out to win business from a pension fund in northern Japan, the cost included dozens of nights drinking at Club Godfather, a discrete watering hole with a $200 cover charge and kimono-clad hostesses. Kazuyoshi Takahama, now 71, was treated to more than 50 nights out at the club in Sapporo as KTOs Capital Partners, a hedge fund, lobbied for a share of the $245 million pension fund he helped oversee as its chairman, prosecutors say. Takahama favored shochu, a local liquor, while his free-spending hosts ordered up expensive wines. Read more of this post

AlphaMetrix Fires CFO as Cash Shortage Hits Commodity Fund; The revelations are another blow to confidence in the futures industry after it suffered two of its largest failures with the collapse of MF Global and Peregrine

AlphaMetrix Terminates CFO as Cash Shortfall Hits Commodity Fund

AlphaMetrix Group LLC, which connects investors with hedge fund managers and futures traders, said it’s experiencing “significant cash flow issues” and fired its chief financial officer. The Chicago-based company runs a business known as a commodity pool operator, AlphaMetrix LLC, which lets customers invest in futures accounts managed by professional traders. The parent company told clients in a letter yesterday that both its liabilities and those of the commodity pool operator “greatly exceed” liquid assets and that the net asset values of some pools may be affected. Read more of this post

IEA Sees Oil Output Outside OPEC Rising Most Since 1970s

IEA Sees Oil Output Outside OPEC Rising Most Since 1970s

The International Energy Agency estimates that oil producers outside OPEC, led by the U.S., Canada and Kazakhstan, will bolster supplies next year by the most since the 1970s, undermining the need for OPEC’s crude. Producers outside the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will increase output by a near-record 1.7 million barrels a day next year to 56.4 million, the IEA said, boosting its forecasts from a month ago by 300,000 barrels a day. Supply losses in OPEC members Libya and Iraq, which reduced the group’s output to a two-year low, are preventing the new shipments from calming oil prices, the Paris-based adviser to energy-consuming nations said. Read more of this post

U.S. Said to Open Criminal Probe of FX Market Rigging

U.S. Said to Open Criminal Probe of FX Market Rigging

The U.S. Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation of possible manipulation of the $5.3 trillion-a-day foreign exchange market, a person familiar with the matter said. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, which is also looking into alleged rigging of interest rates associated with the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, is in the early stages of its currency market probe, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the inquiry is confidential. Read more of this post