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Billionaire Investor Leon Black’s Apollo Global Management ‘Selling Everything’ as Prices Have Risen

Black’s Apollo ‘Selling Everything’ as Prices Have Risen

Leon Black, chief executive officer of buyout firm Apollo Global Management LLC (APO), said prices for traditional buyouts have risen so much that it’s a good time to sell. “We think it’s a fabulous environment to be selling,” Black said today during a panel discussion at the Milken Institute conference in Los Angeles, adding that Apollo has sold about $13 billion in assets in the last 15 months. “We’re selling everything that’s not nailed down, and if we’re not selling, we’re refinancing.” U.S. equity markets have more than doubled from their 2009 lows, helping push up average prices for leveraged buyouts to nine times earnings, Black said. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose to a record today as consumer confidence offset an unexpected drop in business activity and investors weighed earnings reports. Black’s comments were echoed by buyout executives including Scott Sperling, co-president of Thomas H. Lee Partners LP, and Jonathan Sokoloff, managing partner at Leonard Green & Partners LP. “It has become more difficult to find transactions priced at levels we’d like,” Sperling said on the same panel. “We’re having trouble deploying capital at these price levels,” Sokoloff said. It’s “time to take a pause.”

To contact the reporter on this story: David Carey in New York at dcarey13@bloomberg.net

Without explanation, the Shenzhen government has ended a seven-year incentive plan for the city’s much-hyped LED lighting sector

Shenzhen’s LED incentive plan comes to sudden end

Staff Reporter, 2013-05-02

Without explanation, the Shenzhen government has ended a seven-year incentive plan for the city’s much-hyped LED lighting sector, reports Guangzhou’s Southern Metropolis Daily. The original plan by the city government called for building a 130 billion yuan (US$21 billion) LED industry in Shenzhen from 2009 to 2015, according to Sui Shirong, head of Shenzhen Light Emitting Diode Industry. An official who wished to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the issue told the daily that the industry is facing falling prices amid oversupply. Read more of this post

The number of bond funds that own stocks has surged to its highest point in at least 18 years and could expose investors to unexpected losses

May 1, 2013, 8:09 p.m. ET

Bond Funds Running Low on…Bonds

By JOE LIGHT

The number of bond funds that own stocks has surged to its highest point in at least 18 years, another sign that typically conservative investors are taking bigger risks to boost returns. Regulators generally allow funds to hold a mix of assets, but the scale of bond funds’ shift into stocks is unusual, fund experts said, and could expose investors to unexpected losses. Read more of this post

“No more Martini lunches”; Mining Woes Snag Financial Firms; Far from any mine shaft, the legions of bankers, consultants and lawyers who benefited from a decadelong commodities boom are now preparing to retrench as the market weakens.

Updated May 1, 2013, 8:08 p.m. ET

Mining Woes Snag Financial Firms

By ALISTAIR MACDONALD

TORONTO—Far from any mine shaft, the legions of bankers, consultants and lawyers who benefited from a decadelong commodities boom are now preparing to retrench as the market weakens. Global mining capitals such as Toronto, Johannesburg and London all flourished amid lofty prices in recent years for everything from gold and copper to potash. Mining companies have tended to flock to a handful of cities to list their shares, set up headquarters and raise cash.

But over the past year, the sector has been hit by a triple whammy of falling prices, still-rising costs and waning investor interest. Most mined commodities have fallen sharply since their 2011 highs. Gold is 23% off its highs, and copper closed at an 18-month low Wednesday. Gold has fallen 14% since the start of this year to $1,446 a troy ounce. As a result, some of the world’s biggest miners are slashing outlays, shedding assets they bought at the top of the market just a few years ago, and shaking up management teams that spearheaded several years’ of frenetic deal making and fundraising. That is having a spillover effect on the industries servicing miners. Bankers and brokers involved in the sector are starting to see revenue dry up, and some are already shedding staff. Read more of this post

Japan’s Abenomics Haunted by Ghost of General MacArthur

Japan’s Abenomics Haunted by Ghost of General MacArthur

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s drive to revise Japan’s pacifist constitution for the first time risks alienating voters who support his economic agenda and dividing his coalition government before July elections.

Abe aims to make it easier to amend the constitution, a first step in plans to beef up the military at a time when Japan is mired in territorial disputes with China and South Korea. His Liberal Democratic Party is forecast to win the upper house race, potentially giving him the two-thirds majority in both chambers needed to alter the charter.

Overhauling a document imposed by U.S. General Douglas MacArthur’s occupation force after World War II has been a goal of LDP politicians, including Abe’s grandfather, since the party was founded in 1955. While polls show the public backs Abenomics, his strategy to resuscitate the world’s third-largest economy after more than a decade of deflation, a majority of voters don’t rate constitutional revision as a priority.

“The growth strategy can only be accomplished with sustained attention,” said Koichi Nakano, a political science professor at Sophia University in Tokyo. “It’s a monumental task in its own right. If he takes up more nationalistic causes and Abenomics is not looking good, this could lead to a loss of authority after the election.” Read more of this post

Energy Makes Up Half of Water Desalination Plant Costs: Study

Energy Makes Up Half of Desalination Plant Costs: Study

Energy is the largest single expense for desalination plants, accounting for as much as half of the costs to make drinking water from the sea, according to a report. Desalination plants on average use about 15,000 kilowatt- hours of power for every million gallons of fresh water that’s produced, the Pacific Institute said today in a report. In comparison, wastewater reuse draws as much as 8,300 kilowatt- hours of power for the same volume and importing a similar amount of water into Southern California requires as much as 14,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity, it said. There are 17 desalination plants proposed in California and two in Mexico to help supply area homes and businesses, according to Heather Cooley, co-director of the institute’s water program. While the projects may ease water strains for area utilities, they’ll increase suppliers’ exposure to variable energy prices, she said by phone. “While you may be improving your water reliability, you may be increasing your vulnerability to energy price changes over time,” Cooley said. A 25 percent increase in energy expenses would raise the cost of producing water by about 9 percent and 15 percent at reverse osmosis and thermal desalination plants respectively, according to the report. Electricity prices in California are projected to rise by about 27 percent from 2008 to 2020 in inflation-adjusted dollars as power grid infrastructure is maintained or replaced, capacity is added and more renewable energy is integrated.

Read more of this post

Qatar National Bank is No. 1 in Bloomberg Markets’ third annual ranking of the world’s strongest banks

Qatar Bank No. 1 Supplanting Singapore as Canada Slips

The tiny Persian Gulf nation of Qatar controls vast gas and oil deposits that feed billions of dollars annually into the state Treasury. Its petroleum riches make it the wealthiest nation per capita in the world, according to the International Monetary Fund. While other countries have been struggling to stay out of recession, Qatar averaged 13 percent annual growth during the five years through 2012, Bloomberg Markets will report in its June issue. The Qatar Investment Authority, a sovereign wealth fund, has big stakes in Agricultural Bank of China Ltd., Barclays Plc (BARC), Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN) and Tiffany & Co (TIF). It owns London department store Harrods outright.

As Qatar’s government has spread its financial wings, the country’s biggest financial institution, Qatar National Bank SAQ (QNBK), has been at its side. Under Ali Shareef Al Emadi, its chief executive officer since 2005, QNB has become the largest lender in the Middle East and one of the most profitable. Even as the bank has expanded, Al Emadi has maintained QNB’S capital base and aversion to risk. As a result, based on its performance in fiscal year 2012, Qatar National Bank is No. 1 in Bloomberg Markets’ third annual ranking of the world’s strongest banks.

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Malaysia’s election provides a chance for long-overdue change; At stake in Sunday’s poll is governance based on race and patronage

May 1, 2013 6:15 pm

Malaysia’s election provides a chance for long-overdue change

By David Pilling

At stake in Sunday’s poll is governance based on race and patronage

Will it be 13th time lucky for Malaysia’s opposition? Malaysians vote this Sunday in the 13th general election since the country gained independence in 1957. This time, just for novelty value, there is actually some doubt about who will win.

Ever since independence, Malaysia has been run by a coalition dominated by the United Malays National Organisation, which represents the interests of ethnic Malays, who make up 60 per cent of the 29m population. (Ethnic Chinese form 24 per cent, Indians 8 per cent, and there are an estimated 3m migrant workers.) Until now, the arrangement has gone roughly like this. Chinese and Indian communities, who have historically been better off, have allowed the government to hand out preferential treatment to Malays. In return, they are left alone to prosper in a half-decently run economy. Umno administers the system through a policy of affirmative action known as bumiputra, which literally means “sons of the soil”. The system provides Malays with preferential access to everything from schools, universities and civil service jobs to lucrative government contracts and even car imports. Public companies must reserve part of their share allocation for indigenous Malays, who also get a discount on housing. Read more of this post

As Australia’s decadelong mining boom evaporates, the government is girding for what the finance minister calls a harsh “new reality.”

May 1, 2013, 6:22 a.m. ET

Australia’s ‘New Reality’ Sets In as Mining Boom Wanes

By ENDA CURRAN

SYDNEY—Australia faces a harsh “new reality” as a decadelong mining boom evaporates, forcing future governments to seek unpopular savings to avert steep deficits, Finance Minister Penny Wong said. “We have to deal with this new reality,” Ms. Wong said from her Sydney offices ahead of a budget in two weeks that the government already has warned will miss its revenue forecast by about 12 billion Australian dollars (US$12.4 billion). “The new norm is, certainly in the near term, a lower level of revenue growth,” she said. “This budget has to deal with that economic reality, and that is not a popular thing to go out and sell to the public.” And controlling deficits will become even harder in future, Ms. Wong said., as the mining boom fueled by Asia’s demand for Australian raw materials peaks this year and begins to cool.

Read more of this post

Tough times for hedge funds that bet on market tumult using complex trading strategies

Tough times for hedge funds that bet on market tumult

7:06am EDT

By Katya Wachtel

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Nelson Saiers, a trader and math whiz, runs the type of hedge fund that tends to perform best when markets are going haywire. The $600 million Saiers Capital fund and other so-called volatility funds use complex trading strategies to take advantage of pricing discrepancies caused by gyrations in global financial markets. These funds flourished in the years after the financial crisis, when volatility was running hot, but this year is a different story. Financial markets have been largely moving upwards with few wild swings along the way. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index is up about 11 percent and the closely watched CBOE Volatility Index hit a six-year low in March. Saiers Capital’s fund is down about 1.24 percent through April 26, according to an investor. Overall, volatility funds gained 1.16 percent in the first quarter, according to hedge fund tracking firm eVestment, underperforming the broader hedge fund industry’s 3.7 percent gain. Read more of this post

Wall Street to Best Buy – Now, get out of China

Wall Street to Best Buy – Now, get out of China

1:06am EDT

By Dhanya Skariachan

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Best Buy’s move to exit Europe has many on Wall Street hoping the big box retailer does the same in China.

The company sold its stake in a European joint venture to Carphone Warehouse Group this week for less than half of what it paid five years ago. Despite the loss, investors welcomed the news and sent shares up to their highest level in a year.

Many are betting that the next move for the world’s largest consumer electronics chain will be out of China, where it has struggled to fend off local rivals and failed to carve a niche in a cluttered market. That unit has also been without a leader for more than a month.

“They are really struggling in China, much more so than they were in Europe,” said BB&T Capital Markets analyst Anthony Chukumba, who predicted the company could divest its assets there later this year. “There are no strategic benefits to them being in China.” Read more of this post

China Past Due: Hukou ‘Economic Apartheid’

China Past Due: Hukou ‘Economic Apartheid’

APRIL 30, 2013 ⋅ POST A COMMENT

After school in her scruffy Shanghai migrant neighborhood, Yang Liping strolls over to a community center for migrant kids, sits down with an ancient Chinese stringed instrument, and loses herself in the music. “I started playing the guzheng here, three years ago, “ says Yang, an affable 16-year-old in a ponytail and a navy and white tracksuit. She moved to Shanghai from Sichuan in 2008, just after the earthquake, to join her migrant worker parents. And she’s impressed with Shanghai. “There’s a lot more going on here than in my hometown – a lot more ways I can improve myself.” Yang would like to stay in Shanghai for senior high school, so she’ll be likely to do better on the all-important college entrance exam. Not only are Shanghai schools better funded, with better facilities and teachers, but the better universities in Shanghai also require higher scores from those outside Shanghai than from those who go through the school system here. But staying in the city through senior high school and into college is not an option for Yang, or for millions of other migrant schoolchildren like her. That’s thanks to the household registration – or hukou – system, which requires students to take the college entrance exam in the place where their parents are registered. And very few migrant workers can move their hukous to the cities where they work. So some 260 million Chinese migrants – about 20 percent of China’s total population — live as second-class citizens in their adopted cities, in them, but not of them.

China has had a hukou system for at least a couple thousand years, mostly, to keep track of who was in what family. But it was only under Communist Party rule, starting in the late 1950s, that the hukou system started to be used to restrict movement and enforce a kind of economic apartheid. Read more of this post

It is indisputable that China is over-issuing currency. But the reasons behind China’s massive liquidity growth – and the most effective strategy for controlling it – are less obvious

Zhang Monan is a fellow of the China Information Center, a fellow of the China Foundation for International Studies, and a researcher at the China Macroeconomic Research Platform.

Controlling China’s Currency

01 May 2013

BEIJING – It is indisputable that China is over-issuing currency. But the reasons behind China’s massive liquidity growth – and the most effective strategy for controlling it – are less obvious.

The last decade has been a “golden age” of high growth and low inflation in China. From 2003 to 2012, China’s annual GDP growth averaged 10.5%, while prices rose by only 3% annually. But the unprecedented speed and scale of China’s monetary expansion remain a concern, given that it could still trigger high inflation and lead to asset-price bubbles, debt growth, and capital outflows.

Data from the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) show that, as of the end of last year, China’s M2 (broad money supply) stood at ¥97.4 trillion ($15.6 trillion), or 188% of GDP. To compare, M2 in the United States amounts to only roughly 63% of GDP. In fact, according to Standard Chartered Bank, China ranks first worldwide in terms of both overall M2 and newly issued currency. In 2011, China accounted for an estimated 52% of the world’s added liquidity. Read more of this post

Where the Chinese credit is going; there is plenty of evidence to suggest that financial distress is another reason why credit expansion has not worked well

Where the Chinese credit is going…

Kate Mackenzie | May 01 10:51 | 3 comments | Share

Part of the CHINA’S CREDIT CONUNDRUM SERIES

After Chinese first quarter GDP missed expectations, there was some hope that the relatively strong manufacturing PMIs in March would point to a better second quarter. Now that we know China’s April PMIs are definitely not supporting that notion, it is worth revisiting, again, the whole question of the country’s recent surging credit growth. The significance of the debt-to-GDP ratio can be argued over, and it’s impossible to say at what level it might become a big problem. But here are a couple of ideas to consider. First, UBS’ China economist Wang Tao has taken a look at the debt/GDP question. Her estimate is that government debt was about 55 per cent of GDP at the end of 2012, and total debt is about 210 per cent of GDP. (China’s official government debt to GDP ratio is only about 15 per cent, going purely on government bonds, but that ignores many government corporations, local debt, and the asset management companies that took on bad debt in the early 2000s financial crisis.) Anyway, 210 per cent is broadly in line with other credible estimates. Wang argues this absolute level in itself is not cause for dismay. In comparison to developed economies it may seem high, but it’s less dramatic measured against other emerging and Asian economies, which she points out typically have high savings rates which in turn provide some of that credit: There are a couple of other reasons not to worry. The growth might simply be lagging the credit surge, and some credit might have been double-counted: To be fair, we think credit growth has a delayed effect on economic growth, and expect construction an investment to pick up in Q2 and Q3 this year on the back of strong credit growth so far. Also, the TSF may overstate (or double count) the leverage increase in the real economy – corporates that engage in interest arbitrage by borrowing cheaply in the interbank credit market and lend to other corporate and/or local governments have both legs of their transaction included in TSF. While Wang doesn’t think a debt crisis is imminent, she does believe there are certainly reasons to worry. One is the recent rapid increase in the debt-to-GDP ratio. This is a very good point which we mentioned in February and forgot to point out in our ruminations of the past couple of weeks. To recap: Morgan Stanley’s Ruchir Sharma sums up some of these reasons in a WSJ op-ed, citing a BIS paper by Mathias Drehmann and Mikael Juselius which finds that if the private debt-to-GDP ratio increases by 6 per cent or more above its 15-year average, that is a “very strong indication that a crisis may be imminent”.

Wang believes there’s another reason for worry:

However, there is also plenty of evidence to suggest that financial distress is another reason why credit expansion has not worked well. Some local governments and companies do not have sufficient cash flow to pay interest on their existing debt, and have to borrow new debt to help service older debt. This is not hard to imagine for local governments – even if they have invested in sound projects in the last stimulus program, most of the projects do not yet have a cash return. In a downturn where local governments face weak tax revenue, dropping land sales, and more demand for pushing up investment and GDP from higher levels of government, the logical solution would be to incur more debt to keep the ball rolling. Read more of this post

China: Subprime for the masses

China: Subprime for the masses

May 1, 2013 11:54am by Simon Rabinovitch and Naomi Rovnick

With Chinese workers enjoying a break from their travails on May 1 for Labour Day, it is an opportune time to look at one gift recently bestowed on them by the country’s financiers. The gift is a new investment opportunity going by the name ‘fund of trusts’, which conjures up a sense of diversification and safety. But a more accurate name might be ‘subprime for the masses’. China’s funds of trusts are inspired by the funds of funds that are common in developed financial markets, allowing people to invest in a blend of other funds – whether mutual funds or hedge funds – to gain broader and more dispersed exposure. In China, the funds are invested in a cocktail of different trust products, which include some of the riskiest, high-yielding investments legally available in the country.

This innovation is notable for one major reason. Until now trust products have typically required minimum investments of Rmb1mn ($162,000) as a way of ensuring that only wealthy individuals put their money at risk. With funds of trusts, the entry barrier has been cut to as little as Rmb100,000 ($16,200). That puts trust investments within the reach of tens of millions of middle-class Chinese. Read more of this post

Chinese officials ‘taking lavish displays, banquets and secret sauna parties underground’

Chinese officials ‘taking lavish displays, banquets underground’

BEIJING — China’s top newspaper warned yesterday that some government officials were finding ways around President Xi Jinping’s graft-busting instructions to be frugal by taking banquets and other lavish displays underground, including hiding liquor in water bottles.

BY –

6 HOURS 35 MIN AGO

BEIJING — China’s top newspaper warned yesterday that some government officials were finding ways around President Xi Jinping’s graft-busting instructions to be frugal by taking banquets and other lavish displays underground, including hiding liquor in water bottles. Mr Xi has made battling pervasive corruption a top priority of his administration, warning the problem is so severe it could threaten the party’s survival. But despite his repeated admonitions for officials to practice frugality and stop wasting public funds, some people still have not got the message or are finding ways around it, the Communist Party’s official newspaper, People’s Daily, reported.

“In some places, the use of public money for eating and drinking has switched from high-end hotels to private venues and places of business … which has become known as ‘low-key luxury’,” the paper said. Cases had come to light of “saunas in farmhouses” and “maotai being put in mineral water bottles”, it said, in reference to the expensive spirit traditionally drunk at banquets. “These ways of pulling the wool over people’s eyes is typical of not following instructions and not stopping what is banned,” the commentary added. This phenomenon has reminded the party of the need to strictly enclose power “in the fence of supervision” and “the cage of regulation”, it said.  Read more of this post

Biofuel Pioneer Alan Shaw Forsakes Renewables to Make Gas-Fed Fuels; “Everybody but me is still in this nightmare. This model is broken.”

Biofuel Pioneer Forsakes Renewables to Make Gas-Fed Fuels

Alan Shaw, the chemist and executive who led a six-year effort to turn inedible crops into fuels to displace gasoline, has renounced the industry he helped pioneer and decided the future instead lies with natural gas.

Formerly chief executive officer of Codexis Inc. (CDXS), the first advanced biofuel technology company to trade on a U.S. exchange, Shaw now says it’s impossible to economically turn crop waste, wood and plants like switchgrass into fuel. He’s trying to do it instead with gas, in his new post as CEO of Calysta Energy LLC.

Shaw’s views put him at odds with the emerging segment of biofuels that’s invested about $3 billion since 2008 in the U.S. developing processes that turn biomass into new types of fuel. Amyris Inc. (AMRS) and Gevo Inc. (GEVO) are among producers that have yet to make fuel on commercial scales and slid since their initial public offerings.

“Everybody but me is still in this nightmare,” Shaw, 50, said in an interview in San Francisco. “This model is broken.” Read more of this post

Feedback Loops And The Unsustainability Of China’s ‘Moderate’ Growth; the ‘rage’ among the Chinese at any suggestion of the sustainability of their growth model suggest a level of fragility in China’s social fabric

Feedback Loops And The Unsustainability Of China’s ‘Moderate’ Growth

Tyler Durden on 05/01/2013 19:11 -0400

With last night’s China PMI disappointing expectations and eking out a just-expansionary miasma of hope for the growth enthusiasts, the very real question of global growth sustainability (while not on US equity market participants’ minds) is coming to the fore. As Michael Pettis notes, Martin Wolf’s recent perspective that it may be useful to think about Japan as a model for understanding the adjustment process in China since the Japanese model shows how risky it is to shift to a slow-growth model.

Being in the significant non-consensus camp of “malevolent outsiders”, Pettis fears the ‘rage’ among the Chinese at any suggestion of the sustainability of their growth model suggest a level of fragility in China’s social fabric and its self-confidence that could make any slowdown more difficult to manage. The reason he is most-concerned is ‘feedback loops’; self-reinforcing mechanisms that are virtuous (with surprising growth expectations on the way up), but become vicious in an equally destructive manner. Read more of this post

Crude Inventories Surge To Record High As Energy Demand Collapses

Crude Inventories Surge To Record High As Energy Demand Collapses

Tyler Durden on 05/01/2013 11:38 -0400

A month ago we highlighted the somewhat stunning reality of the real economy via the EIA’s detailed energy supply and demand data. The key takeaway was  that we hoped this did not represent the true state of the economy since the data was so dismal. Fast forward to today and the DOE just released a much higher than expected build in crude inventories that took the stuffed-channel of oil products to all-time highs.The 395.3 million barrels is higher than the previous record in July 1990. There appears to be a number of factors at play – none of which are positive. There is a surge in supply due to the incessant harvesting of shale oil (which could have its own problems as we noted here). Second, we suspect there is a degree of ‘channel-stuffing’ occurring – if we pump it, they will buy – as producers and transporters are desperate to keep active and show incremental business (despite fading railcar loadings). But perhaps most important, as EIA data has shown, there has been a collapse in end demand for crude products not seen since the 1990s. Today’s surge in inventories appears to confirm demand remains subdued at best.

Crude Declines for Second Day on Record Inventories

West Texas Intermediate oil fell for a second day as U.S. inventories reached a record high last week and on signs of economic slowdown in the U.S. and China.  Read more of this post