The Hill (April 22)
“Anyone doubting that China is well on its way to a Japanese-style lost economic decade has apparently missed the bursting of its massive housing and credit market bubble and the souring of U.S. and European trade relations with that country.” Make no mistake, China’s fall “would constitute a major headwind for world economic recovery.”
Tags: Bubble, Bursting, China, Credit market, Europe, Fall, Headwind, Housing, Japan, Lost decade, Trade relations, U.S., World
New York Times (April 21)
“The mundanity of the courtroom has all but swallowed Donald Trump, who for decades has sought to project an image of bigness and a sense of power…. For the next six weeks, a man who values control and tries to shape environments and outcomes to his will is in control of very little.”
Tags: Bigness, Control, Courtroom, Environments, Mundanity, Outcomes, Power, Project, Shape, Swallowed, Trump
Washington Post (April 19)
“Earth’s record hot streak might be a sign of a new climate era.” Existing models are coming up short as scientists struggle “to explain how the planet could have exceeded previous temperature records by as much as half a degree Celsius (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit) last fall.” Efforts over the next quarter or so may determine “whether Earth’s climate has undergone a fundamental shift — a quantum leap in warming that is confounding climate models and stoking ever more dangerous weather extremes.”
Tags: Climate, Climate models, Confounding, Dangerous, Earth, Era, Existing models, Hot streak, Quantum leap, Records, Scientists, Struggle, Temperature, Warming, Weather extremes
The Guardian (April 19)
“Ocean waves crashing on the world’s shores emit more PFAS into the air than the world’s industrial polluters, new research has found, raising concerns about environmental contamination and human exposure along coastlines.” Because PFAS “are powerful surfactants that concentrate on the surface of water, which helps explain why they move from the ocean to the air and atmosphere.” It’s likely that “the contaminated spray likely affects groundwater, surface water, vegetation, and agricultural products near coastlines that are far from industrial sources of PFAS.”
Tags: Air, Atmosphere, Coastlines, Environmental contamination, Exposure, Groundwater, Human, Industrial polluters, Ocean, PFAS, Research, Shores, Surfactants, Vegetation
Seeking Alph (April 18)
“This year’s stock market rally has continued to be a story of strong mega-tech performances. Yet, most of the Magnificent 7 are overvalued compared to their sectors,” and Deutsche Bank’s Jim Reid has pointed out “that today’s Mag 7 are bigger than the entire Chinese market, double the size of the Japanese market, and over four times the size of the UK market.”
Tags: Chinese market, Deutsche Bank, Japanese market, Magnificent 7, Mega-tech, Overvalued, Rally, Reid, Sectors, Stock market, UK market
Wall Street Journal (April 17)
Marking “a sharp reversal” from years of “bolstering their office footprints,” Big Tech is now “downsizing workspace in another blow to office real estate.” Especially hard hit, “San Francisco’s office-vacancy rate hit a record 36.7% in the first quarter,” roughly ten times worse than early 2019 when it stood at 3.6%.
Tags: 2019, 3.6%, 36.7%, Big tech, Downsizing, Footprints, Office, Real estate, Record, Reversal, San Francisco, Vacancy, Workspace
Financial Times (April 14)
“Momentum in economies including the US and India has been picking up in recent months, helping stoke optimism that global growth in 2024 will modestly outpace last year’s reading…. providing a bright spot amid a largely lacklustre global economic backdrop .”
Tags: 2024, Bright spot, Economies, Global growth, India, Momentum, Optimism, Outpace, U.S.
Washington Post (April 14)
Farmers in Europe are revolting. They are hopping “mad about high costs and low prices, about the prospect of free trade deals, about the constraints of climate regulations, about what they say is a failure of political elites to understand what it means to grow wheat or raise sheep.” In addition to “reshaping European policy,” their revolt “may foretell a sharp right shift,” including the major U.S. election.
Tags: Climate regulations, Constraints, Election, Europe, Farmers, Free trade deals, High costs, Low prices, Political elites, Revolting, Sheep, U.S., Wheat
The Economist (April 13)
Extreme weather incidents are increasing in frequency due to climate change. “In the decade from 2000 to 2009 only three thunderstorms cost the industry more than $1bn at current prices. From 2010 to 2019 there were ten. Since 2020 there have already been six. Such storms now account for more than a quarter of the costs to the insurance industry from natural disasters.”
Tags: $1bn, 2010, 2019, 2020, Climate change, Costs, Extreme weather, Frequency, Incidents, Industry, Insurance, Natural disasters, Storms, Thunderstorms
New York Times (April 12)
“More economists are paring their bets that the Fed will cut rates after the latest Consumer Price Index report.” The new consensus of “higher-for-longer inflation… has hit the U.S. housing market like a thunderbolt. Home prices and mortgage rates are climbing again, dashing hopes that financing costs would fall this year and adding another economic question that could hang over the presidential election campaign.”
Tags: CPI, Economists, Fed, Financing costs, Home prices, Housing market, Inflation, Mortgage rates, Rates, U.S.
