Wall Street Journal (August 19)
“The financial world’s center of gravity is shifting east.” The latest event to show this shift is the planned listing of Manchester United on the Singapore Exchange. Taken private in 2005, Manchester United had been listed on the LSE for 15 years. The team’s IPO may raise $1 billion. This “major score for Singapore’s exchange” is also a “cold splash of capitalist reality—a reminder that no country or financial system can take its luster for granted.”
Tags: IPO, LSE, Manchester United, SGX, Singapore
Chicago Tribune (August 18)
George Will writes it is “a different world.” European nations have less to offer NATO. “Since the Cold War’s end, the combined gross domestic product of NATO’s European members has grown 55 percent, yet their defense spending has declined almost 20 percent.” For example, the UK is scheduled to cut military personnel by 10%, tanks and artillery by 40% and decommission its only aircraft carrier.George Will writes it is “a different world.” European nations have less to offer NATO. “Since the Cold War’s end, the combined gross domestic product of NATO’s European members has grown 55 percent, yet their defense spending has declined almost 20 percent.” For example, the UK is scheduled to cut military personnel by 10%, tanks and artillery by 40% and decommission its only aircraft carrier.
New York Times (August 17)
In the UK, “the thousands who were arrested last week for looting and for more violent crimes should face the penalties that are prescribed by law.” It is, however, petty and misguided to try to further persecute them as Prime Minister Cameron has suggested by “cutting off government benefits even to minor offenders and evicting them.” The Prime Minister should focus on restarting the economy and creating jobs. “Making poor people poorer will not make them less likely to steal. Making them, or their families, homeless will not promote respect for the law. Trying to shut down the Internet in neighborhoods would be an appalling violation of civil liberties and a threat to public safety, denying vital real-time information to frightened residents.”
Wall Street Journal (August 16)
This time European leaders struck “a novel idea: Restore investor confidence by denying investors crucial price information.” Novel, but ineffective. Like many of the half-measures before the new bans on short-selling will not fix the European debt crisis. “Someday economic historians will describe Europe’s reaction to its current fiscal woes as a case study in avoiding the real problem. In the latest episode, regulators in France, Italy, Belgium and Spain decided late last week to stop the decline of European bank shares by imposing a short-selling ban on financial stocks for at least 15 days.”
Tags: Debt crisis, Europe, Investors, Short-selling
The Los Angeles Times (August 14)
Americans need to take a break. “Each year we work more and enjoy fewer vacation days than most other industrialized nations. The U.S. is one of a few countries that do not provide a mandatory minimum vacation leave by law. This is unfortunate because “vacations are pro-family, promote good health and increase worker productivity. The U.S. needs to relax more.”
Americans need to take a break. “Each year we work more and enjoy fewer vacation days than most other industrialized nations. The U.S. is one of a few countries that do not provide a mandatory minimum vacation leave by law. This is unfortunate because “vacations are pro-family, promote good health and increase worker productivity. The U.S. needs to relax more.”
Tags: Industrialized nations, Productivity, U.S., Vacation
New York Times (August 14)
There is “a growing gloom for states and cities.” Struggling to balance budgets, city and state governments have cut 577,000 jobs since 2008. “Washington should have been trying to find a way to help states avoid the layoffs and cutbacks…. Instead, it seems to be doing everything possible to make the situation worse.” This includes “a budget deal that will probably lead to a significant reduction in federal aid; a bond downgrade that could eventually trickle down to the local and state level, making borrowing more expensive; and a stock market plunge that is bleeding state employee pension funds.”
Tags: Budgets, Cities, Local governments, Pension funds, States, U.S., Unemployment
The Economist (August 13)
The Economist believes “Substandard & Poor” provides a useful wake up call for the U.S. S&P’s past is “flawed,” especially by the liberally dispensed ratings that led to the sub-prime crisis. Still, “the basic fact is that credit ratings are useful for investors: if the likes of S&P did not exist, the market would invent them.” Previously unthinkable, the threat of default should not be a bargaining chip. “This is not how an AAA-rated country behaves. S&P did America a favour by pointing this out.”
Financial Times (August 12)
“England has had a torrid week,” exclaims the Financial Times. “Wanton destruction” damaged the nation’s image to “those abroad who still look on England as a country of civility and tolerance.” Riots amongst the downtrodden are nothing new, but these were altogether different. They were not political protests “about an intolerable deterioration in their living conditions. They were taking advantage of serious policing errors in order to steal mobile phones and trainers.”
Tags: Politics, Protests, Reputation, Riots, UK
USA Today (August 10)
Much of the U.S. is experiencing another summer heat wave. It should be a reminder. “Too often, climate change is discussed as something to be worried about far off into the future… Both the latest global data and the USA’s sweltering summer suggest, however, that the future might be now.” The newspaper believes “a prudent society would begin moving aggressively to reduce carbon emissions and to develop cleaner energy sources.”
Financial Times (August 9)
“More regulatory foresight could perhaps have averted the nuclear meltdowns caused by the earthquake and tsunami in March.” The Financial Times approves of government plans to overhaul nuclear regulation in Japan, shifting regulatory functions from METI to break up the “damaging conflict of interest” that compromised safety.
Tags: Government, Japan, METI, Nuclear meltdown, Regulation
