Wall Street Journal (December 11)
“China’s market may have a massive capitalization on paper but the small float of tradable shares means that it is easily manipulated. Retail investors are often sucked in and then burned.”
Tags: Capitalization, China, Float, Investors, Manipulated, Market, Tradable shares
LA Times (December 10)
“The emerging sharing economy poses a challenge for government because it doesn’t fit neatly into existing regulatory structures. Individuals put their personal cars, homes and other assets to commercial use on an irregular basis, with the help of companies such as Uber and Airbnb that connect them to customers.”
Tags: Airbnb, Assets, Cars, Challenge, Government, Homes, Regulatory structures, Sharing economy, Uber
Financial Times (December 8)
“Greater shareholder engagement with quoted companies has been one of the key themes in corporate governance to emerge since the financial crisis” and underpins the UK’s stewardship code for institutional investors. In the U.S. as well, there has been a “recent upsurge in activist investing,” along with “growing demands by long-term institutions for greater input.” This creates potential for progress. “It can only be good that shareholders take an active interest in the businesses in which they invest.”
Tags: Activists, Corporate governance, Engagement, Financial Crisis, Institutional investors, Shareholders, Stewardship code, U.S., UK
Chicago Tribune (December 7)
“Complying with police commands doesn’t seem to guarantee you won’t get shot at, choked or killed. At least if you are a black male.” The nation is soul searching after a string killings by police has raised attention to the disturbing reality. “A young black male… is 21 times more likely to be the victim of such a killing than is a young white male.”
New York Times (December 6)
“Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey — the so-called MINT economies — along with the more developed South Korea,” could surpass Italy, the world’s eighth largest economy, to each contribute 3-5% of global GDP. The MINTs may even give some of the BRICs a run for their money. Jim O’Neil, who coined the term BRIC to refer to Brazil, Russia, India and China, thought each had potential to produce 5% of global GDP. China’s already there and India will be soon, but it’s becoming apparent that Brazil and Russia will struggle without reforms. While the MINTs “have many challenges, they all have exciting potential, and could become mini-giants, if not quite on the scale of some of their well-known BRIC colleagues.”
Tags: Brazil, BRIC, BRICS, China, GDP, India, Indonesia, Italy, Jim O’Neil, Mexico, MINT, Nigeria, Reforms, Russia, South Korea, Turkey
The Economist (December 6)
“Shinzo Abe’s expected victory in next week’s snap election will leave him no excuse for further backsliding on structural reform.” He has yet to demonstrate enough “vigour in pushing through the tough, market-oriented reforms that he has repeatedly promised.”
Tags: Abe, Backsliding, Election, Excuse, Japan, Market-oriented reforms, Structural reform, Victory
Wall Street Journal (December 4)
With rising production and falling prices, the ‘Peak Oil’ theory has again been debunked. The world routinely panics, then “relearns that supply responds to necessity and price.” The Malthusian hysteria has not been restricted to oil. There have “been regular warnings that the world is running out of soybeans, helium, chocolate, tunsgsten, you name it—and that population growth has become unsustainable. The warnings create a political or social panic for a while, only to be proved wrong.”
Tags: Chocolate, Debunked, helium, Malthus, Necessity, Panic, Peak Oil, Population growth, Price, Production, Soybeans, Supply, Tunsgsten
Washington Post (December 3)
“In authoritarian politics, as in life, attitude is everything, or almost everything.” Vladimir Putin has demonstrated a relentless desire to hold onto power by any means necessary. “Those who hope that falling oil prices, or Western sanctions, or a combination of the two, will force a change of course in Moscow — much less a change of regime — must reckon with the fact that Putin has seen that scenario once already, in Gorbachev’s time. And he seems determined that the sequel, if any, will end differently.”
Tags: Attitude, Authoritarian, Gorbachev, Moscow, Oil prices, Politics, Power, Putin, Western sanctions
LA Times (December 3)
From next week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rules will require restaurant chains, movie theaters, supermarkets and other chain outlets to provide calorie counts on their menus. This marks a step forward. “Awareness will almost certainly grow as the calorie listings become ubiquitous. Even better, restaurants appear to respond to such labeling requirements by offering new, lower-calorie options. It took a long time for the era of supersizing to wreak havoc on America’s waistlines; it will take a while for us to educate ourselves to behave differently.”
Tags: Calorie counts, Chains, FDA, Menus, Movie theaters, Restaurants, Supermarkets, Supersizing
The Economist (December 3)
“If Thailand’s economy could be said to belong to any foreign country, it would be Japan. After floods devastated Thailand in 2011, Japanese firms poured in nearly $30 billion to rebuild their favourite production base in Asia. That is more investment in three years than everything that American firms have poured in since the Vietnam war, plus everything Chinese firms have ever invested on top.”
Tags: Asia, China, Economy, Floods, Investment, Japan, Production base, Thailand, U.S., Vietnam
