OilPrice.com (April 12)
The Iran “crisis has thrown the precarity of the current global energy trade into sharp relief,” accelerating shifts in energy policy. That shift is expected to include “expanded clean energy production capacity” and greatly benefit China. Chinese companies are “incredibly well positioned to continue to consolidate their dominance in global markets, as they are by far the cheapest producer and most accessible trade partner for many nations that have been left in the lurch by the effective blockade of Hormuz.”
Tags: Accelerating, Accessible, Blockade, Capacity, Cheapest, China, Clean energy, Consolidate, Crisis, Dominance, Global markets, Hormuz, Iran, Policy, Precarity, Producer, Shifts, Trade, Trade partner
New York Times (April 12)
Make no mistake “Trump’s war is weakening America,” but nobody should “root for this country to fail. We all have a stake in the nation that he leads. So does the rest of the free world. There are no other democracies with the economic and military strength to counter China and Russia. When America is weaker and poorer, as this war has made us, authoritarianism benefits.”
Tags: China, Democracies, Economic, Fail, Free world, Military, Mistake, Poorer, Russia, Stake, Strength, Trump, U.S., War, Weakening
Bloomberg (April 10)
“Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell summoned Wall Street leaders to an urgent meeting on Anthropic.” The AI firm’s new Mythos system is thought to be “capable of identifying and then exploiting vulnerabilities in every major operating system and web browser.” The leaders, who represented global systemically important banks, were summoned “to make sure banks are aware of possible future risks… and are taking precautions to defend their systems.”
Tags: AI, Anthropic, Bessent, Exploiting, Fed, Future risks, GSIB, Identifying, Meeting, Mythos, Operating system, Powell, Treasury, Urgent, Vulnerabilities, Wall Street, Web browser
Financial Times (April 9)
“Among the many consequences of the stand-off in the Strait of Hormuz, it seems that we may look back on this as the week in which one of America’s most powerful geopolitical tools was shown to be a weakened stick. Threatening to limit access to the global dollar system now seems less fearsome.” US Treasury sanctions cover the entire country of Iran. “But not only does this not appear to have prevented it from selling oil while at war with the US, it has not seemed to stop it from charging ransom fees to international shipping seeking to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.”
Tags: Consequences, Fearsome, Geopolitical tools, Global dollar system, Iran, Oil, Ransom fees, Sanctions, Stand-off, Strait of Hormuz, Threatening, Treasury, U.S., Weakened
Market Watch (April 9)
“The U.S. government recently retired the penny after two centuries because it had become too expensive to mint. Some bitcoin miners are facing a similar existential threat. For many miners, it has cost more in recent months to produce a bitcoin than the coin can be sold for, leading them to stop operating some machines and to sell more bitcoin holdings to raise cash.”
Tags: Bitcoin miners, Cash, Existential threat, Expensive, Government, Holdings, MINT, Penny, Retired, Sell, U.S.
Wall Street Journal (April 8)
“Landlords and their lenders held on to their office towers for years, hoping for a turnaround after Covid. Now, they are accepting enormous losses. Owners and creditors are capitulating to the reality that more employees are splitting their work time between home and office. They are also resigned to stubbornly higher interest rates, which lower property values and make it harder for buyers to borrow.”
Tags: Buyers, Capitulating. Reality, Covid, Creditors, Employees, Home, Interest rates, Landlords, Lenders, Losses. Owners, Office towers, Property values, Turnaround
Fortune (April 7)
The petrodollar “makes up the cornerstone of America’s dominance over global trade, but economists warn the currency architecture has been eroding at its edges for years now.” Indeed, the current era may bring “the biggest change in the world’s relationship to the dollar since 1974, and every day the Iran war continues, the cracks in the old system grow wider and wider. To be sure, the dollar is still overwhelmingly dominant, but it’s no longer the only game in town.”
Tags: 1974, Cornerstone, Cracks, Currency architecture, Dominance, Economists, Eroding, Global trade, Iran war, Old system, Petrodollar
Bloomberg (April 6)
“Chinese bonds may be reaching an historic turning point, with yields climbing from record low levels as deflationary pressures ease and expectations for monetary loosening recede…. Sentiment in the largest emerging debt market has shifted after a slew of upbeat data, from a surprise growth rebound to slower factory-gate price declines, cast fresh doubts on the deflation-driven narrative that has dominated trading in recent years.”
Tags: Bonds, China, Deflationary pressures, Emerging debt market, Expectations, Growth, Historic, Monetary loosening, Rebound, Record low, Sentiment, Turning-point, Upbeat, Yields
South China Morning Post (April 6)
“China’s yuan may be going global faster than Western data suggests” as “many yuan transactions are now routed through China’s own global payment system, which often does not show up in traditional data sets.” Such an understatement by mainstream metrics “could help explain the gap between Beijing’s official narrative–which describes the yuan as the world’s third-largest payment currency–and readings from tracking systems such as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift).”
Tags: China, Currency, Gap, Global, Global payment system, Mainstream metrics, Traditional data sets, Understatement, Western data, Yuan, Yuan transactions
The Guardian (April 5)
This has become “a Japanese century – thanks to the yen’s role as easy money for global finance.” Thanks to “loose monetary policy” the yen has evolved “into the world’s cheapest and most reliable funding currency. By suppressing yields on public debt to keep Japan’s domestic economy afloat, the BoJ effectively created a publicly subsidised funding pipeline for bankers.” They can make a quick buck by borrowing cheaply in yen and investing in higher-return assets, such as US equities. The “yen carry trade” is enormous, with profits for global investors reckoned to run into tens of billions of dollars.”
Tags: Bankers, BOJ, Carry trade, Easy money, Economy, Equities, Funding currency, Global finance, Japanese century, Loose, Monetary policy, Public debt, Reliable, Suppressing, Yields
