Weekend links, 6-7 February 2016

Australian Scapegoat, 1987, Arthur Boyd, Art Gallery of NSW

China

• China’s central bank likely to usher in more currency depreciation after Lunar New Year – SCMP
• China’s foreign exchange reserves likely to record another massive fall in January, analysts predict – SCMP
• With poor job prospects for Chinese students, is it still worth investing in a US education? – SCMP…does Australia offer any better job prospect for Chinese graduates?…
• As China’s economy unravels, Beijing’s attempts at damage control are growing increasingly desperate– Quartz
• Central bank desperate to stabilize yuan ahead of Lunar New Year– Asian Review
• China says FX reserves remain abundant despite recent falls– Reuters
• China’s Banking Sector Will Cause More Pain Than Gain– Seeking Alpha
• China’s Biggest Ponzi Scheme Shows Rot in Internet Financing – Bloomberg
• In China, Books That Make Money, and Enemies – NY Times
• China’s growth prospects – VoxEU, Barro
• China’s economy can avoid hard landing if government pushes market-driven reforms, says IMF chief – SCMP
• China’s HK$59 billion online Ponzi scheme: who started it, how did it happen and now what? – SCMP
• Concern Grows in U.S. Over China’s Drive to Make Chips – NY Times
• China foreign reserves head for record drop on yuan defense – Business Times
• The Great Escape from China – Project-Syndicate, Rogoff
• China eases inbound foreign investment curbs to counter outflows – FT.com
• Something broke in China in 2016 – Market Watch
• SocGen claims China is only months away from burning through its currency reserves – Market Watch
• Central bank desperate to stabilize yuan ahead of Lunar New Year – Nikkei Asian Review
• Beijing is still loath to let go of China’s increasingly vital services sector – CER
• NDRC Said to Have Plan to Cut Steelmaking Capacity over Five Years – Caixin
• More Insiders Said to Be Linked to Agricultural Bank Scandal – Caixin
• RBS: China’s Economy: Slowing Distorted & Debt-Addicted In For Hard Landing – Value Walk

Asia

• Kuroda was confident about passage of negative rates – Nikkei Asian Review
• Amazon Japan is now offering budget-friendly monk delivery– Quartz
• Doubting India’s ‘fastest-growing’ GDP stats, economists devise their own – Business Times
• Japan’s economy minister resigns amid corruption allegations– Daily Commercial News
• Kazakhstan says it can maintain budget despite oil price fall – BNE Intellinews
• Japan’s Negative Interest Rate Gamble – Economonitor
• Saudis Say Cash Crunch Won’t Derail an Ambitious Foreign Agenda – Bloomberg

Europe

• Portugal’s anti-austerity budget provokes Brussels showdown– FT
• Disappointed With Europe, Thousands of Iraqi Migrants Return Home– NY Times
• Turkey isn’t preparing to invade Syria– CNN
• Ireland remains fastest-growing economy in Europe– The Irish Times
• European Growth Seen as Slower Than Previously Predicted– NY Times
• Border controls threaten to derail Europe’s shaky economic recovery, says Commission– The Telegraph
• EU Slashes 2016 Inflation Forecast to 0.5% as Growth Seen Slower– Bloomberg
• BAD BANKS AND RUDE AWAKENINGS: ITALIAN BANKS AT A CROSSROADS – Pieria
• Russia’s fuel oil exports down amid higher home demand – Reuters
• The economic consequences of Schengen – Bruegel
• A new way to approach Europe’s gas security, beyond the usual Russian obsession – Bruegel
• European banking union: should the ‘outs’ join in? – Bruegel
• Fragile balance in Ukraine politics shaken by economy minister’s resignation – BNE Intellinews…good read about a nation being torn apart by its own corruption…
• Putin’s Viagra problem and Russia’s Plan K – BNE Intellinews, Aris…he is right, Putin is in trouble…
• European Banks’ Crude Awakening – Bloomberg

United Kingdom

• Bank of England and interest rates: always crashing in the same car – Guardian
• Bank of England votes unanimously to hold rates – CNBC
• How crises at home are dampening wealthy Russian, Chinese appetite for luxury London property – Financial Post
• HOUSEHOLD DEBT: CONCENTRATED RISK? – Pieria
• Pound could crash by 20pc if UK votes for Brexit, warns Goldman Sachs – Telegraph
• Carney downgrades UK growth prospects as rate rise kicked into long grass – Telegraph
• No one knows what’s coming – as the Bank of England has proved – Telegraph
• It’s time to kill off corporation tax for good – Prospect

United States

• Payrolls in U.S. Rose 151,000 in January, Jobless Rate at 4.9% – Bloomberg
• Wages Rise as U.S. Unemployment Rate Falls Below 5% – NY Times
• Obama to propose $10-a-barrel oil tax– Politico
• George W. Bush cuts television ad backing his brother– Politico
• Grantham: The Real American Exceptionalism; 2015 and 2016, U.S. Equity Bubble Update, and Yet More on Oil– GMO
• Wall Street Cuts Its Rate Forecasts Even Further Below Fed’s – Bloomberg
• US layoffs surge to 6-month high– CNBC
• Border agent: ’We might as well abolish our immigration laws altogether’– Washington Examiner
• Obama to propose $10-per-barrel fee on oil – CNBC
• Why Super Bowls can be a super letdown economically – CBS
• Chinese money flying to New York – Nikkei Asian Review
• Federal proposal seeks to create summer and youth jobs – Washington Post
• U.S. oil, gas industry sheds 100,000 jobs in slump – Reuters
• Jimmy Carter: “Legal Bribery” Is Prevailing In The US Political System – Zero Hedge
• Why a January jobs slowdown may not be a bad sign – Market Watch
• Young voters like Sanders because he hasn’t given up on their future – Market Watch…good on him, good on them…
• Forecasting the 2016 election economy: it turns out consumers really do vote their wallets – Bonddad
• US consumer is the last defense against strong dollar drag on the economy – Sober Look
• Number of Jobless Claims Rises More Than Expected – NY Times
• The Unemployment System Isn’t Ready For The Next Recession – FiveThirtyEight
• How Bernie Sanders Could Lose But Still Defeat Hillary Clinton – New Yorker

Americas

• Without affordable housing, Vancouver risks becoming an economic ghost town – Financial Post
• If you thought the economy was bad in Canada, you should see what’s happening in Brazil – Financial Post
• The Uncertain Prospects of Hasty and Premature Criticisms of Argentina’s Economic Policies – Economonitor
• Venezuela Fights Free Markets And Is Losing, Flies In Planes Stuffed With Cash (Seriously) – Value Walk

Terra Ponzinomicus

• Turnbull, Shorten and the long search for a national leader – Fairfax….second rate leadership looking for the lowest common denominator, and appealing to a baser nation…..
• PM Turnbull denies plan to stop compulsory super rising, but ‘seriously considering’ other proposal – Fairfax
• Public debt is not the issue – that’s just a neo-con scare campaign – Guardian, Phil Soos…cracker of a read…
• Chasing credit ratings is a poor fiscal plan – ABC, Jericho…very good analysis & charts…
• ‘Misleading, inaccurate and in breach of Paris’: CSIRO scientist criticises cuts – Fairfax
• Off-the-plan apartments carry high and rising risks – ABC
• Mining and metals sector yet to trough: Ernst & Young – ABC
• Glass half empty: the latest figures make it hard to be optimistic about the economy – Guardian, Jericho. He’s starting to get it. Falling into line with MB.
• ‘Substantial’ Australian job losses planned at BHP mining spin-off South32 – Guardian
• Super is a $28bn pot of gold for Scott Morrison – but the pain will be felt elsewhere – Guardian, Jericho…very good read…
• The Tesla Powerwall and what it means for Australia’s energy market – ABC…the ability to tell power companies to go and get stuffed…
• We can’t afford to ignore the teacher exodus – ABC
• Reserve Bank of Australia Sees Faster Growth, Scope for Easier Policy – Bloomberg, Heath…faster growth, but not fast enough that means?…
• Dick Smith investigated over employee underpayment – ABC
• ANZ and NAB could be cheap– The AFR
• Shell keeps door open for Browse LNG– The AFR
• CityLink users to be slugged tens of billions under Andrews government plan – Fairfax…Melbourne is a city turning to merde before our very eyes….
• Labor senator Sam Dastyari claims 10 companies have taken control of Australian politics – Fairfax…Laberal the Australian JV of global capital?…
• Australian PBO – hard to take seriously – is it vaudeville or what? – Bill Mitchell

Commodities

• Goldman says zinc has bottomed, base metals to rally on short covering – CNBC
• Oil Seen `Lower for Longer’ by Morgan Stanley as Forecasts Cut – Bloomberg
• World food prices tumble near 7-year low – CNBC
• Battle of Three Oil Benchmarks Upending Crude Flows Across Globe – Bloomberg
• The Death Throes of Oil – Project-Syndicate…dunno about death throes, but the move away of transport fuel is on the radar…
• Oil companies need to tailor strategies to claw back lost profits – FT.com
• Oil: From boom to bailout? – FT.com…major major fallout…
• Can China reform its bloated steel sector? – Reuters, Home
• How much global oil output halted due to low prices? Just 0.1% – Business Times
• Oil Rout Threatens Vicious Cycle for Economy– WSJ
• U.S. running out of space to store oil– CNN Money
• Chinese LNG demand falls for the first time on record – ABC
• Oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens cashes out of crude as worst market in decades drags on – Financial Post
• Dry-bulk shipping under water as bankruptcies rise – Nikkei Asian Review
• Four Days After Predicting Oil Will Double, T. Boone Pickens Sells All Oil Holdings – Zero Hedge
• Chocolate demand falls as candy bars shrink and Asia growth slows – Reuters
• Go for launch: The space race for mining metals from asteroids gains more focus – Platts
• CHINA LPG: PRICES PLUNGE ON SHRINKING DEMAND, INCREASING SUPPLY – Platts
• A warning for commodity markets – Mineweb
• The Golden Age: Why Gold Will Outperform In 2016 – See it Market

Capital Markets

• Goldman Sachs With Pimco Warn Bond Gains Will Turn Into Losses – Bloomberg
• Big Oil Opts for Payouts Over Debt Rating– WSJ
• High-frequency trader warns of potential market ‘catastrophe’– FT
• The Hottest Idea in Finance: Capital Controls Are Good– WSJ
• Who’s Winning the Global Currency War? Not the ECB. – Bloomberg
• How negative interest rates could spur more fear than growth – Financial Post
• The benefits of scrapping cash – FT.com, Tett
• Why Bonds Are So Confusing – A Wealth of Common Sense
• The nature and effectiveness of central-bank communication – VoxEU
• How the use of floating-rate loans changes the impact of monetary policy – VoxEU
• Collapsing crude prices are hurting emerging-market debt – Nikkei Asian Review…major EM problems coming to the surface now…
• Saudi currency devaluation would carry major political risk– Reuters…something has to give, they are burning through cash fast, and will have bank bailouts by mid year…
• Emerging markets: Big trouble from brittle China – Euromoney
• Credit Added to List of Bank Worries – Bloomberg

Global Macro

• The Global Economy’s New Abnormal – Project-Syndicate, Roubini
• The End of the New Normal? – Project-Syndicate, El-Erian
• Russia and the Saudis: A 10-billion barrel game of oil bluff – CNBC
• Oil Dictator Dominos – Project-Syndicate
• A Saudi-Russian Oil Détente? Not Likely – Bloomberg
• Stock markets suspect Federal Reserve has interest rate jitters – Guardian
• Why it would be wise to prepare for the next recession – FT.com, Martin Wolf…makes a lot of perfectly valid points….
• Toxic Loans Around the World Weigh on Global Growth – NY Times
• If There Is a Recession in 2016, This Is How It Will Happen – NY Times
• IIF blames market malaise on central bank liquidity drought – Business Times
• It’s a bad time to be a bank – tracy-alloway.com
• Oil bears closing of $600 million triple-short fund bet seen adding to tumult– Reuters
• Dollar tumbles as Fed rescues China in the nick of time – Telegraph, AEP
• Global Indicators Point to Fed Reversal – Bloomberg…they reverse course three months after they moved and it is time for gold, guns & stocking in supplies…
• Citi: ‘We Should All Fear Oilmageddon’ – Bloomberg
• The rise and fall of the economic central planners – Notayesman
• Goldman Sachs Says It May Be Forced to Fundamentally Question How Capitalism Is Working – Bloomberg
• Iran wants euro payment for new and outstanding oil sales – Reuters
• China reserves data may put cat among global central bank doves – Reuters
• Oil market spiral threatens to prick global debt bubble, warns BIS – Telegraph, AEP

…and furthermore…

• Narcissistic leaders, mirrors in the boardroom and firms’ risk-taking behaviour – SCMP…good read, the higher you go in any organisation, the nuttier they become…
• Yet Another Airbag Recall Will Affect Five Million – NY Times
• End of the Road May Be Near for Side Mirrors – NY Times
• The end of growth could mean the death of Davos Man – Financial Post…bummer…
• Top China defector passes secrets to US – FT.com
• The scientific mystery of why humans love music – Vox
• Lifestyle gets blame for 70% to 90% of all cancers – Market Watch
• The Economics of Pawn Shops – Priceonomics
• Watch out, Fitbit: Smartwatches set to overtake fitness bands, report says – Financial Post
• With their own loans, students are know-nothings – CBS
• How blockchain technology is about to transform sharemarket trading – The Conversation
• These Are the World’s Most Miserable Economies– Bloomberg
• Rich Kids Stay Rich, Poor Kids Stay Poor – FiveThirtyEight
• Cooling Housing Markets: What Works? – Economonitor…well worth a look…
• How to See a Famine Before It Starts – The Atlantic
• How Phantom Limbs Explain Consciousness – The Atlantic