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A review of Champions League games on Jan 30, 2025.

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Pharmaceutical companies in the US will be required to provide rebates to buyers if they increase prices above the inflation rate. This is one of the provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 also called the Climate and Tax bill. Medicare recipients total out of pocket costs for drugs will be capped at $2000 under the Biden bill.

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The drop in the value of the Turkish currency, the lira, hits ordinary Turks as it pushes up the price of food, medicine and other essentials. The lira has dropped by over a third of its value against the dollar in 2021. This is leading to a decline in living standards in Turkey, says this report in WSJ. President Erdogan is pushing an unconventional strategy to increase growth, by having the central bank cut interest rates as the value of lira drops sharply. This could lead to further drops in the lira making it difficult to make dollar debt repayments says this report in WSJ. The problem extends beyond drop in standard of living for average Turks. The country's banks are affected and companies that have borrowed heavily in US dollars and foreign currency denominated debt. A large mismatch between foreign currency debt such as dollar debt and the country's foreign exchange reserves has led to countries such as Argentina falling behind and seeking IMF assistance. WSJ points out that Turkey has about $160 billion in foreign exchange assets, and $280 billion in liabilities as of August 2021, according to the Turkish central bank. Bank lending in foreign currency is 24% to 45% of their total loans in the first half of 2021, according to Fitch Ratings. This could lead to dollar debt rollover difficulties as debt repayment comes due in April 2021. ...

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China has seen novel uses of the internet. Pinduoduo is one of them. It brings people together on the internet to socialize and shop together. Purchases are small compared to Alibaba- $324 a year on average. By  bringing people in large numbers it has brought in about 788 million users in 2020.  One of the attractions is an orchard game where people tend to their digital orchards to earn shopping vouchers and prizes such as boxes of mangoes.The founder Mr. Huang studied computer science at the University of Wisconsin- Madison where he met Chen who now runs the company. Huang's first effort as recently as 2015 was to sell lychees and fruit from their sole warehouse in Shanghai on WeChat platform. This failed when the computer systems of the website could not handle the large number of orders. Lychees then rotted at the warehouse. From that first effort he realized the way social and browsing platforms could work with shopping. To build up large number of buyers who could be served advertising he came up with subsidies to buyers that are financed from the advertising. Money from advertising is put back into the subsidies. The buyers get discount on purchases and the browsing social platform builds large number of users in a short time. In this way it has as many users as Alibaba but purchases are small.  As in these types of startups with huge valuations and fast growth no profits were made in 2020. The loss is $1.1 billion in 2020. It has put $13 billion of the ad revenues into subsidizing the products on the site. Investors have given the company $6 billion for an agriculture program to sell fresh food and produce.  The Chinese government sees the company subsidies as having an effect of distorting the market prices. Regulators have fined the company for its practices. The company's working culture has some aspects that come under criticism with deaths of two employees.  This offers a glimpse of China's internet culture. How much of it is real constructive development of the internet is always a question. Is investor capital productively invested is also a question. Like Japan in the late 1980's few questions are asked by investors about productive uses of capital. As growth slows as it did in Japan by 2000 a lot of these questions are likely to come back.   ...

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Japan does not support Russian assets plan of the EU to use assets in Belgium $210 billion for Ukraine loans. A $71 billion shortfall in the Ukraine 2026 budget. EU's Leyen wants to use Russian assets in Belgium. Belgium is against the idea. Only Canada and UK support it.

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Grim warning from chief scientific and medical advisors to the British government that we are not through this yet, there is more ahead. Without strong action there could be 200 deaths a day and 50,000 cases a day, says Sir Patrick Valance, chief scientific adviser. Tens of thousands of deaths could happen in the winter and there is little prospect that restrictions can be lifted for the next 6 months. The chief medical officer to the government says if we do too little the virus is going to take off. Sir Patrick Valance said at a joint appearance with Whitty in Downing Street that if the virus doubles in 7 days, then if we have 5000 cases a day, it would be 10,000 the next week, 20,000 the next week and 40,000 a day the week after. In a month we could be near 50,000 a day. The vaccine the advisors said may be available to small groups by the end of 2020, only in the first half of 2021 will it be a likely scenario of it being available in widespread way. On protection they say most of us are not protected only about 6-8% may be protected in the hope that immunity is gained by having been infected and developing antibodies. We have to deal with it collectively for the next 6 months as it is now growing across the whole country, not just in some places or environments. Doing too little is dangerous and could let it take off speedily and affect hospitals again, doing too much so that unemployment is affected and poverty social deprivation happens is also to be kept in mind. ...

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This report on Mumbai's underground subway by Corinne Abrams was first published in WSJ January 6, 2019 with Lyrarc gist. Then as happened too often in the past it became the victim of a change in government with the new government in December 2019 stalling the rapid work on the project. Only when it was voted out in June 2022 did the rapid work shown in this Jan 2019 WSJ report resume. It has accelerated under Ashwini Bhide's leadership of the METRO organization and work is back to round the clock 24 hours a day. "A 27 station, 21 mile subway is being built under one of Asia's most crowded cities- Mumbai. It is moving ahead at the pace of one mile a month, with 9 miles complete, started in 2016 the $3.3 billion Metro Line 3 is on track to be completed by 2021. The government of prime minister Modi is eager to show that it is able to tackle some of the toughest infrastructure projects like this one and get them done on  time. As the head of the Metro Rail Corporation, Ms. Ashwini Bhide puts it this should have been done yesterday, considering the appalling and difficult rides facing Mumbai's millions of residents every day on its old and creaky rail system. There is she says " a desperation" to get this done as is true for so many of the infrastructure projects that need to be done in India." "When complete it will take 1.6 million riders a day 80 feet underground to destinations across the city in air conditioned coaches." ...

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Peter Eavis describes the results of the new Federal Reserve LISCC's determination under Tarullo, Gibson and Taylor, to bring discipline to financial markets and reduce systemic risk. Over the last 3 years Goldman Sachs has spent $16.3 billion in buybacks, about 70% of profits, to return money to shareholders and improve metrics such as earnings per share. This strategy will now have to be reversed. With the Fed stress tests in Feb. 2015 the focus is on banks with large trading desks. Goldman unlike other banks has counted on a strategy of preserving a large trading operation in the hope that this will earn the bank larger profits when the market recovers. This does not sit well with the Fed in the 2015 stress tests- showing a $23.8 billion loss if the stock market fell by 60% in a crisis, leaving Goldman with a bare minimum in reserves. Goldman will now have to reduce the buybacks to add to reserves after the current stress tests, and pare down its trading desk operation.

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The Microsoft Edge browser replaced the Internet Explorer in 2015. Now the Internet Explorer will be removed from most versions of Windows 10.

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American workers at the bottom of the income scale, black, younger and low wage workers benefitted the most from wage increases in 2022.

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The average annual UK household energy bill is expected to double from about 2000 pounds now to over 4000 pounds by April 2023.

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EU leaders get Viktor Orban of Hungary to agree to a $50 billion fund to keep Ukraine's economy funded in 2024.

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US has provided Ukraine with combat bulldozers, portable bridges, and other equipment to keep moving forward for its counteroffensive in June 2023. 

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US crude oil futures for November delivery reach about $94 a barrel by September 27. Oil prices are up 30% since June 2023.

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A new central bank governor Hafize Erkan, increases interest rates from 8.5% to 16% in June 2023 to tackle inflation of about 40%.

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Amazon has installed 17000 EV charging points at 120 warehouses making it the largest private EV charging operator in the US in 2024.

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Carapaz from Ecuador wins  2024 Stage 17 of the Tour de France in the Alps on a steep climb leaving behind Yates.

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A rock sample of the moon is brought back by China's Chiang 6 Mission lunar exploration program on June 25, 2024.

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Risk is inherent in investing. It just needs to be understood well and grasped. There is a lesson in here that some risk is necessary, depending on one's risk horizon and it does not have to be Argentine bonds. Argentine 100 year bond and US Treasury 30 year bond returns 2017-2025 show quite a surprise.  50% return for 2017-25 on Argentine 100 year bonds vs -10% on US Treasury 30 year bonds. It shows the nature of emerging market risk says the WSJ- political risk. At one point the Argentine bonds showed a 50% loss, yet investors willing to stick through the downturn did better than expected, much better. The recovery did not start till Jan 2024 though, 7 years later. In this case the risk was the pandemic in addition to political risk of Argentine earlier defaults but the recovery took place years after the pandemic declined and with the election of Milieu as president.

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Waltz made UN Ambassador, Rubio Interim National Security Adviser April 2025.

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BYD electric car Chinese automaker has doubled sales in 2022 and is surging past Tesla in China. Most of its component makers are located in Shenzen which were not affected by the lockdowns in 2022, compared to its competitors VW and Tesla with parts makers in Shanghai area. BYD was a pioneer in making batteries for cars in China, which gives it a considerable advantage over VW and Tesla which source the batteries from outside.

Warren Buffett invested 210 million for 7.7% of BYD in 2008. Other US investors also invested in BYD.

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Britain's parliament voted 328 to 301 to take control of the agenda on Brexit. This includes 21 rebel Conservative Party MP's including Mr. Hammond and Ken Clarke. This means parliament can now set the January 2020 new date to replace October 31, 2019, as the date for Brexit. A new general election would also be called in the event that Labour party cannot form a new unity government under Mr. Corbyn. A no confidence motion on the minority government of Mr. Johnson would be the next step after putting off Brexit to January 2020.

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WSJ's Kate Linebaugh talks to Pedro Pizzaro CEO of Edison electric utility company in California on the impact of president Biden's $369 Climate bill on California's energy needs. He describes what his company is doing today with the wild fires, and how the Biden bill will help the transition to renewables in a state that requires 100% renewables by 2045. His company Edison is at 35% renewables today. By 2045 energy use will increase by about 60% in California and he is looking ahead to that future.

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A warning written in wood. Scientists for years have looked at rings of long life pine trees to understand the earth and climate. This pine deep in the Sonoran desert started life about 200 years ago. The rings each tell the story through the industrialization of America, the destruction of native communities, the entry of Arizona as 48th state in 1912, the two wars fought and won. Only the ring for 2023 is different after scorching heat, it stopped growing midway, says this report in The Washington Post about climate change that is real in 2023.

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Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway sold $75 billion in stocks in the second quarter 2024 including half of its Apple shares. It has now sold off most of its Apple shares. The cash level is now $277 billion in August 2024. The market is now recalibrating after tech stocks are going through skepticism. Berkshire is also trimming investmetn in Bank of America its second largest investment. Bufett says it is better to hold on to cash as he cannot find places "with very little risk that can make us a lot of money."