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The resurgence of the Pudong District of Shanghai, with large investments, an industrial base, migration to the cities, and favorable location at the mouth of the Yangtze River. Since 1995, 70 skyscrapers and 120 million square metres of floor space according to official estimates, have been built in Pudong. Real estate agency Jones Lang LaSalle says occupancy and rates compare favorably with Manhattan in New York. New York has 10.3% empty space compared to 9.5% for Pudong, and space is leased for $693 per square meter annually in Pudong, 10% higher than in midtown Manhattan. The migration to the cities and a growing middle class have proved skeptics wrong over the years about the ability of real estate developers to fill the space they created. Also helping is the central government's plans to focus investment on Shanghai as the business capital of China.

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A cross-referencing initiative by the new government of Mario Monti in Italy called the "income-o-meter," will be setup in the next few months. Under this initiative the government will cross reference different transactions and compare bank accounts with declared income to take action against tax evasion. Tax evasion is so widespread in Italy that an estimated $150 billion is lost in uncollected taxes. This would help Italy bring down its defict and reduce the debt burden in the current crisis. Attilio Befera, director of Agenzia delle Entrate, Italy's internal revenue service, says that the new cross-referencing initiative will prevent someone from declaring income of $26,000 and buying real estate worth $1.3 million. Tax officials say that in a country with 2.5 million luxury cars, only 2% of 41 million taxpayers showed an annual income of more than $260,000.

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India's largest state, Uttar Pradesh, goes to the polls in February 2012. Uttar Pradesh in the northern region has an estimated population exceeding 200 million. 15% of the parliament seats are from U.P. Uttar Pradesh used to be a major stronghold of the ruling Congress party since independence in 1947 during the Nehru and Indira Gandhi years. More recently in the 2002 and 2007 elections Congress failed to get more than 25 seats out of a total of 219 in this state. The state government is now run by a caste based party called the Bahujan Samajwadi party- which draws its support from Dalits a caste lower placed in the caste hierarchy- led by Kumari Mayawati. The election campaign is also being conducted under new rules designed to limit campaign expenses and limit extravagance in election campaigning.

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President Sarkozy on what the euro means for France. Sarkozy told employees of the Airbus plant in Toulouse, France, that the euro was good for France. The single currency had protected France during the economic crisis. "Alone, France cannot resist outside pressures. France is going to borrow 180 billion euros in the financial markets this year to finance 35 years of accumulated budget deficits. Thanks to the euro we can borrow at 3% or a bit more; at the beginning of the 1990's we were paying 10%," he said. He added that "dismantling the euro zone would be like dismantling Europe... I will do everything I can to preserve the euro. He also emphasized that "we can't share the same currency and have different economic strategies," and called for macroeconomic and structural convergence in economic policies.

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The severe drought in China is affecting the provinces of Shandong, Jiangsu, Henan, Hebei and Shanxi, which produce about two thirds of China's wheat. China's Xinhua news agency is reporting that the drought in Shandong province could be "the worst drought in 200 years." China's retail wheat flour prices were up 8% over the two months to January and up 16% from the same month in 2010. The drought puts at risk the winter wheat crop harvested in June, according to the FAO. The FAO provided figures showing that 5.16 million hectares of a total of 14 million hectares of wheat producing areas are affected. China maintains large stores of wheat, estimated at 53 millon tons in Dec 2010, by Ma Wenfeng, an analyst with Beijing Agribusiness Consultant Ltd. The reserves act as a buffer for shortages.

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China's GDP growth of 8.7% for 2009 is based on private sector investment in housing and infrastructure spending through the stimulus funds. Now with a asset price bubble developing from excesssive lending in 2009 the government is trying to slow bank lending. Experts see a situation similiar to Japan, as an asset price developed there in the 1980's after rapid industrialization. Even though China will still be a developing country after this phase of growth. Property prices are going up by 20% a year in the major cities. And with it making housing unaffordable for most people except the top 20% of the people who comprise about 120 million. This raises issues of equitable growth for Beijing. Much of the rest of the country is being left behind when it comes to housing and in other areas like health care.

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Ford's plans for expansion at its manufacturing location in Chongqing, China, in 2012, will make this its largest manufacturing base outside of Michigan. An investment of $600 million for plant expansion will increase production capacity in Chongqing to 770,000 in 2014, from 350,000 today. The project has received government approval. Ford plans to introduce 15 new models in China by 2015, including a redesigned Ford Focus, which the Chongqing plant began producing in 2012. Ford plans to double the number of dealers by 2015 from 400 today. Ford sold 519,000 vehicles in China for 2011, a 7% growth from 2010. The market saw astounding growth of 46% and 32% in 2009 and 2010, but is rapidly decelerating with only 2% growth in 2012. Total sales in China were 18 million vehicles in 2011, making it the largest automobile market in the world.

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Adidas took a one time charge of 125 million euros for irregularities in its Reebok India Company, and expects an additional charge of 70 million euros. Adidas expects net profit to increase by 12-17% in 2012. Net profit for the first quarter of 2012 increased by 38% to 289 million euros, mainly on higher sales in China and Japan and its TaylorMade-Adidas Golf sales. Revenue increased by 14% to 3.8 billion euros on a constant currency basis. Profit results reflected lower financial expenses and a lower tax rate. The 2012 Olympics and Euro 2012 soccer will offer additional marketing opportunities for Adidas. Adidas is increasing its distribution in China and plans to have 2500 stores in 1400 cities by 2015. It will use its NEO brand at lower price points for entry customers in the smaller cities of China.

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About 570,000 Asians live in the Washington D.C. area, making it the area with the largest concentration of Asian people in the East coast of the U.S.. Chinese in the District and Montgomery County, especially in Rockville and Potomac. Filipinos in Prince George and Charles counties. Indians in Loudoun and Fairfax counties. Koreans in Centreville. The 2010 census shows a 60% increase in the Asian population for the Washington D.C. area. Washington D.C. now compares with New York, Northern California, and Boston in the number of Asians living there. Indians are the fastest growing group among Asian-Americans. In Loudoun county, near the high tech corridor surrounding Dulles International airport, the Indian population has gone up from 400 in 1990, 2300 in 2000, up to 20,000 in the 2010 census. They also make up the biggest group of Asians in Virginia.

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A three judge special bench of India's Supreme Court led by chief justice Rajendra Mal Lodha, said the process of allocation of coal licenses by the coal ministry lacked accountability and openness. Lodha said: "There was no fair and transparent procedure, all resulting in unfair distribution of the national wealth. Common good and public interest have, thus, suffered heavily." A report by India's federal auditor in 2012 stated the improper allocation of 200 coal leases to private companies cost the government about $30 billion. Former prime minister Manmohan Singh of the Congresss party headed the Coal ministry for part of the period when the improper coal leases were given, leading to intense criticism from the media. This was an issue in the elections leading to the defeat of the Congress party by the BJP party led by Mr. Modi.

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PFASs class of chemicals used in pizza boxes, carpet treatments and other consumer products. Experts describe the increased risk of cancer, asthma and other diseases from products that are everywhere in today's world. The NYT's Lipton and Abrams provide useful insights into the use of harmful chemicals in everyday life in 2015. Ms. Birnbaum, the head of the national toxicology program of the Department of Health and Human Services in the U.S. questions this widespread use in consumer products of PFASs and the need for alternatives in commentary in Environmental Health Perspectives, a NIH publication. 200 international scientists signed a statement urging countries to restrict use of PFASs. More public awareness is needed for the extensive use of chemicals in consumer products, so that consumers ask questions about which chemicals are in products and look for safer choices.

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Citigroup CEO Michael Corbat's plans to make 11,000 job cuts, about 4% of the workforce, and close 84 branches. Most of the cuts will take place in consumer banking with 6200 cuts, and in the investment bank and transaction services with about 1900 cuts. Citigroup has reduced its workforce by 100,000 since the end of 2007 after the bank was hit by the global financial crisis. Analysts at Credit Agricole Securities and Fitch Ratings say this does not go far enough. Fitch Ratings says the cuts reduce expenses by only 2% of annual expenses and are modest moves. The cuts at the investment bank do not compare with more aggressive action taken by UBS CEO Ermotti. Goldman Sachs analyst Ramsden says the investment bank represents 60% of assets but generates only 30% of revenue, a highly inefficient use of resources.

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The U.S. Treasury plans to sell off its whole stake in General Motors in 15 months. Treasury will sell about 200 millon shares to GM for $5.5 billion by Dec. 2013. The buying price for GM of $27.50 is about 8% higher than GM's closing price on Dec. 18, 2012. Treasury plans to sell the remaining 300.1 million shares within in the next 12-15 months depending on market conditions. Treasury's breakeven point is about $53 a share, and the government will lose money on the bailout compared to the AIG rescue. The government invested about $49.5 billion to help take GM through a planned Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing and reduce a huge debt load. The key in the auto bailout was preserving over 1 million jobs in the U.S. auto industry during an economc crisis.

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Walmart CEO Mike Duke talks with Journal reporters Ann Zimmerman ans Miguel Bustillo. He says customers are under alot of pressure, and he sees what they buy, delaying purchases and the buying at midnight on the first of the month. Apparel sales are down and so are discretionary purchases and basic necessities and things like vitamins and the $4 generic pharmaceuticals are up. Walmart sees 140 million customers in stores every week, and has information systems to show how customers are buying, which gives it a unique lens through which to see changes in buying behaviour after the financial crisis and increasing numbers of jobless. Customers are saying he says that I will invest in basic needs and defer discretionary purchases. Among other things he talks about sustainability as something his company is paying attention to.

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The Dutch had their tulip bubbble, the Chinese have their Pu-er tea bubble which has just burst. It was a pure speculative bubble with speculators cornering the market and bidding up the price of tea in Yunnan province on the Burmese border. From 1997 to 2007 the price of these green tea leaves from Yunnan- that make a fermented brew called Pu-er- wentup from $15 to $150 a pound. Actually a group of manipulative buyers drove prices up. Production doubled from 2006 to 2007 to 100,000 tons. Unlike other teas this tea is said to grow better with age and is packed into compressed cakes for transport. Now prices of this tea have collapsed to $3 a pound. Russia had its own experiment with unbridled capitalism, now China is struggling with the effects of the aftermath of its own unbridled capitalism.

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About 1800 people die in traffic accidents in New Delhi and most of them in motorcycles accidents, the Nano has this market in mind. Whole families riding in tricky fashion on a motrorcycle, a vision that Ratan Tata had in mind when he pursued the goal of a 1 lakh ruppee car affordable to the average Indian on a motorcycle. It meets the Euro III pollution standards and could meet Euro IV with some improvements. Part of the ingenuity of the engineers challenged with this task of affordable quality in design from scratch to reinvent the automobile- a car that has 21% more space and still is 8% shorter than the Maruti 800 the smallest car on Indian roads today. The engine is placed in the back and the wheels at the extreme corners of the car.

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A number of oil analysts believe that the the collapse of SemGroup LO, a private oil marketing firm contributed to the 14% drop in oil prices in the last 2 weeks. Semgroup which first took bets that oil prices would rise and then as oil prices declined on weakness in economic indicators took bets in the futures markets that oil prices would fall, could not come up with collateral to support its positions leading to a loss of $2.4 billion in crude oil futures and transfer of its account to Barclays Capital. The Tulsa, Oklahoma company has filed for Chapter 11 protection. Its publicly traded subsidiary SemGroup Energy Partners LP operates about 1200 miles of oil pipelines and controls 15 million barrels of oil storage capacity, including 7 mo;llion barrels at Cushing, Oklahoma, a storage hub closely tracked by oil markets.

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The French government announced a 26 billion euros or $33 billion package as Stimulus spending. Its going into infrastructure projectsand investents by state owned firms like Electricite de France. It also includes aone-off payment of 200 euros for low-income households. Its valued at 1.3% of GDP. Under this plan, France will dig acanal north of Paris, renovate university buildings, and put new metro cars in service, and also fincnace the construction of 70,000 homes, on top of the 30,000 unfinished homes it is buying in 2009. Motorists who scrap thier old cars to buy new fuel efficient cars in 2009 will get a1000 euros bonus. This is aimed at reducing the stock of unsold cars which is at 1 million cars. And small companies will be exempted from social charges when they hire new employees.

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Why rebalancing the world economy will not be easy. Rebalancing depends on the success of American companies selling goods in China and Germany. China and Germany report large gains in exports through August 2010. The US trade deficit in 2010 is up 40% from 2009. One reason is that it involves changing behaviour of consumers. Another reason is each percentage point reduction in the annual savings rate in Germany and China would increase consumer spending by $42 billion. By comparison each percentage point increase in the annual savings rate for the US reduces spending by $100 billion, according to estimates by McKinsey Global Institute.

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Bank of Spain Gov. Miguel Angel Fernandez Ordonez said Spain finds itself in an "exceptional situation," as it goes "back into recession," and only exports acting to contribute to gains in GDP.

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Progressive caucus in the US House of Representatives led by Pramila Jaypal, a first time Indian American Congresswoman defeats an attempt by Josh Gottheimer of the Problem Solvers caucus to separate much of the president Biden's agenda in health, education and social policy and risk it being defeated by Senators Manchin and Sinema in the US Senate. Without the efforts on child care, education and health, climate change and social services part of the Biden Workers and Families Plan much of the Biden agenda would remain unfinished and Democratic party promises not kept. This also means that Manchin a Senator from West Virginia with a population of 1.8 million and Arizona with a population of 7.2 million, both conservative leaning Democrats could sink the entire agenda of president Biden to support American families and workers for a population of 331 million people. That two states with a population of less than 3% of the American population could sink the entire agenda of president Biden shows how fragile a situation has been created within the Democratic party to support workers and families even during the pandemic following the leadership of Carter, Clinton, and Obama Ms. Jaypal, a three term Congresswoman from Seattle, Washington state, was first elected in 2016 with an endorsement from Bernie Sanders who was the Democratic Party's leading candidate for president till the late stages of the 2020 US presidential primaries. Bernie Sanders says of Jaypal- "I think she is doing an extraordinary job. And I think the Progressive Caucus is doing an extraordinary job." Sanders founded the Progressive caucus after getting elected to the Senate from Vermont 30 years ago. Even though it is hard to imagine the Democratic party being the Democratic party without bold policies in climate change, affordable housing, reducing income disparities,  investing big in childcare, education and healthcare, attempts were being made to sink the entire Democratic party and national agenda going back to Franklin Roosevelt. Jaypal is described in the WSJ as diplomatic and firm, saying "I am so proud of our caucus; I have never seen our caucus so strong. And I am a very good vote counter also." Fifty members of the 100 member Progressive Caucus held firm in support of president Biden's original agenda without which the president would have little to show in keeping promises he made to the American people in the election and little to differentiate him from Mr. Trump who also supported infrastructure spending. Separating the infrastructure bill would have risked sinking Mr. Biden's plan for recovery of America from the pandemic and the devastating policies pursued by American presidents in the last two decades. Policies by previous presidents that have impoverished the country, created huge income disparities, weakened America in the world in trade and technological leadership, and wasted resources in foreign wars. There are no centrists or far left- these are just labels. When Ms Japal said "Let's just remember the Speaker (Nancy Pelosi) is a great champion of this agenda. I think she was trying to do as much as she could to get this done," she could have said it is Mr. Biden's own agenda pushed forward with conviction to help workers and families during the pandemic, and build a solid American recovery, restore American leadership in the world. Pramila Japypal is the first Indian American woman in the US Congress, and one of only two dozen naturalized American citizens in the US Congress. That she could play such a critical role for good in the US Congress shows that with the right convictions, determination, experience, much can be done for the common good in America and the world.   ...

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This WSJ report looks at how China is run today with attention to details by president Xi Jinping. Mr. Jinping takes interest in all matters that relate to wellbeing, reducing gaps in wealth and privilege, coronavirus pandemic, corrupt businessmen or officials, climate change, and the economy. Some decisions have to be reversed after they appear not to be working. In some situations goals conflict such as climate change action on coal requiring shutting down intensive coal dependent factories, and economy jobs goals requiring use of coal intensive factories. Leading to a complete reversal of the original decision to cut back on use of coal as happened in 2021 when factory shutdowns affected the economy.  Jinping does not see it as micromanagement. Previous leaders such as Hu Jintao had little interest and did not put in the effort to seek out areas where policies were not working for families and workers, delegating this to lower level officials. Jinping's style is hands-on and energetic to act on issues that affect how China should be run so that the quality of life of ordinary Chinese is improved. Jinping says that if he did not take action there just is'nt the level of initiative on the part of local officials. Many officials are not competent to tackle complicated issues. Jinping says that "some officials only act when the central party leadership has instructed them to do so." And that he acts as a last resort- "I issue instructions as a last line of defense." His willingness to reverse decisions or let them be implemented with local officials using their discretion if he thinks that would be wise also shows a level of flexibility and humility. Basic to his decisions is a general idea that the original vision of China of the founding leaders in 1948 was forgotten in the headlong rush to modernization of the last 20 years. This means a balance was needed to restore some measure of equality and empowering of the disadvantaged. Xi Jinping's father was one of these founding leaders under Mao and under premier Deng during the market economy founding in the 1990's. Xi Zhongxun, Jinping's father was an energetic leader who also took a keen interest on a whole range of issues for China's modernization drive, a trait now found in Mr. Jinping. The first market economy experiment was done under Xi Zhongxun with premier Deng's encouragement. Xi Zhongxun set up the Guangdong and Shenzen special economic zone in 1979, as governor of the province in an effort to liberalize the economy and slow the exodus to Hong Kong. At the time wages in Shenzen were 1/100 of wages in Hong Kong. Some of this style can be seen in India with Mr. Narendra Modi delving into details of policy and taking intitatives that local officials had neglected to do on a whole range of issues related to modernization, development and technological progress. One of the decisions made by Jinping was to tackle Covid aggressively with a zero Covid policy, which means frequent lockdowns and restrictions even with a few cases. Mr. Modi has also acted vigorously on Covid after warning in March 2020 that this could set India 20 years back, with a policy to get over a billion people fully vaccinated. In both situations the only two countries with over 1 billion population needed this kind of strong leadership with an interest in a whole range of issues that relate to lives of ordinary people during the pandemic to inspire some essential level of public confidence and build public wellbeing.     ...

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The new Australian budget is designed to generate a slight surplus from the A$44 billion deficit for the fiscal year ending June 30. This prepares the Australian government of Julia Gillard for elections in 2013. The budget depends on the mining boom to generate the tax revenues for planned economic growth of over 3% in 2012-2013. This is based on the large number of projects planned for investments in oil, gas and other energy projects, valued at US$456 billion. GE as supplier of turbines and other products to the Chevron-Total gas project and other projects in Australia, has sales in Australia match its sales level in China in 2012-2013. This gives an idea of the extent of the boom in the mining and energy sector. Even the widening trade deficit to A$1.59 in March 2012 reflects large imports for the mining sector. The weakness of this approach is that too much is dependent on the mining and offshore gas boom. Retail spending is weak and Australia is increasingly looking like a two tier economy, subject to the boom and bust cycles that its mining companies have experienced in the past. A bubble in Australia's housing markets and uncertainties in the global economy pose other risks....

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Berkshire Hathaway's deal in Nov. 2012 to pay $780 million for claiming the future cash flows of life insurance portfolio of Caixabank in Spain. Caixabank will claim a pretax profit of $680 million which it will use to increase reserves.