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Same store sales continued to drop for the fifth consecutive quarter for Best Buy electronics retail stores. Best Buy shares have declined by 32% as of September 14, 2011. Best Buy has 1,100 stores in the U.S. and competes with online retailer Amazon for electronics sales. Investors see Best Buy management's plans to reduce square footage by 10% as too slow a response to a developing crisis for big store sales. Best Buy CEO, Brian Dunn, says about 40% of online purchases from Best Buy are picked up at its stores. He sees a role for retailers with physical store space because, as he sees it, customers still want to see, touch and feel the latest tablet or other electronic gadget. Critics say customers are prone to use the stores to look at products, and make the actual purchases online at Amazon, where no sales tax is paid.

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Lenovo shows a profit of $129 million for this fiscal year compared to a net loss of $226 million in the prior year. Revenues in the 1st quarter of 2010 went up to $4.32 billon from $2.77 billon with proft at $13 million. Margins are still under pressure because of growth in the lower priced PC market segment. Gross margins fell to 10.4% this year. To diversify Lenovo has introduced the Le Phone with China Unicom (Hong Kong) and sees sales of its mobile phones exceeding Apple's iPhone sales. It has also developed a prototype of a tablet PC in January 2010. PC shipments in China of $2 billon account for 45% of 3rd quarter revenues- up 67% in China's fast growing PC market. And Lenovo's plan is to expand sales in India, Russia and Turkey, from the current 5% in the fourth quarter ending March 31, 2010, to double digits.

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China's Bright Foods Group acquires a 60% stake in Britain's cereal maker, Weetabix Food company. Cereal demand is growing in China and increased to 1.2 billion yuan or $191 million in 2011. This is an increase of 70% over 2006, according to Euromonitor International. Everbright sees large potential for Weetabix cereal in Asian markets. Cereal Partners Worldwide, a joint venture of General Mills, Nestle SA and Seamild Group of China, has the largest share for cereals in the Chinese market. Everbright is looking for more acquisitions as it plans to double sales in China by 2015 to about $14 billion. It has 3,300 retail stores in China. With the Weetabix stake Everbright gains shelf space and distribution channels in Europe and the U.S. An effort to take a 50% stake in French yogurt maker Yoplait failed in an earlier bid when it lost out to General Mills.

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The Liberal Democrats lost badly in the May 2011 local elections in Britain. Voters also overwhelmingly rejected the alternative voting system that the Liberal Democrats supported. The vote on an alternative voting system was one of the key conditions put up by the Liberals when they joined the Conservatives in a coalition government. About 69% voted to keep the current voting system supported by the Conservative party. In local races Labor and the Scottish National Party made gains at the expense of the Liberals. The Liberals lost 695 of their 1,751 seats in local councils, 12 of 17 seats in the Scottish parliament, and one of six seats in the Welsh assembly. Tory support remained steady, but voters turned away from the Liberals to show they do not support the austerity cuts of the Cameron led government. This will pose problems for Liberal leader Nick Clegg's continued participation in the coalition.

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Turkey's lira depreciates by 21% in 2013 and an additional 7% by January 24, 2014. The central bank uses up a third of its foreign exchange reserves or $19 billion in intervention to support the lira since June 2013. The intervention on June 24, 2014, did not work and the lira continued its downward slide to 2.30 to the lira. The political protests in Turkey and divisions within factions in the government about corruption probes has led to a political crisis and investors pulling back from Turkey. The central bank failed to increase interest rates as expected by investors and suggested by the IMF. Inflation is running at 7.4% for 2013. In August 2001 a currency crisis caused the banking system to collapse. The financial position is stronger than in that crisis, yet the recent political crisis and the large current account deficit has badly dented investor sentiment.

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Robert Gates, U.S. Defense Secretary from 2006-11, says the West should provide a strong response to Russian president Putin's actions in Ukraine. He says settling old scores is not the way to peace in Asia or Europe. He describes Mr Putin's resentment of how Russia has been treated since the disintegration of the Soviet Union, and the desire to prevent the EU and NATO from coming too close to its borders, and especially Ukraine which is linked he says to the beginnings of the Russian Empire centuries ago. This could only lead to worsening tensions. Actions include bolstering defenses in Europe and reducing economic vulnerabilities of the Baltic states, restoring the defense budget to the levels of the 2014 budget proposed by the Obama administration in 2013, cutting overhead at the Defense department to add Navy ships, and urging the EU to grant associate status to Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine.

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About 11% of student loans outstanding amount were over 90 days past due in Sept. 2012, increasing from 8.9% at the end of the second quarter 2012, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. This now exceeds the figure for credit cards. U.S. student loan debt is now at $956 billion for the third quarter 2012, increasing by 4.6%. About 93% of student loans made in 2011 were made by the U.S. government, which is promoting access to loans without asking for information about borrowers finances and education plans and ability to pay the loans back. Because student loans have to be paid back and are hard to discharge even in bankruptcy, this means many borowers who cannot find jobs are deep in debt, and unlikely to get loans for many years for cars and other needs. Moody's warns of a wave of student loan defaults in coming years.

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Of the 13 Republicans who lost their seats, nine were members of the Immigration Reform Caucus, which has opposed path to citizenship for an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants, with a 10th member trailing in his race. Caucus founder Rep. Tancredo and Rep. Hunt of California, both for increased border security are retiring. About 100,000 newly naturalized citizens voted in Florida, where 2 members of the immigration reform caucus lost their seats, as Republicans were perceived in their immigration reform stands as anti-Latino. Senator Dole lost her seat in N. Carolina also facing Latino opposition. In the current job losses environment unions will oppose business group's efforts to get more technical workers in on temporary visas, and there is no leadership on this issue like Ted Kennedy who has cancer. As a result the immigration issue may not see much action early in this administration even with the election results.

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With the reduced demand for Fannie and Freddie mortgages with coupons under 5%, the Fed steps in and purchases $192 billion of 4% and 4.5% conforming mortgages on a gross basis by March 25, 2009. The move helps support falling house prices in the U.S. and reduces mortgage rates. It also helps banks improve profits. Estimates show the top 10 banks increased their holdings of securities issued by Fannie and Freddie and government agencies by $128.6 billion or 30% in 4th quarter 2008, which can be marked up in future quarters.

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The NYT provides a good look at the situation in India in September where cases are over 4.5 million, the world's second largest after U.S. During the lockdown in April and May India had successfully stemmed the coronavirus. After reopening in June a lot has changed as can be seen in this look at the steep curve in June, July, August and September. Cases are now at the rate of 95,000 daily and deaths at 1172 daily as of September 9. The deaths are up 16% and cases up 29% over 2 weeks. Maps show the situation in the states with Maharashtra, Andhra, Tamilnadu, Karnataka, and Uttar Pradesh showing the highest cases. Maharashtra has about 1 million cases and the two states in the south east Andhra and Tamilnadu have about 1 million combined with Uttar Pradesh at about 250,000 cases. Delhi has about 200,000 cases. So that about half of the 4.5 million cases are in three states in the southeast and the western state where Mumbai (Bombay) is located. The increase was seen after increased testing from 200,000 a day to 1 million a day by the end of August, a steep jump being seen in late August and September. At the end of July the coronavirus recovery rate of 70% in India and 90% in Delhi were the favorable signs, until things changed in August with increased testing and the spread to rural areas. India is doing over 1 million tests daily. On September 3, 1.1 million people were tested, taking the total to 45 million tested throughout India.  As in Europe and America the reopening which is essential for the economy and jobs has resulted in a big jump in cases. The laws for lockdown were carefully obeyed without many of the problems seen in America and Europe, the early complete lockdown was implemented with success, and Indian pharmaceutical companies are some of the largest in the world giving the public wide access to essential medicines and drugs. The postal service has functioned remarkably well during the lockdown for delivery of essentials throughout the country, and earlier action to establish bank accounts for each and every individual in the country, has enabled rural Indians to get through this most difficult period. This has given the government some breathing room as it faces the cases from reopening in a vast country of 1380 million people.   ...

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Stephens says the lack of swift military action to protect the U.S. consulate in Benghazi by all means available was not undertaken by President Obama from Wall Street Journal accounts of what happened. The reason given was not to violate Libya's sovereignty, instead an effort was made by the State Department to get the Libyan government to send reinforcements. This was the situation at 5 pm on Sept 11, in an Oval Office meeting, when news of the attack on the consulate reached President Obama. A suggestion was made according to WSJ reports for U.S. planes to fly in from the closest airbase to scare away the attackers but was not adopted. The Obama adminstration was slow to act decisively in the struggle for freedom from the Gaddafi dictatorship and agreed to support the French-British effort after the war was underway for some time. This is likely to have left the U.S. with a lack of sufficient intelligence on the ground about the movement of remnants of Gaddafi's army, mercenaries from Mali, and terrorist groups, which are suspected of involvement in the attack, and which had threatened Ambassador Stevens according to his diary. The U.S. consulate in Benghazi was burned down in a deliberately planned attack and one of America's finest diplomats Stevens lost his life in the attack. ...

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WIth India's oil imports at four fifths of the country's oil needs, the depreciation of the Indian currency, the rupee, is especially painful. The rupee exchange rate has declined from 55 per dollar at the end of May 2013 to 64 per dollar in August 2013, a 14% decline. India provides full subsidies and this accounts for a large part of the current account deficit. Government cuts in fuel subsidies to reduce the current account deficit are diluted by the depreciation of the rupee, with a fall of one rupee in the exchange rate equal to 4 months of cuts in subsidies, according to Moody's analyst Vikas Halan.

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A 2000 square foot space used as a bike shop in San Francisco now rents for $117 per square foot, as Silicon Valley companies look for space in the city. Google and other companies are attracted to the talent pool in the city.

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Growing the banking business right into the 2008 financial crisis - with the effects of the crisis playing out over the next decade- is one decision GE CEO Immelt has described as one he didn't do right. Moves in 2014 and 2015 were designed to focus GE on areas of its historic strengths. GE plans to sell $26.5 billion of office buildings and commercial real estate debt to Blackstone Group and Wells Fargo. This is after moves to spin off the private label credit cards and retail finance business as a separate company called Synchrony Financial. Most of GE Capital's $500 billion business will be sold off or spun off in 2015-2016, except for aircraft leasing and financing for energy and health care, which are related businesses. GE shares were up to $28.38, up 10%, in trading on April 9, 2015. GE Capital's shares were down to $6 in the 2008 financial crisis requiring an injection of government funds. Immelt's 13 years as CEO would end on a positive note with this move, as the role of GE Capital in contributing to the crisis is considered a blemish on his record....

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Wow!!! While the rest of the industry was busy building large vehicles and trucks and SUV's Honda invested 16 million dollars and its time in developing a hydrogen cell capable of powering a car to get 60 miles per hour acceleration in 9 seconds, and speeds upto 100 miles per hour, cut the size of the fuel cell to 150 punds and the size of a box shaped desktop PC, and giving the fuel cell 280 miles on one fillup, almost similar to a gasoline car. What is different is the cleanness, no polluting exhaust and 74 miles per gallon. Only 200 will be built initially, but a production line and mass production is the goal Honda is working on. Already the fuel cells are built on a production line resembling a semiconducor factory, and Honda aims to bring the cost of production down to $100,000 in 10 years or sooner. The nice thing about hydrogen fuel cell cars is that there are no byproducts generated except water and heat. It works by the fuel cell combining hydrogen with oxygen from ordinary air to make electricity....

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The Chinese 90 seat regional jet called the ARJ21 made by government run AVIC I Commercial Aircraft Company has about half of its equipment supplied by US companies. Its maiden flight is Septemeber 21. Canada's Bombardier is investing $100 million in the larger version of this plane citing parts sharing and cost saving potential for its own jets. The Chinese market is expected to grow at about 9% annually according to Boeing's forecast. China will spend about $600 million on the program for ARJ21 according to Chinese aviation officials. The ARJ21 also called the Flying Phoenix has 206 of the 300 orders it needs to breakeven. The plane is targeting the high altitude airports and the lightly travelled routes of western and central China. China is also looking to sell the plane in emerging markets of Malaysia, Turkey and India. According to General Electric China will need at least 500 regional jets over the next 20 years. GE which makes the engines for the ARJ21 sees the 500 jets equal to engine orders of $15 billion. Other companies that are looking for supplier orders are Parker Hannifin, Goodrich, and Mitsubishi....

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Amy Hood growing up in a small town in Kentucky, then a move to Nashvile, Duke and HBS. She joined Microsoft in 2002 on its investor relations team. She moved into management the same time as Nadella who is CEO. Before the pandemic Microsoft's capital expenditures and investments cost about $16 billion. It is now 4 times that at $64 billion. It is Amy Hood's job as Chief Finanacial Officer to see that all that money is well spent for products with demand. AI services bring in about $10 billion annually.  Yet this may just be deflecting by Wall Street of the real question about the funding needs that are being neglected in education, health care and child care, when huge amounts of capital are being diverted by capital markets in ways reminiscent of the warnings of Franklin Roosevelt at the Democratic Convention of 1932. Warnings that the whole capital markets system was not working right, was only defunding the vital needs of the American people. ...

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A advisor to U.S. president Obama lists the gains in U.S. healthcare made by March 2014, after the passing of the Affordable Care Act or Obama healthcare law. He cites on access to care the reduction of the percentage of uninsured Americans from 18% in the middle of 2013 to 15.9% in the first quarter of 2014, according to a Gallup poll.

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Some of the concern about the economy comes from the economic damage done by the coronavirus. The longer the shutdowns continue the more the damage. About 17 million have filed claims for unemployment benefits. The WSJ consensus of 57 economists is that 14.4 million jobs will be lost in coming months, and the unemployment rate will rise to a record 13% in June, from a 50 year low of 3.5% in February. The earliest the economy could go back to the level in February 2020 is 27 months says the WSJ economist survey. The brighter side of this comes in two aspects of this pandemic recovery curve. By flattening the curve and strict testing, contact tracing and isolation till the vaccine is developed about half the jobs lost can be recovered by the end of summer, says Moody's Analytics. The vaccine a year from now or in 9 months by November 2020 would allow the economy to recover faster. A more optimistic view comes from Daiwa Capital Markets which predicts many of people laid off will be recalled quickly allowing the labor market to recover in 6 months by September or October 2020. Only finance and real estate might take longer but most of the industries where the vast majority of jobs are could be back on their feet. The credible evidence supporting this perspective of a rebound comes from Colorado and Washington which require large employers to specify whether layoffs are temporary or permanent, 70% this year are temporary. Compare this to the prior 2009 recession where this figure was less than 1%- as reported by WSJ. The big push in this direction will be the $2 trillion that the Trump administration and U.S. Congress have committed to this task. Even more so is the determination of president Trump to protect American workers at all costs, that every job counts, and that businesses without exception to get the money have to show that workers are retained. The very success of the aid is being judged by how quickly people are back to work. Now for a look at where the situation is today- Oxford Economics, a UK based forecasting and consulting firm, projects 27.9 million jobs lost with industries other than those ordered to close making up 8 to 10 million of that number. It projects April's report will will capture late March layoffs. It will show cuts to 3.4 million business services workers, including lawyers, software groups, architects and consultants, advertising professionals, in addition to 1.5 million non-essential healthcare workers, 100,000 information workers. One conclusion of this report is that the virus does not discriminate across business groups and business service workers are also affected. Many companies that were hiring will cancel that move and many will cut hours worked. Many of these business services are not a priority. Hospitals are affected too, as they cut elective surgical procedures and routine care that are major revenue sources. Some are now charging for telemedicine visits to maintain some revenue stream. State and local governments employ 20 million workers. As tax receipts decline these local governments will face choices of cutting payrolls and services without enough federal government relief. In a way laying off workers and having them take unemployment benefits shifts that burden to the federal government so that services for overtime to police and paramedics, retention and deployment of nurses in schools.    ...

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China trade pause deadline of Aug 12 and its renewal. US negotiators Bessent and Greer in Stockholm report back to DJT for a final decision on whether to extend the trade truce with China by 3 months. China wants to remove the duty related to fentanyl entering the US from origins of the chemicals in China of 20% imposed by DJT, yet trade negotiators say no significant improvements on cracking down on the chemicals used to make fentanyl are seen. Currently duties are at 50-55% and would go up to 80% without a truce. The UK, Japan and European Union, Indonesia, Vietnam have come up with trade agreements with the US by July 28, 2025.

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A provision in tax code letting companies expense investments in US including R&D in 5 years expired in 2022. For budget reasons it was not renewed. The DJT Big Beautiful Bill lets US companies expense R&D in 1 year compared to the 15 years in overseas investments. This is leading to a surge in R&D investment and hiring by companies. Fed's Powell sees this as one of the big positive factors for the US economy in 2025-2028.

The change lowers cost of hiring by 20-25% and this means more engineers and other people are going to be hired.