LyrArc Article Gist
China expands the trading range of the yuan to 1%. The yuan is set by the People's Bank of China, China's central bank, at 6.2879 yuan per U.S. dollar on March 14, 2012 or 15 to 16 U.S. cents to the yuan. The yuan rate is set daily by the PBOC, called the parity rate, and was previously allowed to trade in a 0.5% trading range.

LyrArc Article Gist
China GDP growth forecast at 5% in 2025 and first half actuals at 5.3% with frontloading. The frontloading is because of surge in exporting before tariffs hit by May.  China is waiting to put fiscal stimulus as it fears tariffs will lower growth and increase unemployment. The housing sector is in deep slump. At this point fiscal stimulus is determined in Washington DC. The actual growth in 2025 may turn out to be much lower than 5% considering the weakness in the economy and the issues of tariffs and tough trade negotiations with the US and a changed environment for trade with the European Union.

LyrArc Article Gist
After segregation in housing and schools since the 1867 Lincoln Emancipation, particularly in the US Southern states, protests happened in the South led by Martin Luther King Jr. to change this. situation. Voting Rights Act 1965 signed by LBJ ensures right to vote for Black people in the South- it follows protests in Selma Alabama and LBJ's 1965 "We Shall Overcome" speech that followed Selma. The first Blacks elected to US Congress were from seats redrawn to give Andrew Young a seat in Atlanta, and Barbara Jordan one in Houston. In 1993 2 more seats were added. James Clyburn was given a seat in South Carolina- he was a key supporter for president Joe Biden. Others followed. Today in 2026 there are 62 Black Members of the US Congress. This is about 11.6% of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 100 seats in the Senate total of 535. As a percentage of the population Black people are 16.4%- or 56 million out of US population of 342 million. The Supreme Court is essentially saying it is time to pause this as enormous progress has been made 12% out of 16% already achieved in representation for black people in the US considering the other inequities in American society, the changes in culture and in technology, inequities in world trade and for rural America. In a 2013 5-4 decision Shelby vs Holder US Supreme Court  swing to this conclusion with Alito, Scalia and Thomas joined by Kennedy and Roberts. This already struck down the core of the Voting Rights Act as unconstituional. Roberts wirties in that decision- Our country has changed,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote for the majority. “While any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions.” Times have changed - in 2026 the Court reaffirms this. In Louisiana vs. Calais the Court voted 6-3, striking down the last aspects of the Voting Rights Act, because white voters in Louisiana objected to use of race to redraw districts. The equal protection clause of the 14th and 15th Amendment to the US Constitution prohibit using race to redraw political representation maps. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
William Galston in the WSJ says outright for the first time in the WSJ that the years from the last term of Clinton, through the Bush, and Obama administrations were an outright failure for the American people. He documents the losses- 5.7 million job losses in 2000-2010 as Clinton opened China's entry into the World Trade Organization without any precautions taken to prevent abuse of world trading rules after the experience with Japan. Worse no help to the displaced workers which fed into the resentment of workers. Sex scandals weakened the presidency and acted as the major distraction during the last years of Bill Clinton. Over the administrations of Bush and Obama almost the entire US manufacturing base was dismantled and shipped to China. Pharmaceutical companies were allowed to charge recklessly when Bush disallowed Medicare to negotiate prices for pharmacueticals placing additional burdens on the American people. Bush started long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that cost the US dearly in lives and resources wasted with no vital US interests at stake as in Europe. This distracted attention from problems simmering at home. Obama continued these wars preferring to focus on reelection. The migration crisis, the neglect of infrastructure worsened during this period. The Bush deregulation of banks led to the 2009 world banking crisis that led to large layoffs worsening a bad situation from outshoring and creating a class of unemployed, and shrinking household wealth and savings. The Biden administration, the first Trump administration and now the second have started the process of revival of the US. And yet Biden, DJT are relative outsiders who came to the presidency and were not favored in the established order of the 1990-2016 period. One can say about Blair, Cameron, Boris Johnson in Britain, about Clinton, Bush, Obama in the US, and Schroeder, Merkel in Germany that the leadership was mediocre and failed the people of Europe and the people of America.     ...

LyrArc Article Gist
The 40th anniversary of China's opening up to reforms and opening up the economy with Deng's initiative are being celebrated with a recognition that Xi Jinping has made some missteps in China's policy that led to the confrontation with the U.S. on trade issues. This is leading to policy uncertainty and Mr. Jinping has even appeared conciliatory, without giving up authority. There is a recognition that China must change policy to accomodate some of the concerns the U.S. has made over lopsided imbalances in trade.

LyrArc Article Gist
WSJ and NYT, Wash.Post exaggerated defense of Denmark's claims to Greenland. DJT says there is nothing in writing that says Denmark owns Greenland. The NYT, WSJ cite 1916 Treaty that transferred Danish West Indies to US for $25 million.  The agreement in 1916 said Denmark would extend its economic and political arrangements across Greenland, which was the status quo, but this did not give ownership of the island to Greenland. In 1947 US president Harry Truman offered $100 million for Greenland. This was a generous offer and would be around $1.5 billion in today's terms. The agreement of 1916 is superseded by Admiral Perry leading the US Navy's exploration of Greenland all the way to the north of Greenland at the Arctic northern most points in Greenland. The US planted its flag on Greenland at the time. DJT on Truth Social planting the flag is nothing new. Admiral Perry is never mentioned by NYT, Wash Post and WSJ, the television media and Google internet other AI, which gives the Denmark government an opportunity to misrepresent US claims to Greenland since 1890's and leave out Adm. Perry's discoveries in Greenland. By comparison a few Danish boats and Norwegian boats landed in Greenland. Worse it sets up the Europeans for actions that Scott Bessent says are "unwise". It is mainly Denmark and the Nordics who are in opposition, the rest of Europe has no stake in Greenland and would be better off with the US owning Greenland. Danes were a colonial power and cannot bring up the Greenland Inuit population of 50,000 smaller that what would fit into a baseball stadium as they had never sought to help the Inuits. As recently as 1803-1848 Denmark was struggling to abolish the slave trade in its colonies in the West Indies- it is something that can easily be looked up. It was the US with it's Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson that laid out the vision of a free people which also fought the Civil War under Lincoln by the 1860's with loss of millions of lives for a free and fair society, something the European colonial powers failed to do. Denmark should accept the offer of $1.5 billion from the US consistent with the US offer from Harry Truman in 1947, and not use the European Union to create dissension within Europe as it has done so far in a misleading effort that does not serve the interests of Europe. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
President Trump reiterated his threat to place tariffs on $300 billion of Chinese goods in addition to earlier tariffs on $250 billion in goods.  The problem China faces is that it China imports less, far less than the U.S. does. China has only $10 billion in U.S. goods to place tariffs on. This is after placing tariffs on $110 billion in U.S. goods, mostly agricultural products such as soyabeans in retaliation for U.S. tariffs on the $250 billion of Chinese goods. China could place a ban on imports from Boeing or restrict the access for U.S. companies to the Chinese market. U.S. companies have invested billions of dollars in the China and employ about 2 million Chinese in well paying jobs. Concerns about unemployment would be uppermost to prevent these jobs being affected. Other concern for China is the loss of foreign investment as relations deteriorate. Already supply chains in some products such as clothing and consumer products is shifting other countries in Asia. In automobiles the regional hubs are expected to shift with India as a potential hub for Asia, and Mexico preserving its place as a North American hub following renegotiation of NAFTA. In media the dispute is leading to a shift from Chinese consumers buying Adidas instead of Nike and Huawei smartphones instead of Apple.  For an already slowing economy this hurts China more than the U.S. which is why the U.S. is pushing China to settle with an agreement that the U.S. can trust to bring down China's trade surplus. For the U.S. as most of the loss in exports is in agricultural products the solution has been to provide government aid to farmers, and for Mr. Trump to use the issue to point out that he is fighting for U.S. interests and for fairness. This is why the trade dispute poses more problems for China. Because the surplus is so wildly skewed in China's favor after the inaction of many U.S. presidents just as it was for Japan in the eighties, the situation appears to be headed towards a definite reversal of the lopsided trade surplus enjoyed by China. In the process the U.S. plans to build up the competitive edge it has lost to some degree.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Differences between the U.S. and China on trade, investment and economic policy in 2015 during Xi Jinping's visit to the U.S.

LyrArc Article Gist
Oswald Grubel, CEO of Swiss bank UBS, resigned on Sept. 14, 2011, after the loss of $2.3 billion in irregular trades made at its London trading desk.

LyrArc Article Gist
Iran War and rescue of pilot of downed F15-E in mountainous terrain in southern Iran April 4 2026. CSAR or Search and Rescue Missions become a critical part of the war. The pilot was a colonel trained for the mission and spent 24 hours in mountainous terrain which was monitored by US forces, after intelligence located him in a mountain crevice. For this to be possible unlike in the Vietnam War and Korean War other nations are not involved as in the earlier Cold War.  The US under DJT as president has shifted to respecting Russia as a Northern European power that it can talk with (meetings with Putin in Alaska 2025) and China as a trade partner (planned meeting in Beijing in April 2026) that it can talk with unlike with previous administrations of Biden, Obama and Bush where China had afree hand in economic matters and global trade and Russia was shut out of the world economic system by elites who ran the government in the US at that time. Russia seeks reintegration in the world political and economic systems, and China seeks acceptance as an economic power which the US respects, both points in which the US has offered to accept. US has also repeated the line to China that it was not going to do the job of keeping Hormuz open for China and Japan to get 90% of oil imports, and in oding so risk losing its soldier's lives, while China and Japan can quietly watch doing nothing to help free navigation of international waters. Note that the narrowest strip of water of 13 miles separates Oman from Iran so that a part of these waters are on the Omani side and not on the Iranian side making free use of that Omani part under international law possible- in which sense Iranian hostile activity closing the Omani side also is a violation of free navigation. This is not pointed out by Iran or Japan or even Britain who are benefitting from US action and remaining silent or being ambivalent or accusing US of being interventionist even when everyone knows MAGA base rejected Bush in the Republican party and the elites and embraced DJT for great part because they want nothing to do with interventionist adventures in the Middle East for certain. US is getting a bum rap from European allies and from China, India, Japan and the media inside the US and in those countries as if the US seeks oil from the Middle East. It was Britain where a lot of the posturing goes on about non intervention that started this oil based intervention since 1900 in Iran itself, and in artificial states of Iraq, Syria, that it created out of the collapsed Ottoman Empire in World War 1. Sykes and Picot were the US and French diplomats who set that up. US under DJT has accomplished self sufficiency in oil and US has no need for anything from the Middle East, no desire to even get involved, and MAGA well grasps that fact and wants to keep it that way. Only nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles with long range to hit US and EU are reason for US action, which is reason enough for EU, China, Russia to set their own goals so that non proliferation in dangerous areas is prevented. So that the people of China, Russia, India, Europe and the rest of the world can enjoy the fruits of their own labors after a century of severe hardships and struggles which the American people if not their elites respect, and the fruits of peaceful cooperation which the American people extend to the World, and to China, Russia and India. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
India faces tariff of 25% with policies of reliance on Russia for arms and oil,  Mexico Canada and South Korea face higher tariffs August 1 2025 as they are holdouts now that UK, Japan, EU, Indonesia, Vietnam have agreements with the US on trade.

LyrArc Article Gist
Reliance Oil stops all purchases of Russian oil for it's Jamnagar refinery. US- India trade negotiations move at a faster pace after this decision in November 2025 to increase purchases of US energy and cut Russian oil to where it was before the Ukraine war, when India was getting only about 4% of its oil from Russia.

LyrArc Article Gist
Japan and South Korea which rely on the U.S. for defense offered only a mild response to president Trump's announcement of  25% tariff on steel imports. Australia also defended free trade but offered no response to the U.S. duties on Australian steel and aluminium exports to the U.S. of $388 million.  There was no criticism of Mr. Trump. 

Japan's prime minister Abe talked to Trudeau of Canada as a 11 nation group pushes ahead with the TPP or Trans Pacific Trade Agreement, and are set to sign the agreement in Chile this week, on  March 8, 2018.

LyrArc Article Gist
Japan's car exports have grown in the last six years to double what they were before, growing to $40 billion. This includes a jump in export of SUV's vehicles. Just in the first quarter of 2018 the export of automobiles from Japan to U.S. is up by 10%. Japan is not keen on talking about this issue. President Trump is looking at negotiating a one on one trade deal with Japan instead of through the TPP agreement. as this is seen as a better way to address a $60 billion trade deficit. TPP is not a solution for the U.S. imbalance in trade with Japan as Japan already has no tariffs on imported cars. Yet other barriers exist that make it difficult for U.S. automakers. Ford exited Japan in 2016 and the U.S. has only 1% of the Japanese market. Japanese buyers stay away from American cars and prefer the smaller highly fuel efficient cars made in Japan by Japanese automakers. Perception of buying home made also exist. Other barriers also exist such as zoning and for setting up dealerships, unique safety standards. Japanese automakers make most of the sedans in the U.S. but export the SUV's from Japan. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
The New York Times reports from the comments of current and former members of the Chase Chief Investment Office (CIO), that risk officers at Chase were ignored when they raised issues about the complex trades made by trader Iksil. Iksil's trades had the support of his manager Mr. Macris, and Ms. Drew who was in charge of CIO. The comments also indicate that at one point Mr. Macris brought in a Risk Officer with whom he had worked closely for many years. Risk Officers are supposed to be independent and their concerns seriously heard, with the authority to halt trades that pose excessive risks. Which made this kind of cozy behaviour in the CIO trading offices in London cause for alarm. These reports also say Mr. Braunstein, the new CFO at JP Morgan Chase, did not strengthen controls after he assumed office in 2010. Bank officials disputed this. The New York offices did not fully grasp the complex trades being made in the CIO London offices, and upper management let the CIO operate pretty much on its own, especially with CEO Jamie Dimon's confidence in Ms. Drew's management of the CIO. This led to another gap in the process of risk management. Dimon had other priorities and distractions, from problem mortgages coming with the acquisition of Washington Mutual, pushing back aginst financial regulation after the 2008 crisis, stress tests and others. At the same time the U.S. Federal Reserve, regulators, and Treasury's coordinated effort to merge failing banks with other larger banks- because of the lack of the process of unwinding failed banks provided later under Dodd-Frank legislation- created mega financial banks. Unlike what the U.S. under Treasury Secretary Rubin pushed for in the case of S. Korea during a banking crisis in 1997, Treasury under Geithner and Fed officials did not push for unwinding of failed financial institutions such as Countrywide and Washington Mutual in 2008-2009 Chase's own portfolio of assets under the CIO, increased by an astounding amount from $76 billion in 2007 to $356 billion in 2011. Even if Ms Drew had managed CIO well before, managing a portfolio of this size is most likely to have presented a whole set of new challenges and problems for which the CIO office was not prepared. Similiar concerns were raised by other Fed officials such as Fed governors, Hoenig and Fisher, who raised the issue that such mega-banks posed unacceptable risks and were too big to manage. Pressures to increase investing profits, growing complacency, relaxing risk management controls, led to the situation where a single trader Mr. Iksil, who had only joined the bank in 2007 according to other reports, could create large losses. This follows a situation at UBSin 2011, where a novice trader made bets that resulted in large losses....

LyrArc Article Gist
The paradox during the opioid crisis of American companies conducting business and trade in and with China on a magnitude never seen before in history disassociated from their own neighborhoods in the US is nowhere more evident than in this crisis. A similar paradox between the government in China disassociated from American communities and local stores that import its products and keep workers employed in China in the case of China. And the paradox of the American government allowing any action whatsoever of this type that affects communities in the US and continuing business and trade as normal exists today. It has the impact of eroding public confidence in the relationship between two countries even as it damages the fragile situation of communities in the US hit by lack of investment in infrastructure, in manufacturing, health, and following the pandemic in incomes. It shows the danger of business and trade operating in a vacuum or compartmentalized not aware of everything that is happening in societies and communities that surround it. In any case it is the communities and the land that always exist even as businesses trade patterns change, or take different forms, and some disappear. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
This month president Biden signed into law 100% tariff on China made EV's and 50% tariff on solar panels. The Guardian describes the hollowing out of factory towns in England such as Sheffield and the same in the US and Europe, which was a disaster for these communities dependent on manufacturing. There is now a sense that heavily subsidized products made in Asia should not be allowed to deindustrialize the US and take jobs away from these communities across the US. Trade has to be fair before it can be called free trade. Wars in Asia,  trade that ripped up American manufacturing, monopolies and burdensome pricing of pharmaceuticals and healthcare, lack of investment in infrastructure and public services, shows the deeply flawed policy pursued by presidents from Reagan and Bush to Clinton and Obama that have reduced the standard of living of the American worker and the American people.

LyrArc Article Gist
U.S. frustration with China as coronavirus toll reaches 300,000 deaths worldwide. President Trump says- "They could have stopped it in China where it came from. But it didn't happen that way. " Worst hit are countries in Asia and Africa with food security threatened. After the coronavirus he says of the trade deal he signed in January- So, I make a great trade deal and now I say this doesn't feel the same to me.The ink was barely dry, and the plague came over. And it doesn't feel the same to me." Under that trade deal the China agreed to buy $250 billion in additional goods and service for 2 years in an effort to correct a huge trade imbalance - built up on the advice of American economic theorists and experts who advised American presidents for three decades that it was of no consequence - in exchange for a roll back of American tariffs in stages of part of the tariffs. 

LyrArc Article Gist
The pound trades at 1.23 U.S. dollars and the Euro at 1.12 U.S. dollars. Both currencies lost about 3% in 2019 and the pound could reach parity with the U.S. dollar if Boris Johnson takes Britain out of the EU without a negotiated settlement.

LyrArc Article Gist
The new US Trade Representative, Jamieson Greer, 44 years was the chief of staff to Robert Lighthizer the USTR in the DJT first term. He is a former Air Force lawyer who became a trade lawyer and protege of Lighthizer.

In testimony before Congress Greer has said that he "does not subscribe to the myth that more trade with China reduces the likelihood of conflict."

"From a defense perspective, it is critically important to restore the U.S. manufacturing base to ensure that the U.S. can credibly deter escalation by China and, if necessary, defend its national security interests at home and abroad."