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The Boeing Dreamliner is a big advance from all other airplanes both in terms of fuel efficiency and technology. The Dreamliner is expected to be 20% cheaper to operate than other jets currently in operation. It seats 210 to 290 people and can handle the longer routes such as New York to Tokyo better than existing aircraft.

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Nandan Nilekhani heads India's ID Card Project as acabinet minister. It means the administration of Premier Manmohan Singh is now able to get key business leaders into the cabinet to improve execution of critical projects. The national ID card would enable aid and services to be delivered to people as today a large amount of aid does not reach the poor for whom it is intended. It will aso improve national security. Nilekhani is afounder of Infosys.

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Senator Byron Dorgan warned about a crisis occurring through the dismantling of Glass-Steagall protections in banking that were put in place after the Great Depression. The change was pushed through with the Gramm-Leach-Biley Act named after Senator Phil Gramm of Texas, and was supported by President Clinton, Rubin, and Summers. Senators Dorgan and McCain called for a special committee to investigate what happened and why. This "select Committee" would have sub peona powers. One of the questions this would help address is whether in the future one would go back and reinstate some parts of Glass-Steagall. That decision says Dorgan has to be made, and he does not think its old-fashioned to go back to protections that previously existed. Its not that he was prescient, says Dorgan, its just that the protections put in place by Glass-Steagall were basically sound then, and they are sound today.

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Joe Nocera of NYT on a bankruptcy like option in which the government loans money but sets tough terms, and has someone with the experience and strength and the governmental powers to set tough terms and insist on them being followed without vacillation by the unions or management. And the Congress passing new legislation under the President's leadership to override the state laws that prevent closure of dealerships. The union benefits and mindset and management mindset would go through the wrenching changes that the GM bureaucracy and the unions need to implement to eliminate the legacy costs, the higher benefits costs so that GM does not pay a penny more than Toyota or Honda to its workers when all costs are added up period. And plants that need to be closed would be closed without long negotiations and job retraining and new industries in energy and infrastructure and technology would create opportunities for these displaced workers by 2010 as part of the stimulus program.

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Raghuram Rajan, Professor of Finance at the Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago, was appointed chief economist at the IMF in 2003. He presented a paper, titled "Has Financial Development Made the World Riskier," at the annual Jackson Hole meeting of economists and central bankers for 2005. Rajan says he had planned to write about how financial developments during Greenspan's 18 year old tenure had made things safer, but the more he looked the more evidence came up that the risk reward relationships in a normal functioning financial market had been terribly distorted. Market participants were being rewarded for wins but were not being asked to take on commensurate risks and impacts on their bonuses and rewards. He also cautioned about the use of credit default swaps which acted as insurance against bond defaults, and said insurers were generating big returns on this but with the appearance of little risk- even though the pain could be immense in a default. Banks were carrying credit securties on their books that posed risks to the whole financial system if things went wrong with the credit securities. Reaction from the gathering was unfavorable. Lawrence Summers, a former Treasury Secretary said, "the basic, slightly lead eyed premise of the paper was misguided."...

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The WSJ's Latour, Browne, Tejada and Wei interview Lou Jiwei, chief executive of the China Investment Corporation (CIC), China's sovereign wealth fund. He says it is too early to talk about eurobonds as the financial arrangements necessary have still to be put in place. CIC is reducing its exposure to Europe. CIC is interested in infrastructure investments and sees infrastructure investment as the way out of the economic crisis for the U.S. and Europe. He has the most confidence in investing in China. Other locations are in emerging markets Brazil, S. Africa, Latin America. CIC's target is to have 50% of the assets in long term investments in infrastructure investments, commodities, real estate and direct investment and private equity, etc. and the other half in public securities. But this will pose challenges and CIC has not reached this level. It is learning from ATP, the Danish pension fund, Calpers, TRS, and CPP, the Canada pension fund. The portfolio is mark to market which creates pressures to reduce short term volatilities....

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This podcast in WSJ tells the amazing story of the development of a vaccine for malaria by a British scientist that took forty years. In a world of short run startups this tells the story of medical and indirectly other research include research on renewable energy to tackle climate change that takes years to develop and makes a lasting change in our lives. This is also true of the mRNA vaccine developed by two German scientists of Turkish descent who developed the Pfizer vaccine. The Novavax vaccine in the US also has a story of resilience in the face of many challenges. Mr Scholz of the SDP, currently vice chancellor of Germany and winner of the German election said recently he wanted to expose the myth that was created of the self-made man that has penetrated our culture over the last 2 decades. One cannot even conceive of self made people at a time when the whole world depends on vaccines developed such as mRNA vaccine by these 2 German scientists at university labs that are the first line of defense against the coronavirus. Both scientists took only half a day off when they got married. Both are children of immigrants to Germany from Turkey. They both cycle to work. Mr. Shin says "I don't have a car. I am not going to get a plane. What's life changing is to be able to impact something in the medical field." The electric batteries used in today's electric cars use technology developed by a Japanese scientist and professor who also worked at Toshiba in the face of many challenges. ...

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The Times looks at local elections in Britain this week, and a swing to the Labor party of 700 seats given Labor's 15 point lead over the Conservatives. This is a dry run for the general elections that Keir Starmer is preparing for, as Britain ripped by crises like the rest of Europe and the US, faces another once in a generation period to decide what kind of a society to create for the future. The blue wall refers to former Labor party supporting constituencies that voted for Boris Johnson in the mistaken assumption that the  Conservatives could deliver for British workers and families. A similar situation exists in the US as president Biden seeks to gain traditional Democratic states such as Pennsylvania and the midwestern states such as Wisconsin, southern states such as Georgia, and western states such as Arizona.

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David Brooks calls the agreement reached Jan 1, 2013 on the fiscal cliff inadequate. He puts the blame on voters. On the Medicare couple that takes out more in benefits than it puts in, taking $343,000 out in benefits, while putting in $109,000, according to the Urban Insitute. The politicians are simply following the voter preferences of deferring the hard decisions. Taxes have to go up at a lower threshold than $400,000 says Brooks, and spending cuts need to be made.

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This leader in The Economist reviews an essay in the magazine's October 8-14th, 2016 edition by U.S. president Obama. In it Obama points to the unfinished tasks of his presidency and what comes next as tasks to be done for the U.S. economy. The Economist points out the problems in the 2016 election campaign where there is a lack of discussion of economic issues as a serious problem. Obama lists as priorities efforts to improve conditions of people left out in the recovery, reducing inequality, offering more job opportunities, and increasing productivity.

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Attahiru Jega, Vice Chanellor of Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria, is the new head of Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission with responsibility for the first fair election in Nigeria's history. He has to come up with an entirely new list of voters for a country of 70 million, and very little time to do this. The task involves tens of thousands of computers with finger printing technology and video to be used in 12,000 polling stations, training 360,000 workers, and all this in a country where electricity is mostly generated by private gas powered generators and transport links are poor.

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Lawmakers in Congress finally get overwhelming bipartisan support behind a plan to help homeowners facing foreclosure. The rate of homeowners going into foreclosure is 8000 a day or 2,920,000 between now and the same time next year, with the burden falling more heavily in some regions or states like Nevada, Arizona, California and Florida, and in states where the economy is weak as in the auto industry states of Michigan, Ohio and Indiana. This took some time apparently as there was some hope a couple of months before that the economy would recover and taxpayer money need not be spent to rescue homeowners and lenders from their folly. Now the economy looks sure to go into a serious downturn and homeowner prices measured by the Case-Shiller index show a 16.5% drop in prices from this time last year. Lenders earlier had balked from reducing the size of the loans and balance owed by lenders as part of their contribution. Now with losses of 40-60% in foreclosure the new federally guaranteed mortgages which require reducing the loan money owed to 85% of current value are looking attractive. The new mortgages are 30 year fixed loans with a federal guarantee. Only borrowers wanting to stay in their primary home are eligible. Borrowers also have to pay hefty fees to save taxpayer money. Buyers who purchase unoccupied properties will get a $8000 refund tax credit. There is some concern that because the bill is fairly complicated homeowners and lenders would not make larger use of it....

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Gerry Adams of Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland says in the NYT that some way has to be found to respect the vote of 55% in Northern Ireland in favor of remaining in the European Union. He says Northern Ireland and Scotland should not be made to leave the EU because of a different preference expressed in England and Wales. He points to one of the most harmful effects of the Brexit i- the return to a hard  border between the EU state of Ireland and Northern Ireland. This will affect the economic, healthcare, tourism, business and cultural links of Ireland in the north and south, and reverses the gains of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. He calls it a result of factional infighting in the Tory party, the rise of far right anti immigrant groups such as UKIP, and the Gove faction which never really supported the peace deal in Ireland that has brought two decades of peace. Adams says concurrent referendums for a united Ireland is one solution to this problem. Another is an All Ireland forum of political parties and civic partners to meet, and for the Irish Government to stand behind the Good Friday Agreement, so that the Brexit does not hurt the interests of Ireland as a whole. ...

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Bill Gates describes the successful work of 2 million volunteers and millions of children and parents in India's poorest rural areas to get all the children in India vaccinated for polio. This includes the work of the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. He decribes his visits to India and realizing over time how bringing vaccinations, healthcare, improvement in agricultural development would enable hundreds of millions of India's children to participate and contribute to bringing out India's full potential. Harnessing their full potential is the next big challenge in India's development and modernization.

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Francois Bayrou the new PM of France speaks a dialect of the Pyrenees mountains, is mayor of Pau, and was a school teacher before entering politics. He has a disdain for extreme positions on both sides left and right, including polarizing politics of Sarkozy. He gave key support to Macron at the right time when he needed it to run for president. He gets along well with Le Pen and has helped Marie Le Pen run for president in the past when she needed support because he felt this was essential for the democratic process. He was not the first choice of Macron and insisted on taking the job over other choices.

Pau is located 31 miles from the Spanish border with a clear view of the Pyrenees mountains. It is an ancient city with a University at Bearns, and a medieval heritage.

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Kerkorian will lose $640 million of his $980 million investment in Ford made in April of this year at $7 a share. He sold a portion of his shares at $2.43 a share and is expected to sell the remainder soon. MGM Mirage stock that he owns have fallen by 85% since hitting $100 a share last October. The value of his 54% stake in MGMMirage has sunk from $13 billion to just over $2 billion. Its not clear that sale of Ford shares were prompted bya margin call. After seeing the debacle of Kerkorian twice once before this with GM shares in recent years other investors are likely to be wary of auto stocks.

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Tesla suffered from production issues in 2017 and CEO Musk was not his usual upbeat self.  In early 2018 Musk is back to his usual style predicting big things for Tesla. Just after his company Space Exploration Technologies sent a powerful rocket with a Tesla car into space,Musk predicted making one million vehicles a year in 2020. In 3 months he says a Tesla will cross the U.S. He says Tesla will now be able to make 5000 cars a week of the Model 3.

Another of his predictions is that he will revolutionize production systems and leap over existing car companies. Analysts asked Musk if the Toyota Production System had not already achieved that, Musk says "we don't think so." This report points to changing moods of Musk and periods when he feels high and low, and changing according to the unrelenting stress he finds himself in or indulges in.

 

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Paul Volcker outlined the work remaining to be done to make the U.S. financial system safe in an interview with Gretchen Morgenson in October 2011. On Fannie and Freddie he says it is important to get rid of Fannie and Freddie at the first opportunity, because they simply shouldn't exist, and it was a mistake to have institutions of this type that mix profit making private opportunities with an implicit government guarantee. If a government wants to help low income people find housing, subsidize them directly, don't do it in this way by hiding the liability behind a quasi-private institution, says Volcker, in the interview with Gretchen Morgenson of the New York Times. Volcker sees a point of vulnerability in the industry of money market mutual funds, which operate without reserve requirements and capital requirements. The money market funds did a huge amount of lending to European banks and aggravated the pressures on them when they pulled back. One way to correct this is to require mutual funds to post the value of their assets every day to reflect market fluctuations. Safeguards on bank deposit accounts, such as FDIC insurance and bank capital requirements, do not exist for money market mutual funds. Other areas Volcker emphasized are strong enforceable capital requirements for banks, making derivatives transparent and standardizing them, and rotating auditors....

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Chrysler reported second quarter 2012 income of $436 million, compared with a loss of $370 million in the prior year quarter. The prior year quarter included charges for repaying U.S. government loans. First quarter 2012 income was $473 million. Fiat reported a loss of 246 million euros for the second quarter 2012. The combined operations Fiat-Chrysler reported aloss of 103 million euros. This shows how the effort by Sergio Marchionne to takeover Chrysler and turn it around have proved to be a very successful move for Fiat. With a relatively small investment Fiat is now a majority owner of Chrysler having invested mainly its management knowhow and leadership.

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"The most nervous time of my life is when I was waiting for my A- Level results," says Liz Truss in this interview in The Times with Tim Shipman. More nervous than now when she is running for the leadership of the Conservative Party says Truss. She really cares for education considering the time she talks about it. And childcare is something Liz Truss cares deeply about.