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Increasing demand and profitabilty of the newer fuel efficient twin engine planes seating 250-300 passengers for Airbus and Boeing- the Airbus 321, the Airbus 350, the 777X, 787-9, 787-10.

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Can Fiat get out new models fast enough to survive the current storm in the industry. Experts say the new Fiat based Chrysler vehicles won't come out till 2011 in the USA market. These include asmall Jepp, asubcompact car and aminicar, with amidsize sedan to follow in 2012. This time lag says Michael Robinet of CSM Worldwide is "an eternity" considering the severe fall in sales and the extremely competitive market today. The cutbacks in prouct development under Daimler and then Cerberus were deep, so deep that Chrysler has eliminated 40% of its engineering staff and delayed or cancelled work pn updating braking systems, interiuor enhancements, and even entire products such as the Jeep Wrangler, say insiders. This makes Fiat entirely dependent on Fiat's technology and engineering in the smaller car area.

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The electricity grid in Africa is being strained by electricity demands of mining companies. Power outages are costing African economies as much as 2% of their GDP according to World Bank estimates. Energy shortages in South Africa are creating blackouts in South Africa and neighboring countries Botswana and Zambia and affecting the mining industry in these countries. South Africa's energy company Eskom is petitioning regulators for a hike of 50% in electricity prices to reduce demand. Shortages of electricity have increased prices of platiinum and other metals in the commodities industry. Mining in South Africa produces 7% of GDP but consumes 17% of the electricity leaving less for domestic consumption and for industry. Eskopm was late in ordering new plants not taking action till 2004. For Africa the total electricity generating capacity of 63 gigawats supplies 770 million people about what Spain generates for 40 million people. And the expression energy poor means that this shortage in urban areas means the rural poor wil have no electricity for decades to come. And in places like energy rich Port Harcourt Nigeria electricity is inconsistent or in dire shortage. An accountant at a construction firm in Dakar, Senegal has to choose between paying his child's school fees or paying for electricity, chooses to pay for electricity as prices have gone up by 88% in 3 years. And rural areas of Africa have little hope of electricity. This is another sign of how adverse effects of huge energy consumption in places like China and the wasteful consumption in the USA affect global energy prices and in turn affect the poorest in Africa. In places where the voices will never be heard. How boom times in some Asian and westen economies can lead to choices like fuel guzzling vehicles and energy wasteful plants in China that reverberate across Africa....

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Gerald Seib of the WSJ describes the huge wave of young supporters who helped Labor party leader Corbyn in Britain's 2017 general election. He cites an analysis by the Financial Times that shows young people backed Labor over the Conservatives by 51 points more than the national average. People over age 65 backed Conservatives by 32 points more than the national average. This points to a staggering age gap of 83 points, said the Financial Times. Young people failed to turn out in large numbers during the Brexit vote, and this was a large factor in the pro Brexit win. One exit poll shows turnout went up by 12% in 2017 compared to the 2015 parliamentary election. Only 26% of voters in a WSJ/NBC poll for ages 18-34 years say they approve of U.S. president Trump's performance, 64% disapprove. Seib says the movement of Corbyn is similar to the Bernie Sanders movement in the U.S. and has implications for a similar surge of support showing up in the U.S.

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Any Asian conflict involving China would in a few months destroy Apple's value, CEO's would change quickly, and Apple policies change to shift entire production to India and the US in a rapid shift. Tim Cook would be seen as having gambled against America's interests, unresponsive and failing after repeated warnings.  Apple's goal of sourcing from India by 2027 a mere 26% of its iphones, means that a decade after USTR Lighthizer and DJT started the task of reshoring manufacturing to US and allies in 2016, the No. 1 outshoring company would still be making 75% of its dollar value iphones in China. A degree of overconcentration that would make no sense considering that Apple's 75% of manufacturing would be entirely at risk in 2027 after repeated warnings and inaction. The only option for Tim Cook in 2025 is to come up with new goals of shifting a minimum of 50-60% of its dollar value product manufacturing for iphones to India by 2027. . Tim Cook as Apple CEO has done little to prevent the overconcentration of manufacturing in China since 2016. About 10 years after DJT was elected to bring manufacturing back to India or close allies the simple idea of diversification was not implemented. Why? Having set up this system starting in 1998, a system that did not exist before that tiem when Steve Jobs hired Tim Cook with a winning formula to Make in China, a country just emerging from its Communist phase of failed state economy. By 2008 in 10 years the infrastructure was built in a backward largely agricultural economy that was rapidly modernizing under a market economy with state run capitalism under the Communist Party experiment. The Bush Obama 16 years were ones with America not responding to the challenge posed by this new system which could create huge surges in production capacity with focus on key technologies and flood markets. The next decade after 1998-2008 was one of rapid growth of this experiment which combined with design and engineering in the US generated few jobs in manufacturng in the US, but huge profits with huge margins fro a low cost base with a high image and technology innovation product. Lighthizer, Navarro, Jamieson had already sounded the alarm for American manufacturing and loss of jobs in 2016.  America's deindustrialization was becoming a bigger challenge by 2020 so that president Biden continued the policy of reindustrializing. In 2025 China 2025 Plan that was a warning in 2016 is already a reality with China flooding the world in solar panels, and ready to flood the markets overseas with electric cars. Apple may only get a reprieve, this exemption is not the same as the last one. National security is an issue, key technologies need to be protected. There is only one more opportunity to rebuild American manufacturing and keep promises.     ...

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Stanley Fischer, former head of the Bank of Israel, is the likely candidate for vice chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve in 2014. Fischer is author of a 1977 paper in which he supported an activist central bank monetary policy to tackle economic downturns. As deputy director of the IMF he helped build the "Washington Consensus," which supported flexible exchange rates, free capital flows and balanced budgets. The IMF austerity policies came under much criticism in S. Korea, other Asian countries, Russia, and Latin America during this period, especially high interest rates and sharp spending cuts during downturns. He is a former MIT professor and a dual citizen of Israel and the U.S., born in Zambia (Northern Rhodesia).

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This WSJ editorial says the IMF must help Ukraine with emergency financing, and the U.S. and Germany need to offer long term economic assistance.

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Raghuram Rajan warns about the difficulty of central bankers worldwide to escape from the scenario of ultra low interest rates.

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As the popularity of left party Podemos increases before the upcoming elections in Spain, it comes under increasing attack from the governing party and the Ciudadanos party for advisors from Podemos giving economic advice to the failing Maduro government. Venezuela's economy is in dire straits with high inflation and shortages. Podemos appears to have overtaken the Socialist party in Spain to become the second largest political party. The leader of Podemos, Pablo Iglesias, and other Podemos leaders are cited as having done advisory work for the government in Venezuela.

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Politicians, militant groups, intelligence agencies and security forces, unsettle the Kashmir valley, at a time when Pakistan faces a serious economic crisis, and India faces a slowing down and inflation also. Changing the demography of Kashmir and the dispute over 99 acres seems rather phony and it shows that political unrest can be whipped up when there is such a long legacy of conflict even when the conditions worldwide in developing Asian countries are shifting to modernization.

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After a weeks long standoff both sides disengage expeditiously in the India's border dispute with China over construction of a road in the Doklam plateau region of Bhutan. In this NYT report experts in Hong Kong point out that it is not in China's economic interest with an aging population and debt crisis, tense economic relations with the U.S., and for India struggling with modernization issues, to turn a remote border issue into an open conflict. It would also complicate relations in the Asian region with Japan and economic relations with the U.S, countries with whom China's economy is intertwined through supply chains and other ways. Disputes with China and South Korea have in the past affected the Chinese economy, and China has developed trade with India as its companies look for growing markets. India's Modi administration is focussed on the economy. In this context of broader relations the road construction in Doklam appears to be an aberration that is hard to explain except as a miscalculation and poor understanding of the best interests of the region and of the world.   ...