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Stevenson and Caselli describe the mood in Buenos Aires as negotiations with hedge fund holdout bondholders fail in July 2014.

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According to a report from China's Environment Ministry for the first half of 2013, only 4 cities met the acceptable air quality standards. The national grade 2 standard in China is for 35 micrograms per cubic meter for levels of airborne particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrograms in diameter. WHO standard is for 25 micrograms per cubic meter in a 24 hour period. The 4 cities with acceptable air qualty out of 74 cities monitored by the Environment Ministry are Lhasa in Tibet, island city Haikou, coastal town Zhoushan, and Pearl River Delta city of Huizhou.

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This Times editorial questions whether Mayor Bloomberg did the right thing in the manner in which he ousted protestors from Zucotti park in the financial district of New York city. Now that the protestors have been forcibly removed from the park, it is the responsibility of the Mayor to keep his promise to let the demonstrators continue their protest against income inequality, says the editorial. The concern is that the end of the protests at Zucotti park could end up quashing the entire protest movement, which serves to draw attention to serious issues in a democracy.

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The October 2012 meeting of EU leaders ends with agreement for setting up the EU banking supervisor in the course of 2013. German chancellor Merkel turned down Spain's push for direct aid to its troubled banks and not aid from the ESM bailout fund to Spain which would increase Spain's sovereign debt. The Spanish government has indicated that it might take 40 billion euros out of the 100 billion euros approved by the EU for Spain. Merkel's view is that any direct aid will only go for future recapitalization not to clean up the mess at Bankia and other banks that stems from the failure of Spain's banking regulators and the housing bubble. Merkel said at a news conference: "If recapitalization is possible, it will only be possible for the future." Merkel also said preparations to set up the single banking supervisor would probably go into 2014, and by then "we won't have any more problems with the Spanish banks- at least, I hope not." Germany sees the need to have a carefully developed banking supervision system setup rather than a hurried approach. Merkel is aware that this might be seen as action taken to avoid committing German taxpayer money before elections for chancellor in Sept 2013- "No matter what I'm going to say, it will probably not be the right answer by your standards." ...

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"Defend blue sky and breathe together" says a painting on a brick wall in the coal producing region of Shanxi, northern China. China is finally acting seriously to impose strict environmental rules from the top. Old coal stoves are thrown into a dump as China shifts away from coal stoves to heat homes. So many new homes shifted to natural gas in Shanxi province. population 37 million, that demand overwhelmed natural gas supplies. Results are to be seen in cleaner air in Taiyuan, capital of the province and in Beijing itself.  President Xi's commitment to climate change accord reached in Paris is seen as firm in this report in the NYT. The head of the gas, coal and power markets division of the International Energy Agency, Mr. Peter Fraser, says that even though homes use only 6% of total coal used in China, the effects are disproportionately high because homes do not have any emission reduction mechanisms. Natural gas demand has increased by 16% in 2017 as provincial officials eager to meet the demands issued in Beijing to cut coal emissions even let some homes and schools go without heat in an early winter spell. This extraordinary report shows how in cities in northeastern China the people welcome the change to natural gas and cleaner air. Even in coal country, in cities like Linfen population 4.4 million, the change is seen as people welcome the clean air and officials build natural gas connections to execute the plans issued in Beijing. In Beijing itself Greenpeace estimates show 54% reduction in PM 2.5, harmful particulate matter for breathing by 54%, a startling fact showing Beijing's determination and effectiveness of its actions. Natural gas is more expensive and citizens do not complain in neighboring provinces near Beijing because the state provides adequate subsidies to compensate people. Decrees are being enforced to avoid coal stove use with people knowing they could see action by authorites if reported. Compare this to the problems of crop burning around New Delhi, in Haryana and Punjab provinces, and one can see that centralized control and direction has advantages when used in the right way for a good purpose and supported by people who want to breathe clean air. ...

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A plan being put together in eurozone financial circles is for Spain to request aid and the European Stability Mechanism fund to provide far less than 100 billion euros approved for aid to Spain. With the request Spain would agree to conditions set by the EU, ECB and the IMF for improving competitiveness, reducing rigidity in labor markets, and controlling spending by regions in Spain. This would lead to the ECB taking action to buy Spanish bonds and lower borrowing costs.

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Deocuments from the weekly cabinet meeting show the new budget in France will increase revenues from household income taxes by 23%, and business taxes by 30%. The top marginal income tax rate goes up to 45% from 41%. Limiting a deduction for financial charges for company's taxable income brings in $4 billion in 2013, according to the finance ministry. The goal is to cut the budget deficit to 3% of GDP in 2013 from 4.5% in 2012. The finance ministry has assumed higher borrowing rates for future years- 2.9% on 10 year debt for 2013, up to 3.65% in 2015, and is not relying on the low rate of 2.18% on 10 year government bonds as reported by Trade Web Sept 28, 2012. The overall tax burden will be 46.3% in 2013, and 46.7% in 2015. French debt is at 91% of GDP for the 2nd quarter 2012, expected to be 91.3% in 2013 and falling to 82.9% in 2015. Prime minister Ayrault emphasized- "If we don't put a stop to this, taxpayer money will keep paying for debt reimbursement." Swift anticipatory action and unified government-business-labor posture under a favorable borrowing environment characterizes the approach for Britain and France in 2011-2012, compared to the situation in Spain where government action has been slow, not tough enough in cleaning up the banks, fallen behind in anticipating events and the government-business-labor unified posture has cracked under the strain. As a result under an unfavorable borrowing environment money raised from austerity type tax increases now goes to paying for debt reimbursement in Spain, leading to a situation in which debt and deficit reduction targets just get harder to achieve. A looming drop in credit ratings to junk status for Spain only makes the situation harder to overcome. ...

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Spanish banks agreed to reforms and job cuts as a condition for a 37 billion euro loan from the eurozone bailout fund, the European Stability Mechanism. The restructuring plan applies to Bankia, Novagalicia Banco, Catalunya Banc and Banco de Valencia, with the largest job cuts at Bankia bank. Bankia will have 6000 job cuts, 28% of the total employees, and cut branches by 39%. Banco de Valencia will be absorbed into Caixabank and receive 4.5 billion euros of the loan payment approved.

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Spain's Bankia bank makes headway in the recovery by 2014. Bankia chairman Goirigolzarri says it was "not impossible" that the government would recover the 22.4 billion euros it put in Bankia. Bankia reported net profit of 512 million euros for 2013. Problems remain as 15% of its total loans are more than 90 days overdue yearend 2013, increasing from 13% in 2012. There are billions of dollars of bad loans in a "bad bank." Shares are up 65% since Sept 2013, up to 1.31 euros in Jan 2014. The government valued the bank shares at 1.35 euros at the time of the bailout in 2012.

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Joe Nocera describes his personal situation which also reflects the situation of the average investor in his 401(K) for retirement - inexperience in handling the boom-bust cycles in the market and loss of savings, especially in the last two decades with sharp swings in the market. The Employee Benefit Research Institute statistics on savings of the average American are striking, dismal is the right word- only 22% of workers 55 or older have more than $250,000 set aside for retirement, and 60% have less than $100,000 in a retirement account. The average savings of an American near retirement are $100,000.

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The Merkel government's effort to convince a skeptical German public about the need to aid Spain's banks. This includes a video on YouTube. The German parliament will vote shortly on the loans to Spain's savings banks.

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This Wall Street Journal editorial calls for more transparency in disclosing bad debt problems at Spanish and other European banks. It faults recent and upcoming stress tests of EU banks for not being stringent enough and taking into account adverse scenarios. While Spain's central bank says only 20 billion euros are needed to recapitalize the cajas savings banks, other estimates are much higher. Moody's country report says Spain could need upto 120 billion euros to recapitalize its banks. A big problem is European banks exposure in Spain which is over 700 billion euros as of September 2010- Spanish banks have high exposure in Portugal and German banks have high exposure to Spain.

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Friedman compares the anti-corruption movements in India and the U.S., the world's two largest democracies. The Occupy Wall Street anti-corruption movement in the U.S. focusses on the excessive influence of banks on lawmakers, regulators, and the government, through the use of campaign money, revolving door for government officials and regulators to join banks, and intense lobbying. The anti-corruption movement focusses on corruption in government at higher levels, such as the handling of government licenses, and at the basic levels of needing to bribe officials for something as simple as getting a birth certificate or other government document. Both have pernicious effects, in the U.S. excesssive bank influence leads to taking excessive risk for higher bonuses, putting the entire financial system at risk and creating a crisis in housing that delays the economic recovery. And in India the corruption leads to retarded progress, as funds to invest in infrastructure and development are siphoned off, business and entrepreneurs are required to pay bribes at each step, and ordinary people face the need to pay bribes for the most routine interactions with government officials. In the process this creates more unequal societies by skewing the distribution of benefits from wealth created to groups that are better equipped to game the system. The economic system once distorted in these ways has tendencies to take talent away from productive activity and innovation which create wealth, and direct it towards speculative activities....

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An audit of Spain's banking system by the consulting firm Oliver Wyman, shows that Spanish banks would need 53.745 billion euros to be cleaned up if mergers and acquisitions underway are completed.The amount goes up to 59.3 billion euros if this does not happen. Bankia bank will need 24.7 billion euros to meet capital requirements. Three other nationalized banks need 21.5 billion euros, including 3.2 billion euros for Banco Popular. Of the 14 audited banks only 7 need capital infusions. The other banks considered healthy include BBVA, Santander and La Caixa. These findings are similiar to a preliminary finding by Oliver Wyman and estimates provided by Luis de Guindos, Spain's economy minister, that Spanish banks will need 51 billion to 62 billion euros of capital infusion. Spain's secretary of state for the economy, Fernando Jimenez Latorre, says Spain will soon request about 40 billion euros of the 100 billion euro bailout offer for banks negotiated by Spain in June with the EU. It is not clear whether the capital infusion will go directly to Spain's banks as Spain has argued, or go through the Spanish government. The audits were important to provide credibility through independent assessment of losses in Spain's banking system, and remove the fog of uncertainty that is pushing up Spain's borrowing rate in capital markets....