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Sheila Bair, former head of the U.S. FDIC, points out flaws in the rules for capital adequacy ratios and risk weighted assets which allow banks to increase their capital adequacy ratios. The ratios show the financial strength of the banks and their ability to absorb losses, which makes their accurate calculation very important for the safety of the U.S. banking system, especially with large "too big to fail" banks. Bair says the 2013 U.S. Fed stress tests showed Bank of America as having a capital adequacy ratio of 11.4%, when it should actually be 7.8% without the risk weighted adjustment. The mortgage banking crisis showed how the risk wieighting can be flawed and give a distorted representation of the acutal risks facing the banks in its assets. For Morgan Stanley the 2013 stress tess by the U.S. Fed showed the capital adequacy ratio at 14%, taking out the risk weighting adjustment this drops to 7%. Bair says its not the idea of risk weighting that is the problem, but the way it is applied- for example considering sovereign government bonds in the eurozone as zero risk, or that only 20% of the accounting value of debt one banks buys from another bank is to be taken into account in setting the ratio. Go back to the drawing board she says, it makes no sense that Citibank debt be shown as having one fifth risk of IBM's. ...

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India follows the U.S. and Britain in beginning the restructuring of the social media business to remove monopolistic behaviours, diversion of profits from print and online media content creators, and other behaviours that limit openness and place control in the hands of 3-4 companies.

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This report in The Times shows that small polling errors can swing the election either way into large wins for Republicans or Democrats. A polling error of just 3 points is all it takes for a big win on either side in the 2020 U.S. presidential election.

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Other European nations and the U.S. will be watching Germany's opening of small shops and small retail business under 800 square metres of space on April 20, followed by other business on May 4, in a gradual partial reopening of the economic activity

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Federal judges in Hawaii and Maryland halt a revised travel ban from President Trump banning people from certain countries in the Middle East from entering the U.S. The previous travel ban which was amended into the current version, was halted by a judge in Seattle.

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As the German government seeks to rescue Deutsche Bank through a possible merger with Commerzbank, this report in the NYT describes the bank's U.S. operations and risky ventures. Deutsche Bank faces huge losses from settlements, high management turnover and an uncertain future.

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Prof. Peterson of Harvard and Hanushek of the Hoover Institution, authors with Woessmann of the book "Endangering Prosperity: A Global View of the American School," offer some startling reminders about the importance of education to economic growth and incomes in countries. Simply by raising the math standards in the U.S. to the higher standards in Canada would raise GDP by three fourths of one percentage point. One advantage that the U.S. enjoys comes from its good university systems, open markets, rule of law, tax rates, and open immigration policies, which give it about two thirds of a percentage point in higher GDP growth per year. The estimates are from the authors calculations. For the period 1960-2009, a period of rapid growth in Asian countries Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong, higher test scores in math and reading compared to the wrold average as measured by NAEP test and PISA, have led to 2% higher GDP growth. NAEP shows only 32% of U.S. high school students proficient in math compared to 45% in Germany and 49% in Canada and 63% in Singapore. By contrast to Korea and Taiwan, Peru, Argentina, the Philippines and S. Africa have about 2% less in GDP growth because of lower scores compared to the world average....

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The yuan is up 5.5% since the peg to the dollar ended in 2010, reaching 6.469 to the dollar. But this is not helping the U.S. trade deficit. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the price of imports from China are up 2.8% in May over the same month prior year. And the trade surplus for China in the first four months of 2011 is higher than the same period in 2010. What is happening? The improvements in productivity of Chinese manufacturers and the acceptance of lower margins is reducing the effects on trade balance of a small appreciation of the yuan, so that only a fraction of that appreciation is showing up in higher prices for Chinese goods. Also significant is that the yuan's small appreciation against the dollar is not enough to make up for the dollar's fall against other currencies. The yuan is down 8.3% against the euro and has actually declined 3.7% on a trade weighted basis in the last year.

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Lack of any effort by Democrats and Republicans to come up with a negotiated agreement to end the $85 billion in sequester automatic spending cuts in the U.S. for 2013. For the Republicans the risk is that president Obama gains ground in preparation for the 2014 midterm elections. For president Obama the risk is that his will become a distraction for his second term legislative agenda including immigration reform, and other legislation.

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Landler and Barry say in this report in the NYT that the situation of government paralysis in the U.S. parallels the one in the UK with no-deal Brexit around the corner. President Trump wants a border wall (steel or other kind) on the border with Mexico as a campaign pledge. In the UK Conservative party faction supporting Leave from the European Union, including supporters of Boris Johnson, seek Leave at all cost. Johnson called the shortage of Mars bars a small inconvenience, as the Theresa May government prepares to push its own Brexit deal through Britain's parliament. In a separate report the NYT tries to show that over 80% of the drugs come in through entry ports and the border crossings are largely families or unaccompanied children. For the first time -since the 1950's and the segregation struggles in the U.S. -populists battle the elites in the large cities, say Barry and Landler. The rural urban divide, is seen in both sides of the Atlantic, in Europe and the U.S. ...

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Removing nuclear material has already been done for Kazakhstan and Georgia by the US in the past. The same methods and advanced technologies could be used to get all of the nuclear material out of Iran. Special operations set up for this purpose can also be used to get this done. This appears to be the only safe and certain way to avoid the nuclear proliferation. Despite what the media has been saying, even the Pope and others like Starmer and Macron are saying, who have never brought this up, but is the only way to tell the whole story,  the US and the world is safer without nuclear proliferation -especially in the most volatile region of the world for the last 5 decades. This is all the US is doing and getting more than its share of blame when all it is interested in is making it safe for the people of the world , including the people of India, Brazil, China and Russia, European Union and Africa, Latin America, whatever their leaders say.

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A study by Prof. Peter Petri of Brandeis University, shows the Trans Pacific Trade Agreement boosting economic output in the U.S. by about 0.4% by 2025 or $77 billion. Winners are biologic drugs which get long term patent protection, tech firms and software engineering services. Losers are the Detroit auto industry with higher auto parts imports, light manufacturing, and some heavy manufacturing sectors. Prof. Douglas Irwin of Dartmouth College and other experts say it is not clear how U.S. consumers and businesses will benefit. The import duties as a percentage of total imports are now at about 1.4%. Experts say about 4/5ths of the benefits of TPP for the U.S. are from opening up trade in services and new rules for investment and commerce. TPP includes Pacific countries Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Mexico, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and Japan. Issues are environmental rules, worker protection and standards, agricultural imports in sensitive countries such as Canada and Japan, affordable drugs in poor countries....

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The average forecast for the S&P 500 U.S. stock market is for a 4.1% gain in 2014 for nine analysts surveyed- a much more cautious outlook after 27% gains in 2013. The S&P 500 closed at 1804 in the final week of November 2013.

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The Journal cites figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showing 44.7 million participated in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance program in fiscal 2011. This is a big jump from the 28.2 million people in 2008. Texas has 4 million on food stamps, California 3.7 millon, Florida 3.1 million.

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The views of Anne-Marie Slaughter and other high ranking current and former officials in the Defense Department and State Department on the idea of a military strike by Israel or the U.S. on Iran and the unforeseen consequences.

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During the early weeks of the Libyan people's struggle the Wall Street Journal was one of the rare voices that stood up for freedom in Libya, saying the U.S. had to have the will and was not so overstretched that it could make a difference working with its allies in NATO. It took some time for the Obama administration to make up its mind by which time the Gaddafi forces would have entered Benghazi. It was the leadership of Sarkozy of France and Cameron of Britain that made the decisive difference at the right time. And as the tide turned it was the young people of Libya who could be seen in the video footage who showed bravery against the organized heavily armed forces of the Gaddafi regime. The lesson from the U.S. support for the Libyan people's movement for democratic government is that the U.S. can make a moral difference and a strategic difference when it follows the right instincts that have guided the country since its founding.

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Efforts to get Russia into the WTO on the eve of the G-8 Summit in St Petersburg. Negotiations on sticking points such as intellectual property rights, agricultural trade, regulations for foreign banks.