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This Journal editorial points to a Philadelphia Fed study showing that students in the middle class with higher student debt are reluctant to start small business. The Fed study shows new firms with five employees declined by 17% on average for 2000-2010 in counties where relative student debt was up by 2.7%. The average student loan customer owes $28,000. Student debt has doubled from $547 billion in 2007 to over $1 trillion in 2015. As small business makes up about half of the private economy and generates 6 of 10 new jobs, the effects on small business show the damage being done rising student loan debt.

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India gets 4,100 megawatts from nuclear power or only 2.7% of capacity of 152,000 megawatts. It currently has 17 nuclear power plants. THe US-India Nuclear Cooperation Treaty signed in October 2008 wil give abig push to nuclear energy in India. Six new plants will be built. Nuclear power will rise to an estimated 40,000 megawatts by 2020, and Prime Minister Singh said it could generate 470,000 megawatts by 2050. THis week India's Hindusthan Construction Company signed adeal with Amec PLC, a UK engineering and project management company for taking up nuclear energy plants in India. About 500 engineers are eventually expected to work for the company.

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China's production of 300 gigawatts of soalr and other renewable energy in 2023 makes it possible for the country to achieve earlier emissions reduction than planned, says this report in WSJ. Of this 217 gigawatts are solar and 77 gigawatts are wind. Such is the investment China is making that it showed an increase in solar energy of 55%. The increase was itself more the solar energy installed in the US, for 500 million solar panels. At this rate China can meet its entire increase in electricity demand each year from solar and wind, other renewables. This is the kind of story that should be given prominence because it puts the fight against climate change in the right direction with aggressive climate change action coming from China, the largest user of coal.

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The best exercise routine is a consistent routine, says this health expert in The Guardian. Beware she says of sugary drink highs or coffee in excess to serve as pick ups during the day when energy is low. Instead do some short stretching or exercise routine even if it is only 10 minutes. It does not have to be a long or strenuous exercise, don't let the ads of young people doing strenuous routines fool you, says this expert. What is important is to keep doing it, to stretch and move around even if this is for a short time. Consistent routine is critical.

Carbohydrates, whole grain breads are not to be frowned on, she says, as this provides extra energy, and is healthy when balanced with protein and fat in the diet.

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Janice Turner writes about all those empty calories that are being taken without a thought. For children obesity starts with cereals such as Frosted Sugar Flakes with extremely high sugar content, and other cereals that have high sugar content with fancy names, says this report of how people unconsciously take in so many empty calories. Sugar content that can range to as high as 37%. This builds up disease in our bodies, and obesity. Obesity acts during this time of coronavirus to create a wild fire.

 

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Rakuten CEO, Hiroshi Mikitani, lived in Connecticut, completed graduate studies in the U.S. and speaks fluent English. It is now two years since his announcement that all business in the company will be conducted in English. July 1, 2012 was set as a target date after which all employee communication, including internal emails and memos would take place in English. All employees were required to take English language classes and employee tests in the language. Mikitani planned to expand Rakuten's operations overseas, and in these two years it has expanded to 12 countries from two countries, and plans to take this to 27 countries with 70% of sales generated overseas. Mikitani runs an e-commerce competitor to Amazon and he sees opportunities for the company worldwide and the need for employees to come out of their shell. He has long been a critic of Japanese elementary and secondary schooling in English. Most of the 3000 hours studying English after the seventh grade are wasted he says because most Japanese have trouble speaking English. A similiar effort to get employees to learn English has been launched at Uniqlo, a clothing retailer, and there is much discussion about this issue of improving the country's language proficiency as Japan's population ages and companies have to focus on overseas markets....

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DJT 1.0 was led on the tariffs policy by USTR Robert Lighthizer, who had experience negotiating with the Japanese negotiators in the Reagan era. He is today respected by  Republicans, is seen in an important role in economic policy and to prepare the tariff policy actions of the new DJT administration. Lighthizer prefers to get Congress to take action with legislation. He also believes that domestic manufacturing will make gains with new and higher tariffs on Chinese imports. Lighthizer policy is falsely compared with Hoover Tariffs Act of 1930 when world trade was 9% of world GDP, today it is 63% of world GDP, and where under Hoover in 1930 the tariffs were across the board all countries 20,000 goods. Under Lighthizer on specific products where dumping is happening -steel, aluminium, autos, with Japan in 1960-70 or China 2000-2020 targeting American industries + technologies for takeover. And falsely when it comes to raising costs to each American family on average by $4000 a year by economists. The conventional view for business for 2000-2016 through Bush and Obama favoring free trade did not take into account the unusual experience of China which entered WTO in 1990, then expanded in a way unprecedented in history at 10-12% growth rates for 15 years destroying American manufacturing with dumping, having support of outshoring by companies in the US, and not giving reciprocal treatment for exports from the US to China. China also had unrestricted access to US technologies in this type of trade. Lighthizer's approach was to specifically address this problem not a general across the board tariffs on all goods (20,000 goods) on all countries as with the Hoover Tariffs Act in 1930. Lighthizer's approach adopted by DJT called for reciprocal trade response with China as the US had already done with Japan, not unilateral across the board tariffs, and when world trade had advanced to about zero tariff rates. And falsely compared to Hoover 1930 Act because under Hoover tariffs were 29-40%. raised to 60% when world trade was small, was 9% of GDP. The Biden administration has tacitly agreed with Lighthizer's vision by not reversing DJT tariffs. A new higher tariff will probably be selective based on the industry, country and what goals the US has set under the new administration for that industry. Some of the tariffs revenue may also be used for tax cuts. ...

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S. Africa's slow progress in getting opportunites for black farmers and President Zuma's efforts to jump start this with a mentorship program. The program benefits S. Africa and white farmers as fewer young people want to stay on the land and farm. About 80% of farmland is white controlled, yet the number of white commercial farmers is declining rapidly, from 60,000 in 1994 to 37,000 in 2012, according to Theo de Jager, deputy president of Agri SA, a commercial farmer association. Jager says a new generaion of farmers from the black community has to fill the gap left by fewer white farmers. One of the problems is the high cost of the program and seed money for new black farmers. Since 2009 the government spent $122 million a year to support only about 1 in 10 farmers on redistributed land. The government has spent $730 million to buy white owned farmland since 1994. New farmers receive about $500,000 for equipment, seed and livestock. A mentor gets $600 per month.

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Gilead Sciences contracts with seven Indian generics drug makers to provide Hepatitis drug Sovaldi at $10 a pill for a 24 week course. These Indian companies will pay royalties to Gilead Sciences and supply the market in poor countries. There are about 350,000 deaths from Hepatitis C each year, most of them in middle income or poor countries. Worldwide about 180 million people are infected with Hepatitis C. There is intense criticism for the $1000 a pill charged for Sovaldi in the U.S., with $10 billion in sales for 2014 already set for the new drug's 12 week regimen that costs about $84,000. Gilead spends about 19% of sales on R&D.

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The automakers are still stuck with dependence on pickups like the Dodge Ram which provides 17% of domestic vehicle sales and the F-150 pickup truck for Ford which provides 26% of domestic vehicle sales. Even though they earn estimated $5000 to $10,000 per pickup this dependence has hurt the automakers, as they are losing money due to the neglect of the rest of their lineup. In 2008 the domestic pickup sales will decline 10% to 2 million units from 2.2 million according to Global Insight. Sales to customers now will almost entirley be to construction industry users in a bad construction market, as other customers who used pickups for general use are shifting to other vehicles.

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Mr Iksil, a trader in Chase's CIO London office made such massive bullish bets on CDX-IG-9 index of 121 companies by selling credit default swaps, to the point where it cost less for protection on the index than for the individual components of the index. This worked in Jan-Feb 2012 with hedge funds on the other side having paper losses. In subsequent months hedge funds realized that Iksil would have to unwind some of these bets to avoid large losses. As a trader at Bank of America put it in a memo, at that point "Fast money smelled blood." The result is that hedge funds accelerated their bets against Mr Iksil's bullish positions, leading to the large $2 billion losses at CIO unit of Chase- losses on depositors money from aggressive bets in a volatile market. Mr Iksil is a French born trader, who has worked for Chase since March 2007. He has earned $100 million each year for Chase. He travels to London from his Paris home each week, and works from home Fridays. Two junior traders work with Iksil, primarily placing bets for complex trades in credit markets....

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The main lines of the Message to Congress by the US president in 2025 related to flood of illegal immigration, and illegal fentanyl flows with deaths of Americans in the most vulnerable neighborhoods across 51 states over 12 years, 490,000 deaths, more than Vietnam. "The media and our friends in the Democrat Party kept saying we needed new legislation to secure the border—but it turned out that all we really needed was a new president.” As it turns out the legislation Biden with Republicans led by Senator Lankford negotiated in Feb 2024 did not have the strong action taken in the first 100 days to deter illegal immigration and remove illegal immigrants endangering safety in American neighborhoods. That legislation did not have provisions to bring illegal fentanyl flows into the US to an end with strong action including tariffs on CMC countries Canada, Mexico and China responsible for the fentanyl flows into the US. Transgender was another issue addressed in the speech with DJT clearly stating that their only two genders and against mutilation of bodies, with trust in God about the gender God placed us in as best for us. Other issues were about tariffs action going into effect on reciprocal tariffs on April 2 with all nations including India, Europe, China, Japan, South Korea. DJT cited India for high tariffs, South Korea with 4 times American tariffs, and European nations. The goal was to ensure a level playing field for the US to compete- "what they charge us, we charge them." As explained in an earlier article in the WSJ reciprocal tariffs in the world context mean commodities products would not have price increases for the US consumer, smartphones autos would increase but this would be temporary as these nations play fairly and create a level playing field, and these products manufacturing is shifted to the US. This would mean growth for US auto industry and smartphones coming from inside the US and from India offsetting concentration of production in China. Apple has told the president it will start making inside America investing hundreds of billions in the US from now on. ...

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Spain's central bank says the Cajas savings banks have 217 billion euros in exposure to real estate and construction companies. Of this 100 billon euros is "potentially problematic." The Cajas have provisions for 38% of this. The government approved rules for minimum capital requirements. The capital ratios are set at 8% for all banks and higher for the Cajas. It said all banks will need to raise 20 billion euros by a September deadline. Barclays estimates this at 46 billion euros, twice the government estimate. The government will extend the deadline on a case by case basis, so that banks have until December 2011 to close sales of stakes to private investors.The government will then take stakes in the banks by September through the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring or FROB. After a 3 billon euro bond issuance in January 2011, the FROB has 4.5 billion euros on hand and a 3 billion euro credit line.

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The Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague, Netherlands, rules in favor of the Philippines and rejects China's claims of sovereignty in the South China Sea over some islets in the Spratly archipelago. The claims were made by China on a historical basis. The Hague Court looks at it on the baisis of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and on whether these are islands or land submerged in the sea, or reclaimed reefs.

 

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The Bank of Italy, is conducting central bank examinations of Italian banks in July 2013. The loan portfolios of the 8 largest banks are being examined, and on-site inspections are being conducted for 20 other banks. This could lead to Italian banks having to sell assets or take other steps to improve capital positions. During the last central bank examinations in the fall of 2012 Italian banks were required to set aside 3.4 billion euros to protect against bad loan losses. Bad loan losses are increasing at Italian banks as businesses and individuals fall behind on payments with the worsening economy in 2013, and into 2014. Non-performing loans are up to 249 billion euros, or 14.2% of the banking industry's total loans, according to the Bank of Italy. This is up from 157 billion euros, or 8.9% of total loans in 2010.

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Google's operating profit margin on the Moto G smartphone is about 5%, according to analyst Newman at Sanford Bernstein & Co. By comparison Samsung gets a 28% operating profit margin on the Galaxy S4, and Apple gets a 30-35% margin on the iPhone 5S and 5C. Apple and Samsung have a little over $200 in parts and components in the iPhone 5S and the the Galaxy S4, and price their smartphones at about $640, according to TechInsights. Moto X premium smartphone from Google sells for $350 without a contract. Moto G for price sensitive customers has $123 in parts and components and is priced starting at $199. For about $90 in additional circuitry Apple and Samsung are able to command an additional $440 in price level, say experts. Google's Motorola Mobility head, Dennis Woodside, says Apple and Samsung premium smartphone and lower end smartphone prices are too high, without starting a price war Google is lowering prices gradually.

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This piece in the WSJ misses a deep understanding of India just as the US media failed to understand China in the years of Japanese imperialism in Asia. India with 1.4 billion people and Indonesia with over 300 million people form 1.7 billion people moving towards modernization by 2047. Much of this will accelerate and be achieved by 2037 by which time India will have the third largest economy in the world and have one that is likely to surpass China in its dynamism and youthful energies. DJT's first responsibility was to America and the World- to bring a quick end to the war in South Asia, and the presence of nuclear weapons is a factor too important for the president to not take this responsibility seriously. DJT also made it clear that the economy is where it is all going to happen- the modernization of India and Indonesia in the way the US had helped each of these nations modernize- Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, China, and now India over 1900-2037. The people of South Asia fully support the US president in this endeavor. ...

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A former mayor of Mexico City wins the election for president in 2018 with 53% of the vote. Obrador's margin was over 30% over Ricardo Analya of PAN party who had 22.5%, and ruling PRI's Antionio Meade with 16%, with 72% of votes counted according to Mexico's election agency. Issues in this election were corruption, with many corruption scandals for ruling PRI under president Nieto, and failure to maintain rule of law. The last time that a president won this size margin of victory was in 1982. Morena as Obrador's party is called, won 306 of 500 seats in the lower house of parliament and 70 of 128 seats in the Senate, winning majorities in both houses of parliament. It also won 4 of 8 state governor races and the Mayor's office in Mexico City. FOr the first time since 1997 one party will control both houses and Mexico City. Obrador formed his own party after leaving the PRD party, calling it The Movement for National Regeneration. Most Mexicans were highly disturbed by the violence and corruption that prevailed in local administration under president Nieto's PRI government. The PRI's dominance in Mexican politics is now broken. Obrador says he will work to put more emphasis on helping the poor in Mexico in framing his policies, distancing himself from the politics of the PRI which had distanced itself more and more from grassroots and ordinary workers in Mexico. This means adapting the free market economic model to suit Mexico's own conditions, the differences between northern and southern Mexico, and pushing for more worker friendly policies. It also creates more room for agreement with the U.S. as both Mr. Trump and Mr. Obrador agree on raising labor standards and wages for factory workers in Mexico ...

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Flipkart, India's largest online retailer, was started by 2 Amazon executives in 2007. Flipkart has 22 million registered users and hosts 3000 merchants selling products ranging from electronics to clothing. Flipkart sales reached $1 billion in the last 12 months. In July 2014 Flipkart raised $1 billion from a group of investors including Tiger Global Management, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund GIC. This follows the raising of $210 million in May 2014 from a group of investors led by DST Global, a Russian investor. Competitors include Amazon and eBay backed SnapDeal. Funds raised will be used to hire more engineers and improve mobile technologies, as over half of sales are made on mobile phones. India's online retail market is expected to grow 11 fold to $23 billion by 2018, according to Nomura brokerage firm. Flipkart earns money by charging merchants a fee for products sold on its online website.

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BMW's first mass production electric car the i3 will go on sale inthe U.S. in the second quarter of 2014, priced at $41,350. It is a city car with a range of 100 miles from one charge. BMW will launch a i8 in 2014. The i8 is a super sports car with high fuel economy. A electric motor drives the front wheels and a 3 cylinder gasoline engine drives rear wheels. BMW's CEO Reithofer has increased spending on R&D so that it can meet the 30% of automobiles that have to be hybrids or electric vehicles by 2025 for BMW to meet higher European auto emissions standards. R&D spending was up 17% in 2012 to 9.2 billion euros, and capital spending up 42%.

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The median household headed by a person 60-62 years of age with a 401(k) account has less than one fourth of what is needed to maintain a standard of living at retirement, according to data from the Federal Reserve and analyzed by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College for the Wall Street Journal. Including Social Security and any pensions or other savings, the savings are way short of what is needed for retirement. Households used in this data had a median income of $87,700 in 2009. The 85% needed for a decent standard of living upon retirement is $74,545. Social Security would provide an estimated 40% of pre-retiremment income, or $35,080 for that median family, leaving $39,465 that has to come from other sources. The median 401(k) account has $149,400 which would only provide a fixed income each year of $9,073- only one fourth of the $39,465 needed. To generate that $39,465, households have to have $636,673, and only 8% of American households approaching retirement have that amount. Half of the families have other pension income of $26,500 a year, which added to $9,073 in 401(k) income gets the total income up to $35,573. Other studies using different data by the Employee Benefit Research Institute show results that are largely similiar. The Employee Benefit Research Institute, is supported by 401(k) providers. Its estimate of the median person is based on individuals in the 60's who have worked at the same company for more than 30 years. This data shows an estimated median person having about $158,754, not much different from the Fed data. Why is the amount in most Americans 401(k) savings so low? There was a mistaken sense that a 6% annual contribution, with a 3% company match would be enough. Vanguard Group says the current median amount that people contribute is 9%, counting the employer contribution. Now Vanguard is advising people to contribute more, 12 to 15%, including the employer contribution. Other problems for the low savings is that saving started late, or contributions were suspended after a job loss, or medical emergencies, other debt. The stock market collapses of 2000-2002 and 2007-2009, added to the problems, by wiping out a portion of the savings. The low rate of interest on savings for most of the last decade hurt even conservative investors and lowers the kind of retirement account income used by seniors. The way people are coping with this is to work longer, in some cases into the 70's, cutting down on spending for food, travel, and taking greater risks for higher returns, risks that could make the situation worse....