Just when everything seemed to be going back to (near) normal, the Greek Prime Minister and his cabinet have decided to put his country’s agreement to resolve its sovereign debt crisis to a referendum. This is in the interests of national unity at home — and may even be in the premier’s own political self …
Category archives: Energy / Environment
Sony warns of $1bn loss, citing Thai floods
Sony has warned that it will make a $1.2bn loss this year, having previously forecast a $0.8bn profit for the year to March. Reasons for the change include “slowing demand for consumer electronics”, the strong yen, and the floods in Thailand that have disrupted parts supplies. It says something about the accelerating impact of climate …
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Peak oil? What peak oil?
An interesting article here talking about north America (including Canada)’s resurgence in home-grown energy, mostly from ‘tight oil’ — extracted with gas from shale rock formations, using the fracking process.
Climate change can have severe impacts on business
Owing to Thailand’s recent floods, the country’s central bank has slashed its growth forecast for 2011 from 4.1% to 2.6%. That may not sound like much. But remember that it is now October, so most of the growth in the year has already happened (barring seasonal fluctuations for Christmas). That means output in the last …
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WPP sees growth in 2012, challenges in 2013
WPP has cut its sales growth forecasts for 2011, though margins have improved (implying that costs have been cut significantly). Chief executive, Sir Martin Sorrell, is expecting growth of around 3%-4% in 2012 (down on 4%-6% in 2011), though 2013 may present a greater challenge “when a newly elected president will finally have to deal …
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Equities rise on eurozone deal
News that private investors will accept a 50% reduction in the face value of their loans to Greece, and that that country will be able to reduce its debt to 120% of GDP by 2020, were met by a rise in stock markets to around the levels of early August. Banking shares performed especially well. …
Not all bad news — ABB improves
ABB, seen with other infrastructure and engineering groups as a bellwether of global economic conditions, has posted profits and sales up in the third quarter, benefitting from acquisitions, foreign exchange (FX) movements, and cost cutting and in spite of price pressures. Revenues showed a slight increase after acquisitions FX were taken into account. The order backlog …
China has more internet users than population of EU
The modernisation of China continues apace, as measured by the number of citizens with access to the Internet, which has transformed western lifestyles and economies. China now has over half a billion people using the Internet, more than twice the number using it in the US, and more than the entire population of the EU. Growth in …
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India’s banks raise savings rates to attract local capital
While the west continues to deal with the fallout of deregulated banks, the Reserve Bank of India has deregulated the interest rates paid on savings accounts. Rates in the largely state-controlled sector have been regulated at 3.5% for the past eight years, while inflation has been as high as almost ten percent. Commercial lending rates …
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The energy and economic fundamentals
Here is a series of fundamental points, and then a question: To pay off our existing debts we need the economy to grow Economists are expecting there will be a source of energy to power that growth But cheap oil has run out, oil is ‘peaking’ — supply may match but will no longer exceed …