| To: StanX Long who wrote (60886) | 2/22/2002 1:45:21 AM | | From: StanX Long | | | | Hong Kong's jobless rate hits highest level in decades
By Andrea Ricci
Thursday February 21, 7:00 PM
sg.news.yahoo.com
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong's jobless rate soared to 6.7 percent in the three months to end-January, the highest in decades and well above levels seen during the depths of the Asian financial crisis.
The figure was far above economists' expectations of 6.3 percent and well above the 6.4 percent hit in the spring of 1999, when joblessness was last at its peak.
It was also the highest rate since 1981, when the government began using the statistical model it employs now.
A growing number of companies in the territory have been cutting staff, slashing salaries or asking workers to take unpaid leave in a bid to trim costs as the economy threatens to tip into its second recession in four years. |
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| To: StanX Long who wrote (60887) | 2/22/2002 1:52:01 AM | | From: StanX Long | | | | Singapore share index sinks to four-week low midday
Friday February 22, 1:50 PM
sg.news.yahoo.com
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore's bellwether stock index skidded over two percent on Friday to a four-week low as investors dashed for the exits after Wall Street's sharp losses on fears of shrinking U.S. corporate profits.
By midday, the Straits Times Index, which managed to reverse a four-day losing streak on Thursday, had fallen 39.62 points below the psychologically key 1,700 mark to 1,692.21. The index came off an early low of 1,691.47.
It is still up more than four percent since the start of the year.
In the broader market, losers led gainers 216 to 20. Volume was a moderate 225 million shares.
U.S. stocks tumbled on Thursday, pushing the tech-laden Nasdaq down to its worst close since late October on worries about shrinking earnings at technology icons like chip maker Intel Corp . |
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| To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (60847) | 2/22/2002 5:37:26 AM | | From: Sam Citron | | | | OT Telematics
The factory-installed GPS in the new Lexus seems to have a good audio interface. Don't know how comprehensive the restaurant coverage is, particularly in rural areas. You will still need a cell phone to access menu and prices, and to order so the pizza is hot and ready when you arrive.
It's not quite HAL 2001, but it's slowly getting there. <g> |
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| To: StanX Long who wrote (60884) | 2/22/2002 6:03:16 AM | | From: Sam Citron | | | | Fascinating '96 Fed meeting minutes at federalreserve.gov
Wish we could get them to join our thread. <g>
Excerpt: Lawrence Lindsey 9/24/96
...But that is not where I am most worried. What worries me
more is that our luck is about to run out in the financial markets
because of what I would consider a gambler's curse: We have won this
long, let us keep the money on the table. You can see early signs of
this. It includes real estate appreciation in the Hamptons,
Connecticut, and Manhattan. BMW and Mercedes both had their best
summer in history in the United States. The IBES earnings
expectations survey for 5-year projected earnings hit a 12-year high
in August. It indicates that earnings are expected to grow at a rate
of a little over 11-1/2 percent per year. Now, if we assume nominal
GDP growth of 5-1/2 percent over the same period, this means that NIPA
profits will rise from 10.7 percent of national income to 14.3 percent
of national income in 2001. Readers of this transcript five years
from now can check this fearless prediction: Profits will fall short
of this expectation. Unfortunately, optimism is ripe in the markets.
Excessive optimism is also necessary to justify current levels of IPO
activity and valuations of highly speculative stocks. While it is not
so large as to exert undue pressure on the real side of the U.S.
economy, this emerging bubble is nonetheless real. AS a survivor of
the so-called Massachusetts miracle to which Cathy Minehan referred
earlier, I can attest that everyone enjoys an economic party. But the
long-term costs of a bubble to the economy and society are potentially
great. They include a reduction in the long-term saving rate, a
seemingly random redistribution of wealth, and the diversion of scarce
financial human capital into the acquisition of wealth. As in the
United States in the late 1920s and Japan in the late 1980s. the case
for a central bank ultimately to burst that bubble becomes
overwhelming. I think it is far better that we do so while the bubble
still resembles surface froth and before the bubble carries the
economy to stratospheric heights. Whenever we do it, it is going to
be painful, however...
federalreserve.gov |
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| To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (60840) | 2/22/2002 8:22:08 AM | | From: Katherine Derbyshire | | | | >>At the bottom, capital should not be available. Corporations should not be able to raise money (by selling stock, bonds, anything) to buildout infrastructure to serve any unproven market. <<
Maybe Alan Greenspan really is a genius?
That is, maybe by tightening interest rates when he did and then loosening them dramatically and rapidly, he managed to engineer a relatively soft landing. By doing that, he kept capital scarcity from becoming so severe that it strangled the recovery in its cradle.
Describing this as a soft landing is sort of a scary thought. But I think when the last speculative bubble of this magnitude broke they called it the Great Depression.
Katherine |
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| To: Katherine Derbyshire who wrote (60892) | 2/22/2002 9:10:26 AM | | From: michael97123 | | | | Katherine,
Good point. Nasdaq is only down 3300 points. Unemployment is in the 5's, not the 7's and so on. Now we have to digest and get thru the effect of enron on the value of stated earnings going forward. mike
PS A question. When does an inventory correction end or can one go on forever? With business what it is now, how can this glut still be there? I realize that there are special situations(eg fiber) with explanations but i think most folks have gotten lean and mean at every level and the first sign of robust business will have wonderful bottom line results. Go to the store--no winter goods left and so on. |
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| To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (60841) | 2/22/2002 11:44:44 AM | | From: Kirk © | | | | I'm driving through Montana on a family vacation. A Country radio station is on, volume turned up to drown out the sound of the 6 and 8-old fighting over Legos in the back seat. I ask "where is the nearest pizza place?" The car answers, "12 miles up the road, in Livingston". The 10-year-old says, "I want pineapple and bacon pizza". The car says, "You'll have to go to Billings for that, and it'll cost you 7$ more. Want directions?"
you spoil your kids. :)
When I go on trips with my lady friend with kids, we pack our own food to save money and time as well as to eat healthier. Now if we had a Star Trek replicator in the Suburban... (btw, with the money saved, we eat a nice restaurant dinner in the evenings).
Wireless web access... useful for the business professional who is on the road often and wants broadband in a $3,000 notebook PC.
Kirk |
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