“Fasten your seatbelts – the global economy is heading for turbulence… Nerves about recent poor economic news from China have come to the fore…
“…the focus is shifting from inflation to growth. Next, I expect the focus of financial markets to shift to debt. Public and private debt levels globally are high, limiting the room for policy manoeuvre and leaving many people and firms exposed to a sustained period of high interest rates. Keep the seatbelts tightened.”
“Summer of angst as bond yields surge and global stocks wobble.
“Cracks are forming in a global stocks rally, with surging bond yields, rising energy prices and intensified worries over China’s economy among the factors sapping investors’ risk appetite following months of gains in equity markets.”
https://www.reuters.com/markets/global-markets-cracks-graphic-pix-2023-08-21/
“Diesel supplies may become scarce as winter looms…
“All over the world, prices for the fuel are sky-high relative to the crude oil from which it is made, pointing to a scarcity that should alarm inflation-obsessed governments everywhere. And within just a few months, the Northern Hemisphere will enter winter, pushing up demand for heating.”
“Net-Zero Goals Won’t Slow Down Oil Exploration…
“If spending oil new oil and gas exploration is taking place in [the context of pressure for a green transition], then there must be a very good reason for it, and that reason is not the record profits oil and gas companies made last year. They are part of the reason but not the whole of it. The whole of it is energy security.”
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Net-Zero-Goals-Wont-Slow-Down-Oil-Exploration.html
“Voters will not accept “economic destruction” to achieve net zero, one of Britain’s biggest unions has warned Sir Keir Starmer.
“Gary Smith, the general secretary of the GMB union, said a rush to abandon oil and gas would be “a disaster” and urged the Labour leader to rethink his green objectives.”
“Turbulent times: UK faces strikes, shortages, and soaring inflation…
“Today, a great city like London is a shadow of it’s former self, plagued by crime, transport strikes, a healthcare system that is so broken that you are unlikely to get an ambulance in time when you call for one, and a services industry that has been crippled after Brexit.”
“The amount Britain owes exceeds its GDP for the first time since 1961—and credit-rating agencies are watching…
“The UK’s public debt load has soared by more than 40% to almost £2.6 trillion ($3.3 trillion) since the pandemic struck… A heavy reliance on index-linked bonds at a time of high inflation also means Britain will pay more to service liabilities than any other advanced economy.”
“EU deforestation rules risk ‘catastrophic’ impact on global trade, says ITC chief…
“Pamela Coke-Hamilton, executive director of the ITC, a joint agency of the UN and World Trade Organization, told the Financial Times that a ban on goods linked to deforestation from entering the EU favoured big companies that can trace where their produce had been grown and risked “cutting off” smaller suppliers.”
https://www.ft.com/content/9119d448-ff1c-434d-b07f-27b1bf11c041
“Can Germany fix its economy?
“…The IMF and OECD both expect Germany to be the worst-performing leading economy in the world this year. The country’s top-selling tabloid newspaper Bild Zeitung recently raised the alarm, declaring: “Help, our economy is crashing” as it appealed for chancellor Olaf Scholz to take action.”
https://www.ft.com/content/28d22761-d81f-4402-bd56-7329fd6d18b0
“Violent protests and clashes between demonstrators and police erupted in the eastern suburbs of Liège over the weekend after a 31-year-old driver was shot and killed by police on Friday…
“The incident led to protests, particularly given the similar police shooting that killed a teenager in France before the summer break and led to demonstrations all over France which then spread to Belgium.”
“Europe shows it still can’t handle an influx of migrants…
“For nearly a decade, almost 50 migrants have died or disappeared on average each week trying to reach European shores aboard rickety boats in the Mediterranean. This year, the weekly toll has spiked to about 70…”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/08/20/sunak-britain-migrant-crisis-italy/
“Authorities ‘left people to die’ despite warnings about Cape Verde migrant boat weeks before tragedy, rights group alleges…
“Four national authorities and the European Union’s border patrol agency Frontex failed to make “sufficient” efforts to prevent the deaths of dozens of migrants off West Africa, despite being warned about the boat weeks before, a Spanish human rights NGO alleged Friday.”
“‘It’s Europe or death’: Why no amount of EU money has stopped migrants fleeing Tunisia…
“Hundreds of sub-Saharan migrants of all ages have been sleeping rough in Sfax’s parks and alleyways for nearly two months. Many were forced from their homes in racist pogroms that swept the city earlier this summer. The violent crackdown has added urgency to migrants’ plans to set sail for Italy, and the EU…”
“China urges banks to offer more loans to support recovery.
“China’s central bank and financial regulators have met with bank executives and again told lenders to boost loans to support a recovery, adding to signs of heightened concern among politicians about the deteriorating economic outlook.”
“Why LGFV debt is a growing risk for China’s economy.
“Cracks are showing in a pillar of China’s debt market: local-government financing vehicles (LGFVs). Created to fund such things as roads, airports and power infrastructure, they rarely generate enough returns to cover their obligations. That means most rely on injections of municipal funds to stay solvent.”
https://www.straitstimes.com/business/why-lgfv-debt-is-a-growing-risk-for-china-s-economy
“Taiwan’s Biggest Financial Firm Braces for Deeper China Turmoil.
“Taiwan’s biggest financial conglomerate has cut back on its exposure to China… Fubon Financial Holding, which operates banks and insurance companies, has been capping its risks in China over the past few years during Covid, and is now prepared for even deeper turmoil.”
“The South Korean economy faces fresh risks from China, with no immediate breakthrough in sight to recover its faltering exports…
““Amid the prolonged slump in the chip industry, China’s imports from Korea and Taiwan — key hubs of the semiconductor industry — have dropped largely in recent months. If this does not recover, Korea’s exports will not be picking up anytime soon,” he said.”
https://m.koreaherald.com/amp/view.php?ud=20230820000154
“The Bank of Japan is purchasing government bonds at a record pace this year, a factor that likely prompted its recent move to allow larger yield movements to reduce the strain on its control of longer-term interest rates…
“The central bank has had to intervene in the market twice with unscheduled purchase operations since July 28…”
“Argentina has fixed the price of oil received by drillers at $56, far below international levels, as it scrambles to stop inflation getting further out of control after this week’s currency devaluation…
“Crude drillers in burgeoning shale patch Vaca Muerta will get $56 a barrel until Oct. 31. Argentine oil prices were already decoupled from global markets, but Thursday night’s decision means shale companies will receive 11% less than the $63 at which local light crude was trading in the second quarter.”
“Venezuelans struggle to find power, water amid shortage.
“Yusmary spends as much as half her weekly wage on water. Isora must go to the black market to get gas cylinders so she can cook. Rodrigo, weary of blackouts, bought portable generators for his home and business. Public utilities offer erratic service in Venezuela, and citizens pay steeply to make up for the shortcomings.”
https://www.kuwaittimes.com/venezuelans-struggle-to-find-power-water-amid-shortage/
“South Africa’s delivery of crucial services under threat after Treasury desperately calls for public ‘fiscal consolidation’…
“To prevent a total collapse in the country’s finances, National Treasury has told all government departments in provinces that no new spending will be allocated to them. The Treasury is even prepared to implement budget cuts in 2024…”
“Nigeria’s debt profile up 410% in 8 years…
“In the MAN CEOs’ Confidence Index (MCCI) first quarter 2923 (Q1’23) report made available to Vanguard on Sunday, the association warned that the N77 trillion inherited by the administration of President Bola Tinubu is bound to limit the achievements of the government if urgent critical steps are not taken.”
https://www.vanguardngr.com/2023/08/nigerias-debt-profile-up-410-in-8-years-man/
“Sudanese suffering continues as Sudan’s war enters 5th month… There is not a cease-fire or the opening of the humanitarian corridors…
“Food, other commodity prices rise sharply in Sudanese Armed Forces-controlled areas outside Khartoum, owing to lack of supply and shortages of fuel, power, water, other necessities.”
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/sudanese-suffering-continues-as-sudan-s-war-enters-5th-month/2971553
“UN says forced to cut Yemen rations, compounding food crisis.
“More than four million Yemenis will receive less food assistance as a result of funding shortages, compounding one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, the UN’s food agency warned Friday… With major cuts announced across different programmes, the actual number of people affected could be higher.”
https://jordantimes.com/news/region/un-says-forced-cut-yemen-rations-compounding-food-crisis
“Saudi border guards are accused of the mass killing of migrants along the Yemeni border in a new report by Human Rights Watch.
“The report says hundreds of people, many of them Ethiopians who cross war-torn Yemen to reach Saudi Arabia, have been shot dead. Migrants have told the BBC they had limbs severed by gunfire and saw bodies left on the trails.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-66545787
“Syrians in the regime-held south of the country staged a general strike on Sunday against deteriorating living conditions and price rises, local media reported, amid sporadic demonstrations.
“The government this week lifted fuel subsidies, dealing a blow to people already struggling with the heavy toll that 12 years of war have exacted on Syria’s economy.”
“Illegal logging turns Syria’s forests into ‘barren land’…
“Before, “the forest would attract tourists, birds, purify the air and protect the area from dust storms”, he said. But fuel shortages and rampant poverty during the war have pushed many Syrians to chop the trees to sell or use for heating, dealing a blow to the nature surrounding Jaabar.”
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/illegal-logging-turns-syrias-forests-040554599.html
“Global food security is at crossroads as rice shortages and surging prices hit the most vulnerable…
“Global food security is already under threat since Russia halted an agreement allowing Ukraine to export wheat and the El Nino weather phenomenon hampers rice production. Now, rice prices are soaring — Vietnam’s rice export prices, for instance, have reached a 15-year high — putting the most vulnerable people in some of the poorest nations at risk.”
“Food prices have been rising rapidly and there are reasons to fear they will push even higher. Economists warn some prices might never come down…
“In the longer term, concerns are growing over the enduring effects of a warming climate on production and the danger of high food and energy prices getting embedded into an economy, leaving prices higher for ever.”
You can read the previous “Economic” thread here. I’ll be back tomorrow with a “Climate” thread.
If you found value in this content, please help me continue this work by becoming a patron of my work via Patreon. And if you are already a subscriber or have donated – thank you! It is an enormous help as the cost-of-living crisis ratchets up here in the UK.
“”The Bank of Japan is purchasing government bonds at a record pace this year, a factor that likely prompted its recent move to allow larger yield movements to reduce the strain on its control of longer-term interest rates…
“The central bank has had to intervene in the market twice with unscheduled purchase operations since July 28…”
This Bloomberg story reminded me of an old classic documentary “Princes of Yen” (2014) about how Central Banks operate, specifically the BoJ as a prime example but also looked at the Fed, ECB and their links with the IMF. Its very long, but available for free streaming in various places, including YouTube if anyone else is interested to revisit.
Geopoliticaleconomics heating up worldwide, more and more of the Global South are going under, descending into economic disasters alongside their climate disasters, and Europe in particular, dont want to deal with the increasing floods of victims.
Even the bleeding-hearts of the UN cant feed the hungry millions anymore, which puts a question on the last COP meeting agreeing for the rich countries to establish funding for the poor countries “Loss and Damages”.
I think I might go back to climate threads.
Re the Bank of Japan, it seems to be operating at the very limits of what is possible in, effectively, trying to borrow its way out of a debt crisis – clearly a game that can’t go on indefinitely.
Yeah, the UN-affiliated official who said they were going to have to take from the hungry to feed the starving in Yemen because of lack of funding – that’s the goddam “bleeding heart” stuff you & Harmon-Karen hate, amirite?
Harmon says, “You just cant get over your own smugly goodness, holier than right wing people”
Ouch! Good one.
I didn’t however see in your rants anything that refutes the history lesson offered. Yes, the French decimated the people of Niger to conquer it and has been stealing its wealth since. Apparently, you understand that. Congrats.
Let me explain the dog whistle part:
Yes, Africa is overpopulated. Niger is overpopulated. France is overpopulated. Germany is overpopulated. The US is overpopulated. Britain is overpopulated. (Its called global overshoot. Look it up some day, perhaps while you are flying to your next destination). The problem for some is the fact that those excess babies in the global south all have dark skin.
I found this article re the overpopulation of Niger, which was published in February this year, so prior to the coup. Let me preface it by saying that if I lived in a country with high infant mortality rates and no social safety net, I would be cranking out as many kids as possible in the hope that a growing family would support me in my dotage.
“[Niger] has one of the highest population growth rates in the world, with few signs of slowing down. Its fertility rate – at an average of seven children per women – is the highest in the world.
“Added to this, most of the country is infertile. Two-thirds of its area is located in the Sahara desert. Most of the country’s agricultural land lies in a narrow band close to the Nigerian border in the south and is being encroached on by the desert… history tells us that a young and growing population facing food insecurity and unemployment can be a breeding ground for more instability.”
https://theconversation.com/niger-is-africas-fastest-growing-country-how-to-feed-25-million-more-people-in-30-years-198321
Nice facts Panopticon. It makes this look like an exchange of information, or a debate rather than a name calling session. Not that I mind a name calling session mind you. 😉
You are welcome, Lou. Pulling back the lens and looking at our population predicament globally, Tom Murphy makes this rather startling calculation in his latest piece:
“In 1800, every human on the planet had a corresponding 80 kg of mammal mass in the wild. Wild land mammals outweighed humans in an 80:50 ratio. Today, each human on the planet can only point to 2.5 kg of wild mammal mass as their “own.””
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2023/08/ecological-cliff-edge/
I’ll stop posting for a while and I leave with this one , out of the many I could’ve chosen . Honestly Lou, you seem to overestimate your intellectual understanding of the world by a large margin, mostly because you clung to some of your probably hippie , roots from way back when . I also take a guess you barely had a physical look around the world anymore in this century and dont grasp the immigrant streams coming towards europa , or the mess india , africa are in
Blogs like this really suffer from having people like you on them, which is a shame , because it prevents from realistic discussions about where the Anthropocene is at. Bye bye Xi Lou
As many as 25 countries or a quarter of the world’s population are currently exposed to extremely high water stress annually, new data from World Resources Institute (WRI) Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas showed.
This means they use over 80 per cent of their renewable water supply for irrigation, livestock, industry and domestic needs. Even a short-term drought puts these places in danger of running out of water and sometimes prompting governments to shut off the taps.
Globally, at least 50 per cent of the world’s population — around four billion people — live under highly water stressed conditions for at least one month of the year, the WRI report noted. And by 2050, that number could be closer to 60 per cent.
A region is said to be under ‘water stress’ when the demand for water exceeds the available volume or when poor quality restricts use.
The 25 most water-stressed countries are: Bahrain, Cyprus, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Botswana, Iran, Jordan, Chile, San Marino, Belgium, Greece, Tunisia, Namibia, South Africa, Iraq, India and Syria.
The most water-stressed regions are West Asia and North Africa, where 83 per cent of the population is exposed to extremely high water stress and South Asia, where 74 per cent is exposed.
Global water demand is projected to increase by 20-25 per cent by 2050, while the number of watersheds facing high year-on-year variability, or less predictable water supplies, is expected to increase by 19 per cent. For West Asia and North Africa, this means 100 per cent of the population will live with extremely high water stress by 2050.
This is an issue of concern not just for consumers and water-reliant industries, but for political stability, according to the authors of the WRI report.
The biggest change in water demand between now and 2050 will occur in sub-Saharan Africa, they added. “While most countries in sub-Saharan Africa are not extremely water-stressed right now, demand is growing faster there than any other region in the world.”
By 2050, water demand in sub-Saharan Africa is expected to skyrocket by 163 per cent — four times the rate of change compared to Latin America — the second-highest region which is expected to see a 43 per cent increase in water demand, the analysts observed.
This increase in water use, mainly expected for irrigation and domestic water supply, could foster major economic growth in Africa — projected to be the fastest-growing economic region in the world, they noted.
However, inefficient water use and unsustainable water management also threatens to lower the region’s gross domestic product (GDP) by 6 per cent, according to WRI’s Water Risk Atlas.
https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/water/quarter-of-global-population-faces-extremely-high-water-stress-each-year-91215
And bye bye Africa. Lou wants Europa to solve their problems probably .
Hello Harmon,
oh dear, out of the many responses you ‘could’ give, you have chosen one. You travel a lot but ‘personal details’ I never hear.
Describe to me the cities and landscapes you visit the whorehouses and poverty and desperation you no doubt encounter on your daily overheated bus journeys through the interior of ‘farawayistan’ so daily. Or do your journeys look slightly different?
Hey Harmon! Way to go buddy!! You actually posted a fact. A quarter of the planets population does indeed face extremely high water stress.
I am still very curious though why you think it was OK for France to invade Niger decimate its population during that invasion and then steal its wealth since. You have not actually addressed that – well except to hurl insults and assign intent to my ramblings that do not exist.
“Lou wants Europa to solve their problems probably .”
LOL. Silly Harmon. How could Europe solve the water problems in Africa when I sincerely doubt that it will be able to solve its own water problems? Drought in the south (Spain, Italy) and flooding further north. I brought up the increasing size and northern extent of Hadley Cells in the past.
Hi Pan.
Last week I travelled around totally parched France which is now burdened by a heatwave that will last until the end of the week. Withered landscapes and desolate highlands and forests in autumn. Thanks for your comprehensive article this weekend on the ‘state of forests’ worldwide. Very interesting article based on a study in the Jura region. That came in handy as I was on my way to visit a ‘forestry politician’ and old friend from the Netherlands who owns a large forest plot in the Dordogne with springs and an interesting watercourse.
After that, I focused on the really unusual heatwave at this time of year. It is exceptionally hot and dehydration naturally increases correspondingly. Interestingly, what we all know from the surely good satire ‘dont look up’ is that as the reports whether it is about climate or the economy the reactions start pointing more and more stubbornly in the opposite direction….
The number of reactions that dig their heels in as if they were real chaste birds is huge. And don’t blame them! Every weekend for six weeks now, French motorways have been full of traffic jams from the huge stream of tourists driving from North to South and vice versa. Air traffic is at its old level and expectations are high for the coming years.
Air traffic in China in particular seems to be booming. Don’t look up! Let Harmon cs continue his geopolitical roundabout ways indefinitely. We love the ‘doomers’ as long as we can, just like the preachers of Revelations of John…. the angels and the seventh seal.
As long as we travel around the world and share and link our ‘experiences’ with ‘geopolitical’ and ‘climatic’ bereisdhedi, everything is fat OK. Just be glad we don’t live in the encroaching frayed edges of the system like Venezuela and name the countries
We act like children at the beach…. before we go home tired but satisfied with an ice cream !
Our parents are everywhere and will surely take care of us.
I’m sure that the great god,Capitalism, will solve everyone’s economic problems. It might trickle down to the masses in few centuries.
“The socialism is for them ,the capitalism is for us.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKEZoY-TMG4
Not investment advice. 😉
“Imagine living in a trailer park & sending money to a guy with a private jet & a gold toilet.” – @acnewsitics from All Hat & No Cattle