tbs, do not worry, help shall arrive in time to save canada from tyranny and despair.
From: J
Sent: Thu, February 3, 2011 7:35:16 PM
Subject: Re: The Waiting Game Continues
more 'wasteful, unnecessary, pointless' infrastructure spending on way, to illuminate the streets and such for peasants who shall remain peasants as they ride on same 'wasteful ... pointless' high-speed rails networks as 600-years of pent-up demand be met within another quarter century
and, by the way, for goodness sake and whatever, definitely do upallocationtouranium, before the chinese build rail network for the second time in 200 years for america and power same network with General Electric brand nuke generators
Subject: China Takes Lead in Race for Clean Nuclear Power | Wired Science | Wired.com
wired.com
China Takes Lead in Race for Clean Nuclear Power | Wired Science | Wired.com
From: A
Sent: Thu, February 3, 2011 5:55:28 PM
Subject: RE: The Waiting Game Continues
Martin Wolf, Simon Hunt, Andy Xie, soc gen, N korea etc
arpllp.com
The Absolute Return Letter
February 2011
Find the Hat
“If spending an amount equal to half of the world’s second largest GDP to buy up foreign currencies is not currency manipulation, then what is?”
Martin Wolf, Financial Times
The perils of Chicago Many moons ago, long before I joined Goldman Sachs, a London based employee of the firm went to Chicago to attend a seminar on options and futures. This goes back to the 1970s when proper men still wore hats, and our friend was indeed proper, so he showed up in Chicago in full British-style attire, including his beloved woollen hat. Lo and behold, Chicago can be a very windy place and, shortly after arriving in the Windy City , his hat blew off and was completely flattened by a passing car.
Our friend thought it reasonable that Goldman reimbursed him for his loss so, after having acquired a new hat, the cost found its way to the expense report, which he submitted on his return to London . In those days Goldman was quite a small firm, and expenses were controlled with an iron fist by one very senior person in New York , who shall remain unnamed. When he saw the expense report, he went ballistic and immediately demanded for our friend to re-submit his expenses, this time without the hat.
Now, our friend was not giving in that easily. He was truly upset about the loss and only found it fair that Goldman compensated him, so he rearranged his expenses, with the total adding up to the exact same amount, but the hat had mysteriously disappeared. Then he wrote in big fat letters across the expense report: “Find the Hat!” For reference only Fast forward to China anno 2011. I suspect there is not one but many hats hidden in the national accounts of China and, thanks to Wikileaks, we now have a very public figure admitting as much. In a leaked 2007 cable Li Keqiang, who is the favourite to become the next premier,
confided that official Chinese GDP figures are “man made” and “for reference only” (surprise, surprise), and that one should rather look at alternative measures such as electricity consumption, rail freight volumes and bank lending, if one wants a true picture of economic growth in China
1
So let’s do precisely that. In chart 1 below I have plotted Chinese GDP growth against the electricity output over the past 15 years, and an interesting pattern emerges. During periods of low economic growth (the Asian crisis in the late 1990s, the US recession in 2001 and the global credit crisis in 2008-09), GDP grows much faster than the electricity output. Conversely, during periods of strong economic growth (2002-07 and 2010), GDP growth is lower than the power output. Clearly the GDP numbers are massaged.
.
1
Source: wikileaks.no Chart 1: Chinese GDP vs. Electricity Consumption Source: Simon Hunt Services Digging one level deeper reveals something rather more serious.
Assuming the electricity stats tell the true story, and that the GDP numbers are ‘for reference only’ (remember, not my words!), China ’s economy experienced a dramatic slowdown as 2010 progressed (see table 1). Total power consumption (year on year) grew by a whopping 22.7% in Q1 last year but only by 5.5% in Q4. The slowdown in Q4 was in fact so dramatic that the power output dropped 6.3% quarter on quarter! There were some restrictions in place on the use of electricity in Q3 and Q4 which did have some impact, but those restrictions were dropped in November, so it cannot be the only explanation. This story is largely ignored by the sell-side banks, most of whom have no interest in offending their new pay masters.
Table 1: 2010 Chinese GDP vs. Power Output
GDP
1Q10 11.9%
2Q10 10.3%
3Q10 9.6%
4Q10 9.8%
Power Output
22.7%
18.0%
11.0%
5.5%
Source: Simon Hunt Services
Inflation is taking off
... continued |
