World economy talk

[uls]

KFC parent company:

Due to adverse publicity associated with a government review of China poultry supply – and the corresponding significant impact on KFC China sales during the last two weeks of December – we now expect China Division same-store sales to be -6% for the fourth quarter of 2012, versus our previous forecast of -4%. The Company expects full-year 2012 earnings per share, excluding Special Items, of approximately $3.24. We do not anticipate providing any further updates or commentary until our scheduled earnings release on February 4, 2013.

[uls]

ECB

no rate cut

[uls]

Japan

The Japanese government will spend 10.3 trillion yen ($116 billion) to drive a recovery from a recession in Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s first major policy initiative to end deflation and boost growth.

short yen long nikkei

[uls]

Apple Cuts Orders for iPhone Parts - WSJ.com

Apple Inc. AAPL -0.61% has cut its orders for components for the iPhone 5 due to weaker-than-expected demand, people familiar with the situation said Monday.

Apple's orders for iPhone 5 screens for the January-March quarter, for example, have dropped to roughly half of what the company had previously planned to order, two of the people said.

[uls]

[uls]

Japan happy with yen at current level

weaker would be bad for Japan

TOKYO--A top Japanese economic policymaker warned Monday that a further sharp drop in the yen could harm the country's economy, tempering the full-throated yen-weakening rhetoric of the new government that has successfully pushed the Japanese currency down more than 10% against the dollar in less than two months.

"The yen has come to a good level," Economy Minister Akira Amari said in an interview Monday on Japan's TBS television station, the latest in a series of comments from cabinet members suggesting that officials are happy with an exchange rate of about Y90 to the dollar--but not much weaker.

"If it falls further to the three-digit level, it would boost import prices, weighing on the everyday life of the nation," Mr. Amari said, implying that officials may try to step on the brakes if markets seem to be pushing the dollar to the Y100 level--a mark unseen since 2009.

90 resistance

[Monseratto]

After Tower Records, another traditional brick and mortar institution goes bust...pano yung shops nila sa Hong Kong?

HMV shoppers: 'I'm disappointed but it's understandable why they went bust'

Among the shoppers visiting HMV's flagship store on Oxford Street in central London on Tuesday to take advantage of its month-long sale – and perhaps to bid a fond farewell – was the broadcaster Paul Gambaccini.

"It's inevitable and I've seen it happen in New York," he said of HMV's collapse into administration. "We lost Tower Records and you cannot buy a physical CD in Manhattan. That is an amazing thing.

"It happened all across America, even the finest record stores could not survive. The march of time does not always go forward, sometimes it goes sideways, and what's happening now is a movement sideways, and in every aspect of entertainment in the past 15 years convenience has trumped quality."

He added: "Even if the MP3 doesn't sound as good as some quality recordings, that doesn't seem to matter, it's the convenience that counts, and I understand that. You can't be King Canute and pretend the tide is not going to come in. The tide is coming in, and for these poor folks today [at HMV] it has arrived."

Nostalgia was evident among the digital generation as they reluctantly accepted that the end of an era in music retailing beckoned.

"I'm really disappointed because this suggests the end of buying physical music," said 18-year-old Ally Irwin. "I think, however, this is all understandable because HMV do charge quite a lot for music compared to iTunes, and when you can get so much music for free it's understandable why they went bust."

HMV's prices were widely identified as a factor in the store's collapse. "This is very sad but it's been on the cards for ages," said Seb Fox, 30. "This is definitely to do with HMV charging high prices, and then when no one buys CDs they go into the sale at rock-bottom prices so they never make any money on them. Everyone buys online now."

There was frustration at the announcement that any unspent gift cards and vouchers were now ineligible. "Loads of my friends got gift vouchers for Christmas, one person got £60, and now it's just worthless" Irwin said.

Others were more forgiving. Liz Byrne, 31, said: "It's really awful regarding the gift vouchers, but on the other hand I do understand because HMV have got to try and keep the business going."

On Twitter, the singer Paloma Faith wrote: "I'm devastated that HMV is closing down! I have been buying music in there for years. Going to the shops to buy an album is over."

The rapper Professor Green tweeted: "We may as well just give up on any medium that involves hard copy and get on with it #sadtimes."

[boybi]

Susunod na kaya ang Astro at Odyssey dito?

[uls]

short covering

the world's most popular currency trade reverses

[Monseratto]

Susunod na kaya ang Astro at Odyssey dito?

Last time I went to HMV, halos half the store is selling overpriced headphones and other portable accessories... unlike 5 years ago, it was all CDs and DVDs.

[Monseratto]

More to do with faltering EU economy than political reasons...

Foreign direct investment in China falls in 2012
AFP News – 39 minutes ago
Email

Foreign direct investment in China fell 3.7 percent in 2012 to $111.72 billion, according to the government.

For the month of December FDI also declined, slipping 4.5 percent from the same month in 2011 to $11.7 billion, the commerce ministry said on Wednesday.

Investment from the European Union declined 3.8 percent to $6.11 billion, the ministry said.

But investment from the United States rose 4.5 percent to $3.12 billion, the ministry said, while investment from Japan increased 16.3 percent to $7.38 billion.

"The growth momentum of investment from some developed countries including the United States and Japan was good," the ministry said in a statement.
Ministry spokesman Shen Danyang also said in a statement that in 2012, Chinese directly invested $77.22 billion overseas, an increase of 28.6 percent from the year before.

[uls]

Germany wants its gold

Deutsche Bundesbank - Press releases - Deutsche Bundesbank

Deutsche Bundesbank’s new storage plan for Germany’s gold reserves

By 2020, the Bundesbank intends to store half of Germany’s gold reserves in its own vaults in Germany. The other half will remain in storage at its partner central banks in New York and London. With this new storage plan, the Bundesbank is focusing on the two primary functions of the gold reserves: to build trust and confidence domestically, and the ability to exchange gold for foreign currencies at gold trading centres abroad within a short space of time.

To this end, the Bundesbank is planning a phased relocation of 300 tonnes of gold from New York to Frankfurt as well as an additional 374 tonnes from Paris to Frankfurt by 2020.

The withdrawal of the reserves from the storage location in Paris reflects the change in the framework conditions since the introduction of the euro. Given that France, like Germany, also has the euro as its national currency, the Bundesbank is no longer dependent on Paris as a financial centre in which to exchange gold for an international reserve currency should the need arise. As capacity has now become available in the Bundesbank’s own vaults in Germany, the gold stocks can now be relocated from Paris to Frankfurt.

[uls]

[Monseratto]

First all model type grounding since 1979. That was the DC-10 after a crash in Chicago killing 270+ people.

787 Grounded: FAA Orders Airlines To Park Dreamliners Over Safety Concerns
Posted: 01/16/2013 6:35 pm EST | Updated: 01/16/2013 10:25 pm EST

The Federal Aviation Administration has ordered U.S. airlines to stop operating the Boeing 787, after a series of battery and fuel system failures have called into question the airworthiness of the newly developed composite aircraft.

The latest incident, an emergency landing in Japan after an apparent battery failure, forced the regulatory agency to act, officials said in a statement Wednesday.

"As a result of an in-flight, Boeing 787 battery incident earlier today in Japan, the FAA will issue an emergency airworthiness directive (AD) to address a potential battery fire risk in the 787 and require operators to temporarily cease operations," the FAA statement reads.

"Before further flight, operators of U.S.-registered, Boeing 787 aircraft must demonstrate to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that the batteries are safe," the statement continues.

The directive effectively only targets one U.S. carrier, United, which operates six of the aircraft, the FAA says, though other non-U.S. airlines also fly the 787 into American airports.

On Friday, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said "I believe this plane is safe, and I would have absolutely no reservations about boarding one of these planes and taking a flight," the Associated Press reported.

[uls]

90 resistance

[ben_david19]

ito local naman. wala na akong masabi sa napakagaling nating presidente.

traffic = good economy. :D kamot ulo nalang.

“Maganda na siguro ang problema na binabanggit na ma-trapik sa EDSA, tama po yan, dahil marami ang nasa kalsada, buhay na buhay ang ating economiya kaysa naman walang trapik sa EDSAa dahil wala ng makabili ng gasolina na patakbuhin ang kanyang sasakyan" - Aquino

Aquino: Traffic Sign Of Booming Economy | The Manila Bulletin Newspaper Online

[uls]

^^^

http://tsikot.com/forums/goon-squad-...traffic-91758/

[uls]

during the height of the eurozone sovereign debt crisis billions and billions of euros were converted into Swiss francs

demand for the franc was so strong that the SNB had to peg the franc to the euro. the line was drawn at 1.20



since then the powers-that-be have made it clear that they won't allow the euro project to collapse

the sovereign debt problems havent gone away but a major concern (the end of the euro) has been eliminated

[Ry_Tower]

Dollar rises after Chinese data | Inquirer Business

Xmas season helped China growth.

Sa local market naman mukhang matutuloy na BPI-PNB merger now that naayos na yung PNB at AB merger.

http://business.inquirer.net/103287/...-uk-regulators

[uls]

CFTC Commitments of Traders Report - CME (Futures Only)

JAPANESE YEN - CHICAGO MERCANTILE EXCHANGE Code-097741
FUTURES ONLY POSITIONS AS OF 01/15/13 |
--------------------------------------------------------------| NONREPORTABLE
NON-COMMERCIAL | COMMERCIAL | TOTAL | POSITIONS
--------------------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------
LONG | SHORT |SPREADS | LONG | SHORT | LONG | SHORT | LONG | SHORT
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(CONTRACTS OF JPY 12,500,000) OPEN INTEREST: 196,509
COMMITMENTS
39,447 105,174 295 139,213 30,322 178,955 135,791 17,554 60,718

CHANGES FROM 01/08/13 (CHANGE IN OPEN INTEREST: 3,214)
7,318 -1,051 171 -6,560 984 929 104 2,285 3,110

PERCENT OF OPEN INTEREST FOR EACH CATEGORY OF TRADERS
20.1 53.5 0.2 70.8 15.4 91.1 69.1 8.9 30.9

NUMBER OF TRADERS IN EACH CATEGORY (TOTAL TRADERS: 123)
24 62 4 24 23 51 86

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-0...-meeeting.html

The difference in the number of wagers by hedge funds and other large speculators on a decline in the yen compared with those on an advance -- so-called net shorts -- was 65,727 in the period through Jan. 15, figures from the Washington-based Commodity Futures Trading Commission showed. That’s the least since November.

speculators are still net short but number of shorts have been reduced