Last Friday at a banking conference in Frankfurt, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke denfened the central bank's plan to improve US economy and reduce unemployment, and urged developing coutries to let their currencies raise in value.
Central bank officials from many U.S. trading partners, including Germany, have criticized the plan for potentially dangerous side effects. Bernanke defended Fed's decision earlier this month to pump $600 billion into the financial system by purchasing U.S. Treasuries because it is necessary as the unemployment rate has been persistently high in the United States, particularly among those who have been out of work for long periods of time.
He also noted that the Fed purchased Treasuries and other assets "on a large scale" during the financial crisis, which he said "appears to have been quite successful in helping to stabilize the economy and support the recovery during that period."
The "bifurcated" recovery is making it difficult to coordinate economic policies, he said, and is fueling tensions between nations that have large deficits and those that are running surpluses.
In addition, Bernanke complained that officials in emerging markets have prevented the appreciation of their currencies to the detriment of developed economies.
"Tensions among nations over economic policies have emerged and intensified, potentially threatening our ability to find global solutions to global problems," stated Bernanke.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Irish Prime Minister Says Budget Plans Are Already in Place
Irelands Prime Minister Brian Cowen announced that their four year plan to reduce their budget would not be changed. He was quoted as saying “Our tax rate is 12.5 percent and it is transparent and it is a matter for the national government.” However the opposition has fears that with interest rates as high as 8% that Ireland will not be able to borrow more money from financial markets. Irish bank debts are about 70 billion euros which is about one half of the country's output.
Buy American? Upscale investors looking abroad
Apparentley, more and more people are looking to foreign countries in terms of investing. Most of these people wanted to widen their investment portfolio, like many other foreign people who want to invest in all the big markets, like China, Europe and the United States. Moreover, there could be a few reasons for this. The first is because of the financial situation here in the United States. Not only is there a financial crisis, but the economy is taking awhile to recover, which may scare a lot of Americans. Also, a few other reasons are evident as to why Americans are investing in foreign markets. Some of these include: the weak dollar, the unknown future of the stock market, and the budget defecit of the US government. Indications lead to the investment internationally, but are these bad signs in terms of the state of the Economy? What will happen if people continue to invest in other countries.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Goldman Sachs: All is forgiven?
So is it back to business as usual for Goldman? It does appear that the worst may be behind it. Goldman settled with the SEC in July for a record, but still relatively paltry, sum of $550 million.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Weekly jobless benefit claims rise slightly
Claims for unemployment benefits rose slightly last week but the underlying trend shows that the economy is headed in the right direction. The number of workers still receiving benefits fell 48,000 to 4.3 million the week of November 6th. These were the lowest figures since November 2008.
Japan Economy in 'Lull'
TOKYO—The Japanese economy remains largely at a standstill, the government said Thursday, an acknowledgment that will likely increase pressure on Prime Minister Naoto Kan to do more to jump-start growth even as he seeks to cut the country's massive debt.
In its monthly report for November, the government said "the economy has recently entered a lull," using the same language it did in October when it cut its assessment for the first time in more than a year and a half.
Persistent yen strength has hurt the export-driven economy, while deflation continues to stifle growth at home. Factory output has been falling while personal consumption is showing "some weakness," the government said in cutting its assessment of these two important areas of the economy.
The downgrade to consumption was the first in nearly two years, underscoring concerns that spending could fall sharply as subsidies for fuel-efficient cars and other purchase-incentive programs expire.
The economic deterioration will likely lead to calls for the government to spend more on fiscal stimulus measures. An extra budget, including 4.85 trillion yen ($58.2 billion) to fund new stimulus, passed the powerful lower house of parliament earlier this week, essentially assuring its enactment. But analysts say the spending, which pales in comparison with previous economic support packages, may not be enough to stop the slowdown.
One hurdle Tokyo faces is public debt approaching twice the country's annual economic output, the highest ratio among rich countries. To keep its mountain of debt from growing, the government has pledged to cap its initial budget for the fiscal year starting in April at 71 trillion yen.
Such constraints on spending mean the government will likely ramp up pressure on the Bank of Japan to ease monetary policy further. The central bank last month cut its key policy interest rate to a 0.0%-0.1% range from 0.1%, and also launched a program to buy 5 trillion yen in assets including government bonds.
"Placing top priority on casting off deflation, the government will work as one with the Bank of Japan to launch vigorous and comprehensive policy efforts," the government said in its report.
In another negative sign, the government cut its view on imports, saying they are "moderating."
The soaring currency makes foreign goods cheaper for Japanese shoppers. Stores have been offering "strong-yen sales" on French cheeses, Italian suits, U.S. golf clubs and other overseas products. But import volumes have continued to decline as shoppers hesitate to spend much with the economic outlook so uncertain.
A slight improvement in the jobs market will likely be insufficient to spur more spending, as deflation prompts consumers to continue to wait for prices to fall, analysts say. Core consumer prices fell 1.1% on year in September for the 19th straight month.
And while the government raised its view on employment, after the jobless rate fell slightly to 5% in September from 5.1% in the previous month, it continued to say that the situation "remains severe."
OECD Raises India's Growth Estimate to 9.1%
NEW DELHI –The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Thursday raised India's economic growth forecast to 9.1% for the year ending March 31 2011 from an earlier estimate of 8.3%, citing better domestic demand due to improved farm output.
Asia's third-largest economy is expected to grow 8.2% in the year starting April 1 2011, the OECD said.
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"The recovery in the agricultural sector has helped to damp inflation, which appears to have peaked and is expected to continue to moderate in the near term," the OECD said in its Economic Outlook report.
It expects India's inflation rate based on the wholesale price index to rise 8.1% this fiscal year, and ease to 5.7% in the year starting next April as food prices moderate.
Strong economic growth and the spare capacity in the economy, which is expected to be slight, would spur the Reserve Bank of India to tighten policy rates though it has raised key rates six times this year, the OECD added.
Job Market Continues Slow Climb
The nation's job market continues to show signs of slow improvement.
The number of U.S. workers filing new claims for unemployment insurance increased 2,000 to 439,000 in the week ended Nov. 13, the Labor Department said Thursday. But the four-week moving average of initial claims, a less volatile figure because it smooths out weekly gyrations, fell 4,000 to 443,000, the lowest level since the first week of September 2008.
This level of weekly initial claims is still indicative of a very weak job market. But the indicator has shown improvement in the past few weeks. Taken with another recent report that showed employers created 151,000 nonfarm jobs in October, the data show an economy that is slowly creating new jobs, though nowhere nearly fast enough to make a dent in the nation's 9.6% unemployment rate.
Thursday's report also showed that continuing claims, those drawn by workers for more than one week, declined 48,000 to 4,295,000 in the week ended Nov. 6, compared with the preceding week, the lowest level since Nov. 22, 2008.
In about two weeks, extended jobless benefits are set to expire for roughly two million Americans. On Thursday, the House of Representatives rejected for now a three-month extension of benefits for the long-term unemployed.
A separate report Thursday showed the economy was on track to continue its moderate expansion over the next few months. The Conference Board, a private research group, said its composite index of leading economic indicators rose 0.5% in October, the same gain as the prior month. Six of the 10 measures making up the index were positive, led by interest-rate spreads, stock prices and real money supply.
Irish Grasp at EU, IMF Lifeline
DUBLIN—The Irish government all but buckled to pressure to accept a historic international bailout Thursday, capitulating after a week of intense lobbying from officials across Europe and spurring questions about which other European economies will need a helping hand. Ireland's central-bank governor and finance minister acknowledged for the first time Thursday that the country needs help rescuing its banking industry, which has been crippled by losses on sour loans.
Associated Press
The International Monetary Fund's Ajai Chopra, left, and a colleague pass a beggar in Dublin en route to the Central Bank of Ireland for talks with officials on Thursday.
The Irish government is in talks with the International Monetary Fund and European officials about a loan package that is likely to amount to "tens of billions" of euros, the central-bank governor, Patrick Honohan, said. "It will be a large loan because the purpose...is to show Ireland has sufficient firepower to deal with any concerns of the market."
Ireland's grudging decision to accept foreign aid, after insisting it didn't need help, is a bitter moment for a country that won its independence from Britain decades ago. Already, some lawmakers and editorial writers are bemoaning what they see as the inevitable loss of sovereignty that will accompany a foreign bailout.
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Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan
It is an equally pivotal point for the 16 nations that use Europe's common currency. After rescuing Greece in the spring, European leaders are now betting that if they extinguish the financial crisis engulfing Ireland, it won't spread to other euro-zone weak spots. But with bond markets continuing to punish those countries, new bailouts may be needed soon—a prospect that some believe will call into question the durability of the euro as a common currency.
The near-certain bailout helped ignite a global markets rally in which the euro rebounded against the dollar and equity markets strengthened.
As Ireland copes with the aftermath of a large property bust, it faces a new wave of emigration but also innovation, as a group of architects band together to create a micro economy. WSJ's Andy Jordan reports from Dublin.
In Ireland, fears that the government won't be able to rescue its troubled banks have obliterated market confidence in the country's financial viability.
It has become almost impossible for Ireland's banks or government to drum up funding through traditional market sources. That has prompted them to lean heavily for financing on the European Central Bank, which has grown wary of its growing exposure to Ireland.
The structure of an anticipated bailout remains unclear. Mr. Lenihan told lawmakers Thursday afternoon that the negotiations will be focused on "providing capital—or a contingency capital fund—that can stand behind the banks."
A crucial issue is the fate of Ireland's ultra-low 12.5% corporate tax rate. Some European leaders want Ireland to increase that tax as a condition of the country's receiving funds, but Mr. Lenihan and other Irish ministers have ruled that off-limits. For some time, many EU nations have chafed at Ireland's use of low corporate taxes to woo business. Excluding exemptions, the average corporate tax rate in the EU is 23%; the U.S.'s corporate rate is 35%.
The Irish capitulation underscores the hazards of placing separate countries under a single monetary regime.
Editors' Deep Dive: Sovereign Debt Watch
AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE
British Borrowing Hits Record
ASSOCIATED PRESS NEWSWIRES
Merkel Highlights Call for Creditors to Share Rescue Costs
IRISH TIMES
Intervention Inevitable for Ireland
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The ECB's low-interest policy exacerbated Ireland's bubble during the boom decade. Today, the central bank's anti-inflation bent accelerated Ireland's demise: According to several people familiar with the matter, it was the ECB—nervous to be lending so heavily to troubled Irish banks—that led the charge to push Ireland to find liquidity elsewhere.
The €750 billion bailout fund from which Ireland likely will draw was established just this spring, and European officials hoped never to use it. It was meant to reassure financial markets that they need not fear lending to a euro-zone country, because its fellows stood behind it.
This week, a team of officials from the IMF, the ECB and the European Commission arrived in Dublin to assess the scale of the problem and gauge how much assistance Ireland is likely to require.
Until Thursday, Irish government officials had rejected any suggestion that a bailout was necessary. But that position is wilting as leaders gently prepare the public for the idea of a politically unpopular bailout.
"It's clear we will need some form of external assistance," Finance Minister Brian Lenihan said Thursday evening in a national television broadcast. "We have to find a resolution to our banking difficulties with whatever external assistance is appropriate."
Anxiety about Ireland has rubbed off on other financially shaky euro-zone countries. On Wednesday, Portugal shelled out a lofty interest rate to attract investors in a routine auction of government debt. On Thursday, a Spanish auction fared better, but the country still had to offer a yield that was about half a percentage point higher than when it last issued debt two months ago.
Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank, also sounded an alarm Thursday, saying he had "grave concerns" about how much was being done to toughen the EU's fiscal-discipline rules, which were widely ignored for most of the past decade.
Trying to quell public furor over how much the Irish government has already spent in vain on bank-rescue efforts, Mr. Lenihan said an international bailout "would not necessarily" create additional burdens on the taxpayer beyond fees for the borrowing.
Still, borrowing tens of billions of euros a year could add billions in extra interest payments for the Irish government.
Any loans also could come with conditions attached by the IMF, , which has dispatched a team of about a dozen economists to Ireland, and expects to start working on Friday.
A hint of possible Fund demands are contained in its review of Ireland's economy. In that report, published in June, the IMF said that the Irish needed to boost financial regulation to guard against risky loans to small and medium-size companies, which the Irish government was pushing.
The IMF also called for broad financial restructuring including the sale of bank assets—quickly. "Rather than aiming to time the market for an upturn in property prices, the goal should be to reduce the large overhang of property in state hands (which could keep investors on the sidelines and prices low), restart market transactions and, thus, help normalize the property market," the IMF report said. At the same time, the IMF called for "targeted support" for homeowners who might be forced to default on their mortgages.
The public statements by Messrs. Honohan and Lenihan represent the government's clearest acknowledgments yet that Ireland's repeated attempts to stabilize the banking system have failed. Most recently, the government in late September said it would inject billions of euros more into the banks, pushing the total investment to about €50 billion ($67.52 billion). At the time, Mr. Lenihan vowed that the banks wouldn't need more.
"It's true that the banks need additional confidence," Mr. Honohan said Thursday. "The huge sums of money that have been put in by the government to support the banks have not generated sufficient confidence yet."
One source of market angst is Allied Irish Banks PLC, the country's second-largest bank and a major player in its property-lending binge. So far, Allied Irish has posted smaller losses than some rivals, but some industry officials worry it could be plagued by a new wave of bad loans.
In Dublin, a small band of protesters demonstrated outside the Finance Department building where IMF and European officials were gathered.
As Ireland Moves Toward Bailout, Portugal Waits in the Wings
While everyone is concentrating on Ireland's EU bailout, Portugal is quickly coming into the limelight. Just like Ireland, Portugal's government claims that they have enough money for now and will be OK because they are making big changes in spending cuts.
Reasoning for the extra concern for Portugal is that they are also having a "political crisis". Their Prime Minister lost his majority in 2009 and has had to fight for every bill passed.
They has promised to cut their 'bloated budget deficit' but in fact, their deficit has grown by 2-3 % this year.
The government is blaming financial markets and they are in turn blaming public spending.
Reasoning for the extra concern for Portugal is that they are also having a "political crisis". Their Prime Minister lost his majority in 2009 and has had to fight for every bill passed.
They has promised to cut their 'bloated budget deficit' but in fact, their deficit has grown by 2-3 % this year.
The government is blaming financial markets and they are in turn blaming public spending.
Black Friday deals to draw 138 million shoppers
Black Friday this year is expected to draw up to 138 million shoppers, up 3%. This is a sign that the economy is truly picking up, as consumer confidence is hailing too.
"Instead of waiting until Thanksgiving Day to announce their promotions, retailers are getting shoppers excited about Black Friday by offering sneak peeks of deals in advance, using social media to create buzz, and teasing upcoming deals on their web sites," - the article quotes.
Companies are ultilising social media such as Facebook to advertise this big shopping spree of the year. Facebook is going to earn big bucks from Black Friday too as a result.
So people want to buy cheap, how about you?
"Instead of waiting until Thanksgiving Day to announce their promotions, retailers are getting shoppers excited about Black Friday by offering sneak peeks of deals in advance, using social media to create buzz, and teasing upcoming deals on their web sites," - the article quotes.
Companies are ultilising social media such as Facebook to advertise this big shopping spree of the year. Facebook is going to earn big bucks from Black Friday too as a result.
So people want to buy cheap, how about you?
The Lehman Crisis: An Unhappy Anniversary
One year after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the causes of the financial crisis have come into focus, and the impact of government policies can be assessed. There's plenty of blame to go around—but we should also note the actions that saved the world's economies from a far greater calamity.
The roots of the crisis, of course, lay in the real-estate frenzy of the early 2000s. At the peak of the housing boom, major financial institutions were seriously overleveraged in real estate and real-estate related assets. These firms, as well as the major rating agencies, ignored the substantial evidence that the real estate market was in a bubble and therefore substantially underestimated the risk in subprime and other mortgage instruments.Ultimately, responsibility for the fate of many failed financial firms must fall on the CEOs who were blinded by the seemingly high profitability of financing the housing market and failed to control risk and leverage of their institutions.
The Federal Reserve was also seriously at fault for not anticipating the crisis. Alan Greenspan, along with his successor, Ben Bernanke, failed to grasp the danger posed by the excessive build-up of leveraged subprime securities by the major financial institutions. Furthermore, the Fed failed to issue any warnings—or, for that matter, take any actions—to prevent this overleveraging from occurring.
The collapse of Lehman sent the financial markets into a tailspin. A year ago investors asked, "If Lehman's paper isn't any good, whose is?" As a result there was a massive exodus from private capital to safe Treasury securities, paralyzing capital markets, freezing lending, and sending risk premiums on corporate and personal debt to record highs. These convulsions in the credit markets caused the recession from which we are just now emerging.
The roots of the crisis, of course, lay in the real-estate frenzy of the early 2000s. At the peak of the housing boom, major financial institutions were seriously overleveraged in real estate and real-estate related assets. These firms, as well as the major rating agencies, ignored the substantial evidence that the real estate market was in a bubble and therefore substantially underestimated the risk in subprime and other mortgage instruments.Ultimately, responsibility for the fate of many failed financial firms must fall on the CEOs who were blinded by the seemingly high profitability of financing the housing market and failed to control risk and leverage of their institutions.
The Federal Reserve was also seriously at fault for not anticipating the crisis. Alan Greenspan, along with his successor, Ben Bernanke, failed to grasp the danger posed by the excessive build-up of leveraged subprime securities by the major financial institutions. Furthermore, the Fed failed to issue any warnings—or, for that matter, take any actions—to prevent this overleveraging from occurring.
The collapse of Lehman sent the financial markets into a tailspin. A year ago investors asked, "If Lehman's paper isn't any good, whose is?" As a result there was a massive exodus from private capital to safe Treasury securities, paralyzing capital markets, freezing lending, and sending risk premiums on corporate and personal debt to record highs. These convulsions in the credit markets caused the recession from which we are just now emerging.
Debt and Taxes: Will America Ever Grow Up?
In the space of a week, the chiefs of two blue-ribbon panels in Washington have put forth tough-minded proposals for reining in federal budget deficits. The ugly reality that they emphasized—no less true for being so often described or so reliably ignored—is that Americans have undersaved, overspent, and made unaffordable commitments for the future, particularly on retiree health care. The IOUs are accumulating, and if nothing is done soon, the chits will hit the fan: Creditors will stop lending money or at least demand much higher interest rates for it, as they already have in Greece, Ireland, and Iceland.
Each deficit-reduction proposal was full of serious ideas, and each was greeted by immediate and deadly sniper fire from both sides of the aisle. Postponing action is irresistible because the political blowback from doing anything meaningful is scorching. Every interest group is passionately committed to defending its own sacred cow, trampling the concept of sharing the pain for the common good. Washington, it appears, still isn't ready to grow up.
Simpson and Bowles proposed to shrink or kill the sacrosanct income-tax deduction for home mortgage interest; slash $100 billion in defense spending, in part by closing bases; freeze the pay of federal workers, excluding combat forces, for three years; raise the gasoline tax by 15¢ a gallon; cut Medicare reimbursements to doctors, hospitals, and drug companies; shore up Social Security with tax hikes and benefit cuts; and sharply curtail the growth of federal health expenditures. Rivlin and Domenici rely more on increasing revenue to balance the budget. They call for a 6.5 percent national sales tax, which they package for public consumption as a "Debt Reduction Sales Tax."
Those ringing the deficit alarm tend to be old and indignant. Peter G. Peterson, the 84-year-old retired banker, invested $1 billion in a foundation focused on fixing budget deficits, foreign debt, and entitlement spending. He ruminates about the morality of a society that leaves a legacy of debt. "I have nine grandchildren," Peterson says. "I think a lot about them." Alan K. Simpson is 79. The former Republican senator from Wyoming, who is co-chairman of President Obama's bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, told Bloomberg Television's Charlie Rose on Nov. 16 that he was too old to play budgetary politics anymore. "We're not going to sign our names at this stage of life to a bunch of pap," Simpson says he told his co-chairman, Democrat Erskine Bowles, 65, the North Carolina businessman who served as White House Chief of Staff for Bill Clinton. Says Simpson: "We call it the cruelty of making promises you can't keep."
Simpson and Bowles issued the first deficit-reduction proposal on Nov. 10, one week before former White House budget director Alice M. Rivlin, a 79-year-old Democrat, and Pete V. Domenici, 78, the former Republican senator from New Mexico, unveiled the recommendations of the Bipartisan Policy Center commission that they co-chair. With old-timey affection, she calls him "Senator Pete"; he calls her "Doctor Alice." But their admonitions are grim. Letting deficits continue to run out of control, they warn, would "make us increasingly vulnerable to the dictates of our creditors, including nations whose interests may differ from ours."
Irish head toward bailout; Portugal next in line?
DUBLIN (AP) -- Ireland edged toward taking a bailout loan from the European Union to bolster its debt-crippled banks -- but the prospect offered little reassurance that other corners of Europe could cope with their own crushing levels of government debt.
After Greece and likely Ireland, analysts say Portugal may be the next country in the 16-nation eurozone to need assistance. They suggest the crisis is now being driven less by irrational fears than by a growing realization that debts are too big for vulnerable nations to refinance, never mind pay back...
QE2: 3 signs to watch for progress
A $600 billion investment in our economy might be the fix that this situation requires. Yet, the possibilities of higher employment, stock surges, and greater investment are coupled with inflation, potential market bubbles, and large fluctuations in the trade market. How can we tell that it's working?
Watch out for rising business investments. So far, lower interest rates have not particularly stimulating, but there is still plenty of time. What matters is how much of the new money is snatched by small business owners.
Also, look for any increase in new home investments and refinancing.
Lastly, rising stock prices are great, but most individuals are not investors, so this would come to only make the rich richer.
Only time will tell..
Welcome Back, GM.
GM's Stock prices have gone up 7% on the first day of trading.
"Shares in General Motors (GM) have risen 7% on the first day of trading following the carmaker's record public share offering.
Shares rose as high as $35.99 in early trade in New York, having been priced at $33 by the company.
GM raised $20.1bn (£12.6bn) through its offering, making it the largest share sale in the US to date.
President Obama called the sale a "major milestone" for both the company and the US car industry.
The amount raised could rise to a world record $23.1bn if underwriters exercise an option to sell more shares."
It looks like we will get our taxpayer's money's worth from bailing GM out.
OECD Sees Global Recovery Slowing as U.S. Lags
The global economic recovery is losing steam in the face of a slowing U.S. rebound and tensions over currencies, and a debt crisis in Europe could trigger more weakness next year. The OECD twice-yearly report said governments needed to tighten public finances and coordinate better on economic policy to usher in a durable recovery. The organization’s chief economist said short-term stimulus measures were becoming increasingly ineffective. While the recovery is still in progress, it is more hesitant than in the early part of the year according to the OECD secretary.
Debt Wall Crumbles by $393 Billion as Fed Eases Junk Alarm: Credit Markets
The wall of bonds and loans maturing in the next four years has been slashed by 34 percent to $756 billion as the threat eases that a wave of junk-rated debt coming due will cause a surge in default.
While the Federal reserve’s plan to bolster the economy by buying bonds has drawn criticism from governments around the world, Republican lawmakers and some economists, its policies have helped employers obtain credit by reducing defaults and averting even higher unemployment. Sales of junk, or high-yield, bonds have already surpassed last year’s record, while loans to the neediest borrowers are up 79 percent, Bloomberg data show.
Stock futures surge as confidence grows about Ireland's finances, GM IPO sparks interest
NEW YORK (AP) -- Confidence that Ireland will work out the details for a bailout and strong interest in General Motors' initial public offering lifted stock futures Thursday.
Markets had been roiled in recent days by fears that Ireland would be the latest European country to face a possible default, following Greece's near collapse in May. But confidence is building that Ireland will reach a deal soon with the European Union and International Monetary Fund to provide a backstop should the country not be able to pay its outstanding debt. The EU, IMF and Irish leaders are meeting Thursday.
I think EU is better prepared to handle the bailout of Ireland after what happened to Greece over the summer. I recall that Ireland has the third highest GDP of all nations in EU. So it is obvious that saving Ireland is crucial from defaulting.
What do you guys think about GM? How would this benefit the taxpayers?
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
The Fed will kill the dollar! Eventually!
"Let's look more closely at the greenback. The U.S. Dollar Index has risen 3% since November 3, a move that probably would have been considered impossible a few weeks ago."
China's Inflated Problems
Well, it appears that China's growth has fueled inflation in food prices.
"Inflation accelerated to 4.4% in October, with food prices rising 10.1%.
The government also said it had not ruled out price controls if current grain and vegetable shortages worsen.
Meanwhile the Shanghai stock exchange has fallen nearly 10% in four days on fears of more interest rate rises in response to the price rises."
Growth has a dark side
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