Implications For Investors Of The Dramatically Increasing Chinese Virtual Demand For Rare Earths
China’s Interest in Farmland Makes Brazil Uneasy
Russia grain losses exaggerated by up to 6m tonnes
Sino-Forest Says Paulson ‘Supportive’ After Stock Plunge
Tussle Over Indonesian Agency Raises Bank Supervision Risks
Meme-busting: Tort reform = cost control
Workers’ share of national income plummets to record low
Just In Case You Thought QE2 Is Already Priced In
Are the world's women disappearing?
FT: Vietnam shift could see return of US ships. Cutting your losses isn't just good trading advice.
Awesome link fest Emmie! Look at all that China news! I'll bet you we start hearing talk of deflation again if things in China keep slowing down.
ReplyDeleteRomney and TPaw look like they're starting edge away from the far right. I wonder if they are trying to position themselves for the moderate alternative to the crazies. What if most of the republican senators up for recall in WI are thrown out? I wonder if the Republican Establishment would be smart enough to ditch the Tea Party and tack back toward the left. What would a more authentic Romeny and TPaw look like? If you stripped away all the BS . . .
ReplyDelete@Mutt:
ReplyDeleteFrom Yesterday:
Thanks for the input on the beer and wine. It also works for Scotch: you can get 80 proof fine tasting, and you can get 86 proof not-so-fine-but-after-3-you-don't-notice tasting.
After work, if I was in the city, I used to drive up to Napa and take 3-7 winery tours. Then drive home. (Looking back,I guess I'm lucky to be alive... Or not...) anyway, they told why some wines had more alcohol: the wines didn't ferment right, and the alcohol content isn't high enough, so those wines get "fortified" with ethanol. So you get your money's worth of buzz.
So, what I do, when somebody comes over, I give them first the fine wine, but after 2 glasses, the 2-Buck-Chuck comes out (we can't get wine here below about $14 per bottle) and I substitute that. They never know.
Now here's another secret: I save the fine wine bottles and before a party, I refill those with the 2-buck Chuck. You'd be amazed at the people who say "Wow, this wine is GREAT" looking at the price tag on the bottle.
It's a total gas. You should try that one. You can even have a wine-tasting party and do it that way. You can have so much fun with people, why ever would anyone want to go to a zoo?
@Mutt:
ReplyDeleteFrom yesterday: your 3 questions.
The first two are the two greatest questions I ever saw. The third, "why should I care" should be answered thusly:
"Once you know the answers to the first 2, you can trade and make a fortune".
Which, as they say, is why we're here.
@Dss:
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry, I don't know exactly what I said about the healthcare system in the US.
I do know that when I get really sick, I'm going to Taiwan.
In the meantime, I need to get adopted by my ex-mother-in-law because once you're a citizen in Taiwan, the fees drop to almost zero. I got sick there once, really sick. They took me to the ER, where they gave me a shot, put me in a bed (a nice one), gave me some pills, kept me for 3 hours under 15-minute observation, wrote a letter so I could get a wheelchair in the airport, and sent me home after I paid a bill of $23 U$D.
That's a foreigner's price. Grammy said that the citizen's price would have been around $14 U$D.
@Dss:
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry you're not completely happy with the finish on your windows.
What you describe is what many (I among them) consider to be the beauty of real wood. Since wood is grown, it takes on parameters of the environment over the 10s and 100s of years of the tree's maturing. That means wood characteristics differ, even from the same tree, depending on the rain, sun, how much vegetation decomposes in the root systems' area, etc.
This means the stain will take on and expose those beautiful differences in the trees' lifetime.
I guess to some, sameness is beautiful. And to others, the differences that nature provides is beautiful.
I will also say that the differences in the way wood takes stain is something the plastics people have been working on for years and still haven't got it right.
@Emmanuel117
ReplyDeleteAgain, great linkfest.
I got down to the "are the world's women disappearing"
This is one I worry about. The writer is thoughtful, but I read a book a loooooong time ago which did a study of wars and population male/female ratios.
It was a scary book. Especially as we tend to accentuate the male population.
@Emmanuel117:
ReplyDeleteI read the next article after the "are women disappearing".
A quote from Amy came to my attention, stood out like a fart in church.
"Other people's ideas are much better than your own".
Nope. Not on my watch. IMHO, the best of other people's ideas plus the best of your own in combination are much better than your own.
But she's a blonde. Just like Suzy. (I actually used to go to the Cafe and was served breakfast many times by Suzy---what a trip that was).
A little help from my friends?
ReplyDeleteI looked at "just in case you thought QE2 is already priced in" , and I don't get it.
The charts, as I understand them, simply show the cyclic nature of the values of bonds, equities, and commodities. I think there's a theory out there that this cyclic nature is part of the environment we live in. Anyway, they count cycles. But although fgrom these charts it looks like the bond prices may be tracking through a time-frame readjustment, neither the commodities nor the equities seem to have a similar track.
Then the comment "indeed, it may be far from over until capitulation sets in".
I don't get this either.
Any help?
Rock,
ReplyDeleteRemind me not to go to any parties at your house! :-) I will have to BMOB.
Rock,
ReplyDeleteNo, I am not talking about the natural grain which, of course, is quite variable. I am talking about them making a window out of different species of wood, and the stain takes to each wood differently. Some of the pieces are not taking the stain at any where near the rest of the pieces and these pieces are also blotchy. Trust me, I have bought many, many, many new windows in my life, and this particular window is not staining right. And it is a Marvin, so this should not be happening.
@dss
ReplyDeleteIf it should ever come to pass that you or your family come to my house or an event of mine, you can rest assured that you will be served the best of the best.
On my honor.
hmmm...
ReplyDeleteI'm being attacekd from blogger. I wonder why.
"attack from www.blogger.com, TCP port 3783, IP 209.85.175.191. HTTP TCP flags: S
time 6/18/2011 11:20.22 PM"
and
"attack from webcache.googleusercontent.com (209.85.175.132) (TCP port 3781) (HTTP) (TCP Flags: S)
and
"attack from groups.google.com (209.85.175.113) HTTP TCP Flags: S (TCP Port 3183)
I wonder if Google hates me now that I tried to access from China.
Isn't that interesting?
Denise - that really sucks. Can you demand that the window be replaced so it matches?
ReplyDeleteLooks like summer has finally come to the desert. going to be 98 today, and Wednesdays high is forecast to be 110! Woohoo! (I love the heat!)
Thor,
ReplyDeleteYes, I have to talk to the owner of the painting company whom I have known for more than twenty years. It might just be that this window has mismatched wood.
Rock,
ReplyDeleteSure! But after three drinks who would know? :-)
@Dss
ReplyDeleteI would know.
Rock - you are such a good guy :-) A real class act.
ReplyDeleteDenise - we have had so many problems with contractors, you would think, especially in this part of the country (Eastern Riverside County) that you'd be able to find better service. Good that you've known your guy for so long!
Emmie - Top notch articles this week on China! The rare Earths article was very very good. China is apparently to "safeguard domestic supplies". I wonder how much of that is really about trying to corner the market and reduce the supply to generate more income for them, like the market for diamonds.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone done any research on this topic? Is it really true that there are no other sources? Nothing in Kazakhstan or other Central Asian countries? Nowhere else in the world has these?
@Emamauel,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the list.
Speculation in wheat - we talk about that here a lot time. Nonsense. Uber lie.
Re See No Forest,
The Globe and Mail sent two of its reporters on a fact finding mission:
"Key Partners Cast Doubt On Sino Forest Claim" - theglobeandmail.com
And it's not just the Eastern people copying,
"Velluvial Matrix" and the U of Edmonton's esteem professor.
ICan
From BR's site,
ReplyDelete"Where Overseas Buyers Search for American Homes". www.ritholtz.com
Top international house hunters in the U.S. are:
1 -Canada
2 -U.K
3 -Australia
4 -France
5 -Gernmany
6 -Brazil
7 -Italy
8 -Mexico
9 -Russia
10-Neatherlands
11-Sweden
12-China
13-Japan
14-India
This map only shows purchases in the U.S. I bet some of those Vancourites selling to the Chinese are buying in California. Indian are buyers in U.K. and Canada, Dubai some. MENA and Russian rich are buyers of London.
Money never sleeps
ICan
And this for WS and Greg.
ReplyDeleteBlackberry vs. Apple vs. Droid -ritholtz.com
ICan
In India(most ems)we not only have 'corruption tax' but fakery tax collected by godmen, gurus(religious fakers, not to be confused with fakir, maybe the root word is fakir).
ReplyDeleteRemember I wrote about the yoga guru calling politicians to entact laws to stop corruption - he himself is a billionaire, travels on a private plane. He was born a pauper. Zirp.He owns land worth millions, herbal med. businesses, yoga apparel, nat. food, nat.medicine manfact. media outlets etc. He even owns an island in Scotland and 0ver 90 acres of land in the U.S. He is lululemon of India.
Another one is Satya Sai Baba. His name should be in the Forbes list of worlds' top 20 billionaires. Everyone knows he was rich(died a month ago). He has hospitals, schools, agri land, ashrams etc, all over the world.
This week the trust members opened his personal chamber and found 97 Kilo of gold, 327 kilos of silver, 11 crores of rupees(1 cror =US $100,000), dimonds, rubies, foreign fx and what not.
Stupid sheeple. Indians love to gold-gild temples. Way to buy God's love. That was a good invitation to foreign looters in the past.
ICan
Rock,
ReplyDeleteOk, I'll bring the dessert.
ICan - yes, there are a lot of Canadians buying property down here. We noticed the increase in the number of Canadian plates this past season. A good percentage of the property sales here are to Canadians. Good exchange rate, and people up there have quite a bit of equity built up. . . For now. I don't know if anyone has quite thought what might happen if the Canadian housing market turns over. A lot of those people are leveraged up to the hilt with the expensive homes they have in Canada with equity taken out to purchase here. Many of them would probably give up their new vacation homes in CA and FL, that in itself could be another drag on the housing market in the beach states.
ReplyDeletePerry looking to run for President. . . Please tell me Americans aren't stupid enough to elect yet another Right Wing Texas Governor to the presidency again.
ReplyDelete"Re See No Forest,"
ReplyDeleteHahahaha!
I'm going to have to use that one.
Republicans open to more revenue, Graham says
ReplyDeletehttp://www.politico.com/blogs/politicolive/0611/Graham_Republicans_open_to_revenue_increases.html
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Sunday that any Republican-backed plan to raise more government revenue would have to come from eliminating subsidies and tax deductions, not by raising taxes.
"No one on the Republican side is going to vote to raise taxes, but I think many of us would look at flattening the tax code, doing away with deductions and exemptions and take that revenue and help pay off the debt," said Graham on NBC's "Meet the Press."
"One way to do this is to do away ethanol subsidy and a bunch of other subsides that go to a few people, take that money back into the federal Treasury and pay off the debt," Graham told NBC host David Gregory.
The Senate voted last week to repeal a $6 billion-per-year tax credit to domestic ethanol producers, and a bipartisan group of lawmakers is looking at other ways to reduce the deficit.
This is encouraging yes? If the D's were smart they would take what they can get right now. They've already won the fight on trying to kill Medicare and Medicaid. This way they can score a quick political "win" and in two years, let the tax cuts for the rich expire. Wouldn't it be poetic justice if the D's are the one's who filibuster that and prevent it from happening? Double win, this time with the people.
@Thor:
ReplyDeleteEliminating the loopholes and special tax cuts for special interests just ain't gonna happen.
There are too many congressmen and women in the pockets of these guys that buy and sell their houses through corporations, and the like.
I am simply hopeful that my trading will make me pay more tax.
That would be good.
My taxes were just finished for last year, and it was a good year for Uncle Sam. I'm going to do my best to make this year even better for him!
Rock - you're probably right. Still, I do think they will eliminate some subsidies and loopholes. Just a feeling I have ;)
ReplyDelete