Wherever he is, President Donald Trump exults in the US economic boom, calling it, falsely, the strongest in history. (He’s just recently stopped making the same inaccurate claim for the US stock market.) He even bragged about having a “magic wand” he could wave to conjure jobs and growth. Never mind that almost 13 million of the 17 million jobs ...
Read More »Macron should go for nuclear option
So daunting is the challenge of overhauling the global energy system to prevent further catastrophic climate change, that just thinking about it feels paralysing. It’s been done before though, at least on a national level. During the 1970s and 1980s France built scores of nuclear power plants that now provide almost three-quarters of the country’s electricity. At the time, French ...
Read More »Hyundai earnings shock shows need for direction
We knew the global auto industry was struggling, but is it this bad? Hyundai Motor Co. announced an almost 67 percent drop in net income, saying one-time recall costs to address quality issues were chiefly to blame. There’s a deeper problem, though. Nobody was prepared for the result, and investors fled, pushing the stock down as much as 10.7 percent. ...
Read More »It’s too late for central banks to hike rates
If you haven’t started raising interest rates in earnest already, forget it. Central banks that have dawdled have missed the cycle. Growth seems to have peaked, and markets are signaling potential trouble. For those outside the US who tightened consistently, this is a prudent time to look around and reassess. Nations that could reasonably have been expected to raise borrowing ...
Read More »China’s Tesla wannabe has a big brother problem
Investors are throwing billions of dollars at connected cars. The technological advances that enable vehicles to be linked into wireless networks promise greater efficiency and, in theory, safety. They also open the possibility of being watched and monitored more closely — and that may be a problem for China’s self-proclaimed rival to Tesla Inc. Nio Inc., the electric-vehicle maker that ...
Read More »UBS group is subject to madness of markets too
Sergio Ermotti, the chief executive officer of UBS, will hope that the selloff battering global markets is merely a “healthy correction,†as some investors have described it, rather than something more serious. The past five years have seen the boss of UBS Group AG deliver on a promise of reliable returns and dividend payouts, largely by boosting his wealth management ...
Read More »Italy’s new budget isn’t as crazy as it seems
Europe’s leaders have come down hard on Italy for its plans to increase spending with the aim of boosting growth and helping the poor. What they fail to recognise is that a little stimulus might be just what the Italian economy needs. The outlook for the global economy is deteriorating more rapidly than forecasters realise. A slowdown in China has ...
Read More »Earnings season flop leaves a short list of market saviours
Bloomberg Surging profits, a humming economy, lower Treasury rates. The things that used to rev up the stock market are no longer able to get its motor running. Suddenly it seems like everything is a headwind. The Federal Reserve is raising rates. Cost pressures are percolating. Valuations are under siege and a decade-long bull market is at stake. Rather than ...
Read More »Brazil stocks are on the cusp of a massive rally if UBS is right
Bloomberg The optimism sweeping Brazil’s stock market has reached nose-bleed levels. Analysts are predicting massive gains over the next 12 months on the back of Jair Bolsonaro’s likely win in this weekend’s presidential runoff, saying that he could send stocks to unprecedented highs if he aggressively pursues measures to shore up government finances. The right-wing lawmaker and his economic adviser, ...
Read More »Deutsche Bank’s brutal share slump leaves CEO on back foot
Bloomberg Deutsche Bank AG Chief Executive Officer Christian Sewing gave himself one year to turn around the lender. Six months into his tenure, urgent questions about the future are becoming louder as the stock slumps to record lows. After disappointing investors by posting the lowest third-quarter revenue in eight years and abandoning some targets, the stock rout worsened, producing Deutsche ...
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