Central Perk: 2 dec. 2013

luni, 2 decembrie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Debt Deflation in Spain: Record 4.7% Decline in Household Credit, Business Lending Down 10%
Expect the "Practically Virtually Impossible"
"Emerging Market Slowdown to Last for Years"; Comments from Saxo Bank Chief Economist
Battle for $15 minimum Wage; Should Companies Pay Workers More? Wal-Mart a Savior or a Pariah?

Debt Deflation in Spain: Record 4.7% Decline in Household Credit, Business Lending Down 10%

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 08:01 PM PST

Kiss any notion of a Spanish recovery goodbye.

Via translation, El Pais reports Household credit suffers record fall in October despite the rescue.

Credit in Spain continues to show signs of weakness, year and a half after the Troika bailout.

Statistics from the Bank of Spain show that household credit fell 5.2% in October to 793.940 billion euros. If we look at the evolution of the cash flow of borrowed money, the net change in assets is a decrease is 4.7%.

In October, the credit borrowed to buy homes fell 4.7%, maintaining its rate of collapse, to 614.860 billion euros. Lending to businesses fell 10% in October, to 1.081 trillion euros.

In both cases, the amount of money borrowed is at its lowest level since 2007.

Debt Deflation?

Precisely!

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Expect the "Practically Virtually Impossible"

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 01:44 PM PST

The collapse of Spanish housing left the banking system with as much as 51 billion euros of deferred tax assets(DTAs), mostly from 2011, that can be used against future profits for as long as 18 years.

Because the DTAs depend on future and unknowable profits, the DTAs cannot be fully counted as core capital. To get around Basel capital rules, El Diario reports Spain Guarantees 30 Billion in DTAs.

Multimillion dollar losses banks have generated billions in tax credits in just two years. The official estimate is that the sector hoards 51 billion in such tax advantages.

The government now guarantees 60 percent of the DTAs, some 30 billion euros over the next fifteen years. To make full use of the DTAs banks will have to generate 100 billion euros in profits. If sufficient results are not achieved, the state will have to come to the rescue with public debt, charged to the taxpayer.

Why 100 billion? Because corporate tax takes 30% of the profits of the company. Sources of Finance estimate that at least multiply by 3.3 the DTA to get the benefits that would be necessary to consume these benefits. And then, as always, a lot of fine print.

According to finance minister Luis De Guindos, it is "practically virtually impossible" for taxpayers to be at risk.

The "Practically Virtually Impossible"

The article contains an analysis of various banks including Bankia, CaixaCatalunya Bank, and Santander.

The fine print is critical because some of the banks have no hope of using the DTAs. Rather, they will auction them off in a raffle.

I suspect we will not have to wait until 2029 for the "practically virtually impossible" to happen. Will the eurozone even hold together that long?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

"Emerging Market Slowdown to Last for Years"; Comments from Saxo Bank Chief Economist

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 11:00 AM PST

Citing a need for structural reforms, Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever, the world's third largest Fast-Moving-ConsumerGoods (FMCG) company says the emerging market slowdown is here to stay.

Before diving into the report on Unilever, let's take a look at the definition of FMCG corporations.

Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) or Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) are products that are sold quickly and at relatively low cost. Examples include non-durable goods such as soft drinks, toiletries, and grocery items. Though the profit margin made on FMCG products is relatively small, more so for retailers than the producers/suppliers, they are generally sold in large quantities. FMCG is probably the most classic case of low margin/high volume business. Many of the players on the retailer side such as Walmart, Carrefour, Choithram, Tawseel, Sheel, Walgreens or Metro Group and supplier side are among the largest and most recognized global companies.

Fast-moving consumer electronics are a type of FMCG and are typically low priced generic or easily substitutable consumer electronics, including mobile phones, MP3 players, game players, and digital cameras which are of disposable nature.

Global leaders in the FMCG segment include Johnson & Johnson, Colgate-Palmolive, Anheuser-Busch InBev, Henkel, Kellogg's, S.C. Johnson, Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Beiersdorf, Mars Inc., Heinz, Nestlé, Reckitt Benckiser, Unilever, Procter & Gamble, L'Oréal, The Coca-Cola Company, General Mills Inc., PepsiCo, Mondelēz and Kraft Foods.

Slowdown Here to Stay

Bloomberg reports Emerging Market Slowdown to Last for Years

Unilever (UNA) Chief Executive Officer Paul Polman said the economic slowdown in emerging markets is here to stay as many countries need to enact structural reforms to adjust to new conditions after the boom of recent years.

"They are still relatively stronger economies, but still fragile," Polman said. "And you see that growth coming off now a little bit, obviously not being helped either by lower demand coming from Europe and the U.S. This will last a few years. And it will only be corrected if some of the reforms have been made in these places."

"I am always surprised that I am the one who sort of has to announce there's a slowdown in emerging markets," Polman said, speaking Nov. 29 at a reception where he was awarded the 2013 World Wildlife Fund Duke of Edinburgh Conservation Medal for Unilever's efforts to reduce environmental damage.

"Emerging markets are clearly decelerating, but will always grow faster than the developed world," said Jon Cox, an analyst at Kepler Cheuvreux in Zurich. "Unilever is the emerging market play -- given 60 percent of sales are there, what Polman says on them has a lot of weight."

More on FMCGs

The World of CEOs cites Unilever as the third largest FMCG. Here is a list of Leading FMCG Corporations and the products they have.

Comments From Saxo Bank Chief Economist

Steen Jakobsen, Saxo Bank chief economist pinged me with these thoughts on emerging markets as well as countries in need of structural reform.

Unilever is THE EMG company of the world. In the equity space, EMG earnings should come under some pressure and soon.

Likewise and probably a better play is to short the French luxury makers and CAC40 direct. Short Luxury and short France. Both trades are definitely high on my 2014 list.

A quick look at the CAC40 (the France stock market index), shows the CAC40 includes companies like L'Oréal (personal products), Groupe Danone (a food products corporation), LVMH (clothing and accessories), and Carrefour (food retailers and wholesalers).

France is also a country with uncompetitive labor costs and a huge need for numerous structural reforms.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Battle for $15 minimum Wage; Should Companies Pay Workers More? Wal-Mart a Savior or a Pariah?

Posted: 01 Dec 2013 11:55 PM PST

On Friday, Salon reported Breaking: Massive Black Friday strike and arrests planned, as workers defy Wal-Mart.

Defying the nation's top employer and a business model that defines the new U.S. economy, Wal-Mart employees and allies will try to oust shopping headlines with strike stories, and throw a retail giant off its heels on what should be its happiest day of the year. By day's end, organizers expect 1,500 total protests in cities ranging from Los Angeles, Calif., to Wasilla, Alaska, including arrests in nine cities: Seacaucus, New Jersey; Alexandria, Virginia; Dallas; Minneapolis; Chicago; Seattle; and Ontario, San Leandro, and Sacramento, California.

On December 1, the New York Times reported Wage Strikes Planned at Fast-Food Outlets.

Seeking to increase pressure on McDonald's, Wendy's and other fast-food restaurants, organizers of a movement demanding a $15-an-hour wage for fast-food workers say they will sponsor one-day strikes in 100 cities on Thursday and protest activities in 100 additional cities.

The movement, which includes the groups Fast Food Forward and Fight for 15, is part of a growing union-backed effort by low-paid workers — including many Walmart workers and workers for federal contractors — that seeks to focus attention on what the groups say are inadequate wages.

The fast-food effort is backed by the Service Employees International Union and is also demanding that restaurants allow workers to unionize without the threat of retaliation.

Officials with the National Restaurant Association have said the one-day strikes are publicity stunts. They warn that increasing pay to $15 an hour when the federal minimum wage is $7.25 would cause restaurants to rely more on automation and hire fewer workers.

On Aug. 29, fast-food strikes took place in more than 50 cities. This week's expanded protests will be joined by numerous community, faith and student groups, including USAction and United Students against Sweatshops.

Fight For 15

Inquiring minds are investigating the Fight for 15 website. Here is a snip.

Stand with striking Chicago fast food and retail workers!

We, hundreds of fast food and retail workers, went on strike at 30 stores in the Loop and the Magnificent Mile to demand $15 an hour and the right to form a union without retaliation. Employers like McDonalds, Whole Foods, and Sears are raking in enormous profits while workers like us, mostly adults with families, don't get paid enough to cover basic needs like food, rent, health care and transportation.

We are risking our jobs as we continue to stand up and say ENOUGH. And we need everyone who supports us to join us. It's time to give every worker a chance to survive and thrive – and strengthen Chicago's economy.

Applicants a Mile Long

Whenever Wal-Mart opens up a store it gets tens of thousands of applicants for a couple hundred openings. People want the jobs.

Here's the deal. If you don't like the job, then don't take it.

It really is as simple as that.

Should Companies Pay Workers More?

The economic illiterates think companies should be forced to pay $15 per hour. Is it even possible?

Let's do the math.

Wikipedia reports Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in the world as well as the biggest private employer in the world with over two million employees.

In its last annual report, for the 12 months ending January 31, 2013, Wal-Mart had $16.999 billion in net income.

That sounds like a lot of money, and it is, but not as much as you might think. I do not have a breakdown in headcounts, pay scales, or number of part-time employees, but let's assume that half of the 2 million workers make $8 an hour (75 cents above above minimum wage) and work 30 hours a week.

$15 an hour would be an increase of $7 per hour. $7 multiplied by 30 hours per week, multiplied by 52 weeks a year, multiplied by 1 million workers is $10.92 billion, well over half Wal-Mart's profit.

There would also be a large number of full-time employees making above $10 per hour but less than $15 per hour.

Bump up those employees to $15 per hour and the company would not even be profitable at $15 per hour minimum. Moreover, sales would plunge at Wal-Mart, as would sales at McDonald's and Wendy's.

The pressure to automate would be great, and marginal stores would surely close. Yet, prices across the board would soar, and so would yields on US Treasuries (and of course interest on the national debt would skyrocket).

Then, how long would it take to discover that $15 was not a "living wage"? Less than a year?

Wal-Mart a Savior or a Pariah?

The idea that raising the minimum wage to $15 would fix anything is ridiculous.

I am not totally unsympathetic to the plight of those struggling, but I am totally unsympathetic about minimum wages because the problem is the Fed, not minimum wage laws.

Cheap money coupled with rising minimum wages encourages investment into automation as opposed to hiring of individuals. Cheap money also drives up costs of goods and services.

And given that cheap money primarily benefits those with first access to it (the banks and the already wealthy), it is not surprising that people are struggling.

Rather than protest Wal-Mart (a company that does the world a service by providing over 2 million direct jobs and millions more indirect ones), people ought to be protesting the Fed.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Damn Cool Pics

Chinese Female Bodyguard Training
'Fast and Furious' actor Paul Walker dies in car crash
How to Teach Your Cat to Poop in the Toilet
7 of the Planet’s Coolest Bike Safety Innovations

Chinese Female Bodyguard Training

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 10:45 AM PST

Female bodyguard training course in China.

'Fast and Furious' actor Paul Walker dies in car crash

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 10:20 AM PST

On November 30, 2013, Paul Walker and his friend Roger Rodas left an event for Walker's charity Reach Out Worldwide. Shortly after leaving Roger Rodas lost control of his red 2005 Porsche Carrera GT and crashed into a light pole and tree in Valencia, Santa Clarita, Californa. The vehicle burst into flames. Both men died at the scene. R.I.P.

How to Teach Your Cat to Poop in the Toilet

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 09:27 AM PST

He didn't know what to make of the lasagna tray of pine chips at first

We moved the litter box by it and added some of his "product" to the pan.

He figured it out.

We cut bigger and bigger holes in the center of the pan (the pine litter is flushable) over 2 weeks time til it was gone.

Now mommy and daddy don't buy litter and nobody can tell a cat lives here, we're odor free.

Via aperfectmentlegen.imgur.com

7 of the Planet’s Coolest Bike Safety Innovations

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 08:46 AM PST

Throughout the world, more and more people are taking to two wheels instead of four. Cycling improves fitness levels, saves money, reduces fuel emissions and is less hassle than public transport. What's not to love? Well, riding a bike can be a risky business, which is why clever people all over the planet are coming up with ways to make it safer. We've hunted down some of the most amazing inventions and initiatives that aim to make cycling safer. From invisible helmets to portable pole-dancers, these videos highlight the most exciting and interesting developments for cyclists right now.

1. The Cuddling Cops

In Denmark, cycling is big news. Danish commuters ride their bikes whilst eating breakfast, smoking or precariously carrying cups of coffee. But bike helmets aren't popular in the Scandinavian nation, mainly because people fear they will mess up their hair. Vanity comes before safety, so capital city Copenhagen has come up with a novel way of spreading the safety message – along with a little love. If Copenhagen cops spot cyclists with bare heads, they pull them over, give them a cuddle, brief them on the benefits of protecting their heads, issue them with a brand new helmet – and send them on their way. See the warm arm of the law in this beautiful video.

View Entire List >>

Progress on those 23 executive actions:

Twenty years ago, President Clinton signed the Brady Bill into law.

That law said that if you want to purchase a firearm from a federally licensed dealer in this country, you have to get a background check first. It was a historic piece of legislation -- one that's kept 1.5 million of the wrong people from getting their hands on a firearm in the last 14 years.

But in the wake of the tragedy in Newtown -- a year ago this month -- we know we've got to keep working to build on that progress.

And so even after a minority of Senators blocked commonsense legislation to reduce gun violence this spring, we're pushing forward.

President Obama laid out 23 executive actions to make sure the Administration took essential and rapid steps to save lives while respecting our Second Amendment rights. And since January, we've completed or made significant progress on all of them.

President Obama is keeping his word to make sure our families and communities are safe. See the progress we've made.

Those 23 executive actions are keeping guns out of dangerous hands. They're providing support for communities to hire school resource officers. And they're reducing the stigma around mental illness.

Now, it's not enough to take these steps on our own -- we still need Congress to pass comprehensive legislation to reduce gun violence. We need expanded background checks, and we need to create serious penalties for gun trafficking. There is no question that these kinds of measures would protect our kids and keep our communities safer.

No parent should ever face the horror of the scene at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Or a movie theater in Aurora. Or a temple in Oak Creek. Or the campus at Virginia Tech.

We've seen too much gun violence as a country. And if there's even one thing we can do to save a life, it is our most sacred duty to try.

That's where I stand. And you have my word that the President and I are doing everything we can to make sure no parent loses their child to gun violence.

Take a look at the progress we've made:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/Reducing-Gun-Violence

Thank you,

Joe

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World AIDS Day: Sharing Responsibility, Strengthening Results

Featured

World AIDS Day: Sharing Responsibility, Strengthening Results

The theme of this year’s World AIDS Day is “Shared Responsibility: Strengthening Results for an AIDS-Free Generation.” Now more than ever, it is a fitting theme as the United States focuses, both on the domestic and global fronts, on building partnerships that strengthen our response to HIV and AIDS.

Read more.

Treat Your Channels like a Soccer Team

Posted: 01 Dec 2013 03:14 PM PST

Posted by CraigBradford

If you're like a lot of people (myself included) it's very easy to go into an analytics package and focus only on conversion rate. We look at reports like the one below and make short-sighted decisions:

Looking at only the information above, we might decide that "Organic Search" is a bad channel. Making decisions on how successful a channel is based only on conversion rate is short-sighted and will cost you money. Instead, I urge you to think of your channels like a soccer team.

A sensible soccer formation looks something like the image below:

You have one goalkeeper, defenders, midfielders and attackers. You would never think of creating a team of only 11 strikers. But that's exactly what we do with our channels all the time. We create a team that looks like this:

We have a team of channels that are all being graded on their ability to "score goals"â€"please don't make this mistake. I'm okay with the fact that some of my channels have a low "e-commerce" conversion rate; that may not be what they're designed to do.

Channels aren't binary

The one thing that I want you to take from this blog post is that channels are not binary. It isn't that they either drive sales or do nothing; there's lot's of value in between if you know what to look for.

In a report "The Customer Journey to Online Purchase" Google showed this to be the case by looking at the relationship that each channel is likely to play in the customer journey. The idea is to show on a very simple scale whether a channel plays an "awareness role" or more of a "decision making" role.This is an interactive piece so please have a look and play around in it. You can segment by industry or by country.

Let's take the US market as an example:

US â€" All Industries

It shows that in general, Display and Social are more of awareness channels, while Organic search and Paid search tend to be last interaction/decision making channels. I'm not surprised by that, but if that's trueâ€"if social is best used as a tool for driving awareness of my brandâ€"why would I ever use e-commerce conversion rate as a metric of success? The answer, of course, is that I shouldn't. Better metrics would perhaps be things like:

How many new visitors did social bring this month?
Brand awareness - how many people have heard of my business?
How many people interacted with my brand in some way?

These are just a couple of examples, but if you want more specifics I recommend you read this post by Hannah Smith on the Distilled Blog: Calculating ROI from Social Media - Problems, Pitfalls & Breaking all the thingsâ€¦

If you dig a little further, it gets more interesting. Let's look at the health industry in particular:

US â€" Health

Social is still an awareness channel, but look at display. It's now playing more of a decision-making role. Email has also moved from an awareness role to a decision-making role.

So what does this mean?

The data above shows that different channels play different roles depending on country and industry, so don't assume anything. Don't assume that social will be an awareness channel, don't assume that email will be a decision making channel, and whatever you do, don't assume that all channels are designed to only drive sales. Next time you're accessing your channels, try two things:

1. Assign attributes to channels

As mentioned above, not all channels have the same strengths, but that's okay as long as they are pulling their weight somewhere else. To see if that's the case, try assigning them some attributes other than sales. Avinash Kaushik gave an excellent presentation at MozCon 2013 (if you weren't there, the video can be purchased from Moz), in which he said that channels should solve for performance and relationships. This is shown in the table below (the example is for ModCloth):

As you can see, if we were to only solve for the line with red text ("Orders") we would ignore all of the other good that some channels are doing. Social, in this example, is terrible at everything except "Be the Buyer." I encourage you to do the same for your channels; add in all the metrics that are important for relationship-building, not just sales, and take a step back to see what else your channels might be contributing to that isn't immediately obvious when you simply look at sales.

Create SMART goals

Just about anyone who's ever read about goal-setting will have seen the theory of creating SMART goals:

I think most people are good at thinking about goals that are specific, attainable, and realistic. We think we're good at measurable, and we seem to often forget about time-bound. Since the rest could easily be a post on their own, I'll just focus on time-bound here.

When we look at tables like the one below, If we are going to make bad decisions like declaring channels "good" or "bad" from just one metric, at least remember to consider time.

If we say organic search is a bad channel, what you actually mean is organic is a bad channel at driving sales in the last X days. That's an important difference, because it has an impact on where the channel is placed on the scale of "awareness" to "decision-making."

In summary

Build a team of channels, not just strikers.
Don't assume channels work in the same way across all markets.
Assign attributes to channels (performance- and relationship-based).
Remember to create time-bound goals.
Let me know what you think in the comments.

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luni, 2 decembrie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Damn Cool Pics

Damn Cool Pics

Progress on those 23 executive actions:

World AIDS Day: Sharing Responsibility, Strengthening Results

Treat Your Channels like a Soccer Team

Treat Your Channels like a Soccer Team