luni, 24 noiembrie 2014

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Seth's Blog : Sign your work

 

Sign your work

We expect authors, painters and singers to identify themselves, to sign the work they do.

And surgeons and lawyers as well.

What about managers, committee members, engineers and everyone else who makes something? Who made this policy? Who designed this menu? Who approved this project?

If you're not proud of it, don't ship it. If you are, sign your work and own the results. We'll know who to thank. If you work for a place where work goes unsigned (internally, in particular) it's worth asking why.

       

 

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duminică, 23 noiembrie 2014

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis


"Regin" World's Most Advanced Cyber Snoop Hits Russia, 4 Other Countries; Western Intelligence Agency Likely Responsible

Posted: 23 Nov 2014 09:18 PM PST

Telecom companies in Russia and Saudi Arabia have been hit by the world's most sophisticated hacking software to date.

Symantec believes a Western intelligence agency is responsible.

Please consider World's Most Advanced Hacking Spyware Let Loose
A cyber snooping operation reminiscent of the Stuxnet worm and billed as the world's most sophisticated computer malware is targeting Russian and Saudi Arabian telecoms companies.

Cyber security company Symantec said the malware, called "Regin", is probably run by a western intelligence agency and in some respects is more advanced in engineering terms than Stuxnet, which was developed by US and Israel government hackers in 2010 to target the Iranian nuclear programme.

The discovery of the latest hacking software comes as the head of Kaspersky Labs, the Russian company that helped uncover Stuxnet, told the Financial Times that criminals are now also hacking industrial control systems for financial gain.

"Nothing else comes close to this . . . nothing else we look at compares," said Orla Cox, director of security response at Symantec, who described Regin as one of the most "extraordinary" pieces of hacking software developed, and probably "months or years in the making".

Symantec said it was not yet clear how Regin infected systems but it had been deployed against internet service providers and telecoms companies mainly in Russia and Saudi Arabia as well as Mexico, Ireland and Iran.

The security software group said Regin could be customised to target different organisations and had hacked Microsoft email exchange servers and mobile phone conversations on major international networks.

"We are probably looking at some sort of western agency," Ms Cox said. "Sometimes there is virtually nothing left behind – no clues. Sometimes an infection can disappear completely almost as soon as you start looking at it, it's gone. That shows you what you are dealing with."
Do Dirty Work Then Leave

The software somehow attaches itself, does the dirty work of stealing files or whatever, then vanished without much of a trace, apparently deleting its presence.

It's unknown who did this but I side with Symantec, more specifically willing to suggest the NSA.

Whether or not my suspicions are correct, it's no wonder people want encryption that no one can beat.

Regardless who is responsible, I cheer developments like this development courtesy of Harvard and MIT students: Easy to Use Email So Secure NSA Cannot Break It; What About NSA Other Attacks?

This is what it had to come down to. Government nonsensically spying on everyone led to a more-secure service that freedom lovers and criminals alike will embrace.

By the way, the encryption might be secure, but that will not stop the NSA from hijacking entire computers.

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

Wrong Three Ways: Europe Not at Risk of Full-Blown Deflation Says ECB Vice President

Posted: 23 Nov 2014 10:54 AM PST

Statements from various high-ranking central bank officials prove they are totally clueless.

For example, please consider an announcement today by European Central Bank (ECB) Vice President Vitor Constancio: Europe not at risk of full-blown deflation.

During a debate in central Italy, Constancio said he did not think "that in Europe there is the risk of falling into full deflation" because nominal salaries would have to fall in all member countries "and this cannot happen".

Cannot Happen?!

One really has to wonder about what is in these central banker's heads. Constancio is wrong at least three ways.

Wrong Three Ways

  1. Even if nominal wages and salaries rise, consumers can choose to deleverage, paying down debt, rather than spend.
  2. It is not impossible for aggregate wages and salaries to drop in all or nearly all member countries, and indeed I expect just that when the European recession hits Germany. 
  3. Advantage of inflation grossly misstated.

1. Can consumers choose to deleverage rather than spend? Sure, why not? Demographically speaking, Europe is in such bad shape, one might even expect just that.

2. Europe is clearly flirting with recession (see France Private Sector Output Drops 7th Consecutive Month, Orders Stagnate in Germany, Eurozone Flirts With Contraction).

And in a European recession, one would normally expect aggregate wages and salaries to drop in all (or nearly all) member countries. Parts of Europe are already in deflation and recession. All it takes is Germany to join the party and it will be deflation across the board.

3. Inflation isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

Consider Nominal Wages vs. Real Wages Japanese Style as depicted by Japan's Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.

.

Is it possible for prices to rise more than wages? Certainly. Especially if the ECB gets it inane wish of trashing the euro to create inflation.

Bear in mind that "real" does not include the effect of tax hikes. If Europe embarks on a plan to hike taxes, one might expect similar results as recently happened in Japan (See Abe Makes "Grave Grave" Decision to Delay Tax Hike, Gambles on Snap Elections, Seeks "Better Ideas")

Japan is out of deflation, but consumers are far worse off. All Japan has to show for its decades-long effort is debt approaching 250% of GDP.

The statement by Constancio was so superficial, and so wrong, in so many ways, one might wonder if it was purposeful misguidance or if he is really that much of a blockhead.

I suggest the latter.

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

Seth's Blog : The jobs only you can do

 

The jobs only you can do

One of the milestones every entrepreneur passes is when she stops thinking of people she hires as expensive ("I could do that job for free") and starts thinking of them as cheap ("This frees me up to do something more profitable.")

When you get rid of every job you do that could be done by someone else, something needs to fill your time. And what you discover is that you're imagining growth, building partnerships, rethinking the enterprise (working on your business instead of in it, as the emyth guys would say). Right now, you don't even see those jobs, because you're busy doing things that feel efficient instead.

       

 

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sâmbătă, 22 noiembrie 2014

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis


"Eagle Cam": Aerial View of London via Video Camera Attached to an Eagle

Posted: 22 Nov 2014 03:23 PM PST

An eagle got an impressive birds-eye-view of London this week, flying over the city's most iconic landmarks using a Sony HDR-AZ1VR Action Cam attached to its back.



Link if video does not play: Action Cam Footage Shows Eagle Flying Over City of London

The BBC reports Eagle With Camera Flies Over London
An eagle with a camera attached has flown across London and offered a new perspective on some of the capital's best-known landmarks.

The footage was recorded over a week by an Imperial Eagle called Darchan.

The animal has been brought to London from the French Alps by The Freedom Project to mark the 50th anniversary of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

The Red List compiles the world's most threatened species.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

UKIP Picks Up Second Seat Following Tory Defection, Two More Coming Up?

Posted: 22 Nov 2014 12:20 PM PST

The first one or two people doing something can hardly be called a trend. Yet, all trends start with a movement of One.

UKIP gained a second seat in British parliament as a result of a special election following a Tory defection to UKIP. The first UKIP seat also came from a special election following a Tory defection. Two other Tories are allegedly considering switching parties to UKIP.

Prime minister David Cameron's Tories are clearly under pressure.

Please consider UKIP Gains Second Commons Seat With Victory in Rochester.
The U.K. Independence Party dealt a new blow to Prime Minister David Cameron as it won a second seat in Parliament from his Conservatives in six weeks.

Mark Reckless, who defected to UKIP from the Tories in September and then forced a special election in his seat of Rochester & Strood, 30 miles (50 kilometers) southeast of London, was returned to the House of Commons with 16,867 votes. Conservative candidate Kelly Tolhurst came second with 13,947 votes.

The victory, following that of Reckless's friend and fellow defector, Douglas Carswell, on 0ct. 9, may prompt further Tories hostile to Britain's membership of the European Union to follow suit. The rise of UKIP, which seeks withdrawal from the EU and curbs on immigration, has already led Cameron to promise a referendum on leaving the bloc and to hint he'll seek an end to the free movement of Europeans into Britain.

Fractured Politics

The result also underlines the way Britain's political landscape has fractured in the run-up to May's general election, making the outcome increasingly difficult to call. All three main parties lost votes, with the Tories down 14.5 percent on their 2010 result, Labour dropping 11.8 percent and the Liberal Democrats down 15.4 percent, according to data compiled by YouGov.

"This throws British politics up in the air," UKIP leader Nigel Farage said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. "If anyone gives you a prediction for the next general election, they're whistling in the wind. Nobody has got a clue."

UKIP has the backing of about 15 percent of respondents in national opinion polls, taking support from the Tories in particular. The main opposition Labour Party and Cameron's coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, have been losing support to the Greens and the Scottish National Party. The Greens gained about 3 percent in Rochester.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Seth's Blog : A little more than a bushel, a little bit less

 

A little more than a bushel, a little bit less

Marketing works best when the effort you put into it is a little more than you think you need and a lot more than the market expects from your project.

And projects work best when the amount you need to get done is a little less than the resources you have available.

Marketing rewards a taut system, a show of confidence, the ability to be where you need to be with a true story that works.

Projects reward slack, the ability to keep your schedule and your quality, to watch the critical path and to make smart decisions.

The common errors, then: Pick too big an arena for your marketing, and seem underwhelming. And pick too big an agenda for your project, and run out of slack.

You have a bushel basket. The generosity of overflowing it makes it much more appealing when it's on the shelf. But when your job is to transport those apples, overfilling it even a little makes it likely you won't get to where you're going.

Make unexpectedly big promises. Keep them. Show up with enough resources to do both.

       

 

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vineri, 21 noiembrie 2014

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis


Bloomberg Sensationalism and Inaccuracies Regarding "Forced Nationalization of Crimea"

Posted: 21 Nov 2014 06:12 PM PST

A few days ago a friend emailed the Bloomberg article Russia Delivers a New Shock to Crimean Business: Forced Nationalization.

I replied something along the lines of "interesting, but I am going to bounce this of Jacob Dreizin", a US citizen who provides frequent updates to me regarding Ukraine.

I also bounced the article off Pater Tenebrarum at the Acting Man blog. Pater commented ...
Russian oligarchs stealing stuff back from Ukrainian oligarchs would be my guess. I should add, the arbitrariness of this process is of course quite disturbing (regardless of the fact that Ukraine's oligarchs are a bunch of corrupt thieves). But this strikes me mainly as a case of politically motivated payback. The oligarchs all aligned themselves with Kiev as soon as it was clear that Yanukovich had lost power (many/most were aligned with Yanukovich as long as he ruled the roost). The separatists mainly lost Mariupol because Ukraine's richest oligarch ordered the 7,000 workers of his steel works to oust them. There have been horror stories from Mariupol about the treatment of ethnic Russians there, although it is difficult to know what is and what isn't true (independent information is spotty). But we know since Odessa that the right-wing goons in Kiev's employment are not to be trifled with (the videos of the event speak for themselves).
Reader Jacob Dreizin commented
Hello Mish

First off, that was some really sloppy reporting or editing by Bloomberg. "Crimean prime minister Kolomoyskiy" should actually be written as "Dnepropetrovsk governor Kolomoiskii."

But there's a lot more to it than that. You see, the Ukrainian economic model is a post-Soviet feudal model. Thus, most Crimean business (like most Ukrainian business) belongs either to one of about 8 or 10 leading oligarchs, or to various corrupt officials or former officials or their relatives or thugs or scam artists of various stripes, all of whom either bought it for pennies on the dollar from the state, or seized it from someone who bought it for pennies on the dollar from the state.

For example, the "Krymkhleb" bakery concern mentioned at the beginning of the article was ultimately controlled by a one-time politician from overthrown president Yanukovich's now-defunct party who went from being a young machinist in a coal mine in 1989 to owning or controlling tens of food processing plants and other concerns, mostly in the Donbass, by around 1999.

I'm not saying that his holding company's 2012 purchase of Krymkhleb was necessarily illegitimate; what I'm saying is that the story of his rise is common to post-Soviet robber barons, who would bribe officials to let them buy state-owned factories and other concerns for a few thousand bucks. In my view, taking from these dirtbags and giving back to "da people" is not such a bad thing, though in practice, it usually goes to some other dirtbag. In short, you can't compare these people to real American businessmen and value-creators like Steve Jobs. It's a different planet.

Also, the Yanukovich clan was heavily involved in Crimea. Yanukovich is said to have used the national customs authority as his own personal bank account. And Yanukovich's son, one of Ukraine's 10 or so richest men thanks to his dad's political connections, was involved in Crimean real estate among many other things. So there are plenty of deserving targets for nationalization.

Also, the new crowd in Kiev may not be any better. Parliament recently passed a law that would require state-owned enterprises to hold large accounts at a bank controlled by a childhood friend of Prime Minister Yatseniuk. And former oligarch and prime minister Yulia Timoshenko, a one-time darling of our neocons and leader of the U.S.-funded "Orange Revolution" in 2004, was named by U.S. Federal prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in a huge money laundering conspiracy involving former Ukrainian prime minister Pavel Lazarenko, who ultimately spent 6 years in U.S. Federal prison. See "Tymoshenko implicated in crimes by USA Federal Prosecutor".

As for Kolomoiskii the governor of Dnepropetrovsk, he is one of three shareholders of what is probably Ukraine's largest business conglomerate, and has been funding paramilitary militias to fight for Kiev in the Donbass.  More to the point, "Privatbank", Ukraine's largest bank which falls within his group's portfolio, left Russia holding the bag for hundreds of millions of dollars worth of deposits after the Crimea takeover. So you can be sure the Russians will be seizing anything they can of Kolomoiskii's, including four hotel complexes that were just now taken from him in Crimea.

What will ultimately happen is that once the Russian half of Ukraine fully breaks off, any large concern that was owned by any pro-Kiev oligarch, or by anyone who has fallen out of Moscow's favor or has been deemed too corrupt, will be seized and either transferred to someone more favorable, or will be sold off to Russian or other foreign interests.

The bottom line here is that when you have hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars in real assets--entire factories, gas lines, TV stations, and so forth--that are majority- or wholly-owned by just one man, it is very easy to "change ownership." You just seize that one man's shares and transfer them to someone else's holding company, or to the state. This is not a new story, nor is it specific to Russia. This is how they roll in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan, etc.

The successor to communism is feudalism.
Jacob
Pot Calls Kettle Black

Neither Pater, nor Jacob, nor myself likes this enterprise model, but Bloomberg made it appear as if this is somehow a new thing in Crimea following the Russian takeover.

In fact, the same corrupt model exists in Ukraine. Is either set of thieves better than the other?

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

Reply From Pettis on Spain; Prisoner's Dilemma in Reverse; EMU End Game

Posted: 21 Nov 2014 12:33 PM PST

In response to Spain Needs to Debate Leaving the Euro; Tooth Fairy Economics I received a nice email from Michael Pettis confirming my translation was correct. He also attached the original article in English.

Michael Writes ...
Thank's Mish.

I am attaching the original, but the translations you got were basically right and covered the main points, which you understand anyway.

  1. Excessive debt impedes growth, and very few sovereign debt crises in history have been resolved by growth
  2. The only other way to "resolve" a debt crisis is to assign the losses to one group or another
  3. It is usually workers through unemployment and middle class savers through hidden or explicit taxes who end up paying
  4. It may or may not be worthwhile to save the banks at the expense of the middle and working classes, but at the very least we should discuss it openly and make sure that this is what we have really decided is in the best interests of the country.

Michael
Original Text in English
Spanish Government Debt is not Sustainable

Within four years of the 1837 crisis, before it was truly a united country under a central government, two-thirds of American states, including several of the richest, defaulted on their foreign debt. The US survived. If the European Union is to survive, European debt must be resolved. The longer we wait, the more likely a permanent breakup of the euro and the European Union.

Depending more on faith than on economics or history, Madrid assures us that with the right reforms Spain will eventually grow out of its debt. Every country facing a debt crisis has made the same promise, but has nearly always failed. Excess debt itself prevents growth, and even without the straightjacket of the euro Spain probably cannot grow out of its debt.

Even those who reject debt forgiveness admit that only Germany's guarantee, hidden behind the ECB, prevented Spain from defaulting. Because the German banking system could not survive a default even in one country, they point out, Berlin has no choice but to guarantee Spanish debt forever.

They are terribly wrong. In spite of their hateful policies right-wing extremists throughout Europe have succeeded mainly because protecting the euro and the European banks creates tremendous costs for the working and middle classes. By attacking Europe, these extremists exploit the refusal of Europe's leaders to acknowledge their mistakes. The longer the economic crisis continues, the greater their prospect for winning, and the greater the likelihood of national defaults and an end to Europe.

But even without the extremists, Spanish debt cannot be sustained. Only the promise by the ECB in July 2012 to do "whatever it takes" to protect the euro prevented Spain and other countries from defaulting. But as debt continues to grow faster than GDP throughout Europe, the ECB's burden increases inexorably month by month. At some point growing debt and more weakness in the German economy will threaten the credibility of the ECB guarantee, which will become worthless – slowly at first, and then very suddenly. Spain's default would follow within months.

What is more, Germany's willingness to support European debt is not permanent. In order to protect its banks Berlin is playing the same game that Washington played with Latin America in the 1980s. While debt is continuously rolled over, German banks are rebuilding capital to protect themselves from the default many in Berlin believe will come. Saving the banks implicitly means transferring wealth from German and European households, either openly through taxes or, which is politically easier, in a hidden way by manipulating interest rates.

This is what happened during the Latin American crisis. American banks aggressively rebuilt their capital mainly at the hidden expense of ordinary American households while insisting that Latin American countries didn't need debt forgiveness, just more reform. But the many reforms led anyway to terribly high unemployment and brutal social instability throughout the region.

By 1987-88, when American banks finally had sufficient capital, Washington finally admitted that full debt repayment was impossible, and in 1990 American banks forgave 35 percent of the external debt of Mexico, followed by that of nearly every other country over the next few years. As happens throughout history, it was only then that Latin American finally started to grow.

The same must happen in Spain. German and other European banks must rebuild their capital, but it will take many more years before they are successful. Only then, after Spain suffers meaningless unemployment and tremendous social harm, will Berlin "discover" that Europe requires debt forgiveness.

Even if saving the banks is worth the pain, the choice does not fully belong to Spain. The defaults by the tiny economies of Cyprus and Greece nearly brought down the system. If Portugal, France, Italy, or any third country decides it will not pay, the resulting panic would force Spain into crisis anyway. Every country in Europe must be willing to pay the cost of protecting the banks, or they will all fail together.

History clearly tells us that the cost of repaying the debt will be terribly high and that the debt crisis will probably happen anyway. This means that ordinary people must pay twice, once in the form of hidden transfers that recapitalize the banks, and once in the form of high unemployment and social erosion, and in most cases they get none of the advantages because the crisis occurs anyway.

To avoid repeating this tragic history Spain must debate the debt openly and honestly, and it must decide democratically, if protecting European banks is worth many more years of pain. Perhaps it is indeed worth the cost to avoid default, but we should know that history suggests that no matter how hard we struggle the crisis will probably happen anyway.

The United States made many mistakes, including civil war, before it became a single country with a single currency, against the opposition of many who opposed union, but the genius of its system allowed it to acknowledge mistakes and adjust. There is no reason why Europe cannot recognize that it imposed the euro in an unsustainable way, and adjust. If it doesn't, the most likely winners are the extremist parties who want to destroy the European Union forever.
Thanks Michael!

I side with Pettis on all four points above. In general we agree on things but there are a couple of things on which we disagree. I expect to write about one of them pretty soon.

Cascade of Discussion

I agree with point four that discussion is needed. But actually, I would go so far as to say it's not worth saving the banks and the bondholders - the wealthy - at the expense of everyone else, offering Greece,  Spain, and Cyprus as proof.

The problem with such a discussion is the cascade effect. If Spain has an open honest discussion, then so must Italy, Portugal, France, Germany and every country in the EU.

The reason has to do with contingent liabilities.

Under the euro monetary union, each country has a percentage responsibility to pick up the tab if another country defaults.

The table below shows the current maximum level of guarantees for capital given by the Eurozone countries. The amounts are based on the European Central Bank capital key weightings.

CountryGuarantee Commitments (EUR) MillionsPercentage
Austria€ 21,639.192.78%
Belgium€ 27,031.993.47%
Cyprus€ 1,525.680.20%
Estonia€ 1,994.860.26%
Finland€ 13,974.031.79%
France€ 158,487.5320.32%
Germany€ 211,045.9027.06%
Greece€ 21,897.742.81%
Ireland€ 12,378.151.59%
Italy€ 139,267.8117.86%
Luxembourg€ 1,946.940.25%
Malta€ 704.330.09%
Netherlands€ 44,446.325.70%
Portugal€ 19,507.262.50%
Slovakia€ 7,727.570.99%
Slovenia€ 3,664.300.47%
Spain€ 92,543.5611.87%
Eurozone 17€ 779,783.14100%


There is not a single country in the European Monetary Union (EMU) that could afford to pick up its percentage of responsibility should another country fail.

No One Wants Honest Discussion

With that cascade setup, the ECB certainly does not want an honest discussion.  German Chancellor Angela Merkel does not want an honest discussion. No one in favor of the euro project wants an honest discussion.

So there will not be an honest discussion. Instead there will be mass denial by everyone except from the fringe groups: Beppe Grillo's M5S in Italy, Marine Le Pen's Front National Party in France (extreme right), Alexis Tsipras' Syriza party in Greece (radical left), and the newly formed Podemos party (radical left), in Spain.

For discussion of the latter, please see Spanish Reader on Rise of "Podemos" a New Far-Left Political Party in Spain.

Prisoner's Dilemma in Reverse

In the standard Prisoner's Dilemma setup, two prisoners are better off if they do not talk, but they talk out of fear the other prisoner will talk.

In this case, it is in the best interest of the people to have a discussion, but the act of discussion immediately sets in motion a guaranteed breakup of the eurozone for reasons shown above.

History Lesson 

History suggests, as Pettis states: "ordinary people must pay twice, once in the form of hidden transfers that recapitalize the banks, and once in the form of high unemployment and social erosion, and in most cases they get none of the advantages because the crisis occurs anyway."

History also suggests no monetary union without a fiscal union has ever survived. 

Different Kind of Honest Discussion

The discussion that really needs to take place isn't whether Spain should leave, Greece should leave, or Italy should leave (because as soon as one does a cascade of uncontrolled exits will occur).

Rather, the discussion that needs to happen is for Merkel to get everyone together and work out a plan for a clean breakup. Arguably the beast thing would be for Germany to exit first.

But no one wants that discussion either.

EMU End Game

Since no one can or will discuss anything (until one of the radical parties wins an election outright), here are the possibilities

  1. An uncontrolled messy breakup of the EMU
  2. Mass printing by the ECB to cover all foreign debt
  3. Extreme suffering and pain  in peripheral Europe for another decade or so

Note that options two and three still leave intact all of the structural problems of the euro.

The most likely course is extreme suffering and pain until a radical party wins somewhere and then declares the European Monetary Union (EMU) null and void and all debt associated with it null and void as well.

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