Today, we have reserved a guest post for Jan De Blonde who is very actively engaged in sustainable farmland investment abroad. Jan is ...
My friend the equity racehorse sent me me the following interesting link which appeared on Dutch television and which basically ...
Vorige zondag (6 mei 2012) verscheen het volgend interview in De Zondag:
Elk jaar omtrent deze tijd publiceert BP zijn Statistical Review of World Energy. Bijna 50 pagina’s grotendeels gevuld met tabellen ...
Door een abrupt beëindigde skivakantie (nauwelijks 50 meter op de latten gestaan) bracht ik de rest van de week haast immobiel en al ...
Well, it's not exactly Moody's but more precisely Fitch, sending out messages which are "surprising" to say the least. Remember ...
Davos, setting of the Thomas Mann novel "Der Zauberberg" and sheltering famous people throughout history such as ...
Following our adventures in today's every changing moods in the world of finance, it's not a bad thing to assess volatility as a ...
You may remember I wrote a piece on Asia Pacific Breweries (APB) , Heineken and Fraser & Neave (F&N) when I was in Singapore earlier ...
My dear friend Sideshow Bob sent me a short note which I think deserves some attention. It opens up the discussion on one of the most ...
Geen kat die deze stelling zal betwisten, maar de impact ervan op de Chinese economie wordt vermoedelijk zwaar onderschat. We hebben ...
De kogel is door de kerk, iedereen van ons kan straks aandeelhouder van Facebook worden. Intekenen op een IPO is echter niet altijd ...
Apple kwam de afgelopen week met de langverwachte medeling over hun spaarpot van 100 miljard $. Een mogelijke overname is nog niet in ...
On March 14th, the Media Innovation Center was launched (under the wings of the IBBT) and baptized 'Mix'. Its goal is to support and ...
Yesterday Fitch released a report with some arithmetics and outlook on the ageing population and how the developed west so far has ...
According to the World Economic Forum, Canadian banks have been ranked as the soundest and most safe banks world-wide, this for 5 ...
Gemini, the immortal twins Castor and Pollux, in this case Dublin and Cork. We picked up an interesting story from out of Bloomberg ...
Display
25
items per page, ordered by
newest
Just when you thought you were safe, a last minute move from our dear friends in the US are spoiling the party. Moody's lowered the outlook to"negative" for the AAA ratings of Germany, the Netherlands and Luxembourg (!). Yes,you read this well, even our friends over in Luxembourg - with only 3 government bond ...
Some weeks ago we mentioned the current pressure on some safe havens in keeping their currency peg. In the case of the European periphery, the game is focused on Switzerland and Denmark, having all the trouble in the world to stop appreciating following the declining faith in the single currency (or at least in some of its ...
Over the weekend, I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine on today's surrealism reigning on financial markets. Referring to a previous posting - "Dude, where is my yield" - we quickly altered to another issue with the 64,000$ question at the end : If interbank market rates are manipulated (rigged libor) and if ...
In our series of conspiracy theories during the silly season, we would like to turn our eyes towards the equity market after last week's adventures in Libor land. But before we do that, let's just first reconsider the following conversation which took place some years ago in a San Pedro Police station : Verbal Kint : Who is ...
It's the silly season and as far as financial markets are concerned, we have to conclude à la Monty Python : "Stop this sketch, it's becoming too silly". In the current era of financial repression, we have witnessed mind blowing levels of interest rates. The following table gives you a short overview of the current government bond ...
In our trip around the world during the present holidays, we decided to take a small stop in Santa Fé De Bogota : Columbia es pasion ! Indeed, the tourist guide of Colombia will overwhelm you with the following nice features : mother nature's most beautiful spot in South America (true), amazing rich coffee, amazing soccer players, ...
European stocks gained as China reported the slowest expansion in three years, fueling speculation policy makers will add to stimulus measures. Asian shares and U.S. index futures advanced . Zo begon Bloomberg op vrijdag 13 juni, nadat China bekend maakte dat de economie 7,6% groeide, of zo u het anders wil ...
The FOMC minutes are out and it seems the committee of US rate setters is no longer unanimous on the issues. An extension of Operation Twist was the compromise outcome and there is a reason for that. And in addition, they softened the language even more by the previous commitment of rates on hold to at least Spring 2014 changing ...
Today, the following manifesto appeared in the blog sphere : "In support of a European banking union, done properly - a manifesto by economists in Germany, Austria and Switzerland". For the link, I would like to refer to : http://www.voxeu.org/article/manifesto-banking-union-economists-germany-austria-and-switzerland The ...
The gold price had been caught in a 20-year bear market when Gordon Brown decided to sell off 400 tons of Britain's gold reserves at rock-bottom prices. That more or less marked the bottom of the ferocious bear market. But that's just the way markets behave. Bear and bull markets do not usually end without a 'grand finale'. In 1979 ...
We are now some 5 years into this crisis and we have witnessed some non-text book interventions in terms of substantial large amounts. Having a look at how balance sheets of central banks have exploded, it's really "de jamais vue", in some cases interventions in between 25% and 30% of GDP. It started out with the FED's Tarp ...
Yesterday we had triple whammy : 28 Spanish banks dramatically downgraded & Moodys threatening to cut the Spanish sovereign to junk ; then came the news that Monte dei Paschi will be bailed by the Italian government through means of so-called Tremonti bonds. And finally the presentation of Herman Van Rompuy's 7 page road map ...
Geen kat die deze stelling zal betwisten, maar de impact ervan op de Chinese economie wordt vermoedelijk zwaar onderschat. We hebben het uiteraard over de geboorte beperkende maatregel dat het grootste deel van het land al decennia lang slechts één kind mag hebben.China beheerst de wereldeconomie zoals wellicht nog nooit een land ...
The most acute problems are on Europe's periphery, where many smaller economies are experiencing crises strongly reminiscent of past crises in Latam America and Asia : Latvia is the new Argentina. Paul Krugman, NYT 15/12/08 (slightly wonkish) Yesterday, we picked ...
At Econopolis, we always appreciate it when our faithful audience mingles into the debate of politics, economics, philosophy and the other small things making our lives beautiful. Today we bring you a contribution by Franck Vanhee. It might be poetic at first sight, the underlying thoughts will become crystal clear throughout the ...
T+3 Spanish bail-out, emergency rescue , credit-line and we are back to square 1 if Spanish yields are an indicator. Apparently markets are not convinced about the credibility of the fire wall currently put into place ; or are awaiting more clarity and reassurances, something the so-called master plan might ...
Writing a piece like this after a trip to (a part of) a country is always somewhat difficult. The reason is that you have to be very careful not to extrapolate to the entire country what you have seen in the cities you have just visited. In this particular case, I will try to share with you some thoughts on my recent stay in ...
Flight to quality, safe haven, uncertainty and capital preservation, all these buzz words lately seem to be the only thing that matter. And it isn't restricted to the usual suspects in the current risk-off environment, being JPY and CHF (reversal of carry trades etc). But before focusing on a fairly new contestant in this game, a ...
Catharsis, the emotional purification in Greek drama or the logical conclusion at the end of a play. It seems to me we are nearing such a point in the euro-zone where conflicting parties - now in full collision course in a super game of chicken - will be blessed with catharsis one way or the other. What is at stake ?In previous ...
Het financieel-economisch nieuws wordt nog steeds gedomineerd door 2 parameters: Griekenland (of in het verlengde daarvan de Europese financiële turbulentie) en de vertragende Chinese groei. Deze beide zaken hebben de laatste weken een groter impact op de beurzen dan ander bedrijfsnieuws, zeker nu de kwartaalgebonden ...
There’s good news and bad news on my latest trip to Taiwan. The bad news is that I cannot talk about what was probably the most interesting factory visit and management meeting as they had me sign a very strict three-page long Non Disclosure Agreement forbidding me to even mention that I had talked to them, let alone that I ...
With the new French winds blowing at the Elysée, the debate on a growth pact gathers momentum: briefly “piano piano” on austerity and public investment providing the growth kicker EMU urgently needs. Also the IMF issued some warnings earlier on that moving too quickly on austerity might in the end even be counterproductive. The ...
A poetic quote coming from Irish political philosopher Edmund Burke referring to Spain. Unfortunately, the quote hasn't lost of its value because the whale has stranded in an economic sense. And it still requires some considerable assistance to find open water again. Although, despite the huge challenges confronting Europe's no4 ...
Have we witnessed a kind of decisive paradigm shift in Europe over the weekend ? It might still be too soon to conclude this but in political terms, some important events indeed took place. In order of importance : 1) Greek chaotic election result and not workable in the short term. Already after a couple of hours, leading party ND ...
De openlijke steun van Paul Krugman voor François Hollande is tekenend voor de Amerikaanse topeconoom. Hij schuwt geen duidelijke keuze, en is niet de typische tweehandige econoom (“on the one hand, on the other hand”). Het grote voordeel van de duidelijkheid heeft ook een nadeel. De huidige crisis wordt daardoor al snel een ...
