The world begins 2009 in its first synchronized recession since 1974. The proximate cause of the global slowdown was the collapse of the U.S. subprime housing market, which touched off a liquidity crisis as American financial institutions that had participated in subprime were forced to set aside cash to rebalance their asset sheets. As the recession deepened, loans far healthier than those originated in subprime also went bad, compounding the need to rebalance and draining more capital out of the system. This contributed to a credit crunch that continued into the New Year. This “simple” credit crisis is hardly the end of the story.
If money is akin to water, then a liquidity crisis is analogous to a very low tide that exposes a host of dangers lurking beneath the surface. The United States sports the fewest of these dangers. Its culture of change means that inefficiencies are regularly and ruthlessly purged from its system. For example, the mortgage brokers who made subprime possible are all already out of business, and most of the investment houses that gorged on securities linked to subprime — up to and including Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch — have either gone bankrupt or been acquired by more stable institutions. This obsession with efficiency and rapid evolution results in the constant uncovering of problems, but this very constancy means that the problems tend to be small. In the current case, subprime and its related issues struck more or less at once, but the United States will be able to recover from the problems without getting caught up in unrelated issues. This hardly means that the American recession is a fun time — for one thing, the liquidity crisis has triggered a painful broad-based credit rollback — but the United States is not facing any deeper structural issues.
(Source Yahoo) CHA-AM, Thailand (AP) -- Southeast Asian leaders vowed Sunday to push ahead with ambitious plans to become a European Union-style economic community by 2015 despite roadblocks posed by the global financial crisis and Myanmar's dismal human rights record. The 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations concluded its 14th annual summit with a statement saying leaders had agreed to refrain from imposing new trade barriers and would stand firm against protectionism in their quest to create a single market in the next seven years.
ASSOCIATION OF SOUTHEAST ASIAN NATIONS (ASEAN) The Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN was established on 8 August 1967 in Bangkok by the five original Member Countries, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam joined on 8 January 1984, Vietnam on 28 July 1995, Lao PDR and Myanmar on 23 July 1997, and Cambodia on 30 April 1999. As of 2006, the ASEAN region has a population of about 560 million, a total area of 4.5 million square kilometers, a combined gross domestic product of almost US$ 1,100 billion, and a total trade of about US$ 1,400 billion
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Jack Covert and Todd Sattersten, authors of The 100 Best Business Books of All Time: What They Say, Why They Matter, and How They Can Help You (Portfolio, 2009). Almost every business-book reader will find a way to take exception to the Covert-Sattersten list. The authors are both executives with Internet bookseller 800-CEO-READ, but they insist that their volume isn't just a come-on to stimulate sales for their business. "It's our attempt at helping the modern businessperson find solutions," says Covert. Finance and economics titles would seem to be a natural, especially in today's troubled financial climate but Covert and Sattersten include almost none. Guys, take a look at the current business best-seller lists, and you'll discover what readers are interested in now. Such titles as Charles R. Morris' The Trillion Dollar Meltdown: Easy Money, High Rollers, and the Great Credit Crash (Public Affairs, 2008), or Charles D. Ellis' The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs (Penguin Press, 2008), or Paul Krugman's The Return of Depression Economics (Norton, 1999 and revised in 2009) are hot sellers this week. For an oldie but goodie, you could even include John Kenneth Galbraith's The Great Crash 1929 (Mariner Books, 1954), a paperback best-seller today.
Worldwatch Institute- Global Trends, worldwatch global trends Each Worldatch Global Trends bundle costs $1.00, ... 1980-2003; cart Standard & Poors 500 Stock Market Price Index, 1950-2004 ... www.worldwatch.org/pubs/globaltrends/
IMF-International Monetary Fund Home Page,IMF Home page with links to News, About the IMF, Fund Rates, IMF Publications, What's New, Standards and Codes, Country Information and featured topics. www.imf.org/
WTO|Welcome to the WTO Website, The WTO develops ground-rules for international commerce, mediates trade disputes. www.wto.org/
The Globalist |Daniel Schwartz: The Great Wall of China by Daniel...Mark Warner on Americans in the Global Economy Does an improved techonological infrastructure ... Meeting at Mainz, The Future of Transatlantic Relations ... www.theglobalist.com/
The Oil Drum|Discussions about Energy and Our Future, Posted by Heading Out on Tue Apr 18 at 2:58 PM EST Topic: Supply/Production Tags: LNG (all tags). There are two ways in which you can be supplied with ... www.theoildrum.com/
RAND Corporation Provides Objective Research Services and Public... Rand Corporation conducts independent research on important issues such as science and technology, methodology, national security, public policy, justice, ... www.rand.org/
Poverty- Empowerment and Poverty Reduction: A Sourcebook. Evaluating the Impact of Development Projects on Poverty: A Handbook for Practitioners ... www.worldbank.org/poverty/
China: The New Economic Giant by Philip S. Golub- But longer-term trends point toward it. This is a structural phenomenon that can be compared to the rise of the US as a core economic power, a process that ... mondediplo.com/2003/10/08china
EIU.comIt's too early to talk of Asia's century, but there will be a redistribution of economic power. Emerging markets, China and India in particular, ... www.eiu.com/foresight2020
China's Environment: Will Pollution Undermine Economic Growth? - International organizations and foreign governments are also adding a voice of concern over China's environment which will only strengthen as the 2008 ... www.mongabay.com/external/china's_environment_2004.htm
Annual Energy Outlook 2006 with Projections to 2030 - AEO2006 presents three views of economic growth for the forecast period from ... US economic indicators generally are projected to follow historical trends, ... www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/economic.htm
Welcome to The PeP Clearing House-The portal for user-friendly access to policy, legal and scientific information, as well as good practices, on Transport, ... www.thepep.org/CHWebSite
Economic Strategy Institute - China and India are fast overtaking Western nations in economic growth, ...future, from an author with a history of predicting the important trends long ... www.econstrat.org/
The Long and Winding Road to Privatization in China - Concerns about weak capital markets are leading top Chinese companies to list abroad ... Are Emerging Markets Striking Back, or Out? The View from Investors ... knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/1472.cfm
Oil Price History and Analysis - A discussion of crude oil prices, the relationship between prices and rig ... Several trends established were established in the wake of the collapse in ... www.wtrg.com/prices.htm
EIA - Short-Term Energy Outlook - US Crude Oil Production Trends, gif. 20. US Distillate Fuel Prices, gif. 21. US Annual Energy Expenditures As Percent of GDP* ... www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/steo/pub/contents.html
American Petroleum Institute - Represents all aspects of the US petroleum and natural gas industry. Site includes Newsroom, Resource... www.api.org/
DB Research - Macro Trends - Given the hopes that have been pinned on the future of solar energy by government and large parts of the population the industry needs to invest in research ... www.dbresearch.com/servlet/reweb2.ReWEB?rwkey=u436499
