Global manufacturing industry ended 2009 on what seems to be a fairly positive footing, with the JPMorgan Global Manufacturing PMI posting a comfortable 55.0 in December, up from 53.7 in November, significantly above that critical 50 growth / contraction dividing line.
December’s was the highest reading for 44 months, and the headline Global PMI has [...]
The Latvian government is getting nervous about the level of lending coming from Swedish banks. According to the Financial Times, “Latvia’s prime minister has warned Swedish banks they risk choking off recovery in the Baltic state’s crisis-hit economy unless they resume lending.”
The Latvian authorities are complaining, it seems, that banks [...]
As doubts grow that in the post Dubai word Russia’s central bank will be able to sustain a great deal of momentum in its ongoing programme of interest rate reductions, we learn this week that the pace of expansion in Russia’s economy slowed back in November, following two months of steady advance [...]
“In my view … it is impossible to understand this crisis without reference to the global imbalances in trade and capital flows that began in the latter half of the 1990s.”
* Compared with the average quarterly value of GDP in 2007-08, the first two quarters of 2009 are down in nominal terms [...]
Back in the heady days of 2006 some 30,000 cranes, roughly a quarter of total global capacity, were busy whirring away in Dubai.
Today most of these devices have either left to find service in other parts of the globe, or lie silent, unused and unloved. In what is only the latest sign [...]
“Cutting rates by 50 basis points here and there is not going really diminish the appeal of the ruble,” said Manik Narain, an emerging markets strategist at Standard Chartered Bank Plc in London.
“In terms of nominal interest rates Russia (at 9% as of 24 November) is still offering the highest yields in [...]