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THE ANATOMY OF THE COMING RECESSION / PROJECT SYNDICATE
| Etiquetas: Artificial Intelligence, Central Banking, Digital Technology, Fiscal Policy, Monetary Policy, Recession, World Economic And Political
The Anatomy of the Coming Recession
Unlike the 2008 global financial crisis, which was mostly a large negative aggregate demand shock, the next recession is likely to be caused by permanent negative supply shocks from the Sino-American trade and technology war. And trying to undo the damage through never-ending monetary and fiscal stimulus will not be an option.
NEW YORK – There are three negative supply shocks that could trigger a global recession by 2020. All of them reflect political factors affecting international relations, two involve China, and the United States is at the center of each. Moreover, none of them is amenable to the traditional tools of countercyclical macroeconomic policy.
The first potential shock stems from the Sino-American trade and currency war, which escalated earlier this month when US President Donald Trump's administration threatened additional tariffs on Chinese exports, and formally labeled China a currency manipulator.
The second concerns the slow-brewing cold war between the US and China over technology. In a rivalry that has all the hallmarks of a "Thucydides Trap," China and America are vying for dominance over the industries of the future: artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, 5G, and so forth. The US has placed the Chinese telecom giant Huawei on an "entity list" reserved for foreign companies deemed to pose a national-security threat. And although Huawei has received temporary exemptions allowing it to continue using US components, the Trump administration this week announced that it was adding an additional 46 Huawei affiliates to the list.
The third major risk concerns oil supplies. Although oil prices have fallen in recent weeks, and a recession triggered by a trade, currency, and tech war would depress energy demand and drive prices lower, America's confrontation with Iran could have the opposite effect. Should that conflict escalate into a military conflict, global oil prices could spike and bring on a recession, as happened during previous Middle East conflagrations in 1973, 1979, and 1990.
All three of these potential shocks would have a stagflationary effect, increasing the price of imported consumer goods, intermediate inputs, technological components, and energy, while reducing output by disrupting global supply chains.
Worse, the Sino-American conflict is already fueling a broader process of deglobalization, because countries and firms can no longer count on the long-term stability of these integrated value chains. As trade in goods, services, capital, labor, information, data, and technology becomes increasingly balkanized, global production costs will rise across all industries.
Moreover, the trade and currency war and the competition over technology will amplify one another. Consider the case of Huawei, which is currently a global leader in 5G equipment. This technology will soon be the standard form of connectivity for most critical civilian and military infrastructure, not to mention basic consumer goods that are connected through the emerging Internet of Things. The presence of a 5G chip implies that anything from a toaster to a coffee maker could become a listening device. This means that if Huawei is widely perceived as a national-security threat, so would thousands of Chinese consumer-goods exports.
It is easy to imagine how today's situation could lead to a full-scale implosion of the open global trading system. The question, then, is whether monetary and fiscal policymakers are prepared for a sustained – or even permanent – negative supply shock.
Following the stagflationary shocks of the 1970s, monetary policymakers responded by tightening monetary policy. Today, however, major central banks such as the US Federal Reserve are already pursuing monetary-policy easing, because inflation and inflation expectations remain low. Any inflationary pressure from an oil shock will be perceived by central banks as merely a price-level effect, rather than as a persistent increase in inflation.
Over time, negative supply shocks tend also to become temporary negative demand shocks that reduce both growth and inflation, by depressing consumption and capital expenditures. Indeed, under current conditions, US and global corporate capital spending is severely depressed, owing to uncertainties about the likelihood, severity, and persistence of the three potential shocks.
In fact, with firms in the US, Europe, China, and other parts of Asia having reined in capital expenditures, the global tech, manufacturing, and industrial sector is already in a recession.
The only reason why that hasn't yet translated into a global slump is that private consumption has remained strong. Should the price of imported goods rise further as a result of any of these negative supply shocks, real (inflation-adjusted) disposable household income growth would take a hit, as would consumer confidence, likely tipping the global economy into a recession.
Given the potential for a negative aggregate demand shock in the short run, central banks are right to ease policy rates. But fiscal policymakers should also be preparing a similar short-term response. A sharp decline in growth and aggregate demand would call for countercyclical fiscal easing to prevent the recession from becoming too severe.
In the medium term, though, the optimal response would not be to accommodate the negative supply shocks, but rather to adjust to them without further easing. After all, the negative supply shocks from a trade and technology war would be more or less permanent, as would the reduction in potential growth. The same applies to Brexit: leaving the European Union will saddle the United Kingdom with a permanent negative supply shock, and thus permanently lower potential growth.
Such shocks cannot be reversed through monetary or fiscal policymaking. Although they can be managed in the short term, attempts to accommodate them permanently would eventually lead to both inflation and inflation expectations rising well above central banks' targets. In the 1970s, central banks accommodated two major oil shocks. The result was persistently rising inflation and inflation expectations, unsustainable fiscal deficits, and public-debt accumulation.
Finally, there is an important difference between the 2008 global financial crisis and the negative supply shocks that could hit the global economy today. Because the former was mostly a large negative aggregate demand shock that depressed growth and inflation, it was appropriately met with monetary and fiscal stimulus.
But this time, the world would be confronting sustained negative supply shocks that would require a very different kind of policy response over the medium term.
Trying to undo the damage through never-ending monetary and fiscal stimulus will not be a sensible option.
Nouriel Roubini, a professor at NYU's Stern School of Business and CEO of Roubini Macro Associates, was Senior Economist for International Affairs in the White House's Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton Administration. He has worked for the International Monetary Fund, the US Federal Reserve, and the World Bank.
AMERICA HAS HALF A MILLION FEWER JOBS THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT / THE ECONOMIST
| Etiquetas: Central Banking, The Fed, U.S. Economic And Political, Unemployment
America has half a million fewer jobs than previously thought
As central bankers meet in Jackson Hole, the Fed ponders its next move
IT IS NOT easy being a central banker these days. Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, has come under particular scrutiny in recent months. Some commentators believe he has been too hawkish, even though he cut the Fed's main interest rate by 25 basis points last month, and should cut rates more aggressively. President Donald Trump, who appointed Mr Powell, is now his most vocal critic, and recently tweeted that the Fed should cut its benchmark rate by "at least 100 basis points".
Lowering interest rates would be a natural response to an economic downturn, but optimists have taken comfort from labour-market figures, which suggest that America's economy is still humming along. The country's unemployment rate currently sits at just 3.7%, its lowest level in five decades. The labour-force participation rate of "prime-age" workers aged between 25 and 54, although still below where it was before the financial crisis, has been rising steadily since 2015.
Still, investors are anxious. America's trade war with China shows no signs of abating. The country's manufacturing sector is growing at its slowest pace in nearly three years; and business investment contracted in the second quarter. Meanwhile Germany, Europe's economic powerhouse, appears to be tipping into recession. Recent news from America's Bureau of Labour Statistics has not helped matters. On August 21st the agency revised its figures, saying that employers added half a million fewer jobs in the year ending March 2019 than previously reported (see chart). The 0.3% downward revision to total non-farm employment was the biggest in a decade.
The bond market is also sending worrying signals. The yield on America's short-term government bonds currently exceeds that of its longer-term debt. Such "inversions" have preceded each of the past seven recessions. A forecast from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York issued on August 2nd, based on historical data from the government-bond market, estimated that there was a 31% chance of a recession within the next twelve months. Up-to-date data would yield an even scarier forecast. Mr Trump was at one point so concerned that he floated the idea of issuing a new wave of tax cuts, though he appears to have since reconsidered.
All eyes are now on Mr Powell, who is due to speak tomorrow at an annual gathering of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Financial markets currently suggest the Fed has a 98% chance of cutting its benchmark rate by at least 25 basis points by September. Whether such a cut will be enough for Mr Powell to stave off a recession and placate his critics remains to be seen.
THE ASIAN STRATEGIC ORDER IS DYING / THE FINANCIAL TIMES OP EDITORIAL
| Etiquetas: Asia Economic and Political, China, U.S. Economic And Political, World Economic And Political
The Asian strategic order is dying
Forty years of prosperity in the region are now under threat
When somebody is reaching the end of their life, they often suffer from lots of apparently unrelated ailments — fevers, aches-and-pains, unlucky falls. Something similar may happen when a strategic order is dying. Across east Asia, the past month has seen a rash of diplomatic and security incidents that are symptoms of a wider sickness.
In late July, the Chinese and Russian air forces staged their first ever joint aerial patrol in the region, causing South Korean warplanes to fire hundreds of warning shots at Russian intruders. The South Koreans are also facing the most serious deterioration in their relations with Japan in decades — with the Japanese imposing trade restrictions last week in a dispute that has its origins in the second world war. North Korea has also just restarted missile tests, endangering US-led peace efforts.
All of the other east Asian flashpoints — Taiwan, the South China Sea, Hong Kong and the US-China trade war — are also looking more combustible. Protests and strikes in Hong Kong are still gathering momentum. Chinese officials are now openly discussing military intervention and last week a White House official drew attention to a massing of Chinese troops, just across the border from Hong Kong. For the Trump administration, however, the major preoccupation remains its trade dispute with China, which also intensified last week, with the US imposing a new set of tariffs.
July also saw a Chinese oil exploration vessel enter waters claimed by Vietnam, leading to a stand-off between heavily armed Chinese and Vietnamese ships. The government of the Philippines too sounded the alarm about Chinese naval incursions and called for American assistance. China's growing assertiveness was underlined by the news that Beijing is developing a military base in Cambodia, its first in south-east Asia.
Tensions over Taiwan continue to rise. In late July a US warship sailed through the Taiwan Strait and China released a defence white paper, accusing the Taiwanese government of pursuing independence and threatening a military response. The US meanwhile is talking of soon deploying intermediate-range missiles in east Asia, following its pullout from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty last week.
On the surface, many of these incidents seem unconnected. But collectively they point to a regional security order that is coming apart. America's military pre-eminence and diplomatic predictability can no longer be taken for granted. And China is no longer willing to accept a secondary role in east Asia's security system. In these new circumstances, other countries — including Russia, Japan and North Korea — are testing the rules.
The past 40 years have been a period of unprecedented growth and prosperity across east Asia, which has also transformed the global economy. But Asia's economic miracle relied on peace and stability. Those conditions were established in the mid-1970s, with the end of the Vietnam war and America's rapprochement with China.
Since then, America has tolerated and even facilitated the rise of China. In return, China has tacitly accepted that America would remain the dominant military power in the Asia-Pacific region. You could label these arrangements the "Kissinger order" in east Asia, after Henry Kissinger, the US secretary of state who helped broker the new relationship between America and China in the early 1970s.
But both President Xi Jinping of China and President Donald Trump of the US have rejected basic elements of the Kissinger order. Mr Trump has abandoned the idea that US-Chinese ties are mutually beneficial, by launching his trade war, while Mr Xi has set about challenging America's strategic pre-eminence.
China's challenge to American power has raised the question of how long the US's strategic dominance in Asia will last. Rather than offering reassurance, Mr Trump has added to the uncertainty by openly questioning the value of US alliances with Japan and South Korea. As one Asian foreign minister put it recently: "The damage that Trump has done will outlive Trump."
The loss of the US's regional authority is evident in Washington's inability to control the feud between Japan and South Korea, its two most important regional allies. Even the Australians are beginning to doubt American leadership, with one senior Australian diplomat telling me recently that, with the trade war intensifying, "there will come a point when America and Australia will part company on policy towards China".
But doubts about American leadership are not matched by any desire to embrace a China-dominated region. On the contrary, from Tokyo to Taipei and from Canberra to Hanoi, there is growing anxiety about Beijing's behaviour. That anxiety is only increased by the growing closeness between China and Russia. From Moscow's point of view, the recent joint air patrol underlined Russia's return as a Pacific power — just as military intervention in Syria signalled its re-emergence as a power in the Middle East.
The Kissinger order in east Asia did not resolve most of the historic disputes and rivalries in the region. But it helped to freeze regional conflicts in place, buying time for peaceful development. Now the geopolitical climate has changed so frozen conflicts are moving again. As the ice melts, things can move fast in dangerous and unpredictable ways.
OFFICIALS SEE FEW OPTIONS IF SLOWDOWN HITS / THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
| Etiquetas: Donald Trump, Fiscal Déficits, Government Debt Markets, Monetary Policy, Recession, The Fed, U.S. Economic And Political
Officials See Few Options if Slowdown Hits
Amid debate over whether the U.S. is going into an economic downturn, there are few good options to deal with one if it happens
By Rebecca Ballhaus and Nick Timiraos
Policy makers have limited options to boost the U.S. economy amid signs it is slowing. Above, a Mercedes-Benz assembly plant in Vance, Ala. Photo: andrew caballero-reynolds/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
After debating for days whether the U.S. is going into an economic downturn, Washington policy makers and Wall Street investors on Wednesday barreled into an even more difficult problem: There are few good options to deal with one if it happens.
With short-term interest rates already low, the Federal Reserve has little room to cut borrowing costs to spur spending and investment as it usually does in a slowdown. Meantime, the federal debt is exploding, which could hamstring any efforts to boost growth with tax cuts or spending increases.
Further complicating matters, Democrats and Republicans strongly disagree about how best to rev up the economy, with Democrats favoring higher spending and the GOP wanting lower taxes. Even within their own ranks there are disagreements about what course to take.
President Trump on Wednesday backed away from pursuing new tax cuts, a sharp reversal from a day earlier, when he described several such measures the White House was contemplating. Mr. Trump is in the awkward position of calling for economic stimulus at the same time he says the economy is strong.
"I just don't see any reason to," Mr. Trump told reporters at the White House when asked if he was contemplating tax cuts. "We don't need it. We have a strong economy."
He dismissed an idea he floated Tuesday: lowering capital-gains taxes by indexing investment gains to inflation. "I'm not looking to do indexing," he said. "I think it will be perceived, if I do it, as somewhat elitist…I want tax cuts for the middle class, the workers." He added that it was an option, but "not something I love."
On Tuesday, speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, the president said he had been "thinking about payroll taxes for a long time" and that indexing was "something I'm thinking about." He added, "I would love to do something on capital gains."
White House officials, meanwhile, said the administration has long been examining a range of tax cuts as part of what Republicans have termed "Tax Cuts 2.0," though no proposals are expected imminently and such a measure is unlikely to go anywhere in Congress.
The president also has been pressuring the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates at a clip typically only seen when the economy is severely struggling. On Wednesday morning, Mr. Trump compared Fed ChairmanJerome Powell,his own choice for the post, to a "golfer who can't putt."
Though unemployment remains exceptionally low, economic growth and hiring have slowed in recent months and some warning signs are flashing in bond markets. Most notably, long-term interest rates at times have dipped below short-term rates, something that has telegraphed recessions in the past and spooked investors in recent weeks.
Wednesday's economic reports included some troubling new signs. U.S. job growth was weaker in the year through March than previously thought, government economists said. The Labor Department lowered its estimate of total U.S. employment in March by 501,000, or 0.3%. That brought down the average monthly increase in payrolls over the period to about 168,000 from 210,000—still solid but not as robust as once thought.
Other government data revisions in recent weeks also pushed down estimates of growth and corporate profits.
But it wasn't all bad news: Sales of previously owned homes picked up in July, the National Association of Realtors said Wednesday, a sign that lower mortgage rates may be driving sales after a weak spring selling season. Some retailers also reported good profit numbers, another sign that households remain a pillar of the economy.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 240.29 points Wednesday, or 0.93%, to 26202.73. It had surpassed 27000 in July, when downturn worries started to concern investors.
Academic research cited by top Fed officials in the past says that the central bank should move quickly to cut short-term rates in moments when it has little room to maneuver and the economy might be heading for a slide.
The Fed's target rate is just over 2%, leaving far less room to cut aggressively than in the past.
But officials at the central bank aren't yet convinced that drastic action is needed. Moreover, the Fed's ranks are divided about what steps to take.
Fed minutes from its July 30-31 meeting released Wednesday showed several officials favored holding rates steady because they judged "that the real economy continued to be in a good place."
Two of those officials, Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren and Kansas City Fed PresidentEsther George,dissented from the decision to cut rates by a quarter percentage point.
But two other officials, not identified in the minutes, favored a more aggressive half-point cut, which they said would better address "stubbornly low" inflation.
The minutes also showed the officials believed uncertainty surrounding the Trump administration's trade policy wasn't likely to let up anytime soon, creating a "persistent headwind" for the U.S. economic outlook.
Many business executives have said the uncertain outlook for U.S. trade policy could be holding back the economy. With the U.S. locked in sharp disagreements with China over a range of issues, that might not get resolved soon.
Mr. Powell disappointed some investors—and the president—at his news conference after the July meeting when he pushed back against market expectations of a more vigorous series of rate cuts to follow.
"Now we know why Powell had a hard time at the press conference. There wasn't a clear consensus," saidDiane Swonk,chief economist at Grant Thornton.
Washington's appetite for budget deficits could be tested by a slowdown or recession. Federal spending tends to rise in a recession because mandatory payments on programs like unemployment insurance goes up. Meantime, tax receipts tend to slow as household income growth and business profits slow or decline.
On top of all of that, cutting taxes or increasing spending to kick-start growth could be a challenge since both can boost deficits. Federal deficits are projected to grow much more than expected over the next decade thanks to the two-year budget agreement lawmakers and the White House struck last month, the Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday.
The agency boosted its forecast of cumulative deficits over the next decade by $809 billion, to $12.2 trillion. That means an additional $12 trillion of debt on top of the $22 trillion already outstanding.
The increase primarily reflects higher federal spending under the new budget deal, partly offset by lower projected interest rates.
The CBO said the new agreement, which increased spending roughly $320 billion over the next two years above previously enacted spending caps, will add roughly $1.7 trillion to deficits between 2020 and 2029. That reflects CBO's assumption that federal spending will continue to grow at the rate of inflation after 2021.
Deficits as a share of gross domestic product are expected to average 4.7% over the next decade, up from the 4.3% average CBO projected in May, and a significant increase from the 2.9% average over the past 50 years.
—Kate Davidson, Josh Mitchell and Alex Leary contributed to this article.
WHY MARKETS HAVE BEEN A TINDERBOX IN AUGUST / SEEKING ALPHA
| Etiquetas: Investment Strategies, Monetary Policy, Stock Markets, The Fed
Why Markets Have Been A Tinderbox In August
by: The Heisenberg
- New estimates show that most of the manic moves in stocks and bonds this month can be explained by many of the self-feeding loops I've spent years discussing.
- In rates, the recent plunge in yields was mostly down to convexity hedging.
- In stocks, gamma hedging and CTA de-leveraging played a prominent role last week.
- And it's all exacerbated by disappearing liquidity.
If you're looking to assign blame for the manic market moves that have, through Monday anyway, defined the month of August, you can point to systematic flows and technically-driven price action.
I've discussed this at length here and elsewhere over the past two weeks, effectively documenting it in real time, but I think it's worth fleshing out a bit further for the audience here in the interest of perhaps shedding a bit more light on something that still isn't well understood by retail investors.
Starting in rates, I talked quite a bit in a Friday post for this platform about receiving flows and convexity hedging and the extent to which that had almost certainly played an outsized role in the frantic rally at the long-end of the US curve. 10-year yields fell below 1.50% and 30-year yields below 2.00% at the height of the rally last week.
(Heisenberg)
We've seen the bottom fall out for yields on several occasions in 2019 and while some of that is down to growth concerns, collapsing inflation expectations, a flight-to-safety and the assumption of lower rates, a large percentage of this month's downdraft in yields is attributable to mortgage investors and banks chasing the rally.
That sprint created some $500 billion in demand, according to JPMorgan, whose rates strategists on Tuesday reminded clients that these flows are easy to see. "[It's] clear from the behavior of derivatives markets, since most of these hedging flows occur in interest rate swaps," the bank noted.
(JPMorgan)
As I wrote Friday on this platform, this sets in motion a self-fulfilling prophecy. The lower long-end yields go, the more convinced market participants become that everyone else is panicking about the outlook for global growth. Those jitters beget still more demand for duration, which pushes yields even lower, forcing more hedging, and around we go.
And then there's the psychological impact on equities. The exaggerated moves in rates described above are part of the reason the 2s10s inverted. That inversion, in turn, dealt a grievous blow to investor psychology last Wednesday, when the Dow suffered its worst one-day drop of 2019.
This is a maddeningly circular and exceptionally precarious dynamic. When fundamental, discretionary investors sell on recession jitters tied to what, as noted above, was an exaggerated move in the bond market, that can push equity benchmarks through key levels, which starts tipping dominoes for systematic deleveraging by the likes of CTAs.
JPMorgan's Marko Kolanovic underscored all of this in a note out Tuesday morning. "This is an important data point for equity investors, as moves in rates (e.g. yield curve inversion) significantly impact investment sentiment", he wrote, on the way to quantifying how much selling in and around last Wednesday's rout was attributable to programmatic/systematic strats. That figure, according to Marko, was roughly $75 billion, with 20% of it coming from CTAs.
Now, recall how, on August 11, I mentioned in a post for this platform that dealers' gamma positioning likely flipped negative after the FOMC, which meant that selling would beget more selling. Kolanovic on Tuesday underscored that assessment, noting that heading into last week, dealers' gamma positioning betrayed "a sizable short".
Try to appreciate how the dominoes fall. As yields move lower on what are, initially, fundamental concerns, convexity hedging flows turbocharge the bond rally. That has the potential to create a false optic, or to magnify recession concerns (I referred to it as a "Fata Morgana" earlier this year). Last week, that manifested itself in the inversion of the 2s10s, which led to selling in equities. Once stocks fell through key levels, it activated CTA de-leveraging and because dealers' gamma positioning was negative, their hedging exacerbated the situation.
Kolanovic on Tuesday said some 50% of the above-mentioned $75 billion in programmatic selling during or as a result of the August 14 selloff was attributable to index option delta and gamma hedging, which he calls "the single most important driver of price action during both the selloffs and rallies last week".
Mercifully, that positioning is back to neutral now, something Nomura's Charlie McElligott illustrated on Monday as follows:
(Nomura)
That, folks, is how modern markets can turn into tinderboxes.
If you're looking to explain why nine of the 14 sessions since the July FOMC have seen S&P moves of 1% or more (top pane in the figure), that's why.
This is exacerbated materially by low liquidity. These flows are hitting during a month when liquidity is seasonally sparse, but this August has been particularly dry. More broadly, liquidity in S&P futures simply never recovered after the February 2018 vol. event.
(Deutsche Bank)
That's attributable to a variety of factors, but one of the issues is that HFT liquidity provision is volatility-dependent. That is, algos pull back when volatility rises.
Well, needless to say, the interaction of all the dynamics mentioned above has a tendency to push up volatility. If vol. spikes prompt HFTs to reduce liquidity provision, it can make a bad situation immeasurably worse. That goes for bonds too. As JPMorgan pointed out again on Tuesday, "fast market participants represent roughly 80% of the liquidity provision in the hot-run interdealer Treasury market."
Going forward, positioning has once again been washed out a bit, with hedge fund betas very low, for instance. As noted above, dealers' gamma positioning is (basically) neutral now, so that should serve to help tamp down volatility.
But, it is by no means clear that the impact of hedging flows in rates is behind us, and on top of that, the dollar is near YTD highs. Jerome Powell has the potential to exacerbate both the decline in bond yields and dollar strength on Friday if he doesn't strike the "right" tone in Jackson Hole.
Suffice to Boston Fed chief Eric Rosengren did not signal a willingness to back off his propensity to dissent against more rate cuts when he spoke to Bloomberg on Monday.
And President Trump did not signal a willingness to step back from his insistence on those same cuts when he spoke to Twitter.
THE LME IS EUROPE´S ONLY SURVIVING "OPEN OUTCRY" VENUE / THE ECONOMIST
| Etiquetas: Commodities, Commodities Trading Houses, Copper, Economics, LME
The LME is Europe's only surviving "open outcry" venue
Traders still bark orders for copper as they have for more than a century
HER CLIENT'S huge order would cause prices to surge if the market got wind of it. She knew she needed to be crafty. "So I shouted as loud as I could, 'I'll sell at £795'." The price sank. "By now I was pointing at everyone who had bid, but because they thought I was a heavy seller they backed off, only taking 25 tonnes at a time." At the bell, the price fell to £780. That triggered automatic sell orders. At the next session she was able to buy back her stock—plus a few thousand tonnes for her client—on the cheap.
Every trader on the London Metal Exchange probably has a tale to tell of wrong-footed rivals. This story, told in "Ring of Truth", a memoir by Geraldine Bridgewater, the LME's first female trader, is from four decades ago. Little has changed. Traders still sit in a circle (the Ring) and yell orders for copper at each other, just as they have for more than a century. The LME is the only "open outcry" trading venue left in Europe. Its rituals seem as quaint as Morris dancing or the Trooping of the Colour.
Yet somehow the LME retains its relevance. It is now owned by Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX). Ms Bridgewater's big trade was for the People's Republic of China, a client she had shrewdly cultivated. China has since become the LME's biggest source of custom. There is a rival exchange in Shanghai; China dislikes being a taker of prices set beyond its borders. Still, the LME is where the liquidity flows to. Its staying power owes a lot to incumbency—but also to transparency.
Metals-trading in London can be traced back as far as 1571. Back then, it happened alongside other kinds of merchant-trading on the Royal Exchange. A metals-only exchange that traded mostly copper and tin was formalised in 1877, at the peak of British industry's global clout. In those days copper from Chile took three months to reach London. Merchants wanted to lock in the price of a shipment as it left port. That is how three-month futures became a standard. They are still the most traded LME contract today.
Other traditions are observed. Even on a brutally hot day in July everybody is dressed smartly, the men in jackets and ties. The noise rises a little as the bell signals the start of a new session.
Metals are traded in short, timed bursts to enhance liquidity. Traders sit on the red quarter-circle banquettes of the Ring. Account executives (in Ms Bridgewater's day they were simply "clerks") stand behind them straining to hear. They relay each quote, assisted by hand signals, to colleagues standing, with telephones cradled to each ear, in the brokers' booths that make up an outer ring.
It looks chaotic. It certainly sounds it. But it is striking, given the noise, how calm the traders seem. It is essential for them to remain poker-faced. When they need to be heard, they lean forward. In between yells a trader might glance up at the main board, down at his dealing card or at his watch to see exactly how much time is left (the clock on the dealer board does not count seconds). Unlike in the trading pits of Chicago, most sessions are limited to one sort of commodity. And traders sit in the same spot every day.
Is all this fuss and noise strictly necessary? Only perhaps a tenth of trades that are cleared through the LME are agreed on in the Ring. Most are done over the phone or on the LME's electronic trading platform. When HKEX acquired the LME in 2012, it must surely have thought it would soon be rid of the Ring. It is a costly pageant. Screen-based trading has lower overheads and is more profitable for the exchange. A lot of Ring trades are lending or borrowing between odd dates—from next Tuesday to Monday a fortnight hence, say. Only specialists want to make those kinds of bets.
Yet they are needed to underpin a system of daily contracts that extend out to the three-month contract. They are too complex to be carried out on-screen. Daily pricing matters to the miners, smelters and manufacturers who produce or consume the metals being traded. Long-term supply arrangements are based on LME prices. So the Ring survives. It is like a poker room—a loss-leader in a casino full of more profitable slot machines.
Some things have changed: daytime drinking is now banned. But the LME is still the place to find liquidity of the right sort. Trading could scarcely be more transparent (once you can speak the argot). Prices are trusted worldwide. Traders can feint, but must play fair. Tomorrow they will be face-to-face with the same people. You can't help wishing that all financial markets were like this.
JAPANESE BANKS ARE CIRCLING THE DRAIN / THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
| Etiquetas: Banks And Banking, Economics, Interest Rates, Japan, Monetary Policy
Japanese Banks Are Circling the Drain
Three decades of structural pressure from falling interest rates can no longer be escaped
By Mike Bird
After years of low and now negative interest rates, many Japanese banks are circling the drain. Photo: Photo Illustration by Emil Lendof/The Wall Street Journal; Photos: iStock
Banking in a country where almost nobody defaults sounds easy. For Japan's lenders, it is anything but.
After almost three decades of near-zero, zero, and now negative interest-rate policies, Tokyo has pushed its banking system to its limit.
The country's smaller lenders in particular are facing an existential threat to their business models. Located in aging and shrinking prefectures, they lack the ability to increase fee-related incomes that major banks can raise.
Japan has too many banks, and consolidating them into larger players will buy time. But without a wholesale shift in the way it approaches its economic stimulus policies, the banking system will remain under constant pressure.
Since March 2016, shortly after the country's negative interest rate policy was introduced, net income at major banks has declined by a fifth. At regional banks, the decline has been steeper: Net income is a third below its level three years ago.
Practically all of Japan's regional banks have seen their share prices fall in the past 12 months. More than half have had declines exceeding 30%. They have underperformed the broader Japanese market for decades.
At the beginning of 1995, just before the Bank of Japancut its benchmark policy rate to 0.5%, loans by commercial banks with interest rates of below 1% were practically nonexistent. Over 90% of outstanding loans carried an interest rate of 3% or more. Today, 90% of Japanese loans carry an interest rate of less than 2%. The fastest-growing segment is the paltry 0.25% to 0.5% bracket, which has expanded by almost a 10th in the past year.
The interest offered to Japanese depositors, however, shifted much more quickly to very nearly zero. The upshot of this is that profitability held up for a while but now the 1.5 percentage point spread between interest rates on new loans and new time deposits that prevailed in the 1990s has declined to just 0.5 percentage point. Even with the country's rock-bottom default rates, the resulting profits simply aren't sufficient to run a bank.
Some of Japan's major banks have found an apparent workaround, but one with its own serious risks. Those with the expertise and ability to do so have ventured overseas, acquiring assets and lending in currencies without such low interest rates.
Norinchukin Bank, a Japanese cooperative serving farmers and fishermen, has become a leviathan in the market for U.S. and European collateralized loan obligations, investment vehicles that buy up loans to junk-rated companies. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group ,Inc. reported foreign-currency assets of 111.158 trillion yen ($1.049 trillion) in the year to March, a figure that has risen more than 100% in the last 10 years, three times faster than its domestic assets.
Roaming abroad is more difficult for smaller banks, and it would be unwise even if it was possible: Bank for International Settlements research has demonstrated that banks without local operations and local funding were least resilient against shocks when operating overseas.
The precarious position of Japanese banks isn't an example of negative interest rates failing but of them working perfectly well. Central bankers often complain about problems with monetary transmission—often a byword for banks not passing on interest-rate cuts—but Japan's have done so.
Moving beyond the current dangerous impasse will require consolidation. The country has too many banks and too many rules that prevent them from merging. According to the Nomura Research Institute, of the 11 regional banks created by mergers in the past two decades, 10 reduced their operating expenses and nine became more efficient by downsizing.
Critics of Japan's monetary policy would be wrong to imagine that higher interest rates would help either. As with lower rates, the change would take years to filter through, during which time defaults would rise and economic growth would stall.
On their current path, the future looks decidedly bleak. Atrophying profitability is likely to result in more frauds like that of Suruga Bank Ltd., a one-time regional banking star brought low by a document-falsification scandal relating to real-estate loans. If the economy takes a turn for the worse, any rise in bad loans would likely send the weakest players into financial distress—especially those that have extended further into property-market lending in recent years.
In the 1990s, Japan lost a decade of economic progress to a broken banking system. Today, it's running the risk of a repeat.
SPEAKING THE TRUTH TO POWER / PROJECT SYNDICATE
| Etiquetas: Donald Trump, NSA, U.S. Economic And Political, World Economic And Political
Speaking Truth to Power
Many partisans accused President George W. Bush of lying and pressuring the intelligence community to produce intelligence to justify a war that Bush had already chosen. But the situation was complicated, and to understand the problems of speaking truth to power, we must clear away the myths.
Joseph S. Nye, Jr.
CAMBRIDGE – US President Donald Trump's nomination of John Ratcliffe, a highly partisan Congressman with little international experience, to replace Dan Coats as Director of National Intelligence raised the red flag of the politicization of intelligence. Opposition to Ratcliffe among Democrats and Republicans alike forced Trump to withdraw the nomination, but the question remains: Will power corrupt truth? Presidents need an intelligence director they can trust, but can the rest of the government trust that director to speak truth to power, as Coats did when he contradicted the president on issues like Russia, Iran, and North Korea?
Costly intelligence failures are not unique to the United States. France failed to foresee Germany's attack through the Ardennes in 1940; Stalin was blindsided by Hitler's attack in 1941; and Israel was surprised by the Yom Kippur War in 1973.
Trump, who is angry at the US intelligence services for pointing out the degree of Russian interference in his 2016 election, often justifies his dismissal of their work by referring to their inaccurate assessment that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. Many partisans accused President George W. Bush of lying and pressuring the intelligence community to produce intelligence to justify a war that Bush had already chosen. But the situation was complicated, and to understand the problems of speaking truth to power, we must clear away the myths.
As the American weapons inspector David Kay later characterized the estimates of WMD in Iraq, "we were almost all wrong." Even the United Nations' chief inspector, the Swedish diplomat Hans Blix, said he thought that Iraq had "retained prohibited items," and French and German opposition to the Iraq war was not based on different intelligence assessments regarding the weapons. But the US (and British) experience combined failures at three levels: collection, analysis, and public presentation.
Iraq was a difficult target for intelligence collection. Saddam Hussein was a dictator who instilled fear by killing those who talked, including his own son-in-law when he disclosed in 1995 that Saddam had a biological weapons program. The US and the United Kingdom had few reliable spies in Iraq, and they sometimes reported only indirectly on things they had heard but not seen. After the UN inspectors were expelled in 1998, the US lost access to their impartial human intelligence and often filled the vacuum with the tainted testimony of Iraqi exiles who had their own agenda. And neither country had access to Saddam's inner circle, and thus had no direct evidence about the biggest puzzle of all: if Saddam had no weapons, why did he persist in acting as though he did?
Analysis was also weak. The analysts were honest, but, lacking evidence about Saddam's thinking, they tended to succumb to "mirror imaging": they assumed that Saddam would respond the way we (or any "rational" leader) would. Instead, he felt his power at home and in the region depended on his preserving his reputation for possessing WMD. Another problem was the analysts' tendency to overcompensate for their earlier, opposite error.
After the first Gulf War, UN inspectors discovered that Saddam was closer to developing a nuclear weapon than analysts had thought. Vowing not to underestimate Saddam again, the analysts overestimated, a tendency that was reinforced by the trauma of 9/11. In practice, such dominant mental frameworks or "groupthink" should be challenged by a variety of analytical devices such as designating devil's advocates and creating "red teams" to make the case for alternative interpretations, or requiring analysts to ask what change in assumptions would make their analysis wrong. By all accounts, this rarely happened.
So, what role did politics play? The Bush administration did not order intelligence officials to lie, nor did they. But political pressure can subtly skew attention even if it does not directly corrupt intelligence. As a wise veteran explained to me: "We had a big pile of evidence that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, and a smaller pile that he did not. All the incentives were to focus on the big pile, and we did not spend enough time on the smaller pile."
The presentation of intelligence to (and by) political leaders was also flawed. There was little warning that "weapons of mass destruction" was a confusing term in the way it lumped together nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, which in fact have very different characteristics and consequences. The 2002 National Intelligence Estimate cited Saddam's purchase of aluminum tubes as proof that he was reconstituting his nuclear program, but Department of Energy analysts, who had the expertise, disagreed. Unfortunately, their dissent was buried in a footnote that was dropped (along with other caveats and qualifiers) when the executive summary was prepared for Congress and a declassified public version. Political heat melts nuances. The dissent should have been discussed openly in the text.
Political leaders cannot be blamed for the analytical failures of intelligence, but they can be held accountable when they go beyond the intelligence and exaggerate to the public what it says. US Vice President Dick Cheney said there was "no doubt" that Saddam had WMD, and Bush stated flatly that the evidence indicated that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear programs. Such statements ignored the doubts and caveats that were expressed in the main bodies of the intelligence reports.
Trust in intelligence runs in cycles in our democracy. During the Cold War, intelligence officials were often seen as heroes. After Vietnam, they became villains. September 11 restored public recognition that good intelligence is more important than ever, but the failure to find WMD in Iraq renewed suspicion again, and Trump has used it to obscure the problem of Russian interference in American elections.
The lessons for the next American DNI are clear. In addition to the bureaucratic tasks of coordinating budgets and agencies, he (or she) will have to monitor tradecraft in collection of intelligence, defend rigorous use of alternative techniques for analyzing it, and ensure careful presentation to political leaders and the public. Above all, the DNI has a duty to speak truth to power.
Joseph S. Nye, Jr. is a professor at Harvard University and author of Is the American Century Over? and the forthcoming Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump.
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► dic 18


We had the privilege of coming to Guruji's sharan for the first time on His birthday, 7th July 2001. It was one of those magical moments which dreams are made of. Sounds completely out of a fairytale, but it was love at first sight. The Master welcomed my parents and me with open arms and, before we realised, we were sitting amongst the sangat in a mesmerizing environment under the benevolent eyes of the mahapurusha. His aura can't be described or explained; its power can't be defined and His love for His devotees can't be put into words.
I was 18 years old, not an atheist but often questioning the existence of God. I had been reluctant to go to Guruji. My father had already visited Guruji a few times, and upon hearing of his experiences and thanks to his persistence, my mother and I accompanied him to Bade Mandir. Normally, temples have idols of deities and a presiding saintly figure attired in saffron, reciting mantras or giving a lecture on morals. But this Mandir was way different! Its décor was better than that for a royal Indian wedding. Thousands of people flocked to its gates and all had faces lit up with joy and excitement. It seemed we were in for a big surprise. Our lives were going to change dramatically in the next few moments!
As we climbed up the steps to the Mandir and stood in a queue to have Guruji's darshan, we saw a smart young man dressed in an elegant outfit and sitting on a throne, with a radiant glow on His face. People were bowing before him. Had my father not apprised me of Guruji's physical appearance, it may have been difficult for me to accept that He was a guru. And honestly, come that day and come today, I can say one thing with firm conviction and great pride: I have seen God and experienced His immense blessings ever since I have come to His doorstep. This is no ordinary Guru. He is the Creator, Preserver and Destroyer. Whether you call Him Lord Brahma, Vishnu or Shiva, or give Him the title of any other deity you may worship, Guruji is the supreme power that is God. With His unconditional love for the sangat, not only has healed them of misery, suffering, and incurable ailments for which medical science has no answer, literally giving people a new lease of life, He has also assumed the form of deities dear to His devotees—Sai Baba, Shivji, Guru Nanak Devji—and given their divine darshan to His followers. He demonstrated that there is only one God and if we have faith in Him, we don't need to run helter-skelter to seek His blessings.
I initially came to the Mandir with inhibitions and questions in my mind. But by the time I had visited Guruji a couple of times, I was in awe of His aura that surrounded the place. I also observed how different Guruji's way was.
First, Guruji never preached. Neither did He talk about do's and don'ts or give any religious discourses. He did not ask His disciples to abstain from non-vegetarianism or alcohol. All He said was that if one came with complete faith and was in a position to surrender himself or herself to the Almighty, the devotee's life would get sorted out. That's all He asked for.
Second, there was no place for the charity box (the Golak). I found that significant, as it meant my money was not required and validated that all that Guruji wanted from us was complete surrender. We needed to entrust our lives into His hands. Unfortunately these days, India is filled with false prophets who are commercializing spirituality. I thought the absence of the Golak in the Mandir was a logical proposition: We were coming to Guruji to seek the Almighty's blessings, and as His children, we were in no position to offer him anything apart from our devotion.
Third, the sangat at the Mandir was highly educated. It is easy to bring an uneducated person to the same place time and again, as he might go with the herd mentality. But an educated person will only frequent such a place if he sees some rationale in doing so. Ranging from senior politicians to top bureaucrats, corporate honchos to the common man, not only was everyone treated equally at the sangat, with the same amount of dignity and respect, they also shared langar from the same plate. This inculcated humility. I found it appealing that many educated people were willing to shed their egos, sit under one roof, and share food from the same plate in reverence to Guruji. I intuited that there was something miraculous about Guruji's place. Today, I feel I was naïve and immature as I was still judging my Guru, not realising that I had already been blessed to be a part of His sangat.
Guruji often asked His sangat to narrate their experiences. This is satsang, the true narration of the incident being shared with the listeners. ('Sat' is derived from the word Satya, or Truth, and 'Sang' refers to the company; hence, the word means 'in the company of truth' or 'noble company'.) We initially thought Guruji was showing off His powers by asking people to narrate instances where He had blessed them. Only later did we realise that Guruji meant for us to listen to experiences from the horse's mouth itself so that we could realise the intensity of the peril the devotee faced and the tremendous blessings the devotee had received. Satsangs, thus, helped build up our faith. And faith is all Guruji asks of us!
As a family we have had a number of mind-boggling experiences of Guruji's grace. Shortly after we started coming to Guruji, He sent me abroad for my education. A couple of months there and I caught bronchitis. I came back to India for my winter break and tests showed a patch on the lungs. I went back in January 2002 with a complete medical kit, but as luck would have it, the severe winter with the sultry weather did not help. I suffered a severe asthma attack one night soon after I had returned abroad.
I was gasping for breath for at least an hour and a half or two. I tried every possible medication including the inhaler, but to no avail. Sitting alone in my room in the university, I was left with no other choice but to call the ambulance, when I suddenly remembered Guruji. As I did so, I recalled that He had given me one of His personal belongings before I left the country, which was lying in my cupboard. I went and took out this article of His blessing from my wardrobe and touched it to my chest, praying hard to Him. Honestly, it was sheer desperation and a touch of faith that led me to call out to Guruji. The response was immediate. In under two minutes, I was able to breathe normally.
Today, having gone to Guruji for so many years and through so many experiences, the first thought that comes to my mind in any awkward situation is Guruji. But at that point in time, we had been with Guruji for only about six months and our faith had not yet got the time it needed to develop. The day of the asthma attack I did not immediately remember Him—but it has been a decade since, and with Guruji's blessings, I have never needed to use an inhaler. The divine alleviation of the asthma attack was a dual blessing. It not only returned me to health, but it instilled tremendous faith in Guruji within our family.
A couple of months later, Guruji averted a certain accident. I was out on foot and intending to cross a road. Rather than do it at the distant pedestrian crossing, I ran out to the road after ensuring that no vehicle was approaching. Mid-way, I looked to my right to see a car coming at me. By the time I could slow down, and the speeding car brake, its front wheel had run over my foot. I fell back on the ground, my eyes shut, and I instantly saw Guruji's image in my mind's eye. I knew then that it was Guruji who had made me look to the right.
I lay on the road for a good minute or two before I was lifted up by the driver and taken curbside, as I was unable to walk on my own. When the cops and the ambulance arrived and questioned us, they were shocked to believe that during this entire episode, which lasted a good two minutes or so, no other vehicle had passed by. Yet this road was a busy one, running across the city and connecting two highways. In fact, the length of the road where I chose to cross it was approached by an acute turn, which had blindsided me to the car. It seemed unbelievable that no other vehicle had passed by on this typically busy road. Any vehicle coming around that blind curve would have meant certain death for me. Guruji had saved me again!
In December 2010, when we were on a family holiday in Kerala, Guruji did the same for my father. We were at the Tata Tea Estate in Munnar, a remote hill station four hours away from Kochi. My father suddenly had an angina attack. He was sweating profusely and his arm felt heavy—classic symptoms of an impending heart attack. My mom and I immediately asked for medical aid, only to be told that we were in a very remote area, and the closest doctor or ambulance would be at least 15 to 20 minutes away. We requested the people around us to organize whatever aid was best possible and prayed hard to Guruji to come to our rescue. Within minutes, a doctor and a nurse appeared from nowhere. The doctor was carrying a blood-thinner tablet and a Sorbitrate pill (one of the most common medicines used in this scenario). The doctor decided to take my parents in his car, a self-driven Tata Indigo, to the closest hospital, which was still pretty far away. I followed them in our cab, a Toyota Innova. The Innova, by far the more powerful car that was being steered by a professional driver, at around 80-90 km/h, could not keep pace with the doctor's smaller vehicle. I realised that there was no way the doctor's car was being driven by human agency on these curving hill roads. Guruji was at the wheel. In fact, we still do not know how the doctor and nurse landed up at Munnar: No one had actually called for them!
We reached the hospital shortly, and Dad was taken in to the emergency. It was still a small set-up and we were advised to move to Kochi for better medical facilities. Not aware of the area, we took recommendations from passers-by and landed up at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, only later getting to know that this was one of the best hospitals in South India. The eponymous hospital is run in the name of Mata Amritanandmayi (or as she is widely known, the Hugging Mother, or 'Amma'), a spiritual figure of wide renown. Dad was taken into the cardiac unit where all possible tests were carried out; however, no diagnosis was arrived at. The doctor attending on my father left the next morning for his regular monthly visit to Amma's ashram, a four-hour drive away, saying he would return a day later.
But the doctor returned by early evening. He told my dad that something unusual had happened. He was on his way to the Ashram when he got Amma's message 'in his head' that he should return to Kochi and attend to his patient. In the past 17 years since he had been a devotee of Amma, this had never happened to him. By the time he returned to the hospital, my father's problem had been diagnosed and an angioplasty was carried out the same evening.
The next day the doctor went to visit Amma's ashram and was shocked to hear Her enquire about 'the patient from Delhi' (my father). The doctor narrated this upon his return, and the fact that Amma normally never enquired about any patient. He asked us whether we had got any word put in to seek Her blessings, which we had not done at all. Further, after the doctor told Her about my father's health and the line of treatment given, she exclaimed, "Shiv, Shiv!" The doctor had never heard her use that name for the Lord, for Amma is a recipient of Lord Krishna's grace. This was no one else, but my very own Guruji at work!
In another incident, my 'Mama' (maternal uncle) was driving up from Chandigarh to Kasauli. He was thinking about Guruji and felt like listening to His shabads. However, since he did not have any shabad CDs in the car, he listened to one of Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's renditions, 'Tere bin dil nahi lagda soniya.' He began visualizing Guruji. He was driving up and moved to overtake a truck, when he saw another truck approaching from the opposite direction. He was in a Catch-22 situation: If he swerved, the car would plunge down the valley. If he didn't, the car and truck would inevitably collide. He screamed, "Guruji" and his eyes just shut for a moment. The next thing he saw was that he had already overtaken the truck, the accident being averted. In shock, he went a little ahead and stopped the car to gather his breath and thank Guruji.
When he reached Kasauli, passengers from a car behind his, enquired how he had managed the remarkable feat of steering between the two trucks. They told my mama that they saw the car tilt by almost 30 degrees while overtaking the truck. The right tyres of the car had risen up by a good 12 to 18 inches, thus allowing it to go through the narrow gap between the trucks. It was impossible, and yet again Guruji's divine doing, giving my uncle a new lease of life.
Guruji is simply a way of life. Rather than getting into ritualistic behaviour, if we are able to accept Him as the ultimate supreme power, and remember Him in our day to day activities, our lives would be sorted. Guruji often said, "There are no co-incidences, everything is planned." He alone knows what is best for us, and we should reconcile ourselves to this and accept it if we have completely surrendered our lives to him. It may be easier said than done, but we need to adopt the attitude of 'Teri raza vich raazi' (Your desire is my command). Guruji always said: "Mango nahi... Manno," which means that we should not petition Him for things as our vision is narrow and our mental horizon limited. What we should do is believe in Him because He knows what is best for us in the long run. It is only He who can not only see the past, present and future, but also has the ability to alter the future-something completely out of the hands of human beings—and one which only God Almighty can do.
I feel fully blessed to be a part of Guruji's sangat—I have no words to express my good fortune Life has completely changed for the good after coming to Him. His magnanimity and love for His devotees is unparalleled. He takes care of the smallest of issues and smoothens out this otherwise rough journey of life. Not only does He forgive our wrong karmas by negating the repercussions or minimizing them completely, He blesses us at every step and takes care of us through every stage in life.
Devotees, therefore, come to be in a position to narrate the satsangs they have experienced. However, we have no idea about the many instances where Guruji has not let mishaps occur in the first place. I have no words to thank Guruji for calling us to his sharan, His divine sanctuary, accepting us as His devotees and taking complete charge of our lives. Jai Guruji!


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text:
A Teenaged Gathering
1. Historian M G Sasibhooshan has written several popular and useful accounts of traditional Kerala visual arts. He has also written essays on some of the lesser known aspects of Kerala (and occasionally Indian) history from a firmly right-of-center viewpoint. Here is a curious quote:
"The decline of Indian Civilization began in the 10th and 11th centuries. Royal priests seriously took up Tantrism. They often took the five Makaras of Tantrism (meat, fish, parched grain, liquor and copulation) too literally. Incorporating them into religious practices could lead to the attainment of some special powers but they also led to the country losing its manly valor. This emasculation led to determined enemies easily taking over India.
Indeed Shaktism has a sinister aspect; and one sees an overdose of it at the Konark and Khajuraho temples. It is not enough to view the (erotic) carvings there as works of art alone. Indeed such a perspective can lead to dangerous oversimplifications; some of the carvings might be explained as depicting the Siva-Sakti union but there are others which show ritual practices. I am of the opinion that these temples mark the decline into decadence of a great civilization."
2. At a Tamil-owned restaurant on a highway near Cochin, a shelf of Malayalam books were put up for sale - a smart move directed at car travelers. Here is a glimpse - Mein Kampf and Anne Frank's diary sit on either side of a children's novel by 'Painkili Master' Muttathu Varkey:
The cover of the Mal Mein Kampf clearly says: "For each word in this book, 125 lives were lost. Every page herein killed 47000 people..."
3. The 'Makara' is a mythical beast - half terrestrial animal and the other half fish or bird. It has an all-Asia presence. Even the Greek Capricorn - half goat and half fish - is usually identified with the Makara.
Among the many adornments and attributes our Tradition endows Vishnu with, the strangest are the 'Makara Kundalas' - Makara earrings. I had not even a ghost of an idea as to how earrings could have anything to do with such fantastic beasts - until I saw the grand 'Anantasayana' mural on the inner wall of the Western Gopuram of the Ettumanur Siva temple. Here is a detail. Look at those earrings, Larry!
4. The paintings of Willam Adolphe Bouguerou may be formulaic; and they may fall way short of transcendental greatness; but they have charm (by way of analogy, a Bouguerou is more mellifluous and sweetly amorous film song than profound Pancharatna kriti). And I am a fan. So I was much pleased to see in a glass and picture frame shop, a freshly done painting of Krishna and Rukmini dreamily afloat among iridescent clouds. As shown in the diptych below, it is a very desi adaptation of the Frenchman's 'Psyche and Eros' (the changes made go well beyond the clothing) and represents to me, kitsch at its nicest...
5. As a teenager long ago, I read the following remarkable passage on Indian jewelry in Britannica (1980s edition) - the article 'Dress and Adornment':
"Extensive documentation on ancient jewels is provided by Buddhist statues and the cycles of wall paintings in the Ajanta caves (5th century AD). The great variety of types of jewelry indicates the high degree of development attained by the art of jewelry-making in one of the most magnificent of ancient civilizations, the Indus, and the wealth and variety of deposits of precious and semiprecious stones to be found in India. Indian women were thus the first to decorate themselves with huge quantities of jewels - so many that they were almost fully clothed without wearing any real garments. The clothing of these lovely Indian girls consisted of tiaras, necklaces, earrings, armlets, bracelets, belts, cache sexe (serving the same function as a loincloth) anklets and toe rings, worn on their bare skin and complemented by (practically nothing else)... a woman's belt found at Harappa (3rd millennium BC) used to be worn on the bare body of the woman extending down from the waist for but a few inches..."(*)
What made me recall and then search and find this passage after all these years was seeing this Dwarapala sculpture on the Vyttila temple Gopuram:
Note: Last year, I wrote here: "in his Nataraja form, Siva is almost always shown wearing cycling shorts-like breeches. The Dwarapalas (guardian figures who flank doorways in temples) too usually wear them".
One guesses that a recent repainting/overpainting activity took away the Vytila dwarapala's breeches. Let me also mention that the same treatment has been meted out to some (even more heavily ornamented) female figures on the same gopuram as well.
6. Among the hundreds of hefty DK volumes is the hulking 'Millennium: 20th Century Day by Day', 1500+ pages and 7+ kilos of 'the lazy pleasure of erudition' (to borrow a phrase from Jorge Luis Borges). The tome is also a source of serious wisdom: for instance, I discovered in this book that many more political leaders and other luminaries were assassinated in early 20th century than in the early 21st (for instance in Czarist Russia in Feb 1905, a certain Grand Duke Sergey had a bomb filled with nails dropped in his lap). Even the hoi polloi seem to have had it somewhat worse in those days than now - the long and painful path taken by the Suffragette movement in England is a case in point.
And consider this entry from 1910: "A Chinese army occupies and loots Lhasa forcing the Dalai Lama to flee to India. He returned from exile in Peking only two months back, having fled there when British troops arrived in Lhasa in 1904". Note that we are not reading here about the present His Holiness. Isn't it actually reassuring to note that History is essentially cyclic - but for the World actually getting a wee bit better over a few turns of the Old Wheel?
7. There is something unique about Kochi's traffic jams. Everyday I see many city buses among the hundreds of vehicles stuck at each bottleneck; and practically every single such bus has empty seats. One is tempted to guess: if only Kochiites switch to their old way of commuting by bus from the present preference for cars or taxis or mobikes, the city's traffic woes would largely melt away (in other words, Kochi's traffic congestion seems more life-style disease than inevitable byproduct of economic growth).
(*) While the titillation it offers is very real, this Britannica passage fantastically mixes Harappa and Ajanta (which lie almost 3000 years apart!) and from that cocktail, conjures up a (somewhat virtual) India teeming with bejeweled and unclad maidens.
posted by R.Nandakumar @ 10:18 AM
The First Quarter - Images
'Tale-less' Tales - 2
Mysterious Emperor, Mysterious Idols
Veda to Bhrantan
From Here and There
Maveli and Metro - an Onam Survey
An August Miscellany
Allahabad - Impressions
"Tap .... Donnng!"

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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East Stand shortlisted at Mixology19
We are proud to announce that the East Stand Development at Twickenham Stadium has been shortlisted at Mixology19 Awards in the category 'Bar & Leisure Interiors Project of the Year'.
The East Stand Development includes six new floors creating eight signature food and beverage hospitality and debenture offerings for 6,800 fans.
The new spaces include The Gate, The Union Ale House, The Lock 4, The Lock 5, The Clubhouse, The East Wing and British Airways Rose Garden.
KSS were lead designers and architects for the East Stand development working with Wildfire London on the interior design concept and delivery.
Each space is used vertically to cater for a variety of events from wine rooms, private dining and a spectacular rooftop bar with open terraces looking out onto the hallowed turf of Twickenham.
Each level is distinctive in its design, from raw to refined materials used throughout the spaces, celebrating and bringing to life the unique aspects of the home of England Rugby. Delivering a truly bespoke destination experience for fans that goes far beyond a simple banqueting space.
We look forward to Mixology19 Awards ceremony at Old Billingsgate, London on 20 June 2019.
For more information: http://www.mixology-awards.com/mixology19-finalists-announced/
Twickenham Stadium's East Stand opens
East Stand shortlisted at Stadium Business Awards


text:
Q: Implementing a simple counter in Android Im trying yo implement a counter. There will be a place to show the count, and 2 buttons (++ & --).
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    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:inputType="text"
    android:text="@string/cero" />

<Button
    android:id="@+id/button1"
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:layout_alignLeft="@+id/Edittext1"
    android:layout_below="@+id/Edittext1"
    android:layout_marginTop="16dp"
    android:onClick="onClick"
    android:text="@string/mas" />
<Button
    android:id="@+id/button2"
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:layout_alignBottom="@+id/button1"
    android:layout_toRightOf="@+id/button1"
    android:layout_marginTop="16dp"
    android:onClick="onClick"
    android:text="@string/menos" />

But it is not working. Im very new in Android and I dont get to see what im doing wrong.
public class MainActivity extends Activity implements OnClickListener {

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
    //View boton1 = findViewById(R.id.button1);
    //boton1.setOnClickListener(this);
    //View boton2 = findViewById(R.id.button2);
    //boton2.setOnClickListener(this);
}

@Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
    // Inflate the menu; this adds items to the action bar if it is present.
    getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.main, menu);
    return true;
}

@Override
public void onClick(View v) {
    TextView texto = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.Edittext1);
    int n = Integer.parseInt(texto.getText().toString());
    switch(v.getId())
    {
        case R.id.button1: texto.setText("case1");
            n++;
            break;
        case R.id.button2: texto.setText("case2");
            n--;
            break;
        default: texto.setText("default");
    }
    texto.setText(n);

}

}
When I run the app, it stops suddenly (unexpectly) when I click for the second time.
Can anyone give a little help? thanks for your time!

A:  texto.setText(n);

This is your mistake. n is an int values. setText looks for a resource with the id. if not found you get ResourceNotFoundException.
You are using this public final void setText (int resid) instead of public final void setText (CharSequence text)
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/widget/TextView.html
Change to
 texto.setText(String.valueOf(n));

Also
EditText text0;
@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
texto = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.Edittext1);

http://developer.android.com/reference/android/widget/TextView.html
Although casting edittext to textview is not a problem i suggest you change to  texto = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.Edittext1);
There is no need to initialize edittext everytime on button click.
Also remove implements OnClickListener coz you have android:onClick="onClick"

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Home | Gadgets | Best e-readers for 2023
Best e-readers for 2023
by Leo Beamers Nov 28, 2022 Updated Dec 8, 2022
If you aren't ready to take a big book into public and you don't want to sit and read on your phone, tablet or laptop then there are some great e-readers out there for you nowadays. Here are some of the e-readers i recommend you to check out.
Why should i buy an e-reader
You may think, why do I need an e-reader if I already have an electronic device? Well, e-readers sole purpose is to be able to store up to thousands of books or stories into a very lightweight, easily accessible tablet that you can whip out whenever you fancy a read.
E-readers also don't come with apps on it so you won't have things like emails, social media or anything like that distracting you or tempting you during your reading sessions. You'll also be able to read hours on end and much longer than if you were to read on your phone for example.
Another positive to having an e-reader over a regular device is that the E Ink Displays actually look like printed paper thanks to its suspended layer and non-glossy screen which would be much kinder on the eyes if your sensitive to that sort of thing or if you just prefer the paper aesthetic whilst you're reading. The screens also come in handy when you're reading in the sun because the screens are glare-free which will definitely be an upgrade over regular device screens which are super hard to use when in direct sunlight. The books that you can read on your e-readers are also very accessible and can be bought at low prices and some can even be downloaded for free.
Some people do like to have a nice physical book collection at home that they can be proud of but when it comes to travelling it can be hard to choose which books to take with you, so why not take all of them thanks to an e-reader. E-readers make it super easy to travel wherever and whenever with all your favourite books super accessible. All of these best e-readers come with self-illuminated screens so you never have to be worried about not having a reading light for when you're trying to read in the dark.
Top 5 e-readers
Without further adieu, here are some of the best e-readers for 2023 and a bit of information about them that you should know before deciding on which option you would want to purchase.
Amazon Kindle (2022 model)
The past generations of Kindle have been widely known for being an excellent option as an entry-level e-reader but with Amazon's latest 2022 release it has definitely seen an upgrade within the e-reader ranks. The Amazon Kindle comes standard at $100 dollars with a 6-inch screen which makes it a bit lighter and smaller than the step up version of this Kindle which is the Kindle Paperwhite, available at $140 instead. Although the Kindle may be smaller and lighter, don't let it fool you, it is still very capable, the Kindle has the same 300 ppi resolution as the Paperwhite but that is where the similarities stop. The Paperwhite does have a few upgrades over this regular Kindle like the added waterproofing as well as the 17 LEDs which make the front lighting scheme a lot more sophisticated than the Kindle's four LEDs.
In the past, the Paperwhite has always been worth the few extra dollars if you could afford it but this year with the added upgrades to the Kindle it may not be so anymore. With both Kindles having the same display, in terms of the resolution, it may not be so wise to spend that extra 40 dollars on the Paperwhite, especially when the Kindle is known to see some big discounts on its price during the holiday seasons.
Kindle Paperwhite (2021 model)
The new Kindle above really makes a compelling competitor against the Paperwhite thanks to its new display resolution that now matches that of the Paperwhites. So the gap between these two e-readers has definitely been made a lot smaller and the Kindle has become a much more appealing entry-level e-reader option but although the Kindle may be the better entry-level option for some, there is no denying that the Paperwhite gives off a much more premium and durable feel to it. The Paperwhite also has a few features to it that really gives it the edge over the regular Kindle like the bigger screen, waterproofing and its LED lights which give it a more sophisticated lighting scheme.
There are three different Paperwhite models that are available to you, a base model and then the Signature Edition, which gives you added upgrades like wireless charging, 32GB of storage instead of the standard 8GB with the base model and you even get auto-adjusting light sensors. This all comes at a little higher price as well, at $190 dollars which may be a bit high for most people just looking for their first, entry-level e-reader. The third type of Paperwhite model that you can get is the Kids Edition. Just like the Kindle, the Paperwhite is often seen on sale and could cost as low as under $100 during these periods so you should definitely be on the lookout for those if you aren't ready to spend so much.
The Kindle Oasis is one of Amazon's best E Ink e-readers that they have out right now and it actually got a little bit of an upgrade during 2019. When you compare the new Kindle Oasis with the predecessor you'll see that they are extremely similar, almost identical even, apart from one big thing, the new colour-adjustable integrated light. This new light feature basically allows you to change the tone of the light that your Kindle is exerting from cool to warm, depending on whether you'll be reading during the day or during the night. This can also be set to change automatically at certain times like sunrise and sunset if you don't want to go through the hassle of changing it yourself every time. If you own an Apple device you may understand how this works because it works exactly like the Night Shift feature that you have on your device.
At $250 dollars, you will be able to get the most basic Kindle Oasis, which is definitely not inexpensive for an e-reader. For most avid readers it would be completely fine to opt for the more affordable types of e-readers like the Kindle Paperwhite to satisfy their needs. However, if you are a reader who knows exactly what they want and that is the best of the best when it comes to e-readers then it may just be for you if you are prepared to pay those extra dollars. There is another option within this price range that gives similar performance and a bigger 8 inch screen compared to the 7 and that is the Kobo Forma, so that might be worth checking out if you'd be interested in getting a bigger screen size.
The company responsible for manufacturing this line of e-readers, the Kobo Libras, is Rakuten. Since they're owned by Rakuten they are powered by the Kobo store, which is where you can purchase ebooks and other things similar to that. However, don't think that you'll only be able to purchase from the Kobo store, the Kobo Libra still supports the regular 14 file and the native ebook formats (EPUB, EPUB3, PDF, MOBI, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, TXT, HTML, RTF, CBZ and CBR). If you aren't knowledgeable in the e-readers world and don't understand a word that was said it basically means that if you get an ebook from anywhere besides Amazon you'll be able to read it on the Kobo Libra 2 as well. You may have heard that on a Kindle you are able to take out an ebook from a library via OverDrives Libby app however it is a super complicated process and therefore isn't very popular amongst users. The Kobo Libra 2 has managed to find a way to do this extremely smoothly as it has built-in support for you to check out ebooks from all your favourite local libraries, also via the OverDrive service.
The Kobo Libra 2 comes at a similar price to that of the Kindle Paperwhite Signature Edition, $180, which is actually $10 less. This price places this e-reader right in the middle of e-readers and just like the model that came before it, the Libra H20, it's actually 100% waterproof and comes with a pretty decent, 7 inch 1,680×1,264 pixel, display. It doesn't just stop there though, the display is also an E Ink display which comes with a built-in light and not a single ad. A downside to the Kindles is that you'll need to pay $20 in order to remove the ads which just adds a cost on top of its initial price which many don't appreciate.
In the past there was a Kindle DX which was 9.7 inches in size and there was quite a market for it, readers who loved to read on a bigger screen but sadly this Kindle has been discontinued for quite a few years now, leaving these readers longing for a bigger sized e-reader. There have been a few brands, such as Sony, who have tried to reproduce this subgenre of large e-readers but none have been quite as successful and are often very expensive. Kobo Elipsa is one of those that are trying to fill this large e-reader niche for the market and comes with its 10.3 inch display. The Kobo Elipsa is often purchased as a package called the "Elipsa Pack" which includes a SleepCOver and stylus with the e-reader. Despite the screen being pretty large compared to other e-readers it still has a sharp display which makes it very easy to read. The large display is an E Ink Carta 1200 touchscreen, which has a 227 ppi resolution (1,404×11,872) and even comes with a dark mode to make it less strainful on your eyes when you're reading whilst it's dark.
The Kobo Elipsa comes with some really good stats on the internals of this e-reader such as its 1.8GHz processor and 32GB of storage. However, if you are used to using a stylus or pen on an iPad then you'll be very disappointed with the performance of this e-reader because it will definitely feel a lot slower than you're used to. Another excellent feature that this e-reader is known for is its amazing battery life which is rated in weeks rather than hours like most other e-readers. Just like the other Kobo e-readers it doesn't support Amazon ebooks but does support 15 different formats natively (EPUB, EPUB3, FlePub, PDF, MOBI, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, TXT, HTML, RTF, CBZ, CBR).
With the added size of this e-reader it is understandable that it is on the heavier side relative to other e-readers and weighs in at 383 grams, excluding the case and stylus which would add even more weight. The advantage that the case does offer is that you'll be able to use it to prop up the Kobo Elipsa so that you won't have to hold it anyways whilst you're reading, taking notes or whatever. The bigger size display definitely isn't everyone's preference when it comes to e-readers but if you are into this type of genre of e-readers then this is definitely an option worth checking out.
Many people may have the misconception that e-readers are essentially the same as a screen from your device but this is so wrong, an e-reader actually uses an E Ink screen so that you're able to read for a much longer time without your brain being hurt by the radiation which you get from looking at a LCD or OLED screen for too long. So, do yourself a favour and invest in an e-reader.
Tagged: amazon kindle, e-readers, Kindle


Updates: Mark's TechEd Sessions, Autoruns v11.61, Strings v2.52, ZoomIt v4.5 | SQL Server, SQL Articles and more!
Mark's TechEd Sessions Available On-Demand: Mark delivered four top-rated sessions at Microsoft's TechEd US conference two weeks ago, and the recordings are available now for on-demand viewing. In Windows Azure Infrastructure Services, he gives an overview of the deployment and operation of Virtual Machines and Virtual Networks; in Windows Azure Internals Mark goes under the hood of Windows Azure to show its physical and logical datacenter architecture and operation; in Case of the Unexplained you'll see how to use the Sysinternals tools to solve impossible problems; and in Malware Hunting with the Sysinternals Tools you'll learn how to use Sysinternals tools to identify and clean malware infestations.
Autoruns v11.61: Autoruns is a utility for managing autostarting applications, DLLs and services. This update adds more autostart locations, fixes a bug that could cause a crash when Autorunsc is directed to calculate file hashes, and fixes a bug in Autoruns' jump-to-image functionality on 64-bit Windows.
Strings v2.52: This release fixes a bug that prevented the previous one from running on Windows XP.
Zoomit v4.5: Zoomit is a screen zooming and annotation tool for technical presentations. This release introduces better support for zooming in on Windows 8 Windows Store applications.
This entry was posted in Autoruns, mark Russinovich live, Strings, ZoomIT on 20th June 2013 by admin.


text:
Top 5 Must See Movies for March 2017
Home > Adelaide > Cinema | Family | Fun for Children | Fun Things To Do | Lists
by Barry J (subscribe)
Weekends were created to inspire spontaneous smiles, new friendships and fun-filled adventures. Every weekend deserves a Weekend Note. Discover more by subscribing or clicking the 'Like' link at the end of the article.
Published February 28th 2017
Beastly Batman with Jasper, a mutant and a lobbyist?
Beauty and the Beast (image by Walt Disney Pictures)
Once you've discovered the actual winner of Best Picture in the Oscars, return to the cinema with these top 5 films opening in March.
Beauty and the Beast – March 23
Rated PG for some action, violence, peril and frightening images
Of all the adaptations of Beauty and the Beast, the enduring 18th century French fairy tale, the 1991 Disney animated film is perhaps the most loved. Disney is now retelling the love story in a live film for a new audience.
The story begins with a young prince, punished by a magical spell for his cruelty toward a beggar. Trapped in his castle and transformed into a beast, he must find true love before adulthood to be freed. Belle (Emma Watson), a curious adventurer, becomes lost in the forest, lured into the beast's castle where she is imprisoned by his staff of magical household items. After initial rejection, the beast and Belle begin to fall in love but jealousies and fears threaten them before the spell can be lifted.
The film also stars Kevin Kline as Belle's father, Ewan McGregor as the candelabra and Emma Thompson as the teapot. The original 1991 film featured Academy Award-winning music by composer Alan Menken. He also provides the score for this film, accompanied by new music from Tim Rice (The Lion King, Evita, AIDA).
Logan (image by 20th Century Fox)
Logan – March 2
Rated MA15 for strong bloody violence
Logan, the third in the trilogy of Wolverine films and the 10th X-Men adventure, is set in 2029, 2 decades after the last birth of a mutant.
Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) struggles with the apparent death of the mutant cause, wasting his days with alcohol, surviving only to aid an ailing Professor X (Patrick Stewart), afflicted with increasingly violent visions. When he's compelled to protect a young mutant girl from Transigen, a project cloning mutants, the real excitement begins in his last epic battle against the Reavers.
Logan also stars Richard E. Grant, Boyd Holbrook, Stephen Merchant.
Miss Sloane (image by Paramount Pictures)
Miss Sloane – March 2
Rated M for coarse language and sex scene
Inspired by the real-life drama of Washington D.C., Miss Sloane is a political thriller delving behind the scenes of the political battles fought by lobbyists to determine the future of society's biggest issues.
Miss Sloane, the ice queen of Capitol Hill lobbyists, is enlisted to cripple gun control legislation before an opposing lobby group convinces her to switch sides, beginning an ugly war of threats and scandals in a series of dialogues reminiscent of the West Wing.
Miss Sloane stars Jessica Chastain in the Golden Globe-nominated lead role, John Lithgow as a sleazy senator, Mark Strong and Gugu Mbatha-Raw.
Jasper Jones (image by Porchlight Films)
Jasper Jones – March 2
Rated M for mature themes and coarse language
Based on the award-winning 2009 novel by Craig Silvey, Jasper Jones begins in a mining town in Western Australia in the 1960s.
Charlie Bucktin (Levi Miller (Red Dog: True Blue) is woken by a panicked Jasper Jones (Aaron L. McGrath), a teen with White-Aboriginal heritage, after discovering the body of his dead 14-year-old girlfriend. Charlie agrees to help Jasper find the killer as the police target him as a suspect.
When they confront Mad Jack Lionel (Hugo Weaving), the town's eccentric recluse, they discover the truth of Laura's final moments and a town secret that dramatically changes their lives.
The film, based on an award-winning script by Silvey and Shaun Grant, also stars Toni Collette.
The Lego Batman Movie (image by Warner Bros. Pictures)
The Lego Batman Movie – March 30
Rated PG for mild themes and animated violence
Returning to the world of Lego after the 1994 hit movie, The Lego Batman Movie features the caped crusader taking the lead role in a blocky, fun adventure.
In this sequel, Batman battles his most maniacal enemy, the Joker, as Gotham City is once more in mortal danger from a range of outlandish villains, including the Riddler, Harley Quinn, Two Face, Catwoman and Bane. While Batman broods as the archetypical strong, silent type, an equally outlandish cast of heroes, including Superman, Robin, Batgirl, the Flash and the Green Lantern, emerges to help him find a sense of humour amid a fast pace of gags and action, leading Lego Batman to exclaim "It was off the chain!"
The movie stars a long list popular actors lending their voices, with Will Arnett (Arrested Development) as Batman, Zach Galifianakis as Joker, Michael Cera, Rosario Dawson, Ralph Fiennes, Mariah Carey, Siri (iPhone) in her/its debut role, Conan O'Brien, Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill.
Bonus pick:
Kong: Skull Island – March 9
Kong: Skull Island discovers King Kong's beginnings on an isolated island explored by a team of adventurers. Starring Tom Hiddleston (The Avengers), Samuel L. Jackson (Avengers: Age of Ultron), Brie Larson (Room,Trainwreck), John Goodman ("Transformers: Age of Extinction) and John C. Reilly (Guardians of the Galaxy).
Which movie tops your list for March? Please let us know with a comment.
subscribe to Barry J's articles
Why? Escape into the cinema in March
When: Various session times
Where: Theatres throughout Australia
Family (subscribe)
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Fun Things To Do (subscribe)
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More articles by Barry J
The Best Family Camping Destinations in Victoria
The Best Family Camping Destinations in NSW
Top 10 Tunnels in Melbourne
Top 10 Must See Movies for 2017
More Top Free Things to Do in Melbourne - April 2018
Top 5 Must See Movies for August 2016
View all articles by Barry J
Some pretty good movies out at the moment and still to come.
1 reply reply
by RC (score: 3|1221) 1421 days ago
Stamford Town Centre (London)


text:
Q: ArgumentOutOfRangeException in dropdown from c# I have two dropdown lists one static(Requested) another one is dynamic(Response)."Response" is depends on the "Requested" dropdown list.I am new to dot new framework.I don't no I go a exception in my code.
Ord.aspx
     <%@ Page Title="" Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeBehind="o1.aspx.cs" Inherits="C.Portal.ord" %>
    <asp:Content ID="Content1" ContentPlaceHolderID="head" runat="server">

                        <asp:Label ID="Label0" runat="server" Text="Requested:* " />

                            <asp:RequiredFieldValidator ID="v1" ControlToValidate="ddlreq1" CssClass="error" InitialValue="" Display="Dynamic" SetFocusOnError="true" runat="server">
                                Please select request

                            </asp:RequiredFieldValidator>

                            <asp:DropDownList ID="ddlreq1" Width="100%"
                                TabIndex="15" AutoPostBack="true"
                                onselectedindexchanged="ddlRequest_SelectedIndexChanged" runat="server">
                                <asp:ListItem></asp:ListItem>
                                <asp:ListItem>Req1</asp:ListItem>
                                <asp:ListItem>Req2</asp:ListItem>
                            </asp:DropDownList>

                        <asp:Label ID="Label1" runat="server" Text="Response :* " />

                            <asp:RequiredFieldValidator ID="v2" ControlToValidate="ddlresp" CssClass="error" InitialValue="" Display="Dynamic" SetFocusOnError="true" runat="server">
                                Please select a color

                            </asp:RequiredFieldValidator>
                            <asp:UpdatePanel ID="UpdatePanel1" runat="server">
                                <ContentTemplate>
                                    <asp:DropDownList ID="ddlresp" DataTextField="ddlText" Width="100%" TabIndex="16" runat="server" />
                                 </ContentTemplate>
                                <Triggers>
                                    <asp:AsyncPostBackTrigger ControlID="ddlreq1" EventName="SelectedIndexChanged" />
                                </Triggers>
                             </asp:UpdatePanel>

    </asp:Content>

Ord.aspx.cs
 using System;
    using System.Collections.Generic;
    using System.Linq;
    using System.Web;
    using System.Web.UI;
    using System.Web.UI.WebControls;
    using System.Data;
    using System.Web.Security;
    using System.Configuration;
    using System.Data.SqlClient;
    using System.Net.Mail;

    namespace C.Portal
    {
        public partial class ord : System.Web.UI.Page
        {
             protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
            {
            // other code
            if (!IsPostBack)
                {
                DataSet Color = new DataSet();
             Color.ReadXml(MapPath("Project/Color.xml"));
             ddlresp.DataSource = Color;
                  ddlresp.DataBind();
                }

            }
            protected void ddlRequest_SelectedIndexChanged(object sender, EventArgs e)
            {
             if (ddlRequest.SelectedValue != "")
              {
                var requestMatrix = (from f in db.RequestMatrixes
                                       where f.Type == ddlRequest.SelectedValue
                                       select f).SingleOrDefault();
                 if (!requestMatrix.testcolor)
                    {
                        ddlresp.SelectedValue = "None";
                        ddlresp.Enabled = false;
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        ddlresp.SelectedIndex = 0; // here I got a exception
                        ddlresp.Enabled = true;
                    }
                }
            }

        }
    }

I my code exception details: Response dropdown list not loaded.HOw to load the response dropdown list? some help me.
ddlresp' has a SelectedIndex which is invalid because it does not exist in the list of items.
Parameter name: value
Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code.
Exception Details: System.ArgumentOutOfRangeException: 'ddlresp' has a SelectedIndex which is invalid because it does not exist in the list of items.
Parameter name: value
Source Error:
An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.
Stack Trace:
[ArgumentOutOfRangeException: 'ddlresp' has a SelectedIndex which is invalid because it does not exist in the list of items.
Parameter name: value]

A: You need to bind the ddlresp after assigning DataSource using the DataBind() method. If you do not call DataBind the dropdown wont have any items in it and setting SelectedIndex will throw exception
You may also put it in !Page.IsPostBack block if you need it state.
protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
   if(!Page.IsPostBack)
   {
     // other code
     DataSet Color = new DataSet();
     Color.ReadXml(MapPath("Project/Color.xml"));
     ddlresp.DataSource = Color;
     ddlresp.DataBind();
   }
}

Edit Your html seems invalid as well, you have tr with table tag.
Put both dropdowns in UpdatePanel, you may put your table in UpdatePanel.


Despite the cover being partially ripped off by high winds and the dashboard filled with snow, it started after only a second of cranking.
I'm especially impressed because the dashboard clock runs 24/7, so I expected a weak battery or something.
1) It hadn't run in a month (in the summer this isn't a big deal, but it still takes just a little cranking to wake it up).
2) I have no idea where Neutral is. The front brake is locked. I only tonight realized that this is somewhat common and the resolve is to bleed the brake or run the bike for about a mile. The reason that this is a problem is that if in gear the engine tries to start while also powering the transmission. That's hard on the bike in the summer, let alone the cold.
The easiest resolve here will be to figure out how to convince starting fluid into the impressively well sealed carb system. Once the engine fires I can then free the front brake, get it onto a trailer, then off to safety.
In the meantime, the scooter is the winner!