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miércoles, octubre 31, 2018
SPOTTING THE BLACK SWANS: THE NEXT CRISIS COULD START A LONG WAY FROM NEW YORK / THE ECONOMIST
| Etiquetas: Black Swans, China, Economics, Emerging Markets, Global Economy
Spotting the black swans
The next crisis could start a long way from New York
The recovery of the rich world now threatens overextended developing economies.
TURKEY'S LARGEST city, Istanbul, is intimately linked to the Bosporus. In the year 324AD, the emperor Constantine established a new capital for the Roman empire on the western side of the strait of water that connects the Black Sea with the Aegean. The location was perfect: easily defensible and strategically invaluable, at the hinge between Europe and Asia.
If one Bosporus is a strategic asset, two are even better, reasoned Suleiman the Magnificent, sultan of the Ottoman empire in the 16th century. So he proposed to dig a canal to Istanbul's west, providing a second sea route across the Eurasian isthmus. His plan did not come to fruition, but it is back on the agenda now. In 2011 Recep Tayyip Erdogan, another Turkish leader with grand visions, announced a $20bn project called "Kanal Istanbul" to provide a route parallel to the existing strait. It is an example of what Mr Erdogan himself has called "crazy projects": monumental building feats to reflect the greatness of his regime.
No one is sure if the canal will be finished. But the economic tailwinds that made such grandiose plans possible have abated, so Turkey is now facing an economic reckoning which could threaten the canal's completion and is starting to threaten other emerging markets, too. After the global financial crisis, money draining away from stricken advanced economies flooded into emerging markets. Some of them borrowed too enthusiastically and kept an imprudently loose rein on banks and firms.
The recovery of the rich world, and the withdrawal of monetary support, now threatens those overextended developing economies. Every struggling emerging market founders in its own way, and Turkey's troubles have been exacerbated by its own particular economic and political woes. But the broad shift in financial conditions that is now squeezing the emerging world will inevitably induce some familiar crises.
Business cycles are a matter of feedback loops. In good times, people spend and invest more. Asset prices rise, worries about risk recede, and banks open their credit taps. Easier credit underpins spending and investment, and on the cycle goes. Governments try to moderate booms but often overdo or underdo it. Eventually some error flips the cycle from expansion to contraction. Nervous consumers cut back, firms shelve investment plans, asset prices fall and banks curtail credit. Lending which looked sensible one day becomes a danger to the economy the next.
The integration of the global financial system has turned national financial systems into a vast single sea of money that rises and falls with changes in saving and investment around the world. In the 2000s, for example, the international banking system channelled massive savings accumulated by oil exporters and large emerging markets into rich-world property markets. If such shifting tides are mismanaged, they almost invariably cause economic trouble. Today, the tide is on the move again.
It is most easily observed in the emerging world. Developing countries bounced back from the global financial crisis relatively quickly, buoyed by an explosive Chinese recovery. As quantitative easing in advanced economies depressed the yield on rich-world bonds, investors increasingly looked to the emerging world for better returns. The double boost of Chinese demand and rich-world capital threatened to create unmanageable credit booms in some emerging economies, which have long viewed such inflows of capital with a wary eye. Reversals in the past often left the unlucky ones with piles of unaffordable debt.
The recent experience of some developing countries such as Turkey may foreshadow a return of the sort of woes experienced by emerging Asia in the late 1990s. Turkey has been running a large current-account deficit (indicating heavy reliance on capital flows from abroad), has borrowed heavily in dollars and has an alarmingly low level of foreign-exchange reserves. A loss of market confidence could lead to a dramatic depreciation, waves of defaults and painful adjustments in the Turkish economy. Turkey is not big enough to cause global economic trouble all on its own. But should the forces squeezing Turkey drag down a broader swathe of emerging economies, governments around the world could have a serious problem on their hands.
In the past, torrents of money from abroad proved irresistible to governments in the emerging world. Most have since learned to borrow more carefully and in local currency, and to accumulate a war chest of foreign-exchange reserves. Even so, borrowing by emerging-market firms (not banks) through issuance of dollar-denominated bonds has increased by an average of more than 10% per year since the financial crisis. It has roughly doubled in Brazil and Mexico, tripled in South Africa and Indonesia, and quadrupled in Chile and Argentina, according to a recent analysis published by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS).
Borrowing from abroad has gone hand in hand with large current-account deficits; net flows of foreign money into a country allow it to consume more than it produces. But as the American economy has strengthened and the Fed has tightened, capital flows into America have grown and the dollar has appreciated. The first big round of post-crisis appreciation took place in 2014, in the wake of the "taper tantrum", as the Fed phased out the stimulative bond-buying it had undertaken in the early 2010s. As a result, emerging-market currencies dropped and growth in trade, borrowing and GDP slowed. Now monetary policy across rich economies is becoming tighter and the rise in the dollar has resumed.
The problem, says Hyun Song Shin, of the BIS, is that dollar borrowing by emerging-market firms effectively expanded the monetary reach of the Federal Reserve. Higher American interest rates and a stronger dollar will place financial pressure on big emerging-market firms, forcing them to cut back on investment and spending. Foreign-exchange reserves held by governments are probably sufficient to prevent financial stress at big corporations from translating into a broader panic; but the closing of the credit taps, and pressure on firms to deleverage, will cause a sharp contraction in much of the emerging world that will be felt in advanced economies, too. For countries which have been running current-account deficits, that means buying less from the rest of the world and selling more. Advanced economies will be affected as the value of their investments abroad declines and their exports shrink.
China is not normal
Just how much all this will dampen growth will depend on what happens in China. Although it shares some features with other emerging markets, it is so vast and so unique that it represents its own sort of threat. The economic collapse of China's main export markets during the global financial crisis raised the risk of a sharp slowdown, rising unemployment and political instability. Its leaders responded with a massive fiscal stimulus directed primarily at investment, estimated at around 12.5% of GDP and financed mostly by borrowing, much of it by local governments and large firms. Overall, Chinese debt rocketed after the crisis, from about 175% of GDP in 2009 to more than 300% now. To make matters worse, borrowing has become less efficient over the past decade as more of it has been done in places and by firms with declining growth in productivity. In more recent times the government has tried to rein in, though not stop, the credit boom.
Such an extraordinary rise in debt, and particularly in credit used unproductively, would normally ring alarm bells. But China is not a normal country. Highly indebted emerging economies usually worry about servicing foreign-currency-denominated debt as capital flees the country. But China tightly controls its capital account, and both the government and Chinese banks maintain large asset piles. Moreover, the government has far more control over the economy than in most countries and is determined to avoid the emergence of any kind of destabilising crisis.
Even so, China's debts are hardly problem-free. Economic growth has decelerated steadily since 2010. Still, it continues at more than 6% per year, which adds about $1.5trn to the global economy each year (a Russia, give or take). To maintain growth at that clip requires a steady increase both in the economy's supply capacity and in demand. Increasing capacity has long ceased to mean adding new factories, railways and skyscrapers; instead, it involves the difficult business of technological advancement and reallocation of resources to sectors with higher productivity. Maintaining political support for the reforms needed to make this possible has proved hard, even for a powerful leader like Xi Jinping. On the contrary, recent borrowing props up low-productivity firms and sectors that ought to have shrunk.
And if China were to succeed in boosting the supply side of the economy, demand might become a problem. Culling unproductive businesses would mean less spending and fewer jobs. Households would be obvious candidates for replacing lost demand, but progress on shifting to a more consumption-based growth model has been slow and has relied in part on increasing levels of household debt. Besides, setting monetary policy in such a way as to reduce borrowing by weak firms but encourage household credit growth is tricky. Rising household incomes could help, but China has had difficulty in achieving this; household incomes as a share of GDP have fallen since 2016.
If China's exchange rate were to weaken sufficiently, the increase in sales to foreigners could help offset weak domestic demand. But that risks enraging America, and encouraging Mr Trump to intensify his trade war. A drop in the yuan would also add to the financial stress on Chinese firms with large dollar-denominated debts. And China exporting its way out of trouble might place an undue burden on the rest of the global economy.
In the past, rich countries could shrug off the sort of adjustments in emerging markets that appear to be looming. But times have changed. China's last real economic dip occurred during the financial crisis, when the entire world was reeling. The last serious growth hiccup before that was after the Tiananmen Square unrest in 1989. At that time Chinese GDP was about 4% of the global total; now it is 19% (measured at purchasing-power parity, or PPP). Over the same period emerging markets' share of world GDP has risen from 36% to 59% at PPP. Those markets could cause a downturn in the global economy all by themselves.
Yet not everything is rosy in the rich world either. Although the euro-area economy enjoyed faster growth in 2017, the boom has since cooled, even as the European Central Bank (ECB) has moved toward monetary tightening. An end to quantitative easing by the ECB, set for the end of 2018, and the prospect of rate increases, probably would not be enough to endanger the euro-area recovery. But an end to asset purchases could make markets react faster to political changes that threaten to reignite the euro crisis.
Italy, in particular, is a ticking time bomb. The election of a populist coalition in March rattled bond markets. With Italian government debt at around €2trn, or 130% of GDP, it would not take much to set off a new crisis, which would be extremely difficult to control. Panic in Italy might radiate out across financial markets, putting a chill on investment and growth worldwide.
America has its own vulnerabilities. The ratio of non-financial corporate debt to GDP has reached an all-time high of more than 73%. A worryingly large share of recent borrowing has come in the form of leveraged loans, an alternative to bonds. The business is reminiscent of the mortgage-backed security market which featured prominently in the global financial crisis. Investor demand for such securities has rocketed in recent years, because payouts vary with interest rates, which have been rising. The size of the market has doubled since 2010, to more than $1trn, and is now nearly as large as the market for high-yield bonds. Expansion in lending has come at the expense of credit standards. The share of new leveraged loans considered to have weak protections against default is growing; in the first quarter of 2018 it exceeded 80%.
Despite the parallels with pre-crisis mortgage lending, a meltdown in this market is unlikely to generate the same havoc. But an outbreak of defaults could contribute to a rapid contraction in lending to firms and a tightening of credit—sufficient, perhaps, to touch off a new American recession. One of the lessons of the crisis is that panics can be caused by things hidden until it is too late.
One such surprise might be a rise in the cost of oil. Prices have crept up over the past year, from $50 per barrel to around $80. Politically generated disruptions to supply in Venezuela and Iran could strain the market further. A number of other black swans may be heading upriver even now. Costly frauds may be hiding within underexamined corporate balance-sheets. Elections could go one way not another. Global pandemics might erupt.
Once credit, spending and optimism have reigned for a time, the interplay of foreseen and unforeseen circumstances may cause them to stop doing so. At that point behaviour which seemed reasonable and responsible will start to look like folly, the "crazy projects" of the world will seem unconscionably reckless, and the world will be in trouble again.
THE BREWING FIGHT OVER THE YUAN / THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
| Etiquetas: China, Economics, Hedge Funds, Monetary Policy, The Dollar, The Yuan o Renminbi
The Brewing Fight Over the Yuan
The Chinese government doesn't want its currency to fall too much, but hedge funds are betting they can't stop it
By Jacky Wong
Hedge funds betting the yuan will fall below 7 to the dollar. Photo: Reuters
Investors and the Chinese government are gearing up for a fight over the yuan, with hedge funds betting the Chinese currency will fall below 7 to the dollar for the first time in more than a decade and Beijing essentially saying, "no way."
China's yuan stands at 6.9270 against the dollar, 1% above the psychologically important level of 7. The yuan last traded at that level in 2007, when the Chinese economy was far smaller and its currency was rising rather than falling. The one-year foreign-exchange forward contract on offshore yuan briefly spiked above 7 last week.
There is nothing magical about the number 7, but it seemed to be the do-not-cross line when China's central bank defended its currency in 2016.
This time around, Beijing may find it harder to hold that line because interest rates in the U.S. are rising while China needs to ease to counter the economic slowdown at home. The difference between China's 10-year government bonds and the U.S. Treasury note of the same tenor has shrunk to 0.5% from 1.7% late last year. The divergence in the two country's monetary policies mean the gap will continue to narrow or switch so that U.S. bonds yield more than Chinese.
That draws money into dollars and out of yuan, pushing up the dollar and pushing down the yuan.
The 7 level is especially important now because China is under pressure from the U.S. not to depreciate its currency to offset the impact of trade tariffs. China's central bank Gov. Yi Gang stressed over the weekend that the country wouldn't engage in competitive devaluation.
Another concern for China is capital flight. The yuan depreciation in 2015 sent billions flowing out of the country, and China's central bank eventually needed to spend around $1 trillion of its foreign-exchange reserves to defend the yuan.
Hedge funds share none of those worries and see the yuan as vulnerable. Beijing has made clear that this view is unacceptable. The interbank lending rates on the offshore yuan in Hong Kong spiked last week, an indication that Chinese authorities have tried to squeeze out the shorts by making it more expensive to borrow the yuan.
But speculators don't seem to have been deterred. Three-month 25-delta risk reversal on the dollar versus the offshore yuan—a gauge of bearish versus bullish bets—has stayed higher. A higher number means investors are willing to pay more for bearish bets on the yuan versus the dollar.
China's capital controls, tightened after 2016, seem to be working well this year, as capital outflows are minimal even though the yuan has dropped 10% against the dollar since February. Foreign inflows into China's bond and stock market, in part because they have recently been included in popular indexes, has also helped. But as China's housing market—a major investment for Chinese—starts to feel a little shaky recently, the real test is ahead.
CAN EUROZONE REFORM HELP CONTAIN TRUMP? / PROJECT SYNDICATE
| Etiquetas: Central Banking, Donald Trump, ECB, Europe Economic and Political, The Euro
Can Eurozone Reform Help Contain Trump?
Jochen Andritzky
The Trump administration knows that a key source of US economic leverage is the dollar's role as the world's dominant reserve currency. Countering America's disproportionate power to destabilize the global economy thus requires reducing the share of international trade conducted in dollars.
BRUSSELS – US President Donald Trump is using economic warfare to pursue his foreign-policy objectives. In August, his administration announced that it would double tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from Turkey, in order to pressure the Turkish authorities to release an American pastor detained for two years on espionage charges. At the beginning of next month, the United States will also ratchet up unilateral sanctions against Iran.
The Trump administration knows that a key source of US economic leverage is the dollar's role as the world's dominant reserve currency. Countering America's disproportionate power to destabilize the global economy thus requires reducing the share of international trade conducted in dollars. Can the euro serve as a credible alternative?
The euro is the world's second-leading currency, but it still lags far behind the US dollar. Two-thirds of all loans issued by local banks in foreign currencies are denominated in dollars, compared to just 20% in euros. Similar proportions apply to global foreign-exchange reserves.
European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker is eager to change this. Last month, he declared it "absurd" that "Europe pays for 80% of its energy import bill – worth €300 billion a year – in US dollars," even though only about 2% of the EU's energy imports come from the US. He then called for the euro to become "the instrument of a new, more sovereign Europe," and promised to "present initiatives to strengthen the international role of the euro."
Juncker is not alone among European leaders in recognizing how powerful a tool the single currency can be when it comes to projecting power. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has proposed that the European Union establish its own international payments system.
But these proposals, while ambitious, may overlook what is really needed to elevate the euro's status. If the euro's role in international trade increased, so would foreign companies' holdings of euro-denominated assets and the total volume of euro-denominated loans. More global trade in euros could lead foreign banking systems to become heavily exposed to the currency.
That means that, in the event of a crisis, the European Central Bank would have to take action, much as the US Federal Reserve has done in the past. During the 2008 global financial crisis, the Fed served as de facto global lender of last resort, agreeing to unsecured swap lines not only with reserve-currency central banks like the ECB and the Swiss National Bank, but also with emerging economies like Mexico and Brazil. The goal was to stabilize the global economy, but the liquidity also helped to prevent domestic disturbances from foreign sales of dollar assets and to stop foreign banks from scrambling to buy dollars.
The ECB adopted a much more restrictive approach. In late 2008, it began to provide euros to the central banks of Hungary, Latvia, and Poland, but required them to put up euro-denominated securities as collateral. The ECB wanted to guard its balance sheet against unsecured exposure to Hungarian forint or Polish złoty. But these countries held too few eligible securities to obtain enough euros under the ECB's initial terms. It took another year for the ECB, under pressure from Austria and other countries, to establish proper swap lines against foreign-currency collateral with the Hungarian and Polish central banks.
Even now, the ECB will provide euro liquidity only to countries considered systemically relevant for the eurozone. This risk-averse approach contrasts with that of the Fed and, more tellingly, with that of the People's Bank of China, which in recent years has established an extensive network of swap lines to promote the renminbi's use in trade – and thus its standing as an international currency.
If Juncker's vision is to be realized, the ECB will have to abandon this parochial mindset and adopt a Fed-style role as international lender of last resort. Yet it remains unclear whether the ECB actually would be willing to leave part of its balance sheet exposed to the fate of non-eurozone countries.
The ECB has good reason to be cautious: it lacks a political counterpart akin to the Fed's US Treasury Secretary. With no eurozone finance minister with whom to coordinate in times of crisis, a decision by the ECB to help third countries – even EU countries – could be met with strong resistance. The ECB's reluctance to establish a swap line with Hungary may be a case in point: Hungary was already distancing itself from the EU.
Eventually, the ECB did resolve to do "whatever it takes" to save the euro. But if European leaders want to advance Juncker's vision of strengthening EU sovereignty by boosting the euro's international role, they cannot rely on the ECB to repeat that approach, without proper institutional support.
Instead, eurozone leaders should complete the reforms of the currency union's architecture and provide a political counterpart to the ECB that would support centralized monetary policy.
This is the best initial response to Trump's economic attacks. Anything else would be putting the cart before the horse – yet again.
Jochen Andritzky, a former Secretary-General of the German Council of Economic Experts, is a visiting fellow at Bruegel, a Brussels-based think tank.
SAUDI INVESTMENT IN PAKISTAN COULD YIELD GLOBAL RETURNS / GEOPOLITICAL FUTURES
| Etiquetas: China, Geopolitics, Iran, Middle East, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, U.S. Economic And Political
Saudi Investment in Pakistan Could Yield Global Returns
The deal could pay dividends for both parties, as well as the U.S., while costing Iran and China.
By Xander Snyder
Pakistan's tenuous economic situation is opening the door to foreign competition in the country. Since Islamabad signed on with the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the largest project in Beijing's expansive Belt and Road Initiative, China has spent billions of dollars on the endeavor. And the financing comes with plenty of strings attached. Sri Lanka, for example, had to concede control of Hambantota port, another Belt and Road production, to a state-owned Chinese firm after failing to repay what it owed for the project. Though Pakistan hopes to avoid the same fate, doing so won't be easy. To fend off downward pressure on its currency, the rupee – which has lost 15 percent of its value this year – Pakistan has had to dip into the foreign exchange reserves it needs to service its mounting obligations. The country, facing a balance of payments crisis, seemed to have no choice but to borrow even more money from Beijing or solicit yet another bailout (its 12th since the 1980s) from the International Monetary Fund.
Then a third option emerged: Saudi investment. In late September, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan announced that Riyadh had agreed to invest in the CPEC. Khan walked back the statement Oct. 3, saying the kingdom would not join the project. Still, he made it clear that plenty of investment opportunities, including infrastructure related to but not technically part of the CPEC, remained available to Saudi Arabia in his country. The oil-rich Gulf state's funding would help ease Pakistan's financial woes and discomfort at its growing dependence on China, while also promoting Saudi and U.S. interests in the region.
Buying Time for Islamabad
Choosing between an IMF and a Chinese loan is tricky for Pakistan. On the one hand, taking money from China would increase Islamabad's reliance on and debt to Beijing, notorious for its tendency to raise interest rates when borrowers come back asking for more. On the other, requesting help from the IMF would probably entail greater transparency on Pakistan's part, for instance over its debt deals with China. That transparency – something China has avoided in all of its infrastructure projects around the world – could damage Islamabad's relations with Beijing. It could even provoke domestic backlash if the Pakistani public found the CPEC deals' terms too favorable to China. Despite these risks, however – and despite reluctance from the IMF's second-largest vote-holder, the United States, to follow through on a loan – Khan approved negotiations on Oct. 10 with the global lender. Islamabad has also accepted a few smaller loans from China to keep it afloat in the meantime.
Assistance from Saudi Arabia would give Pakistan a little more breathing room. The prospective agreement between them is believed to include a $2 billion bridge loan, along with a deal for Pakistan to buy between 110,000 barrels per day and 200,000 bpd of crude oil from the kingdom on 90 days' credit, a generous arrangement. (For comparison's sake, consider the 60 days' credit Iran extended to India in what was regarded as a buyer-friendly deal.) The deferred payments plan would be especially important to Pakistan because it would enable Islamabad to stem foreign reserves outflows without restricting its access to oil imports, thereby easing some pressure on the Pakistani rupee. Furthermore, though Pakistan is expected to use the crude from Saudi Arabia initially to meet its domestic needs, the extended payment plan would give it enough time to refine and sell some of the oil to China for a profit before reimbursing Riyadh. Saudi Arabia probably wouldn't mind, so long as Islamabad keeps buying more of its crude oil. After all, every barrel Pakistan sells to China is one less barrel for China to buy from Iran.
And that's not all Riyadh stands to gain from lending Islamabad a hand. In exchange for funding, for example, Saudi Arabia could ask Pakistan to break its neutrality in the Yemeni civil war and lend support to the coalition fight against the Houthis, whom Iran sponsors. A purported investment in a new oil refinery at the Gwadar port, part of the CPEC, also promises to yield a 16 percent return for the kingdom. In addition, the deal would afford Saudi Arabia access to between 14.5 million and 22 million barrels' worth of storage space where it could house its oil without having to worry about a potential Iranian blockade at the Strait of Hormuz. That way, it could guarantee a more reliable supply of oil to its Asian customers regardless of what happens in the Persian Gulf.
A Mixed Bag for China
Beijing would welcome better and more secure access to Saudi oil, but it would take less kindly to other aspects of Riyadh's involvement in Pakistan. If Saudi Arabia invests in infrastructure projects outside the CPEC that are nonetheless integral to the project, such as the refinery, it will undermine China's control over the transport route, particularly at the ingress point. And for China, control is key. The main goal of the CPEC is to provide the country alternative supply routes so that it can bypass chokepoints such as the Malacca Strait in transporting its goods abroad. The corridor from China through northeast Pakistan to Gwadar port is one such route. (It would also give China access to, if not outright ownership of, another port on the Indian Ocean where it could station military forces down the line.) Saudi Arabia's participation, however, would introduce an element of uncertainty to China's authority over Gwadar, and over the CPEC as a whole, since a deal with Riyadh would ease the pressure on Islamabad to heed Beijing's demands.
China's concerns notwithstanding, all signs indicate that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are moving forward with a deal. Pakistani media have reported, citing anonymous officials, that representatives from the two countries are working to finalize memorandums of understanding. To reassure Beijing of Islamabad's continued commitment to the CPEC, the Pakistani army chief visited China in September and had a rare private audience with President Xi Jinping.
U.S. Gains on a Saudi Investment
If China is wary of the deal, the United States is more enthusiastic. The U.S. has an interest in diminishing Pakistan's dependence on Beijing. For one thing, China's growing presence in the Indian Ocean puts India – an emerging partner in Washington's efforts to contain Chinese expansion – at risk of encirclement.
For another, Washington wants to maintain enough clout with Islamabad to facilitate its efforts at rooting out jihadist organizations operating in Pakistan. The more Pakistan depends on it or its allies, the more effective the U.S. can be in this endeavor. Above all, the United States' goal for Pakistan is to keep the country stable and prevent its nuclear weapons from falling into the wrong hands. The investment Riyadh reportedly has offered Islamabad would serve those objectives by helping to stave off economic collapse.
That Saudi Arabia's deal with Pakistan would put pressure on Iran is an added bonus for Washington. Given the choice, China will opt to buy Saudi oil, rather than continue to risk the supply chain disruptions entailed in importing Iranian oil that must transit chokepoints as it crosses the Indian Ocean. Saudi Arabia, moreover, may choose to exclude Iran if it secures control of the new refinery and gets a say over which countries may transport oil through Gwadar port.
Beyond the economic implications, the Saudi investment in Pakistan would also have geostrategic and security ramifications for Iran. Tehran doubtless fears that with its greater involvement at Gwadar, Riyadh will station its own or its allies' naval forces there – too close for comfort to the Chabahar port. Chabahar, a joint project with India, has been a boon for Iran, offering the country a way into the Indian Ocean from beyond the Persian Gulf. Should Saudi Arabia demand greater military cooperation from Pakistan in return for its assistance, the kingdom could turn the tables on Iran and threaten its access to the ocean.
Closer to home, meanwhile, a Saudi presence in Gwadar could fuel the Sunni jihadist insurgency in Iran's neighboring Sistan and Baluchestan province. Many of the restive province's militant groups subscribe to the Wahhabi version of Islam prevalent in Saudi Arabia, and the kingdom could use its activities at Gwadar to more easily finance or even equip them. Just as Tehran has threatened Saudi Arabia's southern border by supporting Yemen's Houthi rebels, Riyadh could menace Iran's eastern border by backing the Sunni insurgents in Sistan and Baluchestan.
The range of economic and geostrategic effects that Saudi Arabia's involvement in Pakistan would produce suggests that the United States played a part in brokering the deal. The arrangement promotes Washington's efforts not only to put the squeeze on Iran, but also to lure Pakistan away from China.
But the U.S. would hardly be the agreement's only beneficiary. The prospective deal, of course, will help Pakistan, too, bringing in more money to offset its growing debt payments and perhaps enabling it to draw in more foreign currency through refined oil exports. Saudi Arabia stands to gain a large oil storage facility in better proximity to its Asian customers and a cut of whatever profits the new refinery at Gwadar generates. What's more, it could secure Pakistan's military assistance in the Yemeni civil war if it makes that demand of Islamabad, and if the Pakistani government agrees. For China, however, the improved access to oil that the deal may afford it would come at the cost of control over the Belt and Road Initiative's largest project.
martes, octubre 30, 2018
DEBT ALARM RINGING / JOHN MAULDIN´S WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
| Etiquetas: BIS, China, Global Debt Markets, Government Debt Markets, Management and Productivity, U.S. Economic And Political
Debt Alarm Ringing
By John Mauldin
Is debt good or bad? The answer is "Yes."
Debt is future spending pulled forward in time. It lets you buy something now for which you otherwise don't have cash available yet. Whether it's wise or not depends on what you buy. Debt to educate yourself so you can get a better job may be a good idea. Borrowing money to finance your vacation? Probably not.
Unfortunately, many people, businesses, and governments borrow because they can, which for many is possible only because central banks made it so cheap in the last decade. It was rational in that respect but is growing less so as the central banks tighten their policies.
Earlier this year, I wrote a series of articles (synopsis and links here) predicting a debt "train wreck" and eventual liquidation—an event I dubbed The Great Reset. I estimated we have another year or two before the crisis becomes evident.
That's still my expectation… but I'm beginning to wonder again. Several recent events tell me the reckoning could be closer than I thought just a few months ago. Today, we'll review those and end with a few suggestions on how to prepare.
Addicted to Debt
As noted, debt can be appropriate—even government debt, in some (rare) circumstances. I am glad FDR issued war bonds to help defeat the Nazis, for instance. Now, however, governments go into debt not because they face existential threats, but simply to keep their citizens and benefactors comfortable.
Similarly, central banks enable debt because they think it will generate economic growth. Sometimes it does, too. The problem is they create debt with little regard for how it will be used. That's how we get artificial booms and subsequent busts.
We are told not to worry about absolute debt levels so long as the economy is growing in concert with them. That makes sense. A country with a larger GDP can carry more debt. But that is increasingly not what is happening. Let me give you two data points.
Lacy Hunt tracks Bank for International Settlements data that shows debt is losing its ability to stimulate growth. In 2017, one dollar of non-financial debt generated only 40 cents of GDP in the US and even less elsewhere. This is down from (if memory serves) more than four dollars of growth for each dollar of debt 50 years ago.
This has significantly worsened over the last decade. China's debt productivity dropped 42.9% between 2007 and 2017. That was the worst among major economies, but others lost ground, too. All the developed world is pushing on the same string and hoping for results like we saw 40–50 years ago. As my friend Rob Arnott constantly reminds me, hope is not a strategy.
Source: Hoisington Investment Management
Now, if you are accustomed to using debt to stimulate growth, and debt loses its capacity to do so, what happens next? You guessed it: The brilliant powers-that-be add even more debt. This is classic addiction behavior. You have to keep raising the dose to get the same high.
At this point, Paul Krugman and others usually call me a debt curmudgeon and argue the debt doesn't matter. I point them to Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart's book from 10 years ago, This Time Is Different, which demonstrates that in every prior debt run-up, over centuries of history, accumulated debt clearly eventually made a difference. There is always an eventual Day of Reckoning.
The US economy is so huge and powerful that our current $24.5 trillion government debt (including state and local) could quite easily grow to $40 trillion before we meet that day. We are one recession away from having a $30 trillion US government debt total. It will happen seemingly overnight. And deficits will stay well above $1 trillion per year every year after that, not unlike now.
Some argue the US has almost $150 trillion of personal and corporate assets to offset that debt. That is true enough, but I think there might be some slight resistance if the government demanded 15% of your total assets, including your house, real estate, investment assets, furniture and goods, to pay off the debt. That would be in addition to your regular taxes, and then they begin accumulating more debt.
Even though you are reading about a budget deficit of under $800 billion this year, the actual amount of debt added last year was well over $1 trillion. That is due to "off budget" items that Congress, in its wisdom, thinks shouldn't be part of the normal budgetary process. It includes things like Social Security and Medicare—which vary from time to time and year to year—and can be anywhere from $200 billion to almost $500 billion.
And here's the point that you need to understand. The US Treasury borrows those dollars and it goes on the total debt taxpayers owe. The true deficit that adds to the debt is actually much higher than the number you see in the news. It brings to mind the scene in the Wizard of Oz, when they wizard says, "Pay no attention to the man behind the screen."
Household and corporate debt is growing fast, too, and not just in the US.
Here's a note from Lakshman Achuthan.
Notably, the combined debt of the US, Eurozone, Japan, and China has increased more than ten times as much as their combined GDP [growth] over the past year.
Yes, you read that right. In the last year, the world's largest economies are generating debt 10X faster than economic growth. Adding debt at that pace, if it continues, will boost the debt-to-GDP ratio at an alarming rate.
Lakshman continues.
Remarkably, then, the global economy—slowing in sync despite soaring debt—finds itself in a situation reminiscent of the Red Queen Effect we referenced 15 years ago, when tax cuts boosted the US budget deficit much more than GDP. As the Red Queen says to Alice in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass, "Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"
I am trying to imagine a scenario in which this ends in something less than chaos and crisis. The best I can conceive is a decade-long (and possibly more) stagnation while the debt gets liquidated. But realistically, that won't happen because debtors won't let it, and they outnumber lenders. Hence, something like the Great Reset will happen first.
The rational course would be to delay the inevitable as long as possible. Yet in the US, at least, we're hastening it.
Lost Exorbitant Privilege
This month, the US Treasury closed the books on Fiscal Year 2018. It was a success in the sense that the government is still open and doing the things it should. Financially speaking, it was another debt-financed failure.
Source: US Treasury
The federal government spent approximately $4.1 trillion in FY 2018, of which it had to borrow $779 billion on budget and a few hundred billion more off-budget (amount TBD). And over 40% of the on-budget deficit went simply to pay $325 billion in interest on previously-issued debt.
Obviously, the government should spend less. But where to cut? There is no political agreement on that and little prospect of one. Nor, barring an economic boom of a magnitude and duration I think unlikely, are we going to grow out of this. So, I expect continued and even bigger deficits.
Deficits mean the Treasury has to borrow cash, which it does by selling Treasury bills, notes, and bonds. This wasn't a problem for most of the last decade but is rapidly becoming one as the amounts grow larger.
Thanks to the "exorbitant privilege" I discussed earlier this month, the US has long had many foreigners willing to buy our debt. Now they are losing interest (forgive the pun) because hedging their currency exposure costs more. There are some complex reasons behind this, relating to swaps and the differentials between the US economy and others, but here's the bottom line: European and Japanese investors can no longer buy US Treasury debt at a positive rate of return unless they want to take currency risk, which most do not. This is a new development.
This might be fine if US investors made up the difference, but that's not happening, either, and might not be great anyway. Capital that goes into Treasury debt is capital that's not going into bank loans, corporate bonds, mortgages, venture capital, stocks, or anything else in the private sector, which generates the growth we'll need to pay off the government's debt.
Treasury auction data shows it is getting harder to attract buyers. According to Bloomberg, last month's two-year note auction matched the lowest bid-to-cover ratio for that maturity since December 2008.
The problem is manageable for now, and Treasury will always be able to borrow at some price… but the price could get awkwardly high, with interest costs rising dramatically.
Given the debt's maturity structure, it could be sooner than you might think. Treasury took advantage of lower short-term rates in recent years, which reduced interest costs, but also created refinancing risk. Here's a Torsten Slok chart (via my friend Luke Gromen on Twitter).
Source: Luke Gromen
Looking only at federal debt not held by the Federal Reserve, Treasury will need to borrow something like 43% of GDP over the next five years just to rollover existing debt at much higher interest rates. That's not counting any new debt we accumulate, which could be quite a lot if we enter recession or (God forbid) another war.
But set aside the hypothetical possibilities. Just the things we know are already locked in, like Social Security and Medicare, are enough to blow up the debt. Somebody has to buy all that Treasury paper. If it's not foreigners, and not the Fed, and not American savers, we are out of prospects.
Now, buyers will appear at the right price, i.e. some higher interest rate. Barring recession-induced lower rates (which would be a different problem), government borrowing could get way more expensive.
Which is more likely: a double-digit ten-year Treasury yield or a worldwide debt liquidation? Neither will be fun. But I'll bet that we see one or the other at some point in the 2020s.
Trigger Points
My renewed fear comes from the very real possibility the global economy breaks down in the next six months. Anything could trigger a crisis, and it could well be something no one presently foresees, but here are three candidates.
Corporate Credit Crisis: As a whole, US companies are significantly more leveraged now than they were ahead of the 2008 crisis. We saw then what happens when the commercial paper market seizes up, and that was without a Fed in tightening mode. Now we have a central bank both raising short-term rates and slowly ending its crisis-era accommodations. Recent comments from FOMC members say they have no intent of stopping, either. A few high-profile junk bond defaults could ignite fears quickly.
There are trillions of dollars of low-rated corporate debt that can easily slide into the junk debt category in a recession. Since most public pension, insurance, and endowment programs are not legally allowed to own junk-rated debt, I can see where it could easily cause a debt crisis along the lines of the previous subprime crisis.
Trade war: One reason the US economy seems to be booming right now is a surge in imports. Companies are rushing to build inventory ahead of the 25% tariff on Chinese goods that takes effect January 1. Coming on top of usual holiday season stockpiling, it is jamming ports, highways, and warehouses—generating many jobs in the process.
That's all good right now, but those truck drivers and warehouse workers will no longer be necessary once the shelves are stocked. Working down that inventory will take months, at least, and the resulting slowdown could ease the economy into recession next year.
We might avert that outcome if the US and China reach some trade resolution, but that doesn't appear likely. The latest reports say the Trump administration is digging in for a long siege and, if anything, may get even more aggressive against China. Nor does China seem likely to bend.
You may have heard the tennis term, "unforced errors." Those are mistakes of your own, not a result of your opponent's good shots. I think the tariffs may be an unforced error in US economic policy that could cause a serious growth decline, or worse.
European Slowdown: This week, we got October PMI reports from Markit. Its eurozone manufacturing and services index dropped to the lowest point since September 2016, with export-dependent Germany particularly weak. Meanwhile, Italy's new budget is wildly out of line with its revenue and growth prospects. This threatens to set off another euro crisis. And then there's the serious possibility of a hard Brexit in early 2019.
In short, Europe (at least some of it) is in real danger of entering recession next year. If that happens, the impact will spread around the globe as the continent reduces imports from the US, China, and elsewhere. Not to mention the potential fireworks if Italy or anyone else actually defaults on debt payments to foreign lenders, i.e. German, French, and other European banks with minimal loss reserves.
If the European Central Bank won't buy Italian bonds, and the Italians won't do it themselves, then Italian interest rates could jump dramatically, precipitating a crisis. This is essentially what forced the ECB into its first quantitative easing program. In theory, the Italians were then in compliance. That is not the case today. I have been pointing my finger at Italy for years. It is the linchpin in the whole euro experiment on debt and solidarity.
I could go on, but you get the point. The US economy looks fine just ahead, but problems lurk over the horizon. Bad things could happen soon.
So, what do you do? I have three suggestions.
1. Build a cash reserve: I know every financial advisor says that, but disturbingly few people actually do it. Have several months of living expenses readily available in risk-free cash equivalents. Cash is also an option on buying discounted assets at lower prices in the future.
2. Deleverage: If you carry business or personal debt, reduce it as much as you can and don't assume you will be able to refinance. Banks can cut your credit lines in a heartbeat, and they will.
3. Have a plan for your longer-term investments, whether they are stocks, real estate, or anything else. Decide now what you will sell, and to whom, because buyers may not be there when you need them. At the same time, decide what you plan to hold through any slowdown. I have assets in private companies and even a few public ones that I truly consider "for the long term."
I sincerely hope I'm wrong. Maybe I'm jumping the gun here and 2019 will be another banner year. But I see major risks ahead, and I want you to be ready for them.
Frankfurt, Cleveland, Golf, and Here and There
I find myself today looking over a golf course in Puerto Rico. The weather is perfect, which is a far cry from what we left in Texas yesterday. Late next week, I catch a plane to Frankfurt where I will speak to a large group of institutional investors at the Lupus Alpha Investment Conference. I am really looking forward to this conference, as I will meet a few people I have always wanted to and hopefully learn more about what is going on in Germany and Europe. I have two brand-new presentations for them with the appropriate trigger warnings. While my host tells me that they don't want me to pull any punches, I am not sure the audience is going to be happy with the message.
As if I needed more to do, I actually had myself fitted for golf clubs last Saturday. It was a 3½ hour process, and I was amazed at the technology available now. It's been 20 years since someone stole my last golf clubs right out of my garage. I took it as a sign that God wanted me to quit. And while I've played a few times with rented clubs, I have resisted actually buying any.
I had a righteous 29 handicap back when I played regularly. I imagine my legitimate handicap for the next year will be close to 40, so none of you will really want to play with me. But then again, I've noticed that when I do play, I am looser for the next few days. I think, combined with my workout routine, this will keep me much healthier in the long run.
And with that, I will hit the send button. Have a great week and hit 'em straight!
Your going to enjoy a few warm days analyst,
Chairman, Mauldin Economics
SPOTTING THE BLACK SWANS: THE NEXT CRISIS COULD ST...
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text:
The Tasting Room
Château Palmer & its Alter Ego
Wine library
In the Vineyards
In the cellars
Between The Rows
Palmer & you
The Jazz violinist Théo Ceccaldi passionately followed the development of the 2019 vintage. His creative residency at Château Palmer is soon to give birth to a limited edition vinyl.
The cancellation of the Hear Palmer event last spring, due to lockdown, gave you a wonderful idea. Rather than a concert: a record!
Yes, the sanitary restrictions transformed the project and made it even more ambitious, deeper. I'm very happy about it. The idea emerged whilst talking with Thomas Duroux and the Château Palmer team: rather than interpreting the vintage at the opening of the Primeurs, we decided to publish an album, a tailor-made disc to celebrate a unusual year and, through it, salute ten years of work in biodynamics. It was an unprecedented experience both for Château Palmer and for myself.
How did you do it?
I had already come to immerse myself in the soul of the estate during the harvest period. I went back there for several days in the spring, after lockdown. I observed the winegrowers, the shepherd and the gardener hard at work. I took notes, I was interested in everything: the culture of the vine, the importance of the terroir, the choice of the vegetables, the character of a grape variety or that of a blend. Thomas explained Château Palmer's very particular ecosystem to me, which strikes a familiar cord with jazz ... The winegrowers show exemplary devotion and dedication. They never know in what order they will harvest the grapes and adapt themselves to the whims of the weather with a mixture of improvisation and alert responsiveness, like with jazz. There are a lot of similarities between the maturation of an album and that of a vintage. It is first and foremost a permanent risk: as concerns wine, you have to understand the unpredictable aspects of nature, trust the land and be attentive.
Is an album really made like a wine?
The main stages echo each other: making music begins with a period of composition, then comes that of recording, mixing and finally mastering. Making wine begins with an acute knowledge of the earth and of the vine, both of which require care at all times. Then comes the harvest, the assembly and the ageing in barrels ... Each step is as decisive as it is essential: musicians and winegrowers alike test, fumble, measure, doubt and relentlessly refine so as to achieve the desired balance and excellence. What percentage of merlot? What degree of reverberation? Extreme precision is required when mixing a track or assembling grape varieties in view of achieving the most harmonious of blends.
"Each step is as decisive as it is essential: musicians and winegrowers alike test, fumble, measure, doubt and relentlessly refine so as to achieve the desired balance and excellence."
How do you express a vintage with a violin?
I did not try to translate my emotions into musical phrases. It's a more tenuous process than that, which passes through immersion and impregnation. The estate's atmosphere tints my music, acts as a filter, a spice that brings a particular flavour to the composition. I improvised in different places: the château attic, the middle of the vines, the cellars ... Each acoustic influences the way in which one plays. The setting inspired me with a new, fine and mature "sound".
I wrote six pieces, each of which represents a wine or a vintage from Château Palmer. The outcome is more refined than my previous albums, with some surges that characterise 2019's effervescence, the vintage of the resurrection. We then spent three days recording in my studio in Orleans. This is my first ever vinyl. It is the result of a shared adventure. The album will be released in November 2021, at the same time as the 2019 vintage, as its musical suite...
2019, the school of nature
AT WINTER TIME
The 2019 Harvest: An Encounter with Théo Ceccaldi
2021 © Château Palmer all rights reserved.
Alcohol can damage your health. It should be consumed in moderation.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Rinorea apiculata är en violväxtart som beskrevs av W.H.A. Hekking. Rinorea apiculata ingår i släktet Rinorea och familjen violväxter. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Violväxter
apiculata

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


PEEK supplier Victrex is building a major Polymer Innovation Center in northern England.
Financial assistance for the project has come in the form of $2 million in grant funding from the UK government's Regional Growth Fund, subject to satisfactory due diligence, which recognises the vital, rapidly accelerating importance of high performance polymers in the global marketplace.
High performance polymers based on PAEK, including Victrex PEEK, are increasingly being sought out for this and other demanding applications in industry sectors that include consumer electronics, automotive, energy, and medical.
The project is expected to help in the creation of over 80 direct and indirect jobs over the next 10 years and could ultimately see a total $24.6 million investment.
"This boost from the UK government's Regional Growth Fund is great news for Victrex, in enabling our company to continue pioneering the market for high performance polymers well into the future," said David Hummel, Chief Executive of Victrex. "As a global world leader and major UK exporter, our past success and our future prosperity is founded on technical excellence and a world-class manufacturing capability. While we are already a global champion, having the right technical skills is key to continued innovation for our customers across the globe."


All eyes on the reset button, Washington has failed to notice Russia's meddling in a crisis next door. At the least, Obama should visit ailing Ukraine and prove that good relations with Russia don't meant forgetting the rest of the region.
Russia has always had a knack for overshadowing its neighbors - and this time the West, focused on Moscow, is distracted from a crisis in Ukraine. As U.S. President Barack Obama gears up to "reset" Russia relations, Ukraine is in disarray. The country is teetering between economic collapse, Russian influence, and vague promises of Western support.
It will take decisive moves from Washington to help pull Ukraine back from the edge. At the least, Obama should visit ailing Ukraine and prove that good relations with Russia don't meant forgetting the rest of the region.
Economic decline is largely to blame for Ukraine's perilous predicament. The country paid heavily for of its massive corporate foreign debt, failure to push through serious economic reform, and unwillingness to clean up a terribly corrupt energy sector. The International Monetary Fund and World Bank forecast an 8 to 9 percent drop in GDP this year, and that might be a conservative estimate; the economy has contracted some 30 percent in the first quarter alone.
Ukraine's currency, the hryvnya, has fallen 40 percent against the dollar. Unemployment may reach 10 percent and mass protests are not out of the question -- especially in the troubled east.
Finger-pointing among Ukrainian politicians, already a national sport, will only accelerate as the country gears up for January 2010 elections for president (and possibly early parliamentary elections, too). Many, including Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko (who has been feuding with President Viktor Yushchenko since the Orange Revolution brought him to power in 2004) are calling for constitutional reform that would strengthen Ukraine's parliament and weaken the presidency.
Constitutional reform, important though that may be, is a divisive distraction at a horrible time. What would be more helpful is economic reform, as the IMF recommended as part of its $16.4 billion deal last year.
But politicians are desperate for quicker solutions, even ones that may not have Ukraine's long-term interests in mind.
Enter Moscow, which has provided loans to the tune of several billion dollars already to Kiev and is interested in buying up more Ukrainian properties and assets. Russia might not be acting out of mere kindness of heart; a campaign to regain its sphere of influence might be at work.
If so, it's a campaign with strategic implications. Russia's Black Sea fleet is set to operate in Ukraine's port city of Sevastopol until 2017. In its current economic predicament, Ukraine will be in a weaker position in contentious negotiations with Moscow about whether to renew the arrangement.
The same is true as the country rejects Russian nationalist claims that Crimea, internationally recognized as part of Ukraine, really belongs to Russia. Clashes between the two countries over gas delivery to Europe are also likely to continue -- with Russia in a position to apply further pressure on Ukraine, (though Ukraine also needs to pay its bills so that future cutoffs are harder to justify).
Why should the international community be concerned about Ukraine's fragility? In a word: location. The country of more than 46 million people is a strategically placed capitalist (albeit fragile) democracy on the fault line between Russia and the European Union. Messy and frustrating as Ukrainian politics may be, the country has been both peaceful and democratic since the Orange Revolution in 2004.
The media in Ukraine are freer than ever, and the parliament (the Rada) is no rubber stamp for the executive branch -- more than some of Ukraine's neighbors can say. Ukraine is central to achieving the goal of a Europe that is whole, free, and at peace. It's the right country in the right place. But if the West turns away, gains from the past five years could be lost.
Visible U.S. support for Ukraine is critical as the country struggles through the coming months. Obama should avoid boosting one politician over another prior to any elections. A visit to Kiev on the president's scheduled trip to Moscow in July would help, sending a powerful message that America will not seek to improve relations with Russia at all costs, neighbors included.
On his trip, Obama must make clear that he seeks better relations with Ukraine and other countries in the region even as he improves ties with Moscow. It's a delicate balancing act, but neither policy can succeed without the other.
NOTE: David J. Kramer is senior transatlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. He was assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor and a deputy assistant secretary responsible for Ukraine from 2005 to 2008. Damon Wilson is director of the international security program at the Atlantic Council. He served as special assistant to the president and senior director for European affairs at the National Security Council from 2007 to 2009.
LINK: http://experts.foreignpolicy.com:80/posts/2009/05/28/ukraine_on_the_brink; FOREIGN POLICY is published by the Slate Group, a division of Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC., Washington, DC.
KIEV - Vladimir Putin, Russia's Prime Minister and former President, is not renowned for his love of literature. But on Sunday he gave Russian journalists an unexpected reading tip: the diaries of Anton Denikin, a commander in the White Army, which fought the Bolsheviks after the revolution in 1917.
the grave of Denikin, who is now portrayed as a Russian patriot. "He says that no one should be allowed to interfere in relations between us; they have always been the business of Russia itself."
Putin's words are seen as the latest in an ongoing volley of pointed warnings to the West not to meddle in Ukraine, which has such close historical and cultural ties to Russia that the Kremlin considers the country firmly within its sphere of interests.
director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, an independent think tank in Moscow. "Their central foreign policy goal is to create a power center around Russia. Any move by the West towards the former Soviet republics is seen as damaging Russia's interests."
in March under which the European Union would help modernize Ukraine's aging gas-transport system. "This agreement is Exhibit A in Moscow's collection [of complaints]," says Trenin. "It's evidence that Europe is concluding bilateral deals with Ukraine that undermine Russia's interests."
states ... see this partnership as a partnership against Russia," he said.
Putin's reference on Sunday to "Little Russia" — a term used during the Russian Empire to describe parts of modern-day Ukraine that came under czarist rule — has raised hackles in Ukraine, where many consider it demeaning and offensive.
source told Russia's Kommersant newspaper how Putin described Ukraine to George Bush at a NATO meeting in Bucharest: "You don't understand, George, that Ukraine is not even a state. What is Ukraine? Part of its territories is Eastern Europe, but the greater part is a gift from us."
Such rhetoric led to fears that after its army's foray into South Ossetia in August, Russia would turn its attention to Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, which has a predominantly ethnic Russian population and is home to Russia's Black Sea Fleet.
In an article in Ukraine's Den newspaper on Thursday, Yuriy Shcherbak, Ukraine's former ambassador to the U.S., wrote that political analysts close to the Russian leadership were keen to portray Ukraine, which has huge economic woes and a political élite riven by infighting, as a "failed state."
"Aggressive conversations are taking place concerning Ukraine and the dividing of its territory ... at various levels of the Russian political, military and secret-service leadership," he wrote. In fact, other experts suggest, such belligerent talk is meant more as a corrective threat than a potential course of action.
Medvedev has called Russia's "privileged interests" in the region to be respected - in terms of politics, business and culture.
And the Kremlin certainly has plenty of levers to pull in Ukraine to make its views felt, with its control over gas supplies, alongside the popularity of Russian state-controlled TV in the east and south of the country, where pro-Russian sentiment is strongest.
"In certain sections of the Ukrainian political and business élite, there are links with Russia stretching back to Soviet times," says Paliy from the Institute of Foreign Policy. "There are also a large number of Russian-sponsored think tanks in Ukraine, which function freely and push the Kremlin's views."
These levers are likely to play a significant role in Ukraine's upcoming presidential elections, set for next January. Last time around, in 2004, Russia and Putin threw their weight behind then Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, whose initial victory was overturned after massive protests in Kiev against vote-rigging, which turned into the so-called Orange Revolution.
Tymoshenko, President Yushchenko's former Orange ally.
Ukrainians alike will be watching for Putin's next trenchant explanation from literary history.
VIENNA - It would be "unthinkable" for the No. 2 emerging Europe lender Raiffeisen International [Bank] to exit crisis-ridden countries like Ukraine or Romania, the head of Raiffeisen's owner, RZB, said in an interview on Wednesday.
Raiffeisen's breakneck growth of the past years came to a screeching halt last year when the collapse of Western export demand and the global credit crunch suddenly pushed the former Communist countries of Europe into a deep economic crisis. "Of course this can be a long, dry spell," said Walter Rothensteiner, chief executive of cooperative bank RZB and chairman of its Raiffeisen International arm.
Ukraine, one of Raiffeisen's key markets where it owns the second-biggest bank, is particularly hit by the crisis, with economists expecting the economy to decline by 8 to 10 percent this year. But Rothensteiner said he would stay put there. "To take single building bricks out of (our network) would be unthinkable," he said. "It would be unacceptable for our overall strategy."
Raiffeisen's loan book grew 40 percent in 2007 and 20 percent in 2008 as companies invested and retail clients borrowed to buy houses, cars and refrigerators. But the bank will struggle to keep it stable this year.
At the same time, bad debt has started to rise and will eat up a big and rising chunk of income this year. Bad debt provisions at RZB rose to six times the level of last year in the first quarter of 2009 already.
"You'll have to sit down with clients and say, 'So what are we going to do?' And then you will lengthen clients' repayment schedules, and they will probably not repay in full. And you are going to see this in the risk provisions," Rothensteiner said.
But he added that the long-term growth prospects remained intact. The fact that there were still 50 to 60 million eastern Europeans who did not even have a bank account guaranteed that banking service would resume their growth at some point.
Rothensteiner criticised what he called alarmist warnings about a financial meltdown in emerging Europe which caused the region's currencies, bonds and stocks to collapse earlier this year.
He said that while the region was clearly in crisis, it was still manageable, and the sums needed to stabilise the region were small compared to those thrown into Western banks.
"With 10 or 20 billion euros of IMF loans, you can relieve the budget and the current account of an entire country," he said, comparing it to the 102 billion euro rescue of Germany's Hypo Real Estate. "We sometimes lose sight of those relative dimensions."
RZB, an unlisted bank owned by regional Austrian cooperative banks, is the main funding source for Raiffeisen, of which it owns 70 percent. Rothensteiner said a recent injection of 1.75 billion euros into RZB by the Austrian government would help it provide both capital and liquidity for Raiffeisen and its subsidiaries in 17 countries across emerging Europe.
"I would expect that central banks in some of the countries will demand to raise the capital," he said. "If Raiffeisen International needs money, they'll knock on our door." Asked if Raiffeisen would have to tap markets for equity to keep its capital ratios intact, he said: "Of course not."
NOTE: Reporting by Boris Groendahl and Eva Komarek; editing by Simon Jessop and David Cowell, boris.groendahl@reuters.com; +43 1 53112-258; Reuters Messaging: boris.groendahl.reuters.com@reuters.net, Keywords: RZB.
TRIPOLI - Libya has agreed with Ukraine to grow wheat on 100,000 hectares of land and export the grain to the North African country, Libyan state media reported on Wednesday.
Tripoli and Kiev also reached unspecified deals in military cooperation including "exchange of secret information" and "nuclear cooperation for peaceful uses", Libyan news agency Jana said.
"The agreement on farming 100,000 hectares in Ukraine is part of several deals between the two countries that include building an oil refinery and investment in several other agriculture projects," Jana quoted Libyan Prime Minister Al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi as saying late on Tuesday.
BARCELONA - The World Bank signed a pact with Ukraine to buy 10 million metric tons of Kyoto carbon emissions rights, the parties said on Wednesday, in a deal worth up to $140 million, according to Reuters calculations.
Under the Kyoto Protocol, signatory nations that are comfortably below their greenhouse gas emissions targets can sell excess emissions rights called Assigned Amount Units (AAUs) to nations which are struggling to meet their targets.
The industry of former communist countries collapsed in the 1990s, making their Kyoto targets very easy, and their sales of AAUs now are making it effortless for polluting countries to meet their targets, green groups say.
AAU deals threaten to undermine a market in carbon offsets, which project developers can sell in return for avoiding greenhouse gas emissions through building wind farms or hydropower dams, for example.
As most AAUs are often the result of economic restructuring rather than investment in clean energy, buyers like the World Bank insist that 'Green Investment Scheme' clauses to be included in the contracts, to avoid scrutiny.
Green Investment Schemes ensure AAU revenues are invested by the seller in clean energy projects. "This memorandum of understanding and the expected transaction are a continuation of cooperation between World Bank and Ukraine to design and implement a Green Investment Scheme," the World Bank said in a press release.
The memorandum was signed by both parties on the sidelines of a carbon market conference in Barcelona. On Tuesday, Ukraine's government said it was looking to sell 150 million AAUs to two private companies. It was not clear whether these deals involved a Green Investment Scheme clause.
Japan's Nomura bank also said it was in advanced talks to buy 100 million-300 million AAUs from Ukraine, which would include a Green Investment Scheme clause.
BARCELONA - Ukraine is in advanced talks to sell some $3.5 billion more sovereign carbon emission rights under the Kyoto Protocol to three companies, the government said on its website this week.
Ukraine's Cabinet of Ministers has asked the National Agency for Ecology Investments to sell at least 150 million more rights, called Assigned Amount Units (AAUs), to the UK arm of Japanese bank Nomura, Swiss-based Dighton Carbon SA and New Zealand-based Tawhaki International LP. The deals represent the biggest such transactions to date.
Laurent Segalen, managing director of commodities and environment at Nomura, said he represented a consortium of Japanese businesses looking to buy at least 100 million AAUs for between 5-10 euros ($7-$14) per metric ton of carbon dioxide, with a view to buying more if the initial deal was successful.
"We're in very, very advanced negotiations ... and expect to sign a mandate with Ukraine soon and a formal agreement by the end of the year," he told Reuters, adding that he was unfamiliar with the other two deals or the private buyers involved.
Ukraine said it also aimed to sell 100 million to Dighton Carbon and 50 million to Tawhaki, but no further details on the deals or the private companies were available. Online records show Dighton set up its carbon trading business within the past 12 months.
Through the most opaque of Kyoto's emissions trading schemes, nations comfortably below their greenhouse gas targets can sell excess rights to other countries that are emitting above their emissions targets.
Critics have called AAUs "hot air," arguing that most were generated through restructuring in eastern Europe in the 1990s, when polluting industries in ex-communist countries were shutting anyway, rather than by new investment in clean energy.
Because of this, many buyers insist that AAU deals should be "greened," meaning their proceeds are transparently earmarked for investment in clean energy or energy efficiency, under so-called Green Investment Schemes (GIS). "Our deal is extremely green," Nomura's Segalen added.
Ukraine, which has around 1 billion AAUs to sell through 2012, signed a deal in March to send 40 million tons east, for around 10 euros each. Laurent said Nomura was in talks with other countries but that Ukraine was "by far the most efficient." This deals represent the largest to date involving private buyers.
On May 5, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said he would fire his environment minister for mishandling a 10 million AAU sale to a private company.
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Ola Cabs Denies Claims User Details, Credit Card Data Compromised
By NDTV Correspondent | Updated: 8 June 2015 13:40 IST
An anonymous hacker going by TeamUnknown on Sunday posted on Reddit claiming to have hacked Ola Cabs. TeamUnknown claims that it was able to acquire Ola Cabs' user database, and describes it as "winning a lottery." It also claims to have sent an email to Ola Cabs to show the weakness, but adds that there has been no response from the company.
As proof, TeamUnknown has included snapshots which show the results of a database query that includes a lot of names that appear to be related to Ola Cabs. There is no further explanation of the methods used, and the Reddit post only states that the hack "was a little tricky, and involved many steps to get to the database." Of course, if this is genuine, then the information sent by the hacker to Ola Cabs could be much more comprehensive.
Ola Cabs has however completely denied that there has been any lapse, or any communication from TeamUknown. The company has issued the following statement:
There has been no security lapse, whatsoever to any user data. The alleged hack seems to have been performed on a staging environment when exposed for one of our test runs. The staging environment is on a completely different network compared to our production environment, and only has dummy user values exclusively used for internal testing purposes. We confirm that there has been no attempt by the hackers to reach out to us in this regard. Security and privacy of customer data is paramount to us at Ola.
On the other hand, TeamUnknown claims it can see unused vouchers, credit card history, and other kinds of personal data which you would obviously not want someone else to see, and Ola is obviously in a position where it would want to deny any leaks. If TeamUnknown doesn't reveal more details soon though, then this could potentially have been a hoax after all.
Further reading: Apps, Hacking, India, Internet, Ola, Ola Cabs
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Your dreams are a poetic reflection of your soul's wishes Be was posted in August 26 2018 at 5:54 am and has been seen by 5 users. If you want to view image in full size just click image on gallery bellow.
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Gold Forex
Abu Dhabi tolls, UAE sugar tax and what else to expect in 2020
A look at some of the new regulations as the year begins
Published: January 01, 2020 16:28 Last updated: January 02, 2020 07:16 Sami Zaatari, Staff Reporter
Picture used for illustrative purposes only Image Credit: Gulf News
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Abu Dhabi: As well as being a new year, 2020 is also ushering in several new regulations to the UAE, with the measures ranging from new toll gates in Abu Dhabi to a nationwide 50 per cent tax on sugary products.
The Abu Dhabi Toll Gate System, which comes into effect on January 2 was announced back in July, bringing a similar Dubai Salik style system to the capital.
The toll gates will operate on four bridges in Abu Dhabi – Shaikh Zayed Bridge, Shaikh Khalifa Bridge, Al Maqta Bridge and Mussaffah Bridge – with motorists having to pay Dh4 when they pass through any of the bridges. The total amount for the day will be capped at Dh16 with Dh200 per month.
No toll on off-peak hours
There's good news for motorists: The Department of Municipalities and Transport announced that they will not have to pay during off-peak hours.
The agency stated that the toll system only charging drivers during its peak hours from 7am-9am and 5pm-7pm from Saturday to Thursday.
Exemptions will also be made for certain motorists who fit the criteria; these include Senior Emirati citizens, people of determination and low income-Emiratis and Emirati retirees.
Certain vehicles will also be exempted from paying the tolls — such as taxis, public and school buses, towed vehicles and public buses with 26-seats or more.
As a way to incentivise greener cars, electric vehicles will also be exempted from paying any charges. Motorbikes as well will not face any toll charges.
Register now: Here's now
Motorists who haven't yet registered are advised to do so, or they will face a fine of Dh100 for the first day, Dh200 for the second and Dh400 for the third day with a maximum limit of Dh10,000.
Drivers can create an account and register online on itps.itc.gov.ae or dot.gov.abudhabi by clicking on the Abu Toll Gate system.
Applicants will need to provide their Emirates ID and license plate details along with their email and mobile number, followed by making a payment.
Tax on sugar
A 50 per cent tax levied on all sugary drinks in the UAE kicked in on January 1, 2020. They include any product with added sugar or sweeteners in the form of beverage, liquid, concentrate, powder, extract or anything that can be converted into a drink.
Starting January 1, a levied tax of 50 per cent is being placed on sugary drinks in the UAE.
They include any product with added sugar or sweeteners in the form of beverage, liquid, concentrate, powder, extract or anything that can be converted into a drink.
The new rule will also require manufacturers to clearly identify and label the sugar content to allow consumers to be informed of what they are purchasing and to be able to make healthier choices according to the UAE cabinet.
As well as the sugar tax, a tax of 100 per cent will also be levied on electronic smoking devices containing tobacco or nicotine, and liquids used in electronic smoking devices. According to the UAE Cabinet, the aim is to encourage residents to reduce their use of such products that can negatively affect their health.
Insolvencies will now be handled with a new insolvency law. Under the new law people won't be jailed for a bounced cheque, instead a debtor can now approach a civil court in the emirate they reside in and invoke their insolvency status.
A graphic shared by the UAE Cabinet about the new law Image Credit: WAM
Once declared insolvent, the civil court will appoint financial experts to come up with a long-term payment plan with the debtor and creditor. Payments can be done through direct payments or by assets owned.
With the payment plan in place, debtors will not face any legal prosecution during that period, and will also have the criminal case against them wiped out once all payments have been completed so they won't have any criminal record against them.
Higher Real Estate Committee
Announced back in September, this committee is expected to have a hands on approach in 2020.
The committee aims to regulate the property market in Dubai by ensuring that semi government real estate companies don't compete with private developers; the aim is to create a well-balanced property market ensuring no oversupply which can bring prices down.
The move aims to ensure the competitiveness of Dubai's real estate sector as well as bringing added value to any new development projects for the emirate.
Revised salary scales
As announced by the Abu Dhabi Executive Council, the salary scale resolution for government employees is aimed at ensuring parity.
Gross salaries will not be affected; instead a unified scale will be created across all government entities in terms of grading systems and allowances.
The resolution will also increase pensions for government employees, with payments calculated on almost 80 per cent of their gross salary, compared to previously when repayments were calculated based on their basic salary.
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History of the Women's and Children's Hospital – Celebrating 140 years
The Women's and Children's Hospital is celebrating 140 years of caring for South Australia's families.
Since the laying of the foundation stone in 1878, the Women's and Children's Hospital has cared for generations of South Australians and today is a leading provider of specialist care for children with acute and chronic conditions, as well as the State's largest maternity and obstetric service.
From small beginnings in a two-story building with twenty four beds, the Women's and Children's Health Network now provides care and community-based services from hundreds of sites across the state.
In 1989, we became the first hospital in Australia to combine health services for women, children and young people. Today, we are recognised as leaders in clinical care, education and research excellence.
This is an exciting time for the Women's and Children's Hospital, as we not only mark 140 years caring for our community but look forward to a move to new purpose-built facilities, so that we may better serve South Australian women, children, young people and babies well into the future.
Celebrating 140 Years – Morning tea and Governor's visit
The foundation stone for the Adelaide Children's Hospital was laid on 20 June 1878.
At that time, the Adelaide Hospital (now 'Royal Adelaide Hospital) was the only hospital in the colony.
And the first public health legislation, the Public Health Act 1873, had been in place for just five years.
That legislation had established the first boards of health, tasked with maintaining and improving the public health of the colony.
Responding to a need
And it was the early investigations of the Central Health Board, which played such a key role in defining the case for a children's hospital.
The first report of the Central Health Board in 1875 stated:
"In old and dilapidated cottages which are really unfit for habitation, often consisting of only two or three rooms, as many as twelve or thirteen persons have been found huddled together, as regardless of decency as of health.
"Around these dwellings are found dilapidated closets, built and exposed without regard even to decency – cesspits overflowing, stagnant drains, and filth abounding in every shape."
The health board identified several of these tenements around the city, and made recommendations to ensure they became 'clean and habitable'.
Provisions were also made for the cleaning of streets and the disposal of rubbish.
The sanitary problems in Adelaide, however, were closely linked to another health crisis in the colony.
High infant mortality
Statistics from as far back as the 1850s show that South Australia consistently reported the highest infant mortality rate in the nation. In the 1870s, this rate peaked at around 180 deaths per 1000 live births.
In 1876, the Evening Journal reported statistics compiled by the Government Statistician in Tasmania, which showed that South Australia had the highest mortality rate in the nation for children under twelve months, under five years and under 10 years old.
To address the crisis, the Central Health Board initiated an investigation.
Dr Allan Campbell
The investigation found that a hospital for children was desperately needed, and prompted Dr Allan Campbell, a member of the Central Health Board, to form the founding committee of the Adelaide Children's Hospital.
It is an extraordinary achievement, when you set out the timeline from the beginning of this movement, to the completion of the hospital.
The nine founders met for the first time to discuss the children's hospital on 5 September 1876, they appointed planning committees, determined a site for the hospital, bought the land, raised two thirds of the cost of the hospital and construction commenced on this date in 1878.
In the 16-month planning period one particularly interesting proposal was considered and rejected.
The Adelaide Children's Hospital original building
In October 1876, the Site Planning Committee recommended that the proposed Adelaide Children's Hospital be co-located with the Adelaide Hospital (now Royal Adelaide Hospital) on North Terrace.
This proposal was rejected, however, on several grounds, one of which was that the children would be 'endangered by the closeness of the East Terrace drains and filth pond in the Botanic Gardens'.
Thankfully, this is no longer a contemporary concern.
Today, it seems somewhat of a "no-brainer" to have a dedicated paediatric hospital in a state capital city – but the establishment of the Adelaide Children's Hospital was a hard-won fight. Not everyone was in favour of it – in particular some of the prominent residents of North Adelaide at the time.
But building an icon is never easy and there can be detractors who want to sully your vision, all the more reason to push on to realise your ambition.
That desire to build on those foundations and achieve excellence in care has never wavered.
On the death of founder Dr Allan Campbell in 1898, the local newspaper, The Register, noted in its obituary – in the florid journalistic style of the times – that:
"Some sympathetic statistician might do much worse than attempt to calculate how many children's lives have been saved through the instrumentality of kindly people moved thereto by Dr Campbell's warm heart."
Nurses and children on a ward at the ACH (date unknown)
Culture of excellence
That vision and desire continues today through the work of clinicians who have dedicated their careers to the specialised areas of caring for children and women – from before birth, during birth, and throughout the various stages of childhood and adolescence.
The Women's and Children's Hospital today
The hospital is something very special – something larger than the buildings that exist on the site today or those that once stood there.
A culture of caring that has evolved with the times and continues to strive for better health outcomes for all South Australians.
Providing excellence in care for 140 years
Acknowledging the hospital's history and treatment of Aboriginal peoples
Kaurna Smoking Ceremony, Aboriginal Liaison Unit, Women's and Children's Hospital, 2014
In celebrating 140 years of caring for the South Australian community, the Women's and Children's Health Network (WCHN) is mindful of the historically negative impact its predecessor organisations may have had on the lives of Aboriginal people as a collaborator in state-sanctioned policies of forced removal of babies and children from Aboriginal families.
WCHN acknowledges this history, and over the last decade has made a conscious effort to change the thinking around Aboriginal health, by adopting an approach that is not only more consultative, but also aware of the cultural needs of our Aboriginal consumers.
Statement from WCHN Reconciliation Sub-Committee (84kb)
last modified: 23 Jan 2019
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ADT Security is more than only home security. They have all you need for fire and security monitoring of your business and homes.
They have over 140 years experience and all their employees are background checked, drug tested and qualification certified.


In the previous sections, the importance of pictures in a shopping web design was mentioned. On the whole, picture quality and volume should be considered and set as the priority of the shopping web design. The format of the selected pictures greatly influences picture quality in the web design. If the picture quality matters for you in the web design, it will be better to select JPEG format among other formats.
One of the best formats for maintaining the quality of pictures in designing a shopping website is JPEG. When you use JPEG for your pictures, they become compressed and this format supports 24 bit pictures so that the high-quality pictures could be displayed in the shopping website.
One of the most important features of JPEG for designing a shopping website is its internationality. JPEG is applicable in all explorers. Another feature of this format is its high compressibility which leads to acceleration of picture loading in the web design. Creating high-quality pictures and supporting 24 bit colors is the other advantage of JPEG in the shopping web design. Furthermore, it supports Progressive format in shopping websites. Progressive enables the user to load different parts of the picture separately, and this feature causes the user to observe the picture before its complete loading.
Picture Selection in a Shopping Web DesignIn the previous sections, the importance of pictures in a shopping web design was mentioned. On the whole, picture quality and volume should be considered and set as the priority of the shopping web design.


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NewsVentureReal EstateUrbanized
Zillow axes home-flipping business after losing $381 million
Kenneth Chan
Nov 4 2021, 12:25 am
Zillow (Shutterstock)
After more than three years of launching a house-flipping division, a decision has been made by Zillow to shut down Zillow Offers, following massive losses.
The Seattle-based digital real estate company told investors in its financial results on Tuesday that a plan is now in the works to gradually close Offers and lay off 25% of its staff.
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Over the third quarter of 2021, it lost about USD$381 million from Offers alone, with the company writing down inventory of about USD$304 million as a direct result of purchasing homes at higher prices than the current estimates of future selling prices.
"This decision was not taken lightly, especially considering the hard work and commitment from the Zillow Offers team. Ultimately, we determined that further scaling up Zillow Offers is too risky, too volatile to our earnings and operations, provides too little opportunity for return on equity, and serves too narrow a portion of our customers," said Zillow co-founder and CEO Rich Barton and CFO Allen Parker in a joint open letter to shareholders.
"In our short tenure operating Zillow Offers, we have experienced a series of extraordinary events: a global pandemic, a temporary freezing of the housing market, and then a supply-demand imbalance that led to a rise in home prices at an unprecedented rate. We have been unable to accurately forecast future home prices at different times in both directions by much more than we modelled as possible."
Offers uses Zillow's iBuying pricing algorithms to buy homes from property owners. Before putting them back on the market for an increased resale value, it conducts light renovations on the home. When it launched in 2018, it was marketed as a way for property owners to sell their home through a non-traditional platform.
But as it turns out, their algorithm has been overpaying for the properties. As well, to date, it has been able to convert only about 10% of the serious sellers who ask for an offer.
During the third quarter, Offers bought 9,680 homes, but only sold 3,032, partially due to its constrained logistical capacity to renovate and resell the properties. It entered the quarter with 9,790 homes in inventory and 8,172 homes under contract.
The company's statements show the average Offers gross profit per home sold was a loss of USD$80,771, while the average Offers revenue per home was USD$386,722.
The average acquisition cost per home was USD$354,482, average renovation cost per home was USD$7,369, average holding costs per home was USD$2,412, and average selling costs was USD$13,326 per home. Offers only operates in about two dozen cities within the United States.
Additional losses of USD$240 million to USD$265 million are anticipated in the fourth quarter on homes it expects to purchase, before the business can be fully shut down. This fourth quarter Offers activity was shifted from the third quarter due to the logistical constraints.
Offers generated USD$1.2 billion in revenue over the third quarter, below their forecast of USD$1.45 billion.
Overall, Zillow recorded consolidated revenue of USD$1.7 billion over the third quarter, with a net loss of USD$328 million.
Zillow states it will now focus on strengthening its core business, which "has thrived while we poured its profits into the Zillow Offers iBuying operation."
The 2006-founded company began solely as a website that provides real estate listings and estimates home prices, and it has expanded into other services such as providing prospective homebuyers with a mortgage loan estimate. In 2018, Zillow expanded its property listings business to Canada.
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Solution of the K3 Option 1 of Reshebnik on theoretical mechanics AA Yablonsky 1978 on the theme: K3 certain speed and acceleration of a rigid body points for translational and rotational motion (page 88.).
After payment you will get the solution of K3 B1 control work on the mechanics of tereticheskoy Reshebnik unique to the collection edited by AA Yablonsky 1978 edition.
This work was clear, legible handwriting or typed in a Word (saved in WORD format) a teacher with 22 years experience and tested for 17 years in several universities of the Russian Federation and more than seven years on the Internet across the country.


Now that the last vestiges of excitement over last September's Philip Lim collection for Target have worn off, it's time for a new guest designer to step in and grace the racks with unique, affordable fashion. Arriving February 9th is London-based designer team Peter Pilotto's highlighter-bright spring collaboration, a godsend for those of us who can't wait to break out of winter with some colorful prints. Also for the first time in Target collaboration history, the collection will be available for international sale on luxury retail site net-a-porter.com right on its Feb. 9 release date. Here are our favorite pieces from the collection!