Monday 10 November 2014

Fracking Cracking. APEC.



Baltic Dry Index. 1437 +01

LIR Gold Target in 2019: $30,000.  Revised due to QE programs.

There are some bored foreigners, with full stomachs, who have nothing better to do than point fingers at us … First, China doesn't export Revolution; second, China doesn't export hunger and poverty; third, China doesn't come and cause you headaches, what more is there to be said?

President Xi Jinping.

For more on fracking cracking, scroll down to crooks corner. If China slows some more as promised and if OPEC doesn’t cut back production at the end of the month, we would seem to be heading for a winter of “cheap” oil.

The big story  this week will be how much last week’s US election results weaken President Obama in this week’s APEC summit in China, and whether anything concrete comes out of that summit. Is President Obama already perceived as a lame duck President? Ahead of the summit, China’s President Xi indicated that China is willing to allow their growth rate to slow further next year.  If so, more trouble lies ahead for commodity prices and oil. Below, APEC developments so far. Off to a fast start by China.

Happiness does not fall out of the blue and dreams will not come true by themselves. We need to be down-to-earth and work hard. We should uphold the idea that working hard is the most honorable, noblest, greatest and most beautiful virtue.

President Xi Jinping.

Xi Dangles $1.25 Trillion as China Counters U.S. Refocus

Nov 9, 2014 4:01 PM GMT
President Xi Jinping sought to counter U.S. efforts aimed at boosting influence in Asia by flexing China’s economic muscle days before a Beijing summit with his counterpart Barack Obama.

Speaking to executives at a CEO gathering in Beijing, Xi outlined how much the world stands to gain from a rising China. He said outbound investment will total $1.25 trillion over the next 10 years, 500 million Chinese tourists will go abroad, and the government will spend $40 billion to revive the ancient Silk Road trade route between Asia and Europe.

“China’s development will generate huge opportunities and benefits and hold lasting and infinite promise,” Xi said. “As China’s overall national strength grows, China will be both capable and willing to provide more public goods for the Asia Pacific and the world.”

China has used the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum summit under way in Beijing to put forward its own trade and economic proposals to strengthen its sway in Asia. Those incentives complement a greater assertiveness in territorial disputes and moves to upgrade its military after decades of U.S. dominance in the region.

China is rolling out counteroffers for each promise made by President Barack Obama, whom he’ll meet this week in Beijing as part of the summit. Xi is pushing the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific in response to the U.S.-backed Trans-Pacific Partnership, which excludes China. An Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank mostly financed with money from Beijing is seen as an answer to the Asian Development Bank and other multinational lenders where the U.S. and Japan have the most influence.

----While spelling out his message, Xi also made clear China is ready to accept a lower rate of growth, assuring executives that the economy is more resilient than ever and his government can safely guide the country through any slowdown. China’s economy is targeted to grow at about 7.5 percent this year, the slowest since 1990, and Xi said a growth rate around 7 percent would still make the country a top performer.

Calling a slowdown part of the new normal in China, Xi said his government is weaning the economy from a dependence on exports and infrastructure and making domestic consumption the key growth engine. He said the country expects to import over $10 trillion of goods over the next five years -- a further benefit to China’s partners.

Without mentioning the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Xi said a key challenge in the region is that “various types of regional free trade arrangements mushroomed, creating puzzling choices.” Underscoring the choice other nations must make, he said the region is at a crossroads.
More

China Factory-Gate Prices Decline for Record 32nd Month: Economy

Nov 10, 2014 2:51 AM GMT
China’s factory-gate prices fell for a record 32nd month in October and consumer prices remained subdued, raising pressure on policymakers to bolster the world’s second-largest economy as disinflation spreads.

The producer-price index dropped 2.2 percent from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics said in Beijing today, compared with the median projection of a 2 percent decline in a survey of analysts by Bloomberg News. Consumer prices (CNCPIYOY) rose 1.6 percent and the rate was unchanged from the prior month and matched economists’ estimates.

China’s economy, burdened by overcapacity and weak domestic demand, is headed for the slowest full-year growth in more than two decades. Lower oil and metals prices are cutting costs at the factory gate, allowing China’s exporters to reduce prices and adding to deflationary pressures globally.
More

China, South Korea 'effectively' conclude free trade deal

BEIJING Sun Nov 9, 2014 10:27pm EST
(Reuters) - Chinese and South Korean leaders said on Monday the two countries have "effectively" concluded a free trade agreement that will remove or sharply reduce barriers to trade and investment between the two trading giants.

The deal follows more than two years of negotiations between the two neighbors on opening their markets wider to each other, although there remains some scepticism in South Korea about a swift passing through the country's parliament.

"South Korean and Chinese leaders today declared an effective conclusion of the FTA at a summit meeting held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing," a statement from Korea's presidential office quoted spokesman Min Kyung-wook as saying.
More

Russia, China Add to $400 Billion Gas Deal With Accord

Nov 10, 2014 3:55 AM GMT
China has secured almost a fifth of the natural gas supplies it will need by the end of the decade after striking a second major deal with Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping signed the gas-supply agreement in Beijing the day before U.S. President Barack Obama arrived in the Chinese capital for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. The deal is slightly smaller than the $400 billion accord reached earlier this year, shortly after Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

Russia’s OAO Gazprom is negotiating the supply of as much as 30 billion cubic meters of gas annually from West Siberia to China over 30 years, it said yesterday. Another Russian company is discussing the sale of a 10 percent stake in a Siberian unit to state-owned China National Petroleum Corp.
More

Abe and Putin Vow to Repair Ties Frayed Over Ukraine

Nov 10, 2014 1:01 AM GMT
Japan and Russia held their first summit in nine months in an effort to repair ties frayed by tensions over Ukraine, pledging to resume talks on reaching a peace agreement outstanding since the end of World War II.

“Relations have been developing rather successfully both in the economic and political spheres,” Russia’s President Vladimir Putin told Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the start of their hour-long evening meeting yesterday in Beijing. “When I mention the political sphere, I also mean the resumption of our talks about concluding a peace agreement.”

Abe set out in 2013 to improve ties with Putin to secure resources for his energy-starved economy and avoid isolation in Northeast Asia. That effort struck difficulty when Russia annexed Crimea in March this year and Japan imposed sanctions in line with its Group of Seven peers. After five summits in less than a year, the two leaders have not met formally since February.

“Your knowledge of Japanese martial arts as a judo fighter, which also means a deeper understanding of Japan itself, I think is a big plus for further development and further strengthening of Russia-Japan relations,” Abe told Putin as the two met on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum.

Abe and Putin called each other on their birthdays in September and October and met briefly in Milan last month. The two leaders during their meeting yesterday discussed a possible Putin trip to Japan next year, according to Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
More

China's Xi and Japan's Abe hold landmark meeting

BEIJING Mon Nov 10, 2014 12:52am EST
(Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe held formal talks on Monday for the first time since the two leaders took office, a breakthrough in ending a two-year row between Asia's biggest economies over history and territory.

China and Japan, the world's second- and third-largest economies, have sparred over disputed islands , regional rivalry and the bitter legacy of Japan's wartime occupation of China.

The meeting between Abe and Xi, which took place in Beijing's Great Hall of the People, came three days after the two countries agreed to work on improving ties and signaled willingness to put their rival claims over disputed islands on the back burner. They met on the sidelines of a gathering of Asia-Pacific leaders, Japan's foreign ministry said.

Rebuilding trust between the long-time rivals will not be easy. In signs that fundamental problems would not be resolved easily, Abe has previously said that there had been no change in Japan's stance on the isles at the heart of the territorial dispute, while China's top diplomat, Yang Jiechi, urged Japan to properly address sensitive issues like history and the islands.

Abe, who has not met Xi except to shake hands since taking office in December 2012, has been calling for a one-on-one meeting at the Nov. 10-11 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.
More

We close for today with faraway, irrelevant dying Europe. The EUSSR’s headaches just got worse.

Catalans Back Independence in Ballot Challenging Rajoy

Nov 10, 2014 12:19 AM GMT
More than two million Catalans voted overwhelmingly in favor of leaving Spain yesterday in a ballot ruled illegal by the Constitutional Court, adding to pressure on Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to open talks on a roadmap to independence.

Eighty-one percent of voters, about 1.6 million people, backed independence, regional vice president Joana Ortega said early today, with 88 percent of polling stations counted. The regional government projected overall turnout would be about 2.3 million out of a total electorate of 5.5 million.

“I ask the people of the world, the governments and media, to help us to convince the Spanish government to sit down at the table to talk,” Catalan President Artur Mas said at a press conference in Barcelona late yesterday. “We deserve to hold a normal legal and binding referendum to decide our political future as a nation.”

The vote marks the highest point so far in a four-year resurgence of separatist sentiment which has put Rajoy on the defensive as he struggles to maintain the support of voters amid a raft of corruption allegations and the harshest budget cuts in a generation. Rajoy had said for a year the vote wouldn’t happen because it breached the constitution.
More

Why must we stand firm on the party's leadership over the military? Because that's the lesson from the collapse of the Soviet Union. In Soviet Union, where the military was depoliticized, separated from the party and nationalized, the party was disarmed. When the country came to crisis point, a big party was gone just like that. Proportionally, the Soviet Communist Party had more members than we (Communist Party of China) do, but nobody was man enough to stand up and resist.

President Xi Jinping.

At the Comex silver depositories Friday final figures were: Registered 66.14 Moz, Eligible 113.73 Moz, Total 179.87 Moz.   

Crooks and Scoundrels Corner

The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally doubled over.

The first casualty in the American War Party’s war on Putin’s Russia over the Ukraine, was the UK and Europe’s non-existent, but emerging, oil fracking industry. After a 28 percent decline in the price of crude oil, hydraulic fracking in Europe is as dead as the Dodo at current prices. Long before President Putin surrenders in Moscow, turning over the keys to EurAsia’s natural resource wealth for slicing and dicing in Washington, the second casualty of the AWP’s reckless war seems to be America’s own and very real fracking industry. Despite all the brave words about being able to live and prosper with the new unexpected lower price structure, after just a few weeks of forced oil price austerity, America’s frackers and deep sea drillers  are starting to throw in the towel.

Unless OPEC scales back production at their late November meeting, oil prices are likely headed much lower yet. It will be interesting to see if the brave words of US frackers survive a world seemingly headed towards a coming year of oil prices descending towards $50. Great news for importers China and India. A wipeout for Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Russia, Venezuela and of course Uncle Scam’s heavily indebted frackers.

Shale Drillers Idle Rigs From Texas to Utah Amid Oil Rout

By Lynn Doan Nov 8, 2014 1:00 AM GMT
The shale-oil drilling boom in the U.S. is showing early signs of cracking.

Rigs targeting oil sank by 14 to 1,568 this week, the lowest since Aug. 22, Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI) said yesterday. The Eagle Ford shale formation in south Texas lost the most, dropping nine to 197. The nation’s oil rig count is down from a peak of 1,609 on Oct. 10.

Drillers are slowing down as crude prices tumbled 24 percent in the past four months. Transocean Ltd. (RIG) said yesterday that its earnings would take a hit by a drop in fees and demand for its rigs. The slide threatens to curb a production boom in U.S. shale formations that has helped bring prices at the pump below $3 a gallon for the first time since 2010 and shrink the nation’s dependence on foreign oil imports.

“We are officially seeing the slowdown in oil drilling,” James Williams, president of energy consulting company WTRG Economics, said by telephone from London, Arkansas, yesterday. “There’s no doubt about it now. We’re already down 49 rigs since the peak in October. It’ll have fallen by more than 100 rigs by the end of year.”

----Executives at several large U.S. shale producers, including Chesapeake Energy Corp. (CHK) and EOG Resources Inc. (EOG), have vowed to maintain or even raise production as they reported earnings this week. They say their success in bringing down costs means they can make money even if prices slump further.

The oil rig count will drop to 1,325 by the middle of next year amid lower prices, Genscape Inc., an energy data company based in Louisville, Kentucky, said in a report Nov. 6.

Drillers from Apache Corp. (APA) to Continental Resources Inc. (CLR) have said this week that they’re laying down rigs in some oil plays.

Transocean, owner of the biggest fleet of deep-water drilling rigs, is delaying the release of its third-quarter results after saying its earnings would be hit by $2.76 billion in charges from a decline in the value of its contracts drilling business and a drop in rig-use fees. The company had been scheduled to report earnings yesterday.

Transocean’s competitors will probably have to take similar measures as “this is going to be an industry wide phenomenon,” Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) said in a research note yesterday.
More

I think both sides [China and United States] should work hard to build a new type of relationship between big powers. The two sides should cooperate with each other for a win-win result in order to benefit people from the two countries and the world.

President Xi Jinping.

The monthly Coppock Indicators finished October.

DJIA: +137 Down. NASDAQ: +275 Down. SP500: +210 Down.  

No comments:

Post a Comment