Baltic Dry Index. 1162 -24 Brent Crude
52.88
Eurasian Snow cover. (How bad will
winter be?)
“The principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under
the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”
Thomas Jefferson
The game changer in question today, is in the manufacture of
organic solar cells, though it might also be a game changer yesterday at Deutsch Bank. For more on OSCs scroll down
to “Solar and Related Update.” Next decade will be as far from the “naughties”
as were the last century’s 20’s from their noughties.
We open today with a Bloomberg explanation for Trumpmania. One I
think will turn out to be a giant mistake. Yes interest rates are about to start
normalising, so it makes sense to start running from bonds. But normalising interest
rates are going to crush those stocks that loaded up on debt to by-back
corporate stock to inflate the stock price. As interest rates begin
normalising, their interest rate expense will start to soar just as profits dip
in the broad economy. Assuming Trump actually delivers on increased
infrastructure spending, only a small segment of stocks will actually benefit,
while if the increased spending comes about by increased US government debt,
interest rates will likely normalise far faster than most now expect.
If
all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
John Kenneth
Galbraith.
Trump Win Set Off $2 Trillion Shock Rotation to Stocks From Debt
by Garfield Clinton Reynolds and Adam Haigh
Donald Trump’s election win sent a $2
trillion shock wave through global markets over the past month.
That’s how much equities’ global market
value has jumped. And that’s about the size of the loss in worth of the
Bloomberg Barclays Global Aggregate Index of bonds, over the worst month for
global bonds in dollar terms on record. Other assets were roiled, too: the yen
plunged the most in 21 years against the dollar. It all amounted to a complete
reversal of the playbooks mapped out by a bevy of analysts and investors who
had anticipated a Brexit-style rush for havens in the event of a surprise
Republican presidential victory.
Those projections did pan out -- for about eight hours, when the yen and Treasuries advanced as the vote-count momentum favored Trump. Then the great reflationary rotation trade started, as Carl Icahn started snapping up S&P 500 futures and other investors decided that the likely new U.S. leader’s promises to cut taxes, boost spending and slash regulation would revive inflation and economic growth. Oh, and potentially force more aggressive interest-rate increases from the Federal Reserve.
How lasting a pattern the new market dynamics will be is an open question, with more than a month to go before Trump takes office and plenty of potential roadblocks to his fiscal and regulatory proposals in a fractious U.S. Congress. For now, eyes turn toward next week’s Fed meeting to set the tone for the outlook as far as monetary policy goes.
“It’s astounding how big the move has been,” said James Audiss, Sydney-based senior wealth manager at Shaw and Partners Ltd., which oversees about $7.5 billion. “It’s been incredible. Now it all hinges on the Fed and the pace of those rate hikes, but for now the markets are happy to be risk-on.”
More
In other news, OPEC gave a get out of jail card to US frackers.
Exclusive: In mammoth task, BP sends almost three million barrels of U.S. oil to Asia
BP's efforts, involving one of the world's longest sea routes, seven tankers and a series of ship-to-ship transfers, underscore a desire among oil traders to develop new routes to sell swelling supplies of cheap U.S. shale oil to Asia, the world's biggest consumer region.
While exports of U.S. crude have been allowed since a 40-year ban was lifted a year ago, the distance, cost and complexity of shipping to Asia has so far kept the flow to a trickle.
Now, using its global shipping and trading network, BP was able to grapple with U.S. port limitations and the need to transfer oil between ships off Malaysia to split cargoes for customers across Asia, according to trade sources and shipping data in Thomson Reuters Eikon.
"Keeping regional price differentials, different tanker rates, and the forward price curve in mind while considering the delivery needs and schedules of your counterparties is not something many oil trading firms can do," said a shipping source in Singapore, who had knowledge of the operations.
"BP is one of perhaps half a dozen firms capable of doing so," he added, speaking on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to publicly discuss operations.
BP declined to comment.
While BP's operations are currently the most sophisticated, others have also begun developing U.S./Asia trade.
China's Unipec, the trading arm of Asia's largest refiner Sinopec (600028.SS), is shipping about 2 million barrels of WTI to China this month, while trading house Trafigura is also exporting some 2 million barrels of U.S. oil to Asia.
Incentives to bring U.S. crude into Asia have risen after the Middle East-led producer club of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Russia agreed to cut output, encouraging refiners across the region to seek alternatives to offset potential supply shortfalls.
"OPEC is putting U.S. shale oil to the test... (and) we will truly see what it can deliver," said Bjarne Schieldrop, chief commodity analyst at SEB. He predicted 2017 would be a "shale oil party" with a surge in U.S. exports after the OPEC production cuts.
More
We
close with dying EUSSR news. In Brexit, Her Majesty’s Government got the vote
that it wanted, though Remainiacs will probably demand a re-vote. In the
Volkswagen emissions fraud scandal, the EUSSR is taking steps to make matters
worse.
British lawmakers back PM May's Brexit timetable
British lawmakers backed Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit timetable
on Wednesday after she headed off a rebellion in her Conservative Party over a
lack of insight into the government's strategy to leave the European Union.
May has come under pressure from lawmakers, businesses and investors to
set out at least a broad picture of how she sees Britain's future relationship
with the EU. She says giving too much away could weaken Britain's hand in the
country's most important negotiations since World War Two.
After a sometimes rowdy session in parliament, lawmakers voted by 448 to
75 to support a motion calling on the government to offer up its Brexit plan,
but also backed the government's timetable to trigger the divorce procedure by
the end of March.
More
EU takes action against UK, Germany over VW emissions scandal - sources
The European Union will take action on Thursday against seven nations
including Germany and Britain for failing to police car emissions rules, EU sources said, after the Volkswagen cheating
scandal showed suspicious behavior in the industry.
Amid frustration in Brussels over nations' responses to diesel vehicles
flouting pollution limits, the European Commission is resorting to the
strongest legal action it can take against members of the 28-nation bloc -
potentially ending in court.
Nitrogen Oxide (NOx) pollution from diesel engines, which power half of
all cars in Europe, lead to respiratory illness and the premature death of
72,000 people per year, European Environmental Agency data shows.
A year after U.S. authorities caught VW (VOWG_p.DE) using software to cheat emissions test, EU officials say many nations wooed by the industry's importance - it employs some 12 million people in the bloc - have shielded carmakers from the kind of sanctions some face in the United States.
According to EU sources familiar with the matter, the EU executive has found fault with countries for failing to set fines to deter sharp practice on emissions, penalize carmakers for breaching the law or cooperate with its demands for information.
Germany and Britain face cases linked to their testing and approval of new VW models, sources said.
"This is not the end; just the first wave of action," one EU source said.
A Commission spokeswoman declined to confirm the reports.
Thursday's notice is the first step in what is known as infringement procedures, allowing the European Union to take action against member states for failing to apply EU law.
Member states have two months to respond. If they fail to satisfy the Commission during a lengthy mediation, the EU can take the issue to European Courts.
More
Deutsche Bank Records Alleged to Show Silver-Price Rigging
by David Glovin and Edvard Pettersson
Eight months after Deutsche Bank AG settled a lawsuit claiming it
manipulated gold and silver prices, documents it disclosed as part of the accord
provide “smoking gun” proof that UBS Group AG, HSBC Holdings Plc, Bank of Nova
Scotia and other firms rigged the silver market, plaintiffs claim.
The allegation came in a filing Wednesday in a Manhattan federal court
lawsuit filed in 2014 by individuals and entities that bought or sold futures
contracts.
According to the plaintiffs, records surrendered by Deutsche Bank show
traders and submitters coordinating trades in advance of a daily phone call,
manipulating the spot market for silver, conspiring to fix the spread on silver
offered to customers and using illegal strategies to rig prices.
“Plaintiffs are now able to plead with direct, ‘smoking gun’ evidence,’
including secret electronic chats involving silver traders and submitters
across a number of financial institutions, a multi-year, well-coordinated and
wide-ranging conspiracy to rig the prices,” the plaintiffs said in their
filing. The new scheme “far surpasses the conspiracy alleged earlier.”
More
For skating on thin ice DB, the sky is now starting to fall.
At the Comex silver depositories Tuesday final figures were: Registered 35.15 Moz, Eligible 143.63 Moz, Total 178.78 Moz.
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally
doubled over.
Today, the serial criminal banks yet again. So why
have they still got banking licences? Take away their banking licence even if
only for a month or two, and make forfeit any bonuses paid to the miscreant
bankster criminals.
They can resist anything except
temptation.
With apologies to Oscar Wilde.
JPMorgan Hit Hardest as EU Fines Euribor Trio $521 Million
by Gaspard Sebag December 7, 2016 — 5:01 AM EST December 7, 2016 — 7:12 AM EST
JPMorgan Chase & Co., HSBC Holdings Plc and Credit Agricole SA were
fined a total of 485.5 million euros ($521 million) for rigging the
Euribor benchmark as European Union antitrust regulators wrapped up a
five-year investigation into the scandal.
The trio colluded to rig the Euribor rate and exchanged sensitive
information to suit their trading positions in correlated derivatives markets,
in breach of EU antitrust rules, the European Commission said on Wednesday in
an e-mailed statement. JPMorgan was fined 337.2 million euros, HSBC got a 33.6
million-euro penalty and Credit Agricole must pay 114.7 million euros.
“The participation in such schemes was very lucrative for the banks,”
Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s antitrust commissioner, told journalists in
Brussels, adding that it’s very difficult to make an exact estimate of their
profits. “Tiny movements of the Euribor rate can have a huge impact given the
trading volumes at stake.”The EU’s investigation into Euribor manipulation was strained three years ago after Credit Agricole, JPMorgan and HSBC refused to join a multi-bank settlement with four other lenders including Deutsche Bank AG and Societe Generale SA. Since then, the holdouts have been a thorn in the commission’s side -- successfully delaying the process and showing up the regulator for its handling of the case.
JPMorgan “did not engage in any wrongdoing with respect to the Euribor benchmark,” Jennifer Zuccarelli, a spokeswoman for the bank in London, said in a statement. “We will continue to vigorously defend our position against these allegations, including through possible appeals to the European courts.”
Credit Agricole in a statement said it “firmly believes that it did not infringe competition law” and that “it will appeal the commission’s decision.” The fine payment “will not affect the 2016 financial statements given the provisions set aside previously,” the Montrouge, France-based bank said.
HSBC said it “did not participate in an anti-competitive cartel,” and is also considering its legal options, according to a statement.
The four banks that settled the Euribor case were accused of sharing, via phone and through online chats, sensitive trading information among themselves and strategizing to push benchmark rates up or down to suit their trading positions.
----About $9 billion in fines have been levied against a dozen banks by global authorities over the manipulation of the London interbank offered rate and similar benchmarks in the last four years and more than 20 traders charged.
Libor and Euribor, the euro interbank offered rate, gauge banks’
estimated cost of borrowing over different periods of time. The rates are a
benchmark used to calculate interest payments for trillions of euros worth of
financial products including mortgages.
More
Let us disappoint the Men who are raising themselves upon
the ruin of this Country.
John Adams.
Solar & Related Update.
With events
happening fast in the development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported. Is converting sunlight to usable cheap
AC or DC energy mankind’s future from the 21st century onwards? DC?
A quantum computer next?
Game changer for organic solar cells
Date: December 6, 2016
Source: University of California - Santa Barbara
Summary: Researchers have developed a simple processing technique
that could cut the cost of organic photovoltaics and wearable electronics.
With a new technique for manufacturing single-layer organic polymer
solar cells, scientists at UC Santa Barbara and three other universities might
very well move organic photovoltaics into a whole new generation of wearable
devices and enable small-scale distributed power generation.
The simple doping solution-based process involves briefly immersing
organic semiconductor films in a solution at room temperature. This technique,
which could replace a more complex approach that requires vacuum processing,
has the potential to affect many device platforms, including organic printed
electronics, sensors, photodetectors and light-emitting diodes. The
researchers' findings appear in the journal Nature Materials.
"Because the new process is simple to use, general in terms of
applicability and should be configurable into mass productions, it has the
potential to greatly accelerate the widespread implementation of plastic
electronics, of which solar cells are one example," said co-author
Guillermo Bazan, director of UCSB's Center for Polymers and Organic Solids.
"One can see impacts in technologies ranging from light-emitting devices
to transistors to transparent solar cells that can be incorporated into
building design or greenhouses."
Studied in many academic and industrial laboratories for two decades,
organic solar cells have experienced a continuous and steady improvement in
their power conversion efficiency with laboratory values reaching 13 percent
compared to around 20 percent for commercial silicon-based cells. Though
polymer-based cells are currently less efficient, they require less energy to
produce than silicon cells and can be more easily recycled at the end of their
lifetimes.
This new method, which provides a way of inducing p-type electrical
doping in organic semiconductor films, offers a simpler alternative to the
air-sensitive molybdenum oxide layers used in the most efficient polymer solar
cells. Thin films of organic semiconductors and their blends are immersed in
polyoxometalate solutions in nitromethane for a brief time -- on the order of
minutes. The geometry of these new devices is unique as the functions of hole
and electron collection are built into the light-absorbing active layer,
resulting in the simplest single-layer geometry with few interfaces.
"High-performing organic solar cells require a multiple layer
device structure," said co-author Thuc-Quyen Nguyen, a professor in UCSB's
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. "The realization of single-layer
photovoltaics with our approach will simplify the device fabrication process
and therefore should reduce the cost. The initial lifetime testing of these
single layer devices is promising. This exciting development will help
transform organic photovoltaics into a commercial technology."
Organic solar cells are unique within the context of providing
transparent, flexible and easy-to-fabricate energy-producing devices. These
could result in a host of novel applications, such as energy-harvesting windows
and films that enable zero-cost farming by creating greenhouses that support
crops and produce energy at the same time.
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished November
DJIA: 19124
+53 Up NASDAQ: 5324 +41 Up. SP500: 2198 +58 Up.
No comments:
Post a Comment