Baltic Dry Index. 1709 -26 Brent Crude 75.16
“Trump:
If you don't know where you are going any road can take you there”
With
apologies to Lewis Carroll, Alice in
Wonderland.
The low-level trade
war talks between China and America, as predicted, got nowhere, so both sides
are now preparing for Trump’s round three of punitive China tariffs, due to take
effect in as early as two weeks on September 6th. In rounds one and two, mere peashooters were
used by both parties, amounting to a mere 50 billion of tariffs in total each. Round
three promises a much more spectacular exchange of artillery, with much more
damage to both sides.
President Trump has
indicated he will impose up to another 200 billion in punitive tariffs, which
China has said it will match. But to match Trump’s 200 billion hit, China will
have to get creative, there aren’t another easy 200 billion of US imports to
tariff. Hitting the A, B, Cs, looks likely, Apple and Boeing and Caterpillar for
starts.
US consumers needing
Chinese made knick-knacks and electronics for Christmas presents, better head
out to Walmart’s before September 6th. Most of the new punitive Trump
tariffs on consumer goods are going to get passed straight on to the long-suffering
US consumer, who now must be deprived from access to cheap Chinese made goods.
Very belatedly, global
stock markets are starting to notice.
Trade wars aren’t good for most stocks. For each “winner” there are many
more losers. Tariff taxing US consumers isn’t a winner either. With less
disposable income left over, that’s less income to spend in the service
economy. Pretty soon no one seems to know any winners.
With a little over
two months to America’s crucial mid-term election, crucial that is for
President Trump’s survival, President Trump and his team of trade hooligans,
have backed themselves into a corner with no feasible exit. President Trump
cannot back down now, or anytime ahead of November’s elections. Things can only
get worse, it seems from faraway London, heading off for a long late summer
weekend.
“Off with their heads!”
President
Trump. With apologies to Lewis Carroll, Alice
in Wonderland.
August 24, 2018 / 1:50 AM
Asia slips after U.S.-China trade talks end without progress, Powell eyed
TOKYO
(Reuters) - Asian stocks fell on Friday after U.S.-China trade talks ended
without progress, with the markets braced for a speech by Federal Reserve
Chairman Jerome Powell for hints on the direction of U.S. monetary policy.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS shed 0.6 percent. It was still up about 0.85 percent on the week.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng .HSI fell 0.8 percent and the Shanghai Composite Index .SSEC dropped 0.65 percent
Australian stocks rose 0.2 percent, South Korea's KOSPI .KS11 fell 0.35 percent and Japan's Nikkei .N225 climbed 0.3 percent.
“Global risk sentiment remains somewhat jittery ahead of Fed Chair Powell’s speech with U.S.-Sino trade talks failing to yield any immediate progress,” strategists at OCBC Bank wrote.
The S&P 500 .SPX shed 0.17 percent overnight to pull back slightly from a record high scaled midweek, with industrial shares sagging after the United States and China imposed a fresh round of trade tariffs on each other.
Shares of industrial giants Caterpillar Inc (CAT.N) and Boeing Co (BA.N), which have been bellwethers of trade sentiment, were among the biggest drags on the Dow .DJI, which lost about 0.3 percent. Caterpillar shares fell 2.0 percent, and Boeing shares fell 0.7 percent.
In
immediate focus was the speech by the Fed’s Powell to be given later on Friday
at the Jackson Hole, Wyoming, meeting of central bankers.
Where
Powell stands on the pace of interest rate hikes will be scrutinized after
minutes from the Fed’s most recent policy meeting indicated the central bank
would tighten monetary policy soon.
----U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his displeasure with the Fed’s rate hikes earlier this week and investors waited to see whether Powell would respond to such criticism.
The Fed should raise rates further this year and probably next year as
well, despite Trump’s opposition to tighter policy, Kansas City Fed President
Esther George said in interviews aired on Thursday.
More
U.S.-China Talks Draw a Blank, Bringing Fresh Tariffs Into View
Bloomberg News
Updated on 24 August 2018, 04:53 GMT+1
The U.S. and China returned to the negotiating table this week after
more than two months, but with no progress after two days of talks, the stage
is set for further escalation of the trade war.
The two sides had met with low expectations for this week’s meetings and
no further talks had been scheduled, a person familiar with the discussions
said. The person, who requested anonymity to discuss the private deliberations,
also said Chinese officials had raised the possibility that no further
negotiations could happen until after November’s mid-term elections in the U.S.
The lack of progress and the looming prospect of further tariffs from
both sides adds to the uncertainty for businesses, who have to decide whether
it makes sense to invest in China or the U.S., given the rising political
tensions and risk of punishing new taxes on trade. A new round of tariffs could
come as soon as early September, but there is no guarantee that will be the
last, or that there won’t be other measures.
"Now, it seems quite likely that the US will impose tariffs on the
$200 billion in imports from China, which will trigger a bigger round of
shooting," said Zhou Xiaoming, a former commerce ministry official and
diplomat. "It is impossible for China to drop the ‘Made in China 2025’ and
its industrial policies as a compromise. But there is haggling room in IP
protection and market access issues," he said, referring to intellectual
property protection.
----But the Trump administration is preparing a far larger tranche of tariffs covering some 6,000 products from China with an annual import value of $200 billion. That move and the anticipated retaliation from the Chinese would mark the largest escalation so far of the trade war between the two economies and take it into new territory in terms of both scale and by starting to hit American consumers more directly. The U.S. could impose the duties after a comment period ends Sept. 6.
More
In better news,
better news for Great Britain that is, while Uncle Sam is busy kicking the
Great Panda in the rear, the Great Panda wants to cosy up to Brexit Britain. Every
cloud has a silver lining, I suppose.
August 23, 2018 / 12:25 PM
China says wants to 'fully strengthen' trade ties with Britain
BEIJING
(Reuters) - Chinese Vice Premier Hu Chunhua told visiting British trade
minister Liam Fox on Thursday that China wanted to “fully strengthen” its trade
and business ties with Britain, state media said, as the country prepares to
leave the European Union.
Britain
has pushed a strong message to Chinese companies that it is fully open for
business as it prepares to leave the EU next year, and China is one of the
countries with which Britain would like to sign a post-Brexit free trade deal.
Last
month, China offered Britain talks on a post-Brexit free trade deal.
Meeting in Beijing, Hu told Fox that China attaches great importance to
ties with Britain and has always put the relationship “in an extremely
important position”, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
China is willing to work with Britain to “fully strengthen cooperation
in economic and trade areas”, Hu added.
The report did not give specifics.
While a trade pact with China would be a political win for Britain’s
government, formal talks cannot begin until it officially leaves the EU. Free
trade talks typically take many years to conclude.
Fox said on Tuesday that Britain aims to boost exports to 35 percent of
gross domestic product after leaving the EU as it looks to increase trade ties
with the rest of the world, but he gave no timeframe for reaching the target.
Fox, a prominent Brexit supporter, has spent much time over the last two
years touring the globe promoting the merits of post-Brexit Britain as a
trading partner and holding preliminary talks ahead of possible future trade
negotiations.
In other news, don’t
ask!
Are we starting to
witness the decline and fall of the west? Political turmoil in Australia. A
house divided and at war in America. A dithering, incompetent government in GB,
kept in place only by the anti-Semitism, and communism of the leading
opposition party. In Europe, a continent starting to tear itself apart, and determined
to shoot itself in both feet over Brexit. Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Holland,
Hungary, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic, all marching to a different beat.
In NATO, America at trade war with most, and economic war with Turkey, the NATO
member with the largest army, and has declared Canada a national security
threat.
Oh well, what could
possibly get worse? Iran?
Only the educated are free.
Epictetus
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally doubled over.
With the American cat off chasing China, Canada and Mexico, among others,
the European mice are out playing with Russia’s Putin. Two years ago, you
couldn’t make this sort of thing up.
“My
dear, here in Europe we must run as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And
if you wish to go anywhere you must run twice as fast as that.”
With
apologies to Lewis Carroll, Alice in
Wonderland
Europe Is Warming Up to Putin
With Donald Trump
upending diplomatic ties around the world, the Russian leader is finding a
friendlier reception from European leaders who’ve long shunned him.
By Ilya Arkhipov and Arne Delfs 23 August 2018, 05:01 GMT+1
On his way to Berlin for a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Vladimir Putin stopped in the Alps on Aug. 18 for the mountainside wedding of Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl. Seated at her right hand at one point, Putin traded toasts with the bride, waltzed with her, and even stuck around for the Cossack singers and dancers he’d brought as guest performers. It was just long enough for Russian official media to tout the appearance as evidence Putin is no longer unwelcome in Europe.
Later that day, the German government tried to play down the significance of his meeting with Merkel, but it was hard to deny the symbolism. It was the Russian president’s first one-on-one meeting on the home turf of his most implacable European opponent since relations froze in 2014 after his annexation of Crimea. If not a breakthrough, it was at least a thawing of the ice.
With Donald Trump upending diplomatic ties around the world, Putin is finding a warmer reception from European leaders who’ve long shunned him. Trump’s decision to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal, plus the billions of dollars in tariffs and sanctions he’s leveled at the European Union and Russia, suddenly give Putin and European leaders a set of common grievances. The U.S. president has added to the pressure with recurrent warnings that he might impose sanctions on a natural gas pipeline under construction from Russia to Germany that Putin and Merkel strongly support.
Although Trump has been a unique catalyst, he’s not the only force behind Europe’s shift toward Russia. Even before he pulled out of the Iran deal and started his trade war this spring, new governments in Italy and Austria were calling for better relations with Moscow. In May, French President Emmanuel Macron attended Putin’s annual economic showcase in St. Petersburg, saying a “strong partnership” could help “anchor Russia to Europe.” The EU has resisted U.S. pressure to add more sanctions on Russia. Speaking in Washington on Aug. 21, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt appealed for more restrictions in the wake of the March poisoning in the U.K. of a former Russian spy, but European officials remain cautious.
With the U.S. throwing everything from European security to trade deals
into question, détente with Moscow is a top priority in Berlin and other
capitals. “Merkel is hedging, and Putin is exploiting,” says Josef Janning,
senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin.
Trump’s meeting with Putin in Helsinki—just as the U.S. president attacked
Merkel and the German economy—highlighted why the chancellor must cultivate her
own relationship with the Russian president, Janning says. “She doesn’t want to
give up the chance of keeping Putin within a margin that is manageable for
Germany.”
Throughout their meeting, Merkel kept a cautious stance, hosting Putin
at a government guest house outside the capital and bypassing the press
conference that typically follows such a visit. “It’s a working meeting, and
one shouldn’t expect any special results,” Merkel told reporters beforehand.
“But we’re dealing with so many problems, from Ukraine to Syria to cooperation
in the economic sphere, that it is justified to keep up a permanent dialogue.”
More
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-23/europe-is-warming-up-to-putin
“Alice:
How long is forever? Donald Trump: Sometimes, just one second.”
With
apologies to Lewis Carroll, Alice in
Wonderland
Technology 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?
A materials scientist's dream come true
Plasticity at the fingertips: Scientists directly control dislocations
Date:
August 21, 2018
Source:
University of Erlangen-Nuremberg
Summary:
Materials can deform plastically by atomic-scale line defects called
dislocations. Many technical applications are based on this fundamental
process, such as forging, but we also rely on the power of dislocations in our
everyday life: in the crumple zone of cars dislocations protect lives by
transforming energy into plastic deformation. Researchers have now found a way
of manipulating individual dislocations directly on the atomic scale.
In the 1940s, scientists first explained how materials can deform
plastically by atomic-scale line defects called dislocations. These defects can
be understood as tiny carpet folds that can move one part of a material
relative to the other without spending a lot of energy. Many technical
applications are based on this fundamental process, such as forging, but we
also rely on the power of dislocations in our everyday life: in the crumple
zone of cars dislocations protect lives by transforming energy into plastic
deformation. FAU researchers have now found a way of manipulating individual
dislocations directly on the atomic scale -- a feat only dreamt of by materials
scientists. Using advanced in situ electron microscopy the researchers in Prof.
Erdmann Spiecker's group opened up new ways to explore the fundamentals of
plasticity and reported their findings in the leading scientific journal Science
Advances.
The thinnest interface with defects
In 2013 an interdisciplinary group of researchers at FAU found the
presence of dislocations in bilayer graphene -- a groundbreaking study that was
published in the journal Nature. The line defects are contained between
two flat, atomically-thin sheets of carbon -- the thinnest interface where this
is possible. 'When we found the dislocations in graphene we knew that they
would not only be interesting for what they do in the specific material, but
also that they could serve as an ideal model system to study plasticity in
general,' Prof. Spiecker explains. To continue the story his team of two
doctoral candidates knew that just seeing the defects would not be enough: they
needed a way to interact with them.
Workbench on the Nanoscale
A powerful microscope is needed to see dislocations. The researchers
from Erlangen are specialists in the field of electron microscopy and are
constantly thinking of ways to expand the technique. 'During the last three
years we have steadily expanded the capabilities of our microscope to function
like a workbench on the nanoscale,' says Peter Schweizer. 'We can now not only
see nanostructures but also interact with them, for example by pushing them
around, applying heat or an electrical current.'
More
Another weekend and the last holiday
weekend of the summer here in GB. And what has been accomplished in the world this
summer of 2018? A rising trade war, a rising currency war, and a Trumpian
attack on friend and foe alike. A US demonization of Prime Minister Trudeau of
Canada, and of Chancellor Merkel of Germany. A US attack on NATO and
Turkey. The USA reneging on freely
entered into international treaties on whim. The USA setting a deadline for the
rest of the world to stop trading with Iran or else!
Having sown the wind in the summer,
what come next in autumn? Have a great weekend everyone.
For
they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.
Hosea 8:7
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished July.
DJIA: 25,415 +213 Down. NASDAQ:
7,672 +259 Down. SP500: 2,816 +166 Down.
All
three slow indicators moved down in March and have continued down ever since.
For some a new bear signal, for others a take profits and get back to cash
signal.
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