Baltic Dry Index. 3352 +117 Brent Crude 75.21
Spot Gold 1790
Coronavirus Cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000
Deaths 53,100
Coronavirus Cases 08/12/21 World 267,406,421
Deaths 5,286,828
There can be few fields of human endeavour in which history counts for so little as in the world of finance. Past experience, to the extent that it is part of memory at all, is dismissed as the primitive refuge of those who do not have the insight to appreciate the incredible wonders of the present.
John Kenneth Galbraith.
In the stock casinos, ignore the reality of Russia, China, rising stagflation, central banksters about to start tapering/raising interest rates; fast spreading omicron disruption, buy more!
Still, if we’re headed for global war over the west’s determination for war over the Ukraine what does it matter if few greater fools will be left to pick over the spoils of the rubble left behind?
European markets head for tepid open as investors digest omicron news
LONDON — European stocks are expected to open modestly higher on Wednesday with investors continuing to digest the latest news around the new omicron Covid variant.
The U.K.’s FTSE index is seen opening 3 points higher at 7,344, Germany’s DAX 8 points higher at 15,827, France’s CAC 40 up 16 points at 7,076 and Italy’s FTSE MIB 23 points higher at 27,139, according to data from IG.
The tepid open expected in Europe Wednesday comes after a strong session for European stocks on Tuesday, with global markets rallying as concerns about the potential severity of the omicron variant eased.
There’s been mixed news regarding the omicron variant since. Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla on Tuesday said the omicron variant appears to be milder than previous strains, but also seems to spread faster and could lead to more mutations in the future.
However, South African scientists said Tuesday that omicron significantly reduces the antibody protection generated by Pfizer and BioNTech’s vaccine, according to a small preliminary study. Still, people who have recovered from the virus and received a booster shot will likely have more protection from severe disease, the study showed.
Earlier, the White House’s chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said preliminary data from South Africa last week was “encouraging” as it suggested omicron is not as severe as initially feared, while noting that more data is needed to fully assess the risk posed by the variant.
In the meantime, the U.S. CDC said Tuesday that the new variant has now been found in 50 countries and 19 American states.
Overnight in Asia-Pacific markets, Hong Kong stocks lagged other markets, with troubled Chinese real estate developers back in the spotlight. Chinese social media giant Weibo also had a disappointing market debut in Hong Kong.
U.S. stock futures also rose in overnight trading on Tuesday after stocks continued their upward climb from the omicron sell-off seen last week.
Major outage at Amazon disrupts businesses across the US
A major outage in Amazon’s cloud computing network Tuesday severely disrupted services at a wide range of U.S. companies for more than five hours, the latest sign of just how concentrated the business of keeping the internet running has become.
The incident at Amazon Web Services mostly affected the eastern U.S., but still impacted everything from airline reservations and auto dealerships to payment apps and video streaming services to Amazon’s own massive e-commerce operation. That included The Associated Press, whose publishing system was inoperable for much of the day, greatly limiting its ability to publish its news report..
Amazon has still said nothing about what, exactly, went wrong. In fact, the company limited its communications Tuesday to terse technical explanations on an AWS dashboard and a brief statement delivered via spokesperson Richard Rocha that acknowledged the outage had affected Amazon’s own warehouse and delivery operation but said the company was “working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.”
Roughly five hours after numerous companies and other organizations began reporting issues, the company said in a post on the AWS status page that it had “mitigated” the underlying problem responsible for the outage, which it did not describe. It took some affected companies hours more to thoroughly check their systems and restart their own services.
Amazon Web Services was formerly run by Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, who succeeded founder Jeff Bezos in July. The cloud-service operation is a huge profit center for Amazon. It holds roughly a third of the $152 billion market for cloud services, according to a report by Synergy Research — a larger share than its closest rivals, Microsoft and Google, combined.
To technologist and public data access activist Carl Malamud, the AWS outage highlights how much Big Tech has warped the internet, which was originally designed as a distributed and decentralized network intended to survive mass disasters such as nuclear attack.
“When we put everything in one place, be it Amazon’s cloud or Facebook’s monolith, we’re violating that fundamental principle,” said Malamud, who developed the internet’s first radio station and later put a vital U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission database online. “We saw that when Facebook became the instrument of a massive disinformation campaign, we just saw that today with the Amazon failure.”
Widespread and often lengthy outages resulting from single-point failures appear increasingly common. In June, the behind-the-scenes content distributor Fastly suffered a failure that briefly took down dozens of major internet sites including CNN, The New York Times and Britain’s government home page.
More
In China news, nothing good.
Some hedge funds may have lost millions on bets on China's Didi Global
December 8, 2021 6:33 AM GMT
TORONTO, Dec 8 (Reuters) - Several hedge funds may have been bruised by bets on Didi Global Inc (DIDI.N), filings showed after the shares tumbled since the Chinese ride-hailing company announced plans to withdraw from the New York Stock Exchange.
Didi’s shares have tumbled 56.8% from their June 30 IPO price. The slide accelerated after the company said on Friday it planned to delist from the New York Stock Exchange and pursue a listing in Hong Kong, bending to Chinese regulators angered by its U.S. debut. read more
Hedge funds were invested in 94.4 million shares of Didi at the end of September, down 13.2 million shares from the previous quarter, according to U.S. 13F filings compiled by industry tracker Symmetric.
It is not known if hedge funds had further reduced their investment since that time, but Reuters calculations show the 7.9% fall in Didi’s shares between the end of September and Dec. 7 would have wiped a combined $60.9 million of value from those positions.
As of the end of September, 27% of the value of the company was held by institutional investors owned by managers classified as hedge funds by Symmetric.
Symmetric notes that stocks with a high percentage of ownership by hedge funds may be susceptible to liquidations by those funds during stressed periods.
Among hedge funds that bought shares in the third quarter, Bridgewater Associates purchased almost 9 million, according to filings.
More
Shares of Chinese social media giant Weibo open 6% lower on the first day of trading in Hong Kong
Hong Kong-listed shares of Weibo opened 6% lower in their trading debut on Wednesday.
Shares opened at 256.20 Hong Kong dollars ($32.85) a piece compared to an offer price of 272.80 Hong Kong dollars ($34.98). At one point, the price fell as low as 253.20 Hong Kong dollars.
It is a secondary listing for the Chinese social media giant, which raised approximately $385 million.
The main listing is on the Nasdaq in the U.S., where the stock rose 4.69% in the overnight session.
Weibo’s secondary listing comes as Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi last week said it will delist from the New York Stock Exchange, and make plans to list in Hong Kong.
Chinese regulators were reportedly unhappy with Didi’s decision to list in the U.S. without first resolving outstanding cybersecurity issues. Regulators told the firm’s executives to come up with a plan to delist from the U.S. due to concerns around data leakage, according to reports.
Didi is China’s largest ride-hailing app and owns a large volume of data on travel routes and users.
Weibo is the latest Chinese internet company to do a secondary listing in Hong Kong.
Others that have done so in recent years include search engine giant Baidu, e-commerce behemoth Alibaba, its rival JD.com as well as gaming firm NetEase.
China’s tech crackdown
It has been a wild ride in the past year for China’s technology sector. While Beijing continues to push for technological self-sufficiency, regulators tightened their scrutiny on domestic internet companies.
China introduced a slew of legislation on issues ranging from anti-monopoly to data security in quick succession. The moves sent investors scrambling and wiped out billions of dollars in value from the country’s tech titans.
----China’s efforts to regulate its big internet companies is expected to continue in the near term, according to Qi Wang, CEO of MegaTrust Investment (HK).
“Don’t get disillusioned that this is over. This will be happening for the next few years. It’s definitely not over. But, having said that, in the short term, I think the worst of the big tech crackdown might be over,” he told CNBC’s “Street Signs Asia” on Wednesday.
More.
Chinese developer Kaisa halts trading in Hong Kong again as real estate concerns resurface
Trading in shares of Chinese real estate developer Kaisa was halted Wednesday for the second time in two months, as troubles in China’s property sector resurfaced this week.
The developer had been snowed under by debt issues, as it struggled to make repayments recently. It looked unlikely that it met its $400 million offshore debt deadline on Tuesday, according to Reuters.
Kaisa halted trading in early November for nearly three weeks, following news that it had missed a payment on a wealth management product.
There was no immediate reason given for the latest trading halt. Kaisa had said in late November that it would restructure offshore debt payments due in December by offering investors new bonds worth $380 million that are now due in 2023. The original U.S. dollar-denominated bonds were worth $400 million.
But last week, the developer failed to close an exchange offer with bondholders. Among other options, bondholders could choose to buy new bonds issued by Kaisa that could be exchanged with equity in some of the developer’s listed units. That failure to reach a deal increased Kaisa’s chances of default, analysts have said.
Among Chinese developers, Kaisa is the second-largest issuer of U.S. dollar-denominated offshore high-yield bonds, according to French investment bank Natixis. Evergrande, the world’s most indebted real estate developer, ranks first.
Kaisa shares have slumped about 20% over the past month.
Evergrande, which saw its debt crisis surface in recent months, came back under the spotlight this week as it looked likely to officially default for the first time. There was still no word from the developer on whether it has paid $82.5 million worth of interest — the 30-day grace period ended Monday.
More
Australia joins diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Games
By Renju Jose and Gabriel Crossley December 8, 2021 4:27 AM GMT
SYDNEY/BEIJING, Dec 8 (Reuters) - Australia will join the United States in a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Wednesday, as other allies weighed similar moves to protest China's human rights record.
The United States has said its government officials will boycott February's Beijing Olympics because of China's human rights "atrocities", just weeks after talks aimed at easing tense relations between the world's two largest economies. read more
China said the United States would "pay the price" for its decision and warned of countermeasures in response, but gave no details.
Morrison said Wednesday's decision came because of Australia's struggles to re-open diplomatic channels with China to discuss alleged human rights abuses in the far western region of Xinjiang and Beijing's moves against Australian imports. read more
Announcing the plans, Morrison said Beijing had not responded to several issues raised by Canberra, including the rights abuse accusations.
More
Finally, Russia. How the west blundered its way into the planets first nuclear war?
Biden Raises Stakes Over a Russian War on Ukraine
By David Rovella 7 December 2021, 22:56 GMT With President Joe Biden already threatening major economic costs on Russia should Vladimir Putin attack Ukraine again, the Democrat had upped the ante even before he met virtually with the Kremlin leader on Tuesday. The U.S. plans to push Germany to stop the contested Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline if Putin goes to war. During the meeting, Biden also warned hat he may “provide additional defensive material to the Ukrainians, above and beyond that which we are already providing.” Russia, which has massed troops and weapons on Ukraine’s border for the second time this year, blames NATO as the root of its brinkmanship. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2021-12-07/bloomberg-evening-briefing-biden-raises-stakes-over-a-russia-attack-on-ukraine?cmpid=BBD120721_BIZ&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=211207&utm_campaign=bloombergdailyBiden Is Left Guessing Over Putin’s Ultimate Aim Against Ukraine
By Nick Wadhams and Ilya Arkhipov· Putin made no promises to withdraw troops on Ukraine border
Biden sought to send a clear message: Russia must not go ahead with an invasion of Ukraine as the U.S. fears it might, and would face massive economic sanctions if it does. Putin, meanwhile, wanted the U.S. to know that Russia won’t tolerate NATO expanding farther east or deploying weapons in Ukraine.
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Ukraine warns of a 'bloody massacre' and five million refugees fleeing into Europe if Russia invades, as Kremlin says escalating tensions are 'off the scale'
· Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said there would be a 'bloody massacre' if Russia invaded Kiev
· U.S. President Joe Biden will call Russian President Vladimir Putin today to discuss the build-up of troops
· Satellite images have revealed huge new camps of Russian troops, tanks and artillery at Ukraine border
· Kiev accused Russia of deploying tanks and additional snipers to the front line amid warnings Russia to invade
In other Russia news, life goes on despite the west.
India, Russia sign trade, arms deals during Putin visit to New Delhi
Issued on: 07/12/2021 - 05:02
Russia and India signed a flurry of trade and arms deals during President Vladimir Putin's visit to New Delhi for talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday, including one that will see India produce more than 600,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles.
Putin travelled to India with Russia's defence and foreign ministers in a visit that saw the two countries reinforce their ties with a military and technical cooperation pact until 2031 and a pledge to boost annual trade to $30 billion by 2025.
The Russian president is visiting India amid increasingly strained relations between Russia and the United States, also a key Indian ally, which has expressed reservations about the growing military cooperation between Moscow and New Delhi.
A joint statement published after the talks said Russia and India had "reiterated their intention to strengthen defence cooperation, including in the joint development of production of military equipment."
In addition to the deal for India to produce AK-203 assault rifles, Russia said it was interested in continuing to provide S-400 air defence missile systems.
ndia's Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said the two countries had signed 28 investment pacts, including deals on steel, shipbuilding, coal and energy. He added that a 2018 contract for the S-400 missile systems was currently being implemented.
"Supplies have begun this month, and will continue to happen," he said, referring to the S-400.
The deal with Moscow puts India at risk of sanctions from the United States under a 2017 U.S. law aimed at deterring countries from buying Russian military hardware.
Russian oil company Rosneft said it signed a contract with Indian Oil to supply up to 2 million tonnes of oil to India by the end of 2022.
The countries also signed a memorandum of understanding for Russia to send an uninterrupted supply of coal to India to support its steel production, among other deals.
Putin and Modi also discussed the situation in Afghanistan, voicing their commitment to ensure that the country will never become a safe haven for international terrorism.
Global Inflation/Stagflation Watch.
Given our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians, inflation now needs an entire section of its own.
Vancouver Port, Rail, Roads Emerge From Flood Crisis, Slowly
By Marcy Nicholson 7 December 2021, 12:00 GMTThe floodwaters are receding and roads and rail lines are being repaired. But it’s still likely to take weeks for Canada’s biggest port to work through its backlog of cargo and vessels after historic rainfall left British Columbia soaked and isolated.
Storms dropped enormous volumes of rain on the province in November, forcing evacuations, drowning hundreds of thousands of livestock, and temporarily cutting off Vancouver from the rest of the country by road and rail.
Ever since, the two major freight railways — Canadian National and Canadian Pacific — that carry about two-thirds of the cargo that’s transported by land to the Port of Vancouver have fixed the lines and are working to keep them open.
They’re running again, albeit slowly. The deluge also caused the Trans Mountain Pipeline, the sole oil conduit running from Alberta to the B.C. coast, to shut for three weeks. The government imposed emergency fuel rationing on Nov. 19, though that should be lifted soon.
Data from the Vancouver port’s mobile app show that half of the 88 vessels at port are awaiting berths on Monday afternoon, with many anchored on the other side of the Strait of Georgia, along the Vancouver Island coast. The port has 28 deep-sea anchorages.
Robin Silvester, the port’s chief executive officer, told BNN Bloomberg Television that the bottleneck has caused ripple effects across Canada, primarily because of the woes on the railway, which he called the “lifeblood of the system.” Typically, C$700 million ($548 million) worth of cargo goes through the port each day, he said.
The Port of Vancouver operates 29 terminals that load and unload goods ranging from vehicles to grain to petroleum. To ease supply-chain problems that have been exacerbated by the extreme weather, a 40-acre site is being prepared to temporarily handle and store empty containers.
Halliburton Sees World Headed for Oil Scarcity Amid Spending Cut
Mon, December 6, 2021, 5:44 PM
(Bloomberg) -- Halliburton Co., the biggest provider of fracking, warned that the world is headed into a period of scarcity for oil after seven years of underinvestment following crude’s plummet from $100 a barrel in 2014.
“For the first time in a long time, we’ll see a buyer looking for a barrel of oil as opposed to a barrel of oil looking for a buyer,” Jeff Miller, chief executive officer at the Houston-based oilfield contractor, told an audience at the World Petroleum Congress on Monday.
Halliburton has seen spending by crude explorers outside the U.S. and Canada cut by roughly half compared with historical norms, Miller said. The hired hands of the oil patch have also been squeezed this year by rising costs, while producers have sought to return profits to investors rather than boost spending.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/halliburton-sees-world-headed-oil-174401444.html
Japan economy contracts 3.6% in 3Q on weaker spending, trade
December 8, 2021
TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s economy contracted at a 3.6% annual rate in July-September, according to a revised estimate released Wednesday.
The downgraded growth estimate for the last quarter, down from an earlier report of a 3.0% contraction, reflected weaker consumer spending and trade, the government said.
In quarterly terms, the measure used for most economies, the economy contracted 0.9%, compared to the earlier estimate of a 0.8% contraction.
The world’s third-largest economy has been mired in recession and struggling to recover from the impact of waves of coronavirus infections.
The latest outbreak, in the late summer, has receded for now with a sharp drop in cases. But it hit during the usually busy summer travel season, with calls for restricted business activity and travel hurting restaurants, hotels and other service sector industries.
The data showed a lower level of private inventories than earlier reported, weaker government spending and business investment and weaker consumer spending. It also showed wages contracted by 0.4%, instead of growing by 0.1% as earlier reported.
Japan’s Cabinet has approved a record 56 trillion yen, or $490 billion stimulus package, including cash handouts and aid to ailing businesses, to help the economy out of the doldrums worsened by the coronavirus pandemic. Parliamentary approval of the plan is expected this month.
Growth of property values hits 15-year high: House prices rise for fifth straight month amid 8.2 per cent annual jump
Tuesday 07 December 2021 7:59 am
Average UK property price hits a new record high of £272,992 last month, rising in November by 8.2 per cent compared to the same month a year earlier, according to Halifx, publishing its monthly index this morning.
Prices increased by 1 per cent month-on-month in November while quarterly house price inflation is now at its strongest level since late 2006, at 3.4 per cent, while Welsh average property prices are breaking past the £200,000 mark for the first time ever.
“This is the fifth straight month that average house prices have risen, with typical values up by almost £13,000 since June, and more than £20,000 since this time last year,” said Russell Galley, managing director of Halifax.
Galley said this morning: “On a
rolling quarterly basis the uptick in house prices was 3.4 per cent, the
strongest gain since the end of 2006, bringing the new
average property price up to a record high of £272,992.”
“The performance of the market continues to be underpinned by a shortage of available properties, a strong labour market and keen competition amongst mortgage providers keeping rates close to historic lows,” he continued.
London continues to lag the rest of UK in its rate of house price growth, with annual inflation of just 1.1 per cent, though this was up slightly from October.
However at an average of £521,129 properties in London continue to be much more expensive than in all other parts of the country.
Galley pointed out that “those taking their first step onto the property ladder are also playing an important role in driving activity, with annual house price inflation for first-time buyers at 9.1% compared to 8.8% for homemovers.”
Commenting on today’s figures, Guy Gittins, CEO of Chestertons, said: “We normally see a seasonal market slowdown towards the end of the year but, this November, witnessed a comparably active market instead. Our offices registered a 16 per cent increase in sales vs October, which proves that buyer appetite remains strong.
---- Also zooming in on today’s house price data, Jan Crosby, head of infrastructure, building and construction at KPMG UK, said that “it appears that house price inflation is entrenched, at least until supply chain issues ease and housing stock finally starts to catch up with demand.”
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Covid-19 Corner
This section will continue until it becomes unneeded.
Mixing Pfizer, AstraZ COVID-19 shots with Moderna gives better immune response -UK study
December 7, 2021 9:39 AM GMT
Dec 6 (Reuters) - A major British study into mixing COVID-19 vaccines has found that people had a better immune response when they received a first dose of AstraZeneca or Pfizer-BioNTech shots followed by Moderna nine weeks later, according to the results on Monday.
"We found a really good immune response across the board..., in fact, higher than the threshold set by Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine two doses," Matthew Snape, the Oxford professor behind the trial dubbed Com-COV2, told Reuters.
The findings supporting flexible dosing will offer some hope to poor and middle income countries which may need to combine different brands between first and second shots if supplies run low or become unstable.
"I think the data from this study will be especially interesting and valuable to low- and middle-income countries where they're still rolling out the first two doses of vaccines," Snape said.
"We're showing...you don't have to stick rigidly to receiving the same vaccine for a second dose...and that if the programme will be delivered more quickly by using multiple vaccines, then it is okay to do so."
If the AstraZeneca-Oxford (AZN.L) vaccine is followed by a Moderna (MRNA.O) or Novavax (NVAX.O) shot, higher antibodies and T-cell responses were induced versus two doses of AstraZeneca-Oxford, according to researchers at the University of Oxford.
more
US CDC adds France to ‘very high’ Covid-19 risk list, urges against travel
Issued on: 07/12/2021 - 08:16
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday advised Americans against travel to France, Jordan, Portugal, and Tanzania, citing Covid-19 concerns.
The CDC now lists 83 destinations at "Level 4: Very High" classification and also on Monday added Andorra, Cyprus and Liechtenstein to the highest travel advisory level.
France said Monday it would close nightclubs ahead of Christmas and tighten social distancing measures in response to the emergent Omicron variant of the coronavirus, but that there was no need for new lockdowns or curfews.
Prime Minister Jean Castex said a fifth wave of the pandemic was surging, but with 52 million people now vaccinated - nearly 90% of those eligible - the situation was better than in previous outbreaks.
The United States imposed new rules, effective Monday, requiring international air travelers arriving in the United States to obtain a negative Covid-19 test within one day of travel.
Under the prior rules, vaccinated international air travelers could present a negative test result obtained within three days of their day of departure.
Some airline officials told Reuters there is a three-day grace period to allow for some travelers to return to the United States with tests taken outside of the one-day window.
A CDC spokeswoman declined to confirm that but said "CDC is exercising some enforcement discretion as this requirement is put in place."
Effective Nov. 29, the White House barred nearly all foreign nationals from entering the United States from eight southern African countries over fears of the spread of the Omicron variant, but has not extended those travel restrictions to other countries where the new variant has been discovered.
France said Monday it has now identified 25 positive cases of the Omicron variant.
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Monday that the African travel restrictions were "being evaluated and discussed on a daily basis."
Next, some vaccine links kindly sent along from a LIR reader in Canada. The links come from a most informative update from Stanford Hospital in California.
World Health Organization - Landscape of COVID-19 candidate vaccines. https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines
NY Times Coronavirus Vaccine Tracker. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html
Regulatory Focus COVID-19 vaccine tracker. https://www.raps.org/news-and-articles/news-articles/2020/3/covid-19-vaccine-tracker
Some other useful Covid links.
Johns Hopkins Coronavirus resource centre
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
Rt Covid-19
Centers for Disease Control Coronavirus
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html
The Spectator Covid-19 data tracker (UK)
https://data.spectator.co.uk/city/national
Technology Update.
With events happening fast in the development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this section. Updates as they get reported.
Solar cell discovery may help speed development of green energy technology
Dec. 6, 2021 / 4:05 AM
Dec. 6 (UPI) -- As researchers look for better materials to harness electricity from the sun, an explanation for the efficiency of one promising material -- perovskites -- has proven elusive.
Thanks to new research out of Cambridge University, however, scientists no longer are in the dark on perovskite's virtues.
It turns out that the material's variegated chemical structure actually guards against the electronic pitfalls associated with similar materials -- and could help point the way to improving both it and other materials being developed for green technologies.
The qualities of perovskite, a high-performance solar cell material that turns more of the sun's rays into electricity, have been demonstrated time and time again -- in lab test after lab test.
But despite a decade of laboratory breakthroughs, it wasn't clear why the material performed as well as it does -- until now.
Cambridge University researchers were able to identify perovskite's nanoscale secrets by surveying its chemical, structural and electronic disorder by using a few different microscopes.
The revelatory observations could accelerate perovskite's development, allowing scientists to further tweak its composition and integrate the material into commercial solar arrays -- and even help light the way for energy research using other materials.
"Now, we can basically tell you why it is very good," lead study author Kyle Frohna, a researcher at Cambridge's Cavendish Laboratory, told UPI.
To exceed performance standards, solar cell materials typically need to be highly uniform. Crystalline silicon, the material currently used in most commercial solar arrays, is almost perfectly homogenous.
Perovskite's ability to to absorb a wide spectrum of solar wavelengths and turn them into electricity had previously confounded scientists, primarily because its makeup is the opposite of homogenous.
"The chemical composition of perovskite is more complicated [compared to silicon]. There's a lot more stuff that goes into them," Frohna said. "We effectively dissolve all these chemicals into a solvent and then print them out onto a substrate, so you end up with a very complicated landscape."
This relatively imprecise production process is much more energy efficient, cheaper and easier to scale, which is why scientists expect perovskite to eventually supplant crystalline silicon in the solar cell industry.
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"I see you don't understand, and I must explain it to you. Well, very long ago, on the spot where the Wild Wood waves now, before ever it had planted itself and grown up to what it now is, there was a city--a city of people, you know. Here, where we are standing, they lived, and walked, and talked, and slept, and carried on their business. Here they stabled their horses and feasted, from here they rode out to fight or drove out to trade. They were a powerful people, and rich, and great builders. They built to last, for they thought their city would last for ever."
Kenneth Grahame. The Wind in the Willows.
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