Baltic Dry Index. 1566 +06 Brent Crude 96.46
Spot Gold 1786 US 2 Year Yield 3.21 -0.03
Coronavirus
Cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000
Deaths 53,100
Coronavirus Cases 09/08/22 World 590,372,133
Deaths 6,438,852
“Why,
sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
Alice in Wonderland.
In the stock casinos, more driving by looking at the rear view mirror. Who’s to blame the punters? The view out of the windscreen is worrying to say the least.
And
with yet more interest rate hikes to come globally, the US yield curve inverted
from the one year at 3.30 out to the 30 year at 3.00, and Brent crude still
trading close to 100 dollars a barrel, nothing good lies ahead for the
remainder of 2022.
Japan’s Nikkei
leads losses in mixed Asia markets; SoftBank shares drop 6% after earnings
losses
SINGAPORE — Shares in the Asia-Pacific were mixed
Tuesday on a quiet data day as markets continue to digest last week’s stellar
U.S. jobs report.
stock fell more than 6% after its Vision Fund
reported a
2.93 trillion Japanese yen ($21.68 billion) loss for the June quarter on
Monday after the market close. The tech-focused fund has suffered as central
banks raise interest rates to fight inflation.
The in Japan
dropped 0.87% and the Topix index was down 0.66%.
South Korea’s Kospi was
about 0.13% higher, while the Kosdaq was near flat.
In Australia,
the S&P/ASX 200 rose fractionally.
Hong Kong’s was
rose nearly 1%, with heavyweight climbing
2.53%.
Alibaba has applied to change its
Hong Kong listing status to primary from secondary, the company said in a
statement on the Hong Kong Exchange. The Hong Kong Stock Exchange acknowledged
the application on Aug. 8. The change will likely take effect before the end of
2022.
The tech giant first announced its plans
for a dual primary listing in Hong Kong last month.
Mainland China markets advanced. The gained
0.31% and the added
0.195%.
Intelligent transport firm Zhengzhou Tiamaes Technology stock
soared nearly 20% after China’s ministry of transport released draft rules for
self-driving vehicles that could lead to a legalization of such vehicles on
public roads.
ShenZhen RoadRover Technology’s
shares jumped 10%, hitting its trading limit, according to Chinese media.
MSCI’s broadest index of
Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was 0.31% higher.
China’s continued military drills
around Taiwan have not impacted markets much, according to Tapas Strickland, an
economist at National Australia Bank.
“Markets instead have been mulling
over Friday’s strong payrolls report with a few more US banks calling a 75bp
hike in September,” he said in a note on Tuesday.
In economic data, investors are
looking ahead to the U.S. consumer price index data due Wednesday stateside.
Singapore and India markets are
closed for a holiday on Tuesday.
Overnight in the U.S., the S&P
500 dipped 0.12% to 4,140.06 and the Nasdaq Composite shed 0.1% to 12,644.46.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose slightly to close at 32,832.54.
More
Asia
markets: Stocks trade lower; SoftBank falls after earnings report (cnbc.com)
Slowing demand in
the U.S., Europe and China could hurt Asian exporters, HSBC says
Asian exporters will face significant challenges
as demand from major markets like the U.S., Europe and China slow down in the
coming months, according to the chief Asia economist of HSBC.
Manufacturers in Europe are already
pulling back quite significantly, namely in Germany, Frederic Neumann told
CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on
Monday.
“Remember that Europe is a major export market for Asian exporters,” the
economist pointed out.
“We also expect
essentially a decline in shipments coming through the second half of the year,
which complements the pivot in U.S. spending away from goods. Both of the U.S.
and Europe slowing down is going to be headwinds for Asian exporters,” he
added.
The slowdown in
China’s economy will further add to the problems facing exporters in the
region, Neumann said.
“Very clearly the
trade data… shows this weakness in domestic demand. China is the third big
export market that we really need to be humming — that too looks like it’s not
really picking up steam. From that perspective, a trade recession cannot be
ruled out at this point,” he added.
China’s weak growth
China’s official
manufacturing purchasing managers’ index fell to 49.0 in July from 50.2 in
June, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said last week.
PMI readings are sequential and represent
month-on-month expansion or contraction. A reading above 50 suggest growth
while anything below 50 indicates contraction.
China, which saw its economy grow only 0.4% year-over-year in
the second quarter, is a key export market for many Asian countries.
Therefore, a slowdown in the world’s second largest economy will have an
overall impact on the entire region.
“The manufacturing sector is really
the most brittle part of the global economy at the moment,” said Neumann.
“That’s where we’re seeing the
first signs of weakness coming through whether in the U.S., whether in mainland
China, whether in Europe,” he said, adding the slowdown will have a trickle
down effect on Asia’s growth.
More
US,
Europe, China slowdown could hurt Asian exporters: HSBC (cnbc.com)
In other
news, Ukraine’s grain exports are likely to little to help much, especially as
Europe’s drought is heavily impacting corn and olive oil production.
Ukraine grain shipments offer hope, not fix
to food crisis
BEIRUT (AP) — A ship bringing
corn to Lebanon’s northern port of Tripoli normally would not cause a stir. But
it’s getting attention because of where it came from: Ukraine’s Black
Sea port of Odesa.
The Razoni, loaded with more
than 26,000 tons of corn for chicken feed, is emerging from the edges of a Russian war that has threatened
food supplies in countries like Lebanon, which has the world’s highest rate
of food
inflation — a staggering 122% — and depends on the Black
Sea region for nearly all of its wheat.
The fighting has trapped 20
million tons of grains inside Ukraine, and the
Razoni’s departure Monday marked a first major step toward extracting those
food supplies and getting them to farms and bakeries to feed millions of
impoverished people who are going
hungry in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia.
“Actually seeing the shipment
move is a big deal,” said Jonathan Haines, senior analyst at data and analytics
firm Gro Intelligence. “This 26,000 tons in the scale of the 20 million tons
that are locked up is nothing, absolutely nothing ... but if we start seeing this,
every shipment that goes is going to increase confidence.”
The small scale means the
initial shipments leaving the world’s
breadbasket will not draw
down food prices or ease a global
food crisis anytime soon. Plus, most of the trapped grain is for animal
feed, not for people to eat, experts say. That will extend the war’s ripple
effects for the world’s most vulnerable people thousands of miles away in
countries like Somalia and Afghanistan, where hunger
could soon turn to famine and where inflation has pushed the cost
of food and energy out of reach for many.
More
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-inflation-africa-lebanon-1eafa6d440e9f50aeb051ac6fe605a76
First
Crop Ship to Leave Ukraine Is Stuck Without a Buyer
Ukrainian
embassy says cargo rejected by its buyer in Lebanon
Razoni
was the first ship to transit new grain-export corridor
August 8, 2022 at 3:31 PM GMT+1Updated onAugust 8, 2022 at 6:08 PM GMT+1
Ukraine
Grain Onboard Razoni Cargo Ship Rejected by Lebanon Buyer - Bloomberg
Global Inflation/Stagflation/Recession
Watch.
Given
our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians, inflation now needs an entire section of its
own.
'Very
critical situation': Almost half of EU countries suffering from drought
7
August 2022
Almost half of European Union land is currently
under a drought warning or more severe "alert" level, hampering
agriculture, energy production and water supply, the European Commission has
confirmed.
From France in the west and Romania in the
east, to western Germany and southern Greece, a "wide and persistent"
lack of rain, combined with heatwaves, makes for an alarmingly long list of
countries where drought is getting worse.
New data from the European Drought Observatory
(EDO) shows some 45% of the bloc's territory under "warning"
conditions, the second of three drought categories, during the 10 days leading
to 20 July.
Meanwhile, 15% of land has moved into the most
severe "alert" state, meaning not only is land drying out after low
rain, but plants and crops are impaired too.
The figures show little improvement
from the previous 10-day period, which saw 46% of land at "warning"
level with dried out soil, and 13% in "alert" territory.
Further dry weather forecasts for
many countries in August and September "add concerns to the already very
critical situation and, if confirmed, will exacerbate drought severity and the
impacts on agriculture, energy and water supply", EDO warned in July.
Crisis team
France's worst drought on record has
left parched villages without safe drinking water, farmers warning of a milk
shortage in winter and corn harvests on course to be 18.5% lower than last
year.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne's
office on Friday set up a crisis team as the country braced for its fourth heatwave
of the summer.
"Widespread stress on vegetation" has hit the Italian
lowlands, much of France, central Germany, eastern Hungary, Portugal and
northern Spain, the EDO said, just as Europeans grapple with higher food prices
as a result of the war in Ukraine.
Farmers in Tuscany, the heart of
Italy's prized wine and olive oil industry, are battling to salvage as much as
they can of this year's crop from the ravages of drought and heatwave.
Professor David Hill, former deputy
chair of Natural England, said intensive farming practices have worsened
droughts by making the soil less able to retain water and therefore dry out or
be washed away more easily.
"Where you have large scale
agricultural intensification, you end up with simple ecosystems that cannot
withstand shock," he told Sky News. "Massive farms are far less
resilient to environmental change than a mosaic of different types."
More
'Very critical
situation': Almost half of EU countries suffering from drought (msn.com)
Below,
why a “green energy” economy may not be possible, and if it is, it won’t be
quick and it will be very inflationary, setting off a new long-term commodity
Supercycle. Probably the largest seen so far.
The
“New Energy Economy”: An Exercise in Magical Thinking
https://media4.manhattan-institute.org/sites/default/files/R-0319-MM.pdf
Mines,
Minerals, and "Green" Energy: A Reality Check
https://www.manhattan-institute.org/mines-minerals-and-green-energy-reality-check
"An
Environmental Disaster": An EV Battery Metals Crunch Is On The Horizon As
The Industry Races To Recycle
by Tyler Durden Monday, Aug 02, 2021 - 08:40 PM
Covid-19
Corner
This
section will continue until it becomes unneeded.
With Covid-19 starting to become only endemic,
this section is close to coming to its end.
China's
Hainan beach resort expands COVID-19 lockdowns
August 8, 2022
BEIJING (AP) — The capital of China's Hainan
province has locked down its residents for 13 hours on Monday as a COVID-19
outbreak grows on the tropical island during the summer school holidays.
The temporary lockdown of Haikou city from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. follows an
ongoing and indefinite lockdown of the beach resort of
Sanya since Saturday — which is confining vacationers to their hotels for a
week — and lockdowns that started in four other cities in Hainan on Sunday.
More than 470 new cases were recorded
in the province on Sunday, of which 245 did not show symptoms. Overall, China
reported more than 760 new daily cases, the National Health Commission said
Monday.
Some 80,000 tourists have
reportedly been stranded by the lockdown in Sanya. Those wanting to depart have
to test negative five times over seven days.
China has stuck steadfastly
to a “zero-COVID” policy, despite the economic and social costs. It has credited
that approach with keeping hospitalization and death rates lower than in other
countries that have opened up amid high vaccination rates and more effective
treatments.
Hong Kong, a semi-autonomous Chinese city,
announced Monday that it would reduce a mandatory hotel quarantine for overseas arrivals to three days from the current
one week. The new policy takes effect Friday.
China's Hainan
beach resort expands COVID-19 lockdowns (msn.com)
Next, some vaccine links
kindly sent along from a LIR reader in Canada.
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
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, among other things, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported.
AUGUST 5,
2022
Graphene oxide membranes reveal unusual behaviour of water
at the nanoscale
The
researchers observed that a density of pores doesn't necessarily lead to
higher water permeability—in other words, having more tiny holes
doesn't always allow water to flow through at the nanoscale. The study,
supported by the European Union and Humboldt Research Foundation funding,
shines new light on the mechanisms that govern water flow through GO membranes.
"If
you create more and more holes in a sieve, you expect it to become more
permeable to water. But surprisingly, that is the opposite of what happened in
our experiments with graphene
oxide membranes," says
Associate Professor Rakesh Joshi, senior author of the study from the School of
Materials Science & Engineering, UNSW Science.
---- In chemistry, molecules can
have what's known as "functional groups" that are either hydrophobic
(water repelling) or hydrophilic (water-attracting). The pores in graphene can
also be hydrophobic or hydrophilic.
"Surprisingly,
more important for the water flux (flow of water through a membrane) isn't the
number of pores, but whether the pores are hydrophobic or hydrophilic,"
says Tobias Foller, UNSW Scientia Ph.D. candidate and lead author of the study.
"That's very unexpected as the GO layers are only one atom thick. One
expects the water to just pass through the pores, no matter if they attract or
repel water."
---- Ultrafine sieves made of
different materials have a diverse range of applications. The researchers say
their findings will help scientists fine-tune liquid transport in atomic sieves
and could advance developments like highly precise water filtration systems.
"By
understanding which parameters will increase or decreases water flux, we can
optimize many possible applications of graphene oxide for water
purification, energy
storage, hydrogen
production and more,"
Mr. Foller says. "We hope other engineers and scientists can use this new
knowledge to improve their own devices, and lead to new developments in the
future."
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